Assistant Professor
Contact Information
- nigelsemaj@umbc.edu
- PAHB 331; x5.5803
Education
- A.A. Arts & Sciences: Fine & Performing Arts, Garrett Community College, McHenry, MD
- B.A. Theatre, Lycoming College
- M.F.A. Theatre, The New School for Drama
Biography
- Pronouns: They/Them
- Website: www.nigelsemaj.com
NIGEL SEMAJ (they/them) is a Baltimore-based director, movement director, and educator originally from Washington,D.C. As an Assistant Professor of Performance and Affiliate Assistant Professor of Gender, Women’s, and Sexuality Studies at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, Nigel’s work is rooted in fostering inclusive and equitable theatrical spaces through anti-racist pedagogies and restorative practices.
Nigel’s directing career spans a wide range of work, including the Off-Broadway premiere of Bloodshot by Elinor T.Vanderburg, Ntozake Shange’s Spell #7, and most recently Bryony Lavery’s Slime. Nigel’s work speaks to those who have let the sadness in—for those who have been attuned to the haunting wail of the banshee. Often exploring themes of grief, violence, and the hardships of life, their work seeks to embrace the darkness from within. This work is evident in their adaptation work, projects like 10,000 Moor, an all-woman adaptation of Shakespeare’s Titus Andronicus exploring rage and violence, For Hylas—an adaptation of the Hercules myth exploring love, loss, and grief, and Call Me By Any Other Name…Just As Sweet, a queer deconstruction of Romeo and Juliet. Upcoming adaptations include the serpent under’t a physical theatre adaption of Macbeth, and a remounting of their Titus Andronicus – 10,000 Moor – seeing it remounted as a gender swapped production examining the relationship between gender and violence.
As a movement artist, Nigel’s work spans theatre, film, and opera. Their credits include Fidelio with Heartbeat Opera at The Metropolitan Museum of Art (2022), Sarah Young’s horror short film Not Him—which premiered nationally and internationally—and a recent collaboration with Submersive Productions on Submerged! at The National Aquarium in Baltimore. Nigel approaches movement as a pivotal tool in storytelling. As a dancer, choreographer, fight director, and physical theatre artist, they employ a range of techniques to communicate narrative in unconventional and visceral ways. Their work is deeply physical, and they currently serve as the Resident Movement Director at UMBC. Upcoming movement projects include choreography for San Diego’s premiere queer theatre, Diversionary Theatre, as well as Gerrad Alex Taylor’s Shakespeare in Harlem, premiering at UMBC before its remount at Chesapeake Shakespeare Company.
Nigel is the 2025 Inaugural Artist in Residence at The Johns Hopkins University Stavros Niarchos Foundation Agora Institute where they will be developing an adaptation of Henrik Ibsen’s An Enemy of the People. Nigel was also a 2025 Artist in Residence with Figure 53’s Voxel Theater, a residency sponsored by Chris Ashworth, the founder and creator of QLab. With their Voxel Residency, Nigel produced and choreographed the 2025 production of Call Me By Any Other Name…Just As Sweet. Nigel was also granted a Robert W. Deutsch Foundation Ruby Arts Award in Baltimore Maryland to support their adaptation work on An Enemy of the People as well as UMBC’s Hrabowski Innovation Fund which will support the development of a new curricular interdisciplinary collaborative laboratory for students in the fine and performing arts.
Nigel’s dedication to creating accessible and inclusive performance is reflected in their academic work, which focuses on developing anti-racist pedagogies in theatre education, teaching new ways of producing and creating work, alongside revising and decolonizing traditional curriculum design. Nigel is a board member of the American Alliance for Theatre Education, and sits on the board of Perisphere Theater in Bethesda, MD. Finally, academically they serve as co-chair of the Irene Ryans Acting Scholarship for Region II’s Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival.