CARDULLO, Robert James 1948- (Bert Cardullo)

PERSONAL:

Born April 27, 1948, in Brooklyn, NY; son of Francesco Santo and Angela Helen (Fattorusso) Cardullo; married Kirsi Birgitta Virtanen, June 11, 1993; Kia, Emil. Ethnicity: "Italian-American." Education: University of Florida, B.A. (with honors), 1973; Tulane University, M.A., 1982; Yale University, M.F.A. (with distinction), 1985, D.F.A., 1989. Religion: Roman Catholic. Hobbies and other interests: Baseball, sports cars, word etymologies.

ADDRESSES:

Office—Department of Theater and Drama, 2550 Frieze Bldg., University of Michigan, 105 South State St., Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1285; fax: 734-647-2297. E-mail—bert.cardullo@umich.edu.

CAREER:

Pennsylvania State University Press, University Park, PA, editorial and research assistant, 1973-74; Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, literary manager of university theater, 1974-77; Stamford Advocate, Stamford, CT, theater critic and copy editor, 1977-78; Florida State University, Tallahassee, FL, assistant to artistic director of university theater, 1978-80; Wesleyan University, Middletown, CT, visiting assistant professor of English, 1985-86; Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, LA, visiting assistant professor of drama, 1986-87; University of Richmond, Richmond, VA, assistant professor of English, 1987-90; University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, assistant professor, 1990-95, associate professor, 1995-2000, professor of theater and drama, 2000—, head of undergraduate theater studies and associate of Center for World Performance Studies, 2000-01. National Endowment for the Humanities, member of theater and film advisory panel. Theatrical producer at various universities; speaker at educational institutions, including University of Turku and Free University of Brussels, and at literary gatherings.

MEMBER:

Phi Beta Kappa, Phi Kappa Phi, Delta Phi Alpha.

AWARDS, HONORS:

Fulbright fellow in Finland, 1996.

WRITINGS:

UNDER NAME BERT CARDULLO

(Editor) Before His Eyes: Essays in Honor of Stanley Kauffmann, University Press of America (Lanham, MD), 1986.

Indelible Images: New Perspectives on Classic Films, University Press of America (Lanham, MD), 1987.

(Editor) The Film Criticism of Vernon Young, University Press of America (Lanham, MD), 1990.

What Is Neorealism? A Critical English-Language Bibliography of Italian Cinematic Neorealism, University Press of America (Lanham, MD), 1991.

Dramatic Considerations: Essays in Criticism, 1977-1987, Peter Lang (New York, NY), 1991.

(Translator and author of introduction) German-Language Comedy: A Critical Anthology, Susquehanna University Press (Selinsgrove, PA), 1992.

Theatrical Reflections: Notes on the Form and Practice of Drama, Peter Lang (New York, NY), 1993.

Film Chronicle: Critical Dispatches from a Forward Observer, 1987-1992, Peter Lang (New York, NY), 1994.

(Editor) What Is Dramaturgy?, Peter Lang (New York, NY), 1995.

(Editor, translator with Alain Piette, and author of introduction) Bazin at Work: Major Essays and Reviews from the '40s and '50s, Routledge (New York, NY), 1997.

(With Alain Piette) The Crommelynck Mystery: The Life and Work of a Belgian Playwright, Susquehanna University Press (Selinsgrove, PA), 1997.

(Editor, with Harry Geduld, Ronald Gottesman, and Leigh Woods) Playing to the Camera: Film Actors Discuss Their Craft, Yale University Press (New Haven, CT), 1998.

(Editor) The Theater of Fernand Crommelynck: Eight Plays, Susquehanna University Press (Selinsgrove, PA), 1998.

Practical Film Criticism: An Enlightened Approach to Moviegoing, two volumes, Edwin Mellen Press (Lewiston, NY), 1999.

(Editor, with Robert Knopf, and author of introduction) Theater of the Avant-Garde, 1890-1950: A Critical Anthology, Yale University Press (New Haven, CT), 2001.

Vittorio De Sica: Director, Actor, Screenwriter, McFarland (Jefferson, NC), 2002.

Contributor to books, including Tennessee Williams: A Tribute, edited by Jac Tharpe, University Press of Mississippi (Jackson, MS), 1977. Contributor of more than 150 articles, translations, and reviews to periodicals, including Quarterly Review of Film and Video, North Dakota Quarterly, Cinema Journal, Forum Modernes Theater, Massachusetts Review, and Journal of Religion and Film. Contributing editor, New Orleans Review, 1987-93, and Hudson Review, 1988—; member of editorial board, Studies in the Humanities, 1987—.

WORK IN PROGRESS:

Theory of Avant-Garde Drama, for McFarland and Co. (Jefferson, NC); The German Modernists: A Study of Lenz, Kleist, Grabbe, Bücher, Hebbel, and Wedekind; editing Conversations with Stanley Kauffmann, University Press of Mississippi (Jackson, MS), and The Drama Is Coming Now: The Theater Criticism of Richard Gilman, 1961-1999, Yale University Press (New Haven, CT); coediting The Norton Anthology of Drama, W. W. Norton (New York, NY), The Fallen Staff: A Collection of Falstaff Plays from the Seventeenth to the Twentieth Century, University of Delaware Press, Theater and Film: A Comparative Anthology, Yale University Press (New Haven, CT), and The Portable Antigone: An Anthology of Plays from Sophocles to the Present; translating Franco-Italian Cinema from Neorealism to the New Wave, 1945-1958, by André Bazin, Peter Lang (New York, NY).

SIDELIGHTS:

Robert James Cardullo told CA: "My primary motivation for writing is to figure out what I think about a particular subject or work of art, and then to communicate my thoughts to the educated general reader. The primary influences on my criticism have been the writing teachers with whom I studied: Richard Gilman and Stanley Kauffmann. Neither of them is an academic in the abstruse or pedantic, traditional sense; each of them wishes to reach a wider public than the community of scholars. So do I. I write about film and drama because they are both the most comprehensive and most communal of all art forms; it's that simple. My writing process is slow and laborious: from yellow pad and pencil to word-processor to edited hard copy and back to word-processor. Then onward to galley proofs and page proofs, each of which I further edit. Perfection is the goal—never quite attained, alas."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Booklist, April 15, 1998, Ted Leventhal, review of Playing to the Camera: Film Actors Discuss Their Craft, p. 1410; April 15, 2001, Jack Helbig, review of Theater of the Avant-Garde, 1890-1950: A Critical Anthology, p. 1527.

Film Quarterly, fall, 1999, Gabriel M. Paletz, review of Bazin at Work: Major Essays and Reviews from the '40s and '50s, p. 45.

Journal of European Studies, December, 1993, Luisa Quartermaine, review of What Is Neorealism? A Critical English-Language Bibliography of Italian Cinematic Neorealism, p. 492.

Modern Drama, spring, 2000, David Willinger, review of The Crommelynck Mystery: The Life and Work of a Belgian Playwright, p. 136.

Publishers Weekly, October 28, 1996, review of Bazin at Work, p. 74.

Theatre Research International, autumn, 1998, Frank Peeters, review of The Crommelynck Mystery, p. 288.

Variety, September 3, 2001, Dade Hayes, review of Theater of the Avant-Garde, 1890-1950, p. 51.