2023-2024 College Catalog

Theatre Arts, Bachelor of Arts

Faculty: Barbara Kahl, Malissa Kano-White (Chair); Marc Shaw 

Adjunct Faculty: Gary Burlew; Kathryn T. Smith

Major
Theatre Arts

Minor
Theatre Arts

About

Hartwick’s Department of Theatre Arts engages undergraduate students in the creative, intellectual, and experiential practice of theatre within a liberal arts education. We prepare students to become versatile theatre practitioners equipped with the knowledge, skills, and experience to pursue careers as independent and collaborative artists capable of pursuing advanced education, working in the performing arts and/or allied professions.

In Hartwick’s student-centered program, students are actively involved in all aspects of theatre performance and production through the 2-3 main stage productions and 2-8 student directed Lab productions produced annually. Students gain real world experience by providing technical support for visiting professional theatre and dance companies.

Outstanding student work may be nominated for presentation at the annual Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival (KCACTF). Past Hartwick students have won regional and national KCACTF awards in Scenic, Media, and Poster design. New plays premiered at Hartwick have gone on to receive Regional and National recognition; most notable were Ghost Dance, written for Hartwick by Nobel Laureate Derek Walcott—a KCACFT Region II winner, and student Rob Shimko’s Specks, the co-winner of the KCACTF Michael Kanin National Short Play Award and Chase O’Neill, co-winner of the KCACTF Region I of the Short Play Award and creator of the original musical There Be Dragons scheduled to open Off-Broadway in June of 2022.

Theatre Arts graduates have gone on to…

  • Graduate school at Yale school of Drama, University of Missouri Kansas City and NYU Tisch graduate school for Musical Theatre and Dramatic Writing programs.
  • Work for Juilliard, Smithsonian Discovery Theatre, MSNBC TV, the Vineyard Theatre (NYC), Adirondack Scenic Studios, Manhattan Children’s Theatre, Glimmerglass Opera, Portland Stage, and the Theatre Development Fund.