A Directing Hit

Independent director, producer, and casting director Rosalind Bevan is woven into the Boston theater community

Photo by Ken Yotsukura

CFA Alumni

A Directing Hit

“I love coming-of-age stories—how we’re all healing that inner child,” says stage director Rosalind Bevan.

May 29, 2024
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Rosalind Bevan smiles widely, her eyes glimmering with joy. She’s talking about theater. The independent director, producer, and casting director of stage productions started acting while in high school, but soon imagined herself giving other cast members performance notes.

Her theater teacher complimented her eye for direction, and eventually Bevan (’19) tried her hand at it, codirecting her senior musical. She fell in love with it. At CFA, she directed productions as an undergraduate. But she didn’t entirely give up acting; she registered for physical acting courses—where movement is the primary mode of storytelling—that would help her connect with actors. “I needed a language, a way for myself physically,” she says.

Right out of college, Bevan joined Boston’s Huntington Theatre as a casting and producing apprentice while also working on side projects. In October 2023, she directed the CFA Fringe Festival production of Tarell Alvin McCraney’s Marcus; or the Secret of Sweet, about a young gay man coming of age in Louisiana. That same month, feeling the urge to branch out as an artist and pursue her directing dream, Bevan moved to Los Angeles. Projects are already rolling in. Early in 2024, Bevan was associate director of IAMA Theatre Company’s production of Catya McMullen’s Arrowhead. This summer, she is associate directing Mike Lew’s tiny father at the Geffen Playhouse, working with director Moritz von Stuelpnagel (’00).

“I am so, so honored and grateful to be part of the Boston theater community,” she says. “It’s so rich, but I was just ready to be flung out to see who I am as an artist in the world.”

What does your typical day look like as an independent director?

I read a lot of plays. I’m trying to figure out what works speak to me and what I want to pitch to other theaters, making connections with playwrights, going to readings. What are my friends doing next? What do we want to produce? How can we raise money? How can I make a connection with another theater out here? Do they need assistance?

[I’m] really just working my artistic community, which is a hard but exciting thing.

Favorite stories to direct?

I am super drawn to the messy and the complicated—and finding the beauty in the messy and complicated. I keep thinking about what is igniting the lover and the fighter in me. I think love is really at the core of any story, if you look hard enough. I’m also drawn to resilience and legacy and building something, so I love coming-of-age stories—how we’re all healing that inner child, that part of us that we tend to shove away without even knowing.

What do you love about the stage?

It’s literally different every single night, even if it’s happened for a long run. There’s something about that collective experience, that sharing of energy, that saves us a little bit.

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  • Steve Holt

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    Steve Holt is a senior editor and writer responsible for print alumni magazines at the Wheelock College of Education and Human Development, School of Theology, and the Sargent College of Health and Rehabilitation Sciences. He came to BU in 2022 from Appalachian Mountain Club, where he was a senior editor at the nonprofit’s award-winning member magazine. Profile