Meet Your Major

As a theatre arts major, you’ll study performance, directing, playwriting and technical production.

Based on a liberal arts foundation, the theatre arts major at Merrimack College will provide you with a variety of core courses in the theatrical arts including history and criticism, literature, performance, directing, design, management dramaturgy, and technical production. You will gain a well-rounded and broad understanding of the field of theatre studies. 

What You’ll Learn

In the theatre arts program, you will:

  • Learn how to analyze plays perceptively and evaluate scripts and theatre productions critically.
  • Enhance your ability to think critically, speak eloquently, write effectively and work collaboratively.
  • Gain a greater awareness of the role, function and value of theatre in society.
  • Apply your experience, research and skills, under faculty direction, to conceive and/or execute a final project in acting, directing, criticism, dramaturgy, playwriting or design.

Hands-On Learning

Stage time, either in the front or back of the house, is a must. Chances are, you’ll find yourself participating in departmental productions as well as those put on by the student-run OnStagers Dramatic Society.

You’ll have the opportunity to learn by doing. Work at the Rogers Center for the Arts, Merrimack’s own modern theater that brings some of the country’s best productions, musicians and films to campus.

Recent theatre arts internships include work in the Stoneham Theatre marketing department and the Merrimack Repertory Theatre’s box office.

Career Options

Our major will help prepare you for a career in live theater production, arts management and/or performance. You will be well-equipped to pursue a range of opportunities, such as actor, director, writer, technician, and designer, in a number of arts-related fields including theatre, television, film, corporate communications, advertising and more. The degree also provides you with the necessary foundation for further graduate school training.

A theatre arts degree is also valuable in other careers that require collaborative skills, creative imagination, and discipline, such as education/training, management, public relations and the law. If you are an entrepreneur you can sharpen your creative abilities, especially when paired with a co-major or minor in business.

Recent graduates are now working in Merrimack Repertory Theatre: Box Office and Group Sales Dept. New England Center for Homeless Veterans: Counselor, Disney World: Costume Designer, Company Manager: Geva Theatre, Rochester NY, 

Some of our graduates have worked in the following positions:

  • Costume designer, Disney World
  • Entrepreneurial businesses owner of Spark a Dream Princess Parties
  • Company manager, Geva Theatre (Rochester, NY)
  • Production Manager, Weston Playhouse (Weston, VT)
  • Box Office/Group Sales, Merrimack Repertory Theatre
  • Assistant Technical Director, Rogers Center for the Arts
  • Acting in Pigpen Theatre Co. such as The Old Man and the Old Moon
  • Theatre Arts and Technical Director at Wilmington High School (Willimington, MA)
  • Middle School Drama Teacher, Hamilton School District
  • Marketing & Communications Assistant at Arts Consulting Group, Boston, MA

What You’ll Take

The theatre arts major requires the completion of a minimum of 12 courses, as specified below. 

Required Courses (6)

FAA 1510 Acting I
FAA 1515 Theatre Practicum: Rehearsal and Performance
FAA 2520 Theatre History I: Origins to the Renaissance
FAA 2530 Theatre History II: Restoration to the Present
FAA 2570 Technical Production for Theatre
FAA 3550 Theatre Arts Capstone Seminar

 

Elective Courses (choose 6)

FAA 1520 Voice for the Stage
FAA 2500 Women in Theatre
FAA 2505 The Politics of Performance: Theatre, Government, and Social Change
FAA 2510 Acting II
FAA 2540 Introduction to Playwriting
FAA 2550 American Musical Theatre
FAA 2560 London Theatre
FAA 2580 Design for the Theatre
FAA 2585 Improvisation
FAA 2586 Script Analysis
FAA 2590 Arts Management
FAA 3510 Directing I
FAA 3520 Acting III: Special Topics in Acting 

 

One elective may be fulfilled by one of the following English courses:

ENG 3250

Shakespearean Drama
ENG 3820 Twentieth-Century Drama and Performance by Women
ENG 3680 World Drama: The Theatrical Impulse Then and Now
ENG 3820 Twentieth-Century Drama and Performance by Women

 

Online Course Catalog