Birgit is a German-born dramaturg, director and translator living in Toronto. She studied Dramaturgy in Munich, Germany before completing a PhD in Drama at U of T, focused on cultural identity formation. As a Dramaturg & Artistic Associate at Canadian Stage she was responsible for season planning and production dramaturgy. Birgit has worked in new play development with award-winning playwrights such as Jordan Tannahill (Botticelli in the Fire & Sunday in Sodom, Governor General’s Award for Drama), Ngozi Paul (The Emancipation of Ms. Lovely), Sook-Yin Lee (Unsafe), and Alon Nashman (Charlotte). For SummerWorks, she created and directed her own stage adaptation of the novel The Piano Tuner. With Dawn Jani Birley’s 1S1 Theatre and Erin Shields, Birgit has been co-developing To A Flame, a play that explores the intersectionality of race-, gender- and ableism-based oppression, set to premiere in 2026. As a director, Birgit specializes in sharing new and international works with Canadian audiences. She also brings her post-dramatic approach to classical texts, such as in Hamlet in High Park (2016), Nathan the Wise in Stratford (2019), Else (ohne Fräulein) (Winner of Austria’s TYA Award STELLA*22) and A Doll’s House, a multi-disciplinary, multi-media production (2022) and Miss Julie (2024) at Bregenz. Birgit has translated over 20 plays from German, most recently the feminist Ibsen-adaptation Peer Gynt (she/her) by Maria Milisavljević. She is the German translator of the award-winning video game performance asses.masses by Milton Lim and Patrick Blenkarn. She has taught and directed at York University, Randolph College and University of Toronto.
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