Performance Studies Commons^™

“Anything Can Have Life”: An Interview With Everett Quinton About Charles Ludlam’S Ridiculous Puppetry, Jungmin Song, John Bell, Everett Quinton

Ballard Institute Publications

This Ballard Institute and Museum of Puppetry conversation, via Zoom, with

Everett Quinton, Dr. John Bell, and Dr. Jungmin Song was recorded March 21,

2021, and edited by Tom Tuke and John Bell. Everett Quinton (1952-2023) was an

actor, director, and—after the death of his partner Charles Ludlam (1943-1987)—

the leader of the Ridiculous Theatrical Company, the landmark ensemble which

helped define queer theater in the late 20th century. While mostly known for his

acting, playwriting, and directing, Charles Ludlam was also an active puppeteer

and ventriloquist. Many of his puppets are now part of the Ballard Institute and

Museum …

Vestigial Choreographies: Climate Consciousness In The Long Nineteenth Century, Alexandra A. Rego

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The aims of this project are twofold: (a) to develop a method of theoretical analysis and (b) to put this method into pointed use. In service of (a), I propose a method of choreographic analysis. This method operates relationally, highlighting the production of movement and stillness among and between bodies, objects, and encounters. Choreographic analysis draws from methods typically sequestered to dance studies. Towards aim (b), this project demonstrates the relevance and breadth of choreographic analysis by connecting it to ecocriticism. Throughout this project, I apply choreographic analysis to a diverse set of case studies. I use choreographic analysis to …

A Puff's Exploration Of Wayne Hopkins, Ethan G. Mullen, Leon Wiebers

Honors Thesis

This thesis is a synthesis of modalities I have studied during the course of my Theatre Arts degree, applied to the realization of the principal character, Wayne Hopkins in the award-winning play Puffs (Or: Seven Increasingly Eventful Years at a Certain School of Magic and Magic) a LMU Theatre Arts Department production. This work is divided into three major sections. First, I reflect on how I applied acting tools I have studied at LMU to the development of my character and performance. These include script analysis, story structure analysis, breath work, and Viewpoints training. Second, I share media displaying my …

Shimmer Methodology: May 2026 Cultural Studies Association Of Australasia, Lola Montgomery

Staff Scholarship - Australia & Dubai

This webinar presents an overview of the contemporary state of creative-practice research and autotheory before introducing Shimmer, an emerging methodological framework developed through creative practice, postgraduate supervision, and reflective inquiry. The presentation argues that while creative-practice research has successfully established creative work as a legitimate form of knowledge production, and autotheory has legitimised lived experience as theoretical material, both traditions leave relatively under-theorised the embodied moment through which insight first emerges.

The significance of the work lies in its contribution to ongoing debates around embodiment, affect, intuition, and knowledge production within creative-practice research. Shimmer proposes a language for understanding …

A Room Of One’S Own: Understanding Feminism In A Dance Theatre Context, Eden A. Wilson

Theatre Undergraduate Honors Theses

This creative thesis project examines how the elements of dance theatre can be applied to existing literature. Through process-based research, I explore how movement can physicalize the feminist concepts of Virginia Woolf’s A Room of One’s Own surrounding the financial and creative constraints of female expression. This project aims to prove the effectiveness of the body as a source of feminist exploration through creating a new lens of interpretation of Woolf’s literature.

A Crown In Death: An (Expanded) Dramaturgical Approach To The Trojan Women Of Euripides, Stephanie Lester

Montview Journal of Research & Scholarship

In the action-packed, visually-oriented market for modern media, some may assume a 2,400-year-old Greek tragedy to be slightly past its expiration date, especially if it features little to no action onstage like in Euripides’ The Trojan Women. However, it is important to remember that literature is lost when the world fails to cherish it, so if a text survives that long, it may be worth another cursory glance. In this case, that glance involved a full dramaturgical study featuring qualitative script analysis of multiple translations of The Trojan Women with related texts to explore context, themes, common literary devices, and …

I Am Hookman: A Reflection, Fiona E. Larsen-Teskey

Scripps Senior Theses

I am Hookman is a reflection paper on my process, experience, and growth performing in the play, Hookman, as my senior thesis.

Staging Violence With Intentionality, Toby O'Brien

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis examines the role of the fight choreographer in the theatre while addressing the potential issues staged violence has in distracting an audience from the intended narrative of the play. Avoiding the instruction manual approach of stage combat in favor of expounding on the theory of violent entertainment, I have constructed a thesis that informs the reader of certain types of violence found in both classical and modern productions and have researched the psychological ramifications of violent spectatorship and the necessity for content acknowledgements as well as consideration for the performer’s well-being. By exploring the history of violent entertainment …

A Burlesque: The Shimmering Body Of Revealing, Lola Montgomery

Staff Scholarship - Australia & Dubai

A Burlesque: The Shimmer Manuscript is a hybrid critical–creative work that examines burlesque as an embodied methodology and a mode of knowledge production. Drawing from my two decades as a performer–scholar, the work reframes glamour, desire, and adornment as epistemological practices rather than theatrical ornamentation. The project is significant in that it expands understandings of performance studies, autotheory, and feminist aesthetics by foregrounding the performer’s body as an intelligent, sensing, world-making apparatus.

The methodology is creative practice research and archive-driven, integrating backstage documentation, AI-assisted photomontage, and theoretical reflection. The work draws from poststructuralist and feminist frameworks (Irigaray, Deleuze & Guattari, …

Investigating The Relationship Between Noun Classes And Plant Folk Taxonomy In Chasu Language Of Kilimanjaro Region In Tanzania, Peter Rabson Mziray

Journal of Humanities and Social Sciences

The current study investigates the relationship between noun classes and plant folk taxonomy in Chasu (G 22). The study focuses on two objectives: the first objective is to describe the plant folk taxonomy in Chasu and the second objective is to determine the relationship between noun classes and plant folk taxonomy in Chasu. Data were collected from rural villages in Same and Mwanga districts by using free listing, field interviews (jungle-walk-and-identify), and written texts containing Chasu plant names. The findings reveal that Chasu folk taxonomy reflects different ethnobotanical categories; including a unique beginner which is mmea/mimea ‘plant(s)’, and three life …

Interspecies Responsivity In Early Modern Drama And Animal Performances, Taylor C. Culbert

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation proposes an expansive, interspecies definition of performance that uses behavior rather than cognition as the decisive feature and illustrates how such a definition can reshape our approach to theatre and performance history. Using the concept of responsivity, which refers to the embodied and affective ways that humans and non-human animals acknowledge and react to one another, I trace human–animal interactions across a variety of sixteenth- and seventeenth-century performance genres, from the aristocratic stag hunt and entertainments involving trained animals to the plays of Molière and Shakespeare. Drawing on my experience training animals, I offer a new perspective on …

Selected Projects In Scenic Design And Technical Direction, Ky Trupp

All Graduate Reports and Creative Projects, Fall 2023 to Present

A selection of projects in scenic design and technical direction produced by Utah State Theater involving Ky Trupp and others. Each chapter studies the design process and production process of three individual shows where Ky was the Scenic Designer or Technical Director.

American Utopia: The Evolution Of David Byrne’S Viewpoint Of America From 1977 To Present, Morgan A. Prince

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

David Byrne is a multimedia artist known primarily as the lead singer and main songwriter for the new wave band Talking Heads. Throughout Byrne’s career he has continually written about America and Americans. This thesis traces his writings about America from the beginning of Talking Heads to his most recent projects. In doing so, the thesis puts forward that Byrne’s opinion on America has changed from one that is centered on the American people to one that is instead focused on American institutions. Additionally, the thesis traces how Byrne’s work has evolved from idealization to realism, as his early work …

A Black Sherlock Holmes: An Exploration Of Nonconforming Characterization., Faith Janaye Artis

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

In the wake of diversity initiatives in the greater American theatre landscape, we are now including more Black actors than ever. Whether that be through the inclusion of diverse playwrights or implementing new casting protocols, we now have Black people in the room. However, when portraying the Black “version” of a character (i.e. Black Annie, Black Ariel, Black Juliet) a question still plagues the Black Actor’s mind: how am I meant to fit here? I evaluate my process of portraying Sherlock Holmes as my thesis role. By challenging the implied white perspective in this “universal” story (despite its feminist retelling), …

Creating New Points Of Access: How Integrating Black Acting Methods Strengthens The Western Theatre Canon., Darrin Edward Dispenza-Mosley

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Western acting techniques have historically disregarded the contributions and techniques of black and non-Western performance to the detriment of black actors. This disregard has created barriers for black actors when engaging in what has now become standard theatre training. This training is enforced by implementation of acting techniques in academia that favor codified techniques of Eurocentric acting. Despite black acting techniques being codified and taught within the black community and academia, outside of a few historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs), predominately white academia has implemented valuable training methods that black/African American Acting techniques can offer. By looking at American …

The Space Defines The Phrase: An Analysis Of How Performance Venues Helped Shape Classic Play Texts, Carl Sage

SACAD: Scholarly Activities

Within the world of scenography there is an axiom that states:

“In the beginning was the word, and the word was with the playwright.” That is to say that designers need to derive their worlds from what the authors present. Scenographers do, of course, engage in research, segments of which include such questions as: What was occurring in the world at the time the piece was written? What stories might the author have been exposed to as inspiration? How have other scenographers interpreted this particular text? Such dramaturgical questions – and others – have a reasonable scenographic utility. However, no …

“Change Is Brewing”: Women Finding Liberation In The Performative Rituals Of Modern Paganism And The Witch Organization, Katie Nelson

The Kennesaw Journal of Undergraduate Research

This project analyzes elements of performative Modern Paganism and Wiccan rituals used by the Women’s International Terrorist Conspiracy from Hell (WITCH) group to determine how these performance practices can provide comfort and agency to those who have been systemically oppressed, particularly women in the United States. The project will focus on WITCH’s activist work, especially during the second wave feminist movement of the 1960-1970s, which used elements of Modern Paganism for social justice purposes by implementing them through guerilla theatre and zap actions. Methodologically, I will be reviewing sources such as performance photos, news articles, and testimonies from the women …

The Page And The Stage: How Comics Perform, Elizabeth Buccella

Theses and Dissertations

Comics and theatre share several, often overlooked similarities, like their unique concept of the gaze, interpretation and execution of a script, and the curation of a distinct visual language. This makes comics a viable candidate for analysis using the field of performance studies and other theatrical forms of analysis. The process of comics and how they are read is discussed before a brief literature review of performance and comics studies scholarship. Two comics, one nonfiction and one fiction, are analyzed using the key concepts from the literature review.

The Sounds Of Madame Geoffrin’S Salon, Melanie Conroy

ABO: Interactive Journal for Women in the Arts, 1640–1830

Salons were core institutions of the eighteenth-century European social calendar, especially in Paris. Literary performances and philosophical conversation were the core activities of many of these gatherings. What did conversation and literary readings actually sound like at these events? To what extent were voices audible to everyone in the room, or too muffled or far away to be heard? What was the impact of the ambiance or of ephemeral sound on the reading or reception of the hearing? Using textual descriptions, paintings, and architectural information, I reconstruct two legendary readings of eighteenth-century texts, Voltaire’s L’Orphélin de la Chine and Marmontel's …

Reflection: The Twenty-Line Trap? Shakespeare Enacted By Young Women, Shannon Reed

Dialogue: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Popular Culture and Pedagogy

Professional actors assemble a toolkit of monologues with an obligatory “Shakespearean monologue” of around 20 lines. But female actors are at a disadvantage, with less than 150 women in a repertoire of over 1,100 characters in Shakespeare’s 37 or more plays. Young female actors (18-22 years old) are even more at a loss, if the powerful and complex older female roles are removed, leaving only a few dozen appropriate speeches. What effect does this limited canon have on such actors? Here, I reflect upon my own participant observer experience as a young woman actor, who received the bulk of my …

“Touching The Untouchable”: Time As Material And The Fragmented Self In The Maximodern Era Shori V. Sims © 2024 Shori V. Sims All Rights Reserved Shorisims., Shori V. Sims

Masters Theses

In the conventional division of disciplines, film/video/moving images and stationary sculpture are categorized as formal and conceptual opposites. In my work and in this thesis, I am arguing that moving images constitute a form of sculpture in the style of assemblage by the manipulation of time around them. Yes, the image is flat and stationary on its own: but the cut of time which it represents exists multi-dimensionally (spatially and temporally) to be combined in a collage-like manner. In my practice, moving images constitute a form of assemblage that manipulates time and space in ways normally attributed to sculpture.

This …

Method Acting As A Therapeutic Intervention For Trauma Recovery, Remi Moses

Expressive Therapies Capstone Theses

While considered controversial by some, Method acting as popularized by Lee Strasberg is a technique that elicits powerful and authentic results on stage and screen. The foundational Method acting techniques, the Relaxation Exercise (RE) and the Sense Memory Exercise (SME), share similarities to bottom-up therapeutic processes like Somatic Experiencing and Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing. By implementing a trauma-informed drama therapy framework with these two exercises, the RE and SME were restructured as a therapeutic intervention for people in trauma recovery. The author implemented a study of three consecutive group therapy sessions for people healing from trauma where clients participated …

Killers, Queers, And Cowards: Suffering And Freedom In Jean-Paul Sartre’S No Exit, Aaron Brewer

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

Throughout No Exit, Sartre’s mirror is key to understanding his characters and philosophy. It is his tool for exploring ideas that are limited by the time in which he lived. Here, the play does what all great works should do: it challenges the status quo and looks beyond what can already be seen. This thesis will use his established mirror metaphor and an expanded mirror metaphor to unearth the true nature of No Exit’s characters.

In setting down the characters’ path, Sartre asks questions that humans have considered for Millenia: Why are we here? Why am I suffering? How …

Manifesting The End Of Amerikkkan Theatre: Black Theatre’S Healing Power To Eradicate Anti-Blackness, R'Myni Watson

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

This thesis explores the potential of Black Theatre as a catalyst for healing anti-Blackness within American theatre. Acknowledging the limitations of systemic change, this study advocates for incremental shifts within communities to combat ingrained racial biases through narrative change and theatrical exploration. Grounded in the theory of Black Theatre's energy force, Nommo, the study proposes the framework of Acknowledge, Dismantle, Re-Educate to address and eradicate anti-Blackness. Through directing the production of Blood at the Root, incorporating Black Theatre methodologies atop eurocentric foundations, this research documents the healing experienced by participants and audiences. Key findings reveal increased community engagement, support, awareness, …

Bedeviled Beauty: My Journey Through White American Theater Institutions, J'Aila C. Price

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

Game console: Oculus Quest

World: American Theater Institutions

Player: Minority

Place: United States

Level: “Ain’t no way.”

This thesis explores the contrast between the Westernized philosophies ingrained in my education and my identity as a Black female artist. It sheds light on the difficulties of pursuing higher education in the arts and the gaps that arise from limited exposure to culturally diverse Black resources, revealing the systemic issues in Western performance education. The paper also discusses the insights gained from my journey as a Black female artist, focusing on my thesis performance of Blood at the Root, which is …

Transforming Into A Politically Engaged Actor Through Gem Of The Ocean., Tajleed Steven Hardy

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This thesis explores my transformation into a politically engaged theatre artist through my performance as Citizen Barlow in the University of Louisville's Department of Theatre Arts’ 2024 production of August Wilson's Gem of the Ocean. My thesis defines the characteristics of a politically engaged theatre artist and proposes specific ways actors can prepare to perform in any production of any play. My transformation into a politically engaged theatre artist resulted from a combination of the skills I gathered as an undergraduate student at Norfolk State University and the new analytical and acting techniques I learned as an MFA in …

‘Faults To Make Us Men’: Shakespeare In The Prison System, Hannah Boyle

Honors Projects

This paper provides a comprehensive analysis of the positive impact of Shakespeare in prison programs on incarcerated individuals, utilizing empirical data, anecdotal evidence, and scholarly insights. It underscores the educational benefits of engaging with literature and performance arts within prison settings, as well as the various social-emotional learning opportunities, especially the ability to reduce recidivism rates and enhance incarcerated individuals' quality of life.

Drawing on the experience and narrative of many practitioners of theatre in prison and Shakespeare in prisons programs, this paper works to show Shakespeare's unique capacity to connect incarcerated populations with those who have gone through the …

Child Soldiers Of Verona: The Antiauthoritarian Antiwar Subtext Of Romeo And Juliet, Carl L. Sage

SACAD: Scholarly Activities

Common practice has Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet identified as a tragic love story, which has antecedents tracing back as far as Pyramus and Thisbe by Ovid. Though valid, this interpretation plumbs only a limited portion of the text. It is the position of this paper that, like Shakespeare’s later work Macbeth, Romeo and Juliet was written with a political subtext in mind. Both texts play on the social memory of the War of the Roses, as well as continuing sectarian strife between Protestant and Roman Catholic adherents contemporaneous to the era. However, while Macbeth served to prop up the …

Big Fish: A Scenic Designer’S Process, Anna K. Schwartz

Johnny Carson School of Theatre and Film: Theses, Student Research, and Creative Work

This thesis presents a comprehensive exploration of the scenic design process through a case study of the production "Big Fish the Musical" at the Nebraska Repertory Theatre. Drawing on firsthand experience as the scenic designer for the production, the author delves into the multifaceted journey of conceptualizing, designing, and executing the scenic elements of the show. The thesis examines the collaborative nature of the scenic design process, highlighting the interactions between the scenic designer, director, technical team, and other creative collaborators. Key aspects explored include the initial conceptualization phase, the iterative design process, the challenges, and discoveries encountered during rehearsals …

Wole Soyinka: A Life Of Arts And Advocacy, Maggie Feduccia

[Archive] Belmont University Research Symposium (BURS)

The life and work of playwright, novelist, and activist Wole Soyinka (born in 1934) serves as a perfect example of the marriage of the arts and advocacy, through the telling of stories of the Nigerian people. Soyinka grew up surrounded by Christianity, Islam, and the tribal religion of the Yoruba people. Additionally, Soyinka’s parents exposed him to Nigerian and other West African literature, Western literature, and ancient Greek drama. Soyinka’s intellect was formed at the intersection of these various theologies and literary traditions, and further developed through studies at the University of Ibadan and the University of Leeds, from where …