The first two times Nicki Hunter applied to Manhattan Theatre Club, she didn\u2019t get the internship. Not enough experience. Come back when you\u2019re ready. 16 years later, she\u2019s running the place.<\/p>\n
On December 1, 2025, Hunter became Artistic Director of Manhattan Theatre Club, succeeding Lynne Meadow, who led the company for more than five decades. She now oversees MTC\u2019s three stages\u2014two off-Broadway at New York City Center and the Samuel J. Friedman Theatre on Broadway\u2014alongside Executive Director Chris Jennings.<\/p>\n
Hunter didn\u2019t arrive at the Broadway institution chasing a title. \u201cI don\u2019t think I really had an idea of what I wanted to be,\u201d she says. \u201cBut I knew where I wanted to be.\u201d From the start, she wanted to be in the room where theater was happening, surrounded by the artists and collaborators who give it its spark.<\/p>\n
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\nTOP: With “Monsters” stars Okieriete Onaodowan (left) and Aigner Mizzelle (second from right) and playwright\/director Ngozi Anyanwu.
\nBOTTOM: With MTC Managing Director Chris Jennings and “Bug” playwright Tracy Letts. (Photos by Bruce Glikas for MTC)
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She grew up just outside Boston, where theater entered her life early. \u201cThe bug bit me in first grade,\u201d she says, remembering an after-school community program called Kid Stock. It was informal and playful: magic shows one week, a musical the next, all thrown together by kids barely old enough to know what they were doing. \u201cMy passion for theater really started there,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n
By high school, she dove into school productions\u2014auditioning, working backstage and designing costumes. Like many theater kids, she jokes, she was \u201ccut from all the sports teams just by trying out for them,\u201d and happily found her place elsewhere. She played Helena in A Midsummer Night\u2019s Dream, joined the Greek chorus in Antigone and appeared in the ensembles of Footloose and Damn Yankees. But she\u2019s quick to add, with a laugh, \u201cI\u2019m not a good singer.\u201d<\/p>\n
At Lehigh University, Hunter intended to major in theater but resisted the idea of a conservatory program. \u201cI knew I wanted to just have a liberal arts education\u2014immerse myself and learn about the world,\u201d she says. She also added a business minor, initially treating it as a backup plan. “If it all goes to…,” she remembers thinking, before laughing, “…I\u2019ll just follow my business path.” Halfway through college, something clicked\u2014her theater and business interests could live alongside one another.<\/p>\n
\n“I don\u2019t think I really had an idea of
\nwhat I wanted to be, but I knew
\nwhere I wanted to be.” \u2014Nicki Hunter
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As she read and fell in love with more plays, one phrase kept appearing on the script title pages: \u201cOriginally produced by Manhattan Theatre Club.\u201d Clearly, this was where great theater was being made. When she discovered the company\u2019s internship program, she jumped at the chance to apply.<\/p>\n
She didn\u2019t get it.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey said, \u2018You don\u2019t have enough experience,\u2019\u201d she recalls. \u201c\u2018Go work in New York somewhere else and then come back to us.\u2019\u201d Instead, she landed an internship at the Summer Play Festival at The Public Theater, a now-defunct program that functioned as a kind of all-hands-on-deck training ground. \u201cI was heating up the props and then running to do the spot op and then sewing a costume and then going back to the spot op,\u201d she says. \u201cIt was a catch-all, which was great.\u201d<\/p>\n
After graduation from Lehigh, she applied again for a summer internship. Again, she didn\u2019t get it.<\/p>\n
This time, she followed up. Were there any openings? Well, kind of. She was offered an internship in special events within the development department\u2014an internship that technically didn\u2019t need to exist. \u201cThere were no special events that summer,\u201d she says. \u201cThey weren\u2019t planning on hiring an intern.\u201d\u00a0 But a foot in the door is still a foot in the door. \u201cI\u2019ll take it!\u201d<\/p>\n
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\nNicki Hunter onstage at the Samuel J. Friedman Theatre (Photo by Emilio Madrid for Broadway.com)
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Once inside MTC, Hunter learned the rhythms of the building and the unspoken rules. \u201cI made myself present,\u201d she says, \u201cbut not annoyingly so. It\u2019s a fine line.\u201d A turning point came when she filled in for the assistant to longtime Managing Director Barry Grove. The temporary role placed her near Artistic Director Lynne Meadow\u2019s office\u2014and on her radar. \u201cThey took a look at me and said, \u2018Wow, this girl\u2019s really stepping in and getting it quickly,\u2019\u201d Hunter says.<\/p>\n
After a stint at Binder Casting\u2014where she worked on open calls for The Lion King<\/a>\u2014MTC called again. There was an opening to be Meadows\u2019 assistant. \u201cWe think you should apply,\u201d they told her. She did and got the job. \u201cI\u2019ve been working here ever since,\u201d she says. \u201cThat was 16 years ago.\u201d<\/p>\n The rise within the company was slow and steady: four years as Assistant to the Artistic Director, two as Artistic Associate, four as Line Producer, four as Artistic Producer and two as Associate Artistic Director.<\/p>\n On December 1, 2025, she took the top job.<\/p>\n
Today, Hunter and Executive Director Chris Jennings lead the institution Meadow and Grove shaped for more than five decades. It\u2019s a generational shift at one of New York\u2019s most stable nonprofit institutions\u2014but one built on continuity. \u201cIf she was stagnant, if this company was stagnant, we wouldn\u2019t be where we are today,\u201d Hunter says of Meadow. \u201cThat\u2019s a huge testament to her vision.\u201d<\/p>\n There\u2019s also a generational shift\u2014Hunter is a Millennial; Meadow is a Baby Boomer. They compare notes\u2014sometimes literally\u2014on how they absorb culture, from social media feeds to the morning paper. Meadow will call to say a review looks great in print; Hunter will send along something that\u2019s circulating online. What unites them is a shared belief in staying alert to the world. \u201cI always want to be listening,\u201d Hunter says. \u201cI always want to be paying attention to the world and having a finger on what audiences are hungry for.\u201d<\/p>\n At Manhattan Theatre Club, that awareness extends to all three of its stages\u2014two off-Broadway at New York City Center and the Samuel J. Friedman Theatre on Broadway. Hunter is clear that she doesn\u2019t see them as a hierarchy. \u201cI don\u2019t want to look at our Stage 1 or Stage 2 space or our Broadway space as stepping stones,\u201d she says. \u201cIt is three amazing theaters that are having equal quality.\u201d<\/p>\n Historically, some of MTC\u2019s biggest successes did move from smaller rooms to larger ones\u2014classic triumphs like Proof, Doubt and Love! Valour! Compassion! followed that path\u2014but Hunter is careful not to frame that as the goal. \u201cI\u2019m not interested in finding a hit and sitting back,\u201d she says. \u201cI\u2019m interested in infusing this city with great work.\u201d<\/p>\n Her relationship to Manhattan Theatre Club as an audience member predates her professional one. The first show she ever saw at the company was David Harrower\u2019s Blackbird. \u201cI walked in and thought, “This is amazing.” The play\u2014a stark, two-person confrontation between a man and the woman he abused as a child\u2014reshaped her sense of what kind of risks the company could take, and what audiences might be ready to meet.<\/p>\n That belief has carried into the way she thinks about programming today. She\u2019s proud of recent MTC stagings she\u2019d helped guide like Choir Boy, Ruined, Eureka Day and points to Jocelyn Bioh\u2019s Jaja\u2019s African Hair Braiding as a recent moment when different audiences came together in a shared experience. \u201cWe invited our subscribers into a hair-braiding shop,\u201d she says, \u201cand there was this beautiful community in our theater of subscribers and new ticket buyers and new audiences.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n“I\u2019m not interested in finding a hit and sitting back. I\u2019m interested in infusing this city with great work.” \u2014Nicki Hunter
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\nINSPIRING MTC SUCCESSES:
\nKalyne Coleman and Maechi Aharnwa in “Jaja’s African Hair Braiding” (Photo by Matthew Murphy) | Alison Pill and Jeff Daniels in “Blackbird” (Photo by Joan Marcus) | The cast of “Eureka Day” (Photo by Jeremy Daniel)
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