Adrian is a very promising and intelligent director... He is one of the most accomplished, generous and promising people I've ever been around.
- Austin Pendleton
Award winning Actor, Director, and Playwright
Adrian's biggest strength as a director is his humanity. He understands people; what makes them tick, their insecurities, and he knows how to instill confidence in every person he directs.
- Ian Belknap
Artistic Director, The Acting Company
Hudson Theatre Works mounts an ambitious and fulfilling Eugene O’Neill Festival.. The two men in “Hughie,” command and embody their roles to near perfection.
-Jim Testa, NJ Arts
"Between Riverside and Crazy"... A RICH NEW PLAY DELICIOUSLY MOUNTED!
- Ben Brantley, The New York Times
Best nonmusical revivals... Baltimore CENTERSTAGE's production of Lynn Nottage's "Crumbs From the Table of Joy," a lyrical memory play worthy of comparison with "The Glass Menagerie."
- Terry Teachout, The Wall Street Journal
Hire this man for anything - He's Great. And cool people too.
- Stephen Adly Guirgis
Actor, Playwright (2015 Pulitzer Prize for Drama)
Adrian is a director, actor, producer, and educator. Growing up with one foot in the United States, and the other in Western Europe, he developed a deep passion for the performing arts and its ability to express the richness and the diversity of human experience.
He brings this passion to all of his endeavors.
New Managing Director of Shaker Bridge Theatre!
As of August 2024, Adrian is the new Managing Director of Shaker Bridge Theatre, the resident theatre company of The Briggs Opera House in the heart of White River Junction, VT. Shaker Bridge Theatre is dedicated to discovering and creating provocative, contemporary plays and to expanding the boundaries of theatre by presenting work that is compelling and innovative. Our plays are gems that we’ve brought north from New York’s off-broadway theaters, from across the ocean from London’s fringe and from regional theaters across America.
Come join us for a great season of plays, readings, music, and more!
The Thanksgiving Play by Larissa FastHorse
Sept 26 - Oct 13
The Wickhams: Christmas in Pemberly by by Lauren Gunderson & Margot Melcon
Dec 5 - 22
The Effect by Lucy Prebble
Jan 23 - Feb 9
Maytag Virgin by Audrey Cefaly
May 8 - 25
Get you tickets and check out upcoming events at
Broadway
2022 - 2023
Helen Hayes Theater
Associate Director. City Hall is demanding more than his signature, the landlord wants him out, the liquor store is closed — and the Church won’t leave him alone. For ex-cop and recent widower Walter “Pops” Washington and his recently paroled son Junior, the struggle to hold on to one of the last great rent stabilized apartments on Riverside Drive collides with old wounds, sketchy new houseguests, and a final ultimatum in this Pulitzer Prize-winning dark comedy from Stephen Adly Guirgis. For Pops and Junior, it seems the old days are dead and gone — after a lifetime living Between Riverside and Crazy.
“It’s a dizzying and exciting place to be!” hails The New York Times.
November 2023
Hudson Theatre Works
Director. Hudson Theatre Works presents Harold Pinter's The Dumb Waiter as part of Pinter x2. As the New York World-Telegram & Sun describes: "In the basement of a long-abandoned restaurant, two hired killers nervously await their next assignment. Barred from daylight and living public contact by the nature of their work, they expend their waiting time in bickering. So eerie is the situation that everything becomes comic, or grotesque, or both. Ben re-reading a newspaper and exclaiming in disbelief over the news items, Gus fussing with an offstage stove and offstage plumbing. Ben bludgeoning Gus into silence if he as much as mentions their work. Gus worrying that someone had slept in his bed. So then the ancient dumbwaiter comes to life, the suspense becomes almost unbearable—that expertly has Pinter put the nerves of his characters and audience on edge."
“Pinter x 2” succeeds on every level. It’s mesmerizing theater with outstanding performances, taut direction and impeccable staging. Adrian Wattenmaker’s tense direction will keep you engaged and enthralled.
- Jim Testa, NJ Arts
May 2023
LAByrinth Theater Company
The Cutting Room
Director. LAByrinth Theater Company's 30th Season Gala Celebration!
2023 marks LAB’s Thirtieth Anniversary!
For three decades, LAByrinth has developed and produced groundbreaking new work, centering forgotten and disenfranchised voices, and changing the face of America's theatrical landscape in the process. Raise a glass with us on May 25 at The Cutting Room as we present our four founders Paul Calderon, David Deblinger, John Ortiz, and Gary Perez with the Davie Hoghe Award, LAB's highest accolade, which honors those who have shown artistic courage and outstanding dedication to LAByrinth. All Proceeds will help support our mission to empower members, create new work, and keep our programming accessible to all New Yorkers.
May 2023
LAByrinth Theater Company
Director. Obituary by Lyle Kessler featuring Margaret Ladd and Lyle Kessler.
2023 marks LAB’s Thirtieth anniversary!
In honor of this milestone, we are hosting a four-day free reading series celebrating the voices that have guided us and the work that has sustained us. We would not be here, thirty years on, without this tribe and we share this achievement with all of you.
Please join us at the Chain Theater from Wednesday, May 10th through Saturday evening May 13th to hear excerpts from the plays you love, conversations among artists you admire and the new material taking us into our fourth decade.
March - April 2023
LAByrinth Theater Co | 59E59 Theaters
Producer. Sex, drugs, queerness, and punk-rock. Welcome to border city life in El Paso, Texas, 1984. DÍA Y NOCHE is an unfiltered coming-of-age story about class struggles and the search for acceptance between two unlikely friends. Danny is a lower middle-class Chicano punk-rock kid who thinks he might be an artist. Martin is a Black upper-middle class band nerd who is gay and in the closet. Danny and Martin double-date, watch X-rated movies, go to concerts and try to overcome great odds as they navigate the racism and corruption greeting them at the doors to adulthood.
March 2023
Hudson Theatre Works
NJ Theatre Alliance Stages Festival
Director. Inspired by a true story, Graceland Too: The Building Elvis Never Left is a bluesy, tragic tale about the galaxy’s number one Elvis fan, Paul MacLeod, and his antebellum home-turned-Elvis shrine in Holly Springs, Mississippi. As Paul gears up for Elvis Week with the help of former prisoner, Dwight Taylor, two very different worlds collide and Graceland Too will never be the same again.
This event is part of the New Jersey Theatre Alliance 2023 Stages Festival, made possible by support from the New Jersey State Council on the Arts, a partner agency of the National Endowment for the Arts; The Horizon Foundation for New Jersey; OceanFirst Foundation; Fund for the New Jersey Blind; New Jersey Manufacturers; and Customers Bank.
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