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Western N.D.
Lance Rustand has often been
compared to actor Jim Carey.
Mr. Diversity
By Kevin Holten
If you could have anything in
the world, what would you choose?
King Solomon asked for wisdom
and got it. Lance Rustand apparently
asked for the ability to make people
laugh and got it tenfold.
By day, he’s a mild-mannered
insurance salesman for Horace
Mann who wins awards for his
service to his clients. But by night,
he might be playing the Marquis de
Mores in Medora, singing with his
quartet the Akafellas in a packed
auditorium, or acting in a play with
Sneak Pique Productions, a Dickinson based community theater
group that he was instrumental in creating because, Lance Rustand
can do it all.
A native of Dickinson, Rustand attended Dickinson State
University on a theater and music scholarship and wowed audiences
for four years on the Stickney Auditorium stage, starring in plays/
musicals like “Footloose,” “Cinderella,” “Noises Off ” and “Rumors.”
He nearly filled the 735-seat house himself with his own two-hour
senior recital, so popular was he.
He got his start in church, standing in a pew next to his mother,
singing while she sang in the choir, followed by an elementary school
choir gig, where he was chastised for “singing too loud” and then
onto a middle school honor choir where he…“had the highest voice
in the choir, including the girls.”
Still, it was a musical production during his sophomore year at
Dickinson High School that revealed how good he could be.
“I guess a person tends to be attracted to things they are good at,”
Rustand said. “I enjoy being part of a person’s escape from the real
world. And I get to relate in a very deep way to things that are funny,
upsetting, calming and extremely sad. Sometimes during a show or
song, I’ll struggle not to cry or laugh because I find ways to relate to
what is happening.”
In a recent performance of “The Marriage of Bette and Boo”
Rustand had audiences rolling in the aisles without uttering a legible
line. But then, making people laugh is what he had asked for when he
put in his order.
Kevin Holten is the communications and events coordinator for the Dickinson
State University Foundation.
Correction: In the previous article “One-of-a-Kind Teacher and Person,” Jan Fields was
credited as receiving the Jaycees “Outstanding Young Educator” award. This award was
not sponsored by the Jaycees. Fields received the Chamber of Commerce “Teacher of the
Year” award, The Dickinson Women of Today’s “Outstanding Women of the Community”
award, and the “Outstanding Women of the State” award in 2010-2011.