About Brooke Tansley

Producer. Performer. Arts & Entertainment Executive. Community Builder.

Brooke Tansley is a Nashville-based producer, writer, performer, and organizational leader whose career spans Broadway, film and television, international production, nonprofit leadership, and community innovation. With decades of experience bringing ambitious ideas to life, she works at the intersection of storytelling, culture, organizational strategy, and human connection.

Brooke began her professional career as a performer, playing Belle in Disney's Beauty and the Beast on Broadway and appearing in the original Broadway company of Hairspray, later performing the role of Penny Pingleton. Her screen credits include Law & Order: Criminal Intent and the Warner Bros. film Music and Lyrics. She was a writer and performer with the Upright Citizens Brigade in Los Angeles, appeared at major comedy festivals, and received a Scenie award for her performance as Clara Johnson in The Light in the Piazza.

Her career subsequently expanded into producing and executive leadership. As Executive Producer and Executive-in-Charge of Production at Practical Magic, she led complex international production operations for a science documentary series developed with Warner Bros. Discovery, coordinating creative teams, budgets, regulatory requirements, and institutional partnerships across six countries. Her work has brought her into collaboration with broadcasters, government agencies, universities, researchers, philanthropic organizations, and international production crews.

Brooke is the founder and Executive Director of Folklight, a nonprofit arts organization dedicated to strengthening communities through storytelling. Her leadership has encompassed creative development, organizational strategy, governance, fundraising, educational programming, and the stewardship of a $4 million public-outreach grant from the John Templeton Foundation. Through Folklight, she is developing a model that connects community storytelling with the creation of original film and television.

Previously, Brooke founded Sonoma Laughfest, building a multi-venue comedy festival featuring more than 100 performers and achieving profitability in its second year. As Executive Director of Sonoma Arts Live, she led an organizational turnaround that increased attendance by 219% and tripled subscriptions within six months. 

Beyond entertainment, Brooke has developed substantial experience in organizational strategy, people operations, workforce planning, employee relations, and organizational change within a global professional-services company. She brings an unusual combination of creative, operational, and human-centered expertise to questions of how organizations function, how people collaborate, and how institutions can better serve the people who depend on them.

In 2026, Brooke emerged as a leading candidate for the inaugural Executive Director of Nashville's Office of Entertainment, following a national search, and led the successful effort to restore its funding after the office's funding was eliminated. Her involvement in the process deepened her work at the intersection of cultural infrastructure, economic development, public policy, and the creative industries.

Today, Brooke's work extends beyond the arts to explore a larger question: Does it have to be this way?

Through writing, speaking, workshops, and community experiments, she examines how the systems shaping modern life affect our time, resources, relationships, and opportunities to flourish. Her initiatives include Let's Do Life Together and Help Hangs, which bring people together around the ordinary work of life, and Better Belonging, a framework for helping groups replace harmful criteria of belonging with behaviors that strengthen people and communities.

Across disciplines, Brooke's work is united by a belief that the ways we live, work, create, and connect are not inevitable—and that with imagination, collaboration, and practical leadership, we can build something better.