A Performer and a Teacher

Kelly Kilgore earned a dual BFA in Acting and Musical Theatre with a minor in Digital Media from Abilene Christian University in Texas. A major factor in her decision to pursue her MFA at UCF was the University’s partnership with the Orlando Repertory Theatre and the Orlando Shakespeare Theater. During her time at UCF, Kilgore performed in many mainstage theatre productions at UCF and Orlando Shakespeare Theater. She wrote her thesis on the OST production of Titus Andronicus, in which she played Lavinia.

Kilgore explains, “In UCF’s Theatre Department, we stress performance as research. In an ephemeral art such as live theatre, our performances are our experiments and our audiences are our test subjects. Our work deals not with numbers but with moments between people: between actors onstage and in the actor-audience relationship. A performance can never be ‘solved’ as a math problem can, and the theatre artist must be continually fascinated with peeling away layers of human behavior and group storytelling.”

Kilgore appreciated the wide range of techniques for approaching voice, movement and acting which she was exposed to through the program. In addition to performing, she enjoyed teaching all levels of students, from Pre-K through undergrad. Kilgore has presented her research nationally at the Association for Theatre in Higher Education conference and co-authored a mini-publication based on the Preparing for Graduate School panel for the American Sociological Association’s Teaching/Learning Matters.  

Kilgore graduated in Spring 2013 and plans to use Orlando as a home base for acting, teaching, writing, and producing.