Directing

Curiosity, Critical Thinking and Continuous Learning: 

Directing students deepen and expand their imagination and intellectual exploration of visual and physical storytelling through classwork and experiential learning.  Through an exposure to a wide-range of globally and stylistically diverse plays, styles of teaching and pedagogies, directing students learn how to ask questions about process and the craft that contributes to lifelong learning.  

Artist Citizen  and Social Justice: 

Directing students develop an understanding and empathy for diverse human experiences through rigorous research and intensive character study across a variety of texts. By engaging deeply with stories that span cultures, socioeconomic backgrounds, and varied life circumstances, directors learn to create holistic, collaborative environments in rehearsal. This immersive approach enables them to build imaginative, dynamic worlds on stage—spaces that not only captivate audiences but also examine, challenge, and highlight contemporary social and political issues.

Collaboration and Process:  

Collaboration is a fundamental skill that directing students hone and develop through classes, workshops, and productions. Directors cultivate effective communication skills through ensemble work, practical exercises, and hands-on learning, mastering the art of giving constructive feedback that both challenges and inspires their collaborators. They learn to approach ideas with a sense of playful detachment, embracing radical revisions when necessary, and gain a foundational understanding of all theatrical disciplines. With an emphasis on experimentation, directors learn that the process of creating artistic work is as important as the final product.  

Risk and Artistic Freedom: 

In all classwork and experiential learning, students are encouraged to take risks in form, style, and content. Students are exposed to a wide variety of theatrical pedagogies styles, and encouraged to expand their horizons, trying new approaches and ideas.  Students are encouraged to make bold choices, “fail” radically in order to learn and expand.  

Technical Skills: 

Through classwork, labs, rehearsals and productions, directors put into practice these foundational skills: ability to articulate visual and theatrical ideas; communicate to a wide range of stakeholders and collaborators; administrative skills such as organization, scheduling and management of resources;  dramaturgical analysis; leadership and decision-making skills that value respect and care for each collaborator; professional etiquette in a rehearsal and production environment.     

THEA 2080: Collaboration I

THEA 2090: Collaboration II

THEA 2010: Acting I

THEA 2700: Acting II

THEA 2260: Conceptual Foundations of Theater Design

THEA 3011: Text Analysis

THEA 2045: Introduction to Directing

THEA 3205: From Page to Stage

THEA 4501: Directing Production Workshop (must be taken twice)

Two of the three following courses:

THEA 3004: Global Theater History - Foundational Impulses

THEA 3005: Global Theater History - Evolutions of the Present

THEA 3920: History of Theater Design (preference given to D&P concentration)

One design course from the list below:

THEA 3985: Set Design I 

THEA 2230: Costume Design I

THEA 3362: Lighting Design I

THEA 3420: Sound Design I

Recommended Theatre elective courses 

Set Design, Set Design II, Lighting Design, Lighting Design II, Stage Management, New Play Dramaturgy, Rehearsal Technique, Theatre Management, Stage Management II, Costume Design, Sound Design, Sound Design II, Projection Design, Projection Design II, Costume Design II, Stage Make Up and Hair

Recommended Interdisciplinary elective courses 

• VART1055 Figure Drawing I
• VART1124 Photography I
• VART1135 Visual Thinking I
• VART1265 Film Video I
• VART2185 Photography II
• VART1180 Painting I
• ARHI1100 Art History Intro
• MUSC1100 Intro to Music

At Fordham, our location allows us to bring some of the top directors in New York into our classrooms as guest speakers, mentors, and workshop leaders, as well as directors of studio and mainstage productions. Notable directors and guest artists from related fields who have worked with us:

Annie Dorsen:

Annie Dorsen is a theater director working at the intersection of algorithmic art and live performance. She is the co-creator of the 2008 Broadway musical Passing Strange, which she also directed. Spike Lee made a film of her production of the piece, which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in 2009, and was released theatrically by IFC in 2010. Dorsen is the recipient of a MacArthur Fellowship, the Spalding Gray Award, a Guggenheim Fellowship, a Foundation for Contemporary Arts Grant to Artists Award, and the Herb Alpert Award in the Arts.

Anne Kaufman:

Described by The New York Times as “one of the leading lights of downtown theater,” Anne has directed at most major New York non-profit and regional theaters. She is a Sundance Program Associate, a Usual Suspect at New York Theatre Workshop, an alumna of the Soho Rep. Writers and Directors Lab, a current member of Soho Rep.’s Artistic Council, Lincoln Center Directors Lab, The Drama League of New York, a founding member of The Civilians, an Associate Artist with Clubbed Thumb and member of New Georges' Kitchen Cabinet. From 2000-2006, Anne was on the directing faculty at NYU. She received her MFA in directing from UCSD, and a BA in Slavic Languages and Literature and Theater from Stanford University. Anne’s awards include two Obie Awards, the Joan and Joseph Cullman Award for Exceptional Creativity from Lincoln Center, the Alan Schneider Director Award, the Barrymore Award for Best Director, and a Lilly Award.

David Esbjornson:

David Esbjornson is a director and producer who has worked throughout the United States in regional theatres and on Broadway, and has established strong and productive relationships with some of the profession's top playwrights, actors, and companies. He directed the world premiere of Edward Albee's Tony Award-winning play The Goat, or Who is Sylvia? on Broadway. Esbjornson also served as the artistic director of Seattle Repertory Theatre and New York City's Classic Stage Company,

Steve Cosson:

Steve Cosson is a director, writer and Artistic Director of The Civilians theater company in New York, where he has originated and developed numerous original works in collaboration with some of the leading theater artists of the country. He’s developed original shows for TBS and ITV Entertainment, is the creator and host of the documentary musical podcast Let Me Ascertain You, and with The Civilians was the first theater company to be Artist-in-Residence at The Metropolitan Museum of Art. He has been a MacDowell Fellow, participated in the Sundance Theater Lab several times, and he was a Fulbright Scholar in Colombia. 

His plays are published by Dramatists Play Service, Smith & Kraus, Oberon Books and Playscripts, Inc.

Ralph Pena:

Ralph Peña has been Ma-Yi Theater Company's Artistic Director since 1996, helping to establish Ma-Yi as the country’s leading incubator of new works by Asian American playwrights, and reaping a number of Obie, Drama Desk Awards, and most recently, a 2018 Lucille Lortel Award for Best Musical (KPOP) and a 2018 Ross Wetzsteon Obie Award. Recent directing credits include Lloyd Suh’s The Chinese Lady, Hansol Jung’s Among The Dead, and A. Rey Pamatmat’s House/Rules. His work has been seen on the stages of Ensemble Studio Theater, the Public Theater, Long Wharf Theater, Victory Gardens, Laguna Playhouse, Children’s Theater Company, and La Mama ETC, to name a few.

Pirronne Yousefzadeh:

Pirronne Yousefzadeh (She/Her/Hers) is a director, writer, and educator, and was recently appointed Associate Artistic Director and Director of Engagement at Geva Theatre Center. Additionally, Pirronne is a founding member of Maia Directors, a consulting group for artists and organizations engaging with stories from the Middle East and beyond.. Her productions of The Dangerous House of Pretty Mbane by Jen Silverman (InterAct Theater Company) and In The Blood (Theatre Horizon) together received a total of fifteen Barrymore Award nominations, including Outstanding Direction and Outstanding Overall Production for both. She has directed and developed work at The Public/Joe's Pub, Playwrights Horizons, New York Theatre Workshop, Ars Nova, Soho Rep, Atlantic Theater Company, Ma-Yi Theater Company, Rising Circle Theater Collective, The Woodshed Collective (The Tenant: Best of 2011, The L Magazine), Partial Comfort Productions, Noor Theatre, Rising Phoenix Rep, HERE Arts Center, La Mama, New York Musical Theatre Festival, Ensemble Studio Theatre, The Wild Project, Dixon Place, The Living Theatre, The Lark Play Development Center, New Dramatists, The Kennedy Center, Williamstown Theatre Festival, American Conservatory Theater, Actors Theatre of Louisville, Cleveland Playhouse, La Jolla Playhouse, Geva Theatre Center, Pioneer Theatre Company, Huntington Theatre Company, Two River Theater Company, Milwaukee Rep, Kitchen Theatre Company, Dorset Theatre Festival, InterAct Theatre Company, Pennsylvania Shakespeare Festival, On The Boards, Perseverance Theatre, Berkshire Fringe Festival, Walnut Street Theatre, and Hangar Theatre, where she was a 2006 Drama League Directing Fellow.

Tony Speciale:

Tony Speciale is the founder of Plastic Theatre—conceiving, coauthoring and directing the Off-Broadway world premiere of Unnatural Acts (Classic Stage Company—Drama Desk Award nominee, GLAAD Media Award nominee). From 2015-2018, Tony served as Artistic Director of Abingdon Theatre Company, an off-Broadway theatre company dedicated to developing and producing new work. NYC: Mister Miss America (AFO/Rattlestick); The Absolute Brightness of Leonard Pelkey (Dixon Place, Westside Theatre); A Midsummer Night’s Dream featuring Bebe Neuwirth, Taylor Mac, Christina Ricci and Steven Skybell (Classic Stage Company); The Boy Who Danced On Air, The Dork Knight, The Gentleman Caller (Abingdon Theatre Company); and Matthew-Lee Erlbach’s Handbook for an American Revolutionary (The Gym at Judson). Regional: Angels in America: Millennium Approaches & Perestroika (St. Louis Rep); The Absolute Brightness of Leonard Pelkey (National Tour: Kirk Douglas, Old Globe, Bay Street, Hartford Stage, Laguna Playhouse, Philadelphia Theatre Company); Harmony by Barry Manilow and Bruce Sussman (Alliance Theatre, Ahmanson Theatre); and Romeo and Juliet (Actors Theatre of Louisville). Tony has developed new work at Berkeley Rep’s Ground Floor, The Goodman Theatre’s New Stages Festival, Sundance Theatre Lab at Mass MoCA and The Public Theater’s Under the Radar Festival. He is currently an assistant professor in the theatre department at SUNY New Paltz, and is the proud recipient of a Princess Grace Theatre Honorarium and Suzi Bass Award.

Niegel Smith:

Niegel Smith is a Bessie Award winning theater director and performance artist. He is the Artistic Director of NYC’s Obie Award winning theater, The Flea; board member of A.R.T./New York; His theater work has been produced at The Alley Theater, The Barbican, Classical Theatre of Harlem, The Flea Theater, The Goodman Theatre, HERE Arts Center, Hip Hop Theatre Festival, The Invisible Dog, Luna Stage, The Melbourne Festival, Magic Theatre, Mixed Blood, New York Fringe Festival, New York Live Arts, Phoenix Theatre Ensemble, Playwrights Horizons, Pomegranate Arts, The Public Theater, St. Ann’s Warehouse, Summer Play Festival, Todd Theatre and Under the Radar, and his participatory walks and performances have been produced by Abrons Arts Center, American Realness, Dartmouth College, Elastic City, The Invisible Dog, Jack, The New Museum, Prelude Festival, PS 122, the Van Alen Institute and Visual AIDS. He often collaborates with playwright/performer Taylor Mac and with artist Todd Shalom.

Carlos Armesto

Armesto has worked as a director and producer of festivals, plays, musicals, concerts, and events around the country. He was an associate curator at the inaugural Pittsburgh International Festival of Firsts, an associate artistic director at The Ensemble Studio Theatre (EST), and co-director for the EST/Sloan Project. He is also a recipient of the Bill Foeller Fellowship at Williamstown Theatre Festival and a Princess Grace Fellowship. Through Theatre C, Armesto has created more than 50 theatrical works. Notable credits include The Who's Tommy (Best Director—New Jersey Star Ledger's Tonys, 2010), Binding (Best Choreography, Solo Performance, and Performance Art Piece—Innovative Theatre Awards, 2010), “Echoes of Etta” at Joe's Pub (MAC Award for Outstanding Cabaret Act, 2014), and Heading East (with BD Wong). Armesto has directed and consulted for several university programs, including Rutgers Theater Company, NYU’s Graduate Musical Theatre Writing Program and the Dramatic Writing Program, and the Carnegie Mellon School of Drama. Currently under development: Cotton Candy & Cocaine, Odd Man Out, (with Teatro Ciego of Argentina), Dimes, and The Rite. He is also creative director for Theatre C's LGBTQ+ Party Series, Retro Factory. SLC, 2022–

Moritz von Stuelpnagel:

Moritz von Stuelpnagel is a freelance director based in New York City. His production of Hand to God on Broadway received five Tony Award nominations including Best Play and Best Director. Other recent productions include Important Hats of the Twentieth Century by Nick Jones (Manhattan Theatre Club), Teenage Dick by Mike Lew (Public Theater), Verité by Nick Jones (Lincoln Center/LCT3), Bike America by Mike Lew (Ma-Yi), Love Song of the Albanian Sous Chef by Robert Askins (Ensemble Studio Theater), Trevor by Nick Jones (Lesser America), Mel & El: Show & Tell (Ars Nova), The Roosevelt Cousins Thoroughly Sauced by Mike Lew (EST), Spacebar by Michael Mitnick (Studio 42), and My Base and Scurvy Heart by Adam Szymkowicz (Studio 42). Around the US, his work has been seen at the Alliance Theatre, Williamstown Theatre Festival, the Huntington Theatre, and others. Moritz is the former Artistic Director of Studio 42, New York City’s producer of “unproducible” plays.

Christopher Bayes:

Christopher Bayes began his theater career with the internationally acclaimed Theatre de la Jeune Lune. In 1989 he joined the acting company of the Guthrie Theater where he appeared in over twenty productions. His roles included Caliban in The Tempest, Edgar in King Lear, The Herald in Marat/Sade and Harlequin in Triumph of Love. 

Outside of New York, his directing credits include a co-production of Scapin at the Intiman Theatre in Seattle and Court Theatre in Chicago, Comedy of Errors at the Idaho Shakespeare Festival, Len Jenkin’s new adaptation of The Birdsat Yale Repertory Theatre, Endgame at Court Theatre, and The Moliere Impromptu at Trinity Repertory Company. He was part of the creative team for the Broadway and touring productions of THE 39 STEPS, for which he created additional movement and served as Movement Director. He is currently a Professor Adjunct and Head of Physical Acting at David Geffen School of Drama.

Kip Fagan:

His off-Broadway credits include Jesse Eisenberg’s The Revisionist and Asuncion, There Are No More Big Secrets by Heidi Schreck, How to Make Friends and Then Kill Them by Halley Feiffer, That Pretty Pretty, Recess and Roadkill Confidential by Sheila Callaghan, Jack's Precious Moment by Samuel D. Hunter, Reborning by Zayd Dohrn, Cipher by Cory Hinkel, The Young Left by Greg Keller, Nelson by Sam Marks and the premiere of Christopher Durang's Not a Creature Was Stirring. His regional credits include the world premiere of Heidi Schreck's The Consultant (Long Wharf Theatre); Tommy Smith and Gabriel Kahane’s musical Caravan Man (Williamstown Theatre Festival); Venus in Fur (George Street Playhouse and Philadelphia Theater Company); Maple and Vine (City Theatre); Circle Mirror Transformation (Marin Theatre Company); the world premiere of Small Tragedy (Playwrights’ Center); The Waverly Gallery (Empty Space); Neighborhood 3: Requisition of Doom and Michael Von Siebenburg Melts Through the Floorboards (Humana Festival) and many plays with Printer's Devil Theatre in Seattle, which he co-founded.

Steven Skybell:

Steven Skybell most recently starred off-Broadway as Tevye in FIDDLER ON THE ROOF in Yiddish directed by Joel Grey, for which he received the Lucille Lortel award for Best Performance by a leading actor in a musical.  His other Broadway credits include: the 2016 revival of FIDDLER ON THE ROOF(Lazar Wolf); PAL JOEY; WICKED; THE FULLY MONTY; LOVE!VALOUR!COMPASSION!; CAFÉ CROWN; AH, WILDERNESS!  His additional off-Broadway credits include: BABETTE’S FEAST, CYMBELINE, ANTIGONE in NY (Obie Award) Other: CAMELOT (Helen Hayes nomination); BROKEN GLASS, CAUCASIAN CHALK CIRCLE (both, Connecticut Critics Circle nomination); HENRY V (Shakespeare Globe, London) TV/Film: “Blue Bloods”, “Elementary,” “Chicago P.D.,” Cradle Will Rock, Simply Irresistible, Arthur Miller’s Everybody Wins, many others. He has taught acting at NYU, Juilliard, Yale Drama,  and Harvard’s ART.

Evan Cabnet:

Broadway credits include Thérèse Raquin (Roundabout Theater Company) and The Performers. Off-Broadway credits include Gloria and Outside People (Vineyard Theater), The Model Apartment and Poor Behavior (Primary Stages), A Kid Like Jake and All-American (Lincoln Center Theater), The Dream of the Burning Boy (Roundabout Theater Company), Elizabeth Meriwether's Oliver Parker! (stageFARM), Warrior Class (Second Stage), Oohrah! (Atlantic Theater Company), The Mistakes Madeline Made (Naked Angels) and Do I Hear a Waltz? (Encores!). Additional credits include Henry V (Chautauqua Theater Company), An American Daughter and his own adaptations of Ubu Roi and Salman Rushdie’s Haroun and the Seas of Stories (Williamstown Theatre Festival) and Saigono Samurai (Ginka Theater, Tokyo). He is an associate artist with the Roundabout Theater Company and a performance consultant for the Metropolitan Opera (Die Fledermaus). Currently, the Artistic Director of LCT3.

Daniella Topol:

Originally from the suburbs of Washington, DC, Daniella moved to Pittsburgh to get her undergraduate degree in directing from Carnegie Mellon where she also received her Masters of Arts Management. World Premieres: Martyna Majok’s Ironbound (Rattlestick), Cori Thomas’ When January Feels Like Summer (EST/P73/Women’s Project), and (Not) Water, co-created with Sheila Callaghan(3 Legged Dog/New Georges). Rachel Bonds' Five Mile Lake (South Coast Rep), Jessica Dickey’s Charles Ives Take Me Home (Rattlestick Theatre) and Row after Row (Women’s Project), Rajiv Joseph’s Monster at the Door (Alley Theatre), Lloyd Suh’s Jesus in India (Magic Theatre and MaYi Theatre), Carla Ching’s Sugarhouse at the Edge of the Wilderness (MaYi Theatre), Willy Holtzman’s The Morini Strad (City Theatre), Sheila Callaghan’s Dead City (New Georges) and Lascivious Something (Women’s Project), and Janet Allard and Niko Tsakalakos’ Pool Boy (Barrington Stage Company).She has directed readings and workshops for a number of companies and is currently a member of the board of the Lark Play Development Center, has been a grants review panelist for the National Endowment for the Arts, NYC Department of Cultural Affairs, NY State Council on the Arts and TCG. She is an NYTW Usual Suspect, member of EST, a Women’s Project Lab alumnus, and a New Georges affiliated artist.

Melissa Kievman:

Melissa Kievman is a director, creative producer and artEquity cohort and board member and a recipient of the National Endowment for the Arts/Theatre Communications Group fellowship for directors. For St. Ann’s Warehouse with Yazmany Arboleda, she programmed and produced over 50 artistic and community-engaged activations for Little Amal Walks NYC. She has served as Associate Artistic Director of New Dramatists, an urban writer's colony devoted to the support and development of new plays and playwrights and as associate to producer Anne Hamburger at En Garde Arts, a site-specific theater company that commissioned and presented large-scale multi-media works for spaces of architectural, historical or political significance in NYC.

Kievman is a member of SDC, Wingspace, Ensemble Studio Theater and the Lincoln Center Directors Lab.  She was a Drama League of New York Directing Fellow, is a New Georges and Trinity Rep affiliated artist, and has performed with the Bread and Puppet Theater in NYC and abroad.  She is a graduate of NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts and Northwestern and currently on faculty at Brown/Trinity and the Brown MFA Playwriting program.

Dustin Wills:

A NYC-based theatre and opera director originally from Texas. Wolf Play by Hansol Jung (MCC, Soho Rep, Ma-Yi), MONTAG by Kate Tarker (Soho Rep), and Wet Brain by John J. Caswell (Playwrights Horizons). Recent projects include Cymbeline (Juilliard Drama), Frontieres Sans Frontieres (Top Ten Theatrical Productions 2017 - New York Magazine) by Phillip Howze at the Bushwick Starr, Mikhail Bulgakov's Black Snow adapted by Keith Reddin at Julliard Drama, Will Arbery's Evanston Salt Costs Climbing with New Neighborhood and Plano with Paper Chairs, a Baryshnikov Arts Center Residency for AWFUL EVENT! - a new musical with Kate Tarker and Dan Schlosberg, and ongoing work on a musical adaptation of Federico García Lorca's surrealist play Once Five Years Pass. Recent opera works include Mozart's Die Zauberflöte AND Alcina with Yale Opera and Cavalli's L'Egisto with the Yale Baroque Opera. Dustin has directed and developed new work with The Foundry Theatre (O,Earth - Time Out NY 5 Stars, Off-Broadway Alliance Best New Play 2016), New York Theatre Workshop, Ars Nova, Rattlestick Playwrights Theatre and PAGE 73 (Orange Julius), Williamstown Theatre Festival, Playwrights Realm, Berkeley Rep, Echo Theatre (Blueberry Toast - Best Director 2016, LA Stage Raw Awards), Yale Rep, Berkshire Theatre Group, Paper Chairs, and Salvage Vanguard Theatre; created large-scale community puppet projects with Creative Action; and devised new work for The English Theatre of Rome and Teatro L'Arciliuto in Rome, Italy. He is a two-time recipient of the Princess Grace Award for Theatre, a Drama League and Boris Sagal directing fellow, former artistic director of the Yale Summer Cabaret, and for a couple of years gave rogue tours of the Vatican.

Our alumni have gone on to make careers in theatre, film, TV, and other related fields. Here are some of our alums.

John Bezark

Freelance Philadelphia-based theatre director, filmmaker, and aspiring interactive and game designer.

Nicole Brodeur

Development Director and Executive Producer of Story Pirates. http://nicoleabrodeur.com

Tim Chaffee 

Filmmaker, director, and editor based in Brooklyn, New York. http://timchaffee.net

Jordana De La Cruz 

Director, curator, and producer based in Brooklyn, New York and former Program Manager and Special Projects Coordinator of Park Avenue Armory

Rebecca Etzine 

Freelance director and Artistic Director of Cradle Theatre Company as well as a teaching artist with WHEDco (Women’s Housing and Economic Development Corporation) in the South Bronx. http://Rebeccaetzine.com

Greg Foro 

Co-Artistic Director of BAMA Theatre Company and Associate Professor of Drama at San Joaquin Delta College.

Peter Gil-Sheridan

Director and Playwright whose work has been produced by Cherry Lane Theatre, developed at Sundance Institute and New York Theatre Workshop, and was named the winner of The Smith Prize from National New Play Network for outstanding political work. Currently serving as a Visiting Assistant Professor in Playwriting & Screenwriting at Indiana University’s MFA Playwriting Program.

Morgan Gould 

Writer/Director and Artistic Director of Morgan Gould & Friends. Directing Off-Broadway & the Ensemble Studio Theatre in April 2016 and currently pursuing an MFA Playwriting Program at Brooklyn College. http://www.morgangouldandfriends.com

Mike Kimmel 

NYC-based Director/Writer. Recent work includes the conception and book for The Last Goodbye, which played at the Williamstown Theatre Festival and the Old Globe Theater in San Diego, and Songbird, which premiered in Fall 2015 Off-Broadway.

Anna Lag (Aurora Lagatutta) 

Freelance Dance/Theatre performance artist whose work has toured internationally. Currently based in San Diego.

Jonathan Lisecki 

Freelance director, writer, and actor whose independent film GAYBY was nominated for an Independent Spirit Award for Best First Screenplay.

James Presson

Freelance Writer/Director and Director/Founder of Less Than Rent Theatre Company. Currently working as a writer for HBO. http://www.jamespresson.com

Aaron Rhyne 

New York City-based video artist and projection designer. His designs have been seen in stage productions around the world, including Broadway, Off-Broadway, Carnegie Hall, and leading U.S. regional theaters. He received a Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Projection Design for his work on A Gentleman's Guide to Love and Murder. http://aaronrhyne.com

Holly-Anne Ruggiero

Freelance Director/Writer/Producer/Teacher. She has worked on Broadway and Off-Broadway since 2000 and is now the Lead Producer of two theatrical production companies based in New York and New Orleans.

Alex Randrup 

NYC-based theatre director.

Dave Ruttura

NYC-based theatre director. Currently serving as the Associate/Resident Director at School of Rock.