Scott Savage - Directing

Upcoming Projects

Salt and Pepper Fall 2026

Utah Valley University

From acclaimed TYA playwright José Cruz González, this touring production engages with themes of inter-generational literacy, complex family dynamics, and responsibilities placed upon youth. The production will travel to schools across Utah and Salt Lake counties and the surrounding areas and will have on-campus performances as well.

Future Projects

I am open to directing projects that will be mounted in Spring 2027 or beyond. Shows I'd love to work on include Spamalot, Next to Normal, Cinderella, and anything mysterious/spooky, TYA, or family friendly.

The Lighting Thief: TYA

Tye Noorda Theatre Camp

With a double cast (and crew!) comprise of 64 youth artists, we put together this monster of a show in two weeks. The production had some exciting fight choreography, skewed towards a younger cast, and was supported with a team of 8 UVU students and a fellow BYU Theatre Ed Alumni, Meredith Campbell who made this a great educational and production experience. The show was double cast with performances June 12 and 13, 2026 and played on a thrust arranged blackbox stage.

(Professional photos to be added later)

Beetlejuice: The Musical Jr.

The Empress Theatre - Magna, UT

This show served as the opening production to The Empress Theatre's 2026 season, and was my first opportunity to direct in this space. The show featured youth performers and had I was fortunate to have an incredibly supportive design team. The show ran 10 performances, including a sensory friendly show and an understudy run with understudies sprinkled through other performances. The show closed February 7, 2026.

New Kid

Utah Valley University - Orem, UT

I directed New Kid by Dennis Foon in fall 2025. The playwright met with the cast over Teams early in the process to help scult their understanding of why New Kid has been such a timeless piece. The production featured BFA and BA theatre majors and toured to a dozen schools, a few libraries and featured performances for home school students, a sensory friendly production and ASL interpretation. With the director's permission, we set the show in Utah and made several Utah cultural references (such as J-Dawgs instead of Hot Dogs). The show had strong social media support (@uvuTYEcenter on Instagram has details!). One of the assignments for the student actors was to sit in a 3000 level language class and be immersed in a language they don't know for an hour. It informed our practice and the show's practices and workshops grew out of the work of Augusto Boal. The show puts the audience in the role of the language learner, and it was thrilling to see the show come to life. A review of the production from Utah Theatre Bloggers can be found here.

Shrek Jr.

Tye Noorda Theatre Camp

Working with an incredible team of UVU students, I directed a 2-week fully mounted production of "Shrek: The Musical Jr." featuring a full technical design and two casts of 24 for a total of 48 youth performers ages 11-18. Particpants came from across the country to engage in the production process. Students were given clear and concise feedback and provided with growth goals which allowed them to have an individually focused approach to their rehearsal and performance process. Parents had overwhelmingly positive responses to the educational focus of the work, the personalized attention each child received and the excellent and consistent communication that kept parents feeling engaged from start to finish.

Beauty and the Beast Jr.

Glendale Middle School - Rose Park, UT

My final production at Glendale Middle School was Disney's Beauty and the Beat Jr. During my time at Glendale, the program grew from 4 enrolled theatre students to one in every 7 students in the school participating in acting or technical theatre (nearly 100 students). The production was part of a season that included a competition, a play, musical and a theatre awards night featuring a congratulations video from Broadway's Ali Ewoldt. Unfortunately, cuts at the district level most harmed arts at west Salt Lake schools, but the part time program is in good hands. Working at Glendale was a career highlight and the community will always have my heart.

The Hundred Dresses

Glendale Middle School

The first non-musical play produced at Glendale Middle School was a community effort. I directed The Hundred Dresses by Ralph Covert and G. Riley Mills based on the Caldecott Award winning book of the same name from author Eleanor Estes. The play was the first time that auditions at Glendale were open to all students, and created incredible opportunities for the broader student body. The play was coupled with a dress drive for our neighboring elementary school, Mountain View and allowed us to perform a play and share goodness with these students. Our aim is to continue a pattern of straight plays and community partnership in our plays at least once a year.

Once On This Island Jr.

Glendale Middle School

I directed this Glendale Middle School 2023 production of "Once On This Island Jr." The production was double cast and introduced students and the community to a Tony Award winning musical that brought our community closer together during a difficult year. Our students greatly benefitted from having continuity from year to year and being able to depend on peer support as the program grows. This year also featured a night of Shakespeare, a performance for special education students, improvisation shows and a district theatre festival.

The Lion King Jr.

Glendale Middle School

I directed this Glendale Middle School 2022 production of "The Lion King Jr." The production was the first play any of the students had been in, and was the first production our school had done since the pandemic and just the second musical the school had produced in ten years. It has been a joy building from the groud up with this group! The students were so enthralled with the show that we opted to have 15 minute mystery plays for the end of the year, and the students felt great each having a principle role in their first year.

The End of Summer by Hank Kimmel

ATHE New Play Devleopment Workshop

During the COVID-19 lock down of 2020, this production of "The End of Summer" by Hank Kimmel was produced remotely. I facilitated production meetings and coordianted with the dramaturg (Dr. Janna Segal) and scenographer Jennifer Ivey on how to bring this play to life using only our remote office spaces. Kimmel's play has since been added been selected by Smith & Kraus as one of the Best Short Plays 0f 2022 and has been published in their anthology. It also had its initial production in Sharon, CT.

Other Projects

Several of my directing projects have been new works. In recent years, I have had the chance to direct the following new plays:

"The Magic Pencil" AATE Playwrights for Change Contest Winner 2024
"Triggered" By John Norton for KCACTF Region 4
"Medea" by Elizabeth Brendel Horn, published by Youth Plays

Other NPDW opportunities included the chance to act in new plays "Raindrops and Robots" by Monica Cross and "I don't know yet" by Dustyn Bain.

In 2016, I directed and adapted "the King and the Magician" by Jorge Bucay for a capstone directing project at BYU. Highlights of that production are found here.

I love engaging with new works as a director, reader, evaluator and performer.

From 2018-2023, I had the opportunity to direct summer camp theatre productions with youth. The camps usually consist of 40-50 performers and are two or three weeks long. In 2018 I directed Winnie the Pooh Kids. In 2019 I directed 101 Dalmatians Kids and co-directed Willy Wonka Jr. In 2023 I directed Lion King kids with my two oldest boys. I've had the chance to direct week-long performance camps, consult on stage lighting installation and have grateful to be brought back to work with the kids and a lovely company so many times.

This project in 2020 was a 1-week Zoom-based puppet class with neurodivergent teens and young adults. In the course we developed characters, created puppets and I wrote a story devised from their characters. The work can be seen here.

Sample Director's Materials

Director's Book for "Words, Words, Words" by David Ives. as a student directing project at UCF.

Pitch for "New Kid" at Utah Valley Univeristy

Many of the hyperlinks above connect to other work samples that may be useful in seeing what I do!

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