Theater Department

Wesleyan sponsors an active program in dramatic art within the Department of Theater, which serves as a producing educational theater in the liberal arts setting. The Wesleyan program is based on direct participation in creative endeavor: Process, performance, and understanding are equally stressed. While the department concentrates much of its attention on the traditional live theater, its work is also applicable to, and can serve as basic training for, many other performing arts of the present era and for the emerging genres of the future.

Each year the department sponsors play productions and other events in a variety of theatrical forms; some are directed by faculty members or guest artists, while others are directed by advanced undergraduates. The department makes regular use of two theater facilities: the Theater in the Center for the Arts, a handsome 400-seat space; and the '92 Theater, a highly flexible studio space. Second Stage, an extracurricular student theater group, has its headquarters and also sponsors productions in the '92 Theater, in cooperation with the Theater Department. Performances are also given in many alternative spaces on campus by members of the lively and diverse Wesleyan theater community.

Many students participate in some aspect of theater during their years at Wesleyan. The most seriously interested become theater majors, while others take only a few courses or work solely on an extracurricular basis. All types of involvement are desired and welcome. It is not necessary to become a theater major to take many courses in the department or to participate in its productions.