| Roger Ellis_
ROGER ELLIS |they-them-theirs| is a director who cultivates performance projects dealing with identity, post-traumatic growth, and digital media. Upcoming projects include Get Out Alive at The Haven Theatre a live adaptation of the award-winning film directed by Ellis.
Other projects include the app-based performance [re: CLICK], in which the audience chooses among four avatars to experience the play. [re: CLICK] has reached audiences in 12 countries. [WOAR - Philadelphia Center Against Sexual Violence played an important role in the development and first iterations of the play CLICK by Jacqueline Goldfinger, which [re: CLICK] is adapted from].
Ellis' choreography for digital project AntigoneNOW was presented at the 27th Cairo International Festival for Experimental Theatre. Based in Chicago, they have also worked in New York, Atlanta, Southern California, and across the United States with companies such as Sacramento Music Circus, Paramount Theatre, American Music Theatre Project, Horizon Theatre Company, Aurora Theatre, Lyric Theatre of Oklahoma, Tuacahn Center for the Arts, and San Diego Repertory.
Ellis is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Theatre at Northwestern University where they serve as co-curator of the Kelsey Pharr Jr. Speaker Series and on the advisory board of Black Arts Consortium. Ellis' research centers on physical inquiry and embodiment-based performance. Ellis has also taught courses in movement for the stage, acting through song, musical theatre scene study, music theatre dance, and collaborative devising process at Marymount Manhattan College, the University of the Arts Summer Institute, and NYC's Professional Performing Arts School. Ellis has taught guest workshops at Boston University, Dell 'Arte International School of Physical Theatre and has been a guest speaker at the School of Sound (UK), Victorian College of the Arts at the University of Melbourne, and the August Wilson Society Colloquium at Howard University.
Ellis holds an MFA in Musical Theatre from San Diego State University, a BA in Theatre Performance from Oklahoma City University, and is a designated teacher of The Lucid Body. Ellis is the recipient of the National Alliance of Acting Teachers' Earle Gister Fellowship (2019) and is a member of Actors' Equity Association, the Stage Directors and Choreographers Society (Associate), the Association of Theatre Movement Educators, and the National Alliance of Acting Teachers.
Photo credit: @dmpphoto
© 2021 Roger Ellis