Kimille Howard is a New York based director, deviser, writer and filmmaker. She is an Assistant Stage Director at the Metropolitan Opera and recently worked on the new Simon McBurney productions of Die Zauberflöte and the James Robinson productions of Champion and Porgy and Bess. She is the Artistic Director of the Lucille Lortel Theatre’s NYC Public High School Playwriting Fellowship and a cofounder of the Black Classical Music Archive. 
 
Select directing credits: Two Corners (Finger Lakes Opera), The Passion of Mary Cardwell Dawson (Glimmerglass/Washington National Opera, Opera Carolina/Pittsburgh Opera), The 2024 New Works Collective (Opera Theatre of St. Louis), Sanctuary Road (Virginia Opera), The Oscar Micheaux Project (NAMT Fest), Treemonisha (Opera Theatre of St. Louis), Songs in Flight (Sparks and Wiry Cries/Met Live),The Italian Girl (Tulsa Opera), The Adventures of Honey and Leon (Theatre Row), American Apollo (Des Moines Metro Opera), B.R.O.K.E.N Code B.I.R.D Switching (Berkshire Theatre Group), Quamino's Map (Chicago Opera Theater), Highway 1, USA (IU Opera), Night Trip (Opera NexGen), The Visit (East Carolina University), Joseph Bologne's The Anonymous Lover (Wolf Trap Opera), Death By Life (White Snake Projects), In The Open by Mona Monsour (Western Connecticut State University), Soil Beneath by Chesney Snow (Primary Stages/59E59), $#!thole Country Clapback by Pascale Armand (Loading Dock Theatre), The Fellowship Plays (Lucille Lortel Theatre Foundation), A Light Staggering by Jeesun Choi (Ensemble Studio Theatre), Tidwell: or the Plantation Play by Rodney Witherspoon II (Samuel French OOB Short Play Festival - winner), Low Power by Jon Kern (EST), BLACK GIRLS ARE FROM OUTER SPACE by Emana Rachelle (National Black Theatre), Skeleton Crew by Dominique Morisseau (TheatreSquared) and TRIGGERED by Gabriel Jason Dean (Cherry Lane Theatre).
 
Kimille was awarded Best Director at the 2016 Thespis Festival for Its All About Lorrie by Joseph Krawczyk at the Hudson Theater and remounted the production for a commercial run at The American Theater of Actors in 2017. Her work has also been seen at The Circle in the Square Theatre Circle Series, The Queens Theatre, Juilliard, The Flea, The Lark, JAGFest, NYU, Sea Dog Theater, and Atlantic Acting School, CLASSIX/The Lewis Center, among others. Broadway: Ain’t Too Proud: The Life and Times of the Temptations (Assistant Director).
 
She has worked with Des McAnuff, Rebecca Frecknall, Ruben Santiago Hudson, Emily Mann, Stephen Wadsworth, Lorca Peress and more. Recent Fellowships: New York Theatre Workshop 2050 Fellowship and the Manhattan Theatre Club Jonathan Alper Directing Fellowship. She has produced shows at the HERE Arts Center, FIAF, and more. She is a current member of The New Georges Directors Jam, a participant in New York Stage and Film’s inaugural NYSAF NEXUS project, and a former Resident Director at the Flea Theater. She was the Series Producer for the first season of American Opera Project’s Music As the Message. Kimille is a recipient of the 2021 Opera Grants for Women Stage Directors and Conductors for her on going project with New Camerata Opera: REFRACTIONS, a visual anthology of works by BIPOC artists and composers. 

Kimille Howard (Director), John Alexander (Lighting Designer), Kimberly V. Powers (Set Designer), and Danielle Preston (Costume Designer) are 2023 recipients
of OPERA America’s Robert L. B. Tobin Director-Designer Prize,
generously funded by the Tobin Theatre Arts Fund.