Kathleen McKinley is a monumental figure in the history of Fresno State’s theater department.

For 40 years she’s been pivotal in directing many plays for the department and has been a mentor to an innumerable number of students. After this semester, she will be retiring.

“I would say I was pretty involved in faculty governance, and involved in GE (General Education) Task Force years ago,” McKinley said. “Anything that I could do to garner more resources for the arts and more support for students in the arts. So, I have been busy and invested in all levels of our program.”

In 1983, McKinley was hired as a professor for acting and directing and has been teaching acting courses of various levels ever since.

She has also been a mentor and faculty advisor for the Experimental Theatre Company, a student-run theatre production, and has worked with several students on MFA applications and auditions. She sat as chair of the Department of Theatre and Dance for multiple years.

Tracy Hostmeyer, an actor and Fresno State alumna, worked with McKinley on one of the first shows she directed in 1985 and worked with her again on her final play as a professor, “At the Wedding.”

Reflecting on her return to University Theatre after 30 years of acting, Hostmeyer said that she was reminded of the fact that McKinley is an actor’s director, first and foremost.

“She’s an actor herself, a very good actor, and she’s a really amazing comedy actor,” Hostmeyer said. “It’s just wonderful seeing her work with the students and being reminded of how she helps guide you to be better and get out of your comfort zone.”

McKinley said her interest in theater began the same way most other people in the arts will tell you: through her high school drama teacher.

After moving to six different high schools, she eventually completed her last two years at Lincoln High School in Stockton. At Lincoln, she was taught by Paul Barnes, a teacher that would have a lasting impact on her view of theater.

“And I just found a home,” McKinley said. “I knew I wanted to be engaged in the arts from that moment on and I feel really fortunate that I had the opportunity to continue to do that.”

Arium Andrews, a student who also starred in “At the Wedding,” has been directed by McKinley for multiple productions and said that McKinley’s initial passion and engagement with her work has yet to wane.

“I say, the same person that she is as a teacher is what she is as a director,” Andrews said. “She’s very determined in working with her students and making sure of getting through a message so that the actor really does understand the character.”

After getting a theater degree from Fresno State and receiving her MFA at University of California, Davis, McKinley’s opportunities as an actor continued to grow. It contributed to her staying engaged with theater and eventually becoming a professor at Fresno State.

The opportunity to work with student actors is one she loves, she said. McKinley is motivated by Fresno State theater majors, whether it be their heart, talent, giftedness or intelligence, she cannot decide.

“I’ve never directed a production at Fresno State where the student passion didn’t drive me forward,” McKinley said.

One example of student-forward production was Fresno State’s “The Wolves,” a play directed by McKinley in 2018 which had an all-female cast and focused on nine high school students on a club soccer team.

Cassidy LeClair, a member of the cast, said that the play was a unique experience that was well guided by McKinley through an intense, yet fun work environment. Rehearsals included learning drills from the university’s own women’s soccer team.

“We all were basically forced to get very close to each other very fast because we had a month to open up the show, and so my experience for her was just, you know, put your head down and work, but also let’s laugh,” LeClair said.

McKinley said that with every show she’s chosen to direct there has been a combination of reasons for why she feels they are necessary to be seen. It may be to broaden the work of an exciting new playwright or show the strengths of the actors she works with, but there has been an underlying goal throughout every production.

“I always felt a responsibility to train our students to provide something interesting for the campus community and to provide something really interesting for the Fresno community,” McKinley said.

Every production she’s been a part of has been an experience for McKinley, and she said that it is hard to choose a favorite memory during her time at Fresno State because she has so many.

One aspect in which McKinley has helped paved the way for during her time on campus is the role of diversity and inclusion in theater productions. Early in her career, she was the only woman in the room and she said that isn’t the case anymore.

In choosing diverse playwrights, stories that push boundaries and unconventional roles for actors, progressive steps were taken forward, McKinley said.

After retirement, McKinley said she looks forward to the new direction that members of the theater department will take in their performances.

“I’m moved by live theater performance in a way that I’m not moved by other types of recorded experiences,” McKinley said. “I watch the audience and they’ll be very shocked by something that happens live in a theater, and I’m thinking, ‘Wow, that’s nowhere near as shocking as everything on TV,’ but just to have that in front of you, it is an intense experience. It’s a ritual. It’s a ritual that’s part of what it is to be human.”

As the first woman to be hired as a director, acting teacher and department chair, her work on campus has been described as bold, kind, energetic and student-forward, setting an example that will not be forgotten.