Meet our team
Dr Lesley Mickel
Dr Mickel is Programme Leader for our BA (Hons) Drama and Production programme and a lecturer in literature. As well as ensuring the smooth running of our drama programmes she is active in developing and supporting a self-sustaining community of performance practitioners in the Highlands, with the promotion of student extra-curricular performance and touring opportunities, as well as bringing in top class performers to deliver master classes and shows.
Her research interests include Renaissance court theatre, material and festival culture. She has published widely on these topics, and is currently investigating the presence and representation of Scots in court festivals at home and abroad. She regularly participates in public engagement activities and contributes to local heritage and festival management. These activities have fuelled a broader interest in the theorising of cultural exchange, and have led to new research developments.
She is leading the Drama, Literature and Art contributions to the UHI interdisciplinary Ruination and Decay project, and has developed international academic connections with the Universities of Salzburg, Innsbruck, Krakow and Krosno. Lesley is an enthusiastic promoter of student and staff exchanges, and regularly presents at her research at academic conferences. She is a member of the Royal Studies Network, The Early Modern Festival Network, The Society for Renaissance Studies, The Society for Court Studies, The Theatre and Performance Research Association and The International Federation of Theatre Research. She is also part of the UHI Learning, Teaching and Research working group; the UHI Cultural and Creative Industries Knowledge Exchange group, the UHI Humanities and Arts Research Cluster and engaged in undergraduate and postgraduate curriculum development.
Stephanie Smart
Steph is a trained actor, director and producer specialising in theatre and performance pedagogies based in the Highlands of Scotland. With a BA (hons) in Acting and English, and a Masters in Arts, Festival and Cultural Management, Steph left Edinburgh behind in 2017 and returned home to the Highlands where she took up the position of Lecturer in Drama and Performance at Inverness College - University of the Highlands and Islands.
Across her career she has worked with companies like National Theatre for Scotland, Grid Iron Theatre company, Strange Town Theatre, Artichoke Trust, Edinburgh Fringe Festival, Screen Academy Scotland, Canada Hub, Eden Court Theatre and Marvel studios to name a few. Her most recent projects being PROCESSIONS and Infinity War.
Steph is an experienced director and educator within the performing arts industry, who has a demonstrated history of working on a multitude of projects, locally and internationally, within theatre and film contexts. Her specialties lie acting and performance theories and practice, within conventional, non-conventional theatre context and applied drama in practice. She is also involved in curriculum development and practice as/based research.
Ruby Worth
Ruby first discovered the communicative power of movement whilst studying at Dartington College of Arts. Over 30 years of arts practise Ruby has created 40 productions working across the generations in community and professional arts settings. Works include: “The Family Project” an intergenerational performance involving 50 local volunteer family members as performers; “Our Town Story” a production that saw 100 teenagers from Moray flying to London to perform in the Millennium Dome and “Hoops Hats and Acrobats” a commission from Imaginate for the Edinburgh International Children’s Festival.
As a teenager Ruby moved from Moray and studied in a performing arts school in New Jersey. Subsequent studies have seen her work within a range of dance/movement forms including: Release Technique, Body Mind Centering, Contact Improvisation, Butoh and Experimental Dance/Theatre. As a teacher Ruby invites people of all ages and abilities to experience their innate senses of the joy of moving through dance and creative practise and is an avid believer that everybody can dance. Another aspect of Ruby’s work stems from her studies in Dance Movement Therapy where she has worked with children, young people and adults across the sectors of mental health, education and social care. Ruby has a BA (Hons) Degree in Theatre, MSc in Dance Movement Psychotherapy and a PDA in Teaching in Further Education.
Alan Macleod
Alan is the drama and performance technician. He's been with Inverness College UHI since April 2017, having gained a strong technical background in his careers as an electrical technician in the Royal Air Force, then self-employed as an audio visual technician for 25 years.
He said: "I love theatre and performing, and feel this gives me greater empathy with our performance students, understanding what they are experiencing on stage and helping them to use tech creatively to enhance performances."
In his spare time he stars in amateur dramatic productions.
Louise Brodie
Lou is an applied artist, performance maker and project manager based in Scotland. Through an artistic process rooted in social practice and conviviality, Lou produces idiosyncratic artworks and events in collaboration with communities, people and place.
Graduating in 2004 from the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland (formerly RSAMD) with a BA(Hons) in Contemporary Theatre Practice, Lou has worked with a range of national and international companies and artists including: Visible Fictions, Tramway Glasgow, Lyra Theatre, Platform Glasgow, Imaginate and the Edinburgh International Children’s Festival, Mammalian Diving Reflex, Nic Green, Southbank Centre, The WOW Foundation, Perth Theatre and The Touring Network.
Lou has worked extensively across the community, youth arts and young audiences’ sectors. Much of her work is preoccupied with the creation of spaces and performative actions that rely on or question the responsibility of the spectator/participant. From teaching teens and adults how to throw bricks, inviting classes of 5-year olds to experience dance theatre on a bouncy castle or spending a full year asking people to hold her hand each day every day for 30 minutes, gently probing the role of risk, responsibility and intimacy are themes that run throughout her practice.
Lou is currently undertaking a part-time MSc in Applied Gender Studies at Strathclyde University in addition to her portfolio of on-going work. Projects currently include the creation of youth consultation events for the First Minister’s National Advisory Council on Women and Girls, an upcoming residency at The Work Room and creative facilitator for the National Theatre of Scotland and All the Queens Men’s Scottish Premiere of The Coming Back Out Ball.