Acting News

Acting alumnus Dave Klasko ’12 joins the cast of Anna Ziegler’s The Wanderers alongside Katie Holmes, Sarah Cooper, Lucy Freyer, and Eddie Kaye Thomas.

Acting alumna Jensen Austria Olaya ’12 voices Jade’s mother, Gram Gram, and friend Lucy in the new animated TV series Jade Armor.

Alumnus Charles Browning ’06 will be taking over the role of Avery in the Broadway production of August Wilson’s The Piano Lesson beginning January 17. 

Directing alumnus Saheem Ali ’07 will make his Broadway directorial debut in James Ijames’s Pulitzer Prize-winning play, Fat Ham, at American Airlines Theatre this spring.

Acting alumna Heather Alicia Simms ’96 will star as Mrs. Drinkwater in the New York premiere of Des Moines at Theatre for a New Audience’s Polonsky Shakespeare Center.

For the first of two thesis productions featuring Columbia MFA actors presented at Lenfest this fall, the company of Halfway Bitches Go Straight to Heaven shows the effects of displacement on a group of women seeking refuge at a shelter. We sat down with cast member and Acting student Katherine George to discuss her acting process and the upcoming production.

For the first of two thesis productions featuring Columbia MFA actors presented at Lenfest this fall, the company of Halfway Bitches Go Straight to Heaven shows the effects of displacement on a group of women seeking refuge at a shelter. We sat down with cast member and Acting student Tenneh Sillah to discuss her acting process and the upcoming production.

For the first of two thesis productions featuring Columbia MFA actors presented at Lenfest this fall, the company of Orlando takes the audience on a transcendent journey through movement. We sat down with cast member and Acting student Hannah Shealy to discuss her acting process and the upcoming production of Orlando.

Directing student Chaesong Kim will perform in Lazarus 1972-2022 with Ping Chong and Company at La MaMa from September 29–October 16. The production is a reimagining of Ping Chong’s 1972 Lazarus, which was the first work he created as an independent artist.

Acting alumna Ito Aghayere ’12 plays Young Guinan in Star Trek: Picard. 

Adjunct Assistant Professor Manoel Felciano will join Broadway's Dear Evan Hansen at the Music Box Theatre.

Acting alumnus Marcel Spears '15 will star in an upcoming co-production of Fat Ham by James Ijames, produced by The Public Theater and National Black Theatre and directed by Saheem Ali '07. Starring alongside Spears in the production is Nikki Crawford as Tedra, Chris Herbie Holland as Tio, Billy Eugene Jones as Rev/Papp, Adrianna Mitchell as Opal, Calvin Leon Smith as Larry, and Benja Kay Thomas as Rabby. Marcel Spears will be playing the character of Juicy.