Norwich ―Philip Trostler’s path to being named Norwich Free Academy Teacher of the Year Thursday has run from Norwich to New York, London, Los Angeles and back, from plays and movies to being a game show grand prize winner.

And when COVID-19 slammed the Slater Auditorium doors for NFA Playshop, the school’s theater program, Trostler and his students “made movies,” winning the Connecticut Halo Award for their online fall 2020, “The Monologue Show,” which featured videos of students on screen, at times interacting with peers in Brady Bunch-style boxes.

Trostler, 36, who is entering his seventh year as NFA’s drama teacher and director of the NFA Playshop, was nominated for the Teacher of the Year award in March, as he was directing NFA Playshop’s live, in-person show, “Annie.” He was selected in June and had to keep it secret until he was called up to give his speech Thursday to his colleagues.

“The award blew me away,” Trostler said. “When you are a new teacher, there is the opening ceremony, and one of the first things you see is the teacher of the year speech. With my subject matter and coming late to the career, I never thought I would be selected.”

In his own speech Thursday, Trostler said he never expected to become a teacher, but his path and journey across the country and to Europe led him back home.

“And I found what I am going to be doing in my life,” he said.

Trostler grew up in Norwich, son of Nancy and Robert Trostler. He joined NFA Playshop as a student and loved it. He graduated from NFA in 2003. He tried college at Drexel University in Philadelphia but left after one semester. He returned to Norwich and performed in local theater, including four shows at the former Spirit of Broadway Theater. He then majored in performing arts/theater at Eastern Connecticut State University.

That took him to New York and London for theater education programs in 2006. He worked as a substitute teacher in Norwich and at NFA for one year at age 22 and then headed to Los Angeles to try his hand at acting and related jobs. He was one of 100 contestants on a pilot game show, “Trust Me,” that never aired. But Trostler was paid the grand prize he won, $50,000, nonetheless.

He was an extra in the movie, “Social Network,” did commercials, cooking shows, got a small part in “How I Met Your Mother,” and was a tour guide.

Trostler returned to Norwich in 2013, earned his master’s degree in elementary school education at Sacred Heart University, and taught at Veterans’ Memorial School in Norwich before starting as NFA’s drama teacher six years ago.

Trostler teaches acting, Unified Drama with special education students, modern drama and co-teaches a Shakespeare class with English teacher Bruce Bierman. Trostler helps students act out roles and express character motivations through acting, dance or music. Bierman teaches the academics.

Bierman, who had Trostler as a student at NFA, nominated Trostler for the Teacher of the Year award.

“I’ve been amazed about how he gets kids over their fears,” Bierman said. “Fear of reading Shakespeare, speaking it aloud and getting up on stage. From the beginning of the year to the end, I see so much change in the students. He develops kids.”

Trostler said he interacts with about 200 students each year, many not enrolled in his classes. Band director Kristen Motola and band students provide music for shows and dance teacher Ashley Caldeira choreographs shows. Career and tech education teacher Todd Zagurski and his students build sets.

This year, NFA Playshop will perform, “Harvey,” in the fall, “Kodachrome” in the winter, and next spring will be like a flashback for Trostler, as they perform “25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee,” a play Trostler worked on in New York as an ECSU student.

NFA students curious about their director’s acting roots can climb to the props and costume loft at Slater Auditorium to see a framed photo of NFA student Trostler with fellow student actors, including the uncle of a current student.

“Teaching is like a time machine, where I’m constantly interacting with the teenage version of myself,” Trostler said. “It helps me treat them as an individual.”

c.besette@theday.com