Donn B. Murphy

Donn B. Murphy (July 21, 1930 – April 3, 2022) taught theatre and speech courses at Georgetown University from 1954 to 2000. At the invitation of Jacqueline Kennedy and Letitia Baldrige, he became a theatrical advisor to the John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson Administrations for White House dramatic and music presentations in the East Room (1961–1965). He was a founding member of the National Theatre Corporation (1974) and was Vice-President and then President and Executive Director of the National Theatre in Washington, D.C. from 1974 to 2010.

Born in San Antonio, Texas, Murphy grew up in Leavenworth, Kansas, where his father, Arthur Morton Murphy, a Knight of the Order of the Holy Sepulchre, was president of Saint Mary College (now the University of Saint Mary (Kansas)). His mother, Claire Frances McCarthy Murphy, wrote children's stories. He graduated from Sacred Heart School and Immaculata High School in Leavenworth, and Saint Benedict's College (now Benedictine College) in Atchison, Kansas.

He served three years in the National Guard, 174th Military Police Battalion, in Leavenworth, Kansas. When the unit was activated in October, 1950 during the Korean War, he served as a Corporal for one year at 5th Army Headquarters, Fort Sheridan, Illinois, and then for one year at Camp Drake, Japan. In Yokohama he studied on special assignment under Margaret E. Lynn in the U.S. Army Entertainment Program.

In Tokyo, he met Rev. Gilbert V. Hartke, O.P., who was touring with Players Incorporated (now National Players) which Hartke had established at Catholic University in Washington, D.C. Murphy subsequently earned a Master's Degree in Speech and Drama at C.U. on the G.I. Bill under Hartke. He acted and did technical work with the Players at St. Michael's Summer Theatre in Winooski, Vermont. He later earned a PhD in Theatre and Psychology on a Ford Foundation Fellowship at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. He was Lighting Director at Starlight Theatre in Kansas City, Missouri for two summers, where he worked with Jeanette MacDonald, Gisèle MacKenzie, Penny Singleton and Charles Nelson Reilly. He was an Assistant Director at NBC-TV Channel 4 in Washington for one summer, where he worked with puppeteer Jim Henson, then a college student. He studied Psychodrama under James Enneis at St. Elizabeth's Hospital in Washington, D.C., and with Jacob L. Moreno at Beacon, New York. ^{[citation needed]}

He served on the National Advisory Board for City at Peace, and the Advisory Boards of The Playwright's Forum and the Synetic Theatre in Washington, D.C.

He became partners with H. Jones "Jon" Carrow, III in 1990. Col. Carrow, US Army ret., and Dr. Murphy, were married in Vermont in 2010, and subsequently retired to Fort Lauderdale, FL.

Murphy was on the faculty of Georgetown University from 1954 through 1999, retiring as professor emeritus. He taught successively in the Departments of English, Fine Arts, and Art Music and Theatre [now the Program in Performing Arts], and in the School for Summer and Continuing Education. He taught, at various times, Acting, Improvisation, Performing Arts in Contemporary Society, Playwriting, Public Speaking, Television Production, Theatre History and Theatrical Design.

For 21 years, he directed the Mask and Bauble Dramatic Society at Georgetown (1955–1976). He staged plays in the McDonough Gymnasium and in ornate Gaston Hall, where one of his star players was future Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia. He also mounted productions in the theatre at Holy Trinity Church near the campus, and in Stage One, a 100-seat black box theatre which he and his students created in a basement storage area in Poulton Hall (a "temporary" classroom building built during WWII, but still in use in 2014).