Biography

Chad Eric Smith, a Washington, DC native, is the inaugural Director of Marketing and Communications for Howard University’s Chadwick A. Boseman College of Fine Arts. A mission-driven storyteller and multihyphenate artist, Chad brings over 15 years of experience spanning the performing arts, higher education, and strategic communications—a career rooted in equity, creative excellence, and community impact.

Before joining Howard, Chad was the first man and first person of color to serve as the Senior Director of Communications and Brand Management for Mural Arts Philadelphia, a part-city, part-nonprofit agency and the nation’s largest public art program. There, he oversaw internal and external communications, branding, content creation, marketing, public relations, and events tied to as many as 125 public art projects annually, led a major rebranding effort, and served as the organization’s executive spokesperson.

An award-winning actor, Chad has built a dynamic creative career across theatre and independent film. Whether portraying a troubled young physicist (Fatherless), a vampire with a fear of blood (Dark Therapy), a justice-impacted man battling addiction (Counselor), or a Black nationalist and atheist in the political drama Four Points, Chad has earned praise for his range and commitment to thought-provoking stories. In theatre, he’s held leading and supporting roles in classic dramas, contemporary works, and musicals, including Raisin and I Gotcha! The Story of Joe Tex and the Soul Clan, for which he received multiple Onyx Awards from the African American Council on the Arts (AACTA).

In 2017, Chad founded MisterDuke Productions, a film production company that creates political ads, PSAs, and genre-bending narrative works for screen and digital platforms. He wrote, directed, and produced the short vampire comedy, Dark Therapy, and short sci-fi drama, Rumination, which have screened at over 30 international festivals and earned numerous awards. In 2019, he was named Filmmaker of the Month by the DC Office of Cable Television, Film, Music & Entertainment.

Chad currently serves as Board President of Theatre Horizon, a professional theatre company in Norristown, PA, is a Leadership Philadelphia 2023 graduate, a founding member of the advisory committee for the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, and holds a B.S. in Psychology from the University of Pittsburgh. He enjoys playing the piano, learning about U.S. presidential history, and spending time with his wife and their seven-month-old son, Legend.