Edmond Williams (Chair) is Professor of Theatre and Chairman of the UA Department of Theatre and dance since its formation in 1979. His production of Edward Bond's Lear was honored with its selection to the national level of the American College Theatre Festival and was performed at The Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C. Dr. Williams has been recognized with Druid Arts Awards for "Best Production of a Play" and "Theatre Educator". In 1996 he was honored by the National Alumni Association of the University of Alabama with their Outstanding Committment to Teaching award. Dr. Williams is a past president of the Alabama Theatre League and the Southeastern Theatre Conference. Presently he serves as Chairman of the Commission on Accreditation for the National Association of Schools of Theatre, and he was recently elected the the National Theatre Conference, an honorary organization of movers and shakers of the American Theatre.
Andy Fitch (Scenic Design) is associate professor of scenic design at the University of Alabama. His recent designs for the University include Cat On A Hot Tin Roof, Hamlet, Grapes of Wrath, Jesus Christ Superstar, The Piano Lesson, The Rocky Horror Show, Sweeney Todd, and Angels In America. His recent regional designs include: Beauty And The Beast, Cinderella, and Forever Plaid at the Alabama Shakespeare Festival; One Flea Spare directed by Adrian Hall for Kitchen Dog Theatre in Dallas, Texas; Dinner With Friends, Art, and Anton In Show Business for the Hippodrome Theatre in Florida; and Henry IV for Theatre SMU. Mr. Fitch is a Founding Member and former Resident Designer for the critically acclaimed Kitchen Dog Theatre in Dallas where he received the 1994 Dallas Critic's Award for Outstanding Set Design for David Mamet's American Buffalo. Noted by The Dallas Morning News as "one of Dallas' top five stage designers," he also won the Dallas Theatre League's first ever Leon Rabin Award for Outstanding Set Design for Kitchen Dog's Fool for Love. Other design credits include the world premier of Bashful in Love adapted and directed by Charles Marowitz at Texas Stage in Ft. Worth, along with many other designs in Texas including the Majestic Theatre; Actor's Theatre of Dallas; Extra Virgin Performance Cooperative; Southern Methodist University Theatre, Dance and Music Departments; East Texas State University; and the University of Dallas. Andy also serves as Chair of the Design and Technology Committee for the South Eastern Theater Conference. Fitch received his M.F.A at Souther Methodist University in Dallas, Texas.
William Teague (Lighting Design & Technical Production), Professor of Theatre, teaches design and technical theatre. In addition to this theatrical work, he is represented in other media as well. He has designed scenery for Alabama Public Television and was Production Designer for the feature motion picture, Rebel Love. Mr. Teague wrote and supplied graphics for the Computer Assisted Design section of Scene Design and Stage Lighting, the most widely used text in technical theatre. He has also served as a theatre consultant on restorations and new facilities around the southeast. He is the Vice-President for Conferences for the United States Institute for Theatre Technology, the 1995 winner of the USITT Southeast Region "Outstanding Educator of the Year" award, former President of the Alabama Conference of Theatre and Speech, and a member of SETC, as well as USITT.
Donna Meester (Costume Design/Production) is Assistant Professor of Theatre and resident costume designer at the University of Alabama. She came to Alabama after teaching and designing at the University of Louisiana-Monroe and Arkansas State University. Ms. Meester has served as the Region VI Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival Design Chair. Her costume designs have won several awards from KCACTF including designs for: Picasso At The Lapin Agile, Voices and A Bright Room Called Day. Other professional credits include work for the Memphis Black Rep, Oklahoma Shakespearean Festival, Ouachita Baptist College and Henderson College. Donna is an active member of USITT and was first vice-chair for USITT-SW before coming to the Southeast region. Meester holds an M.F.A. in Stage Design from Southern Methodist University and a B.S. in Apparel Technology from Purdue University.
Geoffrey Sherman (Producing Artistic Director) Mr. Sherman has been responsible for the world and national premieres of scores of plays-from David Hare's Knuckle to Alice Childress's Moms, as Artistic Director of Off-Broadway's Hudson Guild Theatre, Oregon's Portland Repertory Theatre and Michigan's Meadow Brook Theatre. In New York City, his work as producer and director garnered two Obies, as well as Drama Desk, Outer Critics Circle and Audelco nominations. He has received Best Production and Best Director Awards from every major newspaper in Michigan, for plays ranging from Angels In America and Arcadia to The Old Settler and The Rocky Horror Show. His work as a guest director has been seen at over forty theatres on both sides of the Atlantic including: New York's Roundabout Theatre Company and American Jewish Theatre; England's Redgrave and Crucible Theatres; and U.S. regionals including: Seattle Repertory Theatre, Milwaukee Repertory Theatre, Repertory Theatre of St.Louis, Center Stage Baltimore, Utah's Pioneer Theatre and Studio Arena, Buffalo. His work for television includes Another World for NBC and Woman's Day USA for the USA cable network. He is currently producing artistic director of Michigan's BoarsHead Theatre.
Alicia Johnson-Reed (Director of Marketing and Communications, Co-Director of Theatre Management Program) Alicia has worked as a Speech and Drama Instructor for the Birmingham City School System, theLos Angeles Unified School District University of Alabama Los Angeles Watts Tower New York University of Alabama Alys Stephens Center
Sara Lee Howell (Director of Stage Management Program) is proud to count this as her nineteenth season at ASF. As the Production Stage Manager, Sara works on main stage shows, The Southern Writers' Project, teaches for the Stage Management MFA program through the University of Alabama at Tuscaloosa and occasionally moonlights as a billboard model. In addition to ASF, she has worked at Theatre Virginia, Guthrie Theater, Arizona Theatre Company, Oregon Shakespearean Festival, Southern Appalachian Repertory Theatre and The Lost Colony. Sara would like to thank Kent Thompson for his direction of many of her ASF favorites - On the Verge, Tartuffe, The Cherry Orchard, The Two Gentlemen of Verona, King Lear, Peter Pan, The Little Foxes, Big River, The Tempest, Lizard, The Winter's Tale, The Merchant of Venice, Macbeth, Antony and Cleopatra, Richard III, Toad of Toad Hall, A Lesson Before Dying, An Ideal Husband and Aaronville Dawning. MFA Faculty.
Ray Chambers (Director of Professional Actor Training Program) has worked with the Alabama Shakespeare Festival for thirteen years as actor, director, writer, and instructor. This last year Mr. Chambers directed and adapted A Christmas Carol for the stage and also directed Hamlet for ASF's 2002 repertory season. He has taught Acting and Classical Text in the MFA Professional Actor Training Program for ten years as well as classes and workshops on Shakespeare's text throughout the country. As an educational outreach Ray wrote A Midsummer Night's Scream, an original play for ASF that introduced the works of Shakespeare to teenagers and subsequently toured throughout Alabama. As an Actor Ray has appeared at ASF in title roles including, King John, Henry V, Hamlet, as well as major roles in Julius Caesar, The Winter's Tale, The Rivals, Henry IV (Parts 1 and 2), Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, and dozens of others. Other regional credits include, Bent, Antony and Cleopatra, The School for Scandal, Coriolanus, Love's Labors Lost, Hamlet, Macbeth and others at the Globe Theatres in San Diego; and numerous productions for Arizona Theatre Company, Syracuse Stage and Studio Arena Theatre, among others.
Greta Lambert (Associate Program Director of Professional Actor Training Program) An ASF company member since 1985, playing Shirley Valentine, Lady Croom in Arcadia, Dottie Ottley in Noises Off, Truvy in Steel Magnolias, Blanche DuBois, Ivy Rowe, Hedda Gabler, Sarah Bernhardt, Eliza Doolittle, Candida, Miss Havisham, Hana in Night of the Iguana, Natalya in A Month in the Country, Marquise de Merteuil in Les Liasons Dangereuses, Maggie in Dancing at Lughnasa, and others. Her regional credits include Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, Private Lives, Three Sisters, To Kill a Mockingbird, Death and the Maiden, A Shayna Maidel, and Woman in Mind. In Shakespeare she has played Cleopatra, Lady Macbeth, Gertrude, Hermione, Viola, Mistress Page, Beatrice, Constance, Rosalind, Emilia, Cressida, Kate, Titania, Emilia, Miranda, Duchess of York, Princess Katherine, and Lady Ann. Her television credits include Picket Fences, Young Riders, Nose Dive on A&E, and Requiem on PBS. Her ASF directing credits include Proof, Beauty and the Beast, Relative Values, Cinderella, Alice in Wonderland, and A Midsummer Night's Scream. ASF Associate Artist.
Sarah Felder's (Voice and Speech) work at ASF includes Steel Magnolias, A Christmas Carol, Romeo and Juliet, Much Ado About Nothing, Hamlet and The Comedy of Errors. Her Broadway work includes Cabaret, The Sound of Music, A View From the Bridge, and The Crucible. Her Off-Broadway credits include New York Shakespeare Festival productions of André Serban's Cymbeline, Tartuffe, Julius Caesar, and The Taming of the Shrew; the premiere of Stephen Sondheim's Saturday Night; Tony Kushner's The Dybuk, Ken Lonergan's Lobby Hero; and Bill Irwin's version of Georges Feydeaux' A Flea in Her Ear. Her regional experience includes 5 years with Arena Stage, 8 years at the Shakespeare Theatre in D.C., and the Guthrie Theater on the premiere of Arthur Miller's Mr. Peters' Connections. She has worked frequently at Center Stage, Baltimore; Long Wharf Theatre; Hartford Stage; The Alley Theatre; and the Mark Taper Forum. A graduate of The Julliard School, she is also a Laban Movement Analyst, and has served on the faculty of Catholic University, Fordham, SUNY Purchase and the graduate acting program at New York University, Tisch School of the Arts.
Denise Gabriel's (Movement) work at ASF includes Macbeth, Proof, The Comedy of Errors, Steel Magnolias, Titus Andronicus, Secret Garden, Disguises, A Christmas Carol and Lilly's Purple Plastic Purse. Ms. Gabriel has taught in graduate acting programs and coached actors since 1976. She came to ASF from being guest artist/Fellow of the Seminar at Schloss Leoploldron, Salzberg, Austria, coaching a production of Chekov's Three Sisters. She is a founding Board Member for the Association of Theatre Movement Educators and recipient of the 2000 ATME-ATHE Service Achievement Award. She has worked in New York; Shanghai, China; and a host of University productions across the country including A Raisin in the Sun with Dipunkar Mukherjee, Pangea World Theatre, Minneapolis. Ms. Gabriel's regional credits include The Comedy of Errors and A Midsummer Night's Dream at The Old Globe Theatre, San Diego; Romeo and Juliet at Clarence Brown Theatre with director Paul Barnes; and Alchemy of Desire, Dead Man's Blues, and King Lear at Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park with director Ed Stern. As well as being a member of the ASF resident artistic staff Ms. Gabriel is on the ASF/ MFA Faculty.
Jason Armit (Fight Director) a native of New Orleans, is an Atlanta based Fight Choreographer. He received his B.F.A. in performance from the University of Southern Mississippi, is a Certified Teacher with the Society of American Fight Directors and is the Director of the Atlanta Stage Combat Studio. He has staged theatrical violence for theatres such as: The Alliance Theatre Company, Alabama Shakespeare Festival, True Colors Theatre Company, Georgia Shakespeare Festival, Theatrical Outfit, Theatre in the Square, Dad’s Garage Theatre Company, and Actor’s Express. ASF credits include; The Wars of the Roses, Disney’s Beauty and The Beast, Treasure Island, The Taming of the Shrew, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, All My Sons, and As You Like It.
Andy Fitch (Scenic Design) is associate professor of scenic design at the University of Alabama. His recent designs for the University include Cat On A Hot Tin Roof, Hamlet, Grapes of Wrath, Jesus Christ Superstar, The Piano Lesson, The Rocky Horror Show, Sweeney Todd, and Angels In America. His recent regional designs include: Beauty And The Beast, Cinderella, and Forever Plaid at the Alabama Shakespeare Festival; One Flea Spare directed by Adrian Hall for Kitchen Dog Theatre in Dallas, Texas; Dinner With Friends, Art, and Anton In Show Business for the Hippodrome Theatre in Florida; and Henry IV for Theatre SMU. Mr. Fitch is a Founding Member and former Resident Designer for the critically acclaimed Kitchen Dog Theatre in Dallas where he received the 1994 Dallas Critic's Award for Outstanding Set Design for David Mamet's American Buffalo. Noted by The Dallas Morning News as "one of Dallas' top five stage designers," he also won the Dallas Theatre League's first ever Leon Rabin Award for Outstanding Set Design for Kitchen Dog's Fool for Love. Other design credits include the world premier of Bashful in Love adapted and directed by Charles Marowitz at Texas Stage in Ft. Worth, along with many other designs in Texas including the Majestic Theatre; Actor's Theatre of Dallas; Extra Virgin Performance Cooperative; Southern Methodist University Theatre, Dance and Music Departments; East Texas State University; and the University of Dallas. Andy also serves as Chair of the Design and Technology Committee for the South Eastern Theater Conference. Fitch received his M.F.A at Souther Methodist University in Dallas, Texas.
William Teague (Lighting Design & Technical Production), Professor of Theatre, teaches design and technical theatre. In addition to this theatrical work, he is represented in other media as well. He has designed scenery for Alabama Public Television and was Production Designer for the feature motion picture, Rebel Love. Mr. Teague wrote and supplied graphics for the Computer Assisted Design section of Scene Design and Stage Lighting, the most widely used text in technical theatre. He has also served as a theatre consultant on restorations and new facilities around the southeast. He is the Vice-President for Conferences for the United States Institute for Theatre Technology, the 1995 winner of the USITT Southeast Region "Outstanding Educator of the Year" award, former President of the Alabama Conference of Theatre and Speech, and a member of SETC, as well as USITT.
Donna Meester (Costume Design/Production) is Assistant Professor of Theatre and resident costume designer at the University of Alabama. She came to Alabama after teaching and designing at the University of Louisiana-Monroe and Arkansas State University. Ms. Meester has served as the Region VI Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival Design Chair. Her costume designs have won several awards from KCACTF including designs for: Picasso At The Lapin Agile, Voices and A Bright Room Called Day. Other professional credits include work for the Memphis Black Rep, Oklahoma Shakespearean Festival, Ouachita Baptist College and Henderson College. Donna is an active member of USITT and was first vice-chair for USITT-SW before coming to the Southeast region. Meester holds an M.F.A. in Stage Design from Southern Methodist University and a B.S. in Apparel Technology from Purdue University.
Adjunct Faculty- Alabama Shakespeare Festival
Geoffrey Sherman (Producing Artistic Director) Mr. Sherman has been responsible for the world and national premieres of scores of plays-from David Hare's Knuckle to Alice Childress's Moms, as Artistic Director of Off-Broadway's Hudson Guild Theatre, Oregon's Portland Repertory Theatre and Michigan's Meadow Brook Theatre. In New York City, his work as producer and director garnered two Obies, as well as Drama Desk, Outer Critics Circle and Audelco nominations. He has received Best Production and Best Director Awards from every major newspaper in Michigan, for plays ranging from Angels In America and Arcadia to The Old Settler and The Rocky Horror Show. His work as a guest director has been seen at over forty theatres on both sides of the Atlantic including: New York's Roundabout Theatre Company and American Jewish Theatre; England's Redgrave and Crucible Theatres; and U.S. regionals including: Seattle Repertory Theatre, Milwaukee Repertory Theatre, Repertory Theatre of St.Louis, Center Stage Baltimore, Utah's Pioneer Theatre and Studio Arena, Buffalo. His work for television includes Another World for NBC and Woman's Day USA for the USA cable network. He is currently producing artistic director of Michigan's BoarsHead Theatre.
Alicia Johnson-Reed (Director of Marketing and Communications, Co-Director of Theatre Management Program) Alicia has worked as a Speech and Drama Instructor for the Birmingham City School System, the
Sara Lee Howell (Director of Stage Management Program) is proud to count this as her nineteenth season at ASF. As the Production Stage Manager, Sara works on main stage shows, The Southern Writers' Project, teaches for the Stage Management MFA program through the University of Alabama at Tuscaloosa and occasionally moonlights as a billboard model. In addition to ASF, she has worked at Theatre Virginia, Guthrie Theater, Arizona Theatre Company, Oregon Shakespearean Festival, Southern Appalachian Repertory Theatre and The Lost Colony. Sara would like to thank Kent Thompson for his direction of many of her ASF favorites - On the Verge, Tartuffe, The Cherry Orchard, The Two Gentlemen of Verona, King Lear, Peter Pan, The Little Foxes, Big River, The Tempest, Lizard, The Winter's Tale, The Merchant of Venice, Macbeth, Antony and Cleopatra, Richard III, Toad of Toad Hall, A Lesson Before Dying, An Ideal Husband and Aaronville Dawning. MFA Faculty.
Ray Chambers (Director of Professional Actor Training Program) has worked with the Alabama Shakespeare Festival for thirteen years as actor, director, writer, and instructor. This last year Mr. Chambers directed and adapted A Christmas Carol for the stage and also directed Hamlet for ASF's 2002 repertory season. He has taught Acting and Classical Text in the MFA Professional Actor Training Program for ten years as well as classes and workshops on Shakespeare's text throughout the country. As an educational outreach Ray wrote A Midsummer Night's Scream, an original play for ASF that introduced the works of Shakespeare to teenagers and subsequently toured throughout Alabama. As an Actor Ray has appeared at ASF in title roles including, King John, Henry V, Hamlet, as well as major roles in Julius Caesar, The Winter's Tale, The Rivals, Henry IV (Parts 1 and 2), Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, and dozens of others. Other regional credits include, Bent, Antony and Cleopatra, The School for Scandal, Coriolanus, Love's Labors Lost, Hamlet, Macbeth and others at the Globe Theatres in San Diego; and numerous productions for Arizona Theatre Company, Syracuse Stage and Studio Arena Theatre, among others.
Greta Lambert (Associate Program Director of Professional Actor Training Program) An ASF company member since 1985, playing Shirley Valentine, Lady Croom in Arcadia, Dottie Ottley in Noises Off, Truvy in Steel Magnolias, Blanche DuBois, Ivy Rowe, Hedda Gabler, Sarah Bernhardt, Eliza Doolittle, Candida, Miss Havisham, Hana in Night of the Iguana, Natalya in A Month in the Country, Marquise de Merteuil in Les Liasons Dangereuses, Maggie in Dancing at Lughnasa, and others. Her regional credits include Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, Private Lives, Three Sisters, To Kill a Mockingbird, Death and the Maiden, A Shayna Maidel, and Woman in Mind. In Shakespeare she has played Cleopatra, Lady Macbeth, Gertrude, Hermione, Viola, Mistress Page, Beatrice, Constance, Rosalind, Emilia, Cressida, Kate, Titania, Emilia, Miranda, Duchess of York, Princess Katherine, and Lady Ann. Her television credits include Picket Fences, Young Riders, Nose Dive on A&E, and Requiem on PBS. Her ASF directing credits include Proof, Beauty and the Beast, Relative Values, Cinderella, Alice in Wonderland, and A Midsummer Night's Scream. ASF Associate Artist.
Sarah Felder's (Voice and Speech) work at ASF includes Steel Magnolias, A Christmas Carol, Romeo and Juliet, Much Ado About Nothing, Hamlet and The Comedy of Errors. Her Broadway work includes Cabaret, The Sound of Music, A View From the Bridge, and The Crucible. Her Off-Broadway credits include New York Shakespeare Festival productions of André Serban's Cymbeline, Tartuffe, Julius Caesar, and The Taming of the Shrew; the premiere of Stephen Sondheim's Saturday Night; Tony Kushner's The Dybuk, Ken Lonergan's Lobby Hero; and Bill Irwin's version of Georges Feydeaux' A Flea in Her Ear. Her regional experience includes 5 years with Arena Stage, 8 years at the Shakespeare Theatre in D.C., and the Guthrie Theater on the premiere of Arthur Miller's Mr. Peters' Connections. She has worked frequently at Center Stage, Baltimore; Long Wharf Theatre; Hartford Stage; The Alley Theatre; and the Mark Taper Forum. A graduate of The Julliard School, she is also a Laban Movement Analyst, and has served on the faculty of Catholic University, Fordham, SUNY Purchase and the graduate acting program at New York University, Tisch School of the Arts.
Denise Gabriel's (Movement) work at ASF includes Macbeth, Proof, The Comedy of Errors, Steel Magnolias, Titus Andronicus, Secret Garden, Disguises, A Christmas Carol and Lilly's Purple Plastic Purse. Ms. Gabriel has taught in graduate acting programs and coached actors since 1976. She came to ASF from being guest artist/Fellow of the Seminar at Schloss Leoploldron, Salzberg, Austria, coaching a production of Chekov's Three Sisters. She is a founding Board Member for the Association of Theatre Movement Educators and recipient of the 2000 ATME-ATHE Service Achievement Award. She has worked in New York; Shanghai, China; and a host of University productions across the country including A Raisin in the Sun with Dipunkar Mukherjee, Pangea World Theatre, Minneapolis. Ms. Gabriel's regional credits include The Comedy of Errors and A Midsummer Night's Dream at The Old Globe Theatre, San Diego; Romeo and Juliet at Clarence Brown Theatre with director Paul Barnes; and Alchemy of Desire, Dead Man's Blues, and King Lear at Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park with director Ed Stern. As well as being a member of the ASF resident artistic staff Ms. Gabriel is on the ASF/ MFA Faculty.
Jason Armit (Fight Director) a native of New Orleans, is an Atlanta based Fight Choreographer. He received his B.F.A. in performance from the University of Southern Mississippi, is a Certified Teacher with the Society of American Fight Directors and is the Director of the Atlanta Stage Combat Studio. He has staged theatrical violence for theatres such as: The Alliance Theatre Company, Alabama Shakespeare Festival, True Colors Theatre Company, Georgia Shakespeare Festival, Theatrical Outfit, Theatre in the Square, Dad’s Garage Theatre Company, and Actor’s Express. ASF credits include; The Wars of the Roses, Disney’s Beauty and The Beast, Treasure Island, The Taming of the Shrew, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, All My Sons, and As You Like It.
Dr. Susan Willis (Theatre History/ Dramatic Literature) has been the ASF dramaturg since 1985. She directed last season's Richard III and Fair and Tender Ladies (as well as that play's 1998 premiere and its nine-state tour in 2000) and ASF's recent productions of The Taming of the Shrew, Steel Magnolias, and the premiere of The Moving of Lilla Barton as well as Graduate Acting Company productions of Twelfth Night, The Winter's Tale, Love's Labours Lost and SWP readings and MFA workshop productions. Her other duties at ASF include implementing Theatre in the Mind, ASF's adult educational outreach program, writing study materials for the SchoolFest program, and teaching in the MFA program. With a BA from Emory University and M.A. and Ph.D. from the University of Virginia, she is also a Professor of English at Auburn University Montgomery and author of The BBC Shakespeare Plays: Making the Televised Canon.
Steve Burch (Theatre History) joins the Theatre and Dance Department as its theatre historian after two years at Allegheny College in Pennsylvania. A published scholar in such journals as Theatre Journal and The Journal of Dramatic Theory and Criticism and a prize-winning playwright including a Playwriting Fellowship from the New York Foundation for the Arts, Burch received his B.A. in English from CUNY-Hunter College in New York, his M.A. in Theatre from Northern Illinois University and his Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. His areas of specialization include Irish, labor, and holocaust theatres, and his essays are included in the Reference Guide to Literature of the Holocaust (2002).
Timothy H. O'Connell (Production Manager) Timothy comes to ASF via the New York area. He has had the pleasure to work with several notable companies and productions throughout his career. One of the most notable is Crossroads Theatre Company, the premiere African-American theatre company and 1999 Tony Award Winner for Outstanding Regional Theatre. He also worked off-Broadway and on Broadway as Production Manager. His works include It Ain't Nothing but the Blues at the Vivian Beaumont Theatre, Havana is Waiting at The Cherry Lane Theatre, Complete Works of William Shakespeare Abridged at The Century Center, and Cobb at The Lucille Lortel. He has also worked outside the theatre world on such projects as 2002 GQ Man of the Year, Mercedes E-Motion Tour, The Spitkicker Tour featuring Biz Markie, Dela Soul and Common, Entertainment Weekly 20th Anniversary Party and the MTV College Evasion Tour (Dela Soul).
Steve Burch (Theatre History) joins the Theatre and Dance Department as its theatre historian after two years at Allegheny College in Pennsylvania. A published scholar in such journals as Theatre Journal and The Journal of Dramatic Theory and Criticism and a prize-winning playwright including a Playwriting Fellowship from the New York Foundation for the Arts, Burch received his B.A. in English from CUNY-Hunter College in New York, his M.A. in Theatre from Northern Illinois University and his Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. His areas of specialization include Irish, labor, and holocaust theatres, and his essays are included in the Reference Guide to Literature of the Holocaust (2002).
