Arts! Arts! Arts!

Iqbal Theba, a SAG Awards winning actor, was born and raised in Karachi Pakistan. He came to the U.S. in 1981, first entering OU as a freshman majoring in Civil Engineering, and graduating with a B.S. from the School of Architecture in 1985. Iqbal never truly enjoyed engineering but completed his Bachelor’s degree because he didn’t see another path at that time. A friend, Mary Gregory, an OU Drama major, invited Iqbal to see a play she was in at the (then) Rupel Jones Theater. It was Iqbal’s introduction to live theatre and that experience remained with him long after the curtain came down. In his own words, “watching actors up on that stage was a mystical experience...”. He saw another play at the Stone Soup Theater in Norman, made friends with the cast and asked them what it was like to be an actor. Some of them painted a fairly bleak picture of what the career was like and how almost impossible it was to make a living. After giving it a lot of thought, however, Iqbal decided to enroll in the School of Drama in 1986 to see if theatre was something he wanted to pursue. Two months into the program while doing a scene with his friend in his Acting 1 class, he experienced a connection with another human being that felt so unique, uplifting and inspiring that in that moment he knew he wanted to be an actor. After three years in the  School of Drama, Iqbal left for New York in 1989 hoping to also work in film and television. He moved to Los Angeles in March 1991 with $37 in his pocket. In January 1995, Iqbal was able to quit his job as a waiter and rely completely on acting for his income. Iqbal often says he retired in 1995, because to him, acting is not work. He considers himself the luckiest person on earth to be able to make a living as an actor. Although he may be best known for his role as the school principal in the hit series Glee, he also considers himself the Number One Oklahoma Sooners Football Fan. Throughout his successful career in theatre, film, and television, Iqbal continues to keep in touch with his OU Drama School friends and faculty, and visits as a lecturer and guest speaker for OU School of Drama classes at every opportunity.

Courtney Crappell serves as Dean of the Conservatory at the University of Missouri–Kansas City (UMKC), leading programs in music, dance, and theatre. Since joining UMKC in 2022, Crappell has advanced efforts to connect conservatory training with community engagement and institutional growth, including a major capital campaign for the Olson Performing Arts Center. He previously served at the University of Houston as Director of the Moores School of Music and as Associate Dean in the Kathrine G. McGovern College of the Arts. A recognized scholar and pedagogue, Crappell is the author of Teaching Piano Pedagogy (Oxford University Press, 2019) and has contributed widely to national conversations on music education. He serves on the National Association of Schools of Music Commission on Accreditation and the board of the Music Teachers National Association. Crappell holds the DMA and MM in piano performance and pedagogy from the University of Oklahoma and a BM in piano performance, summa cum laude, from Louisiana State University.

Kristina Love was born in Cincinnati, Ohio where at the age of two years old she began singing gospel music in her church choir. At the age of eleven years old, her family moved to Houston, Texas, where she began studying classical music. She began to compete and represent the state of Texas on the national level in choral competitions, subsequently discovering musical theatre. Finding a home on the stage, she represented the United States in theatre competitions and was discovered and recruited by some of the top Universities in the US. She chose the esteemed Weitzenhoffer School of Musical Theatre at University of Oklahoma, graduating with special distinction and receiving a BFA in Musical Theatre Performance. Upon graduation, she relocated to Germany where she performed in the ensembles of Dirty Dancing the Musical, the World Premiere cast of Rocky the Musical, Sister Act the Musical, and the European Premiere Casts of Disney’s Aladdin, The Hunchback of Notre Dame and Hercules the Musical. Selected by Tina Turner to star in the title role in the German premiere of Tina the Musical, in which she subsequently made her West End Debut. Her first arena tour was as a soloist with Disney in the European leg of Disney 100 performing in sold out arenas to tens of thousands of spectators across Europe. Kristina’s London performance debut was at the Hammersmith and she has performed as a soloist in Magic at the Musicals at The Royal Albert Hall. She has also been an artistic ambassador with UNICEF in Germany for 12 years. Having come from a very humble upbringing, she has dedicated a huge part of her life to combatting educational inequality and fighting injustice wherever possible.

Laura Warriner

OU School of Visual Arts

Oklahoma artist Laura Warriner began her career in the 1960s and early 1970s as a painter grounded in realism. Over time, her work evolved into increasingly tactile, three-dimensional explorations that pushed beyond the canvas. While exhibiting in New York and gaining recognition as an award-winning watercolor artist, she became deeply interested in abstraction through frequent visits to museums and galleries. This growing curiosity, along with extensive travel abroad with her husband, led her to enroll in painting classes at the University of Oklahoma, where she studied with abstract painter and teacher Eugene Bavinger, later adding John Hadley and George Bogart. During this period, she formed a lifelong bond with four fellow students known as the “Gang of Five.” For more than 40 years, Warriner has been actively involved with organizations supporting the arts. Most recently, she leads a mentorship program at ARTSPACE at Untitled, where she mentors middle and high school students through hands-on visual arts education, focusing primarily on printmaking and stop-motion animation.