Diana Dresser

Diana Dresser is an actor, director, dancer, choreographer, professor, and teaching artist based in Denver, Colorado. Raised in Kansas, Diana appeared in her first play at the University of Kansas at age five and began acting professionally in her late teens. She graduated Phi Beta Kappa and with Highest Distinction from the University of Kansas, double majoring in History/Theatre & Film.

Soon after college, Diana was hired by Creede Repertory Theatre, a magical if unlikely summer theatre located in a mountain town of 350 people. She had no idea that this summer gig in 1992 would turn into a lifelong relationship. In 2024, she returned for her 19th season. Creede Rep was an extraordinary training ground, as it produces a true repertory season, with six different plays running each week. Every season, Diana appeared in multiple roles, ranging from Shakespeare to farce, Greek tragedies to musicals, often switching from one to the other on the same day. The need to differentiate between roles engendered in her a love for broad character choices, physical and vocal transformation, and saying yes to whatever was thrown at her. In her 19 seasons at Creede Rep, Diana has acted in over 50 productions, directed six productions, and choreographed 14, including winning a Denver Post Ovation Award for her choreography in Urinetown.

Growing up an actor and dancer, Diana always has been keenly interested in the intersection of theatre and movement/dance, and this led her to apply for the Actor Training Program at Theatre de la Jeune Lune, a Tony-Award-winning physical theatre company in Minneapolis, MN. Diana was accepted and spent a year studying clown and bouffon and devising original works, and thereafter she appeared in multiple Jeune Lune productions.

After a decade bouncing around the country, working with theatres such as Berkeley Rep, Trinity Rep (Jeune Lune tour), NTPA, Theatre Aspen, and New Conservatory Theatre Center (where Terrence McNally selected her for the development of his play Crucifixion), Diana settled in Denver. For the past twenty years, she has worked for theatres throughout the city, including the Denver Center, Arvada Center (Onstage Colorado Best Actor in a Comedy Award for The Book Club Play), Curious Theatre, Buntport Theater, BETC, Catamounts, Aurora Fox, and Local Theatre. Her relationship with the Denver Center began in 2010 and there she has appeared in fourteen productions, multiple New Play Summits, and has served as Assistant Director and Choreographer. She also has found extremely rewarding her work with the Denver Center Education Department, where she has been a Teaching Artist for over a decade, instructing teens and adults in Basic Acting, Scene Study, Improvisation, Dance, Musical Theatre, and Audition Techniques. She has appeared regularly with Denver Center’s experimental branch Off-Center, a highlight of which was the Denver Center/Third Rail Project (NY) collaboration Sweet & Lucky.

Diana also serves as Adjunct Professor at the University of Denver, teaching Acting and Movement for Opera, and she has taught acting and movement in the Colorado prison system, through the University of Denver’s Prison Arts Initiative. She recently choreographed and co-created a production of Antigone at Limon Correctional Facility in eastern Colorado. She is a film and television actor as well.

Diana is currently understudying two world-premiere productions at the Denver Center, The Reservoir and The Suffragette’s Murder, and she will be choreographing for Utah Shakespeare Festival this summer.