Lee Summers is an award-winning actor, director, writer, and educator whose career spans Broadway, television, film, and higher education. He made his Broadway debut in the Tony and Grammy Award-winning original production of Dreamgirls, later returning for the Dreamgirls 20th Anniversary Concert alongside Audra McDonald, Billy Porter, and Heather Headley (available on all platforms).
Summers began his acting training at Tennessee State University and has performed extensively on Broadway, Off-Broadway, and regionally. Screen credits include Blue Bloods, Boardwalk Empire, Law & Order, and Spike Lee’s NAACP Image Award–winning motion picture Malcolm X. His stage work includes Off-Broadway productions such as Little Ham and On Kentucky Avenue (AUDELCO nomination for Best Supporting Actor), collaborations with the Negro Ensemble Company, appearances at Yale’s Eugene O’Neill Festival, and he received the New York Bistro Award for his solo performance Winds of Change. He has also performed alongside Broadway legends at Carnegie Hall.
A two-time AUDELCO Award winner for Best Director of a Musical and a Broadway World Award winner for his direction of Hair: The American Tribal Love-Rock Musical, Summers’ body of work has received 24 AUDELCO Award nominations. On Kentucky Avenue (10 nominations) and Ella, First Lady of Song (6 nominations) both won Best Musical, with Summers receiving the AUDELCO Award for Best Director for each production. From My Hometown earned 8 AUDELCO nominations and ran Off-Broadway for two years; it is now licensed in the U.S. and Canada through Concord Theatricals.
His new musical The Funkentine Rapture is currently in development following a 29-hour industry reading in 2025 directed by Tony Award winner James Monroe Iglehart and is moving toward workshop production.
At NYU Steinhardt, Summers teaches Acting for Singers at the graduate and undergraduate levels and maintains an international private coaching studio, training performers from Shanghai to Seoul. He has also served as a recurring guest director at BerkleeNYC.
Summers began his undergraduate studies at Tennessee State University and later earned his BA from SUNY Empire State College and an MFA in Musical Theatre Writing from NYU Tisch School of the Arts. He is a member of AEA, SAG/AFTRA, SDC, and DG. For more information, please visit: leesummersshows.com