Community Week Events

Each October, more than 1,700 members of the Tisch Drama Community—faculty, students, and staff across the department’s 10 training studios and theatre studies program—come together to build relationships with new and existing communities as part of the Tisch School's annual Community Week.

This year, Drama has planned multiple events for the week of October 17–21, as well as for the final celebration on October 21. 

In observance of Community Week 2022, this year’s departmental initiative is Festival of Voices: Forward #1. This community discussion – Oct. 20 at 6:30pm in the Dean’s Conference Room — is the first in a series of three gatherings that will inform TISCH DRAMA STAGE’s annual Festival of Voices (FOV), highlighting underrepresented voices, aesthetics, and points of view. The spring FOV will consist of devised works on labor and housing. Forward #1 during Community Week is an initial conversation with members of our community about labor conditions and contexts. Join Associate Chair Mauricio Salgado, Associate Arts Professor Gwendolyn Alker, and Drama alum Futaba Shioda (NSB, 2016), an organizer and member of Anticapitalism for Artists, to discuss work, housing, and unionization efforts right here at NYU and in NYC. 

Additionally, throughout the week, the department’s training studios will host an exciting array of activities and discussions reflective of the topic of community. The line-up includes community gatherings, class exercises, ensemble workshops, and other events. Here’s just a sample: 

IN THE STUDIOS

The Atlantic Acting School
To recognize Community Day, Tisch Drama's partner studio, the Atlantic Acting School will suspend afternoon classes on Friday, October 21 to hold an “All Studio Day” event wherein upper-level students will perform works-in-progress for first-year students. First-year students are then invited to ask questions about the application of the technique and the curriculum they can look forward to in their second and third years of training. 

The Classical Studio
On Tuesday, October 18, The Classical Studio will engage Birgit Rathmann’s “Motion Design + Titles” class in a collaboration based on its upcoming production of Shakespeare’s The Winter’s Tale. Students will work with Birgit’s Animation students to come up with a visual identity for the play. Along the way, the Studio will discuss one another’s work — shared and differing goals in the storytelling process.

Experimental Theatre Wing
Continuing a long Experimental Theatre Wing (ETW) tradition, the entire studio community will gather together on Friday, October 21 for a full day of community discussions and sharing of class work.

New Studio on Broadway
Tisch Drama's New Studio on Broadway (NSB) is planning a week of “artistic wellness” panels on topics such as intimacy work, vocal health, and BIPOC NSB alumni.

Production & Design Studio
Tisch Drama’s Production & Design Studio (P&D) hosted an all-studio town hall meeting on October 4 to update its community agreement, currently called a "Shared Beliefs" statement. Additionally, P&D is hosting a "Stone Soup" lunch on Thursday, October 20.  Students and faculty are being asked to bring either something to go into a vegetarian noodle soup or a non-perishable food item that will be donated to a food bank.

The Stella Adler Studio of Acting
Tisch Drama’s partner studio, the Stella Adler Studio of Acting, recently concluded a month-long community-based festival of work that came from its Arts Justice Division called, Weaving Community and Coalition Through Arts Justice. During Community Week, faculty and students will address issues of community and discuss their experiences with the events from the festival.

Stonestreet Studios
On Wednesday, October 19 at 1:15pm, Tisch Drama's partner studio, Stonestreet Studios, will host a screening of short films from its micro-movie collection from the past spring and summer of 2022. The screening and lunch will be held at Stonestreet Studios on the 8th floor in Studio 8A. 

In support of building community, on November 9, the Studio will hold a panel discussion highlighting Navigating Issues of Bias & Representation Onscreen for its first Talkback of the season! Panelists LipicaShah, Christopher Naoki Lee, Christine Bruno, and Ingrid Jean-Baptiste will be joining and the event will be moderated by Managing Director, Monique Ford.

The Lee Strasberg Theatre & Film Institute
The Lee Strasberg Theatre & Film Institute will hold a two-part town hall discussion facilitated by Azudi Onyejekwe, artist, educator, Strasberg instructor, and justice advocate. Part one is a space to gather as people of color to explore the commonalities in experiences, while also highlighting the specific intra-racial/intersectional differences of experience. A space to share; a space to breathe; a space to be; a space to realize the depth of “it’s not just me.” 

Part two of the forum will be a question-and-answer-style town hall format. For allies, this part of the forum will prioritize the key to effective allyship, which is listening to hear/understand versus listening to only respond. This event is geared toward empowering the community of artists to better impact training and the future field.

The Meisner Studio
The Meisner Studio (MSNR) will open its doors to third and fourth-year students who are alumni of the studio to attend its Open House Series of classes. On Friday, MSNR students and faculty are invited to attend community-building activities which include participation in its Jay St. Studios craft project titled, ‘Community is...’.  This project will take the form of a hallway mural expressing a range of community values, artwork, iconography, text, and images. The mural will be installed across the length of MSNR Studio’s complex hallway. On the mural, the Studio community can contribute artwork, quotes or written thoughts, printed images and photos, statements of aspiration for what the community should be, and anything else that evokes a sense of belonging at the Studio.