Christen Mandracchia, PhD 

Christen Mandracchia (she, her, hers) (’15) earned a PhD in Theatre and Performance Studies at the University of Maryland, where she studied the impact of theatre practitioners on the period known as the “Disney Renaissance.” She is a senior lecturer in Theatre History at University of the Arts and has taught Production and Design at Penn State Abington and Delaware Country Community College. She has been published in Studies in Musical Theatre and in the anthology Performance and the Disney Theme Park Experience: The Tourist as Actor. She directed the Off-Broadway premier of Dorian Gray the Musical in the 2017 New York Musical Festival and served as the general manager for the international and Off-Broadway premier of I Will Speak for Myself in the Edinburgh Fringe Festival and East to Edinburgh Festival at the 59E59 St. Theatre, respectively. Her sound design for The Triumph of Isabella: An Immersive Experience was exhibited at the Victoria and Albert Museum and shown at Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre in London. She also has a certificate in Writing Personal Histories from the London School of Journalism. In addition to theatre, she does volunteer public relations and fundraising for nonprofits including the Life Treasures Foundation and DC Paws Animal Rescue. See more on Christen’s website.