TEACHING

Group of people with red clown noses posing together in a room, some standing, some kneeling, making playful gestures.

Clowning Workshop at Sing Sing Correctional Facility

A group of people dressed as clowns and wearing clown noses, some in costumes, posing together indoors in front of lockers and a red door. Some are crouching, others are standing, with various expressions and in different costumes.

Buffoon class at Circle in the Square Theatre School

Physical Theatre at Sing Sing Correctional Facility

Group of students in a classroom, some sitting and some standing, with one girl in a white shirt and black shorts dancing or performing in the center. This is a viewpoints theatre exercise.
Group of students in a classroom, some sitting and some standing, with one girl in a white shirt and black shorts dancing or performing in the center. This is a viewpoints theatre exercise.
Group of seven people wearing black masks, posing playfully indoors against a white wall, with a wooden floor and some ceiling pipes visible.
Group of college students, some standing, some sitting or lying on the floor, in a dance or acting studio with black curtains, engaging in a viewpoints theatre workshop.

Teaching Viewpoints to middle schoolers, Institute of Collaborative Education; Commedia dell'arte workshop, NYU; Teachers improvising in a professional development workshop, AATE Conference; Teaching Physical Theatre, NYU

Dr. Nancy Smithner’s Physical Theatre Improvisation course is popular at NYU: click here to learn more.

Smithner is a Clinical Professor of Educational Theatre at NYU. There, she has taught and revitalized the following courses: Styles of Acting & Directing, Physical Theatre Improvisation, Introduction to Educational Theatre, Theatre History, Acting, Character Study, Advanced Directing, Images of Women in Theatre, Drama in Education, Student Teaching Seminar, Creative Play in the Arts, Community Engaged Theatre, Devised Theatre, Theatre of Brecht & Beckett, and Doctoral Proposal Seminar. Her research interests are physical and experimental theatre, devised theatre, community engaged theatre and postmodern and feminist theory.

She also teaches Clowning, Physical Comedy and Improvisation at Circle in the Square Theatre School, and Physical Theatre, Clowning, Acting and Directing in medium and maximum correctional facilities in New York State. As an international scholar, Smithner has taught workshops at the Central School of Drama, Beijing and the Shanghai Theatre Academy, China; Incheon Catholic University and Soongsil University, Korea; and Ping Tung University and Shu-Te University, Taiwan, and Trinity College, Ireland. For the Program in Educational Theatre, she has directed numerous study abroad programs in Puerto Rico, Dublin and London, and led the Dean’s Global Honors Seminar in Sydney Australia.