Ryan McKinney is a theatre artist, educator and emerging scholar working in theatre arts and performance. As an actor, director & theatre manager, he has worked at Manhattan Theatre Club, The Garden Theatre, Harbor Lights Theatre Company, The Contemporary American Theatre Festival and the touring productions of I Love You, You’re Perfect, Now Change and Forbidden Broadway.

Having taught at several colleges and universities, Ryan currently serves as a Professor of Theatre Arts at Kingsborough Community College where he is also the Director of the Theatre Arts program. He is the recipient of the Kennedy Center Gold Medallion for service to theatre education and the co-recipient of the ATHE/KCACTF Region 1 Prize for Innovative Teaching.  

As an emerging scholar, Ryan’s work explores musical theatre and politics, global theories of actor training, and gay & lesbian representation on stage. A community college educator of twelve years, Ryan is also interested in theatre as social practice and civic engagement. He holds an MFA in Musical Theatre from San Diego State University, an MA in Theatre Studies from Hunter College and is a second-year, Level II student in the PhD Program in Theatre & Performance at The Graduate Center of the City University of New York.