Faculty – PATP
Faculty
Julia Gibson
Co-Head of Professional Actor Training Program; Associate Professor of Acting; Company Member, PlayMakers Repertory Company
gibju@email.unc.edu
CDA #211
Julia Gibson has been with UNC since 2013. She has performed in 20 or so shows as a company member of PlayMakers Repertory Company – including Misery; The Cake; Native Gardens; How I Learned to Drive; Vanya, Sonya, Masha and Spike and Bewilderness.
She has performed on Broadway and in other celebrated theatres in New York City and throughout the country for many years. She toured nationally with The Exonerated and has performed major roles at The Roundabout, Circle in the Square; Manhattan Theatre Club; Classic Stage Company; New York Shakespeare Festival’s Public Theatre and the Delacorte Theatre in Central Park; The Alley; the Arden; Berkshire Theatre Festival; the Goodman, George Street Playhouse; The Long Wharf; New York Stage and Film; New York Theatre Workshop; Milwaukee Rep; Dallas Theatre Center; and the American Conservatory Theatre, among others. TV and Film credits include Blue Bloods; Michael Clayton; Changing Lanes; So Close; Second Born; several episodes of Law and Order and Law and Order: Criminal Intent; Spin City; and One Life to Live.
As a director she has worked with Portland Stage Company; New London Barn Playhouse; Atlantic Theatre Studio; 28th Street Theatre; Rattlestick Theatre; Epic Theatre Company; Naked Angels; Origin Theatre Company; Circle East; Estrogenius Festival; and Chautauqua Theatre Company. She has directed student productions with NYU’s Graduate Acting Program; the Juilliard School; SMU in Dallas; A.C.T.’s Acting Conservatory in San Francisco; the Stella Adler Studio; Stony Brook University; and The Actors Center. Julia served as the Associate Director for The Signature Theatre’s revival of Tony Kushner’s Angels in America.
She received an MFA in acting from New York University, is a Fox Fellowship recipient, a founding member of The Actors Center in New York, and attended NYU’s Graduate Director’s Lab. She taught acting for several years at Stony Brook University. She is a founding member of the National Alliance for Acting Teachers and currently serves on the national Board of Directors for URTA. She is the recipient of a Faculty Scholarship Award from the Carolina Women’s Center and an Institute for Arts and Humanities Faculty Fellowship. Julia additionally works as a voice artist, having narrated over 170 audio books.
At UNC Julia teaches graduate and undergraduate acting as well as theatre games and audition technique. She Co-Heads the Professional Actor Training Program with Tracy Bersley.
Tracy Bersley
Co-Head of the Professional Actor Training Program, Associate Professor of Movement, Director, Choreographer and Intimacy Coach for PlayMakers Repertory Company
tber@email.unc.edu
CDA #216
Tracy Bersley, specializing in movement based theatre, has adapted, directed and choreographed many stories including: Three Incestuous Sisters (CSV), Alice in Wonderland (Dorset Theater Festival), The Epic of Sunjata (Loft Theatre), The House on Mango Street (Syracuse Stage), Tibet: Through the Red Box (at HERE in conjunction with the Lincoln Center Director’s Lab), lamb of gods (NYC Fringe Festival), The Awful Rowing Toward God (Ontological Theatre’s Blueprint Series), The Anatomy of Touch (Foreman’s Ontological Theatre), Rappaccini’s Daughter (Chashama NYC/Jim Henson Foundation’s Festival), Beyond Static and J’tombe (The Studio New York).
Tracy has also been choreographer/movement director for On the Levee (Lincoln Center, LCT3), Anna in the Tropics (Broadway, Royal Theatre), All Over (Broadway, Round About Theatre), Paris Commune (BAM/Public Theatre/Arts Emerson) and Great Immensity (The Pubic/Kansas City Rep) with the Civilians, Pericles, Revenger’s Tragedy, Women Beware Women, Duchess of Malfi, Witch of Edmunton (Lortel Nomination for Outstanding Choreography) The Changeling and Volpone (Red Bull Theatre), Love Child (New World Stages/Primary Stages), The Civil War (Callaway Award Finalist for Choreography) and Max and Ruby (Lortel/Theatreworks USA), Punk Play and Vendetta Chrome (Clubbed Thumb/Ohio Theatre), Takarazuka (HERE/Clubbed Thumb), St. Joan of the Stockyards (PS 122), Winter’s Tale and Measure for Measure (Hudson Valley Shakespeare), Scarlet Letter (Intiman, Seattle), Monstrosity (13P), Quixote (Broad St. Theatre, Philadelphia); Romeo & Juliet (Williamstown).
Tracy runs an artist posse called DDT with two performer/writers whose work aims to transform the actor/audience relationship. She also teaches acting, movement and devising work at conservatories and studios in and out of New York City and is currently guest faculty at YALE School of Drama and Princeton University. Tracy received her MFA in Directing (Syracuse), is currently the head of movement for the Professional Actor Training Program in the Department of Dramatic Art at UNC-CH, is a member of Stage Directors and Choreographers and a Drama League Fellow.
Tia James
Teacher of Voice, Speech; Resident Vocal Coach, PlayMakers Repertory Company
tiajames@ad.unc.edu
CDA #217
Tia has been seen in (Broadway) The Merchant of Venice(Broadhurst Theater), (Regional) Richard III (Allentown Shakespeare)Loving and Loving (Stella Adler Studios)Much Ado About Nothing(Two River Theater),The Merchant of VeniceandThe Winter’s Tale(The Public TheaterShakespeare in the Park),The Golden Drum Year(Radical Evolution),Civilization All you Can Eat(Woolly Mammoth Theater),#NYC(Ugly Rhino). Television: “Nurse Jackie” “Treme” “Sink Sank Sunk”
Tia served as the Associate Artistic Director for The Shakespeare Academy @ Stratford CT, was a teaching artist for NY’s Public Theater Public Works Program, a teaching artist for DreamYard Arts Center, and has directed over a dozen plays including Macbeth, Racial Science, Othello, The Mystery Plays, Sewing Circle, Richard III, and Hamlet. Tia received her BFA from Virginia Commonwealth University, and her MFA from NYU Graduate Acting. Tia is the recipient of the 2003 Kennedy Center American College Theater Festival: Irene Ryan Winner, the 2014 NYU Graduate Acting Diversity Mentorship Scholarship: Voice and Speech.
Gwendolyn Schwinke
Teacher of Voice and Speech; Resident Vocal Coach, PlayMakers Repertory Company
schwinke@email.unc.edu
CDA #212
Gwendolyn Schwinke is David G. Frey Fellow/Assistant Professor of Voice & Speech at UNC-Chapel Hill, and Resident Vocal Coach with PlayMakers Repertory Company.
Gwendolyn works regionally and internationally as a voice, text, dialect and somatic coach with: Prague Shakespeare Company in the Czech Republic, Queensland Shakespeare Ensemble in Australia, and in the U.S. at theatres including Shakespeare & Company (7 seasons), Oxford Shakespeare Festival, Atlantic Stage, Frank Theatre, Cheap Theatre, and in multiple university productions. As a director, she has worked with Tennessee Shakespeare Company, Atlantic Stage, The Playwrights’ Center, The Walker Art Center/Intermedia Arts Minnesota, and several universities.
Gwendolyn is a Designated Linklater Voice Teacher, Certified Teacher of Colaianni Speech and Accent work, and a Certified Feldenkrais Teacher. She has taught voice and acting for universities and training programs including Coastal Carolina University, University of Northern Iowa, CAP-21, Binghamton University and Macalester College, and has taught The Feldenkrais Method in professional theatres, universities, fitness centers, and continuing education programs in the US and Czech Republic.
As an actor, Gwendolyn has appeared with numerous regional companies including Carlyle Brown & Company, Oxford Shakespeare Festival, Frank Theatre, Red Eye Collaboration, Minnesota Shakespeare Project, Atlantic Stage, Old Creamery Theatre, Pulse Ensemble Theatre and Illinois Shakespeare Festival. Her original performance works have been produced by The Walker Art Center, Intermedia Arts Minnesota, The Playwrights’ Center, Southern Theatre, The Jungle Theatre, First Avenue Danceteria, and many others.
As a playwright, her work has been developed or produced by Seattle Repertory Company, Cherry Lane Theatre, The Playwrights’ Center, Red Eye Collaboration, Judith Shakespeare Company, The Jungle Theatre, and Cheap Theatre, and published in several anthologies from Heinemann and Meriwether Press.
She is a member of Actors’ Equity and holds an MFA in Acting from Illinois State University.