Sam Pinkleton (born July 20, 1987) is an American choreographer and theatre director.
He is known for directing the Broadway play Oh, Mary! and choreographing the Broadway musical Natasha, Pierre & The Great Comet of 1812, for which he received a Tony Award nomination.[1] Pinkleton's additional work on Broadway includes choreographing the 2017 productions of Amélie and Significant Other.[2]
Sam Pinkleton was born on July 20, 1987, in Hopewell, a small town right outside of Richmond, Virginia.
As a child, he attended the Carter G. Woodson Middle School.[3] Pinkleton also attended and graduated from The Appomattox Regional Governor's School for the Arts And Technology in Petersburg, Virginia, where he used to play the saxophone.[4]
He moved to New York City when he was age eighteen to attend New York University as a musical-theatre major, but later switched to the directing program instead.
His first Broadway credit was in 2014 as assistant director, working on The Lyons by Nicky Silver. Pinkleton’s first choreography credit on Broadway was for a revival of Sophie Treadwell’s Machinal.
He started working on his most famous Broadway show, Natasha, Pierre & The Great Comet of 1812, in 2013, after seeing the first performance of it in 2012 at the Ars Nova theater in New York City. The director of the show, Rachel Chavkin, asked Pinkleton to help with staging the show for a bigger space, to which he agreed to do.[5] The Great Comet then had a third run at American Repertory Theater in Cambridge, Massachusetts, before finally transferring to Broadway. During its Broadway run, the show received twelve Tony Award nominations including Best Choreography for Pinkleton.
Some of his most recent work includes co-choreographing and co-directing a production of Head Over Heels at the Pasadena Playhouse in Pasadena, California, along with Jenny Koons, as well as creating a cruise-ship show for Virgin Voyages titled Untitled DanceShowPartyThing with Ani Taj and Sunny Min-Sook Hitt.
In 2019, Pinkleton worked as an artist-in-residence at New York City's Pace University.[6]
Pinkleton often talks about not having a style, but instead focusing on the current dancers he has and working with them to create something together. Pinkleton says that he never choreographs on his own body, and tries to use the previous experience and special abilities of the actors to inspire his movement.[7]
| 2012 | The Lyons | Assistant Director | Cort Theater |
| 2014 | Machinal | Choreographer | American Airlines Theatre |
| 2015 | The Heidi Chronicles | Movement Consultant | Music Box Theatre |
| 2016 | Heisenberg | Choreographer | Friedman Theatre |
| 2016 | Natasha, Pierre, and the Great Comet of 1812 | Choreographer | Imperial Theatre |
| 2017 | Significant Other | Choreographer | Booth Theatre |
| 2017 | Amélie | Choreographer/Musical Staging | Walter Kerr Theatre |
| 2022 | Macbeth | Movement | Longacre Theatre |
| 2023 | Here We Are | Choreographer | The Shed |
| 2024 | Oh, Mary! | Director | Lucille Lortel Theatre |
| La Cage aux Folles | Pasadena Playhouse |
| Year | Award | Category | Work | Result | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2017 | Tony Award[8] | Best Choreography | Natasha, Pierre & The Great Comet of 1812 | ||
| 2020 | Lucille Lortel Awards[9] | Outstanding Choreographer | Soft Power | Nominated |