performance

Before coming to NIU, Stanton served as speech and dialect coach for the graduate and undergraduate actors as well as teaching speech and acting at Temple University's Theatre Department. Before that, he was at SUNY New Paltz where he taught voice, acting, Shakespeare, dramatic literature, and stage combat. Stanton received his MFA in Acting from the University of Delaware's Professional Theatre Training Program, and his BFA from the University of Utah Actor Training Program. Stanton has worked professionally as an actor (stage, film and TV commercials), fight choreographer, stagehand, director, stunt man, voice coach , dialect coach and education director at theatres throughout the country. Stanton is a member of the Independent Fight Director’s Guild, and is a certified Associate Teacher of Fitzmaurice Voice Work. Professional credits include: The Shakespeare Theatre (Washington, DC) Peoples Light and Theatre, The Wilma, The Lantern, and Intrepid Theatres ( in Philadelphia), Delaware Theatre Company, City Theatre of Wilmington and First State Children’s Theatre (In Delaware), The Berkshire Theatre Festival, Actors Lab Arizona, Court Yard Players Touring Company, Arizona Jewish Theatre, AKA Theatre, Tucson Actors Studio, Candlelight Theatre Company (NYC), New Paltz Summer Rep, York Little Theatre, and the Arizona, Tucson, South West, Baltimore, Wisconsin, Park City and Utah Shakespeare Festivals.

Kathryn Gately, Associate Professor of Theatre Arts, is the co-director of an international student exchange program between The Gaiety School of Acting in Dublin, Ireland and Northern Illinois University. Having studied with Sanford Meisner at the Neighborhood Playhouse, Ms. Gately has taught the Meisner Method extensively in America and in Dublin, Ireland. Ms. Gately received her MFA from Rutgers University, Mason Gross School of the Arts, under Bill Esper, with whom she eventually co-taught the BFA and MFA candidates. She co-founded the Gately/Poole Studio in New York City on Off-Broadway's Theater Row, which grew into one of the leading two year acting training programs in the U.S. Ms. Gately's alumni have worked in stage, film, and television and have been nominated and/or received such awards as the Cannes Film Festival's Palm d'Or, the Oscar, the Golden Globe, the Emmy, the Ace, the Tony, the Drama Desk, the Outer Critics Circle, the Joseph Jefferson, the Dramalogue, and the Pulitzer Prize. Most recently, James Gandolfini received the Emmy and the Golden Globe for his role in The Sopranos; Roger Bart won both the Tony and the Drama Desk Award for his work in You're a Good Man Charlie Brown; Kevin Chamberlain was nominated for a Tony Award for Dirty Blondes; and Marc Wolf, won the Obie Award and was nominated for both the Drama Desk and the Outer Critic's Awards for his one man show Another American: Asking and Telling, which he wrote and starred in. In addition to teaching at Northern Illinois University, Ms. Gately has also taught at the Gaiety School of Acting and the Abbey Theatre in Dublin and, during the summers, teaches and coaches stage and film acting in Los Angeles and Boston. Ms. Gately coached the world premiere of Sins of the Father at the Theatre Space in Dublin, Ireland.

Christopher Markle is a graduate of Indiana University, Bloomington and the Yale School of Drama. Immediately after he completed his training he began his long association with The Acting Company, founded by John Houseman, founding and artistic director of Julliard, and Margot Harley and currently celebrating its 25th Anniversary season. In his first season with The Acting Company, Mr. Markle co-directed A Midsummer Night's Dream and began his long term association with the distinguished Romanian director, Livui Ciulei. When Mr. Ciulei was invited to take over The Guthrie Theatre, he invited Mr. Markle to join him. Mr. Markle was Resident Director at the Guthrie from 1980-1985, directing Heartbreak House, Hedda Gabler, 'Night, Mother and three editions of A Christmas Carol. He worked closely with John Houseman on the staging of the New York and London revivals of Marc Blitzstein's The Cradle Will Rock and directed its national tour. Upon leaving the Guthrie, Mr. Markle was one of the co-founders of DearKnows, a New York City-based company known for its innovative work with narrative texts, especially James Joyce's Dubliners (in which Mr. Markle appeared in a variety of roles). DearKnows was also closely associated with Olympia Dukakis' Whole Theatre Company, Colorado College. For DearKnows Mr. Markle also staged a version of Alice in Wonderland on commission from New York's Lincoln Center Institute, for which he worked for a number of years as a teaching artist in schools all over the New York metropolitan area. Recently, he directed Othello for the Los Angeles Shakespeare Festival. As a teacher Mr. Markle has also taught privately, conducted many master classes around the country, and has taught at a number of institutions including the Studio School of the Moscow Art Theatre, NYU, SMU, Bard College, the British-American Drama Academy, Princeton and Texas Tech universities. Mr. Markle is a member of the Steering Committee of the National Training Committee of ITI/Theater Communications Group, and recently was the American representative to Project Istropolitanja 2000, a biennial Slovakian festival of international schools of theatre. As artistic director of SummerNite, he has produced the world premiere of The Enduring Legend of Marinka Pinka and Tommy Atomic and the U.S. premiere of The Snow Palace as well as expanded the season into a repertory.

Christopher Markle passed away on July 28th, 2008. We grieve the loss of our friend and colleague.

Richard Poole worked extensively in New York City as a director and teacher before joining the NIU faculty. He has coached actors in several award winning Broadway, Off-Broadway, and television productions. Professor Poole co-founded the Gately/ Poole Acting Studio in New York City with Kathryn Gately and was both its director and a master teacher for 14 years, overseeing its growth to over 250 students per year. Before joining Ms. Gately, he taught for several years at The American Academy of Dramatic Arts and Rutgers University. For 10 years in New York City, Professor Poole was the executive director for 42nd Street’s Nat Horne Theatre, home of three separate companies, and in that capacity was part of the development of Theatre Row. Before leaving New York , he was head of acting for the professional program at Primary Stages Theatre Co, and co-head of the Playwriting Unit with Arthur Giron. He was the co-founder of the c*rst professional television acting training program on the east coast. Professor Poole is also associated with New Dramatists in Chicago, with whom he and several Chicago playwrights workshopped new plays in the acting classrooms at Northern. He has taught and coached actors in New York, Chicago, and Los Angeles and has given master classes in Meisner technique at the Gaiety School of Acting and the Abbey Theatre in Dublin, Ireland. He was a member of the acting faculty at Interlochen Center for the Arts, and from 2002 – 4, he was the artistic director of an Equity Theatre, The Barnstormers, in Tamworth, New Hampshire.

Patricia Ridge is a Professor and Director of Theatre Arts and Performance at Northern Illinois University. Dr. Ridge teaches Directing, Storytelling and Performance courses. As a professional storyteller she performs regularly at festivals, coffee houses, schools and libraries throughout the country. In addition, Professor Ridge specializes in directing original and experimental plays of social and political significance. Her work as a theatre artist has been chosen to represent the Outstanding Contributions by Women Artists Exhibit for the Golda Mier Collection housed at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. Dr. Ridge is a member of the National Storytelling Association, the American Theatre in Higher Education Association, Northlands Storytelling Network, The Association of Women Playwrights and the Fox Valley Storytelling Guild.

Deborah Robertson received her M.F.A. in Dance Performance from Smith College, Northampton, Massachusetts, while on a teaching fellowship, and her B.A. in Dance, from the University of Colorado, Boulder. She is a certified teacher of the Williamson Physical Training for the Actor, and was trained by Loyd Williamson at the Actors Movement Studio in New York City. She has studied Laban Movement Analysis at the Laban/Bartenieff Institute in New York and the Royal National Theatre in London. She is currently studying the work of Michael Chekhov with the Michael Chekhov Association (MICHA). As an actress she completed the two-year Meisner training with William Esper in New York City.

Ms. Robertson is a professor, Head of the B.F.A. Acting Program, and the Undergraduate Advisor for the School of Theatre and Dance at Northern Illinois University, an U/RTA, NAST program. She teaches movement in the B.F.A. and M.F.A. Professional Training Programs. She has previously been on the faculties of the Mason Gross School of the Arts at Rutgers University, the Actors Movement Studio in New York City and the Actors Center in Chicago. She has taught workshops internationally, at national conferences, residencies in university programs, and private studios nationwide.

Her work as a choreographer and movement coach has been performed internationally, in regional theatres, university productions, and on television. As an actress and dancer, she has appeared on Broadway, National Tours, Off Broadway, industrials, regional theatres, and television.

She is the vice president of the Association of Theatre Movement Educators (ATME), a member of the Association for Theatre in Higher Education (ATHE), the Michael Chekhov Association (MICHA), Actors Equity (AEA) and the Screen Actors Guild (SAG).

Recently she received a grant to complete work on the creation of a digital video documentary of Loyd Williamson and the movement training that he created.

Kristin Spangler received her MFA in Stage Movement from Boston University. She also holds an internationally recognized certification as a teacher of the Alexander Technique. In addition to teaching the Alexander Technique to actors in both the BFA and MFA programs at NIU, Kristin has taught the technique to actors, dancers, and musicians at DePaul University, Columbia College, Elmhurst College, Viterbo University, University of Wisconsin-Parkside, Hope College, and the Conservatory at Act One Studios in Chicago. Her specialized approach to the combination of acting and the Alexander Technique has been presented at numerous national conferences, university residencies, professional organizations, and private studios. A founding member of Citadel Theatre Company, Kristin freelances as a director and actor throughout the Chicago-land area.