Meet the Director

Spring, 2023 he directed She’s Got Harlem on Her Mind, Three One Act Plays by Eulalie Spence, for the Metropolitan Playhouse Off-Off Broadway, followed by Destiny of Desire by Karen Zacarías at The Old Globe Theater as Associate Director, with Ruben Santiago-Hudson directing. He was selected to direct These Days by Jacqueline E. Lawton for the FLASH ACTS festival, a co-production of Arena Stage, Georgetown University, and the Forum for Cultural Engagement, featuring 20 commissioned new plays by 10 American and 10 Russian playwrights. Additional directorial projects include the Metropolitan Playhouse Virtual productions of Aftermath by Mary Alice Burrill and Willis Richardson’s Compromise.  Timothy made his Off-Off Broadway directorial debut at the Obie Award-Winning Metropolitan Playhouse with his production of On Strivers Row by Abram Hill. The New York Times said of his work that “Timothy Johnson has shaped 16 striking performances here.” This production also received Four coveted AUDELCO award nominations including Best Direction of a Dramatic Production for Timothy and Best Revival. He served as the Assistant Director for the New York City Center Encores! production of Cabin in the Sky starring Tony Award Winners LaChanze, Chuck Cooper, and Tony Nominee Norm Lewis, directed by Ruben Santiago-Hudson, himself a Tony-Winning Actor and Multiple Award-Winning Director. Timothy is a member of the Lincoln Center Theater Directors Lab.

In March, 2023 he appeared as “Person In The Bathtub” in River by Every Ocean Hughes at The Whitney Museum in NYC. Additional professional performances include the original cast of the U.S. National Tour of James Kirkwood’s play Legends! starring Mary Martin and Carol Channing; “Jazz” in REGINA at the Scottish Opera House in Glasgow, Scotland with John Mauceri as conductor, also recording the role for London/Decca Records; on Broadway in A Chorus Line for the 1983 record-breaking performance directed by Michael Bennett and in the National Tour (U.S. and Canada). His Off-Broadway credits include A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Classical Theatre of Harlem, Lyrics and Lyricists, 92nd Street Y, Zora Neale Hurston, American Place Theatre, Lost in the Stars, York Theatre Company, and Porgy and Bess, Metropolitan Opera House. Timothy is particularly proud to have made his Carnegie Hall debut singing amongst a chorus of glorious African-American artists in Spirituals in Concert starring the incomparable Kathleen Battle and Jessye Norman.

He has also performed at leading regional theaters across the U.S. including the Actors Theatre of Louisville, Syracuse Stage, Goodspeed Opera House, Mill Mountain Theatre, 5th Avenue Theatre, Birmingham Theatre, and Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park. 

Summer stock credits include Kenley Players, Ogunquit Playhouse, Westport Country Playhouse, The Cape Playhouse, Casa Mañana Theatre, and Theater Under the Stars. He was seen in Milan, Italy, and at the Melbourne International Arts Festival as “Adonis” in The Temptation of St. Anthony written by Dr. Bernice Johnson Reagon, founder of Sweet Honey in the Rock, and directed by Robert Wilson.

As a flutist, Timothy was the First Place Winner of Baldwin-Wallace College Conservatory’s Annual Concerto Competition.

He achieved Semi-Finalist Status for the 2012 Eugene O’Neill Theater Center National Playwrights Conference for his play Listening to the Trees.  Several chapters of his original acting exercises are published. His Structured Improvised Scenes, in the book titled “Objectives, Obstacles, and Tactics in Practice: Perspectives on Activating the Actor,” Hillary Haft Bucs, Valerie Clayman Pye, Editors, Routledge Press, Fall 2019. And his exercise titled Our Town: Building A Community, in “How to Teach A Play: Essential Exercises for Popular Plays,” Miriam Chirico, Kelly Younger, Editors, Bloomsbury Press, January 2020.