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Carey Perloff
Carey Elizabeth Perloff (born February 9, 1959) is an American theater director, playwright, author, and educator. She was the artistic director of American Conservatory Theater (A.C.T.) in San Francisco from 1992 to June 2018.
Perloff was born in Washington, D.C., to Marjorie Perloff, a professor and poetry critic, and Joseph K. Perloff, a professor of medicine and pediatrics and cardiologist. She attended Stanford University, where she received a B.A., Phi Beta Kappa, in classics and comparative literature. After graduating from Stanford in 1980, Perloff attended St. Anne’s College, University of Oxford, as a Fulbright Fellow and spent two summers directing at the Edinburgh Festival, where she met her husband, attorney Anthony Giles. She makes her home in San Francisco and is the mother of two children, Alexandra Perloff-Giles and Nicholas Perloff-Giles, also known as the producer and songwriter "Wingtip."
Perloff worked as an administrator at the International Theater Institute, then as a casting assistant with Joseph Papp’s Public Theater, while launching her directing career off-off Broadway. In 1986, she was named artistic director of the Off-Broadway Classic Stage Company (CSC), where she was artistic director from 1986-1992 until becoming the artistic director of A.C.T. in 1992.
At CSC, Perloff directed the world premiere of Ezra Pound’s Elektra, the American premiere of Harold Pinter’s Mountain Language, and many classic works. Under her leadership, CSC won numerous OBIE Awards, including the 1988 OBIE for artistic excellence. She served on the faculty of the Tisch School of the Arts at New York University for seven years.
In 1993, Perloff directed the world premiere of Steve Reich and Beryl Korot’s opera The Cave at the Vienna Festival and Brooklyn Academy of Music. She has also directed a new Elektra, adapted by Timberlake Wertenbaker, for the Getty Villa in Los Angeles in 2010.
Since 2018, Perloff has worked as a freelance artist across America, staging the first American production of The Lehman Trilogy at the Huntington Theater and the Repertory Theater of St. Louis (Best Director Award) and the first American production of Tom Stoppard’s Leopoldstadt at the Huntington and the Shakespeare Theater, DC. For her direction of Leopoldstadt, Perloff received the Elliot Norton Award for Best Director. She also staged Hend Ayoub’s HOME? in San Francisco and New York, Granville-Barker’s Waste and Chekhov’s The Cherry Orchard at Marin Theater. Her play If God Were Blue was developed at the Colorado New Play Summit in Denver in 2025 and her play Vienna, Vienna, Vienna will be produced in the Twin Cities at Six Point Theater in April 2026.
Perloff has continued her explorations of classical Greek plays with her adaptation of Oedipus Tyrannos/Oedipus at Colonus workshopped at Red Bull Theater in NYC starring John Douglas Thompson and Nike Imoru. Carey Perloff currently teaches Directing in the MFA Program at Columbia University.
In 1992, Perloff was appointed artistic director of A.C.T., where her first task was to raise $31 million to rebuild the earthquake-damaged Geary Theater (now the American Conservatory Theater), which reopened in January 1996 with Perloff's production of The Tempest, starring David Strathairn. Perloff's tenure at A.C.T. included the creation of a new core company of actors; revitalization of the acclaimed A.C.T. Master of Fine Arts Program; receipt of the 1996 Jujamcyn Theaters Award, honoring A.C.T.’s efforts to develop creative talent for the theater; a series of international collaborations, including The Virtual Stage and Electric Company Theatre's multi-media adaptation of Jean-Paul Sartre's No Exit, Robert Wilson and Tom Waits' The Black Rider, Morris Panych and Wendy Gorling's The Overcoat, and Kneehigh Theatre's Brief Encounter; and the American premieres of plays by Tom Stoppard and Harold Pinter.
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Carey Perloff
Carey Elizabeth Perloff (born February 9, 1959) is an American theater director, playwright, author, and educator. She was the artistic director of American Conservatory Theater (A.C.T.) in San Francisco from 1992 to June 2018.
Perloff was born in Washington, D.C., to Marjorie Perloff, a professor and poetry critic, and Joseph K. Perloff, a professor of medicine and pediatrics and cardiologist. She attended Stanford University, where she received a B.A., Phi Beta Kappa, in classics and comparative literature. After graduating from Stanford in 1980, Perloff attended St. Anne’s College, University of Oxford, as a Fulbright Fellow and spent two summers directing at the Edinburgh Festival, where she met her husband, attorney Anthony Giles. She makes her home in San Francisco and is the mother of two children, Alexandra Perloff-Giles and Nicholas Perloff-Giles, also known as the producer and songwriter "Wingtip."
Perloff worked as an administrator at the International Theater Institute, then as a casting assistant with Joseph Papp’s Public Theater, while launching her directing career off-off Broadway. In 1986, she was named artistic director of the Off-Broadway Classic Stage Company (CSC), where she was artistic director from 1986-1992 until becoming the artistic director of A.C.T. in 1992.
At CSC, Perloff directed the world premiere of Ezra Pound’s Elektra, the American premiere of Harold Pinter’s Mountain Language, and many classic works. Under her leadership, CSC won numerous OBIE Awards, including the 1988 OBIE for artistic excellence. She served on the faculty of the Tisch School of the Arts at New York University for seven years.
In 1993, Perloff directed the world premiere of Steve Reich and Beryl Korot’s opera The Cave at the Vienna Festival and Brooklyn Academy of Music. She has also directed a new Elektra, adapted by Timberlake Wertenbaker, for the Getty Villa in Los Angeles in 2010.
Since 2018, Perloff has worked as a freelance artist across America, staging the first American production of The Lehman Trilogy at the Huntington Theater and the Repertory Theater of St. Louis (Best Director Award) and the first American production of Tom Stoppard’s Leopoldstadt at the Huntington and the Shakespeare Theater, DC. For her direction of Leopoldstadt, Perloff received the Elliot Norton Award for Best Director. She also staged Hend Ayoub’s HOME? in San Francisco and New York, Granville-Barker’s Waste and Chekhov’s The Cherry Orchard at Marin Theater. Her play If God Were Blue was developed at the Colorado New Play Summit in Denver in 2025 and her play Vienna, Vienna, Vienna will be produced in the Twin Cities at Six Point Theater in April 2026.
Perloff has continued her explorations of classical Greek plays with her adaptation of Oedipus Tyrannos/Oedipus at Colonus workshopped at Red Bull Theater in NYC starring John Douglas Thompson and Nike Imoru. Carey Perloff currently teaches Directing in the MFA Program at Columbia University.
In 1992, Perloff was appointed artistic director of A.C.T., where her first task was to raise $31 million to rebuild the earthquake-damaged Geary Theater (now the American Conservatory Theater), which reopened in January 1996 with Perloff's production of The Tempest, starring David Strathairn. Perloff's tenure at A.C.T. included the creation of a new core company of actors; revitalization of the acclaimed A.C.T. Master of Fine Arts Program; receipt of the 1996 Jujamcyn Theaters Award, honoring A.C.T.’s efforts to develop creative talent for the theater; a series of international collaborations, including The Virtual Stage and Electric Company Theatre's multi-media adaptation of Jean-Paul Sartre's No Exit, Robert Wilson and Tom Waits' The Black Rider, Morris Panych and Wendy Gorling's The Overcoat, and Kneehigh Theatre's Brief Encounter; and the American premieres of plays by Tom Stoppard and Harold Pinter.