Robert Knopf is Professor, Chair, and Producing Director of the Department of Theatre & Dance at the University at Buffalo/SUNY. For the stage, he has directed at Circle-in-the-Square Downtown, the Cherry Lane Studio, Theater North Collaborative, Circle Rep Lab, and historic Town Hall, all in New York City. He adapted and directed the docudrama Hidden Dragon for the National Public Radio series The Archeology of Lost Voices.

Professor Knopf served as Artistic Associate for Brave New World: American Theatre Responds to 9-11, performed on Broadway on the first anniversary of the 9-11 attacks. This event consisted of four programs of one-act plays written and performed by 150 of the American theater’s most renowned actors, directors, playwrights, composers, and lyricists. Knopf directed two plays for Brave New World. His production of Laurence Klavan’s The New Rules was singled out by The New York Times as one of the most effective of the September 11, 2002 performances.

Professor Knopf has written and edited several books on theatre and film, including:

The Theater and Cinema of Buster Keaton (Princeton University Press, 1999)
Theater of the Avant-Garde, 1890-1950 (Yale University Press, 2001)
Theater and Film (Yale University Press, 2004)
The Director as Collaborator (Pearson/Allyn & Bacon, 2005)

At University at Buffalo, Professor Knopf teaches Directing II and Audition Technique. He holds an M.F.A. in Directing, a Ph.D. in Dramaturgy, and is the former Director of Graduate Studies in Theater at the University of Michigan.