Matthew Siegel is a professor at the University New England who was born and raised in Singapore yet still made it far as a Director and professor in the United States.
Lizzie Brytowski
3/30/25
University of New England Student
Matthew Siegel grew up in a small area in Singapore, because of this when he came over to the United States he had to learn the culture of a new country. He had to figure out a completely new way of living on his own and through this struggle became a successful director and professor.
Siegel has been a director and a camera/lights producer for many famous films and TV shows, such as: The Matrix: Reloaded, Spiderman 2, Master and Commander, Mr. and Mrs. Smith, NBC’s Council of Dads, WB’s Everwood, the CBS drama Joan of Arcadia, the Jerry Bruckheimer series Just Legal, and the CBS series The Mentalist, as well as Castle Rock, produced by Stephen King and J.J Abrams for Hulu.
Not only did he work on these films and TV shows but he also had many clients for commercial opportunities, such as: Google, Toyota, Ford, SONY, Audi, MasterCard, Microsoft, and Coca-Cola, with multi-platform branding campaigns filmed for Bayer, Honda, CVS, Timberland, The Smithsonian Institute, and the US Army.
Before coming to the University of New England, Siegel worked at New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts-Asia. Even before teaching, he had run workshops all over the world helping other people with demonstrating production techniques and new technology for ARRI, Blackmagic Design, Canon, Panasonic, Litepanels/VITEC, Quasar Science, and Rotolight.
Siegel is a new professor at the University of New England, where he teaches Communications and Media Arts. He helps his students learn all about new camera, sound, and lighting equipment while giving them tips to make it easier.
Quinnly Raducha, a First year English major at the University of New England, had Professor Siegel as her professor her first ever semester of college. “I was scared of going to all of my classes in the first semester. Professor Siegel’s class however, never made me scared or nervous because he made a great environment for me and my classmates and he was always willing to help whenever he could.”
Raducha is a writer for the school newspaper, The Bolt, and one person who influenced her to join this club was Professor Siegel. In class, Raducha had expressed her love for writing and what she wants to accomplish in the future and Professor Siegel recommended she sign up for The Bolt. She explained how she loves writing for the bolt and thanks to Professor Siegel she now writes articles for them consistently.
Raducha is not the only student of Siegels that had nice words to say about him, Amanda Bergman, a sophomore Business Administration and Marketing major with a communications minor, had Professor Siegel last fall in his intro to communications class. Bergman expressed how this was her first communications class but she has taken a few more after Siegel’s class, and she said how Professor Siegel is a one of a kind professor.
“He’s [Professor Siegel] willing to work 1 on 1 with his students to help them in any way that they need. He is there to give constructive feedback and ways to make your assignments better” Bergman says. She shows that Siegel is always there to help out no matter what is needed from his students and he truly cares about each student he has in his classroom and tries to get to know them personally as well in order to help them learn better. Bergman states that not all professors take the time like he does to help his students in that way and it really sets him apart from professors she has had previously.
Not only does Professor Siegel care about his students, even if one of his previous students is not in one of his classes currently he takes the time to say hello. “Even though I’m not a current student he makes time to say hi and ask how I am doing, which my past professors don’t do if I see them, I don’t even think half of them remember my name but Professor Siegel does.” Bergman says.
Many students of Professor Siegels like Bergman and Raducha, have also reported that they feel comfortable going to his office hours. Siegel’s office is a nice environment and he also brings his dog, Kona, a lot of times to his office which the students also enjoy.
