Molly Smith

Arena Stage Artistic Director Molly Smith presents the design for its new Mead Center for American Theater in 2007.

Molly Smith is an American theatre director and the artistic director of Arena Stage in Washington, D.C.[1] from 1998 to 2023. During this period, she emphasized promoting new American plays, playwrights, and voices, producing 200 works. In addition, she helped originate 150 works by workshops and commissions at the Arena.

She also drove the development and design of a complex called The Mead Center for American Theater, completed in 2010. The project included renovations of the two existing theaters, and construction of a third theater, and related spaces to bring all functions to the site. With this, Arena became the largest regional theater in Washington and second to the Kennedy Center.

In 1979 Smith had founded the Perseverance Theatre in her home town of Juneau, Alaska, soon after completing her master's in theatre at American University. She led the theatre company as artistic director until 1998. In addition to building audience and community through established works, she directed several world premieres of new works by rising American playwrights.[2]

  1. ^ Cite error: The named reference raven was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  2. ^ "Shaw Festival 2008" Archived 2007-09-08 at the Wayback Machine shawfest.com