This fall, for the first time in more than three decades, SpeakEasy Stage Company has a new artistic director: Dawn Simmons has taken the reins from company founder Paul Daigneault.  

According to the Berklee College of Music, “Artistic directors take on the challenge of developing a recognizable artistic identity or brand for a nonprofit arts organization, such as a symphony orchestra, opera company, dance company, or theater company. Designing the company's performance season is a pivotal part of the job, and involves choosing themes to explore; selecting original works to develop; commissioning writers, composers, and/or choreographers to create new work; and hiring directors or conductors to bring the performance pieces to life. 

She knows she has big shoes to fill.  Dawn’s reach, experience, and personal history as an award-winning director, producer, playwright, administrator, cultural consultant, and educator in the Greater Boston theater community put her in good stead.  

The Buffalo native, who traces her Irish roots back through her mother’s grandfather, first came to Boston to attend graduate school at Boston University.  Ironically, while she was here studying, she was offered a prime opportunity with the Irish Classical Theater Company back in Buffalo.  Having admired the group for a long time, she said to herself, “I’m never going to get this again. I need to take this job.”

With the theater presenting a program of Irish, American, and international classics, she once told me, “I wound up house managing part time and being an administrative assistant part time. And I was as able to work my way up to special assistant to the artistic directors.”

Although it provided great experience and she eventually became the company's Resident Assistant Director, she knew she would need to move on if she were going to advance herself professionally.  So, when a job opened at Merrimack Rep in Lowell, she jumped on it and returned to Boston.

She subsequently created two theater companies and directed a wide array of award-winning productions from Actors’ Shakespeare Project, Central Square Theater, Commonwealth Shakespeare Company, Gloucester Stage, the Huntington, Lyric Stage Company, New Repertory Theatre, and Wheelock Family Theatre (all in Greater Boston), to venues in Vermont, Georgia, and Oregon. 

She most recently directed SpeakEasy’s critically acclaimed production of “Ain’t No Mo’” by Jordan E. Cooper, a co-production with The Front Porch Arts Collective, which she co-founded.

“The Porch,” as it’s known, and SpeakEasy have been regular collaborators, co-producing “Pass Over” and “A Strange Loop” in addition to “Ain’t No Mo’”). 

Prior to “The Porch,” she co-founded her first theater company, New Exhibition Room, dedicated to producing provocative, political, and affordable theater events. She also served as executive director of the service organization StageSource, where she focused on workforce development and sector improvement in New England theater. 

As an educator, Simmons holds the 2024/25 Monan Professorship in Theatre Arts at Boston College, which brings renowned theater artists to work and teach at the campus for one year. She has also been an adjunct faculty member at Northeastern University and has worked with Berklee College of Music, Suffolk University, Brandeis University, Harvard University, and others.

Paul Daigneault’s decision to step aside from the company he’d founded and led for more than 30 years triggered an exhaustive six-month search for his replacement.  Close to 100 candidates were reviewed from 15 states and 3 countries.  Dawn was one of them.

She found out the job was hers this past February. “I found out on Valentine’s Day,” she said. “I was taking my car in to be serviced, and it was three days before my 50th birthday. I understood they had many candidates, both local, national and international. When the founding artistic director is leaving, it’s a big decision to make.” 

While she was excited throughout the interview process, she knew the conversation could go either way.  “I was very happy with The Porch,” she said. “So, if it didn’t work out, I had a really amazing company that I could stay with.”

Then a call came from the search committee.  “I sat down for a zoom,” she said.  “I thought there were more questions for me. And instead, the question was, ‘Do you want the job?’  Which was delightful.”

She took over the position July 1 and soon began reviewing and assessing titles for the new season. She and Paul approached the task together.

“It was very much a collaborative effort,” she said. “The kind of collaboration he and I have done really well over the past couple of years.  

“There was one show that had already been set and a slate of shows that SpeakEasy was already looking at. With the process or figuring out what your season is, you apply for [producing] rights and sometimes you get them and sometimes you don’t.  And so, it was back and forth.  

“‘Okay, here’s a show that I’m interested in, and here’s a show that Paul’s interested in. And  here’s what we think is going to work best for SpeakEasy.  And we’d make several offers. We’d get rejected.” 

Ultimately, their goal was to come up with a season of shows that offered an eclectic blend of stories and genres that would, as a group, make a compelling season for both subscribers and single ticket buyers.

 “At one at point, at the tail end of the process . . . both of us were smiling with the shows we were picking.”   

Once the final combination of shows was locked in, she said “This feels like a really good mix of what SpeakEasy was with Paul, and this feels like where it’s going with Dawn . . . I’m really proud. It’s not all me, it’s not all Paul. It’s really a collaboration.”

She is also directing the first show of the season, “Primary Trust.”

One of her long-term goals is to continue to build and expand upon SpeakEasy’s already devoted community.  She believes it’s crucial to address, “Where has SpeakEasy been? Where is SpeakEasy going?  How are we engaged? Specifically, how are we engaged artistically with our community?  How are we creating a space for people?”

She believes the much-touted “loneliness epidemic” is real.  And the self-imposed isolation we experienced during the pandemic didn’t help.  She also feels the public’s desire for community is equally as real.  The challenge is how to attain it.  

“So many of us, we’re online, we come home, we do Netflix and chill.  We have learned to take ourselves out of society.   And I think the offer SpeakEasy is making this year is, let us help you get back in more tangible ways. 

“I always liken it to, if you have an active church life, if you have an active school life, if you’re a parent and you have that PTA thing going on, if you play intramural sports. Those things give you community.  Not all of us do that anymore.  

“That’s part of our mission.  How can we make this more inviting?  I think subscribing – I want your donations, for sure – but what I need is for people to subscribe to our season.”  

She hopes audiences will commit to two shows, or four shows, or the entire season.  Beyond single ticket purchases, the theater has flexible ticket buying plans.  She wants ticket-buyers to get friends to participate.  Make it a social night out. 

“And tell us what you think,” she said.  “If we are supposed to be in communication with our audience, is this a show that’s speaking to the moment?  What did you get out of it?  We need to know.”

She said, “At the end of the day, it’s so much easier to stay home, of course.  We need to get out into the world, talking to each other and being in each other’s presence.”

Dawn Simmons wants SpeakEasy to be a welcome, stimulating, and compelling destination for all that and more.

The 2025-2026 season includes:

Through Oct. 11 – “Primary Trust,” a funny, feel everything play about starting fresh. 

Oct. 14 – Nov. 22 – “Lizard Boy: A New Musical,” a quirky, big-hearted adventure of identify and courage. 

Jan. 16 – Feb. 2 – “Job,” a psychological thriller for the digital age. 

March 6 – 28 – “The Antiquities,” a satire of humanity, set long after we’re gone. 

April 24 – May 23 – “Swept Away,” a haunting new musical of survival, guilt and grace featuring the music of The Avett Brothers). 

For information, visit speakeasystage.com