Creative Macau

Center for Creative Industries

Performing Arts

Chad Woodrow Leslie

Biography

Chad graduated from the Directing program of the University of North Carolina School of the Arts. He then began traveling Asia studying Eastern performance traditions and contemporary Avant- Garde practices, which he has used in combination with his Western background.

After surviving a major earthquake in central Taiwan in 1999, Chad redirected his career to include work in regions devastated by the earthquake employing his tools as an artist in service to the development of the communities around him.  As a result, he became heavily involved with developing training programs in local theater companies and youth organizations around Taiwan, Southeast Asia, and Europe.

Over his 10 years in South East Asia, he has created, performed in, and produced numerous artistic projects within local communities, social and governmental organizations, as well as amateur and professional artists from all over the world. He specializes in interactive performances and educational methodology which lead him to direct and teach in numerous universities, institutions, festivals and theatres including Fu Ren University in Taipei, Aix en Provence University in France, , the Macau Polytechnic Institute, Cirque du Soleil, Seoul Fringe Festival, Macau Fringe Festival, Taipei International Theatre Festival, the World Alliance for Arts Education to mane a few.

In 2000, Chad became the first US director to Assistant Direct at the Subaru Theatre in Tokyo, on a production of “The Grapes of Wrath”, dir. John Dillon (Milwaukee Repertory Theatre), which won Japan’s highest theatre award for Best Production. Chad has had the privilege of working with theatre greats Barry Kyle (Royal Shakespeare Company), Gerald Freedman (leading Director of the New York Shakespeare, the American Shakespeare Company and the first American Director invited to direct at London’s Globe Theatre), among others.

Chad worked as the artistic director for the Center for Arts Technology and Education as well as a lecturer at the Macau Inter-University Institute.

He is the co-founding director of the Worldwide Art Collective International Performance Festival WACFEST, a process oriented festival designed to provide ongoing learning opportunities for artists across language, cultural, economical, and artistic barriers / in search of global artistic languages for the 21st century.

He is a recipient of the Eugene O’Neill New Plays Festival Directing Fellowship under the direction of Lloyd Richards, and has received support for study abroad from the Seman Arts Fund and the Kenan Institute.

Chad is the artistic director of MACWAC Productions in Macau.