ETSU Division of Theatre and Dance

Faculty

Patrick Cronin
Office: 216 Campus Center Bldg.
Phone: 439-6513 or 943-0072
Email: Croninp@etsu.edu
Rank: Director/Professor

Professor Cronin holds the position of Artist in Residence. Pat is no stranger to anyone who watches network television or who goes to the movies. Pat has appeared on numerous television shows including Home Improvement, Seinfeld, Family Matters, Knots Landing, LA Law, Hill Street Blues, Mad About You, Cheers, Star Trek the Next Generation, Sabrina the Teenage Witch, Wonder Years, The Magnificent Seven and more. He has also appeared in the films Breast Men, Rocky V, My Blue Heaven and Splash. Pat first came to ETSU as the Basler Chair of Excellence in 1998. Since then, he has returned to ETSU to teach a variety of classes including Acting for the Camera, Acting II and Dramatic Theory and Criticism. Pat has also worked closely with the Animation Department and the English Department, team teaching classes in those areas. Pat is a 1963 graduate of La Salle. He also has an MS Degree from Temple University. In 1998 he was honored by Temple as Outstanding Alumni, receiving a life time achievement award for his work in the arts and the community. This fall Pat directed A Christmas Carol for the Division of Theatre. He portrayed Willie Loman in our production of Death of A Salesman during the spring of 2001. During the fall of 2001, he directed You Can't Take it With You. For more information on Pat Cronin's acting career go to www.imdb.com/name/nm0188796/.

Karen Brewster
Office: 116 Brooks Gym
Phone: 439-5827
Costume Shop: 120/121 Brooks Gym
Costume Shop Phone: 439-5831
Email: Brewster@etsu.edu
Rank: Associate Professor

Karen Brewster teaches courses in Theatrical Design, Stagecraft, Stage Makeup and Theatre History. She studied with Bud and Daryl Frank in the 1970’s and earned her undergraduate degree in Theatre from ETSU. She earned her MFA in Costume, Makeup, and Mask Design from Michigan State University and toured the country producing costume designs for various theatres such as Nebraska Theatre Caravan in Omaha and Peoples Light and Theatre Company outside of Philadelphia. Karen joined Barter Theatre in Abingdon, Va., in 1982 as resident costume designer. Since then, she has designed over 50 shows for Barter including Guys and Dolls, Cabaret, Fiddler on the Roof, The Foreigner, Greater Tuna, 2005’s Lying in State and Miracle on 34^thStreet, and 2006’s The Philadelphia Story and I’ll Never Be Hungry Again. Karen joined the ETSU faculty in 2000 and since that time has designed costumes for over twenty five ETSU productions including the Kennedy Center/American College Theatre Festival National Finalist Hear That Whistle Blow, Erwin Train A Comin’.

Bobby Funk
Office: 205 Campus Center Bldg.
Phone: 439-6512
Email: Funk@etsu.edu
Rank: Professor

Bobby Funk is a full professor here at ETSU. He teaches a variety of performance classes, including, Acting I, Period Acting Styles, Acting for the Camera I, Stage Movement and The Audition Process. He came to ETSU from the University of Alabama at Birmingham, where he taught for 11 years. Bobby did his undergraduate work at Western Carolina University . He then went on to study at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts in New York and then to receive his MFA Degree in Acting and Directing from UNC-Greensboro. He has worked professionally as an actor and director Off- Broadway and in regional theatres across the country, including Barter Theatre, where he has worked as both an actor and director and has adjudicated the Appalachian Festival of Plays and Playwrights. He is the author of the book, The Audition Process: A Guide for Actors. Bobby has also written a number of plays including, Co. Aytch: Memoirs of a Confederate Soldier, The Dream Continues: The History of the Civil Rights Movement in America, The Brave and the Free, River Rising: TVA and the Town of Butler and Hear That Whistle Blow...Erwin Train A Coming. In 1999, Hear That Whistle Blow...Erwin Train A Coming was selected to perform at the Kennedy Center as part of the finals of the Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival. In the spring of 2000, Bobby was selected as one of eight directors from around the nation to direct a 10-minute play at the Kennedy Center as part of the American College Theatre Festival. Bobby is married to professional cosmetologist and make-up artist, Caitlin Davis Funk. They have two children, Kennedy and Duvall.

Delbert L. Hall, Ph.D.
Office: 201 Campus Center Bldg.
Phone: 439-6525
Email: Halld@etsu.edu
Rank: Professor
Web: faculty.etsu.edu/halld

Delbert Hall has been teaching at ETSU since 1986. He has a B.S. Ed. from Western Carolina University, a MFA from UNC-Greensboro and a Ph.D. from the University of Florida. Dr. Hall has served the Division of Theatre as scenic designer, lighting designer, technical director, and Director of Theatre. Dr. Hall's area of expertise is in stage rigging and flying performers. He has been a flying director for one of the largest flying effects companies in the world, and owned his own flying effects company for over 13 years. Since 1991, he has flown performers in over 300 productions and has worked on Broadway tours such as Wicked and many regional theatres across the country. Dr. Hall is an ETCP Certified Rigger in theatre and an ETCP Recognized Trainer who regularly teaches workshops on stage rigging. He is also an active member of the United States Institute for Theatre Technology.

Cara L. Harker
Office: 160 Mini-Dome
Phone: 439-5687
Email: harkerc@etsu.edu
Rank: Assistant Professor

Cara Harker is an assistant professor, teaching Ballet, Tap, Jazz, Dance Repertory, Dance Improvisation, and Social Dance. Cara graduated from the Chicago College of Performing Arts at Roosevelt University with an MFA in Theatre Performance in 2003. Since that time, she has been working in dance and theatre as an instructor, choreographer, and director in Chicago, Cincinnati, and East Tennessee. Previous choreography credits include Around the World in 80 Days, Marat/Sade, and Girl’s Eye View, which she co-wrote and performed in at Ensemble Theatre of Cincinnati. At ETSU, Cara choreographed Tango Suite, Grease and was seen onstage as Kathleen in Three the Hard Way. Cara also teaches Jazz for Arts4Kids and Ballroom Dance at Kingsport Ballet.

Herbert Mark Parker
Office: 107A Campus Center Bldg.
Phone: 439-6514
Email: Parkerh@etsu.edu
Rank: Assistant Professor

Herb Parker came to ETSU after an acting career that spanned more than 25 years in regional theatre, Off Broadway, stock and national tour. A New Yorker for more than 17 years, he has appeared on a wide variety of stages, including Nashville Shakespeare Festival, Tennessee Repertory Theatre, Florida Repertory Theatre, Madison Repertory Theatre, North Carolina Shakespeare Festival, Huntington Theatre, Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park, McCarter Theatre, Clarence Brown Theatre, Florida Studio Theatre, GeVa Theatre, and Missouri Repertory Theatre, to name a few. Herb has also had the pleasure of teaching at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, his alma mater Stephens College where he earned a BFA in Theatre and Ohio University where he earned his MFA from their Professional Actor Training Program. For ETSU Division of Theatre and Dance he has directed for colored girls who have considered suicide when the rainbow is enuf and Little Shop of Horrors, for which he was awarded a KCACTF Meritorious Service Award for “Excellence in Directing”. He has also acted on campus as Duncan and the Porter in Macbeth and as Mr. M in My Children! My Africa!, a co-production with Oldcastle Theatre Company which traveled to the Bennington Center for the Arts in Vermont for a run during Spring Break 2008. Mr. Parker is a proud member of Actors’ Equity Association.

Melissa Shafer
Office: 116 Brooks Gym
Phone: 439-5837
Scene Shop Phone: 439-5831
Email: Shaferm@etsu.edu
Rank: Associate Professor
Web: www.faculty.etsu.edu/shaferm/

Melissa Shafer's areas of specialization are Scenic and Lighting Design and she also serves as the Theatre Program’s Technical Director. A native of the St. Louis metropolitan area, Melissa received her MFA in Theatre Design in 1985 from Southern Illinois University at Carbondale. She has taught theatre at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, Rollins College in Winter Park, Florida, and Loyola University New Orleans.

Her freelance design credits include work with the Barter Theatre in Abingdon, Virginia; Manbites Dog Theatre in Raleigh-Durham, North Carolina; The Civic Theatre of Central Florida; The Birmingham Children’s Theatre, Southern Danceworks; Milligan College; Kennesaw State University; Lambuth University; St. Louis Community College at Forest Park, and Western Nebraska College. She has also done freelance production work for such companies as The Mid-America Dance Company, The National Black Touring Circuit, and Tulane University.

Melissa is a board member of the Tennessee Theatre Association, is the Tennessee State Representative on the board of the Southeastern Theatre Conference, and is an editorial board member of Southern Theatre Magazine.