Faculty Profiles
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Charissa Menefee, PhD - Performing Arts/Arts & Letters
Academic Statement (Return to top)
Charissa Menefee has served as chair of the Arts & Letters Program and teaches a variety of courses, including Playwriting, Directing, New Play Development and Production, Children's Theatre, Writing as Performance, Comedy Acting Workshop, and Theatre and Social Change. For Prescott College Theatre, she has directed such plays as Oedipus the King, The Water Engine, A Lie of the Mind, The American Dream, The Skin of Our Teeth, and children's theatre productions of The Phantom Tollbooth, Androcles and the Lion, The Great Alphabet Adventure, and Earthlings. As an actor, she was recently seen in The Artist's Path production of The Guys.
Dr. Menefee is passionate about developing new work for the stage. She is a co-founder and producer of Tomorrow's Theatre Tonight, Prescott's new play reading series, now in its sixth year; produces new student scripts and The One Day Plays; and directs and acts in new play festivals. An award-winning playwright, her scripts have been honored by the Utah Shakespeare Festival, Pandora Festival of New Plays, Arizona Theatre Conference, American College Theatre Festival, and The City of Charleston Literary Arts Awards. She was a Tennessee Williams Scholar at the Sewanee Writers Conference and has given presentations on playwriting at Association for Theatre in Higher Education conferences and Association for Writers and Writing Programs conferences, as well as for students at other universities, including Spalding University's MFA in Writing Program.
In 2013, Dr. Menefee has been a finalist in the Julie Harris Playwright Award Competition and Stage Door Productions' Original One-Act Play Festival. The 2012-13 academic year includes regional and national productions of Lydia's Plan, Pretty Lucky, Meet Me Halfway, Just Another Mourning, and Recognize Me.
Background & Experience
Selected Publications (Return to top)
Recent Awards/Productions/Readings (as Playwright)
- Finalist, Beverly Hills Theatre Guild's Julie Harris Playwright Award Competition
- Finalist and Festival Performance, Stage Door Productions' Original One-Act Play Festival
- Pretty Lucky. Theatrics' ThrifTheatre Festival.
- Just Another Mourning. Theatrics' Pet Plays.
- The Figurehead. Utah Shakespeare Festival's New American Playwrights Project.
- How Long is Fifteen Minutes? Pandora Festival of New Plays.
- Not on the List. Pandora Showcase.
- Tennessee Rook. Finalist, Arts & Letters Prize in Drama. Smithsonian CultureFest.
- Just Another Mourning. Finalist, Theatre Oxford Play Contest. McLeod Theatre's 40th Anniversity Celebration. Granite Gate Players. Smithsonian CultureFest.
- Reasonable Doubts. Sewanee Writers Conference. AWP Conference.
- Lydia’s Plan. Reading at Pandora Festival of New Plays. Tomorrow’s Theatre Tonight. Thumb Butte Festival.
- It’s All About Charlie. Pandora Festival of New Plays. The One Day Plays.
- Here Today. Pandora Festival of New Plays. Tomorrow’s Theatre Tonight. Thumb Butte Festival.
- Marked Cards. Pandora Festival of New Plays. Tomorrow’s Theatre Tonight. Smithsonian CultureFest.
- The Midwife. Tomorrow's Theatre Tonight.
- Promotion. Tomorrow's Theatre Tonight.
- You Came Back. Tomorrow's Theatre Tonight.
- Check Your Ticket. Arts & Letters Faculty Showcase.
- Recognize Me. Tomorrow's Theatre Tonight.
- Knock-Down, Drag-Out. Tomorrow’s Theatre Tonight.
- Meteorite. Tomorrow’s Theatre Tonight, Arts & Letters Faculty Showcase.
- Early. The 24 Hour Plays. Smithsonian CultureFest.
- Expectations. Tomorrow’s Theatre Tonight.
- Reunion. Tomorrow’s Theatre Tonight.
Recent Productions (as Director)
- (touch.)
- The Great Alphabet Adventure
- The Water Engine
- Androcles and the Lion
- Oedipus the King
- A Lie of the Mind
- The American Dream
- Earthlings
- The Phantom Tollbooth
- The Skin of Our Teeth
- Us and Them
- Dumping Ground
Articles
- "The Drama of Two Queens: An Inquiry into the Construction of Historical Drama." Theatre Southwest, 15(2), 7-12.
- "Playwriting with Turner and Burke." North Dakota Quarterly, 62, 26-36.
Dissertation
- Dramatizing the Reign of King James: Original Scripts and Essays
Presentations (Return to top)
- Co-founded and co-produces Tomorrow's Theatre Tonight, a new play reading and development series.
- Produces Prescott College Theatre's One Day Plays.
- Panelist, Life in Letters Conference. Prescott College, 2012.
- “Theological and Theatrical Considerations in the Production of Doubt.” Panel sponsored by Elks Opera House Foundation, September 2009.
- “Dramas of Craft: Women Playwrights Read Their Work.” 2007 Conference of the Association for Writers and Writing Programs (AWP) in Atlanta.
- “Barbarians at the Gate: Teaching Playwriting in English Departments.” 2006 Conference of the Association for Theatre in Higher Education (ATHE) in Chicago.
- “Barbarians at the Gate: Teaching Playwriting in English Departments.” 2006 Conference of the Association for Writers and Writing Programs (AWP) in Austin.
- ATHE New Play Development Workshop, 2006. Actor, Bidding.
- ATHE New Play Development Workshop, 2005. Actor, Rumor of Rain.
- “Writing Out Loud, Reading Out Loud.” Guest Lecturer in Playwriting, Spalding University’s MFA in Writing Program, 2004.
- “Writing Out Loud, Reading Out Loud.” Guest Lecturer in Playwriting, Cumberland University English and Theatre Departments, 2004.
Awards, Grants, & Honors (Return to top)
Playwriting Honors and Awards
- Utah Shakespeare Festival's New American Playwrights Project
- Finalist, Beverly Hills Theatre Guild's Julie Harris Playwright Award Competition
- Finalist, Stage Door Productions' Original One-Act Play Festival
- Pandora Festival of New Plays
- Pandora Showcase
- Smithsonian CultureFest
- Arizona Theatre Conference Selection
- American College Theatre Festival Selection
- Finalist, Arts & Letters Prize in Drama
- Finalist, Theatre Oxford Play Contest
- City of Charleston Literary Arts Awards
- Tennessee Williams Scholar, Sewanee Writers' Conference
- Inaugural Class of A Room of Her Own Foundation's Retreat for Committed Women Writers
- Honorable Mention, Christian H. Moe Playwriting Award
Education (Return to top)
PhD, Theatre and Speech Communication, Southern Illinois University--Carbondale
MA, Interdisciplinary Studies (Theatre, English, Music), West Texas State University
BA, English and Theatre, West Texas State University
Expertise (Return to top)
- Directing
- Acting
- Playwriting/Scriptwriting
- New Play Development
- Comedy and Improvisation
- Music/Voice/Musical Theatre
- Dramatic Literature
- Children's Theatre
- Theatre History
- Historical and Documentary Drama
- Theatre and Social Change
- Performance Studies
- Film Studies
- Communication, Advocacy, and Public Speaking
Academic Involvement at Prescott College (Return to top)
Programs/Degrees
- On-Campus Undergraduate Programs
Areas of Study
- Creative Writing
- Interdisciplinary Arts & Letters
- Literature
- Performing Arts
- Writing and Literature
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