JASON LOEWITH (Artistic Director) grew up in Fairfield, Connecticut, and on weekends he took the train to New York with his family to see shows. His dad was the comptroller of a Formica manufacturing company, and his mom was the first woman in the state to be president of a conservative synagogue. Jason inherited his father’s love of numbers, working part-time as a bank teller, leading Math Team in high school, and as a bookkeeper for various nonprofit organizations as an adult. From his mother, he inherited a dedication to Jewish causes, joining the international Board of United Synagogue Youth, working at the Jewish Home for the Aged during high school, and serving as chair of Brown University’s Committee for Soviet Jewry as an undergraduate. Jason seriously considered studying to become a rabbi, but the theater intervened, taking him to Santa Barbara, Los Angeles, New York City, Chicago, and finally, the Washington, DC region, where he’s been since 2009. He has been Artistic Director at Olney Theatre Center since 2013.
Jason recently directed Kinky Boots, The Joy That Carries You (co-directed with Kevin McAllister and winner of the 2023 Helen Hayes Award for Outstanding New Play), Mary Stuart, On the Town, and Every Brilliant Thing at Olney Theatre Center. Additional Olney Theatre productions include Marjorie Prime, Carousel, the NNPN Rolling World Premiere of Steven Dietz’s Rancho Mirage, Avenue Q and How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying (2015 Helen Hayes Award nomination for Outstanding Musical). Jason also directed co-productions of Tony Kushner’s Angels in America, Part 1: Millennium Approaches and James Graham’s Ink at Round House Theatre.
Jason won Lucille Lortel, Outer Critics Circle, and Jeff Awards for Best New Musical for Adding Machine: A Musical, which he co-wrote with composer Joshua Schmidt (off-Broadway, 2008). His musical Big Nate: The Musical, co-written with Olney’s Associate Artistic Director Christopher Youstra, premiered in 2013 at Adventure Theatre-MTC. Regional work as a director includes the world premiere of Broke (Alliance Theatre, Atlanta), Time Stands Still (Everyman, Baltimore), Crime and Punishment, and Working It Out (Center Stage, Baltimore), Adding Machine: A Musical (Studio Theatre, DC), and a dozen plays for Chicago’s Next Theatre Company, where he served as Artistic Director from 2002-2008. Those credits include the Chicago area premieres of Dying City, Defiance, The Long Christmas Ride Home, and Fabulation. He conceived and directed the world premiere of The American Dream Songbook, and produced Chicago premieres by Caryl Churchill, Suzan-Lori Parks, Carson Kreitzer, Sam Shepard, Dael Orlandersmith, and many more.
Jason is a three-time grantee from the NEA for Artistic Excellence and a recipient of support from the Rockefeller MAP Fund, MacArthur’s International Connections Fund, and a TCG New Generations Future Leaders Grant. Jason joined Olney as Artistic Director in 2013 after serving four years as Executive Director of the National New Play Network. Jason is the recipient of a 2015 Montgomery County Executive’s Award for Excellence in the Arts and Humanities. He volunteers for local and national arts organizations, serves as Chair of Board of Theatre Washington, and has mentored a fantastic teenager in Anacostia for BestKids, which he urges you to support.
