IPA Spring 2019 Newsletter

TISCH SCHOOL OF THE ARTS INSTITUTE OF PERFORMING ARTS

SPRING 2019 NEWSLETTER

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Welcome to the tenth IPA newsletter! The Institute of Performing Arts at Tisch School of the Arts includes the Department of Dance, Design for Stage and Film, Graduate Acting, Department of Drama, Graduate Musical Theatre Writing, Graduate Theatre Production and Department of Performance Studies. In addition, Open Arts and the Department of Art & Public Policy are now officially part of the Institute of Performing Arts. Chairs, Associate Chairs, faculty and students from these departments are meeting on a regular basis and sharing concerns, ideas and plans for the future.

This newsletter highlights Spring 2019 events sponsored by IPA and significant happenings in each of our departments. What we’re able to share here represents only a small portion of the exciting work that is going on in all corners of the IPA in both our conservatory and academic programs.

Our IPA office is in Room 267 at 715 Broadway, Second Floor. It is being run by Hali Alspach and her office hours are 9:00am-5:00pm, Monday through Friday. Danny Larsen is the Program Coordinator and can be reached at 212-992-9322. Sarah Schlesinger can be reached at ss4@nyu.edu.

We’re anxious to hear your ideas for collaborative programming, events, etc., so feel free to contact us at any time.

Sarah Schlesinger Associate Dean, IPA

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-IPA Department Highlights-

Art & Public Policy

Spring 2019 Highlights

Events

Paradise Lost: Kashmir’s Political Art for Peace and Justice

The Department of Art & Public Policy, presented “Paradise Lost: Kashmir’s Political Art for Peace and Justice”, a hip-hop performance lecture with MC Kash.

Taking his stage name from his homeland - Kashmir, MC Kash is an up and coming underground Hip Hop artist. Determined to express himself fully as a street poet, this 22-year old rapper is fast emerging as a lyrical storyteller with a distinct voice.

Simultaneously engaging the world of Hip Hop, urban beats and indigenous Kashmiri sounds and cultural influences, Kash's music uses diverse beauty to orchestrate original sounds of unity that support his clear-hearted and exacting lyrics.

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Students Tashina Emery’s work was showcased in two exhibitions: Voices - Indigeneity in NYC, installed in the Kimmel Windows, located on the south side of Washington Square Park. (March 23 - April 1 and July 1 - September 13 2019), and as a part of the Mujeres de Maiz exhibition, Weaving Our Legacies Thru Prayer (March 9 - April 5 2019). Tashina's series was created as part of Prof. Kathy Engel's Language as/is Action in Fall 2018. Tashina's photography and writing are printed on fragile chiffon silk. The series is the legacy of the strong and resilient Anishinaabekwe.

MA Arts Politics student Logan Stacer was selected as a recipient of a 2019 President's Service Award for his exemplary commitment to community service and civic engagement

Logan Stacer

ALL LOOK THE SAME: A seminar on race, identity, music, and doppelgängers, workin-progress was created by MA Arts Politics and Performance Studies students Kristel Baldoz, Chris Cole, Will Green, and Jane Yonge. A developmental showing was presented on Thursday, April 25th.

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Tashina Emery

Alumni

Ricardo Gamboa (APP Alumni '13) brought original web series, Brujos, to NYU for a screening and talkback in "Brujos, Beyond Representation: Decolonizing & Queering TV" hosted by the Center for the Study of Gender and Sexuality at NYU on Tuesday, Feb. 26. The series follows four gay Latino grad students who are witches as they try to survive both the semester and a witch hunt.

Asmaa Walton '18 has been named the first KeyBank Fellow at the Toledo Museum of Art. The fellowship aims to develop diverse candidates pursuing a career in museums, cultural institutions, and related arts fields.

Asmaa Walton, image from the Toledo Museum of Art

The Department of Art & Public Policy partnered with the Amplifier Art x Girl Rising campaign, Brave Girl Rising. The Brave Girl Rising campaign honors International Women's Day and seeks to raise awareness about the global humanitarian crisis of 68 million forcibly displaced peoples around the world. Amplifier Deputy Director Cleo Barnett is a graduate of the M.A. in Arts Politics class of 2016.

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Faculty

Prof. Grace Aneiza Ali curated Women’s Work: Art & Activism in the 21st Century at Pen + Brush gallery.

Pen + Brush is presenting Women’s Work: Art & Activism in the 21st Century. This exhibition highlights work by a prolifically international group of five women artists representing Iraq, Cuba, Guyana, Madagascar, and the U.S. Curated by NYU’s Assistant Professor of Art & Public Policy and OF NOTE magazine founder, Grace Aneiza Ali. The exhibition runs until August 2, 2019.

Image Credit: Suchitra Mattai, Shadow Land, 2019, gouache, watercolor, oil, acrylic,

vintage needlepoint, Hindu comic, 30" x 40" x 1.50." Courtesy of the artist and K

Contemporary, Denver, CO.

Prof. Pato Hebert was a featured artist in Boise State University’s exhibition In the Mix, which explores the complexities of bi-racial and multi-raacial identities to promote a larger discussion and dialogue. Heber also hosted a workshop, “Pivots, Ruptures and Release: Embracing Change in Your Creative Practice.” The exhibition opened Jan. 25 and ran until March 26.

Pato Herbert

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Dance

Kyle Abraham

For the Grad Seminar, it was the Semester of Kyle Abraham. Wendy Perron and her MFA 1 class went to Lincoln Center to see his groundbreaking ballet The Runaway, with music by Nico Muhly, Kanye West and Jay Z, for New York City Ballet. Later in the semester we saw his older work Live! The Realist MC at NYU Skirball. Two weeks later he came into our class as a guest. We got to ask him many questions, about topics from what it was like for him to be an MFA student here 15 years ago, to how he worked with the fashion costume designer for The Runaway.

Andrea Zujko

Adjunct Dance Faculty instructor Andrea Zujko is currently finishing her first year of teaching for the Dance Medicine Residency program at Johns Hopkins Hospital. This project has consisted of developing and teaching a comprehensive course curriculum onsite in Baltimore for both in-house residents and outside healthcare practitioners who work in the field of Dance Medicine. Her contract has just been renewed for the 2019-2020 academic year.

Andrea has also been invited to present this October in Montreal at the 29th Annual Conference of the International Association for Dance Medicine and Science. The focus of her combination presentation and panel discussion is bridging the link between evidence-based medicine and clinical practice in the treatment of anterior hip impingement. She will be representing Westside Dance Physical Therapy and NYU Tisch School of the Arts along with three other colleges from the Harkness Center for Dance Injuries and PhysioArts.

Cherylyn Lavagnino

Cherylyn Lavagnino Dance participated in the Off the Grid Festival in the Emelin Theater on May 4, 2019. The Program included Meagan Williams and Larry Keigwin along with Dance Faculty Cherylyn Lavagnino’s Dance Company.

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Live! The Realist MC Jeremy Jae Neal & Claude CJ Johnson Photo: Julien Benhamou

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Translucent Borders

In February, the Translucent Borders project convened a Workshop hosted by the Abu Dhabi Institute at NYUAD. Directed by Dance Arts Professor Andy Teirstein and NYUAD Professor Gwyneth Bravo, the Workshop gathered leaders in the field of trans-border arts dialogue, including scholars from NYU Abu Dhabi, NYU Shanghai, NYU Tel Aviv, NYU New York, Dean of Columbia University School of the Arts, researchers from Indiana University, Universidad El Bosque in Colombia, University of Ghana, Bethlehem Music Academy, with dance and music artists from the United States, Poland, Sweden, Lebanon, New York, and the United Arab Emirates. Students at Abu Dhabi actively participated in the workshop. Participants looked at the potential role of creative collaboration in the performing Abu Dhabi Mosque arts at global borders of cultural juxtaposition. In addition to panels and presentations, participants engaged in improvisation exercises that addressed our primary questions in the languages of dance and music.

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Design for Stage and Film

IRENE SHARAFF AWARDS

On April 26, 2019, Susan Hilferty was awarded the Irene Sharaff Lifetime Achievement Award at the TDF Irene Sharaff Awards Ceremony. Many of our students, faculty and alumni were there to celebrate the occasion.

The TDF/Irene Sharaff Awards were founded in 1993 to pay tribute to the art of costume design. Since then, the annual award presentation has become an occasion for the costume design community to come together to honor its own.

TDF/Irene Sharaff Lifetime Achievement First presented to the legendary Irene Sharaff in 1993, this award is bestowed upon a costume designer who, over the course of their career, has achieved great distinction and whose work embodies Chita Rivera, Susan Hilferty and Michael Mayer celebrating at the 2019 Irene Sharaff Awards. those qualities of excellence represented

in the lifework of Irene Sharaff: a keen sense of color, a feeling for material and texture, an eye for shape and form, and a sure command of the craft. The designer’s achievement may be in theatre, opera, dance, or film, or, as was true of the work of Ms. Sharaff, for all the performing arts.

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West Coast Alumni Event On April 28th the Design Department hosted a gathering in Los Angeles for West Coast alumni. Alumni from 1972 to the present gathered at the Omni Hotel for an informal brunch. It was a chance for former classmates to catch up and new acquaintances to be made. We love staying in contact with our alumni and we were delighted to present this opportunity to our friends across the country.

Some of our alumni enjoying our event at the Omni Hotel in Los Angeles, April 2019.

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ALUMNI AWARDS & NOMINATIONS

Congratulations to our alumni who continue to be recognized for their incredible achievements by receiving nominations for Tony Awards, Drama Desk Awards, and Outer Critic Circle Awards. We couldn’t be prouder!

The Outer Critics Circle Nominations: Outstanding Set Design: Beowulf Boritt '96 Bernhardt/Hamlet Outstanding Lighting Design: Stacey Derosier '18 Lewiston/Clarkston Outstanding Lighting Design: Bradley King '10 Hadestown *Award Recipient*

The Drama Desk Awards Nominations: Outstanding Set Design of a Play: Mimi Lien '03 Fairview Outstanding Set Design of a Musical: Laura Jellinek '09 Oklahoma!

Outstanding Set Design of a Musical: Laura Jellinek '09 Rags Parkland Sings the Songs of the Future Outstanding Lighting Design of a Play: Amith Chandrashaker '12 Boesman and Lena *Award Recipient* Outstanding Lighting Design of a Play: Amith Chandrashaker '12 Fairview Outstanding Lighting Design of a Play: Simon Cleveland '09 Spaceman Outstanding Lighting Design of a Musical: Bradley King '10 Hadestown *Award Recipient* Outstanding Lighting Design of a Musical: Barbara Samuels '13 Rags Parkland Sings the Songs of the Future

2019 Tony Awards Nominees: Best Scenic Design of a Musical: Laura Jellinek '09 Oklahoma Best Costume Design of a Play: Clint Ramos '97 Torch Song Best Costume Design of a Musical: Paul Tazewell '89 Ain't Too Proud Best Lighting Design of a Musical: Bradley King '10 Hadestown *Award Recipient*

Lucille Lortel Nominations: Outstanding Scenic Design: Laura Jellinek ’09 Rags Parkland Sings the Songs of the Future Outstanding Scenic Design: Arnulfo Maldonado ’05 Sugar in Our Wounds *Award Recipient* Outstanding Costume Design: Kaye Voyce ’94 Marys Seacole Outstanding Lighting Design: Amith Chandrashaker ’12 Boesman and Lena Outstanding Lighting Design: Lap Chi Chu ’98 Mlima’s Tale *Award Recipient* Outstanding Lighting Design: Bradley King ’10 Apologia Outstanding Lighting Design: Barbara Samuels ’13 Rags Parkland Sings the Songs of the Future

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FACULTY HIGHLIGHTS

Jason Ardizzone-West upcoming: Native Gardens, directed by Robert Barry Fleming, opening at the Cleveland Playhouse in May; Blue Man Group national tour opening in Los Angeles in September; the world premiere of The Michaels, written & directed by Richard Nelson, opening at The Public Theater in October (Susan Hilferty, costume design); Once on this Island, directed by Robert Barry Fleming, a coproduction between the Cincinnati Play House and Actors Theatre of Louisville; and a documentary series for Netflix (yet to be announced).

Campbell Baird upcoming: Mornings at Seven, Peterborough Players in Peterborough, New Hampshire; Always…Patsy Cline, starring Sally Struthers and Carter Calvert, the Bucks Country Playhouse, Pennsylvania; a revival of the ballet Empyrean Dances in Fort Wayne, Indiana this September (which Mr. Baird designed for the Joffrey Ballet almost thirty years ago).

In addition, his production of Billy Elliot is being used by City Springs Theatre Company in Sandy Springs, Georgia for their inaugural season this May.

Brett J. Banakis is opening a new Sherlock Holmes play at the Geffen Playhouse called Mysterious Circumstances, based on a New Yorker article of the same name. This Fall, Brett is returning to the Geffen Playhouse with a new production of Macbeth starring Nikolaj CosterWaldau. Brett is continuing work as International Scenic Supervisor on all worldwide productions of Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, with set design by Christine Jones ‘92, in Hamburg, Germany, and San Francisco, CA. Currently running: The Cher Show at the Neil Simon Theatre (co-design with Christine Jones ‘92), and The Enigmatist, a one-man Magic/Puzzles/Prestidigitation show, starring David Kwong, at the High Line Hotel in Chelsea.

Andromache Chalfant upcoming: set designer for Paul Swan is Dead and Gone A Civilians production, written by Claire Kiechel and directed by Steve Cosson at TornPage in Chelsea, lighting design by Lucrecia Briceno ‘04 and composition and sound design by GMTW faculty member Avi Amon.

ML Geiger’s recent productions include lighting design for: Last Night and the Night Before (world premiered) Denver Center Theatre, January 2019 Inherit the Wind, UDel Rep, February 2019; Until the Flood, Portland Center Stage, March 2019; Amber Waves, Indiana Repertory Theatre, April 2019. Upcoming and current productions are West Side Story in Seattle at the 5th Avenue Theatre and Proof of Love, a world premiere produced by Audible at the Minetta Lane, scenery by Alexis Distler ’08 runs through June.

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Last Night and the Night Before - Lighting Design by ML Geiger

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Paul Hackenmueller is designing Carmen at Seattle Opera with director Paul Curran and set and costume designer Gary McCann as well as a production of Cosi fan tutte for Mill City Opera with director Crystal Manich. Spring and summer commercial work includes projects with multiple corporate clients such as Radisson Hotel Group, Starkey Hearing Foundation, Helms Briscoe, Medtronic, and the Target Corporation Strategic Partner Meetings throughout the US and southeast Asia.

Constance Hoffman recently designed costumes for the World Premier of Grimm Tales, a new piece for Ballet Austin, which were recently featured in The Wall Street Journal. She is currently working on The Marriage of Figaro for the Opera Theatre of St. Louis, as well as The Three Mozart/DaPonte Operas for The San Francisco Opera. This summer she plans to study Andean hand-spinning and weaving in Peru.

Susan Hilferty is currently designing sets and costumes for Blood Wedding at London’s Young Vic in the fall directed by Yaël Farber. She will also be preparing The Michaels written and directed by Richard Nelson, Aïda at the Metropolitan Opera, and Tony Kushner’s A Bright Room Called Day directed by Oskar Eustis. Hamlet, from The Gate Theatre in Dublin with Hilferty’s set and costume designs (which earned her a nomination for BEST SET DESIGN from the 2018 Irish Times Irish Theatre Awards) will be performing at St. Anne’s Warehouse in January 2020. Earlier this year she designed sets and costumes for Boesman and Lena at The Signature Theatre. Currently running: The Oresteia written by Ellen McLaughlin and directed by Michael Kahn as his final production as artistic director of the Shakespeare Theatre Company in DC, and La Traviata and Rigoletto in the Metropolitan Opera’s Spring season. Susan is the recipient of the 2019 TDF/Irene Sharaff Lifetime Achievement Award for Costume Design presented on the 26th of April.

Allen Lee Hughes recently designed Sweat at American Conservatory Theater in San Francisco and How to Catch Creation at the Goodman Theatre in Chicago. He is currently designing Toni Stone by Lydia R. Diamond. The play, which is about a female baseball player who plays ball with the men of the Negro league, is directed by Pam MacKinnon and will start previews May 23rd and opens June 20th at the Roundabout's Laura Pels Theater.

Hugh Landwehr is presently designing the scenery for a production of Ken Ludwig’s adaptation of The Three Musketeers at the Alley Theatre in Houston, Texas, where he has worked for many years. He is also a member of the Art Department for Warner Bros. upcoming production of Lin Manuel Miranda’s musical In the Heights, filming in New York City this summer.

Rebecca Lord-Surratt is designing a short film, This is Our Time, written and directed by Alexander Dinelaris of Birdman, and designing Summer Shorts, an annual new play festival at 59e59 including works by Neil LaBute, Chris Bohjalian, Alexander Dinelaris and others. In August, she will be involved in various projects surrounding MTV’s Video Music Awards.

Jim Luigs has been commissioned by Houston Grand Opera to write a new adaptation of The Merry Widow as part of a co-production with the English National Opera. His new libretto will be performed in Houston under the direction of Max Webster. Maestro Patrick Summers

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will conduct. Jim’s work as an interior designer was recently published by Schiffer Publishing, Ltd. in a design anthology, Anatomy of a Great Home, by Boyce Thompson.

Ed McCarthy recently lit the NYC Ballet opening night Gala, and worked on the Tony Awards for the 20th year in a row. He’s also lighting a production of A Chorus Line this summer. After the Tony’s he goes onboard the Allure of the Seas to check up on his production of Mamma Mia!, then off to Hong Kong in early July to light The Heart of Robin Hood, co-designed with Ken Billington.

This summer, Chris Muller will be coming and going to Dubai to advance work on the 'Sustainability' Pavilion for the Dubai 2020 World Expo, now in its fabrication stage. Additionally, he is beginning work on the Georgia O'Keeffe Museum in Santa Fe, New Mexico, and continuing work on the new masterplan for the Philadelphia Zoo. Work will also advance on The Sweet Life, a new children's opera he is co-designing with Cait O'Connor ('09).

Somewhere in there he hopes to find time to spend in the Catskills.

Maggie Raywood will return to Florence this summer, in part to collaborate with Jim Calder from Graduate Acting on produced work with his commedia dell'arte class, but also to continue her research and pattern work on the Hortense Acton dress collection. This summer she will pattern two more dresses.

The photo here shows the pattern work as well as a completed half scale of one of the dresses Maggie Raywood researched and drafted last summer.

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Paul Steinberg designed the set for The Twilight Zone by Ann Washburn, which is currently running in the West End, London. The Marriage of Figaro for Opera Theater of St Louis opens in May. Paul will spend the summer and fall preparing Judgement Day by Odon Von Horvath for The Park Ave Armory and Handel’s Tamerlano for the Frankfurt Opera.

Robert Wierzel upcoming: Jubilee, a new a-cappella musical written and directed by Tazewell Thompson, music direction by Dianne Adams McDowell, world premiere at Arena Stage, Washington DC (May); The Ghost of Versailles opera, directed by Jay Lesenger. Produced

by Glimmerglass Festival, a co-production with Chateau de Versailles Spectacles, France (July. December); Blue, a new opera written and directed by Tazewell Thompson, with music by Jeanine Tesori, Produced by Glimmerglass Festival, world premiere this July; A Walk On the Moon, a new musical directed by Sheryl Kaller, with book by Pamela Grey, music & lyrics by Paul Scott Goodman. Pre-Broadway production at George Street Playhouse in April 2020.

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Drama

News

Tisch Drama Launches Drama Access, a New Internal Digital Portal On January 28, to kick off the spring semester, Tisch Drama launched Tisch Drama Access, the department’s first internal digital portal developed exclusively to serve and connect the Drama community.

The new password-protected platform, built through NYU Wordpress, offers the Drama community a clearinghouse of information on all things about the department, the school, and beyond—from timely news and monthly event calendars to policies and procedures for faculty, resources for students and staff, and more.

At the launch, Chair Rubén Polendo said the goal for Drama Access is to put "a one-stop online platform at community members’ fingertips."

"It’s a tool to consolidate news, information, and functions that—until now—have been spread across multiple digital platforms and with various personnel," he said. "What's more, Drama Access is a practical way of unifying the department and ensuring every member of the Tisch Drama Community belongs."

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Students are able to schedule appointments with advisors, access career development resources, and scroll through an archive of auditions, internships, and jobs. Faculty will find helpful forms, bylaws, and policies. The main portal includes a news feed of community highlights celebrating the achievements of individual students, faculty, and staff.

If a computer isn't handy, members of the Drama community can download Drama Access to their phone as an app for on-the-go communication.

Tisch Drama Student Groups Work with Artists in Action on a Relief Drive

Artists in Action in collaboration with the Tisch Drama Student Council and Meisner Studio's Students of Color Affinity Group organized a relief drive to collect menstrual supplies for the Bowery Residents’ Committee Women’s Shelter. The effort collected items through May 3, which were packaged and delivered to the shelter on May 17.

Artists in Action, which originated in the Department of Drama and was founded by Drama student Kayla Zanakis, is now a Tisch-wide organization.

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Members of Artists in Action, founded by Drama student Kayla Zanakis (center right), pack menstrual products to be delivered to the Bowery Residents' Committee Women's Shelter.

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Tisch Drama Partners with Broadway Ad Agency Serino Coyne for Mentorship Program This spring, Tisch Drama and live entertainment advertising agency Serino Coyne teamed up to create the Women's Mentorship Program, an initiative that pairs female-identifying students interested in arts management with many of New York's top female cultural leaders.

The program began in February with a class of 13 students. Inaugural mentors included Anne Quart, senior vice president of production and co-producer, Disney Theatrical Group; Lauren Reid, chief operating officer, John Gore Organization; Marla Ostroff, executive vice president of arts and theatre, Ticketmaster; Maggie Brohn, chief operating officer, Adventureland LLC; Katie Dalton, senior vice president, Audience Rewards; Hailey Ferber, senior vice president of business and legal affairs, The Araca Group; India Haggins, director of marketing, Jazz at Lincoln Center; Dear Evan Hansen producer Stacey Mindich; Alecia Parker, executive producer, National Artists Management Company; Catherine Reid, chief financial officer, Serino Coyne; Leslie Barrett, managing director, Serino Coyne; Sara Villagio, chief marketing officer, Carnegie Hall; and Dessie Moynihan, vice president for creative projects, the Shubert Organization.

The Women's Mentorship Program has included monthly one-on-one mentorship meetings with Tisch Drama students and women who have achieved great success in their careers. Paired students and mentors have discussed communication, organization, leadership, team building, and other management essentials. In addition, each student had opportunities to meet all of the participating mentors over the course of the program.

"There is real power in one-to-one relationships that are open, honest and relatable," said Leslie Barrett, managing director at Serino Coyne.

"Tisch Drama is thrilled to work with Serino Coyne to bring the Women's Mentorship Program to students," said RubĂŠn Polendo, chair of the department. "The initiative is an excellent example of our commitment to engage young artists in the wide array of career opportunities in the field of theatre at large. It's an amazing and unique opportunity for mentors and mentees to forge relationships with future colleagues."

"I jumped at the chance to be involved," said Anne Quart of the Disney Theatrical Group. "Mentoring allows women to support other women and to share their stories and life experience. A simple human-to-human connection can be transformative."

Similarly, Lauren Reid of the John Gore Organization, the largest Broadway producing and presenting company worldwide, said: "This program allows me to give back and hopefully to illuminate and create more opportunities for women in the entertainment industry both on and off stage."

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Tisch Drama student Cati Kalinoski said that being part of the Women's Mentorship Program had opened her eyes to the possibilities that exist after college.

“Being mentored by someone who has made it so far and started at a place very similar to me was incredibly helpful in seeing what life looks like post-graduation,� she said.

This formal mentorship effort was created in a collaboration between Tisch Drama's Office of Career Development & Alumni Engagement and Serino Coyne, a leading live entertainment advertising and marketing agency founded by Nancy Coyne in 1977. A female trailblazer in a male-dominated industry, Coyne's entrepreneurial spirit continues to inspire women working in the worlds of advertising, marketing, and live entertainment.

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Tisch Drama Theatre Studies Presents Readings, Symposium in All Department Festival This spring, Tisch Drama’s Theatre Studies program presented an array of readings, panels, and special events highlighting the department’s rich academic curriculum, as part of the TISCH DRAMA STAGE All Department Festival.

Events were held April 7 and 14 in the Abe Burrows Theater at Tisch School of the Arts.

On April 7, the program included “Essays on the Theme of Shakespeare,” in which students Kristina Melsheimer, Brock Looser, and Diana Risse from Associate Professor Laura Levine’s fall 2018 Honors Seminar, “Shakespeare and His Inter-texts,” presented papers on The Tempest. Tisch Drama alumna Lachlan Brooks (class of 2017) along with current students Shannon Barnes, Kelsey Bentz, and Micahel Cooper Eichenhorn from Levine’s “Shakespeare and the Constructions of Desire” class, served as official respondents to the papers.

“It was very exciting to be a respondent for these papers,” Brooks said. “The diversity of topics—or takes on a topic—made it an incredibly absorbing event.”

Following, students including Samantha Carberry, Lizzy Walther, Arian Rad, Piper Kristina Lewis, Daniel Holzman, and Jack Siebert, read from their manuscripts in progress as part of “Stories and Memoirs from ‘Curating a Life.’”

“The poet Rilke once advised young writers, ‘Find out the reason that commands you to write,’” Levine noted. “‘You ‘have your childhood, that jewel beyond all price.’ These students have written stories I love from that particular treasure house.”

On April 14, the program hosted two panels as part of a symposium—one on “Digital Performances, Digital Plays(paces),” which explored intersections of technology in productions, and another examining “Asian Performance on the Move.”

In the first panel, Assistant Arts Professor Erin Mee said honors students presented research on an emerging genre.

“In the 21st century, we have seen the invention of smartphones, apps, social media platforms, and online worlds, all of which are now being used to create and disseminate theatre,” she said. “Enough digital performances now exist that we can look at them as a genre and

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ask, ‘How does digital performance invite us to rethink what theatre is, how it functions, and where it takes place? How have digital performances introduced new dramaturgical structures, new ways of seeing, new modes of engagement, and new creative processes?’”

In response to these questions, students examined topics from Instagram popups to digital technology applications and the use of anthropomorphic robots onstage. Presenters included Hunter Dunn, Mia Jabara, Matthew Robert Lee, Kendall Bowden, Valerie Jane Kwok, and Cati Kalinoski—who also presented sections of her honors thesis, under Mee’s supervision. The panel was moderated by Lucas Castro and special guest “Robert” (a robot!) with Hunter Dunn as discussant.

Following, “Asian Performance on the Move” explored the extraordinary range of performance practices, actor training methods, dramaturgical structures, modes of spectatorship, and performance theories embodied in the performing arts of India, Japan, Cambodia, and the Philippines.

“In these papers, the students have paid special attention to negotiations of gender, authenticity, ‘national’ culture, and the impact of colonialism,” Mee noted.

Students presenting at this panel included Noah Borromeo, Elsa Lepecki Bean, Zhen Yu, and Karishma Paresh Bhagani—who also presented sections of her honors thesis, under Mee’s supervision. The panel was moderated by Zahra Budhwani, with Tsui C. Wang as discussant.

Gwendolyn Alker, Tisch Drama’s director of Theatre Studies, explained how these events—demonstrating students’ academic foundation—are vital to the work onstage, presented throughout the festival.

“We like to think of production as the heart of the Drama Department, and the various studios as the organs of this body,” she said.

“Theatre Studies, then, must be seen as the spine: it’s what links us all through the curriculum. Our Theatre Studies classes give us an intellectual backbone as we integrate our training, and the ability to stand tall as we go into this world as thinking artists and global citizens.”

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Students in Tisch Drama's Theatre Studies program present papers and research during the TISCH DRAMA STAGE All Department Festival.

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Bryce Dallas Howard Emphasizes Process and Collaboration at Women in Theatre Event Acclaimed actor, director, writer, and producer Bryce Dallas Howard underscored the importance of an artist’s process, as well as collaboration and innovation, during Tisch Drama’s Women in Theatre series.

The former Tisch Drama student reflected on her multifaceted career, emphasizing her collaboration with Tisch Drama Chair Rubén Polendo.

“The process I inherited with Rubén and Theater Mitu was very, very structured,” said Dallas Howard. “There was a lot of dramaturgy work—us sitting around a table. And you do need that process. [As actors] we are tearing the limits of our own humanity and our own ego. It is an overwhelming experience. So this was us really looking at the text, and asking ourselves, ‘What are the personal things that are going to come up for me? What are my unconscious biases?’ Having that process removed me from sort of the overwhelm.”

Polendo also reminisced on Howard’s time at Tisch Drama—“I remember when she walked through these halls, like each of you,” he said to the students—and noted how her trajectory provides a great example of what a multifaceted artist’s career can look like.

“Not only has Bryce succeeded as this amazing actor in both theatre and film, she has also gone on to write, direct, produce, and really carve out a path for future artists dedicated to innovation and investigation of this ever-evolving field,” he said—noting her partnership with Tisch Drama through the Nine Muses internship program.

The Nine Muses program, held weekly over the course of the semester, invited Tisch Drama students to study under Howard and collaborate with her in creating new work.

“I’ve had some remarkable mentors in my life who have helped me cultivate and enrich my understanding of the creative process and the benefits of unique styles of collaboration,” Howard said. “I’m so grateful for what’s unquestionably one of the most creatively stimulating times of my life, and I’m thrilled to share and collaborate with these young artists at this moment in my career. I hope that this class can be a one-of-a-kind of experience that provides students an opportunity to connect generations of storytellers for mutually beneficial collaboration. I envision this class as a springboard for lifelong relationships and ongoing creative endeavors.”

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Bryce Dallas Howard, left, talks with Tisch Drama Chair RubĂŠn Polendo during the department's Women in Theatre series.

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Tisch Drama Alumnae Gina Rodriguez and DeWanda Wise Highlight Diversity in ‘Someone Great’ on Netflix In a recent Variety interview, Tisch Drama alumna Gina Rodriguez (class of 2006) talked about the importance of having diversity in storytelling and what it was like working with her friends on the new Netflix film Someone Great—including former classmate DeWanda Wise (class of 2006).

“I want to tell the stories that haven’t been told, I want to tell them with people you haven’t seen yet, and I want to open hearts and minds to more tolerance,” Rodriguez said at the movie's premiere. “I think that art has the ability to create healing, so those are the kind of movies I want to make.”

Wise said Rodriguez jumped at the opportunity to work her into the script. The two met more than 15 years ago when they were both training at Tisch Drama.

"For the most part, it was so surreal filming around NYU, filming in SoHo, filming in the West Village, right next to my favorite coffee shop, right next to Grey Dog, right next to all of my vegan, plant-based haunts,” Wise said.

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Tisch Drama’s Production & Design Studio Presents End-of-the-Year Showcase

Throughout the year, Tisch Drama students in the Production & Design Studio are present in productions in the areas of stage management, scenery, costumes, lighting, and sound design. Their work was featured in an end-of-the-year showcase in May. Photos by Joe McGowan

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Faculty Highlights

Ana Cristina (Gigi) Buffington served as the voice, text and dialect coach for Linda Vista, Second Stage at the Hayes on Broadway, by Tracy Letts; the world premiere of Downstate at the National Theatre of London and Steppenwolf, by Bruce Norris; Dying City, Second Stage at the Kaiser, written and directed by Christopher Shinn; for Steppenwolf: Ms Blakk For President (world premiere) by Tarrel McCraney and Tina Landau, featuring McCraney as Ms Blakk; The Children, By Lucy Kirkwood; A Doll’s House, Part 2, By Lucas Hnath; LaRuta, (World Premiere) By Isaac Gomez; Familiar, by Danai Gurira; Uncle Romeo/ Vanya Juliet, adapted and directed by Eric Tucker for Bedlam.

Catherine Coray curated another installment of Arab Voices for the NYU Abu Dhabi Institute, which ran April 17–18. The installment hosted three Arab dramatists from Beirut and Berlin, who presented their work in public programs, directed by Emily Mendelsohn, Tisch Drama Chair Rubén Polendo, and Kristin Horton. Events took place at the NYU Abu Dhabi Institute, located at 19 Washington Square North, and were free and open to the public.

Dawn-Elin Fraser was the dialect/voice coach for several productions being honored with nominations this award season including Slave Play, House that Will Not Stand, By the way...Meet Vera Stark, and What the Constitution Means to Me. She is currently working on the world premiere of the Lynn Nottage/Duncan Sheik musical Secret Life of Bees.

Kent Gash and Dell Howlett were both honored for their work in the Fords Theatre production of The Wiz, which was nominated for 13 Helen Hayes Award nominations. The production’s nominations include: Best Musical, Best Director of a Musical (Gash), Best Choreography (Howlett), Best Musical Direction (Darius Smith, alumnus of Tisch Graduate Musical Theatre Writing), Best Scenic Design (Jason Sherwood, alumnus of Tisch Drama’s Production & Design Studio), and Best Costume Design (Kara Harmon, alumna of Tisch Design for Stage & Film).

Laura Levine presented a paper in May in Lisbon: “Wicked Mysteryes and Broken Epistemologies” on two Renaissance sorcerers at SEDERI (Spanish and Portuguese Society for Renaissance Studies), and in July, is presenting a paper on Kenneth McMillan’s Romeo and Juliet at ESRA (European Shakespeare Research Association) in Rome.

Carol Martin has written several articles including: “No Heaven, Only Sky,” published in Skirball’s Indefinite Articles online and in the printed matter, 2019; "Teatr I rzeczywistość," (“Artists’ Testimonies: Theatre and Reality”) in Dialog (in Polish), February 2019, the lead essay in the leading Polish theatre journal; “La table et le monde hors scène: les objets scéniques dans le théâtre du reel” in Les Théâtres documentaires (in French) edited by Beatrice Picon-Vallin, Montlellier, Deuxième époque, 2019; as well as the review Wendy Wasserstein

by Jill Dolan for Theatre Journal, March 2019. Additionally, she serves as the head of the ATLAS ARTS review panel, which adjudicates fellowships for the purpose of leave time and research support for academic Louisiana artists and scholars to produce art and scholarship

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in the public domain. As head of the review panel, Martin leads members of the panel to select the applicants to receive funding. After the short list is created, she consults with heads of the humanities and science panels to determine the finalists across disciplines to receive the award.

Erin B. Mee wrote an essay titled “Towards a Sustainable Aesthetic Theory: Climate and Rasa” for the HowlRound platform.

Rubén Polendo and his company Theater Mitu premiered a dance-theatre work entitled Grapefruit at their Brooklyn multi-use arts space MITU580. This project marks the beginning of Theater Mitu's Expansion Works Series, a program intended to cultivate leadership and expand artistic practice. In January, Polendo (along with members of Theater Mitu) traveled to Bali, Indonesia, to delve deeper into research explorations with classical and contemporary Indonesian artists in collaboration with Indonesia renowned Institute SENI. This spring, Polendo and his company's work was recognized and awarded by the Trust for Mutual Understanding, the Howard Gilman Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, and the New York State Council on the Arts. They were also awarded a Mid-Atlantic Arts tour grant for their piece Remnant. Theater Mitu’s research initiatives also received support from the NET/TEN Research grant and the Cultural Development Fund.

Louis Scheeder wrote an article on "Iachimo,” the character in Cymbeline, one of the last plays that Shakespeare is given credit for. The title is "Iachimo: By villainy I got this ring."

Alisa Zhulina presented on Anton Chekhov and financial speculation on the modern stage at the Chekhov and the World conference at the Jordan Center for the Advanced Study of Russia at NYU.

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Graduate Acting

Grad Acting Assistant Arts Professor, Scott Illingworth Receives 2019 Fulbright Grant

Grad Acting Assistant Arts Professor, Scott Illingworth, received a 2019 Fulbright Grant to travel and work in Kiev, Ukraine. During his time in Ukraine, Scott will develop a new adaptation of George Orwell's Animal Farm at Theatre on Pechersk, marking the first theatrical production of the piece in Ukrainian. He will also offer workshops and lectures in Physical Actioning and American actor training at Film UA as well as other schools and companies.

Camryn Manheim ( '87) Visits Grad Acting

The Graduate Acting program welcomed Emmy and Golden Globe winner and alumna Camryn Manheim for a Lunchtime Q&A with current students.

Ain't No Mo at the Public Theatre

Scott Illingworth

The World Premiere of Ain't No Mo' by Jordan E. Cooper features four Grad Acting Alumni: Marchant Davis ('16), Fedna Jacquet ('16), Crystal Lucas-Perry ('13), and Simone Recasner ('17). The New York Times has called the production electrifying, and we at Grad Acting are most proud and unsurprised by the note that the actors shine. Their performances show off not only their innate acting ability, but also the rigorous training.

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Camryn Manheim ( '87) Visits Grad Acting

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Alumni and Faculty Highlights

Mahershala Ali (‘00) won his second Oscar for Best Supporting Actor for his work in Green Book.

34th Annual Lucille Lortel Award Nominations: Outstanding Actor/Actress: Marchánt Davis ('16), Clifton Duncan (‘09), Crystal Lucas-Perry ('13), Danielle Skraastad ('99), and Grad Acting faculty member, Steve Skybell!

Happy Birthday, Wanda June, nominated for Outstanding Revival, presented by Wheelhouse Theatre Company: Matt Harrington (‘09), David Kenner (‘09), Michael Schantz (‘10), and Jeff Wise (‘09), featuring Kareem Lucas ('13) and Kate MacCluggage ('07)

Fabulation, nominated for Outstanding Revival featuring Mayaa Boateng ('17), Cherise Boothe ('02), Ian Lassiter ('10) and Nikiya Mathis ('08)

Susan Kelechi Watson (‘03) was honored and presented with the Big Apple Award for Artistic Achievement at the annual Tisch Gala on April 8, 2019.

Class of 2016's Marchant Davis stars in The Day Shall Come, directed by Chris Morris, premiering at SXSW in March 2019.

Class of 2016's Rosa Gilmore will recur on the upcoming fourth season of The Expanse, the sci-fi drama’s first season on Amazon, following its move from Syfy.

Class of 2010's Amber Gray arrives on Broadway in Anaïs Mitchell’s Hadestown as Persephone, after starring as Laurey in Oklahoma!.

Grad Acting Arts Professor and Chair Mark Wing-Davey will direct Mona Mansour's The Vagrant Trilogy at The Public Theater in early 2020.

Mark Wing-Davey will open Berkeley Repertory Theater's season, directing the American Premiere of Francis Turnly's The Great Wave in September 2019.

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Graduate Musical Theatre Writing

GMTWP alum Joe Iconis nominated for 2019 Tony Award for Best Score for his Broadway show GMTWP Alum Joe Iconis (Cycle 14) was nominated for a Tony Award for Best Score for his music and lyrics from his new Broadway musical BE MORE CHILL currently playing at the Lyceum Theatre. The show also garnered Drama Desk nominations for Best Musical, a Drama League nomination for Best Musical, an Outer Critics Circle Award nomination for Best Musical, and a Lucille Lortel Award nomination for Best Musical.

BE MORE CHILL also led the list of nominees for the 2019 Broadway.com Audience Choice Awards, the only major theater prize chosen by Broadway fans. The musical, featuring music and lyrics by Joe Iconis and book by Joe Tracz, earned 12 nominations, including Favorite New Musical. Stars Will Roland and Stephanie Hsu were also the most-nominated actors of the season; they were named in three categories each, including a joint nomination for Favorite Onstage Pair. In addition, three songs from the Iconis score were included in the Favorite New Song category: “I Love Play Rehearsal,” “Loser Geek Whatever” and “Michael in the Bathroom.” BE MORE CHILL won “Favorite New Musical”, “Favorite Featured Actor in a Musical”, “Favorite Funny Performance”, and “Favorite Onstage Pair”.

GMTWP CYCLE 14 ALUM, JOE ICONIS

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A Strange Loop by GMTWP Alum Michael R. Jackson at Playwrights Horizons GMTWP Alum Michael R. Jackson's (Cycle 14) new musical A STRANGE LOOP will receive its world premiere at Playwrights Horizons beginning May 24th and running through July 28th.

Produced in association with Page 73, the show features music, lyrics, and book by Jackson with direction by Stephen Brackett.

The show follows Usher, a black, queer writer, working a day job he hates while writing his original musical: a MICHAEL R. JACKSON - CYCLE 14 ALUM piece about a black, queer writer, working a day job he hates while writing his original musical. The blistering, momentous new musical follows a young artist at war with a host of demons — not least of which, the punishing thoughts in his own head — in an attempt to capture and understand his own strange loop.

Michael R. Jackson was one of the winners of this year's Whiting Awards. This is the first time the award has been given to a musical theatre writer. Jackson won the prize for his submission from A STRANGE LOOP. The selection committee described Michael as: Deftly attuned to pop culture and to the language of the twenty-first century, Michael R. Jackson fashions his plays phrase by phrase, layering irony, humor, pastiche, cultural references, and deep feeling. In a Joycean stream of consciousness, we explore a character buried under the weight of societal projections. The new linguistic pleasures in his work reflect and refract our oldest concerns as human beings: how do we make visible who we are to ourselves and to others? His kinetic plays fairly buzz with energy, his characters self-aware and blithely out of it all at once. This work is robustly intelligent, unflinchingly honest, dizzyingly screwball, and a sheer delight.

Since 1985, the Foundation has supported creative writing through the Whiting Awards, given annually to ten emerging writers in fiction, nonfiction, poetry, and drama. The awards, of $50,000 each, are based on early accomplishment and the promise of great work to come.

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GMTWP Alums will have World Premiere of 'Gun & Powder' at Signature Theatre GMTWP Alums Ross Baum & Angelica Chéri will receive a world premiere of their new musical 'GUN AND POWDER' at the Signature Theatre in Arlington, VA in January and February 2020.

Robert O’Hara (Bootycandy) will direct the musical based on the true story of Wild West outlaws Mary and Martha Clarke, light-skinned African American twins who pass themselves as white to seize funds by any means necessary.

GMTWP ALUMS ROSS BAUM & ANGELICA CHÉRI (CYCLE 24)

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Musicals by GMTWP Alums Receive NAMT Grants Several shows written by GMTWP Alums will receive funding support through grant monies offered by NAMT, The National Alliance for Musical Theater.

The Frank Young Fund for New Musicals (FYFNM) is a major funding program to support NAMT member not-for-profit theatres in their collaborations with writers to create, develop and produce new musicals. Now in its 11th year, this year the Fund is providing grants totaling $70,000 to organizations across the country.

The Innovation & Exploration Fund (I&EF), a funding initiative now in its third cycle, is designed to help NAMT not-for-profit member theatres pilot new capacity-building programs to advance their missions and share knowledge with other members. This year the I&EF is providing grants totaling $12,000 to organizations nationwide.

The GMTWP Alums affected by the grant are: •

• • • •

Niko Tsakalakos (Cycle 17) for his show FALL SPRINGS which will be produced at Barrington Stage Company.

Nathan Fosbinder (Cycle 28) for his show HEPHAESTUS which will be produced at Music Theatre of Madison.

Michael R. Jackson (Cycle 14) for his show A STRANGE LOOP which will be produced by Playwrights Horizons.

Gordon Leary & Julia Meinwald (Cycle 16) for their show SOMETHING BLUE which will be produced by Diversionary Theatre in San Diego, CA. Michelle Elliott & Danny Haengil Larsen for their show HART ISLAND which will be workshopped at The Village Theatre in Issaquah, WA.

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Alumni Highlights

GMTWP alum and Adjunct Faculty Sean Patrick Flahaven heads new acquisition of Samuel French, Inc. for Concord Theatricals.

GMTWP Alum and Adjunct Faculty Member Mindi Dickstein (Cycle 5) and GMTWP Alum Kirsten Guenther (Cycle 16) opened their new musical, Benny & Joon at the renowned Papermill Playhouse in Millburn, NJ in April 2019. Dickstein penned the lyrics and Guenther the book. The music was composed by collaborator Nolan Gasser.

GMTWP alum Rachel J. Peters (Cycle 14) received the World Premiere of her new opera COMPANIONSHIP at Fort Worth Opera in early May 2019.

GMTWP alum Brandon Anderson (Cycle 17) and Open Fifth Publishing announced the release of Anderson's new studio album, Wages of Sin on March 5th along with the first single and video, Righteous Is Right.

Kirsten Childs, GMTWP Alum (Cycle 4) and Adjunct Instructor, received an original cast recording of her new musical BELLA: AN AMERICAN TALL TALE, which was produced at Playwrights Horizons last year. The recording took place at Avatar Studios.

GMTWP Alums Molly Reisman (Cycle 27) and Emily Chiu (Cycle 26) were the recipients of the inaugural Eric H. Weinberger Award for Emerging Librettists, a juried cash and production grant given annually to support the early work and career of a deserving musical theatre librettist, commemorating the life and work of playwright/librettist Eric H. Weinberger (1950-2017), who was a Drama Desk Award nominee for Best Book of a Musical (Wanda's World), and the playwright/librettist of Class Mothers '68, which earned Pricilla LOPEZ a Drama Desk Award nomination.

GMTWP Alum Gihieh Lee (Cycle 9) will receive a production of her new song cycle '13 FRUITCAKES' at LaMama this summer.

Three different GMTWP Alums will participate in the augural "Makers" cohort through Musical Theatre Factory. Ty Defoe & Tidtaya Sinutoke (both Cycle 22) and AriDy Nox (Cycle 27) were chosen from a pool of more than 80 applicants.

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Art Matters with Paul Lazar

Open Arts

Continuing with the third iteration of master class series ART MATTERS, this spring Open Arts invited actor and theatremaker Paul Lazar to deliver a series of lectures about his experiences as a working actor, both as part of downtown New York's influential theatre collectives, and on the big screen. Paul also created some exciting innovations for the class, curating a series of dynamic guest performances for his students.

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Admitted Students Day

Open Arts has just celebrated a major milestone for the growth of the program! This spring Open Arts admitted its first class of incoming students for the new conservatory BFA program in Collaborative Arts. This new collaborative cohort will be a vital new addition to Tisch's vanguard of multidisciplinary co-creators and researchers. Students from this first cohort arrived for NYU's Admitted Students Day, and they got right to work, preparing a "shadow theatre" performance with the faculty.

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Earth Day Speaker Series

For Earth Day this spring, Prof. Peter Terezakis presented a series of speakers and panel discussions for students, faculty and staff. Titled The Air We Breathe, the sessions addressed current threats to the natural world, citizen-led activism, new tools for environmental researchers, debates on climate change and human health, and a film on humanity's place in a world that is increasingly displaced by technological preoccupation.

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Performance Studies

LECTURE SERIES

The Department of Performance Studies hosted more than a dozen unique events this spring, bringing artists, scholars, faculty, and PS community members together to discuss important themes like race, ability, and sexuality, through the lens of performance. Some highlights include:

Feb. 14 | The Queer Drama of Black Life

The book launch for Tavia Nyong’o’s Afro-Fabulations: The Queer Drama of Black Life, brought former PS faculty member back to PS to discuss his latest work, where Nyong’o argues for a conception of black cultural life that exceeds post-blackness and conditions of loss. Barbara Browning, Sébastien Régnier, Malik Gaines, Fred Moten, and Ann Pellegrini joined Professor Nyong’o in discussing the work.

Photo: Tavia Nyong’o at 2/14 event. Credit to Raafae Ghory

Feb. 28 | Moving Mad, Queer, and Crip: Artful Research, and Living

Lindsay Eales and visiting professor, Danielle Peers, danced a quartet that embraces critical disability, spoken word, dance, and film, offering critical reflections on the generative possibilities of disability and madness in the arts. Their performance was followed by a discussion with Hentyle Yapp and Department Chair, André Lepecki.

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March 7 | Legacies of Aesthetic Concealment: Conversations with Baseera Khan

B.A. Candidates Manion Khun and Akeem Omar Ali discussed the implications, effects, and processes of artist Baseera Khan’s work. This event was organized and facilitated by PS B.A. Departmental Assistants, Student Representatives, and other members of the UG cohort.

Danielle Peers and Lindsay Eales from a prior performance Photo credit: © Laura Blüer 2014

April 4: Carolee Schneemann: This Kinetic Life

Celebrating the life and work of Carolee Schneemann, M.A. Candidate Jess Saldaña organized a salon-style conversation with André Lepecki, Barbara Browning, Malik Gaines, and Karen Finley. The panel discussed how Schneemann’s widespread practice as a painter, photo/videographer, writer, and performance artist continues to permeate the politics of the arts today.

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CONFERENCES & SYMPOSIUMS

On April 12, 2019, the Department of Performance Studies hosted the Fourth Annual Curating Symposium: Curating Performance.

The final panel, "Curating Queer Futurity," was dedicated to a consideration of José Muñoz's ongoing impact on art practices and curating. The symposium concluded with a book launch and celebration of NYU Press’s 10th Anniversary Edition of José Muñoz's “Cruising Utopia.” Invited panelists included Jane Anderson, Emily Johnson, Jordan Wilson, Alexandro Segade, Julietta Singh, Wafaa Bilala, Isolde Brielmaier, Nao Bustamante, Miguel Gutierrez, and more.

Photos: Cover of Cruising Utopia provided by NYU Press.

Photo of Nao Bustamante and Ann Pellegrini from the final panel of the day.

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The department was buzzing with excitement in anticipation of “Hiving: Living Forms, Forms of Living,” a symposium organized by Ph.D. Candidate Sarah Richter. On April 5, 2019, performance artists and scholars, anthropologists, and beekeepers gathered to imagine the hive or nest. With the generous support of the Office of Creative Research, Sarah organized a day-long event that explored how social forms of life and their infrastructures exceed and instruct the political, examining how this could expand a conventional performance studies understanding of ethics and aesthetics, reproduction, collectivity, assembly, domestic space, and organizing.

PRAXIS

This February, the department hosted PRAXIS, INC: Innovate, Network, Collaborate, the department’s annual community event.

This year’s iteration included workshops that played with techniques of sonic documentation, analyzed the aesthetics and politics of transness, and discussed ways to bridge the gap between higher education and the mainstream media, through writing.

&

of

This year’s final presentation, "Dramatizing Autoethnography: Selves and Others in Applied Theatre," was given by Nandita Dinesh (M.A. '08).

Photos: All photo credits to Isa Saldana. Moments from various workshops from this year. Bottom right is Nandita Dinesh

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FACULTY HIGHLIGHTS

On February 12, 2019, the Department of Performance studies honored Department Founder and Professor Emeritus, Richard Schechner, naming the studio in his honor. Room 612 is now known as the Richard Schechner Studio! The department also celebrated Professor Emerita, Barbara Kirshenblatt-Gimblett, who served as the Department’s Chair for over twenty years. The department’s Office of the Chair has been named in her honor.

Associate Professor Alex Vasquez presented her research as part of the Inaugural Black Sound & the Archive Symposium at Yale University in February 2019. She joined Licia Fiol-Matta, and Deborah Vargas in a conversation for “Session Players: Latina Music Critics at Work” at Provincetown Playhouse.

This past February, Professor Ann Pellegrini joined Skirball Talks in a roundtable to reflect on gay liberation—a movement whose story cannot be told without Stonewall— and to consider to what extent liberation is an “academic” question, in both senses of the term. In March, she co-taught an all-day workshop on "Psychoanalysis Meets Queer Theory: Productive Synergies and Clinical Implications" at the Michigan Psychoanalytic Institute. She gave the annual Yasmin Roberts Memorial Lecture at the Austen Riggs Center, in Stockbridge, MA. The title of her presentation was "The Queer Arts of Analysis."

Professor Deborah Kapchan released “Poetic Justice: An Anthology of Contemporary Moroccan Poetry” in Spring 2019. She also received a fellowship from the Global Research Initiative to spend six weeks at NYU Paris writing about her research on North African Sufism in France.

Professor and Department Chair André Lepecki published his essay, "Testimony for the Living (Or, Metabolic Theater)" for the Walker Arts Center in March 2019. He also published the essay "Movement in the Severed," commissioned for the exhibition and film catalog Redoubt by Matthew Barney, (Yale University Press, 2019).

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Photos: Courtesy of Noel Rodriguez of Richard and Barbara and other PS Faculty.

Professor Lepecki was the recipient of a travel grant from The Artis Foundation, supporting a workshop and two public lectures at Kelim Choreographic Center of Tel Aviv in February 2019. His other travels included serving as the keynote speaker, with Professors Nadine George-Graves, and Stephanie Jordan at the Yale Dance Symposium, an initiative of Yale University. Lepecki was the guest scholar at Center for Theater Studies, Lisbon University, April 22-24, 2019.

Distinguished Teacher Allen Weiss did the photography for a new book, East Village Blues, by Chantal Thomas.

Associate Professor Karen Shimakawa celebrated her 15th Anniversary teaching at Tisch this Spring.

Professor and Chair AndrĂŠ Lepecki, Professor and Associate Chair Fred Moten, and Associate Professor and Director of Undergraduate Programs Malik Gaines co-organized an event that was presented with the exhibition Judson Dance Theater: The Work is Never Done at MoMA PS1.

Lepecki at Judson Dance Theater: A Collective Speculation presented as part of VW Sunday Sessions on Jan 27, 2019, at MoMA PS1, New York.

Image courtesy MoMA PS1. Photo by Maria Baranova.

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Moten at Judson Dance Theater: A Collective Speculation presented as part of VW Sunday Sessions on Jan 27, 2019, at MoMA PS1, New York.

Image courtesy MoMA PS1. Photo by Maria Baranova.

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STUDENT UPDATES

Congratulations Class of 2019!

Congratulations to the B.A. class of 2019! In May, the department celebrated the culmination of their work with a B.A. Capstone Symposium. Their works displayed a diverse body of work that explored the intersections of art, politics, and performance. We can't wait to see what's in store for all our graduates!

Performance Studies Ph.D. Candidate James McMaster has accepted the position of Assistant Professor of Gender and Women's Studies and Asian American Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison beginning in Fall 2019.

Spotlight On: Troizel Carr - The PS Spotlights Series highlights students doing exceptional work in their field. This year, we sat down with Ph.D. Candidate, Troizel Carr, to find out more about what brought him to Performance Studies. Troizel completed his M.A. in performance studies and immediately started their Ph.D. Now, he currently holds a teaching fellowship at the New Museum of Contemporary Art. Troizel finds that the tools and modes of analysis used in his performance studies courses have proven helpful in facilitating conversations with the general public about what art does and can do.

Photo courtesy of Raafae Ghory of Troizel at work at the New Museum of Contemporary Art.

B.A. Candidate Akeem Omar Ali and M.A. Candidate Cree Noble organized a series of three teach-ins called "Performance and Protest."

Participants learned how to engage with law enforcement while traveling and strategies for becoming a better ally during protest and performance protest. The department invited accepted students to participate in the second session, which took place in conjunction with Weekend on the Square.

B.A. Candidate Micaela Brinsley served as director for GRYDD, a ProFunds theatrical collaboration between students from Tisch School of the Arts’ Drama, Performance Studies, and Film & Television Departments. GRYDD tells the story of Elyssia Moore, the inventor of a groundbreaking virtual reality game experience called “The GRYDD.” Set in a high brow tech conference, Moore pitches The GRYDD to a group of investors.

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ALUMNI UPDATES

To celebrate the publication of alumni Shane Vogel’s (Ph.D. ’04) new book, Stolen Time: Black Fad Performance and the Calypso Craze, Shane gave an informal discussion about the performances that shape the book. Stolen Time, the first cultural history of the calypso craze, offers a new framework for understanding the cycles of repetition and difference that shape race, entertainment, and mass culture during the Jim Crow era and charts new forms of diasporic exchange between the US and the Caribbean.

Iván Espinosa (M.A. ’18) published his essay “A SKIN THAT SINGS: Movement, Mycelium and Corporeal Choirs,” in NYU’s Center for Experimental Humanities interdisciplinary journal, Caustic Frolic, in February 2019.

Gelsey Bell (M.A. ’05, Ph.D. ’07) was featured in a New York Times article, “The Pleasures and Perils of Reviving a Robert Ashley Opera.” Gelsey discussed her role in the revival of Robert Ashley’s “Improvement (Don Leaves Linda).”

Jessica Nydia Pabón-Colón (Ph.D. ’13) joined Cathy Hannabach on the Image Otherwise podcast to discuss how women graffiti writers perform feminism on the global stage in February 2019.

Branislav Jakovljevic (M.A. ’96, Ph.D. ’02) gave the talk “Madness as a Form of Knowledge: Pavel Karpov’s Creations of the Mentally Ill” as part of the Occasional Series, in March 2019.

Leonie Ettinger (Ph.D. ’16) won a 2018-2019 Outstanding Teaching Award (NYU, College of Arts & Science). She currently teaches in the Department of German Studies.

Lizzie Leopold (M.A. ’10) has accepted a position as the Executive Director of the Dance Studies Association after completing her Ph.D. at Northwestern in 2017. She will also be lecturing in Screendance at the University of Chicago next academic year.

Masi Asare (M.A. '07, Ph.D. '18) received an honorable mention in NYU's UniversityWide Outstanding Dissertation Awards for her dissertation "Voicing the Possible: Technique, Vocal Sound, and Black Women on the Musical Stage."

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Institute of Performing Arts

IPA EVENTS

IPA Spring Speaker Series

In the Spring Semester, IPA hosted a series of speakers in the Black Box Theatre open to all IPA students, faculty and staff. From a Tony Award-winning director, to a financial planner, to a rising theatre critic, the guest speakers offered a wide range of knowledge and experience.

March 6th - A Conversation with Tony Award-winning Director Rebecca Taichman

NEW YORK: Broadway: TONY AWARD 2017 Best Direction, Obie Award and Outer Critics Circle Award for Outstanding Direction: Indecent by Paula Vogel; (Upcoming) The Roundabout: Time and The Conways by JB Priestley; Off-Broadway: MCC: School Girls or The Mean African Girls Play by Jocelyn Bioh; Playwrights Horizons: This Flat Earth by Lindsey Ferrentino; (Previous) Lincoln Center: "How To Transcend A Happy Marriage" by Sarah Ruhl; Playwright's Horizons: Familiar by Danai Guirira; Yale/LaJolla/The Vineyard: Indecent by Paula Vogel; Lincoln Center: The Oldest Boy by Sarah Ruhl; Playwright's Horizons: Stage Kiss by Sarah Ruhl; Gotham Chamber Opera: Rappaccini's Daughter; LCT3: Luck of the Irish by Kirsten Greenidge;Playwrights’ Horizons: Milk Like Sugar by Kirsten Greenidge; Classic Stage Company: Orlando by Sarah Ruhl; Music Theater Group/Gotham Chamber Opera at John Jay: Dark Sisters music by Nico Muhly libretto by Stephen Karam (world premiere); Orpheus by Telemann at New York City Opera; Second Stage: The Scene by Theresa Rebeck; The Ohio Theatre: Menopausal Gentleman (Special Citation Obie Award/world premiere).

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March 13th - Financial Planning for Early Career Artists with Ari Teplitz

Ari Teplitz is an award-winning financial planner focused on empowering artists and arts administrators to achieve their version of financial success. For nearly a decade, Ari has been working with professionals across the theatrical landscape by providing meaningful, personal financial education aimed at making them better financial consumers.

A graduate of the Yale School of Drama, Ari spent many years as a professional fundraiser and producer. During his time working in the arts, Ari grew passionate about eliminating the starving artist trap. He is an advocate for financial independence and helps his clients develop habits that show them the path towards their long-term financial goals.

Ari began his career in finance with New York Life Insurance Company and joined his family practice, the Teplitz Financial Group, four years ago. As an independent financial advisor, Ari believes wholeheartedly that there is no one-size fits all solution and that financial advice and education is the key to long term success.

April 1st - A Conversation with Theatre Critic and Director Sara Holdren

Sara Holdren is a Brooklyn-based director originally from Charlottesville, Virginia, as well as the Artistic Director of Shakespeare Academy @ Stratford and the Artistic Director/co-founder of the theater company Tiltyard. Since July 2017 she has been the theater critic for New York Magazine and Vulture.com. She gravitates towards Shakespeare, Russian theater, reimagined classics, literary adaptation, and spectacular, outsized stories with a sense of humor and an element of the otherworldly to them. Recent projects include Macbeth and The Comedy of Errors with Two River Theater's A Little Shakespeare program, MIDSUMMER (which she co-adapted from the play by William Shakespeare) with Tiltyard, Deer and the Lovers by Emily Zemba, The Zero Scenario by Ryan Campbell, and The Master and Margarita, adapted by Edward Kemp from the novel by Mikhail Bulgakov, as well as serving as the Artistic Director of the 2015 Yale Summer Cabaret, where she directed the original production of MIDSUMMER and Sarah Ruhl's adaptation of Virginia Woolf's Orlando. She holds a BA in Theater from Yale University and an MFA in Directing from Yale School of Drama. She is also a Drama League Fellow, a graduate of the Acting Shakespeare program at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, and the recipient of the 201617 George Jean Nathan Award for Dramatic Criticism.

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Rebecca Taichman with Associate Dean of Tisch Institute of Performing Arts, Sarah Schlesinger and Tisch students.

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Book Banquet

On April 1st, Tisch Institute of Performing Arts held a Book Banquet made possible by a generous donation of approximately 3,000 books from Joel Rubin. The books’ subjects ranged from plays, books on the history of theatre, memoirs, arts management, design for stage or film, to architecture, European history and much more. The books were free and first come, first serve to all Tisch students, faculty and staff. It was an extremely successful event with scores of people leaving with new and unique resources to enhance their interests.

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A NOTE FROM THE DONOR, DR. JOEL E. RUBIN: I started collecting books on the theatre no later than 1944 with the meager earnings from being a lighting designer in Cleveland, notably at Cain Park Theatre (a 3000-seat amphitheater), the Karamu Theatre, and the Cleveland Playhouse.

When my newly-wed wife and I came to New York in 1954 it was principally to gain access to the research materials required for my doctoral dissertation on the development of theatre lighting apparatus in the United States from 1900 to 1950. I was fortunate to join Kliegl Bros. Lighting, an association that lasted 30 years. Kliegl provided equipment to theaters around the world, and travel became a constant in our lives. This allowed browsing in antiquarian bookshops in the various countries visited.

Now looking to pass on a collection that has given me pleasure for some 75 years I thought there is no better way than to offer them to students in the arts.

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Book Banquet

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Tisch Graduate Musical Theatre Writing and Tisch Design for Stage and Film Collaborate to Create The Stonewall Operas

Four half-hour long mini-operas inspired by the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall Riots, a watershed moment in LGBTQ civil rights, had their world premiere at NYU’s Shubert Theatre on May 18, 2019 and within the modernday Stonewall Inn itself on May 19 and 20. The mini-opera performances are part of NYU’s Stonewall at 50 Series, a collection of panels, performances, events, and discussions commemorating the riots and their legacy.

Some of the works were set on the night of the Stonewall uprising; others focus on Stonewall’s impact on societies as disparate as contemporary Ukraine and a post-apocalyptic 2418.

The mini-operas are the fourth entry in the collaboration between Brooklyn contemporary opera producer American Opera Projects and the NYU Tisch Graduate Musical Theatre Writing Program’s “Advanced Opera Lab” in which emerging opera writers compose works based on a historic New York City location.

The operas were performed by professional opera singers Errin Duane Brooks, Brandon Coleman, Sara Couden, Amy Justman, Kathryn Krasovec, Jordan Rutter, Hans Tashjian, and Clayton Williams, each of whom helped the creators develop the operas over the past four months along with music directors Kelly Horsted, Daniel Schlosberg, and Jillian Zack. Horsted and Zack provided piano accompaniment at the performances.

The four 30-minute operas were written and composed by alums of the NYU Tisch School of the Arts’ Graduate Musical Theatre Writing Program, as part of the Advanced Opera Lab led by GMTWP professor Randall Eng with Design Dept. professor Sam Helfrich. The operas are designed by Tisch students from the Design Department and choreographed by students from the Dance Department, directed by students from The New School's College of Performing Arts, and performed by the professional opera singers from American Opera Projects.

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The Stonewall Riots took place in the early hours of June 28, 1969, when New York City police raided the Stonewall Inn, a gay club located in Greenwich Village in New York City. The raid sparked a riot among bar patrons and neighborhood residents as police roughly hauled employees and patrons out of the bar, leading to six days of protests and violent clashes with law enforcement outside the bar on Christopher Street, in neighboring streets and in nearby Christopher Park. The Stonewall Riots served as a catalyst for the gay rights movement in the United States and around the world.

The Opera Lab was started in 2015 by Eng and Helfrich, and is open to both students and alumni. In previous years, the program’s minioperas were created on the subjects of Brooklyn’s historic Fort Greene Park, Judy Chicago’s iconic feminist artwork “The Dinner Party” that is on permanent display at The Brooklyn Museum, and New York City’s International House, which houses and supports international students and entrepreneurs from around the world.

“The Stonewall Riots provide a powerful inspiration for our students in the Opera Lab—both the drama of the moment itself, as well as the extraordinary reverberations that continue to be felt in its wake,” said Eng. “The Stonewall Operas are fantastic examples of the power and versatility of contemporary opera; by looking at this single historic event 50 years in the past, the composers and librettists are wrestling with issues, characters, and situations that speak deeply to them as artists living in the world today. These 30-minute operas imagine what it was like to be at the Stonewall Inn on June 28, 1969; how the legacy of Stonewall impacts people fighting for their rights today; and what it could lead to in the distant future. And to present these works at the Stonewall Inn itself—the air is going to be electric.”

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Tisch Institute of Performing Arts presents a reading of a new musical: Keaton and The Whale

On February 22 nd and 23rd , IPA presented a reading of Keaton and The Whale as the first Family Theatre Event welcoming all Tisch students, faculty, staff and their family members of all ages.

Keaton and The Whale features book and lyrics by Molly Reisman (GMTW alum), book and music by Emily Chiu (GMTW alum), direction by Leora Morris, and features Forest Van Dyke, Ally Bonino, Jonathan Christopher, Jeffrey Johnson and MinJi Kim.

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Meet the loneliest whale in the world.

The Whale has been swimming alone with only his shadow for company since he can remember, until one day, he hears a mysterious voice and immediately falls deeply in love. The Whale sets out to find his soulmate, much to the excitement of Riley, a 13-year old who has been tracking The Whale since she was six. Unfortunately for The Whale, this voice from afar is less of a soulmate and more of a terrible sound installation project of tortured artist, Keaton.

Based on the real-life 52- Hertz Whale, Keaton and The Whale is a show about the universality of loneliness and the power of vulnerability and connection.

The cast of Keaton and The Whale

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IPA Staff Lunch

Tisch Institute of Performing Arts hosted 4th Annual IPA Staff Lunch to celebrate the work of the exceptional IPA Staff. This year we honored Therese Bruck from Tisch Drama, Marie Costanza from Graduate Musical Theatre Writing, Kristin Killacky from Art & Public Policy, Bob Cameron from the Office of Student Affairs, and Joan Maniego from the Office of the Dean for all of their dedication to excellence!

IPA also recognized and celebrated the Office of Student Affairs for their extraordinary work and commitment to the Tisch Community.

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Kathy Engel and Kristin Killacky at the IPA Staff Lunch

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IPA Full Time Faculty Gathering

On April 4th, IPA held the 2nd IPA Full Time Faculty Gathering in the Sons of Normandy Studio in the Dance Department. Full Time Faculty members in attendance caught up with each other and met fellow colleagues over wine and appetizers. After the event, tickets were provided to those who wished to attend the Major Dance Concert in the Jack Crystal Theater.

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IPA Staff Grants 2019

Susan Hamburger - Tisch Dance and Production Susan Hamburger is writing a book tentatively titled Handbook for Dancers, with the intention to help clarify the process of how to selfproduce in the dance and performing arts community. Handbook for Dancers is intended as a basic guide to self-producing one's art including Identifying Theatrical Spaces and Rehearsal Spaces, Working with Collaborators, Technical Riders and Contracts, among many other topics.

Casey O'Neil - Tisch Drama Casey O’Neil, with collaborators Greg Moss - Co-Writer (GMTWP cycle 24) produced The Great Cat Massacre as part of the inaugural year of Pop-sical Off-Broadway Festival. With inventive staging, catchy songs, and outrageous humor, The Great Cat Massacre is a rollicking trunk show in which the status quo is turned upside down as cats are turned inside out! The Great Cat Massacre is a tale about classism, sexism, and what happens when rich Parisians choose to believe alternative facts with eager hysteria. Set in the 1700's, this show follows two apprentice printers who convince their neighbors that their beloved cats are possessed by demons. The resulting slaughter is the worst event of feline history.

Michael Doshier – Design for Stage and Film Michael Doshier continues to expand the experience of his musical alter-ego Johnny Darlin, which, with the help of his IPA Staff Grant, now takes the form of a full band. This is a departure from his solo keytar performances which tended to get booked in underground theatre spaces. Now, with the band, they've moved into live music venues and have already played Pianos, Bowery Electric, and Rockwood Music Hall. Most recently, Michael filmed a music video for his song “Way with Words” in a Methodist church in Arkansas, featuring drag queen and Miss Gay Arkansas Chloe Jacobs. It was funded in part by his IPA Staff Grant and is screening at the My True Colors Film Festival on June 29th as part of Pride month. It can be seen at johnnydarlin.com.

“Way With Words”

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Lisa Joseph - Tisch Drama Lisa Joseph is in the final stretch of filming interviews for her documentary short about African-American actors and production members working in the television industry, varying from children's TV to dramas. In her exploration of the subject, she aims to show the juxtaposition of onscreen 1980s-2000s racial diversity with the unfortunate behind-the-scenes politics that filter within.

Craig Foisy - Open Arts Craig Foisy has completed a multimedia documentary project he has been working on about a 77 year old “sewing artist” named Marie Antoinettte from Woodstock, NY, and creating “wearable art” in a ramshackle shop. Tentatively titled MARIE ANTOINETTE, THE MAFIA & THE BUDDHA, the piece is a hybrid work of documentary film, photography and textile design. The next stage of the process will be to convert the large images into textiles prints.

Genevieve Hoeler - Dance Genevieve Hoeler is creating a dance/theater piece that explores the inner lives of three Shakespeare heroines: : Katharina from "The Taming of the Shrew," Viola from "Twelfth Night," and Ophelia from "Hamlet." She previously created and performed one part of this trilogy, "Kate," for the Rochester Fringe Festival in September, and is currently developing the two other parts of the piece. This project will be developed through workshop rehearsal, sound design, and research for script adaptation.

Danny Haengil Larsen– Graduate Musical Theatre Writing Danny Haengil Larsen will be producing a concert version of “Cloaked” a musical psychological thriller with music & lyrics by Danny Haengil Larsen, book & lyrics by Michelle Elliott and directed by Brandon Ivie. “Cloaked” is a musical psychological thriller in which people who are yearning for human connection turn to the internet in search of fulfillment. The show follows the lives of Tanner, a cop specializing in internet crimes against children; November, a too-smart-for-her-own-good 14 year-old girl who was abused by her parents and now lives in a foster home; and Janice, a psychotherapist who has neglected her own needs, on their quest to find something – anything – to fill the canyon of emptiness inside themselves. As their online worlds collide with reality, identities blur, hidden desires are revealed and the darkness of the human heart gains an all-consuming power.

Holly Grace Gaddy - Tisch Drama Holly Grace Gaddy will record her piano compositions in a professional studio with a live violinist to then be digitally mastered for sharing across multiple platforms. Upon completion, Holly’s long-term vision is to collaborate with local artists and choreographers to construct performance art pieces utilizing the compositions.

Marie Costanza – Graduate Musical Theatre Writing Marie Costanza worked with an editor to complete a developmental edit as the next step in the writing of her novel.

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Therese Bruck - Tisch Drama Therese Bruck, Asa Thorton, and Kim Parkman led the 2nd Annual Installment of “The Real Cost of Clothing� an interactive performance art installation. Its purpose was to draw attention to the clothing industry's impact on the work force, the environment, and the economy.

Additionally, the installment was scheduled on March 25th to coincide with other events commemorating the anniversary of the Triangle Shirt Factory Fire. The goal of the installation was to enlighten and engage the participant and passersby to really think about the product they are buying, who made it, who benefited from its purchase, and how it affects the environment both in the making of the textile, and the garment when it is no longer needed.

The Real Cost of Clothing

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Joe McGowan - Tisch Drama Joe will be traveling to Norwich, England to attend a teacher training course in Literature and Drama in Language Teaching at the Norwich Institute of Language Education. In addition to Joe’s work at Tisch, he teaches English as a Second Language to international students — both in NY and abroad. Last summer he traveled to the United Kingdom and taught English to students from all over the world and he has taught newly-arrived immigrants with the NYC Board of Education.

Amy Burgess – Graduate Musical Theatre Writing Amy Burgess will be putting up a concert of songs from her new musical "This Is Not For You" a live cabaret evening in which 5 characters hold a funeral for the Patriarchy. Set in a utopian future, the characters "eulogize" patriarchal systems of oppression through song and monologue, recounting the Patriarchy's hold on the world for 2,000 years through to its glorious fall at the hands of those it was created to oppress. Music by Amy Burgess, words by Sara Cooper and directed by Dev Bondarin.

Greg D. Chan - Tisch Drama Greg Chan, in collaboration with Byron Easely (Tisch Drama) are researching forms of oppression and trauma experienced by displaced New Yorkers for an immersive project blending art activism, dance performance and Virtual Reality. Through the immersive experience Greg hopes to communicate the fears and struggles of the displaced, as well as the loss of culture and identity of gentrified / actively gentrifying neighborhoods by placing the viewer in the center of a silent war against New York's most disadvantaged.

Jennifer Fisher - Graduate Acting Jennifer Fisher participated in Joan Scheckel’s Feeling Lab in New York City to further research for a full-length play. As a first step towards creating a full-length play with music, Jennifer is finishing a 30-40 minute one woman show told in the form of letters sent home to America.

Kat Tharp - Tisch Drama Kat Tharp and Dan Soule will continue their Scenic Arts workshop series. This workshop will be devoted to Mold making and Casting. It will be developed by us in conjunction with a professional scenic artist. The goal is to expose students to a selection of new and classic scenic art techniques used by professional scenic artists, and give them the knowledge and confidence to begin to utilize those techniques in the creation of their own performing arts pieces while following best practices.

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Tisch Institute of Performing Arts "Students of Color Mentorship Program"

The Tisch IPA Students of Color Mentorship Program continued to meet monthly. The Spring Semester meetings included conversations about childhood experiences with artists of color and representation as compared to current experiences, and for the final meeting, a show & tell where students shared what they had worked on this academic year.

The Program is committed to providing a welcoming, forward-focused environment for mentorship, fellowship and the sharing of experiences among faculty of color, staff of color, and students of color from all departments based on a common rising passion around the intersection of race, heritage and culture within the performing arts. Each monthly event is held on a different day of the week to accommodate varying class schedules, and is planned and led by an individual faculty mentor or group of faculty mentors with an eye towards reflecting the diversity of the Tisch IPA faculty and student body.

The success of any mentorship program hinges on the quality of its participants, and though the students and faculty who have attended this year have been an extraordinary group, new members are very much encouraged to join. Any students of color, faculty of color or staff of color interested in participating should feel free to contact Hali Alspach at tisch.ipa@nyu.edu.

“Show & Tell�

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IPA Ticket Initiative

In its fifth successful year, the IPA Ticket Initiative has continued to send classes within the IPA to shows all over Manhattan, Brooklyn and a few outside New York!

This semester IPA funded the attendance of Conduct of Life, Uncle Romeo and Vanya Juliet, Bernhardt/Hamlet, The Jungle, Measure for Measure, Tinga Tinga Tales, The Prisoner, “Call to Action! Grabbing Pussy/Parts Known”, Carmen, Good Grief, Gloria, A Life, Malala at BAM, Halfway to Dawn at BAM, Brooklyn Museum, Alvin Ailey, New Museum, Blue Ridge, The Light,, Fabulation, WTF: A Political Cabaret, White Noise, King Kong, Suicide Forest, Polylogues, Venezuela, All My Sons, Hadestown, Cradle Will Rock, The Mother, King Lear, Martha Graham at Joyce Theater, Emerge at Gibney, Intelligence, Be More Chill, Complexions, NYCB, The Trial of the Catonsville Nine, Sea Wall/A Life, Julius Caesar, The Irene Sharaff Awards, and Benny and Joon.

Continuing IPA’s collaboration with Skirball, this semester IPA funded the attendance of Elevator Repair Service: Gatz, Adam, 10,000 Gestures, and the Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Company.

Hilary Rosenfeld, Therese Bruck and a student group heading out to attend the 2019 Irene

Sharafff Awards.

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Dean Allyson Green

Associate Dean of the Institute of Performing Arts Sarah Schlesinger Program Coordinator, Institute of Performing Arts Danny Larsen Program Coordinator, Institute of Performing Arts Hali Alspach

Institute of Performing Arts Tisch School of the Arts 715 Broadway, New York, NY 10003 Second Floor, Room 267 212-998-1654

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