Jude Kelly

Director Jude Kelly (The Importance of Being Earnest) is the artistic director of the South Bank Centre in London, responsible for programming at the Royal Festival Hall, Queen Elizabeth Hall, Purcell Rooms, and Hayward Gallery. She founded Solent People’s Theatre and then Battersea Arts Centre, establishing it as a national venue. In 1986 she joined the Royal Shakespeare Company before becoming the first artistic director of the West Yorkshire Playhouse in Leeds, the country’s largest regional theater. She established the West Yorkshire Playhouse as an acknowledged center of excellence on a local, national, and international scale, developing an ever-expanding policy of access for all. Her production of Singin’ in the Rain transferred twice to the Royal National Theatre and was awarded the Laurence Olivier Award for Outstanding Musical Production in 2001. She directed Ian McKellen in The Seagull and The Tempest; Patrick Stewart in Johnson over Jordon and Othello; the English National Opera in The Elixir of Love (South Bank Award—Newcomer Opera); and over forty productions for stage and screen, including the York Festival (also artistic director 1985–1988), Brooklyn Academy of Music, the Sydney Festival, and Channel Four. In 1997 Ms. Kelly was awarded the OBE for her services to the theater.