Ellen Geer's perseverance is a family trait: Influences Ellen Geer has served as artistic director for the Will Geer Theatricum Botanicum since 1978, the year her father, who founded the company, died. Though known to most of the country as Grandpa Walton on the 1971-81 television series "The Waltons," Geer Sr. was a much more complicated figure Blacklisted in the 1950s for refusing to testify in front of the House Un-American Activities Committee, his family left their Santa Monica home and settled in Topanga, where they grew - and sold - produce, and ran an informal theater for other victims of the Red Scare. Ellen Geer, 70, grew up surrounded by theater, and moved often - both with her family and seeking various kinds of theatrical training. By the time she was a young woman, she wanted to settle down, in part so her children would know more stability than she had known. She settled in Los Angeles and acted in movies ("Harold and Maude") and television ("The Jimmy Stewart Show"), along with helping to consolidate her family's theater. This season, which runs through Sept. 30, the company will put on "Measure for Measure," "A Midsummer Night's Dream," George Bernard Shaw's "Heartbreak House," David Gow's "Cherry Docs" and Deborah Brevoort's "The Women of Lockerbie." People say, 'Why Shakespeare?' Geer says. But it does something to kids. It elevates them. We spoke to her about her influences. Will Geer: For his bravery during a difficult time in America. After he was blacklisted we moved to the country, here in Topanga. He had a degree in horticulture; he said Shakespeare wrote through the plants. He kept our family together while a lot of families were falling apart. I played the piano, but we moved so much I had to get rid of it - I went to something like 14 different schools. So he bought me an accordion so I could continue. How you get through things is what my family taught me. Sir Tyrone Guthrie, one of the founders of Minneapolis' Guthrie Theater: I learned so much from him, European values. Working with great actors. Being in a company, acting every day. I saw him do "As You Like It," set right after the Civil War - it fit so well. The rebel side was wandering around in the forest; it brought the play alive. John Houseman: He was the man who gave my father his first job after the blacklist. He told me, "Keep doing it, Ellen! Don't go too fast! He taught me to take time and surround myself with a network of actors and educational programs. And he was involved with a Shakespeare theater, in Connecticut - that's where I was turned on to Shakespeare. I was about 16. I went to work early. Zelda Fichandler, co-founder of the Arena Stage inWashington, D.C.: I never met her, but I studied what she did and how she pulled that place together. People worked in repertory, in a community - and a community is a large family. It's something you can pass on to the next generation. And working on the classics, whether you update them or not, you keep that language alive. You elevate things. Various performances through Sept. 30 at the Will Geer Theatricum Botanicum, 1419 N. Topanga Canyon Blvd., Woodland Hills, (310) 455-3723 (box office), http://www.theatricum.com/index.html