bio

Joey is a director of film and theater, and a teacher of the same. His work is didactic and episodic. Like much of the art he produced, Joey Rizzolo the artist developed in New York, directing plays and musicals ranging from new work to Shakespeare, with a particular penchant for politics and the stories of young people. As one of the early members of the New York Neo-Futurists, he created and developed new work for nearly 2 decades. As a political director with a commitment to equity, diversity, and inclusion, Joey often adopts an Epic approach to storytelling, identified by critic Christine Howey as a director of "restless imagination." He teaches interdisciplinary performance and film at Oberlin College.

With the Neo-Futurists, Joey served as a co-artistic director, education chair, and was responsible for the aggregation of new artists. He has written over 400 short plays and directed countless others for the Neo-Futurists' downtown East Village staple The Infinite Wrench (formerly Too Much Light Makes the Baby Go Blind), an ongoing, ever-changing attempt to perform 30 plays in 60 minutes, and the Neo-Futurist lab series out of which new plays are born. Joey wrote and performed in the NYIT award-winning performance art museum installation, Locker 4173b, and directed Yeauxlanda Kay's one-woman journey through world religion, Bible Study for Heathens. As a co-artistic director, he has taken part in the development of other full-length plays, such as Steve: A Docu-Musical, Laika Dog in Space, The Soup Show, the Drama Desk nominated The Human Symphony, and the Drama Desk nominated The Complete and Condensed Stage Directions of Eugene O'Neill.

Joey’s gravitates toward work wherein art is embedded in communal activism. He is a trained EDI facilitator focusing on issues surrounding disability and ally-ship. For two years, he worked with Queens Theater in the Park mentoring juvenile offenders at Riker’s Island in the development of original plays to reduce the rate of recidivism at Riker’s. While living in Ohio, Joey worked with Great Lakes Theater, and the Oberlin Summer Theater Festival following through on a commitment to provide free theater to under-served communities.  Recently with OSTF, Joey directed Romeo and Juliet, The Cradle will Rock, Butterflies are Free, and choreographed for Macbeth, Picnic, Bus Stop, Treasure Island, As You Like It, Henry IV Part One, and Hamlet.

Joey received is MFA in directing from The New School. While earning his undergraduate degree at Oberlin College, Joey was the recipient of the Nash Drama Award and the college's performing arts fellowship. He was taught by Tea Alagic, Steven Brown-Fried, Moises Kaufman, Lee Sunday Evans, Leigh Fondakowski, Dimitry Krymov, Susanna Gellert, David Chambers, William Cusick, Ellie Enfield, and Paul Moser. Fight Choreography: Thomas Schall, Ricki Ravitts, Charles Conwell. Choreography: Nusha Martynuk, Ann Cooper-Albright.

Joey Rizzolo is a husband, a father, and a disabilities advocate.