Jonas Vaitkus graduated from the Saint Petersburg State Institute of Theater, Music and Cinematography in 1974. From 1974 to 1975 he worked as the senior director in Šiauliai Drama Theater, and from 1975 to 1978, Vaitkus worked as a director in National Kaunas Drama Theater. From 1978 to 1980, he attended Senior Courses of Directing in Moscow, later from 1980 to 1988, he worked as a senior director in Kaunas Drama Theater. Since 1988, he was working as Lithuania’s National Drama Theater director, from 1990 to 1994, as the senior director at the same theatre. Since 1988, he is teaching in the Lithuanian Academy of Music and Theater as a professor. Since 1991, Jonas Vaitkus works as an educator in the USA, Norway and Denmark. He created plays in Lithuania and abroad, directed films for the cinema. In 2003, he received the National Culture and Art award. He became the director of the Lithuanian Russian Drama Theater in 2008.