Since 2015, the Theatre Arts Program has brought theatre artists to campus each year for a multi-faceted artistic residency. Past residencies have featured workshops, class visits, and collaboration on Theatre Arts productions. We are thrilled to announce the first details of our Spring 2020 Artist-in-Residence programming.

Blanka Zizka, Artistic Director of the Wilma Theater, will be joining us as Artist-in-Residence, and participating in classes, workshops, and more, from February through April. Blanka is an accomplished theatre director and playwright who has had an incredible impact on Philadelphia throughout her career. Blanka came to Philadelphia in the 70s from communist Czechoslovakia and soon joined the performance collective, which would become the Wilma Theater, with the aim to “create European-style theater experimenting with content and form.”

Over the years, Blanka has directed more than 70 productions at the Wilma. More recently, she has created the Wilma HotHouse, a company of actors who train in physical and experimental techniques suited to the Wilma’s newest works. The HotHouse has hosted workshops by Theodorous Terzopoulus (Greece), Ivana Jozic (Belgium), and other international artists. We are excited for Blanka to share her artistic practices with our students and classes through this artistic residency.

As the primary component of her residency, Blanka will be working closely with Theatre Arts 275-301: The Edinburgh Project, directed and taught by Dr. Marcia Ferguson. The five Theatre Arts Majors enrolled in The Edinburgh Project course are rehearsing a production of Orlando by Sarah Ruhl to be performed in April in Philadelphia and in the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in Scotland in August. Blanka will attend rehearsals and work with the students on acting and movement techniques they can apply to the production.

She will also join us on Thursday, April 23rd for the opening night performance of Orlando in the Annenberg Center’s Bruce Montgomery Theatre. Following the free performance, we will host a reception and post-show discussion with Blanka that will be open to the public.

Beyond her work with The Edinburgh Project, Blanka will be visiting additional Theatre Arts classes as well as offering an extended masterclass open to the larger student body.