Biography
Robby Lutfy (he/him) is a theater maker whose work focuses on new plays, collaborative storytelling, and the training of the next generation of theatre artists. His work includes directing world premieres by Keiko Green, Nathan Alan Davis, and Kate Hamill. He has taught acting, stage management, directing, singing, and producing at universities across the U.S., including UC San Diego, San Diego State University, The University of North Carolina School of the Arts, and Grossmont College. Robby believes deeply in the connection between professional practice and theatre education, bringing his experience as a working theatre artist into the classroom. His directing credits include Marin Theatre Company, Milwaukee Repertory Theater, Anacostia Playhouse, Tantrum Theatre, Boston Court Pasadena, Backyard Renaissance, RhinoLeap, and UNCSA. His productions have earned 12 Craig Noel Awards, including Director of the Year and Outstanding Dramatic Production.
Robby has served as Associate Artistic Director at Marin Theatre Company and Cygnet Theatre, directing more than 20 productions and commissioning 18 new plays. As head of Cygnet's education department, he collaborated with faculty and staff to run the stage management, MFA design, and MFA playwriting fellowships. He has developed new work with playwrights including Aaron Posner, Miranda Rose Hall, Chris Oscar Peña, Herbert Sigüenza, and Leah Nanako Winkler. At Marin, he was head of casting and produced new work by Samuel D. Hunter, Carson Kreitzer, Martyna Majok, and Mona Mansour.
His fellowships include Trabajo Práctico, Moulin/Belle, La MaMa Umbria, and The John F. Kennedy Center William R. Kenan Jr. Fellowship — he is the only person to have been awarded that fellowship twice — as well as the National New Play Network Producer in Residence, Goodyear Arts, Arts on Site, The Eugene O'Neill Theatre Center, and SPACE on Ryder Farm. As a producer, he has collaborated with Queens Theatre, NNPN, Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company, The Playwrights' Center, The John F. Kennedy Center, the New Harmony Project, and the Thomas S. Kenan Institute for the Arts, where he served as project manager for the New Play Roundtable, managing the convening of new play development leaders from around the country.
He produced the 25th Showcase of New American Plays in New York for NNPN. He also founded the Bill and Judy Garrett Finish Line Festival, which guarantees UCSD MFA playwrights a commission at Cygnet Theatre, and the Dee Silver M.D. Commission.
Everything in this bio was built with others. Robby sees theatre as an inherently collaborative art form, and this work belongs as much to the directors, actors, stage managers, designers, playwrights, administrators, and educators who shaped it as it does to him.