From 1997 through 2006, Joe Banno served as Artistic Director of Washington DC’s eclectic and audacious Source Theatre Company (after his 15 years of critically acclaimed work as a guest director and, later, Associate Artistic Director with the company). Source – which had given early-career boosts to theatre artists as diverse as Marcia Gay Hardin, Charles Busch and Eric Schaeffer, and won the GLAAD Award and the Washington Post Award for its production – was instrumental in the early efforts to revive DC’s historic, but economically depressed Shaw neighborhood into the thriving, culturally diverse destination it has become.  As Artistic Director, Banno built on the fine work of his predecessors, continuing to raise the quality and prestige of the company’s productions, nurturing the development of burgeoning writers (among them, Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa and Caleen Sinnette Jennings) through the annual Washington Theatre Festival of New Plays, and producing and directing works by a who’s-who of contemporary American and British playwrights (involving many of the finest actors and designers on the DC theatre scene in the process). Banno’s multi-year cycle of nine plays by David Mamet featured many rarely-revived works, and culminated in the multiple-Helen Hayes Award-nominated production he directed of “Edmond”. Under his creative leadership, Source expanded well beyond its mission of producing its own work as an SPT theatre. Banno initiated a late-night theatre season by guest companies; offered extensive musical programming, ranging from intimate cabaret series to all-night rock events to chamber music recitals to workshop stagings of opera; hosted installations of gallery art and photography; and forged partnerships, artistic residencies and co-productions with emerging DC theatre, dance and musical ensembles – resulting in Source’s growth into a bustling, multi-disciplinary arts center.