2008–2009 Theatre Courses
First-Year Studies: Costume Design
Level: FYS
Semester: FYS
What is costume? In an attempt to answer this question, First-Year Studies in Costume Design has a weekly meeting in the history and theories behind costume and a second weekly meeting in the actual process of costume design and execution. Our first sessions of the week will look at costume itself more intently. Each week, we will look at costume from a different perspective. Some of the topics we will explore: body perception based on undergarments through history; the impact of political events on fashion; cultural taboos—West and East don’t meet; fashion and women’s rights; the relationship between fashion and costume design for the theatre; the difference in costume for theatre or ritual or office; and gender identity and costume. Your conference work will probably develop from one of these inquiries. In our second weekly sessions, your “hands-on” practice of costume design will introduce you to the basics needed to design and execute costume for theatre. From making concept sketches, to talking with directors, to threading a needle then using it, to doing fittings with actors, to making a costume book for a production, we will look at and practice all aspects of costume design. We will use plays drawn from your theatre history class as the basis for these exercises. Our goals are (in history and theory) to develop the critical skills to read and examine costume history, from both textual and visual sources, and (in process) to define the responsibilities of the costume designer as part of the collaborative production team, to learn the basic skills needed to function as an off-Broadway designer and beyond, and to develop your ability to communicate your ideas both visually and verbally. In choosing this course, you are choosing to be a Theatre Third. This means that in addition to your costume courses, you are also required to take Gateway to Theatre, which introduces you to theatre history and technology, and come to the monthly theatre forum. All first-year students in theatre are required to do this. You also must do thirty hours of technical work each semester, which can be in costume. It is strongly suggested that you have an interest in theatre if you choose this course as your first-year study, as you will be spending a great deal of time in the Theatre department, and hopefully, some of that time will be down in the costume shop.
Students taking theatre at Sarah Lawrence for the first time enroll in components that include Gateway to Theatre, two courses that introduce them to the history of theatre and to a wide range of technical theatre skills. Students are also required to complete thirty hours of technical work each semester.
Theatre Forum
Level: Open
Semester: Year
Required of all students taking a Theatre Third (including First-Year Studies with Carol Pelletier). We meet once a month (Tuesdays at 2 p.m.) to explore current topics in the theatre and meet leading professionals in the field.
Gateway to Theatre
Both courses listed here are required for students new to the Theatre program.
Gateway to Theatre: History and Histrionics: The Theatre Through Time
Level: Open
Semester: Year
Required of all students new to the Theatre program. This course is designed to give students an overview of major periods in world theatre. We will explore theatre as both a product of its time and place and of the vision of individual playwrights. Through a combination of lecture and discussion, students should emerge with access to the major idioms of dramatic writing. This class meets once a week.
Acting
The Actor in Action
Level: Open
Semester: Year
Students taking this course are required to also take Movement for the Stage (see below). This workshop will translate the actor’s imagination into stage action by building one’s performance vocabulary. The class engages students’ essential self by expanding their craft through a wide-ranging set of training techniques. This course is a required prerequisite for all students wanting to take acting classes at Sarah Lawrence. This class meets twice a week.
Movement for the Stage
Level: Open
Semester: Year
Required for students taking The Actor in Action. This is a beginning-level movement class for anyone interested in performance. Daily warm-ups and movement exercises will lead to moving through space and movement invention. Later we will explore the integration of text and movement composition for the theatre. As a requirement of the class in the fall semester there will be a unique opportunity to observe rehearsals and/or performances of Mr. Neumann’s professional engagements in New York City (more details to follow). This class meets once a week.
Singing Workshop
Level: Open
Semester: Year
We will explore an actor’s performance with songs and various styles of popular music, music for theatre, cabaret, and original work emphasizing communication with the audience and material selection. Dynamics of vocal interpretation and style also will be examined. This class requires enrollment in a weekly voice lesson and an Alexander Technique class. Class members will be selected by audition during registration week. This class meets once a week.
The Theatre of Mask
Level: Open
Semester: Spring
This course is a hands-on exploration of the potent expressions and creative springboards inherent in the making and performing of theatrical masks. Using neutral and character masks provided by Mr. Olsen, as well as those created by the participants, the class will explore the dynamics of gesture, body language, and the full range of situations evoked by the masks. Explorations will include creation of masks and vignettes that are both stageworthy and representative of an artistic point of view. This class meets once a week.
Acting Conference
Level: Intermediate
Semester: Year
This is an intensive scene class that focuses on the relationship of text, dramatic actions, and the actor’s need to discover personal performance experience and knowledge of diverse global forms and styles of theatre. Classes will connect physical and vocal work with the immediacy of needs, events, and character. Video will be used and differences between stage and film performances will be explored. Emphasis will be placed on building technique and range, and on refocusing acting habits and definitions. New plays by contemporary and international playwrights will form the basis of cold readings and auditioning techniques. Scene work will proceed step-by-step from the first breakdown of text to the needs of the performer. This class meets once a week.
Comedy Styles and Performance
Level: Intermediate
Semester: Year
This is a scene study class for students interested in the great comedy traditions in theatrical history. In the first semester, students will work on Greek comedy, commedia dell’arte, French farce, and Restoration comedy. The second semester begins with the British style of Noël Coward and Oscar Wilde but is devoted to modern American playwrights. The great comedies of the 1930’s and 40’s as well as current Broadway and off-Broadway writers become the focus of this semester’s scene study. This class meets twice a week.
Comedy Workshop
Level: Intermediate
Semester: Year
This is an exploration of the individual’s comic voice and the classic structures of comedy. It begins with a focus on improvisation and ensemble. Theatre games, status play, storytelling, and the Harold Exercise develop the artist’s freedom and confidence. The second semester introduces students to commedia dell’arte characterization, vaudeville comic and straight partnering, political satire, and parody. The workshop produces a Comedy Night at the end of the year. Each student performs five minutes of stand-up comedy in a club atmosphere. This class meets twice a week.
Contemporary Scene Study
Level: Intermediate
Semester: Year
Two-character scenes by modern American playwrights will form the basis of intensive acting work. By focusing on techniques of script analysis and how they relate to examination of objectives, given circumstances and obstacles, students will be given practical methods for unlocking contemporary texts. This class meets once a week.
Creating a Role
Level: Intermediate
Semester: Year
It is a sanctum of discovery enabling the actor to explore non-Western movement: centering energy, concentration, the voice, and the “mythos” of a character to discover one’s own truth in relation to the text, contemporary as well as the classics. Traditional as well as alternative approaches to acting techniques are applied. Fall semester: concentrates on working on roles such as Hamlet, Leontes, Caliban, Othello, Lear, Macbeth, Hecuba, Medea, Antigone, and Lady Macbeth. Spring semester: applied to scene study from such works by Arrabal, Beckett, Ionesco, Maria Irene Fornes, Sam Shepard, Albert Camus, and Jean Genet. This class meets twice a week.
Improvisation Laboratory
Level: Intermediate
Semester: Year
Using experimental exercises and improvisation, we will explore the character’s connections to his or her environment, relationships, needs, and wants. In the second semester, we will concentrate on fashioning a workable technique as well as on using improvisation to illuminate scene work from the great dramatic playwrights: Lorca, Chekhov, Strindberg, O’Neill, Shaw, etc. Available to students who are willing to approach material experimentally in a laboratory setting. This class meets twice a week.
Improvisation Techniques
Level: Intermediate
Semester: Spring
Great art comes from using oneself. If theatre is a way of knowing oneself, improvisation energizes that process. This course is for actors who are willing to personalize, place their characters in dangerous situations, play strong objectives, and then move on. A conscious way to reach the unconscious. We will approach the material experimentally in a laboratory setting twice a week. Available to students who are willing to act with and without text.
Acting for the Camera
Level: Advanced
Semester: Fall
We will focus on basic principles of camera acting, script analysis (using both original and published works), understanding character and type, comprehension, and creative construction of a solid foundation for camera work. The methodology is Meisner based. The second half of each semester will be dedicated to putting a film scene on its feet within, but not constrained by, the specific parameters of the camera lens. This class meets twice a week. One-semester course: separate fall and spring sections.
Acting for the Camera
Level: Advanced
Semester: Spring
We will focus on basic principles of camera acting, script analysis (using both original and published works), understanding character and type, comprehension, and creative construction of a solid foundation for camera work. The methodology is Meisner based. The second half of each semester will be dedicated to putting a film scene on its feet within, but not constrained by, the specific parameters of the camera lens. This class meets twice a week. One-semester course: separate fall and spring sections.
Acting the Poetic Text
Level: Advanced
Semester: Year
The emotional, vocal, and physical demands of acting in poetic plays are extreme. In order to rise to the challenge of performing in such works, the actor’s instrument must be capable of expressing poetry. The objectives of this course are to explore various techniques designed to tap and release the actor’s raw passion, to develop the physical stamina necessary to perform poetic text, and to work toward creating a performance vocabulary appropriate to the scale of poetic text. Particular attention will be paid to honing the skills necessary to speak complex language with clarity and precision. We will begin with the works of Shakespeare and move backward and forward in time, depending on the composition and the specific needs of the class. The course culminates in a performance project. This class meets twice a week.
Acting Shakespeare
Level: Advanced
Semester: Spring
“O, for a muse of fire!” No playwright in history created more dramatic roles or combustible language than Shakespeare. He did so through some simple techniques that he communicated to his actors in a code they understood and he embedded in his scripts. In this course, we will learn some of that code and use his techniques to ignite his words, using Romeo and Juliet and Hamlet as our primary texts. This class meets twice a week.
An Intuitive and Impulsive Exploration of Text: A Useful Tool for Actors and Directors
Level: Advanced
Semester: Year
This course strives to release the creativity of each student through intuitive and impulsive responses to text—primarily plays, film scripts, and poems—and to discover the practical uses of this approach to acting and directing in theatre and film. The participants will do exercises, scene work, and a year-end performance with a view toward increasing their ease, imagination, spontaneity, and power. Although physically demanding and largely visceral, the course work will provide an enlarged intellectual and conceptual understanding of acting and performance. This class meets twice a week.
Auditioning
Level: Advanced
Semester: Spring
A study of the skills necessary for a successful audition. Actors will practice cold readings and prepare monologues to performance level. Emphasis will be placed on how best to present oneself in an audition situation. Class size is limited. This class meets once a week.
Breaking the Code
Level: Advanced
Semester: Year
A specific, text-driven approach to performance based on identifying, analyzing, and exploiting particular attributes common to characters in all plays. This class provides a foundation and a context for the most vital and decisive characterizations. Students will read, discuss, and act scenes from contemporary plays and adaptations. This class meets twice a week.
Voice and Movement
Note: students taking acting courses must take a voice or breathing course in their first or second year of such courses.
Breathing Coordination for the Performer
Level: Open
Semester: Year
Students will improve their vocal power and ease through an understanding of basic breathing mechanics and principles of speech. Utilizing recent discoveries of breathing coordination, performers can achieve their true potential by freeing their voices, reducing tension, and increasing concentration and stamina. Students will consolidate their progress by performing pieces in their field (theatre, dance, music, etc.) in a supportive atmosphere. This class meets once a week.
Introduction to Stage Combat
Level: Open
Semester: Year
Students will learn the basics of unarmed stage fighting with an emphasis on safety. Actors will be taught to create effective stage violence, from hair pulling and choking to kicking and punching, with a minimum of risk. Basic techniques will be incorporated into short scenes to give students experience performing fights in classic and modern contexts. This class meets once a week.
Linklater Voice Training
Level: Open
Semester: Year
Students will begin to open the channels of communication as physical and psychological tensions release. Using technical and imagistic exercises, students will open their connection to breath, develop resonance and range, increase sensitivity to their creative impulse, and strengthen their voice. There are two separate sections (and times) for this course, and each meets once a week.
Advanced Stage Combat
Level: Intermediate
Semester: Fall
A continuation of the training in Introduction to Stage Combat. Students progress to additional weapons and styles, including small sword, knife, and rapier/ dagger. This class meets once a week.
Prerequisite: Introduction to Stage Combat or by interview with the instructor.
Alexander Technique
Level: Intermediate
Semester: Year
The Alexander Technique is a neuromuscular system that re-educates and enables the student to identify and change poor and inefficient habits, which may be causing stress and fatigue. With gentle hands-on guidance and verbal instruction, the student learns to replace faulty habits with improved coordination by locating and releasing undue muscular tensions. This includes the ease of the breath and the effect of coordinated breathing on the voice. An invaluable technique that connects the actor to his or her resources for dramatic intent. This class meets once a week.
Building a Vocal Technique
Level: Intermediate
Semester: Year
A continuation of Breathing Coordination for the Performer, which is a prerequisite. Students will work on scenes they currently are rehearsing and also bring in pieces of their own choosing. Emphasis will be on physical ease and the use of breathing coordination to increase vocal range and power. This class meets once a week.
Linklater Voice Training Into Text
Level: Intermediate
Semester: Year
This course will investigate how Linklater voice work parlays into text. Students will expand vocal agility and dynamics and find greater sensitivity and connection to language. Students will discover an authentic and personal experience of the self through voice. This class meets once a week.
Breath and Speech
Level: Advanced
Semester: Year
Building on the foundation and awareness the student has learned in the previous course the Alexander Technique, we will explore the direct application of the Alexander principles by working with text and the voice in coordination with the breath. Previous Alexander work required. This class meets once a week.
Directing
Stage Management
Level: Open
Semester: Year
This yearlong elective course will focus on the art and practice of stage management. Students will be assigned productions and will be mentored through the process from auditions through tech week and strike. This class meets once a week.
Ms. Minsky, Fall Semester
Mr. Potter, Spring SemesterCollective Conscious: Actor, Director Ensemble
Level: Intermediate
Semester: Year
A specific approach to performance that unifies director and actor in a common understanding of the central metaphor of a play. In addition to script analysis, comparative study of styles, and regular in-class performance, students will pre-sent work as part of the Theatre program season. Over the course of the year, each student will be required to direct and perform. Open to serious students who have an interest in both directing and acting. This class meets twice a week.
The Director/Actor Dialogue
Level: Intermediate
Semester: Fall
This course will assist directors in communicating effectively with actors. The director’s role in character development with an actor is not a fixed one, but it demands clarity, brevity, and the ability to inspire other artists. Class is open to directors and actors, but directors need to have some previous directing experience. This class meets once a week.
The Director/Designer Dialogue: From the Page to the Stage
Tom Lee, Greg MacPherson, Carol Ann Pelletier
Level: Intermediate
Semester: Spring
Student directors will develop skills essential to realizing a design vision. Emphasis will be on furthering communication skills with an eye toward improving the collaborative process of design while strengthening directors’ abilities in relating ideas to design professionals. Exercises will include use of sketches, photographs, and other media. This class meets once a week.
Directing Shakespeare
Level: Advanced
Semester: Year
How does a director approach the complex challenges of staging Shakespeare? Through an intensive examination of Hamlet, the course will examine how to use research and Shakespearean scholarship, how to prepare a text for rehearsals, how to develop a production approach, how to collaborate with designers on that approach, and how to rehearse the play with special attention to the work with actors. Students need previous directing experience. This class meets twice a week.
Directing Workshop
Level: Open
Semester: Year
Directors will study the processes necessary to bring a written text to life and the methods and goals used in working with actors to focus and strengthen their performances. Scene work and short plays will be performed in class, and the student’s work will be analyzed and evaluated. Common directing problems will be addressed, and the directors will become familiar with the conceptual process that allows them to think creatively. In the second semester, students will select and direct a one-act play for production. Open to beginning directors. This class meets twice a week. Students enrolled in this class must take or have completed the Stage Management section of Gateway to Theatre: Technology.
Playwriting
Playwriting courses are subdivided into craft, workshop, and specialty courses. Craft courses focus on process and typically entail reading assignments and specific, short writing assignments. Workshop courses focus on the writing of complete plays. Specialty courses answer the needs of particular writing situations.
Craft Courses
The Playwright’s Voice
Level: Open
Semester: Year
This is a full-year course for beginning playwrights in the art of the scene and one-act play. In the first semester, students write a scene a week or every other week prompted by exercises, script analysis, and craft readings designed to break through old patterns of writing, teach the art of storytelling, and stimulate one’s singular voice in a variety of ways. The second semester focuses on the art and craft of the one act. This class meets once a week and prepares students to pursue playwriting in future classes.
Solo Performance Playwriting
Level: Intermediate
Semester: Fall
For people who lean toward performing and writing. Most of us have stories to tell; what makes a personal story dramatic? This course challenges the solo performer to discover and craft the dramatic structure of the solo play, not just what is on the stage, but what is on the page, with emphasis on imagination, characterization, story, and plot. This class meets once a week.
Playwriting Techniques
Level: Open
Semester: Year
In the first semester, students will write scenes every week. Each scene will explore issues of structure or creative process in order to facilitate the development of a technique that is individual yet based on traditional dramaturgical ideas. At the end of the semester, students select one of these scenes and write a longer, finished piece that grows out of it. In the second semester, students apply their technique by writing two short plays. The first is an adaptation of a short story of the student’s choice, and the second is a short play based on a historical event or person. This class meets once a week.
Face the Blank Page
Level: Intermediate
Semester: Year
Who are you as a playwright? What kind of stories are you passionate about? What do you want to say? What do you want others to hear? Why? This course will explore these questions and your relationship to them as a writer. It will begin with writing exercises that will kick-start the creative process and end with the first draft of a new play. This class meets once a week.
Workshop Courses
Spencer Workshop
Level: Intermediate
Semester: Year
This course is designed for playwriting students who have a basic knowledge of dramatic structure and an understanding of their own creative process. Students will be free to work on plays of any length and with themes, subjects, and styles of their choice. They may also work on more than one project at one time. Work will be read aloud and discussed in the class each week. The course requires that students be self-motivated and enter with an idea of which play or plays they plan to work on. This class meets once a week.
Orlandersmith Workshop
Level: Intermediate
Semester: Year
This course will explore the development of plays in reference to how and why characters are written and the circumstances that define them as particular characters. The course will explore how specific all this information must be in adding to the whole of a play. We will also examine how essential it is that the written word be clear in creating the story and plot; the sense of a beginning, middle, and end; the conflict; and the resolution. Some playwriting experience preferred. This class meets once a week.
Outreach
Methods of Theatre Outreach
Level: Open
Semester: Year
Developing original, issue-oriented dramatic material using music and theatre media, this course will present the structures needed for community extension of the theatre. Performance and teaching groups will work with small theatres, schools, senior citizen groups, museums, centers, and shelters. The productions and class plans will be made in consultation with the organizations and our touring groups. We will work with children’s theatre, audience participation, and educational theatre. Teaching and performance techniques will focus on past and present uses of oral histories and cross-cultural material. Sociological and psychological dynamics will be studied as part of an exploration of the role of theatre and its connections to learning. Each student will have a service-learning team placement. Special projects and guest topics will include use of theatre in developing new kinds of after-school programs, styles and forms of community on-site performances, media techniques for artists who teach, and work with the Sarah Lawrence Human Genetics program. This class meets once a week.
Original Works
Invention
Level: Open
Semester: Spring
Students will invent and explore new models for making performances that fall, perhaps, outside the traditional models (e.g., the compartmentalization of tasks—the playwright writes, the designer designs, etc.). In this course of “self-scripting,” the traditional roles are blurred as directors perform, performers write, and choreographers design. We will look at and experience developing nontext (image)-driven theatre, as well as investigating autobiography and historical/political events as the source material for original perfor-mances. Open to actors, directors, playwrights, designers, musicians, and visual artists. This class meets once a week.
Making New Work
Level: Open
Semester: Year
A performance ensemble lab where the creative process and global forms and styles are presented and explored. Techniques include using research of past and present world theatrical movements. Methods of vocal and physical work will add to interdisciplinary collaborations in order to explore sources of inspiration for new work. Using connections that cross cultural and media traditions, the group will create and present weekly projects. Open to actors, dancers, visual artists, writers, musicians, filmmakers, and directors. This class meets once a week.
Creating Original Theatre Today
Level: Intermediate
Semester: Year
This class is a hands-on exploration of how to build a theatre piece from scratch. We will focus on the use of organized movement in live performance blending dance-making principles with text from both theatrical and non-theatrical sources. While pursuing one’s original voice in performance, the goal of this class will be to integrate one’s disparate courses of study in a theatrical context presenting both solo works and group collaborations to the campus. In addition to the scheduled class time, students will be required to attend rehearsals of Mr. Neumann’s professional engagements in New York City. This class meets twice a week.
Projects
Level: Intermediate
Semester: Spring
This course will provide a critical and supportive forum for the development of new works of original performance. Interdisciplinary forms such as self-scripting, devised works, performance pieces, puppet works, performative installations, or image pieces will be examined as each student focuses on creating one original project over the course of either a semester or the full year—typically a solo, a duet, or a trio. This class meets twice a week. During the first class, students will show works-in-progress. During the second session, students and faculty will meet to discuss these showings and any relevant artistic and practical problems that may arise.
Open to juniors, seniors, and graduate students.
Puppet Central
Level: Open
Semester: Year
Through puppetry, this course will develop students’ skills as directors, writers, and performers and encourage the pleasures and rigors of creativity in a performing medium. Students will research and study a global range of puppet styles and forms—Western models like hand, rod, and string puppets, as well as Eastern practices like Indonesian shadow and Japanese Bunraku, among others. Contemporary construction methods and a variety of manipulation techniques will be explored. Students will build a short, original puppet piece from the ground up. They will design and construct the puppets, write the scripts (or scenarios), choreograph, rehearse, and publicly pre-sent short works in progress. This class meets for four consecutive hours, which includes a two-hour lab, once a week.
Mr. Acheson, FALL SEMESTER
Mr. Hurlin, SPRING SEMESTERDesign and Technology
Costume Design I
Level: Open
Semester: Year
An introduction to the many aspects of costuming for students with little or no experience in the field. Among the topics covered are basics of design, color, and style; presentation of costume design, from preliminary concept sketches to final renderings; researching period styles; costume bookkeeping, from preliminary character lists to wardrobe maintenance charts; and the costume shop, from threading a needle to identifying fabric. The major class project will have each student research, book-keep, and present costume sketches for a play. Some student projects will incorporate production work. This class meets once a week.
Costume Design II
Level: Intermediate
Semester: Year
A more advanced course in costume design for students who have completed Costume Design I or who have the instructor’s permission to enter. Topics covered in Costume Design I will be examined in greater depth, with the focus on students designing actual productions. An emphasis will be placed on students developing sketching techniques and beginning and maintaining their portfolios. This class meets once a week.
Lighting Design I
Level: Open
Semester: Year
Lighting Design I will introduce the student to the basic elements of stage lighting, including tools and equipment, color theory, reading scripts for design elements, operation of lighting consoles and construction of lighting cues, and basic elements of lighting drawings and schedules. Students will be offered hands-on experience in hanging and focusing lighting instruments and be invited to attend technical rehearsals. They will be offered opportunities to design productions and to assist other designers as a way to develop greater understanding of the design process. This class meets once a week.
Lighting Design II
Level: Intermediate
Semester: Year
Lighting Design II will build on the basics introduced in Lighting Design I to help develop the students’ abilities in designing complex productions. The course will focus primarily on CAD and other computer programs related to lighting design, script analysis, advanced console operation, and communication with directors and other designers. Students will be expected to design actual productions and in-class projects for evaluation and discussion and will be offered the opportunity to assist Mr. MacPherson and others when possible to increase their experience in design.
Scenic Design I
Level: Open
Semester: Year
This course introduces basic elements of scenic design, including developing a design concept, drafting, and practical techniques for creating theatrical space. Students will develop tools to communicate their visual ideas through research, sketches, and models. The class will discuss examples of design from theatre, dance, and puppetry. Student projects will include both conceptual designs and production work in the department. During the second semester, students will have direct exposure to construction and scenic painting techniques in the scene shop. This class meets once a week.
Scenic Design II
Level: Intermediate
Semester: Year
This course will further develop the student’s skill set as a scenic designer through work on department productions and individual projects. Students will be introduced to CAD drawing and computer modeling through VectorWorks and develop their ability to communicate with directors, fellow designers, and the technical crew. In addition, students will continue to have hands-on exposure to practical scenic construction, rigging, and painting techniques. This class meets once a week.
Sound and Music for the Theatre I and II
Level: Open
Semester: Year
Open to theatre and music students, these courses deal with technical and creative aspects of sound and music production for theatre. Hands-on training and practical application using facilities in the electronic music studio as well as sound equipment from the various theatre spaces will be emphasized. Drawing from each semester’s theatre performance schedule, students will be assigned one or more productions for which they will serve as sound designers, assistant sound designers, or composers. Composition students who normally would not consider writing for other media may find this work both challenging and useful in stimulating new musical ideas. No previous background in music is necessary. Topics to be covered include basic acoustics, use of studio equipment, sound reinforcement techniques, using sound effects, creating and embellishing special effects, creating sound and music collages, incidental music from existing resources, and composing original music. This class meets once a week.
Design Techniques in Media and Puppetry
Level: Open
Semester: Year
This course allows students to explore design possibilities in projection, animation, scenic design, and puppetry through a series of exploratory projects and group work. Visual sequences will be created using overhead projector, stop-motion animation techniques, shadow puppetry, and video animation. The course will introduce basic digital image manipulation in Photoshop, simple video animation in After Effects, and the live manipulation of video using Isadora media interface software. Individual projects in the second semester will challenge students to integrate these techniques into performance. This class meets once a week.
Tools of the Trade
Level: Open
Semester: Year
A yearlong elective course focusing on the nuts-and-bolts of light board operation, sound board operation, projection technology, as well as the use of Final Cut Pro and Pro Tools editing programs and basic stage carpentry. Students who take this course will be eligible for additional paid work as technical assistants in the Theatre program. This class meets once a week.
Advanced Pro Tools Editing
Level: Intermediate
Semester: Year
This course covers advanced Pro Tools editing topics. Students explore session management, automation, plug-ins, MIDI instruments, editing techniques, and mixing operations. Through hands-on projects, students will develop practical production and technical skills. Skills learned in this course will prepare student to record, edit, mix, and master any project. This class meets once a week.
Theatre Studies
Far-Off, Off-Off, Off-, and On-Broadway—Experiencing the 2008-2009 Theatre Season
Level: Open
Semester: Year
Weekly class meetings where productions are analyzed and discussed will be supplemented by regular visits to many of the theatrical productions of the current season. The class will travel in the tristate area, attending theatre in as many diverse venues, forms, and styles as possible. Published plays will be studied in advance of attending performances; new or unscripted works will be preceded by examinations of previous work by the author or company. Students will be given access to all available group discounts in purchasing tickets. This class meets once a week.
Global Theatre: Africa and the Black Diaspora in the Caribbean and America
Level: Intermediate
Semester: Fall
This course will explore the wide range of theatrical expression found in the work of diverse writers, including Wole Soyinka, Athol Fugard, Derek Walcott, Mustapha Matura, Trevor Rhone, Errol John, Suzan-Lori Parks, Lynn Nottage, August Wilson, Lorraine Hansberry, and Ntozake Shange, among others. A variety of plays will be read and discussed and selected scenes worked on. Students will also attend relevant plays in New York City. This class meets twice a week.
Global Theatre: China, Japan, and India
Level: Intermediate
Semester: Spring
This course explores traditional and contemporary performance practices of China, Japan, and India. During the semester, we will examine the text and performance of classical plays and operas, contemporary theatrical productions, classical and modern forms of dance, folk performances, and rituals. We will discuss and compare dramaturgical structure, staging, acting, gender conventions, actor/dancer training, the respective roles of performer and audience, and religious and political themes. We will seek to understand the aesthetics and social purposes of these performances, in addition to the relationship that different genres have to everyday life. We will secondarily consider how performances are conducted and adapted by Asian immigrant communities, as well as by non-Asian artists. Our work will be based on lectures, readings, discussions, videos, live performances, and studio exercises. This class meets twice a week.
The Performing Arts for Social Change
Level: Intermediate
Semester: Fall
In today’s world, theatre is increasingly defined as a commercial enterprise. This course will examine the use of theatre for social change, examining its history, practices, theories, role, and production. Discussions will include an examination of approaches to using theatre for creating personal and social change and the key elements of successful projects. Interactive class sessions will include participation in a creative theatrical process involving community building, team building, conflict resolution, social analysis, and scene creation. Each student will be expected to develop a coherent theory of change and construct a viable performing arts-based project “blueprint.” Students will also visit one Saturday rehearsal of the City at Peace project in New York City, a nonprofit using the performing arts to empower teenagers to transform their lives and communities. This class meets once a week.
Producing
DownStage
Level: Intermediate
Semester: Year
DownStage is an intensive, hands-on conference in theatrical production. DownStage student producers administrate and run their own theatre company. They are responsible for all aspects of production, including determining budgeting and marketing an entire season of events and productions. Student producers are expected to fill a variety of positions, both technical and artistic, and to sit as members of the Board of Directors of a functioning theatre organization. In addition to their obligations to class and designated productions, DownStage producers are expected to hold regular office hours. Prior producing experience is not required. First-year undergraduate students are not eligible. This class meets twice a week for the entire year.
Internships
Conference for Internships
Level: Intermediate
Semester: Year
For students who wish to pursue a professional internship as part of their program. All areas of producing and administration are possible: production, marketing, advertising, casting, development, etc. Students must have at least one full day each week to devote to the internship. Through individual meetings, we will best determine each student’s placement to meet individual academic and artistic goals.
Outside Programs
Theatre students may be invited to participate in outside programs, including:
The London Theatre Program
Sponsored by Sarah Lawrence College and the British American Drama Academy (BADA), the London Theatre Program offers undergraduates from Sarah Lawrence an opportunity to work and study with leading actors and directors from the world of British theatre. The program offers acting classes with leading artists from the British stage. These are complemented by individual tutorials where students will work one-on-one with their teachers. A faculty selected from Britain’s foremost drama schools teaches technical classes in voice, movement, and stage fighting. This intense conservatory training is accompanied by courses in theatre history and theatre criticism, tickets to productions, and the experience of performing in a professional theatre. In addition, master classes and workshops feature more of Britain’s fine actors and directors. Designed for dedicated students who wish to study acting in London, the program offers enrollment in either the fall or spring semester, for single semester study. Those wishing to pursue their training more intensely are strongly encouraged to begin their training in the fall and continue with the Advanced London Theatre Program in the spring semester. Acceptance is by audition only.
The Play’s the Thing...Sarah Lawrence College Playwriting Summer Intensive
Playwriting Intensive is a five-day, five-night workshop designed to provide traditional and innovative guidance in the art and craft of writing plays. Student writers have the opportunity to work with our faculty playwrights, working playwrights all, in daily classes and one-on-one meetings. Each member of the playwriting faculty offers a distinct voice and perspective, and each class is designed to lend a particular approach to the creation of a play. All students have the chance for their work to be read aloud by Sarah Lawrence graduate student actors, under the guidance of faculty directors. Students also have the opportunity to work with actors on structured improvisations of their written material. Guests join the faculty seminars on a broad range of interests. All students and faculty meet together for meals, group discussions, and nightly readings of student-written material. More information is available at www.slc.edu/summer.
June 2009
La MaMa E.T.C.
La MaMa E.T.C. in New York sponsors two summer events in Italy in conjunction with Sarah Lawrence. They are the International Symposium for Directors, a three-week training program for professional directors, choreographers, and actors where internationally renowned theatre artists conduct workshops and lecture/demonstrations, and the Playwright Retreat, a one-week program where participants have ample time to work on new or existing material. Each day, master playwright Lisa Kron will meet with the playwrights to facilitate discussions, workshops, and exercises designed to help the writers with whatever challenges they are facing. More information is available at www.lamama.org/italy/directorssymposium.html and www.lamama.org/italy/PlaywrightRetreat.html.
Summer 2009