Whitney White

Whitney White is a Tony Award-nominated, Obie Award and Lily Award winning director, writer, and musician. She is a believer in collaborative processes and multi-disciplinary work. Her love of music and undeestanding of rhythm is the root of her practice and at the core of all her work across film, television, theatre and musical theatre. From fierce world premieres to bold Broadway debuts, Whitney shapes ensembles the way a composer builds a chord — every voice placed, every body in motion, each artist valued with nothing wasted.

Her Broadway debut, Jocelyn Bioh’s award-winning Jaja’s African Hair Braiding (2023), announced her at the largest scale with a riotous, vibrant ensemble comedy that earned her a Tony nomination for Best Direction of a Play. She was the third African American woman to ever be nominated in this category. Whitney followed this with a fresh staging of Jason Robert Brown’s The Last Five Years, and Bess Wohl’s Liberation, a daring drama following a group of women in 1970 in Ohio attempting to raise their consciousness and create political change in their lives.

For her work off-broadway on Walden (Second Stage) and the premiere of Liberation (The Roundabout) Whitney was awarded the Obie Award for Sustained Achievement in Directing (2026).  She was also awarded the Drama League’s Founders Award for Excellence in Directing (2025).

Her most recent original work All Is But Fantasy is a four-part look at William Shakespeare’s Macbeth, Othello, Romeo and Juliet and Richard III, each scored with original music and featuring a live-band on stage. All is But Fantasy premiered at the Royal Shakespeare Company in Stratford-upon-Avon and was called “a subversive hurricane” by critics. 

Whitney received foundational training in the MFA Acting program at Brown University where she developed a love of the classics. She has since directed William Shakespeare’s Othello and James Baldwin’s The Amen Corner. Whitney is a part of the Rolex Protegé and Mentorship Arts Initiative and received her BA from Northwestern University.