Dr. Barbara Wallace Grossman is a theatre historian, theatre director, voice specialist, and author. Her strong interests as a researcher and practitioner focus on Holocaust-related theatre and film, contemporary musical theatre, arts advocacy, and mindfulness practice to alleviate anxiety, develop resilience, and promote positive change. Professor of Theatre at Tufts University, she also is a certified mindfulness instructor affiliated with the Mindfulness Institute for Emerging Adults. Her publications include Funny Woman: The Life and Times of Fanny Brice (Indiana University Press), A Spectacle of Suffering: Clara Morris on the American Stage (Southern Illinois University Press), and book chapters focusing on musical theatre as well as on the Holocaust and the arts. A Presidential appointee to the National Council on the Arts (1994-1999) and the United States Holocaust Memorial Council (2000-2005), she was Vice Chair of the Massachusetts Cultural Council from 2007 to 2019. She currently serves on the American Repertory Theater’s Board of Advisors, the Anti-Defamation League’s New England Regional Board, the Jewish Arts Collaborative’s Arts Advisory Council, and the Board of Directors for MassCreative, the principal advocacy organization for the cultural sector in Massachusetts. In 2018 she was honored to receive the Terezín Music Foundation’s Legacy Award for her “commitment to diversity, tolerance, and dialogue through acts of civil service, philanthropy, scholarship, or artistry.” A member of Temple Emanuel in Newton, she sings with Kol Emanuel, the synagogue’s adult choir.
