Obituary: Steven Kent Lockwood, 79, turned Park Square Theatre into a St. Paul arts institution

Richard Cook was in the second year of a three-year master of fine arts program at the University of Iowa in the early 1970s when Steven Kent Lockwood arrived.

He wasn’t going to spend three years there, Lockwood declared — he’d graduate in two.

“That was kind of his style in life,” said Cook, who would become Lockwood’s husband and collaborator. “He created an immediate impression in the program because he was ambitious, and he was very quickly recognized as an experienced director. And we committed to each other that year.”

Cook and Lockwood were personal and professional partners for more than five decades, earning renown within the Twin Cities arts community for co-running St. Paul’s acclaimed Park Square Theatre — with Lockwood as executive director and Cook as artistic director —