Staff

Carolyn Griffin

Producing Artistic Director

Producing Artistic Director Carolyn Griffin has been with MetroStage since its founding in 1984 and has produced over one hundred main-stage productions, including seventeen plays and musicals that were world premieres, and dozens of cabarets.  She is committed to producing the best contemporary writing and showcasing the best regional artists for a broad-based audience reflecting the diversity of the Washington DC metro area. She has built three theatres by re-purposing nontraditional storefronts (and a lumber warehouse) into intimate well-equipped theatre spaces, and is currently working on a fourth. 

She has chaired both the Alexandria Arts Forum, which she co-founded, and the Cultural Affairs Committee of the Alexandria Chamber of Commerce and has served on regional panels for both the Virginia Commission for the Arts and Kentucky Arts Council.

She has received many awards including the Actors Center Award of Distinction (2002), the Cultural Affairs Award from the Alexandria Commission for Women, and the Award of Harmony from the Alexandria Harmonizers. She was named a “Living Legend” in 2007 by the Alexandria Gazette Packet and the Alexandria Rotary Club. She was honored to receive “Helen’s Star”, named after Helen Hayes, from theatre Washington, “presented to daring visionaries who have shaped and redefined the landscape of Washington theatre”. She has also served on Arts Management panels at the annual Black Theatre Symposiums sponsored by the University of Maryland.                              

She served on the Board of The Playwrights Forum, hosting many of their play readings, and she collaborates with arts organizations and artists to further the growth of the arts and young artists in the Washington metropolitan area.  She served as chair of the Membership Committee of the League of Washington Theatres for a decade. She was chosen by the Canadian Embassy and the Helen Hayes Awards to travel to Canada in 2004 as part of the Canadian/Washington Theatre Partnership. She is currently an Advisor to the Board of the Alliance for New Music-Theatre. She was a member of the Small Area Plan for Old Town North for the City of Alexandria, and currently is on the Board of the Old Town North Alliance.

She holds a B.A. in Psychology from The George Washington University, an M.A. in Psychology from Catholic University and an MBA from Georgetown University.  She has three daughters who live in Venice CA, Washington DC, and Molteno, South Africa (where her youngest daughter served in the Peace Corps and stayed), three DC based grandchildren and one grandchild in South Africa. She lost her son after a valiant fight with cancer in 2020.