Does Ryan’s mom worry about him working too much?
Yes, but, “I don’t tell him,” said Diane Ryan of Laguna Miguel, Calif. She is a retired Rockford School District employee who was a teacher and theater instructor as well as a technology and curriculum developer. She moved from Rockford last year. “He has a handle on it,” she said. “He has always been one to dig in deep. And he’s extremely competitive.” Why does he work so hard? “He’s always said that this is a young man’s game,” she said. “So you have to work while you can. He works to know that his family is secure, and he loves his work, too.” Whom do his parents give much credit for inspiring Shawn in theater? Ginny and Rod MacDonald of Rockford. The now-late Ginny was his theater director at the private Keith Country Day School, and Rod helped her. Shawn also starred with the MacDonalds in “On Golden Pond” at the now-closed New American Theater in Rockford in 1981. Register Star writer Stan Buckles said then in a story that Ryan, “who studies his Latin assignments from Keith Count
