Associate Professor, Department Chair
Producing Director
Dramaturge, Historian, Integrative Studies
Specializations
- Dramaturgy
- Intimacy Choreography
- Adaptations
- Directing
Contact Information
Office: Waller 104
cjcole@iup.edu
Courses Taught
- Intro to Theatre
- Foundations of Theatre
- Dramaturgy
- Musical Theatre History
- Musical Theatre Performance
Degrees
- Willamette University (Bachelor of Theatre)
- University of Arizona, (MA in Theatre Studies)
- University of Maryland (PhD in Theatre and Performance Studies)
Biography
Carrie J. Cole is chair, producing director, and an associate professor in the Department of Theatre, Dance, and Performance. Her scholarly work concentrates on current and future trends in US theatre, performance, and popular culture, specifically staging science fiction and the fantastic, which she regularly presents at national and international conferences. Her creative work as producer, director, dramaturge, deviser, fight/intimacy choreographer, adapter, and actor takes her across the US.
At IUP, Cole created new adaptations of Shakespeare’s Measure for Measure and Wedekind’s The Awakening of Spring; directed The 39 Steps, Measure for Measure, The Wolves, I and You, and Fahrenheit 451. She also devised and directed Electriad, which explored the repercussions of war from the perspective of the warrior, the home front, and the displaced. In addition, her reimagining of H. G. Wells’ War of the Worlds, which reflected the events of the second Mars Rover exploration, was staged as part of the Tucson Festival of Books by Arizona Theatre Company and recently remounted in the Pacific Northwest. She has served as company manager and festival dramaturge for the KO Festival of Performance, where she appeared as part of the ensemble of Katie Pearl’s OK OK.
As an advocate for new plays, Cole regularly produces and directs “Flash Play Festivals”—readings of 10-minute plays written by award-winning authors at both the International Conference of the Fantastic in the Arts. Cole serves as secretary for the Network of Ensemble Theatres.