This year students can look forward to new chances and opportunities to explore the art of theatre.

The department will be offering productions ranging from a large assortment of genres that returning students are already anticipating.

Senior theatre major Hillary Rheinheimer said she’s excited for the upcoming season.

“The shows chosen may not be as well-known as some others we have done in the past,” Rheinheimer said, “but they are different and will give our students so many new and wonderful opportunities.”

In addition to new productions, the department will also be welcoming a new professor to campus as well, Scott Hudson. Department Chair, Teresa Durbin-Ames, thinks he will bring a breath of fresh air to the campus.

“He is a New York actor and director and has worked in the business with professionals,” she said. “He is bringing all kinds of experiences, opportunities, and resources for our students.”

For students interested in working with Hudson, this fall he will be directing the production of “Servant of Two Masters” by Carlo Goldoni, a period piece out of the Italian renaissance with unlimited opportunities from live musicians to juggling to physical acrobatics. The show is all about improvisation and stock characters and is full of great comic business.

Alongside Hudson’s production, Fabio Polanco, 2013 recipient of the Taylor Excellence in Teaching Award, will be directing the Latin American drama “Night Train to Bolina” by Nilo Cruz. Cruz is most revered as the 2002 winner of the Pulitzer Prize for his play “Anna in the Tropics.”

Polanco chose this show to coincide with the 2014 Undergraduate Research and Creativity Symposium theme: Latin America and the Caribbean. He was intrigued by the thought of performing through a minority voice.

“The play is about what it’s like for a couple of children to live in an environment of civil unrest and how these particular children deal with it and escape their realities through their imaginations; which is in lots of different ways,” Polanco states. “It really gives a fantastic quality to the play.”

The final production of the year will be directed by Teresa Durbin-Ames. Her choice, “Songs for a New World” by Jason Robert Brown, is a new and interesting style of musical described as a song cycle. As opposed to the traditional style of musical, this one does not convey much of a story but instead gives students opportunities to sing songs of all different styles about new beginnings.

Director Durbin-Ames said she is looking forward to this new opportunity and challenge.

“The show is all about new beginnings and embarking on something new. I have never worked with this style of musical before. We have never done a musical by Jason Robert Brown who was a composer in the late 1990s early 21st century,” she explains. “I just think it’s an opportunity to explore and create a show that is different from anything I’ve done before.”

She also feels freshmen in particular can also empathize with this show.

“For freshmen, college is a new beginning. They are starting and embarking on a new world,” she said. “There are songs about relationships and deciding what to do next. And relationships when they work well and don’t work well, all things students are going to encounter.”

The theatre department stresses the endless opportunities to get involved on campus if students get out there and take advantage of them.

“Being a freshman does not mean you can’t do the things you want to do,” Polanco says. “We do our casting based on merit not on how long you’ve been here. Everyone should come in with the understanding that they have got as much a chance as someone that is a senior.”

Auditions will take place within the first few weeks of school. For students seeking more information, they can attend the theatre interest meeting at 6 p.m. on Monday, Aug. 19 in the Hugo Young Theatre.