Cheryl Lynn Bruce, veteran director, writer, and performer who has staged productions for Victory Gardens Theatre, Teatro Vista Theatre Company, Illinois Humanities, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Columbia College, University of Illinois, Indiana University, DePaul University, and Creative Arts Foundation. Bruce developed and directed Sandra Delgado’s La Havana Madrid and Para, Graciela and Misty DeBerry’s Milkweed (both solo works), and Bruce has directed Before the Pop, Pop, Pop for Collaboraction’s inaugural citywide Peacebook Festival (2016). She also developed and directed Kerry James Marshall’s Bunraku-influenced urban comic Rythm Mastr for the Wexner Center for the Arts (2008). She won both the African American Arts and Black Theatre Alliance Best Direction Awards for From the Mississippi Delta, and earned a Joseph Jefferson nomination for her direction of Jitney, both Congo Square Theatre productions. Other recognitions include: the Illinois Public Humanities Award (2019); Robert Rauschenberg Residency (2015); a Yale Art Gallery residency (2013); and Jane Addams Hull House Woman of Valor Award (2010).

Major work

Delgado's Para, Graciela and Misty DeBerry's Milkweed

2008: Kerry James Marshall's Bunraku-inspired urban comedy Rythm Mastr

2016: Before the Pop, Pop, Pop

2017: Sandra Delgado's La Havana Madrid

Awards

2010: Jane Addams Hull House Woman of Valor Award

2013: Yale Art Gallery Residency

2015:Robert Rauschenberg Residency

2019: Illinois Public Humanities Award

African American Arts en Black Theatre Alliance Best Direction Awards for From the Mississippi Delta

Joseph Jefferson nomination for her direction of Jitney