This First-Year Seminar is designed around what is on stage in Baltimore and DC this fall. We will attend several plays, both professional productions and student productions at JHU. We will pay attention to the interpretation of plays on the page, and to the ways that scripts materialize as performances on the stage. We will place these performances in the context of larger theatre histories, studying great plays from the age of Shakespeare to contemporary American theatre. No acting experience is required – just the desire to explore the theatre of today. A great way to find out about the lively theatre scene on campus, and a great way to get to know your new city.

• Days/Times: TTh 9:00AM - 10:15AM
• Instructor: Stoll, Abraham D
• Room: Krieger Laverty
• Status: Waitlist Only
• Seats Available: 0/12
• PosTag(s): n/a

Investigations into some of the many histories in the development of the drama, from Greek origins to today's global theatre. An introduction to interpretive concepts, as well as to practical elements of playmaking. This course is a good way to explore and appreciate the art of theatre, and is required for the minor.

• Days/Times: MW 12:00PM - 1:15PM
• Instructor: Stoll, Abraham D
• Room: Gilman 413
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 7/14
• PosTag(s): n/a

An exploration of foundational exercises and techniques in the art of acting. Practice in voice, movement, listening, and improvisation. Students will read plays and develop interpretive and storytelling skills, building toward scene work. This class is for both new and experienced actors, and offers preparation for advanced acting and performance classes.

• Days/Times: TTh 12:00PM - 1:15PM
• Instructor: Gruenhut, Johanna
• Room: Krieger 103
• Status: Waitlist Only
• Seats Available: 0/12
• PosTag(s): n/a

An exploration of foundational exercises and techniques in the art of acting. Practice in voice, movement, listening, and improvisation. Students will read plays and develop interpretive and storytelling skills, building toward scene work. This class is for both new and experienced actors, and offers preparation for advanced acting and performance classes.

• Days/Times: TTh 9:00AM - 10:15AM
• Instructor: Rome, Susan R
• Room: Krieger 103
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 3/12
• PosTag(s): n/a

Learn about contemporary theater through contemporary plays; learn about contemporary plays through contemporary theater. We will read amazing, current plays about life today by some of today's most vibrant playwrights. For each play class will start with a table-read, followed by a discussion that simulates how actors and directors work together. The goal is to approximate the first week of a rehearsal process. In this way the class teaches a theater artist's approach to reading, analyzing and understanding dramatic text.

• Days/Times: TTh 1:30PM - 2:45PM
• Instructor: Gruenhut, Johanna
• Room: Krieger G-20
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 10/12
• PosTag(s): n/a

Inspired by the 100th birthday of James Arthur Baldwin – and his deep friendship with Lorraine Hansberry – this new course will explore diverse stories through the lens of modern queer playwrights. This seminar and advanced acting studio will celebrate the power of storytelling by illuminating unique perspectives and intersectionality from across the evolving landscape of contemporary queer dramatic literature, examining complex characters who defy the norm in universal stories.

• Days/Times: T 1:30PM - 4:00PM
• Instructor: McClendon, Forrest
• Room: Krieger 103
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 10/12
• PosTag(s): n/a

A seminar and workshop in playwriting with Dr. Joe Martin, playwright and dramaturge. Student writers, developing their plays, will learn how to open up to the creative process, “brainstorm,” refine their work, and shape it toward an act of artistic communication. Writer’s techniques, such as attending to plot or “story,” delineation of character, creating effective “dialog,” even overcoming “writer’s block,” will be addressed. This course is designed to be complementary to – not a replacement for – playwriting classes in the Writing Seminars.

• Days/Times: Th 4:30PM - 7:00PM
• Instructor: Martin, Joe
• Room: Krieger Laverty
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 1/8
• PosTag(s): n/a

Laughter is what brings audiences into the theatre -- and sends them home again having heard whatever else they found when they got there, too. From a lot of Greeks in masks a couple of millennia ago, through Moliere and Shakespearean clowns, to Keaton and Chaplin and Ball and Burnett and right on up to a solid majority of all entertainment staged and filmed today, the folks in the seats come in, for all kinds of reasons, ready for a laugh. Getting up on a stage and going "out there" --learning how to play fast and sharp with verbal, physical, and satirical comedy -- is the key to telling almost any story in a way that "goes over", "gets across", and brings 'em back for more. Members of this performance class will explore, every week, up on our feet, how to find the funny, and get it from the page to the stage.

• Days/Times: M 6:00PM - 8:30PM
• Instructor: Glossman, James
• Room: Krieger 103
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 2/12
• PosTag(s): n/a

By cultivating a sense of play and active engagement, students will learn how to create theatre without a script. We will overthrow the tyranny of the text and the suffocation of the director's vision to find equal footing in creation, and focus on the sweet spot where content and form come together to make a work that highlights the art of theatre. A perfect complement to standard acting classes, students will use the principles of Tectonic Theatre Company's Moment Work to devise an original piece for public performance. Aspiring actors, directors, technical designers, and playwrights are welcome. Some theatre experience required.

• Days/Times: W 4:30PM - 7:00PM
• Instructor: Vincent, Michael P
• Room: Krieger 103
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 8/12
• PosTag(s): n/a

The world is ending, the planet is dying, civilization is falling to ruin – now what? For millennia, theatermakers have asked and answered this question through their art. Why does theater keep staging such scenes of devastation and renewal? In this course, you will read a selection of such apocalyptic plays, as well as works in other genres that ask us to imagine that, when all else has withered away, the theater will somehow survive. Course materials will range from medieval morality plays and Shakespearean tragedies to recent novels, avant-garde theater, and Broadway musicals. With the help of texts by and about BIPOC performers, we will also ask: For whom, exactly, is the world supposed to be ending? For whom did it end at least once already – whether years or centuries ago? And what does theater offer to communities who have already survived the apocalypse, or who currently live in apocalyptic times? As an introduction to college-level studies in English, this course teaches the fundamental skills of close reading, attentive viewing, deep discussion, powerful writing, and effective revision.

• Days/Times: TTh 9:00AM - 10:15AM
• Instructor: Grobe, Christopher Arthur
• Room: Gilman 17
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 14/15
• PosTag(s): n/a

An exploration of foundational exercises and techniques in the art of acting. Practice in voice, movement, listening, and improvisation. Students will read plays and develop interpretive and storytelling skills, building toward scene work. This class is for both new and experienced actors, and offers preparation for advanced acting and performance classes.

• Days/Times: TTh 10:30AM - 11:45AM
• Instructor: McClendon, Forrest
• Room: Krieger 103
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 12/12
• PosTag(s): n/a

An exploration of foundational exercises and techniques in the art of acting. Practice in voice, movement, listening, and improvisation. Students will read plays and develop interpretive and storytelling skills, building toward scene work. This class is for both new and experienced actors, and offers preparation for advanced acting and performance classes.

• Days/Times: TTh 3:00PM - 4:15PM
• Instructor: Moores, Molly J
• Room: Krieger 103
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 12/12
• PosTag(s): n/a

Students will survey theatrical design through various projects. We will develop moments based on sound, costume, space, and light, focusing on how these elements help to tell a story. Students will develop artistic statements and arguments that justify their creative choices, while practicing constructive criticism in an environment that encourages exploration and play.

• Days/Times: W 3:00PM - 5:30PM
• Instructor: Vincent, Michael P
• Room: Krieger 103
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 12/12
• PosTag(s): n/a

Students will work with a selection of Shakespeare's plays --- TWELFTH NIGHT, RICHARD III, and CYMBELINE--- in exploring specific ways in which the power of the lines can be translated dynamically and immediately into vocal and physical performance. This course can be repeated for credit, because it covers different topics. (Some background in the acting sequence is encouraged).

• Days/Times: M 6:00PM - 8:30PM
• Instructor: Glossman, James
• Room: Krieger 103
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 12/12
• PosTag(s): n/a

A hands-on approach to the technical and theoretical elements of production. Meets in the Merrick Barn Scene Shop. Permission Required.

• Days/Times: TTh 10:30AM - 11:45AM
• Instructor: Roche, William C
• Room: Gilman 77
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 8/8
• PosTag(s): n/a

Student actors, directors, and playwrights will explore their respective crafts with emphasis on process and individual artistic growth. Participants in the class will also collaborate on the creation of new material for the stage. Recommended Course Background: one course in Acting, Directing, or Playwriting.

• Days/Times: T 6:00PM - 8:30PM
• Instructor: Denithorne, Margaret
• Room: Krieger 103
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 12/12
• PosTag(s): n/a

An investigation of the major playwrights, historical movements, and theatre practices of the 20th and 21st centuries. Watch high modernism upend everything – and then watch it all get upended again and again. How does it land today? We will go to the theatre in Baltimore and DC to answer that question.

• Days/Times: MW 1:30PM - 2:45PM
• Instructor: Stoll, Abraham D
• Room: Gilman 77
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 9/12
• PosTag(s): n/a

An exploration of the imagination and the senses using basic techniques of improvisation: exercises, conflict resolution, ensemble building, and theatre games. No previous acting experience is required.

• Days/Times: TTh 4:30PM - 5:45PM
• Instructor: Moores, Molly J
• Room: Krieger 103
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 12/12
• PosTag(s): n/a

In this cutting-edge course, an acting class designed for pre-med students who are interested in a career in either clinical work or research, we will explore ways in which collaboration, curiosity, and connection can enhance your understanding and ability to be an effective medical professional. Empathy, perspective-taking, analysis of dramatic literature with medical themes, and devising a piece around medical ethics will be the focus of the activities. No acting experience is required, just a willingness to explore your creativity in an inclusive environment.

• Days/Times: TTh 9:00AM - 10:15AM
• Instructor: Rome, Susan R
• Room: Krieger 103
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 12/12
• PosTag(s): MSCH-HUM

Creativity in Arts Management is designed for those involved or passionate about the arts, offering a comprehensive exploration of arts management and the transferable skills that apply across various career paths. This practitioner-focused course delves into a wide array of arts disciplines, including theater, orchestra, visual arts, literary arts, and more. By examining different artistic genres, the professionals within these fields, and the strategies and systems of arts management, students will gain not only a deeper understanding of these specific areas but also the ability to apply these insights beyond the arts.

• Days/Times: MW 4:30PM - 5:45PM
• Instructor: Willson, Nicoleen
• Room: Gilman 77
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 11/12
• PosTag(s): n/a

Maryland had the largest pre-Civil War population of free African Americans who were intent on creating the educational means necessary to maintain their own freedom and uplift. Education and land ownership was tantamount to securing standing in society and to forging an early, even if fraught, sense of social citizenship and its benefits. In this course, students will support the research efforts of a local Maryland school house museum to develop immersive, experiential learning and engagement tools. Drawing on material and documents specific to the museum such as objects, curricular texts, original letters, newspaper accounts, experiences of the first teachers, and contemporaneous accounts of teaching in Freedmen’s schools, students will engage in a speculative history that will serve as the foundation for creative reenactment of freedom education in early 1800s Maryland.

• Days/Times: M 1:30PM - 4:00PM
• Instructor: Staff
• Room: Greenhouse 113
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 12/12
• PosTag(s): CDS-SSMC