Music Theater
- DAN 351/MTD 374/THR 374: Inventing PerformanceThis studio course culminates in student-created performances in the Roberts Theater at the end of the term. Students from across fields who are interested in slowing down the art-making process to explore the nature of devising, developing, revising, and performing are invited to join. We'll delve into the often-intermingled roles of creator, performer, designer, technician, and audience member. We'll use embodied tools to generate material and hone collaborative processes. We'll question why and how and in what contexts we make work. We'll look at forms like the lecture-performance, the happening, concert dance, and one-person shows.
- GSS 322/MTD 324/THR 324/AMS 325: There She Is: Beauty, Pageantry, & Spectacular Femininity in American LifeAfter more than 100 years running, the Miss America Pageant (1921- ) stands among the most enduring - and enduringly controversial - popular performance traditions of American life and culture. This course offers an intensive, method-based historical overview of how "Miss America" as both idea and event documents the shifting ways gender, sexuality, race and embodiment been comprehended in the United States, even as it also examines the disparate ways the "beauty pageant" as a performance genre has been adopted and adapted by/for communities excluded by the rules of Miss America.
- MUS 347/MTD 396/THR 396: Multidisciplinary Musical Storytelling - Tularosa: An American DreamtimeUsing the musical story-work "Tularosa: An American Dreamtime" as a springboard, students will explore the mythology of the American West and musical storytelling through a multidisciplinary lens. Students will then use a variety of creative methods including songwriting, theatrical performance, experimental movement and dance, video, dramaturgy, archival and site-specific research, and artifact- and symbol-making to create unique multidisciplinary storytelling projects from their own points of view.
- THR 101/MTD 101: Introduction to Theater MakingIntroduction to Theater Making is a working laboratory, which gives students hands-on experience with theatre's fundamental building blocks -- writing, design, acting, directing, and producing. Throughout the semester, students read, watch and discuss five different plays, music theater pieces and ensemble theater works. We will analyze how these plays are constructed and investigate their social and political implications. In-class artistic responses provide hands-on exploration as students work in groups to create and rehearse performances inspired by our course texts.
- THR 347/ENG 274/MTD 347: The Oral Interpretation of Toni and WilliamThis course is a performance lab that examines speech as an aspect of fine art through the exploration of the literary canons of iconic American writer Toni Morrison and English playwright and poet William Shakespeare. Research assignments will explore writings found in the Princeton University Toni Morrison archive and Princeton University's copy of Shakespeare's first folio.
- THR 400/MTD 400/VIS 400: Theatrical Design StudioThis course offers an exploration of visual storytelling, research and dramaturgy, combined with a grounding in the practical, collaborative and inclusive skills necessary to create physical environments for live theater making. Students are mentored as designers, directors or project creators on realized projects in our theaters, or on advanced paper projects. Individualized class plans allow students to imagine physical environments for realized and un-realized productions, depending on their area of interest, experience and skill level.
- THR 401/MTD 401: Advanced Studies in Acting: Scene Study and StyleA practical course focusing on approaches to classical and contemporary acting styles. Primarily a scene lab investigating the actor/director relationship; performance as a collaborative experience: the exploration of a wide variety of techniques including movement, voice, comedy and musical theatre. Texts will come from a range of playwrights, classical and modern.
- THR 419/MTD 419: Directing for Theater and Music TheaterThis course is designed to encourage the development of directors for theater and musical theater, covering techniques and practices from both areas. The course will look at the practices of a small list of key figures in world theatre and how their work has influenced how directors approach the rehearsal room today. The course will incorporate a strong practical element, giving student directors the opportunity to explore and hone their own practices, developing useful and appropriate style and language as they move forward in their work as young directors.
- THR 451/MTD 451: Theater Rehearsal and PerformanceThis course will be a focused rehearsal process, led by a faculty director, culminating in two weekends of public performances of The Winter's Tale, conceived by Lear deBessonet with musical adaptation by Todd Almond.This Public Works project features a large cast of actors, singers, musicians and dancers, and plenty of offstage and backstage roles. Students interested in participating as performers, stage managers, musicians, musical directors, dramaturgs or designers should reach out to Shariffa@, earaoz@ or tj4@for more information. Most performing roles will be cast through our Try OnTheater process in the May reading period.