Gregory Ramos

Department Chair
Theatre Arts Department

Photo of Gregory Ramos

Education

B.A. in Theatre Arts at UCLA in 1999
Masters in Playwriting at UCLA in 2001

Contact

Theatre Arts Building
130
P: 909.748.8733
E: gregory_ramos@redlands.edu

Meet Gregory Ramos

Gregory Ramos studied and taught dance in Los Angeles before beginning his professional career. He has appeared on television and toured the U.S. and Europe as a performer in numerous shows, including the national tours of The King and I and West Side Story. He studied acting at Playwrights Horizons in New York and with Academy Award-winning actor Ellen Burstyn before completing his MFA in Playwriting at UCLA. His short plays Reaching Mercy and Breasts were produced in New York City. He has performed his original solo plays Border Stories and When We Danced in venues across the country. His plays A Visit From San Cristobal and Our Father’s House were part of the new play reading series at Company of Angels Theatre in Los Angeles. Several of his short plays have been performed at festivals around the country. His most recent full-length play is a bilingual play for young audiences, based on Mexican legends and family ghost tales, Cuentos de Josefina (Josephine’s Tales) YouthPLAYS (2017). He is certified in the Meisner Acting Technique through the TRUE Acting Institute.

Gregory has directed and choreographed plays and musicals at universities and at professional theatre companies around the country. Some of these include:
Ain't Misbehavin', Cabaret, Confessions of Women from East L.A., The Exonerated, Evita, Godspell, Jesus Christ Superstar in Concert, Into The Woods, The Legend of Georgia McBride, Our Town, La Ronde, Marat/Sade, Mothers and Sons, Pippin, Real Women Have Curves, Spring Awakening, Stop Kiss, Time Stands Still and Urinetown. While on faculty of the University of Texas at El Paso he founded The Latino Guest Artists Program and the Border Public Theatre. Board memberships have included the Texas Commission for Arts Performing Arts Panel; Las Americas, an immigrant advocacy organization on the US - Mexico border; and VermontCARES, a statewide nonprofit organization with the mission of bettering the lives of Vermonters with HIV/AIDS. He served as board President for Vermont Shakespeare Festival, and as national secretary for the American Theatre in Higher Education's Latino Focus Group. While on faculty at the University of Vermont, he directed the ALANA U.S Ethnic Studies Program (Now Critical Race and Ethnic Studies) and was chair of the Department of Theatre and Dance. Gregory is currently working on a new play about gun violence and community. The play is inspired by interviews with community members in El Paso, Texas after the 2019 mass shooting at Walmart.

Experience

University of Texas at El Paso, Assistant Professor

The University of Vermont, Resident Director and Associate Professor/Professor

The Stella Adler Conservatory Musical Theatre Intensive, Guest Instructor

Gregory worked as a professional performer before beginning his academic career. He continues to direct and perform at professional theatres when time allows. He has appeared on television and in U.S. Tours, European Tours, and at regional theatres. Some recent venues have included Vermont Stage, Saint Michael’s Playhouse, and Company of Angels.

Publications

Ramos, G, Essay, Meisner Training in the Undergraduate Context, Michael Chekhov and Sanford Meisner – Collisions and Convergence in Actor Training, Routledge Press 2020
Ramos, G, Cuentos de Josefina (Josephine’s Tales), YouthPLAYS, 2016
Ramos, G, Interview with Andréa Burns, Café Onda, howlround.com/Latina/o Theatre commons, 2016
Ramos G, Theatre Review, “El Año de Ricardo,” El Foro de la Fabrica, San Miguel de Allende, Mexico. Latin American Theatre Review, spring 2015
Theatre Reviewer, El Paso Times, 1999-2001

Subject of Publications:
Martinez A, “Interview: with Playwright Gregory Ramos,” Texas Theatre Journal, Volume 10, Issue 1, 2014

Lucas, Ashley: "Performing the Queer Frontera: Gregory Ramos' Play Border Stories." Revista de Literatura Mexicana Contemporanea, Núm. 53, Año 18, Abril-Junio 2012, pp. xxxv-xl.

Awards, Honors, Grants

LDBT Faculty Award, The University of Vermont

Numerous Faculty Research Support Awards

KCACTF Region 1 Ensemble Award, Stop Kiss, The University of Vermont

Djerassi Artist in Resident Grant

Affiliations

Actor’s Equity Association

Lincoln Center Director’s Lab