In Memoriam: Seth Marquette

It is with great sadness that I inform you of the passing of manager Seth Marquette.  Seth died by suicide last week at his home in Virginia at the age of 49.  He came into membership in 2005 after passing his NMAM exam. 

Seth got his start in management in 2000 at New York City Center. In 2003, he began his ATPAM apprenticeship on THOUROUGHLY MODERN MILLIE.  He followed that production with a very long stint at The Charlotte Wilcox Company working in General Management on such shows as DIRTY ROTTEN SCOUNDRELS, THE WEDDING SINGER, GREASE, COME FLY AWAY and THE DROWSY CHAPARONE among many others.  In 2014, Seth joined Disney Theatrical in Production Development and Business Operations. Most recently he was a consultant with 101 Productions. 

I first met Seth when he was starting his ATPAM apprenticeship on MILLIE at Nina Lannan Associates.  He was sweet with a quiet determination and dedication to his craft but he also had a sly humor that belied that quiet demeanor. I am so grateful that I was able to get to know him early in his career and happy that we kept up over the years.

I’ve asked his longtime friend and employer, Charlotte Wilcox to share her thoughts on Seth and she graciously provided me with this:

Seth was a special human being with whom I was lucky to work.  He considered every angle of every situation in order to ensure  fairness and kindness and integrity.  He was hardworking and diligent and fully committed and he was fun.  Seth was also very fragile…a person who lived his highs and his lows to the hilt with very little middle ground….elated and on top of the world when he had a position that challenged his creativity and in the depths of despair when the road bumps of life assaulted him.  He lost his mother and then during Covid a job he loved.  He never recovered from these losses.  The last few years were hard ones for Seth.  He couldn’t find a place to live or a job to do that felt comfortable to him.  He was plagued with demons.  I spent some time with him about a month before he died.  He told me that he was trying very hard to “hold on”.  He didn’t want to succumb to the despair that had become his everyday life.  He knew that he was “off”, but he didn’t know how to change the feelings that plagued him.  I hope that in death he has found the peace that eluded him in life.  I choose to remember Seth as the buoyant and life loving person he was when I first encountered him.  He had a purpose and he pursued it with a passion.

MAY SETH’S MEMORY BE A BLESSING.