NORMANDY SHERWOOD.
an award-winning writer, director and designer of costumes, objects and scenery.
ARTIST BIOGRAPHY.
Normandy Sherwood is a writer, a director, and a scenographer/costumer in NYC. Recent work includes her curtain spectacular PSYCHIC SELF DEFENSE (2024 OBIE Award) created as a part of HERE Arts Center’s HARP residency; THE MUSHROOM created with Nikki Calonge, presented in the 2026 Exponential Festival; her work as Scenographer/Co-creator of Theater in Quarantine’s Phantom of the Opera (2025) and Nosferatu, a 3-D Symphony of Horror (2023) presented by NYU Skirball; as well as scenic and/or costume design for projects by Bailey Williams and Emma Horwitz and Lisa Fagan and Lena Englestein. Her theater company is The Drunkard's Wife, and from 2001-2017 she was a co-artistic director of The National Theater of the United States of America (R.I.P.). She has designed costumes for Faye Driscoll, Tina Satter, Young Jean Lee, Rachel Chavkin/Anne Washburn and Kristin Marting. She has been an artist in residence at HERE, MacDowell, Yaddo. She’s a Clinical Associate Professor in Expository Writing at NYU and has an MFA in playwriting from Brooklyn College.
ARTIST INTERVIEW.
Stay tuned for the interview, to be released on June 1.
"...one of the best compliments I ever got was that I design costumes like a playwright.... I think costumes are such a powerful tool for creating a world—you can address a character’s history or relationship with other characters, create a sense of time and place, give the actor lots of stuff to work with, give the audience a lot to look at."
Here, Ms. Sherwood sets out, it seems, to
EXCAVATE AND EXAMINE
narrative habits and
TYPES OF THEATER MAKING.
THE NEW YORK TIMES
GALLERY.
Discover photos and videos from Normandy's work.
CREDITS: PSYCHIC SELF DEFENSE, created and directed by Normandy Sherwood, commissioned, developed, and produced by HERE Artist Residency and Dream Music Puppetry Programs, performed by Daniel Allen Nelson, Kate Brehm, Nikki Calonge, Elyse Durand, Dorothy James (swing), Ean Sheehy, Adrienne Swan, photo by Maria Baranova; Headshot by Peter Bellamy; MADAME LYNCH, written and directed by Normandy Sherwood and Craig Flanagin, featuring Juliana Francis Kelly, Lisa Clair, Nikki Calonge, Blaze Ferrer, Braulio Cruz, Mieko Gavia and the dancers of Ballet Panambí Vera, New Ohio Theatre, photos by Russ Rowland; BEAST VISIT, written and directed by Normandy Sherwood, Music and sounds by Craig Flanagin, features performances by Nikki Calonge, Braulio Cruz, Blaze Ferrer, Craig Flanagin, Daniel Allen Nelson, and Normandy Sherwood, photos by Maria Baranova; FEATHER GATHERERS, written by Normandy Sherwood and Craig Flanagin, directed by Normandy Sherwood, performances by Juliana Francis Kelly, Margarethe Kelly, Ean Sheehy, Jess Barbagallo, Nikki Calonge, Admiral Grey, Tavish Miller, Lili Sotirova and Edgar Oliver, photos by Russ Rowland; THE GOLDEN VEIL, written by Normandy Sherwood, directed by James Stanley, by The NTUSA, the kitchen, 2012, Photos by Paula Court; CHATAUQUA, created and produced by The NTUSA, written by Normandy Sherwood and James Stanley, directed by Yehuda Duenyas, photos courtesy of the artist; TINY HORNETS, written and directed by Normandy Sherwood, Composed and Music Directed by Craig Flanagin, With Admiral Grey, Juliana Francis Kelly, Jordan Baum, Hanlon Smith-Dorsey, Maxwell Cosmo Cramer, Alexander Paris, Blaze Ferrer, Maggie Robinson, Kristine Haruna Lee, Mieko Gavia and more, photo by David Pym.