Nigel Semaj (they/them) is a director, movement director, and educator whose work lives at the intersections of theatre, dance/movement, pedagogy, and social transformation. Nigel’s directing work spans a wide range, including the Off-Broadway premiere of Bloodshot by Elinor T. Vanderburg, Ntozake Shange’s For Colored Girls & Spell #7, George C. Wolfe’s The Colored Museum, and We Are Proud to Present… by Jackie Sibblies Drury, as well as new works such as Calley Anderson’s Collective Empathy Formation from 1968 and 2018, Reid Tang’s wolfchildren runslowly through a bruegel landscape, 1558, and Aeneas Sagar Hemphill’s Black Hollow.
Their adaptation work includes productions 10,000 Moor an all-woman adaptation of Shakespeare’s Titus Andronicus, exploring rage and violence, For Hylas—an adaptation of the Hercules myth exploring love, loss, and grief, and in the darkest forest, exploring horror aesthetics in theater. Upcoming work includes: Call Me By Any Other Name…Just As Sweet – a new queer retelling of Romeo and Juliet, and a physical theatre adaptation of Shakespeare’s Macbeth entitled the serpent under’t.
Inspired by Ntozake Shange’s belief that “it is possible to start a phrase with a word and end with a gesture,” Nigel treats movement as a vital language. Their movement direction and choreography have appeared in opera, film, and theatre, with credits including Fidelio (Heartbeat Opera), Not Him (short film), and Bryony Lavery’s Slime. Upcoming: Shakespeare in Harlem by Gerrad Alex Taylor, SALTY by AJ Klauss, and Voyages: Chapter Seven at The National Aquarium.
Nigel is a board member of the American Alliance for Theatre & Education, and Perisphere Theater. Their interdisciplinary approach to performance and education seeks to amplify underrepresented voices and reimagine the boundaries of theatre.