Here are some of the noteworthy developments that helped to define the 2006-07 academic year for the Theatre Department:
- in September, John Houchin began his term as Chair of the Department, taking over from the indefatigable Stuart J. Hecht, whose fifteen-year tenure as Chair transformed the Department into a major liberal-arts theater program with a national reputation;
- in September, Ruth Conrad took the position of Technical Director of the Robsham Theater Arts Center;
- in September, Cambridge University Press published Scott T. Cummings' contemporary theater study, Remaking American Theater: Charles Mee, Anne Bogart and the SITI Company;
- in October, the Department collaborated with the Winston Center for Leadership and Ethics on "An Unknown Future: The Body, Biotechnology and Human Nature," a groundbreaking series of programs exploring issues raised by Patricia Riggin's mainstage production of Shelagh Stephenson's An Experiment With An Air Pump ;
- in January, Scott T. Cummings inaugurated a new course, Composition and Performance Workshop, an intensive laboratory course that explored ensemble techniques, collective creation, and image-and-movement-based theater;
- in February, BC students excelled at the Region One gathering of the Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival:
- three of six ten-minute plays selected for rehearsal and performance at the festival were written by BC students (Aimee Delaporta ('09), Patricia Noonan ('07), and Ian Stoker-Long ('07);
- Matthew Cullinan ('07) placed third overall in the highly competitive Irene Ryan acting competition and Patricia Noonan ('07) was named Best Partner in the Irene Ryans;
- Russ Dauterman ('08) won the national Barbizon Award for Costume Design;
- Sarah Lunnie ('08) won the regional LMDA/KCACTF student dramaturgy competition and advanced to the finals at the National Festival in Washington DC;
- in February, the Department presented the world premiere of two original one-act plays written by BC student playwrights, No Child Left Behind by Megan Maile Green ('08) and The Storykeeper by Patricia Noonan ('07), and directed by Scott T. Cummings;
- in March, Hector Arisizabal taught a workshop on Theater of the Oppressed, sponsored by the Contemporary Theater;
- in April, Crystal Tiala designed scenery for Emerson Majestic Theater production of On The Town;
- in April, the Robsham began its 25th anniversary celebration with a rousing production of Gilbrt & Sullivan's The Pirates of Penzance directed by Howard Enoch, his 25th show at Boston College;
- in April, Paul Daigneault, BC alum ('87) and Producing Artistic Director of SpeakEasy Stage Company, received the fifth annual Arts Council Alumni Award for Distinguished Achievement;
- in May, senior theater majors graduated and headed off in various directions, including to MFA acting programs at UCSD (Evan Powell) and American Conservatory Theatre (Mairin Lee);
- in June, Patricia Riggin produced Bloomsday Boston, a celebration of James Joyce's Ulysses sponsored by BC's Office of the Provost and Irish Studies Program with Boston's New Center for Arts and Culture.