Visual Creativity for Stage Students will develop an understanding of color, line, form, shape, texture, and balance as they apply to historical and current theatrical literature. Projects in figure drawing, charcoal and chalk, watercolor painting, and model making are intended to stretch the student's research ability, artistic imagination, critical-analysis, and presentation skills. The class is designed for all students interested in the visual and the performing arts and serves as an introduction to set, costume, and light design. 25 hours of production lab work will be assigned in class.

Acting I: Beginning Acting Rigorous physical and psychophysical exercises attempt to break through the cultural and psychological barriers that inhibit an open responsiveness to impulses, to the environment, and to others. Attempt is made to free personal response within improvised scenes and, eventually, within the narrative structure of a naturalistic scene. Attention is given to various theories of acting technique. Students are expected to audition for departmental shows.

Scenic Design I: Beginning Exploration and development of basic set design skills for theatre and dance. Class projects will introduce the student to sketching, sculpting, script analysis, and presentation skills. The design projects will challenge the student's imagination and creativity through historical and current theatrical literature, the study of artistic movements in theatre, concept development, and research. In addition, students will work on productions in order to understand better how theory relates to practice. 25 hours of production lab work will be assigned in class.

Lighting Design I: Beginning This course examines historical and present lighting theories, theatrical artistic movements, and theatrical literature, leading to the planning and conceptual development of the lighting plot. Class projects will also introduce the student to sketching, painting, sculpture, script analysis, and presentation skills. In addition, students will work on productions in order to understand better how theory relates to practice. 25 hours of production lab work will be assigned in class/

In preparing a fully produced theatrical production for the stage, students will participate in and be exposed to professional production practices in all areas of theatrical design, including sets, costumes, props, lights, and sound. Students will be involved in planning, building, painting, constructing, and running and striking of shows. More advanced students may speak to the professors about taking on special projects, but those with little or no experience backstage are very much encouraged to participate. 8 hrs. lab

History of Western Dress: 1300-Present This course will address the changing ways in which societies have clothed the human body since the phenomenon of fashion in Western dress began during the late Middle Ages. Slides, readings, and video clips will be used to examine the ways in which evolving styles of dress reflect the social and political values of a society.

Spring Production Studio: Design In preparing two fully produced theatrical productions for the stage, students will participate in and be exposed to professional production practices in all areas of theatrical design, including sets, costumes, props, lights, and sound. Students will be involved in planning, building, painting, constructing, and running and striking of shows. More advanced students may speak to the professors about taking on special projects, but those with little or no experience backstage are very much encouraged to participate. 8 hrs. lab

Acting II: Voice for the Actor Using the Linklater technique for the voice, students will study the physiological foundations of voice and alignment. By means of interrelated physical and vocal exercises, students will discover ways of changing patterns that restrict a full range of physical and vocal expressiveness. Students will study and present passages from Shakespeare to explore ways in which their new physical and vocal skills may be used to express a greater range of intellectual and emotional understanding.

Costume Design I: Beginning This introductory course will explore the art and practice of costume design for the theatre. Topics will include the psychology of dress, play-script and character analysis, concept development, historical period research, figure drawing, and fabric considerations. Evaluation will be conducted through critique, class discussions and design presentations to the class. In this course we will not be discussing fashion design or project runway and we will not be discussing sewing techniques.

Contemporary Women+ Playwrights In this course we will read and discuss the work of influential contemporary American playwrights from the late twentieth century to the present. Authors will include Maria Irene Fomes, Ntozake Shange, Lynn Nottage, Larissa Fasthorse, Martyna Majok, and others. Issues of race, class, and gender will be closely examined. Readings will include selections from performance and feminist theory.

Theatre History Using the dramatic text as the primary focus, this course will chart the progression of theatre from its ritualistic origins to the advent of modern drama. This survey will include an overview of theatrical architecture, the evolution of design and acting styles, and the introduction of the director. Since theatre does not exist in a void, a consideration of the social, cultural, political, and scientific milieu of each era studied will be included in the course. 2 1/

Fall Production Studio: Acting The cast works as part of a company interpreting, rehearsing, and performing a play. Those receiving credit can expect to rehearse four to six nights a week. Appropriate written work is required. Participation in the course is determined by auditions held the previous term.

Directing I: Beginning As a group, students will analyze one or two plays to discover the process involved in preparing a script for production. Attention will be given to production and design concepts, textual values, auditions, rehearsals, and the structuring of a performance in time and space. Students will also cast and direct one or more scenes to be worked on and performed in class. The practical work is combined with written analysis.

Playwriting I: Beginning The purpose of the course is to gain a theoretical and practical understanding of writing for the stage. Students will read, watch, and analyze published plays, as well as work by their peers, but the focus throughout will remain on the writing and development of original work.

Spring Production Studio: Acting The cast works as part of a company, interpreting, rehearsing, and performing a play. Those receiving credit can expect to rehearse four to six nights a week. Appropriate written work is required. Participation in the course is determined by auditions held during the term prior to the performance.

Contemporary Latinx Playwrights In this course we will investigate Chicana/o/x and Latina/o/x artistic activism since the 1960s in the works of playwrights such as Luis Valdez, Josefina Baéz, John Leguizamo, and Guadalís Del Carmen. In alternating in-person and online meetings, we will engage with scripts as diverse in aesthetic approach as they are in societal concerns (including misrepresentation, unfair labor practices, gender roles, immigration, and colorism). Conversations with guest artists will enhance readings about historical events that inspired theatrical challenges to the status quo. Creative responses to the materials will strengthen critical interpretive skills including production dramaturgy, performance, and design.

The Plays of Station Eleven This course will provide a study of theatrical literature through an interrogation of the specific ways live performance and the human body inform meaning in text-based theatre. We will begin with a reading of the novel Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel, the plot of which centers around a traveling troupe of actors performing plays after a plague. After studying the novel and subsequent television series, we will begin a deep reading of the plays depicted within the story, including Shakespeare’s King Lear and Hamlet. Following these tragedies, we will read modern plays that explore different forms, themes, styles, and methods of theatre-making, again led by the evocations of post-pandemic performance. Contemporary plays will include Jonathan Payne’s The Revolving Cycles Truly and Steadily Roll’d, Tom Stoppard’s Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead, Liz Duffy Adams’ Dog Act, Anne Washburn’s Mr. Burns, a Post-Electric Play, Caridad Svich’s Twelve Ophelias, and Sarah Ruhl’s Passion Play.

Directing and Creating: Textual Work and Devised Work In recent years the disciplines of directing ‘text-based’ theatre and of creating (or devising) a theatre piece without an initial reliance on a text have built shared approaches to material. Devised work may be composed through vocal or physical improvisation, created through interviews, or collaged from various sources, a text may emerge during the process. Text-based theatre is more traditional in its impetus, but the process of fleshing out a text can be very similar to creating without a text.  In this course we will approach both forms of theatre, creating and directing pieces in many forms, and viewing works. Readings include The Viewpoints Book, The Active Text, and The Frantic Assembly Book of Devising Theatre. The course is suggested for actors and designers as well as directors and may be used to fulfill a requirement for senior work in directing or devising. This course is not open to students who have taken THEA 0237 or THEA 0324.

Out on Stage: US Gay and Lesbian Drama In this course we will study US American gay and lesbian plays from the 1930s through the present day. Our journey will illuminate key moments in the history of homosexuality in the United States: from the dramatization of closetedness and “the love that dares not speak its name” to the Gay Liberation Movement, the AIDS epidemic, and, lastly, the emergence of queer and transgender identities. Students will learn how to analyze the dramatic text as pre-text to a fully embodied event in front of an audience. To that end, in addition to approaching the plays through the lens of theatre praxis, we will watch recorded performances and cinematic adaptations. Secondary readings and research will illuminate the ways in which the works respond to specific historical contexts.

Contemporary Native American Playwrights In this course we will study plays and productions by contemporary Native American, First Nations, and Canadian Métis playwrights such as Mary Katherine Nagle, Larissa Fasthorse, Drew Hayden Taylor, and Monique Mojica. We will engage with scripts that reflect Indigenous resistance to settler colonialism, challenge harmful stereotypes, reclaim cultures, traditions, and languages, and celebrate survivance. Conversations with guest artists will enhance readings of critical theory and history that situate theatre as a tool for healing, transformation, sovereignty, and the future of Indigeneity.

African American Drama In this course we will respectfully investigate African American performance and theatre history since the late 19th century by exploring works of playwrights such as W.E.B. Du Bois, Zora Neale Hurston, Amira Baraka, Adrienne Kennedy, August Wilson, and Brandon Jacobs-Jenkins. We will also engage with theoretical essays by Alain Locke, Henry Louis Gates, Jr., Patricia Hill Collins and more, that illuminate how, despite centuries of lethal stereotyping, the stage has been and continues to be a forum for self-representation, unification, resistance, and liberation. Guest artists will provide firsthand accounts in conversation with the students. Dramaturgical and critical responses to the materials will strengthen production interpretation and design skills.

Acting III: Scene and Monologue Study Designed primarily for majors who have had experience on stage or have otherwise demonstrated a serious interest in performance. The skills introduced in Acting I and Acting II are given intensive application to different kinds of dramatic texts, primarily realistic in nature. Attention will be given to expanding the performer's range of emotional and intellectual expressiveness.

Playwriting II: Advanced For students with experience writing short scripts or stories, this workshop will provide a support structure in which to write a full-length stage play. We will begin with extended free and guided writing exercises intended to help students write spontaneously and with commitment. Class discussions will explore scene construction, story structure, and the development of character arc. (ENAM 0170 or THEA/CRWR 0218 or FMMC/CRWR 0218; by approval) 2 1/

Costume Design II: Advanced In this course we will continue exploration of costume design and figure illustration. Design projects will focus on the further development of students' graphic and conceptual abilities. A range of work will be encountered, including modern dress, period realism, and fantasy.

Acting and Directing for the Camera In this advanced workshop we will focus on the relationship between actors and directors in the context of live action media production (film, television, advertising, web series). Students will gain practical knowledge of actor-director engagement and insight into both facets of this process. Students will also analyze produced screenplays, practice actor-director communication, and direct and perform for the camera. All students will take turns fulfilling the roles of director and performer, culminating in recording and editing workshopped scenes.

Acting IV: Styles of Acting The course will expose students to the rigorous physical, vocal, mental, and emotional demands of "non-naturalistic" acting, beginning with the Greeks, continuing through Shakespeare, Restoration, the eighteenth century, and ending with contemporary absurdist playwrights. Emphasis is first upon an intellectual understanding of the texts, then upon their fullest physical, vocal, and emotional expression. The course is designed for students who have had some prior stage experience.

Twentieth/Twenty-first Century Performance Aesthetics This course is an intensive exploration of the evolution of the theory and practice of theatrical experimentation in the 20th and 21st centuries. The Modernist movement irrevocably altered the artist’s relationship to the social, and political order. The ramifications of this change will be addressed throughout the course, with particular emphasis on Brecht, Artaud, and Grotowski. Students will write papers and give presentations on the work of such contemporary artists as Peter Brook, DV8, Robert Wilson, Ariane Mnouchkine, Complicite and Jerzy Grotowski.

Senior Independent Project Senior work is required. In consultation with their advisors, theatre majors may propose a THEA 0700 Independent Project. Preliminary proposal forms approved by the student's advisor will be submitted to the program by March 1st of the preceding academic year for those wanting credit in the fall or winter terms and by October 1st for those wanting credit in the spring term. Projects will conform to the guidelines that are available in the theatre office. Students are required to attend a weekly THEA 0500/0700 seminar.

Senior Work: Joint Majors in Theatre and English & American Literatures Approval required.

Introduction to Digital Media In this course students will develop an understanding of how projections can be integrated into the theatrical space. This course is an exploration into projection design and digital media production. We’ll examine the art, tools and craft of projection design as it relates to live performance. Current practices, equipment, programming, mapping, and masking will all be covered.

Couture Costume In this hands-on course, students will work on one costume project from concept to execution. Before the start of term, inspiration images and sketches detailing proposed project are expected so that sewing patterns can be provided. The design should be for the whole body and can be anything from formalwear to historical reproduction; casual, sports, and daywear excluded. Skills covered: pattern alteration, couture construction and finishing, working with difficult materials, and fitting techniques. Intermediate to advanced sewing skills, i.e. basic hand and machine sewing, work with sewing patterns (commercial or your own), and have constructed several garments.

Mexican Revolution/Revelation Using theatrical workshop techniques, students in this interdisciplinary will explore the socio-political-economic history, literature, music, dance, graphic art and architecture that reflect the period of time commonly known as the Mexican revolution. The course will consist of both academic research as well as dramatic and musical performance. The work will center around adapting scenes for the theater from Mariano Azuela’s novel of the revolution Los de Abajo. Students will study, contextualize and incorporate various elements of Mexican folk music into these scenes.  The course will culminate in a dramatic presentation of the work.

Speaking from the Stage: Hearing from Contemporary Playwrights In this course we will explore, through reading, films, and personal performance, a selection of plays (scripted, verbatim, devised) from a range of women and women-identifying writers for the theatre. The focus of the work is both an examination in form and content of the works’ diversity, and an accompanying analysis of any thematic and formal similarities. Course reading highlights texts of the plays accompanied by historical/theoretical readings. Students will produce two brief pieces of written work, one creative and one comparative. Playwrights will include Adrienne Kennedy, Betty Shamieh, Caridad Svich, Aleshea Harris, Naomi Wallace, Martyna Majok, Jazzmun Nichcala Crayton, Lauren Yee, and Dipika Guha.

Alexander Draper

Carol Wood

Cheryl Faraone

Claudio Medeiros

Courtney Smith

Craig Maravich

Dana Yeaton

Gerald Boddie

Ioana Uricaru

James Dunn

Julia Proctor

Mark Evancho

Matthew Saldivar

Michole Biancosino

Mira Veikley

Olga Sanchez Saltveit

Summer Jack

Read 26 reviews for Theatre courses at Middlebury College. Find the best Theatre professors and courses.  Discover your new major today!

It was a generally easy course if you fully buy in. It was definitely a step outside the comfort zone, but if you take the class with a friend, it makes it much easier. There is minimal homework, but you will perform skits in class. 

Mark can be a bit rambly, but otherwise super friendly. The class focuses primarily on intro drawing skills, with only a minor focus on actual theatre (not counting the actual theatre lab hours you need to do). The work is generally easy.

I took this course as a schedule filler. I was pleasantly surprised when I showed up and was told that all tests are take home. The only two major assignments you have are a research paper, and an applied project with another paper. Besides those two massive assignments the rest of the class is a breeze. 