Newell Promotion Narrative W Letterhead

Department of Communication Arts
P.O. Box 8091• Statesboro, GA 30460
Communication Studies
Multimedia Film & Production
Multimedia Journalism
Public Relations
Theatre
Professional Communication & Leadership, MA
To the Committee:
I would like to thank the committee for reviewing my materials for promotion. The recent loss of our colleague and area chair,
Kelly Berry, has caused me to look upon the years since my tenure, and my decade here at Southern, and to be filled with
gratitude for the opportunities and support that he and the rest of my colleagues have given me to grow as an educator and artist.
During this time, we have seen triumphs in our work and seismic shifts in our university and the world. This season of change has
been daunting, but I am hopeful that we will move into the future with the optimism, ingenuity, and kindness that Kelly always
provided.
Teaching:
I am currently creating a grant proposal to design new study abroad opportunity for our students, supported by the Halle
Foundation, which provides support for educational and artistic cooperation between the state of Georgia and the nation of
Germany. I am proposing, with the foundations help, to offer 2 summer classes in Berlin, with lodging and classes held at the
Akademie Hotel in Pankow and Berlin itself as a larger cultural classroom. The courses will be THEA 4334 Drama in Performance,
which will focus on the techniques of Bertolt Brecht and will culminate in an applied workshop of one of his plays. THEA 3030 will
be a Special Topics class where we will study plays and operas of German luminaries such as Brecht, Weil, Schiller, Goethe,
Sternheim, Mozart and Wagner through both their texts and live performances of those works at various Berlin theatres. Summer
A Term will coincide with the national German theatre festival Theatre Treffen, which showcases the best productions across
Germany. These courses will give students the rare opportunity to study German theatre and its important tradition of innovation.
The hope is to create a unique educational and cultural experience for our students and for Georgia Southern that is not offered
anywhere else in the state or country; and to strengthen ties to the Halle Foundation and the College of Arts and Humanities
which successfully collaborates with our Music and Language departments.
The events of the last several years created tremendous challenges, but also an opportunity to innovate, as the pandemic
demanded online methods of instruction and assessment. Most of my classes are performance-based and traditionally require a
constant live presence, but Covid-19 required an open-mindedness from me and demanded creativity that I believe has helped me
to focus on what is necessary and most efficient in my teaching. I have found new methods through experimentation brought on
by necessity that continue to will serve my classroom in the future as we return to the traditional on person teaching formats.
My largest lecture class, Theatre Appreciation, provided the biggest opportunity for change. It became apparent that the
traditional lecture format (with supplemental visual and recorded content) was not going to work in a setting where students
would be be sick for extended periods of time. Furthermore, students who spent almost two years in a distance learning format
were not prepared for the discussion asked of them in college classroom settings so I have embraced the “flipped format” to help
facilitate their transition. By splitting my large lecture class into two smaller groups and having the basic assessment of the reading
take place online before the start of each lecture and class discussion, I’m able to create a less intimidating environment for first
year student. The smaller class size has increased the level of discussion tremendously. Instead of a handful of students in a 60
person class that can be relied upon to answer questions and offer opinions, at least half of a 30 person class will regularly
participate in class discussions. Putting traditional assessments online has opened up more class time to discuss of concepts and
make connections with previous lessons. I have also added a component of creative projects that force students into applying
concepts and skills taught in class through casting, designing, or performance, which has also facilitated overall student
engagement. After a few years of revising the format, I was thrilled to get the feedback that “The in class discussions/lectures
were where I learned the most. The professor really brought the course content to life” in course evaluations this semester.
My Fundamentals of Acting course typically ends with an ensemble Chekov project involving the entire class, but that proved
impossible to perform in a pandemic year. I adjusted to assigning a performance piece that was written by the student based on
Armstrong Campus: 11935 Abercorn St. Fine Arts Building, Ste. 125 Savannah, GA 912-344-2556
Public Relations
Theatre
an interview with a grandparent or older relative. This project yielded fascinating performances and allowed students to flexing
their writing skills. It also led to an object lesson in observation as a tool of transformation in Stanislavski technique which was
more accessible than when I send students out to observe strangers as I’d traditionally done. By having a close connection to the
subject, students more readily made the necessary physical and vocal adjustments in transforming with a role. As one student
evaluation said “The professor being very willing and happy to help is what made this course more enjoyable. It was challenging at
times and definitely brought me out of my comfort zone which I needed.” In my Voice for the Stage class, I replaced a second
accent assignment with a voice-over project where the student created a reel of narration, commercial, and animation
performance which provided students with a look into an entirely vocal performance style and showed them the freedom they
can have as a disembodied voice while providing the first steps toward working in the voice-over field. In Acting Styles, I decided
move where my student’s strengths were and replaced the overtly political work of Brecht with the existential Beckett which is
most poignant when performed by skilled clowns. For Movement, I decided to put the full focus on Stage Combat which tends to
be the portion of the class that students are most excited by and also requires the most discipline. With the room afforded us in
the Recreation Activity Center I was able to teach Tai Chi as well as armed and unarmed combat. The slow pace and precision of
the martial art proved to be the better preparation for the simulated combat which requires control and working at slower speeds
to ensure safety.
Acting for the Camera provided the biggest challenge and opportunity as it was taught in the fall of 2020 and without the usual
partnership with the Film class to provide projects to assess. The pandemic’s unprecedented halt of work in TV and film left
industry professionals with uncharacteristic free time so I called in every favor I had in the industry and found many working
professionals eager to speak to and even mentor college students over Zoom. Thanks to Zoom, I could offer a series of master
classes with actors from Hollywood, New York, Hawaii and New Zealand including Emmy and Obie nominees and stars of their
own television series. Of these 13 guests, half were actors of color and/or female and only a three were white and male. I was
very proud to present such a diverse segment of accomplished guest speakers and give students such a rare opportunity to
connect with them. As one student said in their evaluation, “All the guest speakers that came and spoke to our class gave such
great real-world advice that I don't think we would have gotten unless this class was structured how it was!”
Shakespeare in Performance was a terrific opportunity to delve into classic text further than we have time for in Acting Styles and
Voice for the Stage. I was able to do multiple scenes that explored the role of scansion dialogue and the pacing created by iambic
pentameter. I took the opportunity to assign students monologues from more obscure plays of Shakespeare and contemporaries
like Marlowe, Kyd and Middleton. This was designed to give students the advantage of having a less common monologue they can
use as a classical piece at auditions which will stick out to directors, casting agents and graduate schools. One of those students
currently in her second year of the MFA acting program of New York University.
Creative Scholarship:
Since my last promotion I have directed nine peer-reviewed productions for Georgia Southern, one of which was selected to travel
and compete in the Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival, where it won regional and national honors from the
Kennedy Center. Other productions since have been highly recommended to travel and compete with KCACTF. I also published
an article in The University of California San Diego’s international peer reviewed journal, Theatre Forum, and acted professionally
in two Actors Equity (union) guest contract regional theatre productions. Additionally, I founded a new play initiative at Lean
Ensemble Theater called Lean Lab through which I have produced, workshopped & commissioned playwrights to create original
plays. This has led to two World-Premier plays. one of which became the best-selling production in the history of Lean Ensemble
Theatre. Images, reviews, program notes, and other artifacts from these projects are available under Supplemental Materials.
An Octoroon: In the fall of 2017 I directed Brandon Jacob Jenkins’ play An Octoroon, a post-modern adaptation of the 19th century
abolitionist melodrama The Octoroon by Dion Boucicault. The production provided an opportunity to produce a play by an African
American Playwright based on source material from the most successful Irish playwright of his time while exploring Brechtian
Public Relations
Theatre
techniques of Verfremdungseffekt. An Octoroon was written with many theatrical devices that made the familiar strange such as
whiteface makeup for black actors, performers playing different characters who physically fight each other, and showering the
audience with cotton for the purpose of scathing social commentary. This inspired me to lean into the Brechtian experiment by
displaying stage directions on signs that addressed the challenge of portraying harmful stereotypes to inform the audience of the
playwright’s intent. I also reimagined the concept of music in a melodrama with we cast a live band not included in the script who
played between scenes sometimes. The music ranged from traditional spirituals to rock and became the glue to carry the
emotional and intellectual impact of the scenes after their conclusion. We were awarded a special national commendation by the
Kennedy Center for integration of musical performance as well as for the performance of lead actor Tyair Blackman who portrayed
BJJ, the protagonist and antagonist of the play.
Master & Margarita: It had been a goal of mine to present a theatrical adaptation of Mikhail Bulgakov’s novel Master &
Margarita, which dared discuss such forbidden subjects as Magic, Jesus, and the Devil in Stalin’s USSR. The book was banned in
the Soviet Union only to survive in hand-written copies passed from person to person long after the author’s death and felt
especially relevant n a time in which authoritarianism has been on the rise globally. We were granted rare permission by the
author’s estate only because it was a university production rather than a professional one, and we were able to produce the epic
which spans from the court of Pontius Pilate to 1930’s Russia to the afterlife itself. A week before our technical rehearsals I was
forced to take emergency family medical leave and I left the show in the capable hands of my assistant director, choreographer
and stage manager who brought the play to opening in the last two weeks. I am indebted to them and to the rest of the faculty
for a smooth run of the show and for being there for me in a very scary time.
Importance of Being Earnest: We ran this classic comedy of Oscar Wilde in rep with a production of Noel Coward’s Hay Fever on a
unit set and presented a 1-2 punch of Brits behaving badly. It is a balance when directing Victorian era play to embrace manners
of the period that are the source of the comedy, but to also keep an awareness of the imperial societal structures in that period
which enforced inequity and injustice throughout the world. Color-conscious casting was one way to spin the power dynamic, but
another is to highlight the fact that the women of the play that are the prime forces of power, intelligence and goodness in the
story while also being marginalized in the society the play is set in. I happened to have cast two very talented musical theatre
performers in the roles of Gwendolyn and Cecily and after I searched for period appropriate songs to perform in the scene
transitions and was unsatisfied with the results, professional dramaturgy Katie Rasor suggested I use 20 th century song I Want to
Be Evil to serve as an unexpected musical number representing the rage the characters might feel, not only at being deceived by
their significant others, but at the confines that women were kept in this period.
Sling Song: During the period of 2018/2019, I was selected to direct a revival of the short play Sling Song working with emeritus
professor Mical Whitaker for planned run in the spring of 2021 and a tour to the summer Lincoln Center Out of Doors Festival in
Manhattan. I held meetings with the playwright and prospective musicians for the project, but this production was set aside
because of the Covid-19 pandemic.
Urban Rabbit Chronicles: Urban Rabbit Chronicles was a world premiere production by Steve Harper, a playwright and television
producer from Los Angeles. I had been working on the play since 2012 at the Hilton Head Island New Play Festival before I came
to Georgia Southern. We cast and staged the production in the spring of 2020 and had held our first run throughs when in-person
classes were cancelled and the campus closed due to the pandemic. The cast and crew mostly graduated that year and it ended
up being two years before we could stage the play again. The script was accepted for Piccolo Spoletto in Charleston, but that
event was also cancelled.
Social Creatures: The pandemic challenged the entire theatre industry to abandon conventions of live performance and
experiment. I chose Jackie Sibblies Drury’s play about a group of surviving hiding in a theatre building during a Zombie apocalypse
as a prescient look at how racial and economic disparities become even more profound in times of crisis (she wrote it in 2013). It
Public Relations
Theatre
also presented what I thought at the time would be a simple way to film safely with only a few scenes staged in an almost empty
theatre and the majority of the text spoken on a recorded zoom. This experiment in filmed theatre proved to be quite the
challenge, and while I am proud of the fact that we accomplished a traditional narrative play in hostile circumstances, I am
indebted to the faculty, cast, and crew for embarking on a process that was filled with technical difficulty.
Spoon River Anthology: Faced with the need to produce another filmed play and wanting to learn from the difficulties in
producing work in the fall, I chose to adapt Spoon River Anthology by Edgar Lee Masters. The structure of the series of poems in
which one ghost provides a single monologue at a time, provided a framework in which we could cast as many people as possible
and rehearse more safely in small groups before filming in costume in front of a green screen for ease of editing. To adapt the
play, I curated 26 of the 243 free verse epilogues with an emphasis on active stories that interconnected with each other. A play
about death and the meaning of individual lives seemed a fitting end to the 2020/2021 schoolyear.
Tartuffe: Moliere’s timeless comedy about a charlatan who cons the well-meaning and pious to the brink of ruin had been on my
mind as the relevance of this 17th century play became frighteningly immediate over the previous five years. David Ball’s
translation/adaptation avoided the pitfalls of constant rhyming couplets while retaining Moliere’s genius and provided an object
lesson for the students in the risks an artist can take to speak truth to power. It was a pleasure to stage a play in person especially
one that is equally hilarious and bawdy as it is poignant. This production was recommended for KCACTF festival.
Urban Rabbit Chronicles: We were finally able to give Urban Rabbit its premiere with an almost entirely new cast and a much
broader set design to facilitate quick scene changes. The playwright was present for the performance for the entirety of the run
and he was made available for questions, classes and talk backs. The students were able to have the experience of performing for
the playwright and I was able to complete a journey I began 10 years before. This production was highly recommended for
KCACTF region IV Festival.
Fairview, my most recent production at Georgia Southern was perhaps the most challenging production I have ever attempted, as
the Pulitzer Prizewinning experimental play by Jackie Sibblies Drury utilizes metatheatrical and theatrical alienation devices to lull
an audience into a sense of security before subjecting them to a deeply uncomfortable theatrical experience in the service of
creating an awareness of racial aggressions people of color endure on a daily basis. Rehearsing the play proved to be extremely
technically difficult as the second act is a repeat of the visual movements of the first act, but with live voiceover. The actions of
the actors onstage and the those who are speaking are designed to be tethered to each other in ways that give meaning, requiring
even more skill and discipline than the elaborate dances and stage combat also called for in the play. Audiences were very
receptive to the play and its message. It was the honor of my professional life to bring it to this community. This production was
highly recommended for KCACTF festival.
Professional Theatre: I have performed in two Actors Equity guest artist contracts at Lean Ensemble Theatre where I am an
ensemble member and director of New Play Development. In January & February of 2018 I played the role of Mike in Good
People by David Lindsay-Abaire. October of 2018, I played the lead role of Tom Newton in Who Am I This Time? (And other
Conundrums of Love) by Aaron Posner based on the writings of Kurt Vonnegut. I was offered two other roles in the plays Death of
a Street Car Named Virginia Woolf and Art both of which I could not accept because of scheduling conflicts.
In my role as Director of New Play Development at Lean Ensemble I spearheaded Lean Lab, a new play workshop that built out of
the creative team’s successes with the Hilton Head Island New Play festival for South Carolina Repertory Company. The new
model that I proposed and implemented focuses on a single playwright for a two-year period: one year of script development
culminating in a workshop production, and a world premiere production in the second year as part of the regular season.
We began Lean Lab with Playwright Nora Leahy of the Jackalope Theatre in Chicago. Her play If You Forget Me went through
several revisions between the playwright, dramaturg and myself over the course of a year and was workshopped in the March of
Public Relations
Theatre
2018 in Hilton Head, which culminated in a staged reading under my direction. The week of rehearsals led to massive changes in
the script. We recruited Boston Actor/Director Sarah Newhouse to direct, and it had its world premiere in March of 2019.
Throughout 2018 I led the development on the next Lean Lab project, which is based the history of Mitchellville, the first self-
governing settlement of freedmen in the United States, located on what is now Hilton Head Island. I began working with the
Mitchellville Freedom Park and coordinated with local church and civic leaders in the community to pave the way for the
development of a production about this local history over the course of 2018. The Gullah people who still inhabit Hilton are
understandably wary of outsiders so finding a playwright who would be able to connect with them was an important task. I held a
six-month national search for an African American Playwright, reading submissions, interviewing playwrights and their agents from
across the country, and represented Lean Ensemble in the 2018 Theatre Communications Group and National New Play Network
conference. These efforts led to our signing award-winning playwright and television writer Aurin Squire. In 2019, I arranged and
hosted a research trip for Aurin to Hilton Head where I introduced him to local Gullah leaders and provided tours of neighboring
Dafuskie Island, to learn about Gullah culture. The company dramaturg and I worked on two drafts with Aurin over six months in
which we provided feedback and necessary edits to streamline the plot, as well as avoid tropes and unintentional offense to the
Gullah inhabitants of the island. I insisted on a more nuanced ending that provided a resolution for the plot without implying that
the very real struggles facing the Gullah in retaining their land and culture could be easily attained by help from outside the
community. I prepared for a May 2020 workshop that was cast largely of former students from Georgia Southern. Covid 19 and
the Black Lives Matter summer changed our plans dramatically. In addition to needing to postpone the workshop as theatres shut
down, we decided that a story with this complicated history needed an African American director in the workshop process as well
as the premiere. We held another search which led to the hiring of New York-based Director and Choreographer, Christopher
Windom to direct the workshop over Zoom in the Fall of 2020 while I continued to work as the producer, and arranged for the
casting of former student Akil Jackson and Georgia Actress Katherine LeRoy Lawson in the project. The world premiere of
Mitchellville was delayed repeatedly due to Covid performance restrictions, but premiered in March 2023 with an almost entirely
African American creative team and cast. It was the best-selling production in Lean Ensemble Theatre’s history with every ticket of
the run sold.
Published Scholarship & Conference Panel:
Theatre Forum published my article Illuminating the Debate Society and The Light Years (Editor Ted Shank) in the December issue
of 2017. My article examined The Debate Society, a theatre company based in Brooklyn and their unique collaborative process
with playwright/actors Hannah Bos & Paul Thureen and director Oliver Butler. I interviewed the company and their frequent
collaborators on their unorthodox play creation process which has its roots in Russian Stanislavski training as applied to stories
that reflect the Midwestern themes and aesthetic of Bos and Thureen, and explored the watershed moment in the Company’s
journey from avant-garde darlings to mainstream successes with the premiere of The Light Years at Playwright’s Horizons.
I also served on a panel in the 2021 Association of Theatre Educators conference that focused on the work habits and expectations
of theatre practitioners who are also parents against the backdrop the pandemic. Reimagining Support for the Artist/Academic
Who Is Also A Parent was joined by fellow panelists from across the United States and United Kingdom in a Zoom conference
format required for Covid protocols.
Fight Choreography and Vocal Coaching
In addition to choreographing safe, but visually effective violence on my peer reviewed productions of Fairview, Urban Rabbit
Chronicles and An Octoroon, I choregraphed sword fights for my colleague’s production of Anon(ymous) in the fall of 2017 utilizing
a rarely used replica of an ancient Greek Kopis sword. I also directed rapier swordfights for the music department in the Opera
South production of Don Giovani in 2018.
Public Relations
Theatre
As a vocal coach I have coached British RP accents for productions of Hay Fever and Importance of Being Earnest in 2019 and text
and operative work for verse in Shakespeare’s Measure for Measure in 2018.
Service:
College/University Service:
In 2017/2018 served as Chair the Faculty Development Committee for the University and a Faculty Senate Alternate. As chair of
Faculty Development, I oversaw the selection process of $100,000 of faculty development grants for further training, certification
and travel.
In the Fall of 2022, I was able to bring Pen Fellow and Pulitzer Prizewinning playwright Jackie Sibblies Drury to campus to discuss
her award-winning play Fairview and her work as a Black artist in a panel led by a student dramaturg and myself. I organized
funding from across the college and university with contributions from Communication Arts, Writing & Linguistics, Literature,
Theatre South, a Campus Life Enrichment Committee Grant and a Fredrick Douglass Grant for Diversity Equity and Inclusion from
the Provost’s office. The well-attended event was held in the ballroom of the Performing Arts Center and included community as
well as student and faculty in attendance.
Since 2015, I have served as the faculty advisor for the student organization Theatre South which went through a difficult period
both during and following the pandemic. I am happy to report that this has all changed in 2022 with the election of new officers,
most of whom were underclassmen. Theatre South now has a healthy membership, continues to produce annual 24-Hour New
Play festival Wham Bam New Play Slam, meets bi-weekly, and is made up not only of Theatre majors and minors, but students
with an interest in theatre from other disciplines. They have held fundraisers for the department, played an active role in
recruitment, and have branched out into social events such as a “Masquerade Ball.”
Departmental Service:
I am currently working on the search committee for an emergency replacement limited term faculty line for stage and light design
after the death of our recently deceased colleague. The search is expected to begin the last week of June and continue through
July until a suitable candidate is hired for the fall term.
In the Spring of 2023, I was asked to write a response to the most recent assessment from the National Association of Schools of
Theatre to present to the Dean and Provost about changing Armstrong Campus to a Theatre Minor, retaining the Major on
Statesboro Campus, the way our program advertises itself under these new conditions, budget and safety measures. I have been
asked to write a follow up to the organization in the Summer of 2023 in which we address the NAST response and inform them
about the loss of our colleague and our actions as we endeavor to find his replacement.
I served for five years on the Diversity Committee, sat on a Faculty Search Committee in 2017, and began service on the Tenure
and Promotion Committee and Technology committees in 2022, but the biggest contribution I have had to the department has
been through recruitment.
Theatre requires active recruitment to attract the types of students who not only have an interest in theatre, but an aptitude and
talent. In many ways this is similar to athletic recruitment. I have spent the last several years addressing the fact that while our
program is award-winning and creates impressive graduates who have success in the profession, Georgia Southern has not been
known for our theatre outside of Southeast Georgia. While building on the success of holding a Theatre Visitation Day and
Scholarship Audition/Portfolio Review in the Fall and Spring Semesters respectively; I have taken several steps to build our
recruitment beginning with a strong presence at conferences and festivals. I have begun to represent Georgia Southern at not
Public Relations
Theatre
only Georgia Theatre Conference, but Georgia Thespians Conference (ThesCon), and remotely at the Southeastern Theatre
Conference, and the Next Steps auditions for transfer students at the Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival.
These conferences connect us with prospective students, but the amount who visit our campus has not always been fruitful. We
needed to become known to students before they start making their college plans and plant the seeds of Georgia Southern
Theatre earlier in their academic career. My strategy has been threefold: First to present ourselves well at conferences with
banners and slideshows that highlight the excellence of our production most values and the diversity of the student body. We
have also purchased swag that advertises the program such as sunglasses to increase our visibility. Second, I recognized that high
school students wanted to know if the culture of the department will be a fit for them by speaking to current students rather than
professors. I have begun bringing several of our students to conferences in order to attract more prospective students to our
tables. Through this method, we have more than quadrupled the number of students who sign up at our tables for information.
Lastly, I implemented an ongoing contact system with prospective students to keep them informed of our productions, accolades
and student successes on a rolling basis in addition to invitations to scholarship auditions and campus visitations. I always make
sure that students who are called back from auditions at conferences are sent a personal email from me and try to connect them
with faculty who are in their discipline or current students who are on similar tracks. Personal communication is frequently a key
factor in a student’s decision, so I make a habit of being in constant communication not only with them, but their parents as well.
In the 2021/2022 and 2022/2023 academic years we have had incoming freshmen classes of 30 and 20 respectively, and I hope to
build on our successes as the word of our achievements spreads through those we have had contact with since their freshmen and
sophomore years. Our last Theatre Visitation day included a dozen prospective students and their families which was the highest
amount since I began working here.
In 2019 I was asked to take over Public Relations duties from Lisa Abbott during her years of heavy national service as President of
KCACTF Region IV. After a year of shadowing her, I took over in 2020 through the present academic year. There has been a
learning curve as I navigate collaborating with marketing, printing on and off campus, and utilizing press releases and university
announcements, but I have been able to collaborate with students from PR program to generate publicity with the online
Statesboro news periodical Grice Connect, have begun a relationship with a local radio show 94.9 the Eagle, which features
departmental productions on their morning segments. In 2023 I am handing the public relations back to Professor Abbott and
plan to sue what I have learned to promote our program, productions and student success to prospective students in the digital
sphere.
Since my tenure I have written five successful CLEC grants to bring in guest artists for workshops, talk backs, panel discussions, and
designs for our productions bringing in more than $10,000 for the department.
Professional Service:
I completed my term as Chair of the Professional division and board member of the Georgia Theatre Conference in the fall of
2017, bringing in Lauren Gunderson, the most produced playwright in America that year, to receive a Georgia Hall of Fame award.
She joined keynote speaker playwright Tony Kushner for events and gave a playwriting workshop.
I have been an active respondent for the Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival in Region IV, having responded to six
productions over the last five years in Georgia, Kentucky and Virginia and completing nominations for student actors and
designers and faculty who have shown exceptional work in their fields. It is always a pleasure to view work from my
contemporaries and to connect with programs outside of our university.
Public Relations
Theatre
As director of New Play development for Lean Ensemble Theater I was the organization’s representative at the Theatre
Communications Group conference in 2018. In addition to continuing to build a relationship with TCG now that that conferences
have resumed their in-person programming, I also hope to involve myself in the operations of a national organization such as the
National Theatre Conference or the Southeastern Theatre Conference in the very near future.
Community Service:
During 2018 I served on the pastor nominating committee of First Presbyterian Church of Statesboro where I joined elders in a
national search for a new pastor. The several months long process of vetting applications and holding interviews culminated in
our hiring Harvard Theological Seminary graduate Taylor Lewis Guthrie Hartman, the first female pastor in our session’s history.
In the Summer of 2019, I choreographed staged violence for the Averitt Center here in Statesboro on a community theatre
production of Gin Game which was performed in the Mical Whitaker Blackbox and directed by Kelly Berry
Student Success:
Each production of Georgia Southern theatre provides student designers in costume, light, and sound design as well as stage
management, and up to three acting nominees opportunities to attend the Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival as
well as the hands-on experience of working on a full production. An important aspect of my job is the time I spend mentoring
students outside of class, preparing monologues and audition sides for scholarship competitions, film opportunities, summer stock
companies and graduate school. I continue my mentorship of students after graduation in their endeavors as they audition for
theatre and film programs that will advance their career. Some of these students are in prestigious MFA programs (NYU and
Northwestern) and others work in the film and television industry. I have arranged for students to be hired as designers at Lean
Ensemble Theater, one of which has gone on to become the production manager for the company. Our department traditionally
has had great success in helping students find job placement in summer stock theatre programs for technical fields and I am proud
to say that in the summer of 2023 two students have been hired for their first professional acting jobs.
Conclusion:
Since my tenure, I have continued to grow as a teacher, scholar, artist, and colleague. I am committed to continue this growth and
that of our department by developing opportunities for myself and for our students. I thank the committee for your consideration
and look forward to our work together as we continue improve the program and the collaborations within it.
Sincerely,
Nicholas Newell
Associate Professor of Theatre
Georgia Southern University

Newell Promotion Narrative W Letterhead

Uploaded by

Document Information

Original Description:

Original Title

Copyright

Available Formats

Share this document

Share or Embed Document

Sharing Options

Did you find this document useful?

Is this content inappropriate?

Copyright:

Available Formats

Newell Promotion Narrative W Letterhead

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

Department of Communication Arts

P.O. Box 8091• Statesboro, GA 30460

Published Scholarship & Conference Panel:

Fight Choreography and Vocal Coaching

You might also like