MARK ARMSTRONG is a Brooklyn-based theater director and the artistic director for The 24 Hour Plays. His production of Eric Bogosian’s Drinking in America (NYT Critic’s Pick) featured Andre Royo and enjoyed an extended run at the Minetta Lane Theatre, plus a live audio capture released on Audible. Mark was born and educated in Duluth, MN, where he recently directed Jesse Eisenberg's The Revisionist and Will Arbery’s Heroes of the Fourth Turning at The Depot Theater.

As a director, his collaborators include Emily Mann (Execution of Justice, Playhouse Creatures + NYU Tisch mainstage), Christopher Shinn (Falling Away, Ensemble Studio Theatre; The Coming World; Williamstown), Dan O’Brien (From Kandahar to Canada, EST; The Angel in the Trees, Production Company) and many others. Recently, he developed and directed The Accident with drummer Kid Millions at Roulette.

Highlights from his tenure with The 24 Hour Plays include annual productions of The 24 Hour Plays on Broadway and The 24 Hour Musicals (featuring artists from Broadway, TV, film, music and comedy), the emergence of The 24 Hour Plays: Nationals as one of the major professional development programs in the American theater, partner productions across the US and the creation of The 24 Hour Plays: Viral Monologues, which premiered on March 17, 2020, praised by Ben Brantley in The New York Times as "funny, scary and necessary...theater mutates into online deliverance" and went on to engage millions of viewers worldwide.

As Director of New Work for Keen Company (2012-2016), he created their mid-career playwrights lab, commissioned and produced new work performed by New York City high school students, and directed Old Folks by Max Posner and 30 Million by Jason Kim and Max Vernon. Over the course of his career, he has developed and directed plays with Naked Angels, Primary Stages, New Dramatists, Williamstown Theatre Festival, Hartford Stage, Lincoln Center Theater, TheatreSquared, Dorset Theater Festival, The Lark, Midtown Direct Rep, The New York Neo-Futurists and more, including work by Stephen Adly Guirgis, Jonathan Marc Sherman, Qui Nguyen, Laura Jacqmin, Matt Schatz, Jason Grote, Sarah Schulman and many others.

With his own Production Company (2005-2011), he directed and produced Blair Singer's The Most Damaging Wound and Meg's New Friend, along with new plays by Liz Meriwether, Stephen Belber, Alan Berks and others. As a member of Ensemble Studio Theatre (2011-present), his work includes new plays by Ken Greller, Leah Nanako Winkler, Charly Evon Simpson and Gabe McKinley, among others. As a guest professional, his academic directing credits include productions with NYU/Tisch, Columbia University, The New School for Drama, Stella Adler Studio, Atlantic Theater School and the University of South Florida.

Mark spent three years as the Literary Director for Playscripts, Inc, where he compiled and edited the play collections 24x24: The 24 Hour Plays Anthology and Naked Angels Issues Projects: Collected Plays. His writing has appeared in American Theatre, HowlRound and the Brooklyn Rail.

Assistant professor (part-time), The New School for Drama; proud member Stage Directors and Choreographers Society and UAW 7902; alum Lincoln Center Theater Directors Lab and Williamstown Theater Festival Directing Corps; member, Ensemble Studio Theatre.