—Vinita M. Alexander

CHRISTINA M. SHELBY ’04

Christina M. Shelby ’04 is no stranger to the Harvard stage. This spring, she will dance on a Washington, D.C. stage as a part of a national dance showcase put on by the American College Dance Festival.

As a performer in the annual Dancers’ Viewpointe since its inception in 1999, Shelby, this year’s recipient of the Radcliffe Doris Cohen Levi Prize that is awarded annually to Harvard’s premier student actress in musical theater, has a played an active role in molding the campus’s dance culture.

Pointing to the overall lack of University funding for dance programs, Shelby says she especially appreciates the Office of the Arts-sponsored spring Dancers’ Viewpointe because it provides a rare opportunity for Harvard students to witness the rich community of their dancing peers at work. “Performing in Dancers’ Viewpointe was always one of the highlights of each year for me, and in my opinion it showcases some of the very best dance at Harvard,” Shelby effuses.

Shelby admits that she was bitten by the dancing bug early on and is always restless for her next dance opportunity. “I get a huge rush out of performing…there is this part of me that I can access through dancing that otherwise remains hidden,” she says. “It’s a highly personal feeling—like catching a glimpse of your soul and reveling in it. It’s wonderfully fulfilling.”

But Shelby says she unexpectedly found her greatest artistic fulfillment in a role that required both singing and dancing in the 2002 Loeb Mainstage presentation of Cabaret. “It was actually the first time I branched out to musical theatre at Harvard, and I couldn’t be happier that I did it…It was very gratifying to take a risk in auditioning for the show and have it turn out to be such a wonderful success,” Shelby recalls.

Although Shelby will bid farewell to the College stage this spring, it is hardly the end of the road for the Eliot House resident, who is planning a post-graduation move to New York to professionally pursue modern dancing.

Indeed, it will be hard to take the Harvard spirit out of this dancer who is so well-entrenched in Harvard’s dance community, as a member of the Radcliffe Dance Company, the Mainly Jazz Dance Company, Harvard Ballet Company and Harvard Contemporary Dance Ensemble.

In particular, Shelby says she will always have fond memories of the site where she spent much of her creative college career: the Riemann Dance Center. “It’s really quite amazing to stand alone on the marley [there] and think of how many dancers have tread in the same spot before you and scrutinized themselves in the same mirrors, how many dances have been made in the space, how many dance world “greats” have been there, how much sweat and blood the room has held and how many people have bared their souls there. It’s a majestic space.”

“Harvard has been a wonderful home for me,” Shelby says. “I think I am definitely a different person now than I was when I first got here.”

—Vinita M. Alexander

E. PEYTON SHERWOOD ’04

After four years of intensive involvement with the technical side of Harvard theater, E. Peyton Sherwood ’04 has been selected as one of this year’s recipients of the Louise Donovan Award for excellence in behind-the-scenes theater work. Sherwood has worked as technical director, producer, executive director, master rigger, sound designer, lighting designer, technical advisor, sound board operator and master carpenter for over 20 Harvard productions, as well as serving on the executive board of the Harvard-Radcliffe Dramatic Club (HRDC), as a proctor for the Harvard Freshman Arts Program and as managing producer for the Harvard-Radcliffe Summer Theater in 2003.

Sherwood identifies Cabaret, which he worked on during the fall of his junior year, as his favorite production experience. “For me, the process of creating art and the friendships developed during the collaborative process are just as important as the end product,” he says. “All three of those things were particularly rewarding during Cabaret.”