Duke University: London - Duke in London, Drama Summer Program

The Duke University Department of Theater Studies, the Duke English Department, and the Duke Global Education Office for Undergraduates offer a two-course, six-week program at University College London, under the direction of Sarah Beckwith, Professor and Chair of Theater Studies. The director teaches the program with a distinguished group of British theater practitioners and scholars. Students take classes and live in a residence hall of University College London (UCL), in central London.

The Program offers intensive study of drama in performance in the theater capital of the world and based on the assumption that the only way to study drama properly is through seeing performances, not just reading scripts. It is designed to fit the needs of two types of students:

Students in the program see and study over twenty productions over the six-week term. In addition to classes offering background on and discussion of the plays seen, students come to understand the writing, directing and acting process through their classes with the London faculty and through participation in scene work.

So that every student understands drama from an actor’s or director’s point of view, all students are required to participate in two scenes coached and evaluated by a noted British actor. In recent years, acting workshops and scene work have been supervised by Rory Kinnear and Paul Ready, leading actors with the National Theatre of Great Britain and William Houston, leading actor with the Royal Shakespeare Company. Students are not graded on acting ability, but on the ideas and effort they bring to their scene work. Students in musical theater are offered the opportunity to participate in a master class in musical performance led by Michael England, Musical Director of Spamalot and a leading musical theater performer (recently this has been Olivier Award winner Daniel Evans, star of Sunday in the Park with George and Gavin Creel, currently starring on Broadway in Godspell).