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Dan Giles (he/him) is a Brooklyn-based playwright and screenwriter from Massachusetts. He is a recent alumnus of The Juilliard School’s Lila Acheson Wallace American Playwrights Program, the Filmmakers’ Workshop at New York Stage & Film, and Youngblood at Ensemble Studio Theatre. He is a 2026 Resident Artist at the cell theatre. His plays include The Charioteer (the cell theatre), The Pittsburgh Free Press (Lee Strasberg Institute/NYU), Mike Pence Sex Dream (Ensemble Studio Theatre, First Floor Theater), 1969: The Second Man (Next Door at New York Theatre Workshop), How You Kiss Me Is Not How I Like To Be Kissed (Haven Theatre), and Breeders (New Light Theater Project, Great Plains Theatre Commons). He’s a recipient of the Clifford Odets Ensemble Commission from Lee Strasberg/NYU, a NYSCA Support for Artists grant, the Alfred P. Sloan Screenwriting Award, the New Light New Voices Award, and the American College Theater Festival’s Mark Twain Prize for Comic Playwriting. He has been a finalist for Ingram New Works at Nashville Rep, Lighthouse Works, SPACE on Ryder Farm, Pipeline, The Lark, the Bay Area Playwrights Festival, and the Playwrights Center; a semifinalist for the Terrence McNally New Works Incubator at Rattlestick, the O’Neill National Playwrights Conference, and the Princess Grace Award; and an honorable mention for the Relentless Award. He is a graduate of Harvard College (AB in English) and Carnegie Mellon School of Drama (MFA). Contact [email protected] Upcoming May 14 - a reading of The Charioteer dir. Matt Dickson at the cell theatre - RSVP |
Recent Work
The Charioteer
Charly’s older brother has always been her hero, even when he forgets that she exists. When she goes to visit him at college, she hopes to start a new chapter in their relationship. But shortly after, he vanishes off the grid to live in a radical environmentalist commune. Ten years later, he needs her help. But first, she needs answers. Across fault lines of politics and family, Charly and Owen must figure out who they are to each other if either of them is going to survive what’s in store. What do you do when the person who taught you right from wrong is also the person who hurt you most? The Charioteer is a taut, tender two-hander about how to fight with—and for—the people you love. (1w, 1m)
The Pittsburgh Free Press
A young journalist uncovers an explosive scandal—a story with the potential to upend local politics and launch her career. Then her editor kills it. When she pursues her scoop anyway, her decision has unforeseen consequences for the alt weekly where she works, and for the staff of misfits doing everything they can to keep it alive. An epic ensemble dramedy set within an endangered civic sphere, The Pittsburgh Free Press dramatizes the vulnerability of idealism and the malleability of truth. (8w, 4m)
The Dog Walker
His life in shambles, a young dog walker goes looking for love and finds it in bed with his older client. Harry is handsome, erudite, and charismatic, and he has everything Jay doesn’t: a Brooklyn Heights address, a chosen family, a rich husband. But as Jay becomes entangled in Harry’s world, new hungers disturb old wounds. Soon Jay realizes that if he wants more, he must risk losing what little he has to get it. A queer coming-of-age story about sex, money, and death, The Dog Walker explores how desire can change who you think you are. (2w, 4m)
The Estabrook School
Every Tuesday at recess, four white teachers meet in a second-grade classroom for their anti-racist reading group. This week, Jenny lost her shit. As their collective identity crisis unfolds, will any of them emerge unscathed? Who will they be on the other side? And are these the questions they should really be asking? The Estabrook School is an ensemble comedy about the pleasures and dangers of righteousness and empathy. (2w, 2m)
Charly’s older brother has always been her hero, even when he forgets that she exists. When she goes to visit him at college, she hopes to start a new chapter in their relationship. But shortly after, he vanishes off the grid to live in a radical environmentalist commune. Ten years later, he needs her help. But first, she needs answers. Across fault lines of politics and family, Charly and Owen must figure out who they are to each other if either of them is going to survive what’s in store. What do you do when the person who taught you right from wrong is also the person who hurt you most? The Charioteer is a taut, tender two-hander about how to fight with—and for—the people you love. (1w, 1m)
- Resident Artist project, the cell theatre (upcoming 2026)
- workshop dir. Matt Dickson, The Juilliard School (2025)
- semifinalist, O'Neill National Playwrights Conference (2025)
- NYSCA Support for Artists Grant (2026)
The Pittsburgh Free Press
A young journalist uncovers an explosive scandal—a story with the potential to upend local politics and launch her career. Then her editor kills it. When she pursues her scoop anyway, her decision has unforeseen consequences for the alt weekly where she works, and for the staff of misfits doing everything they can to keep it alive. An epic ensemble dramedy set within an endangered civic sphere, The Pittsburgh Free Press dramatizes the vulnerability of idealism and the malleability of truth. (8w, 4m)
- workshop dir. Jake Beckhard, Lee Strasberg Institute/NYU (2024)
- reading, The Juilliard School (2024)
The Dog Walker
His life in shambles, a young dog walker goes looking for love and finds it in bed with his older client. Harry is handsome, erudite, and charismatic, and he has everything Jay doesn’t: a Brooklyn Heights address, a chosen family, a rich husband. But as Jay becomes entangled in Harry’s world, new hungers disturb old wounds. Soon Jay realizes that if he wants more, he must risk losing what little he has to get it. A queer coming-of-age story about sex, money, and death, The Dog Walker explores how desire can change who you think you are. (2w, 4m)
- reading, The Juilliard School (2023)
- honorable mention, Relentless Award (2024)
- semifinalist, Terrence McNally New Works Incubator at Rattlestick (2024)
- semifinalist, O'Neill National Playwrights Conference (2026)
The Estabrook School
Every Tuesday at recess, four white teachers meet in a second-grade classroom for their anti-racist reading group. This week, Jenny lost her shit. As their collective identity crisis unfolds, will any of them emerge unscathed? Who will they be on the other side? And are these the questions they should really be asking? The Estabrook School is an ensemble comedy about the pleasures and dangers of righteousness and empathy. (2w, 2m)
- Clifford Odets Ensemble Commission, Lee Strasberg Institute/NYU (2024)
- finalist, Ingram New Works, Nashville Repertory Theatre (2024)
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