Valerie Clayman Pye, Ph.D. is an Associate Professor of Theatre and Chair of the Department of Theatre, Dance, and Arts Management who specializes in making Shakespeare accessible and training other artists to do the same. At LIU Post, she teaches Acting, Voice and Speech, and Shakespeare in Performance; she is also Assistant Faculty with Theatrical Intimacy Education. Valerie’s research focuses on actor training pedagogy, Shakespeare’s Globe, Shakespeare tourism, and on practice-as-research (PaR). Valerie is a professional actor and director whose work has reached audiences in over twenty countries.

Her book, Unearthing Shakespeare: Embodied Performance and the Globe (Routledge) is the first book to consider what the unique properties of the reconstruction of Shakespeare’s theatre can contribute to both the training of actors as well as to the performances of Shakespeare’s plays. She is the co-editor of Objectives, Obstacles, and Tactics in Practice: Perspectives on Activating the Actor (with Hillary Haft Bucs), and Shakespeare and Tourism (with Robert Ormsby). Her essays have appeared in Shakespeare, Teaching Shakespeare, PARtake: The Journal of Performance as Research, New England Theatre Journal, Theatre Topics, and several essay collections. A 2018-20 LabWorks Artist at the New Victory Theatre in NYC, Valerie has been developing "Shakespeare’s Stars", an immersive, multi-media, multi-sensory performance for babies and their caregivers, along with Spellbound Theatre, featured in The Wall Street Journal. Shakespeare’s Stars will premiere at the New Victory Theatre in May 2023.

When she isn’t focusing on Shakespeare and devising new work of her own, Valerie has worked extensively on new play development, alongside writers such as Reginald Rose (Twelve Angry Men). Valerie recently appeared as the Nurse in Adjusted Realists’ production of The Refugees (ART/NY). She currently serves as Vice-President of Conference 2024 for the Association of Theatre in Higher Education (ATHE) and has served as the Focus Group Representative, Conference Planner, and New Member Liaison of ATHE’s Acting Program. Her next book, Innovation & Digital Theatremaking: Rethinking Theatre with ‘The Show Must Go Online’ (with co-author Robert Myles) with be released later this year.