Jeff Grace
Associate Professor of Theatre
Meet Professor Grace
Years at Knox: 2009 to present
"My main area of interest is the representation of homosexual visibility on stage. My research examines how playwrights at the Caffe Cino, a small New York coffeehouse that pioneered the 1960s Off-Off-Broadway movement, presented gay characters in their plays. This research interweaves social and cultural history with themes of sexual identity to expose how issues of gender expression, social oppression, camp perception, and characteristics of affirmation coalesced around textual bodies of performance in the 1960s, thereby facilitating the advancement of homosexual visibility on stage."
Professor Grace's Personal Web Page
Education
Ph.D., Theatre History, Theory, and Literature, 2008, Indiana University.
M.S., Education, Curriculum and Instruction, 2004, Indiana University.
B.A., Theatre Arts, 1997, Brigham Young University.
Teaching Interests
Theatre History, Directing, American Alternative Theatre, Gay and Lesbian Theatre, Postmodernism, Historical Off-Off-Broadway, Rise of the Modern Director, Musical Theatre, Drag Narratives and the Performed Body.
Selected Professional Accomplishments
Honors/Grants
- Faculty Research / Creative Work Grants, awarded annually from 2013-2025.
- Cartier Faculty Excellence Award, Knox College, 2017.
- Philip Green Wright-Lombard College Prize for Excellence in Teaching for Un-tenured Faculty, Knox College, 2012.
- Career Enhancement Grant, Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, 2012.
- Faculty Travel Grant, Knox College, 2010-2020.
- Research Travel Grant, Department of Theatre, Indiana University, 2008 and 2009.
- Research Travel Grant, College of Arts and Sciences, Indiana University, 2008.
- Hubert C. Heffner Award for Outstanding Scholarship in Theatre, Indiana University, 2006.
- 1st Place Director of Region III Drama Championship Team, Salt Lake City, 2001 and 2002.
- 2nd Place Director of State Drama Championship Team, Salt Lake City, 2001.
- Outstanding Directing Award (Best Play), UHSAA, Salt Lake City, 2000 and 2001.
Publications
Review of Landford Wilson: Early Stories, Sketches, and Poems, edited by David A. Crespy. Theatre History Studies, vol. 38, 2019, pp. 220-22.
Review of Critical Lives: Tennessee Williams, by Paul Ibell. Theatre History Studies, vol. 37, 2018, pp. 329-31.
Review of Theatre & Photography, by Joel Anderson. Texas Theatre Journal, vol. 12, no. 1, 2016, pp. 100-02.
Review of The Afterlife of Ophelia. Eds. Kaara L. Peterson and Deanne Williams. Texas Theatre Journal 9.1 (2013): 122-24.
"Coming Out at the Caffe Cino: Emancipation from the Dramatic Closet." In Public Theatre and Theatre Publics, edited by Robert Shimko and Sara Freeman, Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars Publishing (2012): 176-185.
Review of Tender Fires: The Spiritual Promise of Sexuality, by Fran Ferder and John Heagle, Ecumenica, A Journal of Theatre and Performance 2.2 (2009): 109-110.
Review of Theatres of Independence: Drama, Theory, and Urban Performance in India since 1947, by Aparna Bhargava Dharwadker, Modern Drama 49.4 (2006): 541-543.
Presentations
“Celebrating the Underground: A History of the Caffe Cino.” Cornelia Street Café, New York City, NY, November 2022.
“Queering Character at the Caffe Cino: Reimagining Gender in the Camp Performances of H.M. Koutoukas.” Mid-America Theatre Conference, Chicago, IL, March 2020.
“Caffe Cino: The emergence of Off-Off-Broadway and the struggle to preserve a ‘free theatre’ aesthetic.” Mid-America Theatre Conference, Cleveland, OH, March 2019.
"Closets? What does this have to do with closets?: The problem of the hidden homosexual in Doric Wilson's Now She Dances!" Mid-America Theatre Conference, Houston, TX, March 2017.
"Sex Is Between Two People: Variety and Opportunity at the Gay Baths." Mid-America Theatre Conference, Minneapolis, MN, March 2016.
"The Caffe Cino Project: Recreating an American Cultural Landmark." Mid-America Theatre Conference, Kansas City, MO, March 2015.
"Re/visioning Homosexual Stage Characters: From the Wales Padlock Act to the Caffe Cino." Mid-America Theatre Conference, Cleveland, OH, March 2014.
"Exaggerating the Myth: Camp Performance at the Caffe Cino in H.M. Koutoukas's Medea, or Maybe the Stars May Understand." Mid-America Theatre Conference, St. Louis, Missouri, March 2013.
"The 'Pass-the-Hat Theatre Circuit': Working for Pittance Off-Off-Broadway." Mid-America Theatre Conference, Chicago, Illinois, 2012.
"Caffe Cino: A Landmark of American Gay Theatre." Mid-America Theatre Conference, Minneapolis, Minnesota, March 2011.
"Coming Out at the Caffe Cino: Staging Lanford Wilson's The Madness of Lady Bright." Mid-America Theatre Conference, Cleveland, Ohio, March 2010.
"'I don't really know the procedures': Sexual Codes and the Elimination of Class in 1960s Gay Bathhouses." Mid-America Theatre Conference, Chicago, Illinois, March 2009.
Productions
Director, Birthday Candles by Noah Haidle, Knox College, 2026.
Director, Twilight Bowl by Rebecca Gilman, Knox College, 2024.
Director, The Coast Starlight by Keith Bunin, Knox College, 2024.
Director, The Wolves by Sarah DeLappe, Knox College, 2023.
Director, Dear Elizabeth by Sarah Ruhl, Knox College, 2022.
Director, Mrs. Harrison by R. Eric Thomas, Knox College, 2021.
Director, A Doll’s House, Part 2 by Lucas Hnath, Knox College, 2019.
Director, The Laramie Project by Moisés Kaufman, Knox College, 2019.
Director, The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee Williams, Knox College, 2018.
Director, The Nether by Jennifer Haley, Knox College, 2016.
Director, The Secret in the Wings by Mary Zimmerman, Knox College, 2016.
Director, Rapture, Blister, Burn by Gina Gionfriddo, Knox College, 2015.
Director, "The Caffe Cino Project" - a theatrical project that involved directing four one-act plays that were originally staged at the Caffe Cino in the 1960s (A Funny Walk Home, The Bed, Who Killed My Bald Sister Sophie?, and Daddy Violet). Knox College, Oct.-Nov. 2014.
Director, Next Fall by Geoffrey Nauffts, Knox College, 2013.
Director, The Caucasian Chalk Circle by Bertolt Brecht, Knox College, 2013.
Director, Under Construction by Charles Mee, Knox College, 2012.
Director, The Serpent by Jean-Claude van Itallie, Knox College, 2010.
Director, Euripides' Medea translated by Robin Robertson, Knox College, 2010.