From North Texas community theater mainstay Kitchen Dog Theater to Broadway and beyond, these notable SMU alums live for the applause.
Steven Gridley ’00 brings live theater to life
This talented playwright received his BFA in Theater Studies in 2000. He had the privilege of premiering the Drama Desk Award-nominated Spaceman (written under the pseudonym Leegrid Stevens) in New York with his wife, Erin Treadway ’00, starring in the production. Since that debut, the play has been translated into German, staged in Switzerland and made its regional premiere at Fort Worth, Texas’ Amphibian Stage last year. In addition to his writing career, Gridley works as a sound designer, composer and director, while simultaneously working as an Investment Group Assistant at Capital Group Companies.
“SMU gave me the knowledge and access to do live theater on my own,” he says. “It allowed me to make my own opportunities.”
Since his Spaceman days, he staged a show called War Dreamer and has a synthwave musical titled The Trojans set to open in Manhattan in spring 2025.
Laura Galt ’91 brings Pony pride to New York’s Broadway
Anyone working in live theater likely dreams of one day crossing the stage to accept Broadway’s most prestigious honor. And for SMU alum Laura Galt, that dream came true on June 16, 2024.
“Winning a Tony Award is a dream come true,” she says, acknowledging the recent Best Musical win of The Outsiders Musical for which she served as coproducer. “Broadway has been something I have aspired to since the age of 12, so winning a Tony is the ultimate reward for years of keeping a goal in sight, fortitude and overcoming obstacles.”
Galt & Co. is a theatrical and film production house that coordinates all aspects of production management with creatives and companies. Galt is also a speech-language pathologist, so she provides voice, diction, dialect coaching and accent modification for people and professionals who speak English as a second language.
Galt says SMU set her up for success by providing her with a breadth of experiences. Currently, her daughter, Campbell Snavely ’25, enjoys those same educational benefits while also working at Galt & Co. to form a powerful new mother-daughter team.
Kitchen Dog Theater made community theater an SMU tradition
Founded in 1990 by five graduates of the MFA Theater Program, Kitchen Dog Theater has continued the tradition of SMU alums at the helm. The artistic integrity instilled in each student guided their approach and led the quintet to stay in Dallas after graduation to broaden the local creative community.
Today, Tina Parker ’91 and Tim Johnson ’91, who both graduated a year after the theater company’s founding, have settled into leadership roles and have worked together since the beginning.
“[The founders] brought me in to direct Howard Brenton’s Sore Throats in 1993, and I cast Tina in the show. It was the first KDT show for both of us,” Johnson says.
“I think it was important to me to keep the way we work at KDT alive, which is so deeply steeped in the training we received at SMU as grads and undergrads, as part of our ongoing legacy,” Parker says. “Our mission statement is the same as when the company was founded 34 years ago and is still our touchstone when making artistic decisions today.”
