Andrew Smith
Associate Professor, Acting
Associate Area Chair | Acting/Music Theater
Andrew W. Smith joined the School of Drama in the fall of 2014. Before joining Carnegie Mellon, he worked as a professional stage, film and television actor, and as the founding, Co-Artistic Director of Project Y Theatre Company in New York City.
Project Y Theatre Company produces new and innovative theatre, with a focus on unheard and diverse voices. We support new plays and playwrights that appeal to an audience interested in such themes as race, feminism, technology, and community. The Women in Theatre Festival, which seeks to broaden the opportunities for women in the entertainment industry by producing new work by women with more than 50% female representation of all artists involved, will celebrate its 6th year in the summer of 2021.
With Project Y, he has served as producer for 4 Women in Theatre Festivals, 2 New Playwright Festivals, and over 20 world premiere’s including world premiere productions by Lee Blessing, Lia Romeo, Megan Monaghan Rivas, Amina Henry, Tori Keenan-Zelt, Samuel Brett Adams, Justin Shipman, and Karl Gajdusek.
Additionally with Project Y, he is a core member of the grant writing teams that have received funding from New York State Council on the Arts (NYSCA), the Department of Cultural Affairs (DCA), Nancy Quinn Grant (from ART/NY), Creative Space Grant (from ART/NY), Bel Geddes Grant (from ART/NY), and the Puffin Foundation.
Andrew has directed multiple professional productions with Project Y Theatre, including the world premiere of Three Musketeers 1941, by Megan Monaghan Rivas.
As Co-Artistic Director of Project Y, he oversees the day to day business of Project Y Theatre Company, which includes a bi-monthly Writers Group, a bi-monthly Reading series of new work, and a commitment to the development of new and emerging voices in the theater.
As a professional actor, Andrew has been seen in many regional theatres around the nation, including: Pittsburgh Public Theatre, Pittsburgh City Theatre, Quantum Theatre, Actor’s Theatre of Louisville, Seattle Repertory Theatre, Arena Stage, Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company, Roundhouse Theatre, Potomac Theatre Project, Ars Nova, Studio Theatre, and Olney Center for the Arts. Filmwork includes Lucid, Shooting Script, Death of a Nation (Winner: Best Short, IndieFest 2011; Best in Show, Best Shorts Competition 2011), Under-Ground. Television work includes GONE, Law and Order: Criminal Intent, One Life to Live, As the World Turns, Guiding Light.
In 2019, Andrew was an invited teacher at the Monfitz International Theatre Festival in Sozopol, Bulgaria, and he will be next teaching as a guest teacher at the Chekov Players in Moscow, Russia.
Andrew is a graduate of the MFA Acting program at the University of California, San Diego, from which he received the Teaching Excellence Award upon graduation.
