Maria Aitken has credits that include the Olivier and Tony Award-winning production of Alfred Hitchcock's The 39 Steps which she directed at the Huntington Theatre Company before its Broadway run. She also directed Betrayal, Private Lives, and Educating Rita at the Huntington. Her other credits include Man and Boy (Broadway and Duchuess Theatre), The Gift (Melbourne Theatre, Australia), As You Like It (Shakespeare Theatre Company), Quartermaine’s Terms (Williamstown Theatre Festival), Japes (Bay Street Theatre), Noël Coward’s Easy Virtue (Chichester Festival Theatre), Lady Bracknell’s Confinement (Vineyard Theatre), School for Scandal (Clwyd Theatre), As You Like It (Regent’s Park), and many others. As an actress in London at the Royal Shakespeare Company, the National Theatre, and in the West End, her leading roles have included Blithe Spirit, Bedroom Farce, Travesties, Waste, Private Lives, and The Vortex, among others. Her film credits include A Fish Called Wanda and others. Ms. Aitken is a visiting teacher at the British American Drama Academy, The Juilliard School, Yale School of Drama, New York University, The Actors Center in New York, and the Academy for Classical Acting. She is the author of two books, A Girdle Round The Earth and Style: Acting in High Comedy.