If you love working behind the scenes, this is how you get ahead—with in-depth training and hands-on experience in state-of-the-art venues, all right on campus. This program is for anyone who wants a career in the entertainment industry as a designer, technician, stage manager, or nearly any off-stage or off-camera role. Whether you want to envision stage designs, engineer sets and costumes, or direct lighting for Broadway shows, you can bring your innovation and creativity to UB—and see how a world-class university can open new doors.
You’ll start with structured, intensive classes in all major areas of production, including scenic design, lighting design, costume design, sound design and projection design, as well as stage management, technical direction and live event production.
Then, as early as your first year, you’ll get real-world experience working on musicals, plays, dance performances and other live events.
As you work side-by-side with our faculty and staff in our studios, shops and performance spaces, you’ll learn firsthand about industry standards and new technology, including automation, wearable media and evolving digital practices. You will also develop the powerful communication, organization and leadership skills critical to succeed in the highly collaborative entertainment industry.
In addition to hands-on experience through your classes, you’ll have plenty of opportunities to do what you love and make new friends.
Designer for stage or film. Head lighting, sound or media technician. Scenic artist. Wardrobe supervisor. Technical director. Model builder. Puppet master. Stage manager. Whether you want to fabricate props, call the cues or handle nearly any backstage role in the wings, shops or studios, you’re in the right place.
Our graduates can be found working on Broadway, in regional theatres, on national tours, in film and television, on cruise lines, with major live event companies, and for themed entertainment enterprises including Disney Parks. They’ve worked with leading organizations including Bandit Lites, Chicago Flyhouse, Glimmerglass Festival, Hangar Theatre, Lighting Design Group, Parson-Meares LTD, Tait Towers, TheaterWorks USA, and Sante Fe Opera, among many others. Other graduates have gone on to pursue advanced degrees at prestigious institutions across the country, furthering their expertise in specialized areas of design and technology.
At UB, our BFA students receive portfolio coaching and demonstrate impressive accomplishments, helping them go straight into industry jobs—or earn full tuition waivers and assistantships at top MFA programs in stage design and technical production.
At UB, our faculty are internationally recognized professionals and well-connected mentors. From Broadway to regional theatre and countless live events, they’ve worked on hundreds of shows as designers, technicians and stage managers. They are members of key industry unions, including the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees, United Scenic Artists, Stage Directors and Choreographers Society, Actors’ Equity Association and SAG-AFTRA.
They are also exceptional teachers and mentors, with faculty in the design and technology area having earned the Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival Gold Medallion for extraordinary contributions to the teaching/producing of theatre, and for significant contributions to the development of university-level theatre art. Our faculty have also received UB’s Award for Distinguished Undergraduate Teaching and Mentoring, and numerous other awards for teaching and mentoring including the University Resident Theatre Association Excellence Award for Undergraduate Training, an institutional honor within the UB Theatre Design/Technology program.
In addition, UB hosts design and tech guest artists, including many alumni you can learn from (and add to your network) as they offer masterclasses, workshops, seminars and performances.