Chuck Smith

Chuck Smith is a celebrated Resident Director at Goodman Theatre, where he also serves on the Board of Trustees, and at the Westcoast Black Theatre Troupe in Sarasota, Florida. Over his distinguished career at Goodman, Smith has directed numerous acclaimed productions, including Chicago premieres of Pullman Porter Blues, By the Way, Meet Vera Stark, and Race, as well as world premieres like By the Music of the Spheres and The Gift Horse. His direction of James Baldwin’s The Amen Corner garnered the IRNE Award for Best Direction after its transfer to Boston’s Huntington Theatre Company.

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Beyond Goodman, Smith’s directorial credits span the country, with productions at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Seattle Repertory Theatre, Nashville Shakespeare Festival, Milwaukee Repertory Theater, and Alabama Shakespeare Festival, among others. He was a founding member and artistic director of the Chicago Theatre Company, and his work has been seen at major universities and theaters nationwide. Smith has also contributed to television, winning a Chicago Emmy Award as associate producer/theatrical director for NBC’s “Crime of Innocence,” and earning additional Emmy recognition for “Fast Break to Glory” and “The Martin Luther King Suite.”

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Smith’s impact on American theater has been recognized with numerous honors, including an Honorary Ph.D. from Governors State University, lifetime achievement awards from the African-American Arts Alliance of Chicago and the Joseph Jefferson Awards Committee, and induction into the Chicago State University Gwendolyn Brooks Center’s Literary Hall of Fame. He is a recipient of the Paul Robeson Award, the Black Theater Alliance Award of Merit, and was named a Chicago Tribune Chicagoan of the Year.