Deborah Wright Houston

Costume Designer and Dramaturg

Deborah Wright Houston (Costume Designer) is a classically trained actress, singer, director and costumer with thirty years of performance experience in New York City.  She holds a Bachelor of Music Degree from the Hartt College of Music, University of Hartford. Ms. Houston received her classical theatre training with Dr. Elmer Nagy at Hartt and after graduation at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, London. Ms. Houston was the founder and Artistic Director of the critically acclaimed Kings County Shakespeare Company serving Brooklyn from 1983 to 2007. For Saint Francis College, she created and directed The Gathering, a production of scenes from Shakespeare and contemporary monologues by playwright Isidore Elias, featuring South African Fulbright Scholar Vaneshran Arumugam. In collaboration with opera singer Hayden DeWitt, she created and directed a hybrid performance piece of intertwined scenes from Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet and Bellini’s I Capuleti e i Montecchi Recent directing credits include a production of Gian-Carlo Menotti’s Amahl and the Night Visitors, for the Brooklyn Philharmonia Chorus, and The Merchant of Venice for Salon Sanctuary Concerts from a First Folio concert adaptation by Erica Gould.

Most of the costumes chosen and adapted for this production come from the Kings County Shakespeare Company’s collection. Certain key costume pieces, especially the corsets, that have been adapted for Venus and Adonis, were were originally created by Cathy Una Maguire for Ms. Houston’s production of Richard Brinsley Sheridan’s The Rivals.