Theatre

The theatre department, which has between 30 and 40 majors, is part of the Five College Theatre Department consortium, which mounts numerous theatre productions each season, including musical theatre, opera, and a range of classic, contemporary and original works. The department season consists of four major productions, directed by faculty and students, including a festival of one-act plays; students also participate in writing, acting and directing for the New Play Reading Series. Majors and non-majors are welcome to audition for productions. Studios and laboratory performances initiated, produced and directed by students provide additional opportunities to act, direct, design and stage-manage shows.

Students learn from visiting innovators of the modern theatre such as playwrights Pearl Cleage, Michel Tremblay and Alice Tuan; designers Ralph Lee and Jane Musky; directors Max Stafford-Clark and Chuck Mike; and performers Ruth Malaczech, Deb Margolin, David Strathairn and Billie Whitelaw. Students frequently participate in workshops in acting, design, directing and writing for the theatre by world-renowned artists in these fields. The department also organizes field trips to New York City, where students attend a variety of plays and performances and meet performers, playwrights, directors, producers and stage managers active in the New York theatre scene.

Theatre faculty members have a variety of interests including Hispanic-American drama, the theatre of Shakespeare, Chekhov and Moliere, African-American and African-Caribbean drama, Israeli theatre, Jewish-American theatre, feminist theatre, theatre translation, Asian theatre, performance art, improvisation and collaborative creation. Courses include Theatre History and Culture, Acting, Directing, Writing for the Theatre, Set Design, Costume Design, and Lighting Design, and a rich array of courses in world drama, including American theatre, Black theatre, Jewish theatre, African and Caribbean theatre, Canadian theatre, as well as premodern and modern European theatre. 

The department has specialists in costume design, computer-aided scenic and lighting design, sound design, voice, movement, stage management, technical theatre, and theatre publicity and promotion. Smith maintains an extensive historical costume collection of women's clothing from the 19th and 20th centuries.

• Collaboration: producing work—creating meaning—together, that we could not produce alone.
• Competence in one or more areas:
  • Dramaturgy (History, Literature, Criticism)
  • Design and Tech
  • Performance (Acting & Directing)
  • Playwriting
• Describe, analyze, interpret and evaluate performative, visual and written texts.
• Contextualize and interpret diverse theatrical works, practices and traditions.
• Creative investigation: Engage intuitively, creatively and imaginatively in investigations and research across disciplines.
• Develop, articulate and defend informed choices and judgments. Write and speak clearly and conceptually about theatre.
• Apply discipline and process to enhance and increase students’ capacities.

Our curriculum reflects the global connections of theatre in the past and present. We offer courses at all levels and in both history/theory as well as performance. Recent courses have included a first-year seminar on contemporary theatre and film in China; Modern European Drama; Staging the Jew, an intensive study of selected plays and films from the U.S., Israel and the Jewish diasporas; Contemporary Canadian Drama; a colloquium on African and Caribbean Theatre; and Shamans, Shapeshifters and the Magic If, which uses an international range of plays including Caryl Churchill, Wole Soyinka, Derek Walcott, Bertolt Brecht, in an examination of theatre as a transformative experience beyond the mundane world.

• Search for courses

Theatre Productions From All Over the World

We consider our productions to be the laboratories for our curriculum. We use them to explore in depth the texts and ideas discussed in our classes. Since so many of our classes include playwrights and performance techniques from all parts of the globe, it's not surprising that our plays are as diverse.

Here is a selection of a few productions staged at Smith recently.

Study Abroad

Many theatre majors spend a semester or year studying on campuses all over the world, on programs approved for Smith College credit as well as programs that students have chosen for their special curriculum or location. Some programs have a strong curriculum focused on theatre. Others offer only a few related classes that might count for credit towards the major but offer a cultural experience that enriches that student's perspective on the field.

Opportunities range from Smith’s own junior year programs in Paris, Florence and Hamburg to the Smith Associated Kyoto Program in Japan, the University de Puebla in Mexico, the University of Otago in New Zealand, SIT Kenya, Rhodes University and the University of Kwa Zulu Natal in South Africa and the British American Drama Academy in London.

• Learn more about study abroad

All Majors

All majors are encouraged to include courses in art and music in their programs as well as dramatic literature in any of the language departments.

Requirements

Theatre Major

Eleven semester courses including

1. 198 and 199 Theatre History and Culture
2. Two courses from History/Literature, Criticism
3. 141 Acting I
4. One Design course: 100, 252, 253, 254
5. 344 Directing I or 261 Writing for Theatre
6. Four credits of 200 Theatre Production (these count as a single semester course)
7. Three Elective Courses: At least 8 credits of these must be beyond introductory level in Performance (acting or directing), Playwriting and/or Design.

Consult with your adviser regarding which study away credits, if any, can be applied to the major requirements. No more that 16 credits from study away can ever be applied to the major requirements.

Seperate from study away, no more than eight credits from outside the department (whether at another Smith department or at another of the Five Colleges) can be applied to the major requirements.

Requirements

Six Courses

• Theatre 198 and 199 as the basis
• In addition one semester course approved by an adviser in each of the following divisions plus one 4-credit course of the student’s choice (including, as an option, 4 credits of 200 Theatre Production):

1. History Literature, Criticism;
2. Acting, Directing or Playwriting; and
3. Design: 100, 252, 253, 254.

Director: Leonard Berkman

Requirements

• 430d Thesis (8 credits)
• 431a Thesis (8 credits)
• 432d Thesis (12 credits)

1. Production–linked proposals for the honors program must be submitted to the department in the semester preceding entrance into the honors program and no later than March 1 of the second semester of the junior year. Non–production–linked proposals must be submitted to the director of theatre honors no later than April 4. The department recommends that all prospective theatre honors students enter the program at the outset of the junior year.
2. Fulfillment of the general requirements of the major. These should be taken as early as possible to allow for seminars and independent study in the department and in approved related departments during the junior and senior years.
3. Completion of honors work will be: 

• a thesis in literature, aesthetics, critical analyses or history of any of the theatre arts; or
• a creative project in acting, dance, design, direction, playwriting, choreography or stagecraft. Performance projects should be supplemented by production materials (logs, directors' notebooks, etc.) as requested by the department. All creative projects are to be supplemented as well by a research paper relating the project to its specific theatrical context (historical, thematic, stylistic or other).

4. Work for a one–semester thesis or project paper must be done in the first semester of the senior year; and the thesis or component research paper is due on the first day of the second semester. Work for a two–semester thesis or project/paper must be done during the senior year, and the thesis or component research paper is due on April 15.
5. Two examinations: a general examination in the theatre arts and an oral examination in the general field of the student's honors thesis or project/paper.

Fall 2023

New Play Reading Series
Ziona by Katie Wilson ’26
Thursday, September 28 at 7:30 p.m.
Acting Studio 1

New Play Reading Series
Hidden in Plain Sight by Yewon Park ’25
Thursday, October 12 at 7:30 p.m.
Acting Studio 1

Dance Nation
by Clare Barron
Directed by Daniel Kramer
October 26, 27, 28 at 7:30 p.m.
October 28 at 2 p.m.
Hallie Flanagan Studio Theatre

New Play Reading Series
The Right Thing To Do by Patricia Mew
Thursday, November 9 at 7:30 p.m.
Acting Studio 1

Spring 2024

You on the Moors Now
by Jaclyn Backhaus
directed by Monica Lopez Orozco
February 29, March 1, 2 at 7:30 p.m.
March 2 at 2 p.m.
Hallie Flanagan Studio Theatre

Everybody
by Branden Jacobs-Jenkins
directed by Tara Franklin
April 25, 26, 27 at 7:30 p.m.
April 27 at 2 p.m.
Hallie Flanagan Studio Theatre

Auditions

AUDITIONS for DANCE NATION

by Clare Barron
directed by Daniel Elihu Kramer

Somewhere in America, an army of pre-teen competitive dancers plots to take over the world. And if their new routine is good enough, they’ll claw their way to the top at Nationals in Tampa Bay. A play about ambition, growing up, and how to find our souls in the heat of it all.

Auditions: 

Sunday, September 10 and Monday, September 11, 7–9 p.m.
Acting Studio 1, Mendenhall CPA

Please let us know if you are interested but unable to make either date.

Callbacks will be on Tuesday, September 12

Performances: 

October 26, 27, 28 at 7:30 PM and October 28 at 2 p.m.
Hallie Flanagan Studio Theatre

Casting Breakdown: 

9 Actors. Actors of all ages and identities are encouraged to audition. No dancing ability is required! (But also it would be cool if some people can dance/move.)

• DANCE TEACHER PAT – The head of the dance studio.
• AMINA – The star dancer.
• ZUZU – Always second best.
• CONNIE – A talented dancer who thinks she should play the role of Gandhi.
• LUKE – The only male dancer on the competition team.
• MAEVE – The oldest and least talented dancer on the team.
• SOFIA – Knows what’s up.
• ASHLEE – Future president of a post-apocalyptic USA.
• VANESSA/THE MOMS – Could’ve been a phenomenon./Means well. Grown-up Wendy.

Audition Prep: 

No appointment necessary. Sides from the script will be available at the audition for cold reads. No preparation necessary. Perusal scripts available at Josten Library.

Contact/Questions: 

Production Manager, Nikki Beck, ncbeck@smith.edu
Director, Daniel Elihu Kramer, dkramer@smith.edu

Fall 2023

Theatre 200 Meeting
Monday, September 11 at 4:30 p.m. 
in the Mendenhall CPA Green Room (T114)
Email ncbeck@smith.edu for more information.

Mendenhall Tour
Email Nikki Beck if you are interested!

To join the department of theatre mailing list, please email Production Manager Nikki Beck (ncbeck@smith.edu).