Alley Theatre hires Rob Melrose as new artistic director

Rob Melrose is the new Artistic Director of the Alley Theatre. Melrose is an award-winning director, writer, teacher and translator with nearly two decades of experience. Thursday, Nov. 1, 2018, in Houston. Rob Melrose is the new Artistic Director of the Alley Theatre. Melrose is an award-winning director, writer, teacher and translator with nearly two decades of experience. Thursday, Nov. 1, 2018, in Houston. Photo: Marie D. De Jesús, Houston Chronicle / Staff Photographer Photo: Marie D. De Jesús, Houston Chronicle / Staff Photographer Image 1 of / 23 Caption Close Alley Theatre hires Rob Melrose as new artistic director 1 / 23 Back to Gallery

In perhaps the most significant hiring of an arts leader in Houston this year, the Alley Theatre has selected Rob Melrose as its new artistic director.

The hire, announced Thursday, represents a significant departure from former artistic director Gregory Boyd. Melrose is the founder of the Cutting Ball Theater, an experimental, avant-garde theater based in San Francisco.

His hire comes at the end of a six-month search for a leader for Houston’s largest theater company. Boyd, who had led the Alley for 28 years, retired abruptly in January as the Houston Chronicle began investigating allegations that he had fostered an abusive working environment and had singled out female actors for harassment.

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Under Boyd’s tenure, the Alley’s budget grew and the company received a Tony Award for Best Regional Theatre.

Alley Board members Ken Kades and Kathryn Ketelsen, working with the consulting firm Albert Hall & Associates, led the search process.

The artistic director isn't just in charge of planning out the theater season and hiring directors, writers and actors -- he or she represents the vision of the company, which includes demeanor, professional conduct and artistic style.

Melrose will place “an emphasis on growing and strengthening the Alley Resident Company, increasing internal collaboration, continuing new play development, and producing work that is bold, innovative, and inclusive,” according to a statement by the Alley Theatre.

Melrose once said, in an interview with Princeton’s Lewis Center for the Arts, that he saw surrealist paintings by René Magritte and Salvador Dalí as a child and asked himself, “Who wrote plays like these paintings?”

That question led to a career in experimental theater — theater that does not adhere to the traditional standards of naturalism and formalism. He often directed works written by absurdist, existential playwrights.

Melrose’s sensibility might be most closely compared to the Catastrophic Theatre in Houston. His resume features writers such as Will Eno, Suzan-Lori Parks, Richard Foreman and Martin McDonagh, and adaptations of writers such as August Strindberg, Eugene Ionesco, Henrik Ibsen and Shakespeare.

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Boyd, on the other hand, was known more for a more conventional, "masterpiece" style of theater.

Melrose stepped down from his role as artistic director of Cutting Ball in 2016 to focus on freelance directing. Paige Rogers, his longtime wife and collaborator, replaced him.

Melrose has directed at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, the Guthrie Theater and the Public Theater.

He will move to Houston early next year to plan the 2019-20 season at the Alley. Longtime Alley company member James Black will remain as interim artistic director during the 2018-19 season.

wchen@chron.com