ELEANOR RHODE

​Eleanor Rhode is a freelance director working across theatre, audio and film.

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"Eleanor Rhode directs with an assurance that should make her a permanent fixture at the Globe."

The Guardian

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Her work has been produced by the Royal Shakespeare Company, the Almeida, Shakespeare's Globe and Audible.

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In audio, her Audible production of Mrs Wickham by Sarah Page, starring Jessie Buckley and Johnny Flynn, won the 2023 Audie Award for Best Original Work.

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In 2025 she wrote and directed her first short film, Codes, starring Johnny Flynn, which is currently on the international festival circuit.

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In the same year, her acclaimed production of A Midsummer Night's Dream for the Royal Shakespeare Company, starring Matthew Baynton, transferred to The Barbican. 

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Recent theatre work includes:  Once Upon a Time in Nazi Occupied Tunisia at the Almeida, starring Adrian Edmondson; King John for the Royal Shakespeare Company (★★★★ The Guardian); Rust for the Bush Theatre and HighTide; the UK premiere of Blue Door at Theatre Royal Bath (★★★★★ Daily Mail); Wendy and Peter Pan for the Royal Lyceum Theatre, Edinburgh (★★★★★ The Guardian); and the world premiere of Boudica at Shakespeare's Globe, starring Gina McKee in the title role.​​

 

In 2009 Eleanor co-founded Snapdragon Productions to bring overlooked and underperformed plays to new audiences. Productions include Richard Bean's Toast, which toured the UK before transferring to New York and was nominated for Best Touring Production at the 2016 UK Theatre Awards ("Eleanor Rhode's direction rings as true as the writing." — Sunday Express ★★★★), and the world premiere of Teddy by Tristan Bernays and Dougal Irvine, winner of Best New Musical at the 2016 Off West End Awards ("Eleanor Rhode directs with pizzazz. Energy and invention abound. Remarkable." — Evening Standard ★★★★).
 

Other directing credits include Frankenstein (The Watermill Theatre and Wilton's Music Hall), Beauty and the Beast (Watford Palace Theatre), Terrorism (Bush Theatre), When We Were Women (Orange Tree Theatre), Toast and Thark (Park Theatre), Generous, The Drawer Boy and Hugh Leonard's A Life (Finborough Theatre), and the world premiere of For All That at Centerstage Theater, Seattle.
 

Eleanor is a former board member of Stage Directors UK, where she helped oversee the organisation's transition to becoming a trade union in 2025, representing stage directors, movement directors and choreographers.