[3] In her last year as an undergraduate at Princeton, Blain-Cruz directed Ntozake Shange’s For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide / When the Rainbow Is Enuf for her senior thesis.
[11] In 2013, she directed The Bakkhai (translated by Ned Moore) at Bard College,[12] and Hollow Roots by Christina Anderson for the Under the Radar Festival at The Public Theater.
[13] In 2015, she directed Salome at JACK in Brooklyn,[14] and in 2016, Red Speedo by Lucas Hnath at New York Theatre Workshop[15] and Revolt.
[16] Her 2016 direction of The Death of the Last Black Man in the Whole Entire World by Suzan-Lori Parks at Signature Theatre[17] was lauded by critic Ben Brantley, who called it “a hypnotic staging” by Blain-Cruz.
She wrote the play Create Dangerously, based on Edwidge Danticat's book of essays, and directed it at Miami New Drama in 2023.
[44] In January 2024, it was announced that a new musical about Prince called Purple Rain was in the works, with book by Branden Jacobs-Jenkins and directed by Blain-Cruz.
She was Artistic Associate at The Orchard Project & The Exchange from 2007 to 2009,[47] and in the Director's Lab at Lincoln Center Theater in 2008.
[48] In both 2017 and 2018, she was a United States Artists Fellow,[citation needed] and a former New York Theatre Workshop 2050 Fellowship awardee.