“One of the best performed shows in New York right now … exquisitely directed by Ryan Dobrin” - Helen Shaw, review of ‘you don’t have to do anything’ for The New Yorker
Photo Courtesy of HanJie Chow from tech for CAPTAIN ZUKE IN CONCERT at Joe’s Pub (2024)
“The cast [is] synced to precision realism by director Ryan Dobrin” - Jackson McHenry, Review of ‘the voices in your head’ for vulture
Photo Courtesy of Connor Haggerty from rehearsals for YOU DON’T HAVE TO DO ANYTHING (2024)
current / upcoming
[Director/Co-Conceivor] a preview of The Painter and the Thief created by Julian Hornik & Ryan Dobrin / Produced by Chase Haylon / January 7
[Creative Consultant] HAIR Now: A Musical Concert for Palestine / Judson Memorial Church / January 21
[Director] In Praise of Folly (workshop) by Jacob Wasson / Produced by Jennifer O’Grady, Zachary Hausman, & Zachary Landes / January 31
[Associate Director] The Last Five Years by Jason Robert Brown / directed by Whitney White / starring Nick Jonas & Adrienne Warren / Hudson Theatre, Broadway / previews start March 2025
[Director] Ego Show by Keith White / Edinburgh Fringe Festival / August 2025
bio
Ryan Dobrin (he/him/his) is a queer & biracial director and producer of musicals, plays, and digital collaborative work. He facilitates work centered on otherness, emotional growth, and connection through textual dramaturgy and intentional conversation. He is passionate about both highly-stylized and deeply realistic storytelling, ethical implications, the existence of magic and spectacle, and narratives with a strong, beating heart. He believes in leading with friendliness, openness, and honesty and in the building of community through shared experience, a leadership style that originates from a Quaker education and an Ethical Humanist upbringing.
In 2024, Ryan directed the world premiere of Ryan Drake’s you don’t have to do anything, which was on Vulture/NY Magazine’s Best Theater of 2024 List and called “one of the best performed shows in New York” by Helen Shaw in The New Yorker, as well as the world premiere and remount of Billy McEntee and Grier Mathiot’s The Voices in Your Head, which was on Theatrely’s Best of 2024 List.
Ryan is one of the Producing Artistic Leaders of Obie Award-winning The Movement Theatre Company, an artistic associate at Fault Line Theatre, and was the associate/resident director to Maria Friedman for her Tony-nominated work on the Tony-winning revival of Merrily We Roll Along. Alongside Carina Goebelbecker, he is one half of Those Guilty Creatures, an interdisciplinary performance creating and producing collective.
He has been an associate/assistant to celebrated directors (including Olivier, Tony, Emmy, and Obie winners) such as Maria Friedman, Whitney White, Sam Gold, Billy Porter, Christopher Ashley, Christopher Gattelli, Trip Cullman, Zi Alikhan, Margot Bordelon, and Tyne Rafaeli.
Ryan has served as a visiting director at Yale University, the University of Michigan, Tufts University, Fordham University, NYU Tisch’s Experimental Theatre Wing, the Atlantic Acting School, and Waterwell/Professional Performing Arts School.
He has been a reader for Page 73’s Playwriting Fellowship, Juilliard’s playwriting program, Roundabout’s Refocus Series, Ars Nova’s Play Group and ANT Fest, WTF’s Weissberger New Play Award, MTC’s Literary Department, Fault Line Theatre’s Iron in the Fire program, and the 24 Hour Plays Nationals.
Ryan is a graduate of Wesleyan University, where he double-majored in Theater and Italian Studies. He was the recipient of the Rachel Henderson Theater Prize and the Outreach & Community Service Prize in Theater, becoming the first-ever student to receive both awards bestowed by the Department of Theater. During his time at Wesleyan, he studied abroad in Bologna, Italy and Santiago, Chile. He is a proud Gen-Z/millennial cusp.