Stephen Gundersheim

Gundersheim serves as the theatre education program director and also teaches acting, directing, musical theatre and theatre education classes. In addition, he directs productions at Winthrop. Before coming to the university, Gundersheim taught theatre at Pentucket Regional High School in West Newbury, Mass., where he directed and choreographed more than 25 productions. He also worked as a freelance director and choreographer and co-founded and served as the co-artistic director of SPiNN, a jazz dance company in Methuen, Mass., where he choreographed and performed.

He has performed in plays, musicals, television, and film in California, Georgia, Arizona, Chicago, West Virginia, and Massachusetts, as well as on cruise ships. Gundersheim, a trained dancer, began his early dance training in Amherst, Mass., at The Amherst Ballet Centre, where he studied RAD and cecchettitechnique as well as character, modern dance, and jazz. He performed principal roles in Les Sylphides as well as pas de deux from Bluebird and Don Quixote. He also performed as a member of the Amherst Ballet Theatre Company, traveling to Austria, Hungary and Yugoslavia where he danced lead roles in modern and jazz pieces. He attended the NARB Craft of Choreography Conference and trained under Rochelle Zide-Booth. Gundersheim had the opportunity to work with choreographers Bruce Stegman, Jimmy Locust, Robin Karson, Kathi Jo Hubner, and Gary Schaeffer. He also spent a summer in Beckley, W.Va., studying under Jerry Rose.

While enrolled at Northwestern, Gundersheim worked and trained with Gus Giordano. While in Los Angeles, he studied jazz with Joe Tremaine and had the opportunity to work with choreographer Twyla Tharp.

At Winthrop, Gundersheim enjoys working with theatre education majors as they study to become theatre teachers, and he has presented workshops for the Palmetto Dramatic Association, Charlotte Mecklenburg School District, and the Old English Consortium. Gundersheim has also served as an adjudicator for SCTA and PDA's Secondary School Play Festivals, and he presents workshops regularly at SCTA, AATE, and SETC conferences.

At Winthrop, Stephen has directed "Antigone," "To Gillian on Her 37th Birthday," "Anything Goes," "Godspell," "Once Upon A Mattress," "Chicago," "Hairspray," "Urinetown," "bare: a pop opera," "Into the Woods," "Legally Blonde," "Heathers," "The Wiz," "HAIR," "Dog Sees God," “The Arkansas Bear,” “RENT,” and “Lilly’s Purple Plastic Purse” for the department. Past directing credits in the Charlotte area include Disney's "Aladdin" at Children's Theatre, "Songs for a New World" at Theatre Charlotte, "Godspell" at CPCC and "Seussical," "The Wiz," "Honk," "The Trial of the Big Bad Wolf," "Joseph," "A Year With Frog and Toad," and "Willy Wonka" at the Jewish Community Center of Charlotte and "Legally Blonde" for Teen City Theatre in Charlotte, NC.

Stephen served on the board of AATE for five years, received the Outstanding Theatre Educator Award for 2012 by the South Carolina Theatre Association (SCTA) and last year received Winthrop's College of Visual and Performing Arts Excellence in Academic Advising Award.