John Richard Tiffany^[1]OBE (bornc. 1971) is an English theatre director. He directed the internationally successful productionsHarry Potter and the Cursed Child,Black Watch andOnce. He has won 2Tony Awards, anOlivier Award, aDrama Desk Award and anObie Award.

Tiffany was brought up inMarsden, nearHuddersfield, England. His mother was a nurse, also a chorus girl; his father was an engineer, and also played in a brass band.^[2] As a youth, he participated in theHuddersfield Choral Society Youth Choir and held jobs atBoots UK and a restaurant.^[3] He initially studied biology atGlasgow University, but switched to classics and drama.^[2]

Tiffany's theatrical background is in "developing and directing new plays at Scottish theaters".^[4] He was literary director atEdinburgh'sTraverse Theatre from 1997 to 2001.^[5] He then began his working association withVicky Featherstone, becoming associate director at UK new writing touring theatre companyPaines Plough, from 2001 to 2005, where Featherstone was artistic director.^[6]

After Featherstone was named founding artistic director of theNational Theatre of Scotland in late 2004, she hired Tiffany again, as associate director of New Work of the company.^{[3][5][6][7][8]} Tiffany's earliest success with the company was his direction of the highly regarded 2006 production ofBlack Watch.^[4][9] Tiffany's other National Theatre of Scotland productions included an adaptation ofPeter Pan, which played in Glasgow, in April to May 2010, and then toured to London, Inverness, Edinburgh and Aberdeen;^[2] a version ofThe Bacchae, starringAlan Cumming as Dionysus;^[9] andMacbeth, as co-director with Andrew Goldberg, in which Cumming played all the roles.^[10] His final production as associate director wasLet the Right One In produced byMarla Rubin, which premiered in Dundee in 2013.

James Bond movie producerBarbara Broccoli acquired the stage production rights forOnce, which is based on the 2006musical film by the same name, and subsequently recruited Tiffany to produce it after seeing hisBlack Watch atSt. Ann's Warehouse inBrooklyn.^[11]

Tiffany collaborated onOnce with longtime friend and choreographerSteven Hoggett, with whom he had also worked onBlack Watch.^[4] Although the two had been close friends since 1987,^[3][4] they did not collaborate until 2003 when they worked onThe Straits byGregory Burke.Once marked their seventh collaboration.^[4]

Tiffany directed theOff-Broadway and Broadway productions ofOnce in 2011–2012. He won the 2012Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Director of a Musical for his direction ofOnce.^[12] Among the artistic decisions that Hoggett and Tiffany made was the decision to eliminate the choreography from several works including "Falling Slowly", which won theAcademy Award for Best Original Song at the80th Academy Awards in 2008.^[4] He won theTony Award for Best Direction of a Musical forOnce at the66th Tony Awards.^[13] Tiffany also received a 2012Obie Award special citation (along withOnce colleagues Hoggett and Martin Lowe).^[14][15]Once earned 11Tony Award nominations, more than any other production for the 2011–12 season.^[13]

In 2013, he directed a production ofTennessee Williams'The Glass Menagerie at theAmerican Repertory Theater,Cambridge, Massachusetts, which transferred to Broadway.^[16] The work earned him a second Best Direction of a Play Tony Award nomination.^[17] However, he lost out toKenny Leon who directedA Raisin in the Sun.^[18] In April 2015, his production of Enda Walsh's adaptation ofThe Twits was described as "torture" byTelegraph Chief Critic Dominic Cavendish.^[19]

Tiffany directed the stage playHarry Potter and the Cursed Child.^[20] The play opened at the West EndPalace Theatre, London on 7 June 2016 in previews and officially on 30 July.^[21]Harry Potter and the Cursed Child opened on Broadway on 22 April 2018, again directed by Tiffany.^[22] He won the 2018Tony Award for Best Direction of a Play,^[23] 2018Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Director of a Play,^[24] and 2018 Outer Critics Circle Award for Outstanding Director of a Play.^[25]

Tiffany directed the world premiere ofWild Rose, when it opened at theRoyal Lyceum Theatre, Edinburgh in 2025.^[26][27]

• John Tiffany at theInternet Broadway Database
• John Tiffany atIMDb
• Tiffany profile, BroadwayWorld.com

• Living people
• Drama Desk Award winners
• 1970s births
• Helpmann Award winners
• English theatre directors
• Officers of the Order of the British Empire
• Tony Award winners
• Laurence Olivier Award winners
• People from Marsden, West Yorkshire
• Alumni of the University of Glasgow

• Articles with short description
• Short description matches Wikidata
• Use British English from July 2014
• All Wikipedia articles written in British English
• Use dmy dates from July 2014
• Articles with hCards
• IBDB name template using Wikidata
• Place of birth missing (living people)
• Date of birth missing (living people)
• Year of birth uncertain