Kristen Tripp Kelley is a Western New York based theater artist who has been working in the region as an actor, director and theater educator for over two decades. As an actor she has been fortunate to collaborate with a wide array of WNY theater companies including Irish Classical Theatre Company, D’Youville Kavinoky, Road Less Traveled Productions, Second Generation Jewish Repertory Theatre of WNY, and Shakespeare in Delaware Park. 

Kristen has directed three Western New York premieres for the D’Youville Kavinoky Theatre and two world premieres for Road Less Traveled Productions. She was director for Diane Jones’ Forget Me Not that traveled to the Edinburgh Fringe Festival in 2019. She made her directorial debut with Irish Classical in 2023 with The Importance of Being Earnest.

Kristen is an award-winning theater educator and director at Nichols School where she serves as arts department chair. Her student productions of Hush: An Interview with America and The Penolopiad were accepted into the Edinburgh Fringe Festival through AHSTF (the American High School Theater Festival). She is a proud founder, former Co-President and current Council Member and Education Committee Co-Chair for ARTA and is the Western New York Regional Chair for NYSTEA (New York State Theater Education Association). Kristen earned a BA in Theater as a Performing Arts Honors Scholar at the University at Buffalo and an MFA in Acting from Purdue University.