About Daniella

DANIELLA CAGGIANO (she/they) is a queer disabled director, intimacy director, and proud native New Yorker. She is committed to radically centering queer and femme voices on stage and screen. Their directing challenges traditional power structures and explores taboo topics, inviting audiences to sit with discomfort and welcome empathetic vulnerability. Daniella draws inspiration from a long line of gutsy theatremakers including Sarah Kane, Caryl Churchill, The Five Lesbian Brothers, Brecht, and Holly Hughes. 

One of her favorite directing projects, a site-appropriate Fun Home inside a real funeral home, sold out in 2 minutes and starred Jenn Colella, Will Swenson, Kate Baldwin, and Caitlin Kinnunen. Other favorite projects include Next To Normal (benefitting The JED Foundation), Head Over Heels, Glass Town, Vinegar Tom (performed with an original Riot Grrrl score), Show Me Eternity, Macbeth and The Moss Maidens (3x extended, winner Best Play, SheNYC). ​Most recently, Daniella directed a reading of Here Is Gone, a sci-fi jukebox musical featuring the songs of the Goo Goo Dolls. Some recent collaborators include Dillon & Caps, Collard & Rosenblatt, SMJ, Dylan Zwickel, Mika Kauffman, Cayenne Douglass and Katelynn Kenney. Her work has been presented throughout NYC with NYTW, Joe’s Pub, Clubbed Thumb, The Tank, WOW Cafe, HERE, and Rattlestick among others. Daniella is an alum of Roundabout's Directors Group, MTC Directing Fellowship, The Drama League Residency, and alum of the Lincoln Center Directors Lab. Daniella has also assisted or associate directed for rockstars Leigh Silverman and Rebecca Taichman.

​As an Intimacy Director, Daniella believes in healing the industry through choreography and consent education. She brings a queer, feminist perspective to this work. She believes that a trauma-informed approach to handling onstage intimacy is essential to creating a safe working environment where performers are confident to take risks and do their most daring work. They have worked at Rattlestick, The Center at West Park and Exquisite Corpse Company (dir. Tess Howsam, NYTimes Critics Pick). She also works in and with schools such as Brooklyn College, University of Pennsylvania, Philips Exeter Academy, The College of New Jersey, Alfred University, NYU, and PPAS to bring consent-forward language and practices into their rehearsal and classrooms. Her intimacy training includes work with TIE, IDC, and a certification in Mental Health First Aid. 

Outside of theatre, Daniella’s short films “Untitled Sam Bennett Project, “Metalero” and “Strange Power” (starring L Morgan Lee) have been screened at many festivals including the Imagine This Film Festival, Salem Horror Festival, the NY Indie Theater Film Festival, The Berlin Flash Film Festival and have won Best Director, Best Comedy and Best Short. 

Daniella holds an MFA from The New School and a BA from Sarah Lawrence College. She lives in Brooklyn with her wife and rescue dog. ​
www.daniellacaggiano.com @dfcaggiano​