Ethan Heard is a director, producer, and teacher who makes theater to build community and foster love. He recently became the Associate Artistic Director of Signature Theatre in Arlington, VA, where he has directed Pacific Overtures, The Bridges of Madison County, and Which Way to the Stage. He is the Founding Co-Artistic Director of Heartbeat Opera, “an enterprise that, while small and still young, has already contributed more to opera’s vitality than most major American companies” (NYTimes). His production of Beethoven's Fidelio updated the story to the Black Lives Matter era, and featured more than one hundred incarcerated singers in six prison choirs across four states. His collaborations with institutions like BAM, Opera Philadelphia, The Met Museum, and Berkshire Theatre Group have received rave reviews in the New York Times, New Yorker, and Opera News. In 2017, he served as resident director of China's first jukebox musical, Jay Chou's The Secret.
As a Yale student, Heard sang in the Whiffenpoofs and served as Artistic Director of Yale Cabaret, where he launched an annual drag show which continues to this day. In 2009, he co-conceived and directed The Gay Ivy, a music theater piece responding to the controversy following a cover story in the Yale Alumni Magazine entitled “Why They Call Yale the Gay Ivy.”
Heard has taught acting and directing at the David Geffen School of Drama at Yale, the Yale Institute of Sacred Music, and Princeton University. He served on the Drama School's Board of Advisors and the YAA's Board of Governors.
Learn more about Ethan on his website.
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