By Alexis Taylor

Special to the AFRO

Baltimore and the theatre world at-large is mourning the death of Dr. Shirley Basfield Dunlap, legendary stage director, producer and professor at Morgan State University (MSU).

“Dr. Dunlap created a safe haven for young Black artists to create and grow on our own terms,” said Grant Emerson Harvey, now the director of student and faculty affairs at the Atlantic Acting School in New York City.

In 2018, after taking one class a semester at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County for nine years, Dunlap added a doctoral degree to her list of accomplishments after defending her dissertation, the Oral History Project of African American Stage Directors in American Theatre.

Dunlap’s tenure at MSU undoubtedly changed the path of many artists in the Black theatre community.

“Dr. Shirley Basfield Dunlap is the first person who sat me down and explained to me the significance of capitalizing the “B” in Black when referring to our heritage as a people,” Keyinta Boyd told the AFRO.