Maureen Towey is a director, writer and producer working across artistic mediums. As an ensemble member with Sojourn Theatre, Towey directs radical community-based arts events. She directed Finding Penelope, a site-specific play written by Anne Basting and featuring a chorus of older adults. The play inspired a documentary, The Penelope Project, which played nationwide on PBS. The project also grew into a book, co-edited by Towey, entitled The Penelope Project: An Arts-Based Odyssey to Change Elder Care. With Sojourn, Towey also co-created The Islands of Milwaukee, which culminated in a large-scale installation in Milwaukee City Hall as well as a series of radio pieces that Towey produced.
For The New York Times, Towey directed the award-winning documentary “Sensations of Sound” and served as the Senior Producer for The Daily 360, the only series in the world to create professional VR journalism on a daily basis. Towey has worked as a Creative Director for Grammy-winning musicians such as Arcade Fire, Ray LaMontagne, and Esperanza Spalding. She directed a music video for Sharon Van Etten’s “Seventeen” (currently over eight million views on YouTube) and the celebrated short film “The 8th Year of the Emergency,” starring Mary Beth Peil, Phillipa Soo, Linda Emond and Jeffrey DeMunn. A highlight of her theater work is directing Black Mountain Songs, which was co-created with Bryce Dessner (of The National) and Richard Reed Parry and starred the Brooklyn Youth Chorus (BAM in NYC, Barbican in London).
