About

Maggie Whitaker is a costume designer, educator, producer, and activist. They have designed for theatre, film, and video games over the course of their career. With a foundation in theatre, they have translated their love of new work development into a successful career in film. Their previous feature films showcased at acclaimed festivals like Sundance, Hamptons International Film Festival, Frameline, and more. Currently, their design work is featured in several short films in Oscars eligible competitions touring the festival circuit, with both “Liminality” and “After What Happened at the Library” collecting recognition and awards as they move forward in their trajectory. Additionally, their work on the short, “Freyr” will be seen this June at Tribeca Film Festival, and “Betty” at OutFest, with the long awaited premiere of the feature film “Dope Queens” at the Bentonville Film Festival on June 20.

Their work as a costume designer is evolving, as they are working as a consulting producer on more and more short films and independent live theatrical and immersive projects. They are taking their broad capacity to network labor, build capacity, and lead departments to add to their portfolio of skills when an independent project needs that extra bit of support. Because of this capacity and desire to build a larger future for their work in the industry, they are focusing their work on building more sustainable models of design. With this as a motivator, they are bringing a sustainable design mixer to New York during Tribeca Film Festival with the goal of creating better pathways for reducing waste and reinforcing local film infrastructure nationwide.

Their theatrical work includes the world premieres of nationally recognized plays including “Eureka Day” by Jonathan Spector at the Aurora Theatre, “I and You,” by Lauren Gunderson at Marin Theatre, and “Truffaldino Says No!” by Ken Slattery at Shotgun Players. Their continuing love of live theatre is based in a respect of text, the development process, and the active participation of creating new work. They actively seek live theatre projects that challenge their creative capacity, offer them the ability to imagine new worlds, and move with an intimacy in detail that allows their work to stay relevant between all narrative media.

They received their BFA in Theatre Design at the University of South Florida and their MFA in Costume Design at the University of San Diego, California. In addition to their production work, they created a fully accredited BFA and MFA Costume Design Program for the Academy of Art University in San Francisco. Mx. Whitaker has written courses for both an online and onsite program that deal with the specific training of costume designers through individual project work as well as collaborations with the School of Acting and the School of Motion Pictures and Television. Their alumni have gone on to fellowships at Santa Fe Opera and American Conservatory Theatre, and can be found working in New York and Los Angeles. Ms. Whitaker is a member of United Scenic Artists Local 829.