Julia Flood
Learn more about the Director of Digging Up Dessa, Julia Flood!
Julia said, “It has been wonderful to return to live theater on stage again! Collaborating with brilliant artists and dedicated staff to create something with such a powerful underlying theme about the importance of human connection in our lives has been a moving experience. To hear the laughter, and the gasps, of young people and their grownups in the audience has been energizing for all of us. There is nothing quite like the magic that happens at a live performance.”
We asked her about some memorable moments during rehearsals and performances of Digging Up Dessa:
The moment in final rehearsals when the actors removed their masks and saw each other’s faces for the first time
Visiting Mastodon State Park and watching the actors playing Dessa and Mary Anning appreciate the majesty of the beasts that used to inhabit our backyard
Watching young hands shoot into the air during the post-performance question and answer sessions
Hearing laughter and tears from the audience again for the first time since we shut down live performances in March 2020
The beauty of theater in its ability to bring the work of many hands together to create something greater than any one of us could make alone—what a wonderful example for a young person of the power of community
Julia Flood (Artistic Director / Director, Digging Up Dessa) has directed The Very Hungry Caterpillar Show, It’s a Wonderful Life, The Girl Who Swallowed a Cactus, The Hundred Dresses, Frida Libre, Bud, Not Buddy, Hans Brinker and the Silver Skates, The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane, And In This Corner: Cassius Clay, Out of the Box, Talkin’ Trash, Afflicted: Daughters of Salem, Unsorted, and Say Something, Do Something! for Metro Theater Company since she moved to St. Louis to become artistic director in February 2014. Previously, Julia spent 16 years as artistic director of Eckerd Theater Company in Clearwater, Florida where she commissioned such plays as Vote?, by Eric Coble, provoked by Florida’s role in the 2000 presidential election, and Battledrum by Doug Cooney with Lee Ahlin, a musical about the effects of war on young people through the lens of Civil War drummer boys, subsequently produced at Metro Theater Company. A graduate of Northwestern University, Julia spent seven years as a resident member of the Bloomsburg Theatre Ensemble in Pennsylvania, a unique artist-led ensemble founded under the guidance of legendary acting teacher Alvina Krause, before following a freelance career as actor/director/playwright/teacher. Julia served on the national board of directors of Theatre for Young Audiences/USA from 2011 to 2019, and brings more than 40 years of experience to her role as artistic director of Metro Theater Company.