9/26/2015

Changes come to the theatre program with Scott Cox, new dept. chair at the head | The Circuit

Changes come to the theatre program with Scott Cox,

new dept. chair at the head
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November 18, 2013

By Kaihtlyn Schachter, Guest Writer

Scott Cox

We need to send socially, charitable minded Christian people into the theatre profession, said
Scott Cox, theatre department chair and assistant professor. We need to keep them running into
this business not away.
I always say, Im probably a little more liberal than my students, but Im a lot more conservative
than most people in theatre, Cox said. I think its a good fit.
This is Coxs first year as a tenure track assistant professor at Benedictine College. He is working
on building and improving the theatre department.
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9/26/2015

Changes come to the theatre program with Scott Cox, new dept. chair at the head | The Circuit

Cox has already made many changes to the department and has many goals for the future.
His goal is to develop the department into a program that is competitive with other theatre
departments and conservatories, both state and private schools.
We are building, Cox said. Rome wasnt built in a day.
Signs of change first showed through the departments theatre productions.
My first step was to amp up how often we produce and what we produce, Cox said. I am
working on complicating our design process in a good way and challenging the students with a
wider variety of performance material, Cox said.
Last year, as the interim chair, Cox oversaw the production of shows with more elaborate
costumes and sets, including a pool on stage for one performance.
The department also performed a wider variety of shows, ranging from Everyman, a medieval
morality play, to The American Dream, an absurdist play.
Coxs plan is to do four main stage plays a year, directed by faculty or a guest director and two
student directed plays.
Its fairly ambitious for a small theatre department, but we can do it, Cox said.
A major change in the department is its degree program, which Cox rewrote.
I just have all the paperwork to file, Cox said. It wasnt bad, just incomplete.
He reworked the program to provide majors with more classes that will better prepare them for
the field, Cox said.
The chair added the class Script Analysis and made it a major requirement. In the class,
students learn the basics of how to read a script and visualize it for what it will eventually
become, Cox said.
Cox eliminated the class Intro to Theatre from theatre majors requirements. He considers it a
general education class for non-majors.
Theatre majors dont need it because they are going to learn all about that in much greater depth
by doing the course work, Cox said.
Because of its popularity as a general education class, the department is going to begin offering
Fundamentals of Acting every semester, instead of just in the fall.
Cox is increasing the number of design and acting classes taught, making them three tier
programs. In both subjects, there will be three different classes, which build off each other.
Then, Cox plans to have additional alternating acting electives offered for students who want to
focus their studies in acting. These include Auditions Technique Workshop, Advanced Scene
Study and Shakespeare for Performance.
I want the students coming out of here knowing their literature, knowing their history, knowing
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9/26/2015

Changes come to the theatre program with Scott Cox, new dept. chair at the head | The Circuit

their design processes, knowing a little bit about everything, Cox said.
Cox has the long-term goal of instituting a speech and theatre education certificate.
We have a great education department and I think we could work together, Cox said.
Few colleges in the area offer that specific degree.
I think it would grow our department and offer something a lot of students want, Cox said. We
have a lot of people that want to work with kids and want to be teachers and a lot of people who
love the theatre as well, and they end up compromising.
Students often end up majoring in different secondary-education fields, instead of theatre
education which they would prefer, he continued.
An acting studio is another long-term goal of the chair.
I think our students deserve it and I think we need it, Cox said.
As an actor for 22 years, Cox has had lots of experience creating productions in small areas.
Im a renegade theatre maker, Cox said. Ive always produced my own stuff, sometimes on a
shoestring budget, sometimes in very small spaces. I can work with the space. But, having more
space would really improve the department.
In past years, the theatre department had the entire basement of St.Benedict Hall.
My goal is not to oust the Registrar and the Admissions annex, it is to hopefully find them a more
suitable space so that I can reclaim that space, Cox said. Our theatre is the only place we have
to rehearse.
He listed benefits to having an additional rehearsal space: the department could teach multiple
classes that need that type of space simultaneously, they could rehearse the seasons next play
while another is in production and it would allow more time for each set to be built.
But he admitted that the need for space is a problem for many departments at Benedictine.
To tell you the truth, Ive always wanted teach at a small liberal arts college, Cox said.
He has previous experience teaching at the University of Central Missouri in Warrensburg, MO.,
and Kansas University, where he was a graduate teaching assistant and continues to be a
student. He finished his comps last year and is now working on the dissertation for his doctorate.
The bigger colleges focus more on the theory of theatre, but Cox says he likes focusing on doing.
You learn a lot in the classroom, but in the theatre, you learn primarily by experience, doing the
work, Cox said.
At Benedictine, people say hi and look you in the eye as you walk across campus and that
doesnt happen at KU, Cox said. Its just too big and people are too busy.
This is a really warm place, Cox said. Its easy to develop an ensemble here because the
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Changes come to the theatre program with Scott Cox, new dept. chair at the head | The Circuit

students care about each other and they seem to care about the professors, and the professors
care about them.
I want to send talented artists into the world, but Im also concerned with sending good people
into this profession, he said. We are sending people that need to be in the theatre, we are
sending people with strong moral compasses.

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