We are almost four months into the academic year and the faculty, staff, and students in the Department of Theatre and Dance have been busy—as always—doing phenomenal work. Here’s just a taste:

• Will Lewis continues his work exploring whether exposing students to a gamified performance experience can make them more aware of the ways digital media algorithms reinforce polarizing messages and perspectives.
• Professor Emerita Anne Fliotsos will direct her rom-com musical adaptation of the Oedipus myth at the Off-Broadway venue 54 Below in New York.
• Fan Zhang was nominated for a Drama Desk Award and a Henry Hewes Design Award earlier this year for her sound design for Good Bones, which premiered at the Public Theatre in New York City.
• Ashley Bellet and Devin Scheef took a group of our undergraduate students to see Revolution(s) at the Goodman Theatre, where they met with some of the staff and cast.
• Tom Robson directed our season opener Horse Girls, which got a nice feature in The Exponent.
• Robert Cohen ’24 came back to campus as the A1 on The Book of Mormon tour!
• The new Interdisciplinary Performance major—launched last year, has grown to five students in just one year! Combining pathways to graduation in dance, theatre, and the Daniels School of Business, we are excited to see the IP major take off.

Be sure to keep checking our news page to keep up with the happenings in the Department.

I mentioned in our spring newsletter my anxiety about the state of the performing arts in Indiana and the US more broadly. Since then, some of what were merely rumblings have become more real: in May, Governor Braun signed into law House Enrolled Act 1001, sometimes referred to as “the state budget bill,” which included provisions that have a significant impact on many programs at Purdue including in Theatre and Dance. This is a complex situation, but the short version is that because the number of graduating students in the Department is below an arbitrary threshold set by the legislature, the state accrediting body could force the University to eliminate our program entirely. To date, the offices of the Dean and the Provost have been incredibly supportive and willing to strategize responses aimed at continuing the great work of our faculty, staff, and students. I am tentatively hopeful, but much is uncertain. You can read more about HEA 1001, its implications for us, and what we are doing in response here.

What you can do to help: share your stories with us! How did your major in theatre or your MFA degree contribute to your career? If you weren’t a major but were a minor or simply took classes, how did that contribute to your career? How did a major, minor, MFA, or taking classes contribute to your success while at Purdue? These stories can help us demonstrate the importance of theatre and dance for students at Purdue now and in the future. You can email your stories to us at theatre@purdue.edu; put “Alum Story” in the subject line so we can be sure to see it!

As always, we rely on gifts from individual donors to support the work of the Department of Theatre and Dance. Our annual expenses are supported nearly equally by funding from the University, ticket sales, and gifts from people just like you. Help us keep Theatre and Dance thriving by making a donation at any time: visit this portal and make a gift to directly support Purdue Theatre or the Dance Program.