Congratulations to our August PhD graduates! Liz Kurtzman defended her dissertation "Chilling Affect: Sensory Engagement and Participation in Immersive Horror Experiences" and is currently a Visiting Lecturer at the University of Pittsburgh. Victoria LaFave defended her dissertation “Queer Americana: Affect, Embodiment, and Performing Archives" and is the Production Manager for the Gibson Arts Center at Washington College. Emma Squire defended her dissertation "'It’s a Yiddish Theatre, You Know?': The Jewish Amateur Theatre Collective of Soviet Vilnius." She is completing her time as Archivist for Kalaupapa National Historical Park on Molokai, Hawaii, where she has worked over the past year.
Continuing Graduate Student News
MFA student Jeremy Kahn had a busy summer, juggling various acting, teaching and research opportunities. He joined the faculty for American Conservatory Theater's Summer Training Congress where he worked with an international cohort of students during the 6-week program in San Francisco. In late July, he participated in the ATHE conference, facilitating a roundtable discussion titled: “Pedagogy of the Medical Performer: Training Acting Students for Employment in Healthcare” and presented a lesson for the peer reviewed adjudicated acting exercises titled: “Tuning the Senses: Pathways to Presence in Performance.” Over the course of the summer, he acted in several developmental workshops of new plays including pieces by Anne Washburn and recent Tony award winner Jonathan Spector. Finally, he is thrilled to announce he’s been cast in Pittsburgh Public Theatre's production of Noises Off which will run in October, marking his first opportunity to work on a Pittsburgh stage.
PhD student Frederick Miller’s article, “It’s a Scandal! It’s an Outrage!: Disrupting Nostalgia in Daniel Fish’s revived Oklahoma! (2019)”, was published in MusicTheatreDance, the digital journal of Music Theatre Dance Association. He presented on works in progress at Song, Stage and Screen 2025 and ATHE 2025 respectively, in addition to coordinating two sessions for Music Theatre Dance Association’s offerings at ATHE. Frederick also spent the summer researching and producing the second season of The High School Musical Podcast, which will begin airing weekly episodes on Monday, August 25th on Spotify and Apple Music.
PhD student Laya Shahzamani presented on the Middle Eastern Theatre Focus Group’s Emerging Scholars Panel at ATHE’s July 2025 virtual conference, The Real. Her work, “Female Ta'ziyeh: Women’s Response to Iranian Theater Post-Constitutional Revolution,” is a historiography of an Iranian performative ritual that, for the first time during the Qajar dynasty, was performed by women and for women.
PhD student Guilherme Meletti Yazbek has been busy inside and out of Pittsburgh this summer! Before spending three months in Brazil doing fieldwork, Guilherme became a contributor for the independent theater review site OnStage Pittsburgh, which covers productions ranging from amateur and community theater to Broadway shows. Guilherme published a review of The Glitterbox Theater's production of Speed: The Musical earlier this spring. Now back in the 'burgh, Guilherme's most recent review covered Iron Horse Theatre Company's production of Coach and Mrs. Jagoff, which runs through the 23 of August. Guilherme plans to publish at least two reviews per month that feature theatre and dance productions in the Pittsburgh area that are locally produced or touring through!