The Acting Area will grow in the Fall of 2023 with two new tenure-track faculty. Here are the details about each of these excellent additions to T&D.

Karen Sabo (she/her) is a teacher, director, actor, writer, and dialect coach. She has been a member of three resident acting companies, including the LORT Barter Theater in Virginia where she was also a resident director, dialect coach, and eventually, director of education. Karen studied with the American Conservatory Theatre, the San Francisco Mime Troupe, the Saratoga International Theatre Institute, Shakespeare & Company, and Larry Silverberg’s Meisner program. She has taught at many universities including Baldwin-Wallace and Appalachian State, where she won an exemplary faculty award. She earned a B.A. from Hampshire College, an M.A. from East Tennessee State University, and an MFA in Directing at the University of North Carolina Greensboro. Karen’s particular interests are verbatim theatre, projects that embrace diversity and connect with community, democracy and theatre, and site-specific work. Her plays have been produced nationwide and she has published dozens of articles including in American Theatre and Southern Theatre Magazine. She is a 25-year member of Actors’ Equity, belongs to SDC (Stage Directors and Choreographers Society), and to VASTA (Voice and Speech Trainers Association). She is married to writer/theatre artist Derek Davidson and is the mother of actor/director Rachel Sabo-Hedges. www.karensabo.com

Nikki Ferry comes to Missouri State University from teaching appointments at Northern Kentucky University and Miami University. She holds a BFA in Acting from Wright State University, an MFA in Acting with a Classical Emphasis from Wayne State University and is a certified teacher of the Michael Chekhov Technique through the Great Lakes Michael Chekhov Consortium. In addition, she has trained extensively with SITI Company in Suzuki Technique and The Viewpoints, The Michael Chekhov Acting Studio, Intimacy Directors and Coordinators, Theatrical Intimacy Education, and studied at the Moscow Art Theatre School in Russia.

Her creative activity and scholarship include psychophysical pedagogies in actor training, specifically how this supports an integrated approach to acting and voice, and Intimacy Direction working to create a consent-based culture surrounding performance in Higher Education. Pulling from her training in Stanislavski, Michael Chekhov, Patsy Rodenburg, and The Viewpoints she educates students in a holistic, full-bodied, and consent-based approach to acting, voice, and movement.

Previous teaching appointments include Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park, St. Croix Festival Theatre, and workshops with Toledo School for the Arts and the Great Lakes Michael Chekhov Consortium. This summer she will be joining the Drama Faculty at Kentucky Governor’s School for the Arts.

Professionally she has appeared on stages regionally at Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park, Stage One Family Theatre, East Lynne Theatre Company, and St. Croix Festival Theatre. In New York City she performed with La Mama ETC, Inwood Shakespeare Festival, Theatre for the New City, Pulse Theatre Ensemble, Theatre 20/20, Columbia University, Our Bar (writing and performing original works performed in a bar), and with American Bard Theatre Company.

Recent productions include Dialect Coaching for The Play That Goes Wrong, Spamalot, and Once; Intimacy Direction for 9 to 5, The Lieutenant of Inishmore, Peter and the Starcatcher, Scenes from A Wild Party, The Elephant Man, and Violet; and Directing Disney’s The Little Mermaid and Radium Girls.

During her career, she has been honored with a Detroit Free Press Award Nomination and Wilde Award for Best Actress in a Leading Role Comedy for her turn as Julie in Lovers and Executioners. She also received an Honorable Mention and staged reading of her play Past History as part of the Louise Heck Rabi Playwriting Competition. Subsequently, her play was granted a workshop at Jeff Daniel’s company The Purple Rose Theatre Company in Chelsea, Michigan. She enjoys pulling for her playwrighting skills by serving as a professional mentor for Michigan State University’s Young Playwright’s Festival, guiding high school playwrights through their play’s revision and post-production processing.

She is a proud member of the Actor’s Equity Association, The Great Lakes Michael Chekhov Consortium, The Association of Theatre Movement Educators, and the Voice and Speech Trainers Association.