Emily rankin
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Emily Rankin is a director, actor, and artist who has been an active theatre maker for over twenty-five years. After receiving her BFA in Theatre Directing and Psychology, she worked extensively in Austin, TX, both in film production and in theatre. There, she helped bring to life shows like Whirligig Theatre's Deus Ex Machina, a choose-your-own-adventure based on the Oresteia, and Penfold Theatre's Murder on the Rails, a murder mystery series performed aboard the Austin Steam Train. She worked with companies like Bottle Alley, Generic Ensemble Company, and The Hidden Room Theatre to create site-specific, devised, and original practice works, in addition to more traditional theatre. With Meason Wiley, she co-created and developed Verstehen, an improvisational performance series for sound and live painting that toured the west coast in 2017. In 2018 she relocated to Santa Fe, NM, where she worked with Meow Wolf, serving as a project manager and production coordinator for their Interactive and Entertainment divisions, specializing in Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality experiences for Convergence Station in Denver. She also appeared in Meow Wolf: Omegamart in Las Vegas. In 2019, she directed "The Garage," a Meow Wolf performance which featured five unique Magic Leap headset experiences and a company of ten actors. The piece made Forbes' list of the Top 35 XR Installations of 2019. Since then, she’s worked regularly with Meow Wolf’s House of Eternal Return in Santa Fe, creating and managing immersive, interactive performance. She’s also been a regular fixture in Santa Fe’s theatre scene, working with companies like the Santa Fe Playhouse, where she twice served as interim production manager, Santa Fe Classic Theater, Incite Shakespeare Company, Ironweed, Almost Adults, and Blue Raven. In 2025, she began serving as the Artistic Director of the New Mexico Actors Lab in Santa Fe. She lives and works in New Mexico.