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Andrei Serban, looking remarkably youthful at 50 in his black jeans and crewneck sweater, darts out of his office at Columbia University, where a year-and-a-half ago he was hired as head of the Oscar Hammerstein Center for Theatre Arts. Thin, edgy, sporting a neat beard and shaggy brown hair, the Romanian-born director motions to a bright-eyed graduate student and they disappear behind his door for a quick conference. Minutes later, Serban swoops out and motions to his next visitor.
To those familiar with the marginalized, tradition-bound Columbia theatre program that seemed gripped by rigor mortis though much of the 1970s and '80s, Serban's energetic presence signals important changes. For this Ivy League institution's commitment to the arts over the past couple of decades was never so neatly symbolized when the university razed the campus theatre to make way for a state-of-the-art law school without ever building a new performance venue.
Why would a critically acclaimed director who has worked with an inspiring range of international artists-from innovative experimental performers to opera companies to Japanese masters--accept a position at an institution with such a track record? Serban sips his coffee, settles awkwardly into his chair in his bright, recently repainted office and takes an uncharacteristically long pause: "The time has come to transmit my experiences in the theatre and my understanding to the younger generation, for two reasons: one, to pass those things on; and two, for myself to clarify these directions."
Serban's arrival was one in a series of fortuitous hirings that injected new life into the sixth floor of stodgy Dodge Hall, the building that also houses Columbia's graduate writing, film and music programs. First, Peter Smith was named dean of the school of arts six years ago; he hired Arnold Aronson to chair the graduate theatre division. Together they pursued Serban, hoping he could do for their theatre program what he has...