About
Lili-Anne Brown, a Chicago South Side native, works as a director, actor and educator, and has performed in, directed and produced many award-winning shows in Chicago and nationally. Directing credits include: The Nacirema Society…, School Girls, or The African Mean Girls Play and the world premieres of Ike Holter’s I Hate It Here and Lottery Day (Goodman Theatre); Two Trains Running (The Acting Company, National Tour); The Hot Wing King (Writer’s Theatre); Dreamgirls (McCarter Theater and Goodspeed Musicals), FELA! (Olney Theatre), Joe Turner's Come and Gone (Huntington Theatre), Ain’t No Mo’ (Woolly Mammoth and Baltimore CenterStage), Waitress, Rent, and The Color Purple (The Muny), Once on This Island (Oregon Shakespeare Festival), Acoustic Rooster...(Kennedy Center and National Tour), Put Your House in Order (La Jolla Playhouse), Cullud Wattah (Victory Gardens). She is the former Artistic Director of Bailiwick Chicago, where she focused programming on Chicago-premiere musicals and new play development with resident playwrights. During her tenure she directed Dessa Rose (Jeff Award), Passing Strange (BTA Award), See What I Wanna See (Steppenwolf Theatre Garage Rep), and the world premiere of Princess Mary Demands Your Attention by Aaron Holland, and produced many other award-winning shows. Other directing credits include The Color Purple (Drury Lane Theatre), P.Y.G. or the Mis-Edumacation of Dorian Belle (Jackalope Theatre), The Total Bent (Haven Theatre w/About Face), Caroline, or Change (Firebrand Theatre w/TimeLine), Tilikum by Kristiana Colon (world premiere, Sideshow Theatre), Buddy: The Buddy Holly Story (American Blues Theatre), Hairspray (Skylight Music Theatre), The Wolf at the End of the Block (16th Street Theatre), Marie Christine (Boho Theatre), Peter and the Starcatcher (Metropolis Performing Arts), The Wiz (Kokandy Productions), Xanadu (American Theatre Company), Jabari Dreams of Freedom by Nambi E. Kelley (world premiere, Chicago Children’s Theatre), American Idiot (Northwestern University); and Little Shop of Horrors, Unnecessary Farce, Cabaret, Sweet Charity, and The 25th…Spelling Bee, among others, at Timber Lake Playhouse where she was an Artistic Associate. She has received 2 Helen Hayes Awards, 5 Jeff Awards, 2 BTA awards and one African American Arts Alliance Award for excellence in directing. Lili-Anne is an inaugural recipient of the Walder Foundation’s Platform Award (2024), a 2021 recipient of the 3Arts Award for Theatre and the 2023 Zelda Fichandler Award Finalist. She is a member of SDC, AEA, SAG-AFTRA, and a graduate of Northwestern University.
Long ago in another life:
Lili-Anne supplemented her Chicago acting career as a talent agent by day for five years, also serving as the Casting Director at Bohemian Theatre Ensemble (where she was a founding company member) and Bailiwick Chicago, and providing freelance casting for several other theatres.
Onstage, favorite roles include originating the role of Tia in the world premiere of hit play A Twist of Water by Caitlin Parrish, with Route 66 Theatre Co, which she reprised in its successful Off-Broadway run; and Joanne in RENT at American Theatre Company, directed by David Cromer. She has also performed at Steppenwolf Theatre, Chicago Shakespeare Theatre, Victory Gardens Theatre, Writers’ Theatre, Next Theatre, Ravinia Festival, ShawChicago, Drury Lane Oakbrook & Water Tower, Alabama Shakespeare Festival, Theatre at the Center, Peninsula Players, and many more. She is a local cabaret artist and former member of Chicago Cabaret Professionals; her solo shows Brown & Blue and Same Fool Twice ran successfully at Davenport’s Cabaret. She has performed extensively with The Second City, appearing in Chicago Live! at the Chicago Theater, understudying the etc. Stage, touring for BizCo (corporate education and entertainment) and performing in the shows The Second City Guide to the Opera at Lyric Opera; A Girl's Guide to Washington Politics at Woolly Mammoth Theatre and Charmed and Dangerous at CenterStage Theater. She is the creator and co-author of Blacktacular!, a musical sketch comedy. Television credits include ABC’s Betrayal, USA's Sirens, and A&E Network's The Beast with Patrick Swayze, as Demarca, “the gangsta queen of the South Side”. It was all a blast.
