Kristen is a multihyphenate theatre professional with a broad range of experience that encompasses acting, voice work, directing, choreographing for theatre, monologue and audition coaching, and teaching. As a teaching artist, most of her work subsists at the undergraduate collegiate level, with both acting and non-major students, as well as with emerging professionals and professional actors continuing their training. Kristen leads with empathy, valuing her students as individuals and encouraging them to encounter, acknowledge, and embody themselves fully while working from a place of professional rigor and curiosity. She is passionate about contributing to and building (and re-building) brave spaces, engaging in anti-racist learning, and creating a more just theatre and society for all people. As both an actor and a teacher, Kristen says her great love is working on anything that makes her feel and think deeply, and provides the chance to explore rich relationships—whether that be with self, another character, or the audience. In addition to earning her BFA in Acting and Dance from Adelphi University and MFA in Acting at the University of Montana, Kristen has spent more than a decade training with Shakespeare & Company’s Center for Actor Training in Lenox, Mass., including five years as a teacher trainee studying under and assisting Master Teachers, and has been a full member of the teaching faculty since 2022. Kristen credits her actor training at Shakespeare & Company with changing her teaching trajectory, her acting career, and her life. At Shakespeare & Company, Kristen also serves as the Center for Actor Training Programs Manager, where she works in collaboration with the Director of Training to develop new workshops as well as review and reimagine curriculum and teaching practices in order to remain relevant in the field of actor training and the greater theatrical landscape. Kristen has been a guest teaching artist or on faculty at the University of Connecticut, University of Montana, Seattle University, University of Washington-Tacoma, and San Jose State University. Kristen is currently training to become a Designated Linklater Teacher and lives in Lenox, Mass. with her husband and their two daughters. There, she lives out the best roles ever as Wife and Mom.

curriculum vitae

• Talent Scholarship, Shakespeare & Company, MA, 2012
• Cardell Moore Drama Scholarship, University of Montana, 2010
• Harrington Scholarship, University of Montana, 2009, 2010
• KC/ACTF Irene Ryan Scholarship Finalist, 2002
• Talent scholarship, Adelphi University, NY, 1999-2003