Each spring Theater Studies presents awards. The deadline for awards for which students need to apply is March 20. These include grants for summer study and prizes for essays or scripts. Others are given for achievement and chosen by the faculty. Check here to learn more. read more about Awards Season is Here! »
Wednesday, March 4, 2015 5:00-6:30 p.m., Gross Hall 270RSVP Take control of your future and market your personal brand! Every project—theater, social innovation, music, literature, visual arts, dance—needs a powerful elevator pitch to grab an audience’s attention. Meet Jody McAuliffe (writer, director, dramaturg) and Jeff Storer, co-founder and artistic director of Manbites Dog Theater, a professional company founded in 1986 dedicated to world and regional premieres of contemporary work. Whatever you have to pitch—a project… read more about Taking Control of Your Future: Personal Branding »
Kelly McCrum opens her adaptation of the novel A Time For Dancing by Davida Wills Hurwin this week. Her play is called Dancing in the Bonehouse and is inspired by personal experience. She says, "as strong as we are, we often forget how fragile we can also be. We take advantage of our bodies until something goes wrong, at which time we are suddenly made aware of the myriad of things our bodies provide. This project started as a ‘what if’ story from my own experience, and has morphed into this production,… read more about Dancing in the Bonehouse Opens »
Duke students Jamie Bell and Austin Powers will present Mukwerere, an original play written by Bell, designed by Powers and set in Zimbabwe. Durham artist Tamara Kissane is directing. The play is Bell’s and Powers’ senior distinction project and will run Feb. 12-14, 2015 in Sheafer Theater on Duke’s West Campus. The title is derived from the Zimbabwean Mukwerere ritual—a rain-making ceremony—a plea to the ancestors to bring rain to thirsty fields and yield a fruitful harvest, explains Bell, herself a… read more about Mukwerere »
Check this preview of Mike Myers' distinciton play: http://www.dukechronicle.com/articles/2015/02/05/student-director-tackl… read more about Wittgenstein's Hamlet »
Please join the Department of Theater Studies for its spring lecture series, "New Directions in Musical Theater," which begins with a talk by Kim H. Kowalke, Richard L. Turner Professor of Humanities at the University of Rochester and Professor of Music at the Eastman School. “Give Me Time”: Sondheim, A Clever Maid, and “The Miller’s Son” Monday, January 26 4:30 pm 209 East Duke Building The series will continue on February 5 with Stacy Wolf, and again on February 11 with David Savran. On February 21 and 22,… read more about Lecture by Kim H. Kowalke »
Four seniors are preparing for their upcoming productions in their efforts to graduate with distinction in May. Mike Myers is working from Shakespeare's most famous play in his original Wittgenstein's Hamlet, in which influential philosopher Wittgenstein inhabits Shakespeare’s linguistic universe, embarking on Hamlet’s ingenious and lunatic quest for truth and justice. Seniors Jamie Bell and Austin Powers are collaborating on Mukwerere, set in Zimbabwe, Bell's native land. Kelly McCrum's Dancing in the… read more about Seniors Preparing Distinction Projects »
Very special course opportunities brought to theater studies by award-winning visiting artists - check out the courses and the artists teaching them! THEATRST 290-4 CoLAB: Contemporary American Collaborative Theater Making w/guest artists Lisa D’Amour and Brendan Connelly (ALP): Work with award-winning theater artists to examine practices of four American ensembles (The Rude Mechs, Theater of a Two Headed Calf, the Wooster Group and UNIVERSES) and apply theory to create short pieces in class. Artists from all these… read more about Unique Course Opportunities! Drop and Add! »
All Duke undergrads are invited to audition for the Theater Studies spring play, Enron (running April 2-12), directed by guest artist Talya Klein (see bio below). Auditions will be on Monday, January 12 from 6 to 8 pm in Bryan Center 128 (Clum Room). Sign up below. If you can't come Monday night, contact the director at talyaklein@gmail.com to make other arrangements. Note: Cast must be available for the class 6:30 to 9 pm on Tuesday evenings. For your… read more about Auditions for ENRON! »
TELLING STORIES FOR SOCIAL CHANGE: Confronting Sexual and Domestic Violence at Duke and in Durham will have a performance of monologues on sexual violence from interviews with activists, lobbyists, artists, and survivors in the Sheafer Theatre in Duke University's Bryan Center on Wednesday, December 3rd at 6:00 PM. Admission is free. Town Hall Discussion and Reception to follow. Check out the class blog here and read an article in Duke Today here. On Saturday, October 4th and Saturday, November 8th, Hidden Voices conducted… read more about Telling Stories for Social Change's final performance »
A discussion about “Domestic Terrorism” followed the opening night performance, with Tim Nichols, Duke University Executive Director, Counterterrorism and Public Policy Fellowship Program and Fellows from his “National Security Decision-Making” class. This play lends itself to a good discussion about what makes a terrorist, as we follow Ted Kaczynski through his reading of The Secret Agent, by Joseph Conrad in his cabin in the Montana woods. read more about Fascinating Talkback After Opening Night of The Perfect Detonator »
Some alums recently got together for some fun in the city at Motown the Musical, which was directed by an alum, Charles Randolph Wright! read more about Alums Gather in NYC for Motown the Musical »
This weekend, learn about life in stage, film and administration outside of Duke from alumni with real world experience including TS alums Adam Saunders ('99), Emma Miller ('12) and Nathaniel Hill ('12). November 7th and 8th. Details at http://dukealumni.com/alumni-communities/deman read more about DEMAN Weekend Almost Here! »
The Department of Theater Studies is honored to welcome Lisa D'Amour and Brendan Connelly to campus to teach spring semester. Take a look at their courses and see their bios below. D'Amour and Brendan are teaching together on THEATRST 290-4 Theater Studies Workshop: CoLAB: Contemporary American Collaborative Theater Making (Short title: Collaborative Theater Making) Synopsis: CoLAB is designed as a laboratory that invites students to "try on" different modes of collaborative creation. Over the course of the semester, we… read more about Guest artists D'Amour and Connelly to Teach Spring Semester »
Enron by Lucy Prebble Three blind mice wander across the stage while a few Texas businessmen determine the financial fate of the nation. A lawyer with a ventriloquist dummy delivers disclaimers to the audience while ferocious velociraptors lurk in the darkness... This is the world of Enron by Lucy Prebble, a modern day morality play which charts the notorious rise and fall of Enron, the company that caused one of the most infamous financial scandals in global history. A blend of… read more about Enron - the Spring 2015 MainStage Play »
The New Works in Process Workshop is back! Professors Neal Bell and Jeff Storer are resurrecting this once popular course. Writers are asked to submit scripts that, if chosen, will be developed in the class, by Friday, October 17. Students who take the course will form a theatrical “company” to develop new works for the stage. Participants - actors, directors, writers, designers, stage managers and producers - will focus on the art of collaboration, and they will do so by engaging in discussions, assigned readings,… read more about New Works in Process Workshop - First Deadline Oct. 17! »
The Perfect Detonator, Professor Jody McAuliffe's adaptation of Joseph Conrad's The Secret Agent, opens Thursday, November 13 in Sheafer Theater in the Bryan Center. McAuliffe’s adaptation follows Ted Kaczynski, the Unabomber, as he reads The Secret Agent. In the process, Conrad’s fictional tale of a 19th century anarchist bomb plot in London intersects with Ted Kaczynski’s real life bomb plots in the United States. The Secret Agent follows members of an anarchist cell in 1886 London as… read more about The Perfect Detonator Opening Thursday! »
Rude Mechanicals, one of the most innovative theater companies working in the US at this time, brought their immersive theatrical experience, Now Now Oh Now, that explores the nature of beauty, evolution, choice, and chance. While they were on campus, they visited acting and advanced acting classes, a legal issues in the performing arts class, a contemporary theater class, and they had a lunchtime conversation with scientists studying evolution, where they discussed the evolutionary… read more about First Visiting Artists of the '14-'15 year »
The Duke In Chicago 2014 group. Below, excerpts from a blog entry from a student who participated in the Duke in Chicago 2014 program. See more of what the students had to say here. "Our incredible six week artistic and entrepreneurial immersion has been extremely fun, eye-opening, and insightful. When I board my flight to New York on Sunday, I will take lots of small, specific information about the industry away with me, but what about the big picture? Through our guest speakers… read more about Duke In Chicago 2014 »
Professor Jaybird O'Berski was in China this summer working with migrant workers, along with recent Duke graduate Shucao Mo. Below are visual dispatches from Beijing with captions. Jaybird and his new friend Caesar (adult pictured) visited an English class in a school for the children of migrant workers. They taught them a game called Fruitbowl that he plays with acting classes at Duke. PS He says the pro actors here already knew Big Booty (a favorite of Duke students… read more about O'Berski in China »
The theater studies department invited a number of exciting guests to campus during the 2013-14 academic year, in an ongoing commitment to provide students with unique opportunities to work with or hear from professional artists and scholars. September brought Sibyl Kempson, an experimental playwright who was a 2010 MacDowell Colony Fellow, a member of the New Dramatists class of ’17 and a 2013 McKnight National Resident and Commissionee. Kempson came to campus for two weeks to develop… read more about A Bounty of Visiting Artists »
Three theater studies faculty members, Ellen Hemphill, Neal Bell, and Torry Bend, premiered new work off campus over the year. Filmmaker Jim Haverkamp provided the video, former theater studies designer Jan Chambers designed the set, Duke alum Jesse Belsky designed the lighting, and New York composer Allison Leyton-Brown composed the score to tell the story of events that threaten our civilization and species—from the past and the future.Hemphill brought to the stage an original piece in November called The… read more about New Work from Faculty »
Director Jeff Storer brought Anton Chekhov’s Uncle Vanya to the fall theater studies mainstage. Storer (professor of the practice of theater studies) calls Chekhov “the master of combining laughter and tears,” so he prepared his student cast by having them explore both Chekhov’s vaudevilles and his longer major works to help them understand the fine balance of humor and suffering in his work. To help the cast mine the humor in the play, Storer brought in Providence, RI-… read more about Uncle Vanya Plays at Duke »
Sophie Treadwell’s Machinal was the department’s spring mainstage play. Jules Odendahl-James, visiting lecturer and resident dramaturg in theater studies, directed the play. Machinal is the story of “a young woman, any woman,”—a woman destroyed by “a world of money, men, and machines.” Machinal depicts the struggle for personal fulfillment in a world where alienation, commodification and automation reign supreme. A world that is past,… read more about Machinal Comes to the Spring Stage »
Brand new graduate Phil Watson spent his final year at Duke immersed in his senior distinction project. A theater studies and classics double major, he chose to perform An Iliad by Lisa Peterson & Denis O'Hare, a one-man retelling of Homer’s Iliad, in Phil’s words, “the first and greatest war story.” He described the play to a writer at The Chronicle back in the winter when he was deep in the rehearsal process: “There’s this… read more about Senior Phil Watson's One Man Show »
When senior Phil Watson needed a director for his one-man distinction play, An Iliad by Lisa Peterson & Denis O'Hare (see story here), Kevin Poole (T’98) had just moved back to Durham from Colorado with his wife and twin girls after training at Naropa University and becoming immersed in Viewpoints theory. Watson had been exploring physical acting, with an emphasis on movement and voice and had done summer training in Viewpoints with SITI Company. So it was an obvious… read more about Alum Kevin Poole Comes Home »
John Clum has just finished a book on the plays, musicals, and screenplays of Arthur Laurents. He and Sean Metzger are co-editing a volume, Awkward Stages: Dramas About Gay Teens for Cambria Press. John is also writing an essay on Terrence McNally for a new Methuen volume of essays about contemporary American playwrights. Heartbreak Express, an opera with music by George Lam and libretto by John Clum will receive its first concert performance in New York and Baltimore in November. A full… read more about Faculty News »
The Duke University Dept. of Theater Studies will present Sophie Treadwell’s Machinal April 3-13, 2014 in Sheafer Theater in Duke’s Bryan Center. Jules Odendahl-James, visiting lecturer and resident dramaturg in theater studies, is directing the play. Machinal is the story of “a young woman, any woman,”—a woman destroyed by “a world of money, men, and machines.” Machinal depicts the struggle for personal fulfillment in a world where alienation, commodification and automation… read more about Machinal Opens April 3 at Duke »
Brand new graduate Phil Watson spent his final year at Duke immersed in his senior distinction project. A theater studies and classics double major, he chose to perform An Iliad by Lisa Peterson & Denis O'Hare, a one-man retelling of Homer’s Iliad, in Phil’s words, “the first and greatest war story.” He described the play to a writer at The Chronicle back in the winter when he was deep in the rehearsal process: “There’s this character only referred to as the poet. He gets up to tell this… read more about Phil Watson's One-Man Show »