Janice L Blixt, in addition to being a founding member of the Patches,  is entering her twelfth year as the Producing Artistic Director of the Michigan Shakespeare Festival. In past seasons, she directed King Lear*, Cyrano de Bergerac*, Measure for Measure*, The Rover, Julius Caesar*, the Seagull, Richard II, The Killer Angels, a play by Karen Tarjan based on the novel by Michael Shaara, A Midsummer Night's Dream, adapted and directed a combined production of Henry IV*, the acclaimed Hamlet and The Importance of Being Earnest*, Twelfth Night, Richard III, George Bernard Shaw's Pygmalion*, Romeo & Juliet, Much Ado About Nothing, and The Winter's Tale*. She also adapted and directed the ongoing MSF touring productions of Romeo & Juliet and Macbeth.

*Wilde Award Winners for Best Productions

 Jan has been a working director in Chicago for the past ten years where she has helmed Julius Caesar, Macbeth, Twelfth Night, The Taming of the Shrew, A Midsummer Night's Dream, The Merchant of Venice, and Henry V.   She has also been the vocal director and text coach for Othello, Edward III, and Hamlet. She teaches text analysis and folio technique for professional actors and in colleges. In her career as an actor of Shakespeare she has played Titania, A Midsummer Night's Dream; Olivia, Viola, and Maria, Twelfth Night; Isabella, Measure for Measure; Lady Capulet, Nurse, Romeo & Juliet; Lady Macbeth, Elizabeth, Richard III; Rosalind, As You Like It; Dionyza, Pericles; Portia, Julius Caesar; and Beatrice, Much Ado About Nothing. 

A graduate of the Hilberry Theater's MFA program in classical acting, Jan is married to David Blixt -- whom she met in 1997 when they played Kate and Petruchio in The Taming of the Shrew. They are the parents of Dashiell (15) and Evelyn (13).

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