In the Aud

MFA Acting Candidates Sharon Combs, Abbie Cathcart, Eloy Gomez-Orfila, and Darah Donaher discuss how they devised and produced four original works based on current newspaper headlines. Final performances have been recorded and released for viewing is the form of a Buzzfeed-style news website, which can be found at www.untoldstoriesmsu.com

Members of the Second Stage organization discuss playwriting festival that was organized, written, performed, and produced entirely by Michigan State University’s very own aspiring playwrights. Watch the performances at theatre.msu.edu/spaces

A group of Michigan State University students virtually came together throughout fall 2020 to create a series of 5 new audio plays, each connected to the themes of diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI). As a starting point, we all brought in poetry to share. We read and discussed dozens of poems from diverse artists and used those as a jumping off point. The poetry evoked frank and honest conversations about race, gender, and sexuality, and every member of the ensemble shared deeply moving personal experiences about how these impact the way they move through the world today. We then created scenarios and improvised scenes until the basic structure for each play began to take place. Individuals and groups of students took on the challenge of weaving these experiences into cohesive audio dramas.

In this episode we speak with Director Sarah Hendrickson and four members of the Department of Theatre Freshman Class about their experiences with starting college online during a pandemic and the amazing creativity that came out of that experience. Student guests include Queenmakeeda Taylor, Henry Clise, Tessa Kresch, and Sebastian Barnett. In Pandemic'd!,MSU Department of Theatre Freshmen are followed by a fictitious camera crew as they explore their first year in college. Using humor and satire, our actors delve into the uniqueness of their experience in a university and society that have been impacted by a pandemic. It’s “Parks & Rec” meets “Glee” meets “Waiting for Guffman” meets “The Office”. It’s Pandemic’d! Pandemic'd! A Mockumentary Comedy will premiere its first two episodes on Friday, February 12, 2021. See both episodes at https://www.youtube.com/theatre_msu. Subscribe to be notified when new episodes are released! For more information visit theatre.msu.edu/pandemic

Designer, educator and Department of Theatre Alum G Max Maxin IV returned to Michigan State to review and critique the portfolios of our BFA and MFA Design Students. In this episode we hear from Max, along with students Alaina Guttierrez, Rose Legge, Zech Saenz, Grace Foiles, Nick Casella, and Mona Jahani about their portfolio review experience and why they all chose MSU. To learn more about these designers, you can visit their websites: https://www.ivmaxin.com https://www.monajahani.com https://zechsaenz.weebly.com https://www.nicklascaselladesign.com https://gracefoiles.weebly.com https://leggedesigns.weebly.com/ [https://leggedesigns.weebly.com/]