For Renée Russas, stories are more than just entertainment.
As the Administrative Manager for Columbia University's M.S. in Narrative Medicine program, Russas helps support a community dedicated to understanding how stories shape health, illness, and human experience. Outside of Columbia, she channels those same ideas as a stage director, using theater to create space for reflection, empathy, and social justice.
Speaking during a Narrative Health and Social Justice seminar hosted by the Narrative Medicine program, Russas reflected on the experiences that led her to see theater not only as performance, but as “advocacy in action.”
“When I am not taking care of all of you in my capacity to do so, I have a love of theater and the humanities and music,” she said, addressing student attendees. “It became a place where I could express joy, grief, and everything in between.”
Growing up in a military family, Russas found it easier to express emotions through characters than as herself. Music and theater became both a creative outlet and a source of resilience. She pursued degrees in both arts separately before earning a master’s degree in musical theater, building a career as a performer before eventually stepping away from touring to care for her family.
After her mother’s illness and passing, Russas found herself searching for a way to tell stories through her own lived experience. When she joined Columbia’s Narrative Medicine program in an administrative role, she discovered a discipline that gave language to work she felt she had been doing all along.
“My whole life is narrative medicine,” she said. “While some prefer journaling or artwork as their ‘third object’ to crack open dialogues with the people around them. I utilize the embodied story of theater to process and navigate the ups and downs of my lived experience.”
For Russas, theater serves as both a mirror and a doorway. Audiences may recognize themselves in a character’s experiences, or they may step into perspectives entirely different from their own. Either way, the experience creates space to examine difficult questions without immediately needing to act, and can spark conversations that continue long after the curtain falls.
“I think of theater as kind of an incubator and a lab where we can test-drive choices and ideas,” she explained. “Maybe before we make those decisions for ourselves, we could go into the theater and watch somebody make that choice and see how it plays out.”
Those ideas guided Russas as she recently directed Melanie Marnich's play, These Shining Lives, for The Poor Mouth Theatre Company in Riverdale, New York. The play was inspired by the real story of the Radium Dial factory workers who unknowingly suffered fatal radium poisoning while painting luminous watch dials in the 1920s and 1930s, and whose fight for workers’ compensation ultimately catalyzed the formation of the Occupational Safety and Health Association (OSHA) forty years later.
As she researched the women behind the play, Russas found herself drawn not only to the historical events but to the complexity of the people themselves. She admired the playwright's decision to include humor, flaws, friendships, and agency, rather than simply portraying them as victims.
“The story is about how these women wanted to gain a sense of individual identity and camaraderie with their neighbors,” she said. “They entered the workforce to support the war effort and help their household combat the financial impacts of the Great Depression. Sadly, they were unaware it would come at the cost of their physical health.”
Her role as director, she explained, was not to showcase theatrical spectacle but to ensure every artistic decision served that story. Whether considering lighting, costumes, or staging, the guiding question remained the same: Does this help audiences connect more deeply with the women at the heart of the play?
That responsibility feels especially meaningful because Russas views storytelling as a catalyst for action. Reflecting on the Radium Girls’ fight for justice, she noted that audiences today benefit from knowledge the women themselves never had. That perspective, she believes, carries its own responsibility.
It also reflects what Russas values about narrative medicine. Through close reading, reflection, and careful attention to lived experience, students develop skills that extend far beyond the classroom.
“It's not just entertainment,” she said of the arts and humanities. “It is survival resources…and a pathway to agency.”
Whether supporting students at Columbia or directing actors on stage, Russas sees the work as part of the same larger purpose: helping people feel seen, bear witness to one another’s stories, and recognize the power those stories have to inspire empathy, advocacy, and meaningful change.
About the Program
Columbia University’s Master of Science in Narrative Medicine prepares health professionals, writers, and scholars to apply the skills and values of narrative understanding to improve outcomes for both patients and caregivers. It offers a rigorous and in-depth study of close reading of creative texts, illness and disability narratives, narrative ethics, philosophy, creative writing, and other perspectives. The master’s program is available for part-time or full-time enrollment. Learn more here.
