Janeece Freeman Clark

Janeece Freeman Clark is a director, producer and skilled vocal technician all rolled into one. She is the founding Artistic Director of Vanguard Theater Company, a Montclair, NJ based regional theater where she has spent the last seven years reimagining musicals through color-conscious lenses, as well as developing original musicals told from the perspective of underrepresented voices. Through her work, Janeece explores how theatre can challenge participants, both theatre-makers and audiences, to think critically and increase empathy and understanding for others, therefore becoming more responsible members of our democracy. Vanguard is funded in part by TeeRico by Lin Manuel, and has been the recipient of numerous grants awarded to theater-makers committed to “changing the narrative.”

Janeece received her undergraduate degree from the University of Michigan with both a Voice Performance and Musical Theater emphasis, and her masters degree in Vocal Pedagogy from Westminster Choir College (Rider University.)

Janeece’s directing experience alongside her vocal expertise gives her a unique approach to training singers. Her process encourages students to engage their full bodies as well as their full hearts – with the goal of not only being technically sound singers, but artists who are always fully present, expressive and communicative. Janeece’s students and mentees have appeared on Broadway in: West Side Story, Rent, Tarzan, The Color Purple, Charlie & The Chocolate Factory, Tina, Ain’t Too Proud, and more. 

Prior to becoming a full-time director and vocal coach – As an actress, Janeece appeared on Broadway, Off-Broadway, in television, and on too many regional stages and national commercials to count.

Janeece is an adjunct professor of theater at Seton Hall University where she teaches acting and frequently directs main stage productions – most recently: Oklahoma, Twenty-Six Pebbles, and The Revolutionists. Janeece serves as special Advisor to Seton Hall’s Arts Council and sits on several boards within the tristate area, including the NJ Theater Alliance Board of Directors where she serves on the Equity and Access Committee.

A member of The Stage Directors and Choreographers Society, Janeece has had the pleasure of directing regional (and summer stock) productions of: Next to Normal, Songs for a New World, Memphis, Little Women, Spring Awakening, Into the Woods, Two Gentlemen of Verona, Music Man, Carrie, Heathers – and the original productions of Walk In My Gravity, A Portrait of Ray, and Everything is Fine Until It’s Not – the latter two also having successful NYC runs. Janeece directed the first and second National tour of the TYA favorite – Showtime with Shakespeare and her Off Broadway production of Everything Is Fine Until It’s Not won both the “Fringe Fave” award at the NYC Fringe Festival, as well as the “United Solo Backstage Audience Award.”