CONTRIBUTORS

Aaron Landsman is a writer, organizer and performance maker . His awards include a Guggenheim Fellowship, an Abrons Arts Center Artist Residency, a Princeton Arts Fellowship, and an ASU Gammage Residency. His projects have been commissioned and presented in New York by Abrons Art Center, The Chocolate Factory, The Foundry Theatre, EMPAC, and HERE and funded by Jerome, MAP, Mellon, Graham, NEFA, LMCC and the National Performance Network. Current work includes Perfect City, a 20-year art and activism collective working on gentrification, Language Reversal, a new theatrical work with collaborators in Serbia, Brazil and Nigeria and Night Keeper, a theatrical work about insomnia as a super power. He teachers at Princeton, has guest lectured at Princeton, ASU, Juilliard, NYU, Bennington and Bard, and co-created the Creative Capital Professional Development Program, was the first Development Director at The Field, and the first grants manager for the award-winning ensemble ERS Theater. He has performed with many artists, across the US and Europe, in Australia and on London’s West End. His book about participation, performance and democracy, No One is Qualified, co-written by Mallory Catlett, will be published by The University of Iowa Press in 2022. http://www.thinaar.com

Adam Chanler-Berat (he/him) is known for his performances in the original companies of Broadway’s Next to Normal, Peter and the Starcatcher, Saint Joan, and Amelie as well as Off-Broadway in Assassins, Rent, Fly By Night and Fortress of Solitude among others. As a writer, he is proud to be a member of the Civilian's 2022-23 R&D group. Adam was a 2020 Rhinebeck Writer in residence with collaborator and Kleban Prize winner Ryan Scott Oliver. His play with music, Contra, has been workshopped at Ars Nova, was a finalist for Space on Ryder Farm 2018, and a semi-finalist for the 2020 O’Neill Festival New Music Theater Conference. Adam was a writer-in-residence with Barrington Stage (2021) as well as New York Stage and Film (2022). His Civilian’s R&D musical, Assisted, written with composer Julian Hornik, is currently a finalist for the 2023 Rhinebeck Writing Residency and Berkeley Rep’s Ground Floor 2023 cohort.

Aeneas Sagar Hemphill (he/him) is an Indian-American playwright and screenwriter based in NYC and DC. Weaving through genres, his work builds new worlds to illuminate our own, using passion, pathos, and humor to investigate the ghosts that haunt our lives and communities. His plays include: Karma Sutra Chai Tea Latte (Gingold Speakers' Corner), Black Hollow (Argo Collective, Dreamscape Theatre), The Troll King (Pipeline), Childhood Songs (Monson Arts), The Republic of Janet & Arthur (Amios), The Red Balloon (Noor Theatre), A Stitch Here or There (DarkHorse Dramatists, Slingshot Theatre), A Horse and a Housecat (Slingshot Theatre). MFA Playwriting, Columbia University.

Alan Bounville is the​ Artistic Director of IN OUR WORDS, a theatre company that primarily uses stories from individuals as the source material for its work. As a teaching artist, Alan works with several leading companies in New York City and beyond. He also holds a Masters in Educational Theatre from New York University with a focus on theatre for social change. www.inourwords.org

Alex Ates is from New Orleans. He's the incoming director of theater arts at Westtown, a Quaker school outside of Philly, and an incoming Dean's Scholarship graduate student at NYU Gallatin. His writing has appeared in American Theatre, Backstage, Incite/Insight, and Scalawag. Alex was the education and engagement director of The NOLA Project, where he is still an ensemble member. He currently serves on the board for the American Alliance for Theatre and Education (AATE) and Goat in the Road Productions. With an MFA from The University of Alabama, Alex is the recipient of the SETC Graduate Young Scholar Award for his research on the Free Southern Theater and his research on Stage Studies at Black Mountain College is to be published as a chapter in the 28th edition of Theatre Symposium. Alex has been a guest director at Emerson College, Agnes Scott College, and Tulane University. He is the editor of AATE's Incite/Insight. BA from Emerson. iAmAlexAtes.com

Alex Hare is a director pursuing a path as a citizen-artist -- in one sense, creating work that's informed by movements for justice and visibility, and in another, bringing an artistic sensibility to participation in civic life. Co-artistic director of the theater collective The Brewing Department, Alex has developed and premiered work at HERE Arts Center, Cherry Lane Theatre, Dramatists Guild, NYCFringe, Dixon Place, Irondale Center, and Feinstein's/54 Below. He is a frequent assistant for film/theater director Bill Condon, including on "Side Show" (Broadway, Kennedy Center) and the 2017 live-action remake of "Beauty and the Beast." Other assistant directing credits include "School of Rock" (Winter Garden Theatre) and "Straight" (Acorn Theater). Alex studied English Literature and American Studies at Columbia University.

Alex Lambert has directed and produced three feature-length documentaries: The Mark of Cain, Bayou Blue, and Mentor, as well as numerous shorts. She was a writer on the HBO show Deadwood and a writer/producer on John from Cincinnati. She has conceived, written, and directed two short series for MOCA tv: Crime: The Animated Series, and Ambiance. She is the author of Crime and The Silencing. Patreon: www.patreon.com/user?u=22964805.

Amelia Parenteau is a writer, French-English translator, and theater maker with a passion for social justice, based in New Orleans. An alumna of Sarah Lawrence College, she has worked with Ping Chong + Company, The Civilians, the French Institute Alliance Française (FIAF), The Lark, the New York International Fringe Festival, the Park Avenue Armory, and Theatre Communications Group in New York City, as well as Trinity Repertory Company in Providence, RI, People's Light in Malvern, PA, the Eugene O'Neill Theater Center in Waterford, CT, the Théâtre du Soleil in Paris, France, and Intramural Theater and No Dream Deferred in New Orleans, LA. Her writing has been published in numerous publications including American Theatre Magazine, Contemporary Theatre Review, and HowlRound. www.amelia-parenteau.com

Amina Henry is the former Literary Associate for the Civilians. As a playwright, her work has been produced and/or developed by: Clubbed Thumb, HERE Arts Center, the Flea, the Cell: a 21st Century Salon, Dixon Place, Theater for the New City, the Brick, Drama of Works, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Kitchen Dog Theater, Brooklyn College, Texas State University, among others. She is currently an adjunct lecturer at Brooklyn College, as well as a teaching artist for the Shakespeare Society and the Teachers & Writers Collaborative. She is a graduate of Yale University, NYU's Performance Studies MA program and the MFA Playwriting program at Brooklyn College.

Anastasia Patlay is a Moscow based playwright, curator, and theatre director. Born in Tashkent, Anastasia made her career in Moscow’s documentary theatre Teatr.Doc. Since 2010, she has collaborated with Teatr.Doc as an invited director and five of her last shows remain in current theatre’s repertoire. Other productions are running in Sakharov center and Moscow State Museum of Architecture. Anastasia is also the director of the theatre programme titled Archeology of Memory at the Sakharov Center and the festival of documentary projects titled Hunting for Reality. Anastasia has delivered dramaturgical workshops including Memory of the Great Terror and Jews in USSR: family in the history. She is a participant of the theatre festival and the National Theatre Award, Golden Mask. Most of Patlay’s performances have travelled in Russia and abroad. From time to time, Anastasia Patlay conducts trainings and workshop on practices of documentary theatre. In her current activity Anastasia tends to communicate with different art professionals from all around the world, create and work out new ideas, participate in different common and individual activities and projects, get a deeper understanding on the complicated questions - “What is the art we create? What is the world we live in and what is the reality we act in?"

Andrea Ciannavei is a writer, teacher and activist. Graduated the Juilliard School’s Lila Acheson Playwriting Fellowship. Plays: "The Winstons" (Hangar Theater) and "Pretty Chin Up," produced by LAByrinth Theater Company (Artistic Directors: Philip Seymour Hoffman and John Ortiz) at the Public. TV: "American Odyssey" (NBC Universal), "Borgia" (Canal Plus) and "Copper" (BBC America). Andrea produces writing workshops for wounded veterans and family caregivers for Writers’ Guild Initiative and Wounded Warrior Project. In 2011, Andrea traveled to 10 countries on behalf of Marsha Norman, researching human trafficking, gender violence and economic issues impacting women. She is heavily involved in social and political activism and works for the Yes Men.

Andrew Saito (he/him) was a Fulbright Scholar in Papua New Guinea and Andrew W. Mellon Resident Playwright at the Cutting Ball Theater, which produced his plays Krispy Kritters in the Scarlett Night, Mount Misery, and his translation of Life is a Dream. Other productions: El Río (Brava/BACCE), Stegosaurus (or) Three Cheers for Climate Change (FaultLine), Men of Rab’inal (El Teatro Campesino/La Peña), and Br’er Peach (AlterTheatre/Parsnip Ship). He teaches at SUNY Purchase, was a member of the ViacomCBS 2020-21 Writers Mentoring Program, and a staff writer on The Lost Symbol (Peacock). Residencies: Montalvo, Blue Mountain Center, Djerassi, Arquetopia. MFA: Iowa.

Anne Washburn's plays include "Mr. Burns," "The Internationalist," "A Devil At Noon," "Apparition," "The Communist Dracula Pageant," "I Have Loved Strangers," "The Ladies," "The Small" and a transadaptation of Euripides' "Orestes." Her work has been produced by 13P, Actors Theater of Louisville, the Almeida, American Repertory Theatre, Cherry Lane Theatre, Clubbed Thumb, the Civilians, Dixon Place, Ensemble Studio Theater, the Folger, the Gate, Playwrights Horizons, Red Eye, Soho Rep, Studio Theater, Two River Theater Company, Vineyard Theater and Woolly Mammoth. Awards include a Guggenheim, a NYFA Fellowship, a Time Warner Fellowship, a Susan Smith Blackburn finalist, and residencies at MacDowell and Yaddo. She is an associated artist with the Civilians, Clubbed Thumb, New Georges, Chochiqq, and is an alumna of New Dramatists and 13P. Currently commissioned by MTC, Playwrights Horizons, and Yale Rep. "10 out of 12" will be produced this spring by Soho Rep in NYC.

Anthony Lioi is an associate professor of Liberal Arts and English at the Juilliard School, where he teaches academic writing, American literature, and cultural studies. He is working on a book called "Nerd Ecology."

Arielle is interested in how cultural institutions and arts initiatives can facilitate social justice and cultural equity through the championing of culturally specific performance. Emerging from her work and research around U.S. slavery, racial terror and justice, Arielle is committed to supporting and creating Black performance work that commands imaginative and material space for social transformation. In service of this work, Arielle's practice is necessarily multidisciplinary as it traverses cultural producing, cultural strategy, performance making, dramaturgy, public history and performance curation. Woven throughout her cultural work, Arielle teaches and facilitates workshops across various cultural and academic spaces. As a facilitator she has been most transformed by her work on The Love Balm Project, a workshop series and performance that centers the testimonies of mothers who have lost children to systemic violence (2010 -2015|more information below). Additionally, Arielle has taught performance at; Destiny Arts Center, Streetside Stories, Eastside Arts Alliance and Liberation Songs (at Morehouse College). She has been a guest lecturer at the Pomona College Department of Theatre and Dance. Arielle has facilitated workshops and or served on panels at Open Engagement, Common Field, Highlander Homecoming, ROOTS Weekend Atlanta, Theatre Bay Area Conference, College Art Association Conference, Alliance of Artist Communities, ASWAD and others. For her creative projects, Arielle has been awarded funding from CalHumanities, Center for Cultural Innovation, Akonadi Foundation, Zellerbach Family Foundation, Theatre Bay Area, USDAC, AlternateROOTS, Highlander Institute (We Shall Overcome Fund), the Leeway Foundation Art and Change Grant, the JKW Foundation, Velocity Fund, The Sachs Program for Arts Innovation, and MAP Fund. Arielle was recognized by Intersection for the Arts as as 2014 Changemaker. She was a Mellon Artistic Leadership Fellow for the 2014 Encuentro at LATC. She was a 2017-2018 Inaugural Diversity and Leadership Fellow at Alliance of Artists Communities. Arielle was a 2019 Monument Lab National Fellow. Arielle received her B.A. in Theatre from Pomona College and holds an M.A. in Public Humanities from Brown University where she was the 2015-2017 Public History of Slavery Graduate Fellow with the Center for the Study of Slavery and Justice. www.ariellejuliabrown.com

Teague is the founding artistic director of Notch Theatre Company and recipient of the Embark Fellowship Award for Social Innovation in Entrepreneurship. Notch creates community-responsive theatre to drive change around the pressing issues of our time, offering communities nationwide a platform to tell their real stories on stage and be their own change makers. Notch is currently producing Wild Home, which takes an odyssey across rural America using theatre to tell personal stories about threatened wilderness spaces and the communities that depend on them. Teague is a participating partner on Remember2019--an effort to make space for the congregation of the Black communities in the Arkansas Detla, supporting and facilitating local practices of self-determination, memory, and reflection as directly related to the lasting effects of racial terror, and the current and future health of these communities. Teague/Notch co-developed FIT, a play by Gwen Kingston about the 20th century American eugenics movement that partners with the Intellectual Disability community. While with Cornerstone Theater Company, Teague produced Talk It Out, which travels California creating community-engaged theater aimed at changing public policy around the school-to-prison pipeline crisis. Teague's work has been featured on Monument Lab, Broadway World, OnStage Blog, in N Magazine, Medium, the Huff Post, and by the US Department of Arts and Culture. Teague's work has received numerous awards including Broadway World awards for Best Director/Choreographer, Best Musical and Best Ensemble Cast, to name a few. www.ashteague.com, www.notchtheatre.org

Brandy Hoang Collier is a queer Vietnamese-American writer from San Antonio, TX. Selected works include The Blazing World (Polyphone Festival of New and Emerging Musicals 2021) with music by Sean Eads and Yoko’s Husband’s Killer’s Japanese Wife, Gloria (The 5th Avenue Theatre “First Draft” Commission 2021) with lyrics by Clare Fuyuko Bierman and music by Erika Ji. Collier also runs Root Beer Occasion Theatre Company with co-founder Jessie Field and works as a professional properties master. Off-Broadway credits include Mrs. Warren’s Profession (Gingold Theatrical Group), The Panic of ‘29 (Less Than Rent Theatre), and Belfast Girls (Irish Repertory Theatre). brandyhoangcollier.com

Brian Young is an editor, animator and visual effects artist living in New Jersey near some woods. He frequently ventures to New York City to collaborate on narrative and documentary film projects.

CALLEY N. ANDERSON is a Brooklyn-based playwright from Memphis, TN. Her work has been staged at several colleges and 10-minute play festivals around the country, including recent commissions by the Davidson College Theatre Department and the University of Memphis Department of Theatre and Dance. Anderson is currently a member of American Theatre Group PlayLab, Liberation Theatre Company Writing Residency Program, Clubbed Thumb Early Career Writers Group, The Civilians R&D Group, and is a Dramatists Guild Foundation Fellows alum. Beyond her writing, Anderson was previously the Showrunner’s Assistant for Season 2 of One of Us Is Lying (Peacock) and is currently Program Manager at NY Writers Coalition. BA: Davidson College | MFA: New School for Drama. calleynanderson.com

CANDIS C. JONES (Director). Upcoming Productions: 53% OF at The Alliance Theater, Cullud Wattah (The Public Theater), Pipeline Festival (Women's Project Theater) Upcoming Workshops: Trapt (Joe's Pub), A Dead Black Man (Playwrights Realm),. Past Productions: Pipeline (Detroit Public Theater), Nike (A.C.T. New Strands Festival), Gloria (AADA), The Wolves (AADA), Brother Rabbit (New Black Fest), Name Calling (Kennedy Center), The Fire This Time Festival (Kraine Theater) New Shoes (The Drama League), Morning in America (Primary Stages), TEMBO! (Zanzibar International Film Fest). Awards and Fellowships: Lilly Award, Fellow WP Theater’s 2018-2020 Lab, Drama League Alumni. www.candiscjones.com

Carlo D'Amore is the owner and creative director for LIT. An award winning writer, director, producer as well as an actor with Broadway, off broadway, regional theater, film and television credits. With Live IN Theater aside from creating and directing the work, he has also originated the role of Yosef Solanskie in The Ryan Case 1873 and played Augustus MacCorck, Benjamin Ryan, Patrick Burke, and one time he came very close to playing Sally Watkins the pickpocket prostitute. In The Lombardi Case 1975 he originated the role of Joey Lombardi-the brother and has played Vinnie The Mouth, Sergeant Lawrence O'Donelly, Captain Patrick Miller, Trickypop (the male version on Trixypop the junkie). He is thrilled to have the opportunity to create new work with the amazing actors who are part of Live IN Theater.

Carlos Sirah is a native of the Mississippi Delta. He is a writer, performer, and cultural worker. Sirah creates formal structures rooted in Black expressions of possibility that take the shape of concert, lyric prose, procession, & screen and stage plays. His work aims to center and uplift the voices of the often unheard. Sirah’s transdisciplinary work takes its cues from multiple aesthetic traditions: Black Arts Movement, Butoh, Free Jazz, Blues, & Field Hollers. Sirah has shown or developed work with The Flea Theater, The Playwright’s Center, The Bushwick Starr, AS220, The Baltic Centre for Contemporary Art, The Palestinian National Theatre in Jerusalem, the Chicago Cultural Center, and the National Veterans Art Museum. His work has been supported with residencies or grants from the Vermont Studio Center, Haystack Mountain School of Crafts, Warrior Writers in collaboration with the William Joiner Center for the Study of War and Social Consequences, Ragdale, The Hambidge Center, The Virginia Center for Creative Arts, Millay Colony, The Blue Mountain Center, MAP Fund, Network of Ensemble Theatres, Alternate Roots, the National Endowment of the Humanities, and the Writers Guild Foundation. Sirah is a member of the Remember2019 collective, the emerging Veterans Art Movement, Warrior Writers, and Petit Maroon, and is the founder and project director of the ritual ecology project, RiverRites. Carlos Sirah is a Macdowell fellow and a graduate of Brown University’s MFA in Writing for Performance.

Caroline Meredith is the Editorial and Social Media Intern for The Civilians and a student at NYU's Gallatin School of Individualized Study (BA '22), where she is concentrating on arts administration and writing. She previously served as the editorial intern for American Theatre magazine and their publisher, Theatre Communications Group. As a general management intern, she assisted Martian Entertainment with "The Play That Goes Wrong" Off-Broadway and the 2019 Broadway transfer of "The Lightning Thief." At NYU, she was a producer of the 2020 Gallatin Arts Festival and a student editor and frequent contributor to Confluence, NYU Gallatin's online platform for student writing, art, and research.

César Alvarez is a Drama Desk-nominated composer, lyricist, performer and writer. His Civil War sci-fi musical "FUTURITY" world premiered at American Repertory Theater in 2012 and was a co-commission of Walker Art Center. César's band, The Lisps, has released 4 albums and played hundreds of shows around the country since 2005. César is co-founder and resident composer of the LA-based dance theater company Contra-Tiempo. He has presented work at Lincoln Center, MASS MoCA, the Stone, Roulette, Dixon Place, the Tank, Joe’s Pub, HERE, La MaMa, Dance New Amsterdam, Ars Nova, Walker Art Center, ASU Gammage, Ford Amphitheater, RedCat, and CounterPulse, among others. César was a member of the Civilians' R&D Group for 2012-13, a visiting artist in the Sarah Lawrence College Theater Program and a Visiting Lecturer on Dramatics at Harvard University. He writes about theater, music and science at www.musicisfreenow.org.

Chris Tyler is a performing artist examining the intersections of popular culture and contemporary identity. A graduate of Brown University, he has shown original performance at the Under the Radar Festival, Prelude, Taylor Swift's apartment, and gay bars all over Brooklyn.

Clare Fuyuko Bierman is a playwright and lyricist raised in a Japanese-Jewish home with some rabbits, a snake, and a bunch of finches. Current commissions include Yoko’s Husband’s Killer’s Japanese Wife, Gloria (Book by Brandy Hoang Collier, Music by Erika Ji, Winner of 5th Avenue Theater’s First Draft Commission), and Theseus and the Minotaur and the Other Six (Music by Joshua Vranas, Youth Theater Northwest). She has participated in the Johnny Mercer Songwriting Project, Broadway’s Future Songbook Series, and the Samuel French Off-Off Broadway Play Festival. Originally from Los Angeles, she received her MFA from New York University. clarebierman.com

Cory Tamler's writing and translations have been published by Asymptote Journal, Howlround, the Berlin Theatertreffen, EXBERLINER, and in the anthology The Animated Reader edited by Brian Droitcour for the New Museum. As a playwright and theater maker, her focus is on collaborative and community-based, site-responsive performance, and she has written plays and created performances based on research, interviews, and places with Open Waters Theater Arts, Yinzerspielen, and Unlisted. She is a member of the Network of Ensemble Theaters and an alumna of DirectorsLabChicago, and was part of The Civilians' inaugural Field Research Team. She teaches creative writing workshops with WritopiaLab and is the teaching artist in residence with Brooklyn Acts. Originally from Pittsburgh, Cory has lived and worked in Chicago, and in Berlin as a Fulbright scholar. Currently, she is based in Brooklyn. <a href="http://www.corytamler.com">www.corytamler.com</a>

Crystal Skillman (Writer) is an award-wining dramatist. She is an NY Innovative Theatre Award winner, an alumni of Youngblood, the WP and Soho Rep Writer/Director Lab, and an EST member. Plays include NYTimes Critics Picks OPEN (The Tank), KING KIRBY (The Brick), GEEK (Vampire Cowboys), and CUT (Theatre Under St. Marks), as well as ANOTHER KIND OF LOVE (Chopin Theatre), and WILD (Lucille Lortel MCC Reading, IRT). New plays include PULP VÉRITÉ (2019 Kilroys List Honorable Mention) and RAIN AND ZOE SAVE THE WORLD (2018 EMOS Prize). She is the book writer of  the musical MARY AND MAX  (Composer/Lyricist Bobby Cronin), winner of the 2018 MUT Award Critics Prize, which premiered at Theatre Calgary last fall, which will premiere in Europe this fall.  TV/Comic Books: EAT FIGHTER (WebToon), ADVENTURE TIME (Boom! Studios), and the pilot PAPER HEROES (Finalist for Big Break and Launch Pad).  https://www.crystalskillman.com/ 

Cynthia Hopkins is an internationally acclaimed musical performance artist. She writes and sings songs, records albums and creates groundbreaking multi-media performance works that intertwine truth and fiction, blurring the lines between edification and entertainment. Through the process of making performances, she attempts to alchemize disturbance into works of intrigue and hope that simultaneously stimulate the senses, provoke emotion and enliven the mind. She has produced six performance works: "A Living Documentary" (2014); "This Clement World" (2013); "The Truth: A Tragedy" (2010); "The Success of Failure (or, The Failure of Success)" (2009); "Must Don't Whip 'Um" (2007 Bessie Award for design); and "Accidental Nostalgia" (2005 Bessie Award for Creation). She also has produced eight albums of original music: "The Truth: A Tragedy" (2010); "The Success of Failure (or, The Failure of Success)" (2009); "Must Don’t Whip ‘Um" (2008); "Accidental Nostalgia" (2005); "Alas Alack" (2002); "Devotionals (Songs for Shunkin)" (2001); "Hooker" (2000); and "Gloria Deluxe" (1999). Her band Gloria Deluxe (1999-2009) developed an enthusiastic following for its unique blend of folk, cabaret, rock, blues and country music, producing multiple albums and performing hundreds of concerts, opening for legendary artists such as David Byrne and Patti Smith. Her work has been honored with many awards, including the 2007 Alpert Award in Theater and a 2010 Guggenheim Fellowship. Ms. Hopkins also works as a performer and composer for hire, most recently appearing at BAM in the Big Dance Theater piece "Alan Smithee Directed This Play." She is currently at work on several new projects — an experimental lecture demonstration about alcoholism, a memorial service for her large-scale works in collaboration with the Fabric Workshop &amp; Museum in Philadelphia, and a piece exploring the trials and tribulations of social media — while continuing to work as a performer, composer, voice over artist and musician for many other folks.

Dan Caffrey is a playwright, musician, teacher, and pop-culture critic who graduated from The University of Texas at Austin's M.F.A. Playwriting program in 2020. He's currently based in Brooklyn after a stint teaching playwriting at the Tony Award-winning Alliance Theatre in Atlanta.

Darrel Alejandro Holnes is a poet, playwright, and researcher from Panama City, Panama, and the former Panama Canal Zone. His plays have won or been finalists for various awards and honors including the Princess Grace Award in Playwriting, Eugene O'Neill Theater Center's National Playwrights Conference, WSU’s Best New Play, Farrar Prize in Playwriting, and the Hopwood Award in Drama at the University of Michigan – Ann Arbor. He’s been awarded various grants including a Kitchen Theater Company New Play Development Grant, Arch &amp; Bruce Brown Foundation Production Grant, and the Jerome Foundation Travel and Study Grant in Literature. His plays have been presented as part of the Kennedy Center for the Arts College Theater Festival (THE BURNING ROOM), NOW African Playwrights Festival (SHELL SHOCK), Brick Theater's Festival of Lies (BIRD OF PRAY), Keep Soul Alive! at the National Black Theater (TRIGGER), and elsewhere nationwide. He is a MacDowell fellow in playwriting and a member of the Lincoln Center Directors Lab, Page 73’s Interstate 73 Writers’ Group, the Musical Theater Factory’s POC Roundtable, and the Stillwater Writers Workshop. His play NATIVITY was selected for the 50PP List of top unproduced plays by Latinx playwrights in 2018. His play STARRY NIGHT was a 2018 finalist for the O'Neill's National Playwrights Conference and a 2019 finalist for the Princess Grace Award in Playwriting. His play FRANKLIN AVE was selected for the 2019 SolFest: A Latinx Theater Festival presented by The Sol Project and Pregones Theater/Puerto Rican Traveling Theater, and an excerpt of his play MIMADO was read at Primary Stages as part of their Infinite Stories series presented by NYC Latinx Playwrights.

Dan Hoyle is an actor and playwright based in New York City. His brand of journalistic theater has been hailed as "riveting, funny and poignant" (New York Times) and "hilarious, moving and very necessary" (Salon). His solo shows “Each And Every Thing,” “The Real Americans” and “Tings Dey Happen” — all created and premiered at The Marsh Theater in his native San Francisco — have had critically acclaimed runs Off-Broadway (Culture Project, Joe’s Pub at The Public Theater) toured the country and overseas (Berkeley Rep, Cleveland Playhouse, Portland Center Stage, Painted Bride in Philadelphia, The Park in Calcutta, India and five cities in Nigeria on an official U.S. State Department tour), and received several awards (Will Glickman Best New Play Award, TBA Best New Play Award, Edgerton Winner, Prize of Hope, Lucille Lortel nominee, Bay Area Theater Critics Circle). Hoyle was a Fulbright Scholar in Nigeria in 2005-2006, and has been awarded grants from the Fulbright Foundation, the Pew Theater Initiative, the Fleishhacker Foundation, the Zellerbach Foundation, and the Circumnavigator’s Club. He has served as an artist-in-residence teacher and has taught workshops at colleges and theaters around the country. He holds a double degree in Performance Studies and History from Northwestern University and lives in the South Bronx with his wife Lyra, a visual artist and art teacher in Bronx and Manhattan schools.

Deepali Gupta is a composer-lyricist, playwright, and performance artist based in Brooklyn, NY. She makes heretical choral works, morbid attempts at bubblegum pop, and actual plays and musicals. Her work has been performed at a range of venues including Ars Nova, Joe's Pub, The Public Theatre, The New Ohio Theatre, Dixon Place, The Invisible Dog, and Vital Joint. Recent projects as a composer include SEHNSUCHT (JACK, dir. Sarah Blush), SKI END (The New Ohio, devised by Piehole/dir. Tara Ahmedinejad), MINOR CHARACTER (Under the Radar, The Sharon Playhouse, created by New Saloon/dir. Morgan Green), and a song for FAR AWAY (Harvard University, dir. Annie Tippe). B.A. in Writing for Performance, Brown University (Weston Award recipient). M.F.A. in Musical Theatre Writing from Tisch School of the Arts. Find her on Soundcloud: deepali (k) gupta - or her Website: deepaligupta.net - or even Instagram: deepaligupta

Hailed by the San Francisco Chronicle as “a tower of strength in the Bay Area theatre scene,” Denmo is an American playwright, actor, author, and entrepreneur of Egyptian descent. A Sundance Theatre Lab and Rainin Fellowship Finalist, her work has toured to international festivals in Cairo, Berlin, and Loire Valley, and to parks, black box theaters, and universities throughout the U.S. Her children’s book Zaynab’s Night of Destiny will be published by Fons Vitae in late 2021. Her next writing project is a ten-part historical drama for Audible. Denmo holds an MFA from Naropa University. denmoibrahim.com

Dezi Tibbs (she/him) is a dramaturg, writer, and performer based in New York City and Philadelphia, PA. She aims to afflict the comfortable and comfort the afflicted. His work likes to utilize stereotypes, magic, and television tropes in order to reveal humanity’s secrets. She finds herself drawn to pieces that center blackness, queerness, or spirituality. As a dramaturg, his work is very research driven but grounded in tangible concepts. www.dezitibbs.com

Divya Mangwani is a theatre artist from Pune, based in New York. She creates reimaginings that question our perception of narrative truths and shared mythologies. Divya was the founder and Artistic Director of Moonbeam Factory Theatre and wrote, directed, and produced plays in India, Singapore and the UK. MFT was the first English language theatre in Pune committed to original productions and community building. In New York, she has developed work with UNICEF, Soho Rep, New York Theatre Workshop, Bushwick Starr, Rattlestick Playwrights Theater, Mabou Mines, Gingold Theatrical Group, Hypokrit Theatre, The Flea, among others. Divya is a New Georges Jam member and was a fellow of Soho Rep’s Writer/Director Lab, Gingold Speakers Corner playwright, NYTW 2050 Artistic Fellow, Hypokrit Theatre Tamasha playwright, Project Y Writers Group playwright, and Playlab fellow at Pipeline Theatre. As a journalist and editor, Divya has worked with ESPN, The Times of India, Daily News &amp; Analysis, and Crisis Response Journal. www.divyamangwani.com

Daniel Krane is a Brooklyn-based director, playwright, and arts journalist. He was the Civilians' Editorial and Social Media Intern for the 2019-2020 season. In addition to his work at the Civilians, he served as the Artistic Director at Princeton Summer Theater for two critically-acclaimed seasons, and has worked for the Public Theater's Public Works program and the Brooklyn Arts Exchange. His writing has been featured in American Theatre Magazine, Exeunt NYC, and Extended Play. He received his B.A. from Princeton University in 2018, where he studied Portuguese and Theater. DanielKrane.com

Dominic is a Brooklyn-based playwright, performer and freelance dramaturg. His writing has been produced and developed around the country, including with Actors Theatre of Louisville, the Civilians, the Lark Play Development Center, the National New Play Network, PlayPenn, Portland Center Stage, the Flea Theater, the Kennedy Center, the Ucross Foundation, the Amoralists and at the Samuel French Off-Off Broadway Short Play Festival. Dominic is a native of San Francisco and is completing the MFA Playwriting program at Columbia University.

Ed Wasserman is a New York City-based playwright, currently pursuing his MFA at Columbia University. His plays include "Dear Mr. Kappus," "From Pilgrim Landing," and "Between Fire and Smoke." Ed is also a co-creator of "Town Hall," an interactive, documentary piece, modeled on the format of local town hall meetings.

Elizagrace Madrone is a writer, theater-maker, &amp; dramaturg living in-between NYC and the Northern California backwoods.

EllaRose is an award-winning New York based writer. She is currently working on "Cotton Candy and Cocaine" (Ars Nova Uncharted), "Patriettes" (The Tank’s TV Writing Program), and a new investigative piece in The Civilians R &amp; D Group. Her other projects include the Malaysian musical "Marrying Me" (BOH Cameronian Arts Award Winner), "Sidney D. Crosier: An Unfinished Portrait" (Hayswood Theater), "The Daguerreotype" (Prospect Theater), "Left to Our Own Devices" (Ronald M. Ruble New Play Finalist), "Endless Summer" (NYFA Estuary), and a commission about Indiana’s Bicentennial. She has contributed material to a variety of feminist and politically engaged projects, including "Be the Death of Me" and "Occupy Your Mind" (The Civilians), "We Are Theatre!" (Cherry Lane Theatre), "By the Numbers" (Prospect Theater) and "The Birds and the Bees: Unabridged" (Honest Accomplice Theater). She is a founding member of Bastard Playground, in residence at the Drama League. Additionally, EllaRose is a 2015-16 Dramatists Guild Fellow, NYFA Fellowship Playwriting/Screenwriting Finalist, a winner of the Weston Award for musical theater, and a proud member of ASCAP and the Dramatists Guild. BA: Brown University; MFA: NYU Tisch.

Eric Marlin (he/him/his) has been produced and developed by the Public Theater, Theatertreffen Stückemarkt, Ars Nova's ANT Fest, the Civillians, Edinburgh Festival Fringe, The Tank, Dixon Place, Samuel French, HOT! Festival, Exquisite Corpse Company, PTP/NYC, Tennessee Williams Festival, Play Date @ Pete's, and Wildclaw Theatre. Winner of the Samuel French OOB Short Play Festival. Finalist for SPACE at Ryder Farm, the Jewish Plays Project, and two-time finalist for the O'Neill National Playwrights Conference. Current member of the Civilians' R&amp;D Group. Former Resident Artist at Montclair's New Works Initiative. MFA: Iowa Playwrights Workshop. BA: Bennington College.

Erika Ji is a cross-genre composer-storyteller who loves soaring melodies, dream worlds, and stories that challenge our preconceptions about what is true, good, right, or worth wanting. Her works, including Yoko's Husband's Killer's Japanese Wife, Gloria (5th Avenue Theatre First Draft Commission) and VISARE (immersive circus fantasia, 2021 New Voices Project Winner), have been featured Off-Broadway and around the world at Lincoln Center, the Public Theater, the Rattlestick Playwrights Theater, and the Nadia Boulanger Institute. The proud daughter of Chinese immigrants, Erika studied computer science &amp; philosophy at Stanford and built products at Dropbox before deciding to follow the music. MFA: NYU Tisch. erikaji.com

Eva von Schweinitz (Creator) is an interdisciplinary theater- and filmmaker. Recent projects: GERMAN INTERMEDIATE I / HEIMAT (The Bushwick Starr), THE GREAT GOD BROWN (TMT Lab, The Brick), ALL ABOUT NOTHING (FFT Düsseldorf), A FILM IS A FILM IS A FILM (Tribeca Film Festival), HEADS OR TAILS (Palm Springs International ShortFest), REENVISIONING THE HOMELESS (Brooklyn Homeless Shelters). As projection designer, Eva has worked with Elevator Repair Service on MEASURE FOR MEASURE (The Public), ARGUENDO (Associate Designer, The Public, OBIE Award Outstanding Projection Design), and THE SOUND AND THE FURY (New York Theatre Workshop, The Public). Further video/sound design collaborations include:Sibyl Kempson, Piehole, Superhero Clubhouse, Eliza Bent, and Sarah Hughes. Eva is a founding member of pulk fiktion, a German theater collective, which was awarded the 2016 George Tabori Advancement Award. MFA in Performance and Interactive Media Arts from Brooklyn College. BA in Film from International Filmschool Cologne.

Felicia Limada, or simply referred to as Limada, is a New York based performance artist. Predominantly a dancer, she has trained with prestigious schools throughout her childhood and well into her young adult career. While she has been technically trained under the names of Obediah Wright, Deborah Zall, Cassandra Phiffer, and Michael Leon Thomas to name a few, Limada briefly drew away from the art of dance and delved into other mediums such as writing, modeling, and photography. Limada is a graduate of SUNY Purchase College with a B.A. in Journalism and a certified Zumba® Fitness Instructor. She is the Management Intern at the Civilians and continues to freelance artistically, with plans of enrolling into grad school for a M.F.A. in the Performing Arts.

Gabriel "Gaby" Alter is a songwriter and composer living in Brooklyn, originally from Berkeley, California. His musicals include NOBODY LOVES YOU with playwright Itamar Moses (Second Stage, The Old Globe Theater), BAND GEEKS (Goodspeed Musicals, Human Race Theater, MTI) and the song cycle 29 (Joe's Pub, NYU Steinhardt, Troy University) as well as contributions to STARS OF DAVID (DR2 Theater, National Tour). Film &amp; TV: Disney's animated feature "Tinkerbell and the Pirate Fairy", PBS Kids TV, "3rd Street Blackout" (MarVista) starring Janeane Garofalo and John Hodgman. Gaby is the recipient of a Jonathan Larsen grant, the San Diego and San Francisco Critics' Circle Awards for Best Original Score and an ASCAP Plus Award in Musical Theater. He recently released his debut folk pop album under the name Yes Gabriel. 

Georgina Escobar's playwriting credits include: "Sweep" (Carnaval of New Latino Plays, 2015) The Wayfoot Series (In Development: INTAR, NYC; original development at the National Puppetry Conference, 2014), "Coal: Fable of the Firerock 2.0" (The Lensic, 2012); "Ash Tree" (Duke City Repertory, ASSITEJ Festival, Kennedy Center's National TYA Award);THE RUIN (Manhattan Repertory Theatre, Words Afire Festival of New Works, 2011). Artistic Development includes: OMPF (INTAR), The Brooklyn Generator (Brooklyn), HotInk Festival (The Lark), Literary Associate (2011-12) and Playwright Lab Instructor (NTI) Eugene O’Neill Theater Center. Other work: Founder of Fourth Wall/One Blue Cat Productions, contributing writer for American Theatre Magazine, HowlRound, Café Onda, and Culturebot, Steering Committee Member for the Latina/o Theatre Commons. www.georginaescobar.com

Julia Meinwald and Gordon Leary's musicals include "Pregnancy Pact" (2012 Weston Playhouse premiere, 2011 NAMT, 2011 Yale Institute for Musical Theatre), "I Love You, Anita Bryant" (2015 Polyphone Festival at UArts, 2014 OutLoud reading at Ars Nova), "Disappeared" (2009 Lincoln Center Directors Lab), and the short film "Galaxy Comics" (2014 United Airlines in-flight programming.) Together, they have been Dramatists Guild fellows and inaugural members of Ars Nova's Uncharted. Gordon's other work has received the 2009 Richard Rodgers Award and been featured in both the Daegu International Musical Festival and the Seoul Musical Festival. Gordon is a graduate of NYU's Musical Theatre Writing Program.

Grace Cannon is a theater artist and educator living in Big Horn, WY. She graduated from Vassar College with a major in American Culture and minor in German Studies. After volunteering for a year through AmeriCorps and studying in Berlin with a Fulbright Fellowship, Grace began working with American Theater Company eventually assistant directing under PJ Paparelli on the production of the original documentary play "The Project(s)." She has directed staged readings and in short play festivals in Chicago. Grace is a great believer in the power of documentary theater. Her passion for the form began when she formed No Fog West Theater Company to produce "The Laramie Project" and "Talking to Terrorists" in Wyoming, Utah, and Idaho. It has been solidified in her work in the New Play and Education departments of American Theater Company in Chicago.

Grace McLean is an actor, singer, writer and composer. Broadway: Natasha, Pierre... (also Off-Broadway, ART). Off-Broadway: New Group, MCC, LCT3, Public, Vineyard, La MaMa, among others. 2017 Emerging Artist Award, Lincoln Center. Grace McLean &amp; Them Apples performed in the 2015 and 2016 seasons of Lincoln Center’s American Songbook, and Grace toured Pakistan and Russia as an artistic ambassador with the US State Department. She is a member of the 2020 Civilians R&amp;D Group and a Writer-In-Residence at Lincoln Center Theater where her original musical In The Green was commissioned and produced, earning her the Lucille Lortel Award for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Musical as part of 6 Lortel nominations, including for Outstanding Musical. She also received a 2020 Richard Rodgers Award. www.gracemclean.com

Hailey is a dramaturg and writer of plays, essays, and other things.

Héctor Flores Komatsu is an international theater-maker, based in México and the US. Artistic Director of Makuyeika Creativo Teatral and fellow at the Laboratory for Global Performance and Politics of Georgetown University. HFK founded Makuyeika after a yearlong journey across México conducted as an inaugural recipient of The Julie Taymor World Theatre Fellowship. He’s worked with Peter Brook as an apprentice in Battlefield, as an actor in The Valley of Astonishment, and most the Spanish- language premiere of The Suit. Graduate of the University of Michigan (BFA Theatre Directing). Has trained with the Suzuki Company of Toga, Japan, interned with Théâtre de la Ville - Paris, and facilitated theatre workshops in prisons and favelas of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

Ilana Becker is a producer and director specializing in new play and musical development, investigative and verbatim material, community-driven projects, and arts education. In addition to currently serving as The Civilians’ R&amp;D Group Program Director, she has been a member of the staffs of All For One Theater, Lincoln Center Education, and Bret Adams Ltd, and spent a year as the Associate Artistic Director and Interim Artistic Director of Company of Fools/Sun Valley Center for the Arts. Line Producing includes work with CollaborationTown, All For One, and Jewish Plays Project. Ilana is the creator of Argument Sessions, a series of ongoing immersive theatrical events weaving verbatim SCOTUS transcripts with collaboratively developed original material. She is a member of the WP Theater 2018-2020 Producers Lab, and an alum of the Civilians’ R&amp;D Group, Lincoln Center Theater Directors Lab, DirectorsLabChicago, Fresh Ground Pepper PlayGroup, as well as a Playwrights Horizons Robert Moss Directing Fellow and an Emerging Leader of NY Arts Fellow. Much gratitude to Megan and EllaRose for laying the R&amp;D Group groundwork. www.ilanabecker.com

Jack Cummings III most recently directed Transport Group’s "Three Days to See," "Almost, Maine" and "I Remember Mama," as well as the world premiere of Terrence McNally’s "And Away We Go" for the Pearl Theatre Company. He is a five-time Drama Desk Award nominee for Outstanding Director. Additional New York credits include "A Thousand Words Come To Mind" and "Arlington" (both for New York’s Premieres/Inner Voices), and the 2013, 2014, &amp; 2015 Drama Desk Awards. For PBS, he directed a musical version of "A Tale of Two Cities" (filmed in Brighton, England), starring Michael York. Jack received his MFA from The University of Virginia and his BA from The College of William and Mary. He is married to actress Barbara Walsh.

Jacob is a New York-based actor, composer, and musician. As an actor, he has performed regionally at Bucks County Playhouse, Weston Playhouse, Williamstown Theatre Festival, Huntington Theatre Company, Company One, New Repertory Theatre, Speakeasy Stage Company, and Wheelock Family Theatre. He has been a featured composer at NYMF, and his work as a composer/performer has been developed and performed at New York City Center, Ars Nova, Ensemble Studio Theater, Chinatown Soup, Fresh Ground Pepper, the Exponential Festival, The Tank, and the Motor Company. Jacob's actor-musician show "1969: The Second Man" premiered at New York Theatre Workshop as part of their Next Door Series. He is an alum of The Civilians R&amp;D group, and a graduate of Harvard College, where he studied acting and playwriting.

Jacques Servin, along with Igor Vamos, is half of the activist duo the Yes Men. He performs under the alias Andy Bichlbaum.

James Carter is a writer and experience designer. He was a founding member of terraNOVA Collective and its associate artistic director for eight years. Recent transmedia plays include "FEEDER: A Love Story" (terraNOVA/HERE, NYC) and "NY_Hearts" (One Muse Presents &amp; The Brick Game Play Festival). James also works as a social impact strategy and research consultant for Lina Srivastava, LLC. He has written for the Creators Project, Culturadar.com, ArtsFwd and Theatre Communications Group.

James La Bella (he/him) is a writer and performer from New England. He earned his BFA from Emerson College, with additional coursework completed at Harvard University. Jameslabella.com

Jan Cohen-Cruz wrote Local Acts, Engaging Performance, and Remapping Performance, edited Radical Street Performance, and, with Mady Schutzman, co-edited Playing Boal and A Boal Companion. She was Director of Field Research for A Blade of Grass, which supports socially-engaged artists, and directed Imagining America: Artists and Scholars in Public Life. A longtime professor at NYU, Cohen-Cruz initiated Drama’s minor in applied theater and received ATHE’s Award for Leadership in Community-Based Theatre and Civic Engagement (2012). Jan was evaluator for the US State Department/ Bronx Museum cultural diplomacy initiative smARTpower and for seven initiatives of NYC’s Public Artists in Residence (PAIR) t. She is writing, with Rad Pereira, Meeting the Moment: Socially Engaged Performance, 1965-2020, by Those Who’ve Lived It.

Jasmyn Brielle is a writer, poet, and creative director. She finds her inspiration through love, travel, and nature. After graduating from SUNY Purchase with a B.A. in Journalism she dove into editorial writing at Collide Agency covering events like Village Voice’s Choice Eats, NYC’s Food Film Festival, and Northside’s Taste Talks. Discovering new food haunts is her hobby, and on her days off you can find her writing poems in a sunset.

Jason Tseng is a queer, non-binary Chinese-American playwright based in New York City, originally hailing from the suburbs of Washington, D.C. Their plays have been presented and developed by Flux Theatre Ensemble, Judson Arts, Mission to dit(Mars), Theatre COTE, Inkubator Arts, Second Generation, Downtown Urban Arts Festival, and LA Queer New Works Festival. They are a Creative Partner of Flux Theatre Ensemble, a member of The Civilians’s 2019/2020 R&amp;D Group, a member of Mission to dit(Mars)’s Propulsion Lab, and their plays have been honored as Semi-finalists for the New American Voices Playwrights Festival and the Eugene O’Neil National Playwrights Conference. Jason’s full-length plays include Rizing (World Premier, Flux Theatre Ensemble), Like Father, Same Same, Ghost Money, Fear and Wonder, and The Other Side. Find more at www.jasontseng.co

Jay Stull is a director and playwright. Recent New York directing credits include "Utility" by Emily Schwend (The Amoralists at The Rattlestick), "As Far As The Day Goes" by Jenny Schwartz (Clubbed Thumb, Workshop Production), "Omega Kids" by Noah Mease (Dixon Place), "Take Me Back" by Emily Schwend (Walkerspace), "Leave Me Green" by Lisi DeHaas (Gym at Judson), and "Enter at Forest Lawn" and "Rantoul and Die" by Mark Roberts (The Amoralists). His written and directing work has been seen at or developed by LAByrinth, Ars Nova, the Bloomington Playwrights Project, The Flea, Dixon Place, Fresh Ground Pepper, the Lark Play Development Center, Ugly Rhino, The Culture Project, and Joe’s Pub. He was a Directing Fellow with Clubbed Thumb and a member of the Lincoln Center Directors Lab and The Civilians R&amp;D Group. He is an alumnus of Fresh Ground Pepper’s Playground Play Group, Pataphysics at The Flea, and Bowdoin College.

Jeanine Oleson is a visual artist with a growing interest in performance and opera. She attended the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and Rutgers University. Oleson has exhibited and performed at venues including: New Museum, NY; Exit Art, NY; Beta Local, San Juan, Puerto Rico; X-Initiative, NY; Grand Arts, Kansas City, MO; Commonwealth &amp; Council, CA; Socrates Sculpture Park, NY; Diverseworks, Houston, TX; L.A.C.E., Los Angeles; Monya Rowe Gallery, NY; Samson Projects, Boston, MA; MoMA/P.S.1, NY; Pumphouse Gallery, London; White Columns, NY; and Art in General, NY. Oleson received a Franklin Furnace Fellowship and a Jerome Foundation Travel and Study Grant (2009), a Brooklyn Arts Council Community Arts Regrant (2008 and 2009), and a Professional Development Fellowship through College Art Association (1999–2000). She was in residence at the New Museum, Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture and Smack Mellon Studio Program. She also published two books about performance projects in 2012 — “What?” and “The Greater New York Smudge Cleanse.” Oleson is an Assistant Professor at Parsons the New School for Design. She lives in Brooklyn, NY, and was a member of the Civilians' 2013-2014 R&amp;D group. www.jeanineoleson.com

Jeremy D. Olson creates installations, videos and performances that explore our unconscious and affective relationships with mundane entities – politicians, tomatoes, ants, Gatorade, Spandex and generic office furniture, for example – to trace our entanglements in larger social and ideological systems. His work uses exaggeration and exacerbation to produce uncanny effects, sometimes adhering to aesthetic rules too strictly, or at the wrong times, resulting in forms that are seductive, awkward and disturbing. A former dancer and physicist, his work has been exhibited in New York City and internationally, and he has performed with David Neumann, Trisha Brown, Polly Motley and many others. He has an MFA from Parsons, the New School for Design, and studied physics at Princeton and Harvard.

Jessie Dean is a Brooklyn-based writer and actor. Most recently, she has finished writing her first novel, INVENTING VIDA, which is currently undergoing edits. Recently in NYC, she appeared Off-Broadway in BUM PHILLIPS: AN ALL AMERICAN OPERA at LaMama and WELCOME TO THE KINGDOM OF SAUDI ARABIA at 59E59 both produced by Monk Parrots, where she is an artistic associate. Jessie has developed plays and musicals at New York Theatre Workshop, the Lark, PlayPenn, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, the Kennedy Center, and the Fingerlakes Musical Theatre Festival. The last play she directed, PIGSKIN, won the Samuel French Off-Off Broadway Festival. Prior to moving to New York, she was a founder and co-artistic director of Relativity Theatre Concern in Atlanta, Georgia. She earned her MFA at Illinois State University. www.jessicadean.net

Jisun Kim is an MFA candidate in Dramaturgy and Dramatic Criticism at Yale School of Drama, and Co-Artistic Director of Yale Cabaret 53.

Joey Sims is a critic and playwright based in Brooklyn. He is a frequent contributor and social media editor at Exeunt NYC. He has worked as a script reader for New Dramatists, Manhattan Theatre Club and The Public Theater. Joey has conducted research for The Civilians, and written at The Tank and The PIT. He is also an alumnus of the National Critics Institute. Prior to the theater shutdown in New York City, he was an operations manager at TodayTix.

Julia Izumi's plays include Regretfully, So the Birds Are (Playwrights Horizons/WP Theater), miku, and the gods. (ArtsWest), and Sometimes the Rain, Sometimes the Sea (Rorschach Theater). Select development: Manhattan Theatre Club, WP Theater, Ojai Playwrights Conference, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, NNPN/Kennedy Center MFA Playwrights’ Workshop. Past memberships &amp; residencies: Clubbed Thumb’s Early-Career Writers’ Group, New Georges Audrey Residency, The COOP's Clusterf**k, Berkeley Rep’s Ground Floor, SPACE on Ryder Farm. Awards and honors: OPC Dr. Kerry English Award, Theater Masters’ Visionary Playwright Award, and KCACTF’s Darrell Ayers Playwriting Award. Current New Dramatists Resident and LMCC Workspace Resident. Current commissions: True Love Productions, MTC/Sloan, Playwrights Horizons, Seattle Rep 20x30. MFA: Brown University.

Julian Hornik is a composer/lyricist and librettist whose work has been performed at, amongst others, the Kennedy Center, New York City Center, Ars Nova, Symphony Space, Carnegie Hall, the Yale School of Drama, and every Gay Men's Chorus in the country. He has developed shows at Rhinebeck Writer’s Retreat, Vineyard Arts, Orchard Project, Johnny Mercer Songwriter’s Project, and the ASCAP Musical Theatre Workshop. Film and TV include Share (HBO), and animated series Helluva Boss. Recipient of the 2017 Lucille and Jack Yellen Award and the 2018 Sammy Cahn Award from the ASCAP Foundation; 2020 Jonathan Larson Grant finalist.

Julie Felise Dubiner is the Associate Director of American Revolutions: the United States History Cycle. At OSF, Julie has served as dramaturg for "The Wiz," "Sweat," "The Cocoanuts," "The Liquid Plain," and "Party People." At Actors Theatre of Louisville, she collaborated on more than 40 productions and projects in the regular season and the Humana Festival, and co-created "Rock &amp; Roll: The Reunion Tour." In Philadelphia, she was project manager of the musical "The Rosenbach Company" and dramaturg at the Prince Music Theater. In Chicago, Julie freelanced with Defiant Theatre, blue star performance company, Steppenwolf Theatre Company and others. She has been a guest dramaturg at the Kennedy Center and KCACTF, the O’Neill Playwrights Conference, the New Harmony Project and elsewhere. Julie is the co-editor of two anthologies of Humana Festival plays; co-author of 'The Process of Dramaturgy: A Practical Guide;" and a contributor to "The Routledge Companion to Dramaturgy; Innovation in Five Acts: Strategies for Theatre and Performance;" HowlRound; the LMDA Source Book; and is a Kilroys nominator. Julie holds a BA from Tufts University and an MFA from Columbia University.

Kate Douglas is a theater artist, composer and performer. Her work has been performed at The Met Cloisters, Ars Nova, Joe’s Pub and The McKittrick Hotel and developed at New Victory Theatre, SPACE on Ryder Farm, The Orchard Project, Rhinebeck Musicals, The National Theater Institute and the Writer’s Colony at Goodspeed. She is a Johnny Mercer Songwriters Project Fellow and a member of the BMI Lehman Engel Musical Theatre Workshop. She is currently a 2019-2020 Dramatists Guild Fellow. Upcoming co-writes include work with Todd Almond and Matthew Marsh. Favorite conversation topics include old growth forests, quantum physics and Nancy Drew.

Kate Foster is a D.C.-based dramaturg working in international and intercultural theatre. She trained with international artists abroad in Moscow, Russia (Moscow Art Theatre School), Munich, Germany (Ludwig Maximilian University, DAAD grant recipient), and Florence, Italy (IUGTE–International University Global Theatre Experience). She was a literary manager for Columbia University’s School of the Arts International Play Reading Festival in 2020 and a Student Fellow at Georgetown University’s Laboratory for Global Performance &amp; Politics during the 2020/2021 academic year. Currently, she is a dramaturg for VPL’s upcoming Constitution Day project as well as assistant director of ExPats Theatre’s Pankrác ‘45. MFA Dramaturgy Candidate 2022, Columbia University. MA German and BA Theatre and German, Wayne State University.

KATHLEEN CAPDESUÑER (director) is a director, theatre-maker, and artistic leader currently based in NYC. She is a 2019/20 The Civilians’ R&amp;D Group Director, 2019/20 Manhattan Theatre Club Directing Fellow, 2018/2019 Roundabout Directing Fellow, 2017/18 McCarter Theatre Center Directing Apprentice, Latinx Theatre Commons Steering Committee Member, and The COOP Youth Advisory Board Member. Kathleen has developed work at: Roundabout Theatre Company, American Lore Theatre, Columbia/Signature, Ensemble Studio Theatre, PlayxPlay, McCarter Theatre Center, Little y, and internationally in the Fringe Festival circuit. Kathleen is a first-generation Cuban-American from Kissimmee, Florida and committed to making equitable change in this industry. kcapdesuner.com

Katie Pearl is a collaborative theater artist and author of new performance works for both traditional and alternative spaces. She is co-Artistic Director of the OBIE Award winning PearlDamour, an interdisciplinary company she shares with playwright Lisa D’Amour. Recent work blends visual art, theater, and casual get-togethers to explore the role of live conversation within performance.

KC Luce is an arts administrator and dancer based in New York. She has worked as a fundraiser with the Civilians, Signature Theatre, Roundabout Theatre Company and Rattlestick Playwrights’ Theater and dances with ChEckiT!Dance. She is a graduate of Muhlenberg College and originally hails from the Philadelphia area.

Kelley Van Dilla is a NYC-based non-binary trans theatre and film director and writer who is passionate about self-expressive and reflective work, often centered around their gender identity, sexuality, and experience with a mother who has bipolar disorder. They recently explored the collision of their identities with the world premiere of their autobiographical hybrid feature film/play, LET GO OF ME, at Live Arts Theater in Charlottesville, Virginia (March 2021) and is currently in pre-production on their next feature film, CLIO: a positive transgender romance. Their autobiographical short films, B3d 0f R0s3s and LET GO, MOTHER, premiered at Cucalorus film festival in Wilmington, NC, where they moonlight as a film judge and occasional MC/host. Other projects include AMERICAN RUST with Showtime, HIGH MAINTENANCE with HBO, Steven Soderbergh's THE KNICK with Cinemax, and theatrical productions of HAMLET, RED, THE PILLOWMAN and THREE SISTERS. She is a frequent collaborator with Chekhov at Lake Lucille. As a co-founder of Playground of Empathy and co-creator of the WALK in My Shoes Experience, she is a proud recipient of the Harvard Culture Lab Innovation Fund (2020). She loves painting, photography, and travel; she has walked the 1,200km O'Henro Buddhist Pilgrimage to 88 Temples on the island, Shikoku, in Japan. Kelley uses they/them/their and she/her/hers pronouns.

Ken Urban is a playwright and screenwriter. Recent plays include A Guide For The Homesick (Huntington Theatre Company, West End), The Remains (Studio Theatre), Sense of an Ending (59E59 Theatres, London’s Theatre503), and Nibbler (The Amoralists). Awards include Weissberger Playwriting Award, New York Foundation for the Arts Fellowship, Dramatist Guild Fellowship, and MacDowell Colony Fellowships. He is a resident playwright at New Dramatists and affiliated writer at the Playwrights’ Center.

Kit Yan is an award-winning New York based spoken word artist raised in Hawaii and living in Brooklyn. Kit has been seen on television programs such as HBO’s “Asian Aloud” and PBS’ “Asian America.” Kit’s poetry has been reviewed in New York, Bitch, Curve, and Hyphen magazines and he has toured internationally with Sister Spit, The Trans* Roadshow, and Good Asian Drivers. Kit’s work has recently been featured in “Flicker and Spark” and “Troubling the Line” — two new queer and transgender poetry anthologies and has a forthcoming book with Transgenre Press. His recent performances include two national tours of “Queer Heartache” and a performance at the Brooklyn Museum. Kit’s solo slam poetry show “Queer Heartache” was recently awarded the spirit of fringe award, artists’ pick award, and audience choice award at the 2015 Chicago Fringe Festival. His solo show will be produced at the 2016 Transgender Theater Festival and the San Francisco Fringe Festival. He has been recognized by the Sylvia Rivera Law Project and Babson College for his contributions in activism, literary arts, and theater.

Larissa FastHorse is an award-winning playwright and choreographer and a member of the Sicangu Lakota Nation. Larissa's produced plays include "Urban Rez," "Landless," "Average Family," "Teaching Disco Squaredancing to Our Elders: a Class Presentation," and "Cherokee Family Reunion." Three new plays "Vanishing Point," "What Would Crazy Horse Do?" and "The Thanksgiving Play," are scheduled for production in the next year. www.hoganhorsestudio.com

Laura Nix recently directed "The Yes Men Are Revolting," which premiered at the Toronto Film Festival in 2014 and the Berlinale 2015. Previously, she directed and produced the documentary "The Light in Her Eyes," about a Syrian Quran school for women that premiered at IDFA and was broadcast on the series POV on PBS. Her other feature directing credits include the fiction feature "The Politics of Fur," which played in over 70 festivals internationally, and won multiple awards, including the Grand Jury Prize at Outfest, and the feature documentary "Whether You Like It or Not: The Story of Hedwig," for New Line Cinema. Her work has received support from the Bertha Foundation, BritDoc, Cal Humanities, COBO Fund, the Danish Film Institute, and the Sundance Documentary Fund. Based in Los Angeles, she's currently developing a documentary feature about ballroom dancers in the suburban Chinese community of San Gabriel Valley, California.

Leah Putnam (she/her) is a dramaturg from outside of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Prior to joining The Civilians, she worked as a dramaturg for Live Arts in Charlottesville, Virginia and has worked on developing new work with writers including LET GO OF ME by Kelley Van Dilla. She is particularly passionate about immersive theater and also has a background in costumes. Leah completed her MA in English at UVA and her BA in English at NYU.

Lee Sunday Evans is a two-time Obie Award winning Director + Choreographer, and was recently appointed Artistic Director of Waterwell. Recent projects include: The Courtroom with transcripts arranged by Arian Moayed (Waterwell), Detroit Red by Will Power (ArtsEmeerson), Dance Nation by Clare Barron (Playwrights Horizons, Steppenwolf), In the Green by Grace McClean (LCT3), Intractable Woman by Stefano Massini and Caught by Christopher Chen (The Play Company), HOME by Geoff Sobelle (BAM Next Wave).

Leigh Fondakowski - Original work as playwright/director includes, "Spill" (Swine Palace, TimeLine Theater Company, Ensemble Studio Theatre, and 2015 Kilroy List); "The People's Temple" (Berkeley Repertory Theatre, American Theater Company, The Guthrie Theater, and received the Glickman Award for Best New Play in the Bay Area 2005); "I Think I Like Girls," (Encore Theater, Bay Area Critics Circle nomination for Best Production, and voted one of the top 10 plays of 2002 by The Advocate). As a member of Tectonic Theater Project, Leigh was the Head Writer of "The Laramie Project," a co-writer of "The Laramie Project: Ten Years Later," and an Emmy-nominated co-screenwriter for the adaptation of "The Laramie Project" for HBO films. She is a 2007 recipient of the NEA/TCG Theatre Residency Program for Playwrights, a 2009 Macdowell Colony Fellow, and a 2010 Distinguished Visiting Chair at the University of Minnesota, where she lectured and developed CASA CUSHMAN, a work-in-progress about 19th-century American actress Charlotte Cushman. She released "Stories from Jonestown", her first non-fiction book in 2013, and is currently adapting the book to film. She is a teaching artist at New Orleans Center for Creative Arts and Naropa University.

Obie Award-winner Les Waters is the Artistic Director at Actors Theatre of Louisville where he has directed Charles Mee’s "The Glory of the World," Lucas Hnath’s "The Christians," Thornton Wilder’s "Our Town," Will Eno’s "Gnit," Todd Almond’s "Girlfriend," Eugene O’Neill’s "Long Day's Journey into Night," Naomi Iizuka’s "At the Vanishing Point" and Charles Mee’s "Big Love" (2001 Obie). Waters' other credits include the world premieres of Anne Washburn’s "10 of out 12" at Soho Rep and "Dear Elizabeth" by Sarah Ruhl at Yale Repertory Theatre, as well as countless productions in New York at the Public Theater, Second Stage, Manhattan Theatre Club, Connelly Theater, Clubbed Thumb, BAM Next Wave Festival, and regionally at theaters such as the Mark Taper Forum, Steppenwolf Theatre Company, Goodman Theatre, Yale Repertory Theatre, American Conservatory Theater, La Jolla Playhouse and American Repertory Theater. From 2003 to 2011, he served as Associate Artistic Director at Berkeley Repertory Theatre, and in 2009, he made his Broadway debut with "In the Next Room, or the Vibrator Play." Les’s productions have ranked among the year’s best in the New Yorker, the New York Times, TimeOut New York, Time Magazine and USA Today. He led the MFA directing program at University of California at San Diego from 1995 to 2003.

Liba Vaynberg is a playwright and actor. She lives in a constant state of anxiety with her husband Zev and dog Vera. @libavaynberg

Lila Rachel Becker is a DC-born, NYC-based director and one half of the theatre collective Portmanteau. She has directed and developed work with theaters all over the country, including Actors Theatre of Louisville, Woolly Mammoth, Portland Stage Company, Williamstown Theatre Festival, The Tank, Folger Theatre, and the Source Festival. Recent productions: and come apart by Eric Marlin (Portmanteau + The Tank); THREE SISTERS by Anton Chekhov (University of Iowa); bad things happen here by Eric Marlin (Portmanteau + Edinburgh Festival Fringe); CLARABELLE, 86 by Anna Fox (Cloud City). Member, LCT Directors Lab, Directors Lab North. BA Wesleyan University. MFA University of Iowa. Associate Member, SDC. lilarachelbecker.com

Lucas Hnath’s plays include “The Christians” (Humana Festival, 2014; Playwrights Horizons, 2015); “A Public Reading of an Unproduced Screenplay About the Death of Walt Disney” (Soho Rep, 2013); “Red Speedo” (Studio Theatre, 2013); “nightnight” (Humana Festival, 2013); “Isaac’s Eye” (Ensemble Studio Theatre, 2013); ”Death Tax” (Humana Festival 2012; Royal Court Theatre, 2013). Hnath’s work is published by Dramatists Play Service and Overlook Press. He has been a resident playwright at New Dramatists since 2011 and is a member of Ensemble Studio Theatre. He is the recipient of the 2015 Kesselring Prize, a 2015 Guggenheim Fellowship, a 2015 Whiting Award, the 2012 Whitfield Cook Award and two Steinberg/ATCA New Play Award Citations. He is also a recipient of commissions from the Actors Theatre of Louisville, the Civilians, EST/Sloan Project, New York University’s Graduate Acting Program, Playwrights Horizons, Royal Court Theatre and South Coast Repertory. In 2016 his play “Hillary and Clinton” will premiere in Chicago at Victory Gardens, and “Red Speedo” will have its New York premiere at New York Theatre Workshop.

Lynn Nottage is a Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright and a screenwriter. Her plays have been produced widely in the United States and throughout the world. "Sweat" (Pulitzer Prize, Obie Award, Susan Smith Blackburn Prize) moved to Broadway after a sold-out run at The Public Theater. It premiered and was commissioned by Oregon Shakespeare Festival American Revolutions History Cycle/Arena Stage, "By The Way, Meet Vera Stark" (Lilly Award, Drama Desk Nomination), "Ruined" (Pulitzer Prize, Obie, Lucille Lortel, New York Drama Critics’ Circle, Audelco, Drama Desk, and Outer Critics Circle Award), "Intimate Apparel" (American Theatre Critics and New York Drama Critics’ Circle Awards for Best Play), "Fabulation, or The Re-Education of Undine" (OBIE Award), "Crumbs from the Table of Joy," "Las Meninas," "Mud," "River," "Stone," "Por’knockers and POOF!." In addition, she is working with composer Ricky Ian Gordon on adapting her play "Intimate Apparel" into an opera (commissioned by The Met/LCT). She is also developing "This is Reading" a performance installation based on two years of interviews set to open at the Franklin Street, Reading Railroad Station in Reading, PA in July 2017. She is currently an artist-in-residence at the Park Avenue Armory. She is the co-founder of the production company, Market Road Films, whose most recent projects include "The Notorious Mr. Bout" directed by Tony Gerber and "Maxim Pozdorovkin" (Premiere/Sundance 2014), "First to Fall" directed by Rachel Beth Anderson (Premiere/ IDFA, 2013) and "Remote Control: (Premiere/Busan 2013- New Currents Award) Over the years, she has developed original projects for HBO, Sidney Kimmel Entertainment, Showtime, This is That and Harpo. She is writer/producer on the Netflix series "She's Gotta Have It" directed by Spike Lee. Nottage is the recipient of a PEN/Laura Pels Master Playwright Award, Literature Award from The Academy of Arts and Letters, Columbia University Provost Grant, Doris Duke Artist Award, The Joyce Foundation Commission Project &amp; Grant, Madge Evans-Sidney Kingsley Award, MacArthur "Genius Grant" Fellowship, Steinberg "Mimi" Distinguished Playwright Award, Nelson A. Rockefeller Award for Creativity, The Dramatists Guild Hull-Warriner Award, the inaugural Horton Foote Prize,Helen Hayes Award, the Lee Reynolds Award, and the Jewish World Watch iWitness Award. Her other honors include the National Black Theatre Fest's August Wilson Playwriting Award, a Guggenheim Grant, Lucille Lortel Fellowship and Visiting Research Fellowship at Princeton University. She is a graduate of Brown University and the Yale School of Drama. She is also an Associate Professor in the Theatre Department at Columbia School of the Arts. Nottage is a board member for BRIC Arts Media Bklyn, Donor Direct Action, Dramatist Play Service, Second Stage and the Dramatists Guild. She recently completed a three-year term as an Artist Trustee on the Board of the Sundance Institute. She is member of the The Dramatists Guild and WGAE.

Civs Prod Dir

Originally from the Bronx, NY and dedicated to developing new plays and musicals, the majority of Maria-Christina’s work has been in world premieres. She has done countless workshops and readings with the Lark, Sundance, EST, Primary Stages, New Dramatists, Ma-Yi, INTAR, NYTW, the Working Theatre, 52nd Street Project, Clubbed Thumb, Women’s Project, the Public, Red Bull, New Georges, Playwrights’ Realm, MCC, MTC, and Page 73, among others. She is a member of the Actors’ Center Workshop Company, Partial Comfort, serves on the Advisory Committee of Bingham Theatre Camp, and is the recipient of the 2014 Charles Bowden Actor Award from New Dramatists. She has also served on faculty and is a frequent guest speaker at Yale University, Fordham University-Lincoln Center, NYU, Stella Adler Conservatory, Primary Stages, UC Boulder, University of Iowa, Berkeley Rep School of Theatre, &amp; Denver Center Theatre Academy.

Marion Friedman Young (she/her) is the executive director of the Lewis Center for the Arts at Princeton University. She is the executor of the estate of her late brother, composer Michael Friedman.

Marsha Stephanie Blake’s latest project is the miniseries "When They See Us" directed by Ava Duvernay.  Upcoming film projects include "Luce" directed by Julius Onah and starring Octavia Spencer and "See You Yesterday" from director Stefon Bristol and producer Spike Lee.  She was recently seen onstage as Emilia opposite Daniel Craig’s Iago in "Othello" at NYTW. Shows with the Civilians include "This Beautiful City" and "In The Footprint." Broadway: "Joe Turner’s Come and Gone" and "The Merchant of Venice." TV credits: "Quantico," "Good Wife," "Blacklist," "Getting On," "OITNB" (SAG Ensemble Award). She lives in NYC with her husband and two kids.

Matt Barbot (Writer) is a playwright from Brooklyn, NY. His plays include EL COQUÍ ESPECTACULAR AND THE BOTTLE OF DOOM (Two River Theatre), THE VENETIANS (Columbia@Roundabout New Play Series), INFALLIBILITY (Robert Moss Theater, Theater for the New City), STOO'S FAMOUS MARTIAN-AMERICAN GUMBO (Peppercorn Theater at Kaleidium), PRINCESS CLARA OF LOISAIDA (Columbia University), and THE TRAGEDY OF SULTAN KHALID BIN BARGHASH; OR, THE ENTIRE ANGLO-ZANZIBAR WAR IN REAL TIME (Dixon Place). Matt recently collaborated with Ilana Becker and Christina Quintana on the Civilians' Lobby Project OH, THIS IS SUCCESS! (New York City Center). Additionally, Matt has worked with comic book creator Edgardo Miranda Rodriguez as an editor and co-writer for Darryl Makes Comics' DMC, as well as Somos Arte's La Borinqueña. Matt is a New York Theatre Workshop 2050 Fellow, a Sheen Center playwriting fellow, and received his MFA from Columbia University.

Mauricio Tafur Salgado is a first gen born to proudly subversive Colombians with graduate degrees + light brown skinned + aspiring bio-regionalist + cis-hetero + married + artist pursuing justice and healing through a decolonial framework. He comes from the everglades watershed, his antepasados and a solid plate of his grandma’s arepas and buñuelos. His educational background begins in the public schools and community centers of South Florida among migrant farm workers. It was amongst those folks that he learned the power of the theatre to break through patriarchal and generational chasms. He then continued his education as a mischief-maker at the Juilliard School; in pedagogies of resistance at Union Theological Seminary in NYC, and in radical breathing at Brown University &amp; Trinity Rep’s MFA in Theatre Directing. And somewhere at the soft center of all of that he is joyfully fumbling through a continual dance with his beloved and the divine. www.mauriciotsalgado.com

Megan McClain is the R&amp;D Program Director for the Civilians and leads the writers, directors, and composers of the R&amp;D Group. As a former Civilians Literary Associate, she worked on "The Way They Live" and "The End and the Beginning" at The Met. She is a staff member at The Lark and also serves as the Resident Dramaturg for Superhero Clubhouse, an ensemble creating original works at the intersection of ecology and theater. She has developed new theatrical work presented during artist residencies granted by The Metropolitan Museum of Art, The Drama League, NACL Theatre, Catwalk Institute, Stony Brook University, Lacawac Sanctuary, and the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council. She has provided dramaturgical support and literary work for productions and projects at numerous organizations including The Goodman Theatre, Disney Theatrical, Hartford Stage, PoNY, Playwrights Realm, The Lark, LMDA, Target Margin, Jewish Plays Project, New Georges, PlayPenn, and American Players Theatre. M.F.A Dramaturgy: University of Massachusetts Amherst.

Melissa Li is a composer, lyricist, and performer. She is a Jonathan Larson Award winner, whose most recent musical “99% Stone” (The Theater Offensive), about the 1969 Stonewall riots, received an NPN Creation Fund and a NEFA Grant. Her first musical, “Surviving the Nian” (The Theater Offensive), won an IRNE award for Best New Play in 2007. Melissa has released music both as a solo artist and collaboratively. including her solo album “2 Seconds Away” in 2008, then “Drive Away Home” in 2009 as part of rock-poetry band Good Asian Drivers. After forming her own pop/rock outfit Melissa Li &amp; The Barely Theirs, the band released “The Beginning” in 2011. She is proud to be from Boston, and proud to live in Brooklyn.

Michael Alvarez (Director) is an international and interdisciplinary director and visual artist. He has directed in New York, London, Los Angeles, Atlanta and Eastern Europe, including such institutions as Her Majesty’s Theatre in the West End, Arcola Theatre, Institute of Contemporary Arts (UK), and the British Museum. Michael was a recent 2050 Directing Fellow at New York Theatre Workshop, a Drama League Directing Fellow, and a member of the Lincoln Center Director’s Lab. His new piece, "Love, Medea," with writer Peter Gray, will be in residence at the Center at West Park in January 2020, and his new musical, "Salome," will have a residency at A Noise Within in Los Angeles in Spring 2020. He holds a BA in Performance Art from the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama and an MFA in Directing from California Institute of the Arts. www.Michael-Alvarez.com

Michael's recent credits include the musicals “Unknown Soldier,” “Pretty Filthy,” “The Fortress of Solitude,” “Love’s Labour's Lost” and “Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson,” the last of which premiered at the Public Theater before transferring to Broadway. With the Civilians, he has also written music and lyrics for “Canard Canard Goose,” “Gone Missing,” “Nobody’s Lunch,” “This Beautiful City,” “In the Footprint” and “The Great Immensity,” and music for Anne Washburn's “Mr. Burns.” With Steve Cosson, he is the co‐author of “Paris Commune” (BAM Next Wave Festival). Friedman has been a MacDowell Fellow, a Princeton Hodder Fellow, a Meet The Composer Fellow and a Barron Visiting Professor at the Princeton Environmental Institute. His TedX talk, “The Song Makes a Space,” can be seen on YouTube. An evening of his songs was featured at Lincoln Center’s American Songbook, and “The New Yorker Radio Hour” on WNYC features his songs about the 2016 election. He is artist in residence and director of the Public Forum at the Public Theater, and received an Obie Award for sustained achievement.

As writer, Micharne Cloughley’s plays with the Civilians include "The Way They Live" and "The End and the Beginning" (The Metropolitan Museum of Art) and, as dramaturg, "Be the Death of Me" (Irondale Center). Micharne’s other plays include "99 Phone Calls You Shouldn't Have Made," "Masters of F*** All," "Not That Kind of Doll" and "One Flesh." Her work has been developed or presented by Holden Street Theatres, Animus Theatre Company, Australian Made Entertainment NYC, Rock Surfers Theatre Company, Baggage Productions and the Australia Council's Jump Mentorship program. Micharne also works both in the development and production of non-fiction television series.

Nilaja Sun is the solo performer and writer of the off-Broadway smash "No Child...," which had its initial run with Epic Theatre Ensemble, followed by and a year-long run at the Barrow Street Theatre. For her creation and performance of "No Child..." and its subsequent national tour, Nilaja garnered 21 awards, including an Obie Award, a Helen Hayes Award, a Lucille Lortel Award and two Outer Critics Circle Awards, including the John Gassner Playwriting Award for Outstanding New American Play. Theater credits also include "The Commons of Pensacola," "Einstein's Gift," "Time and The Conways," "Huck and Holden" and "The Cook." Tv/Film credits include "Madam Secretary," "Louie," "30 Rock," "Law &amp; Order: SVU," "Unforgettable," "The International" and "Rubicon." As a solo performer, her projects include the critically acclaimed "Blues for a Gray Sun" (INTAR), "La Nubia Latina," "Black and Blue," "Insufficient Fare," "Due to the Tragic Events of..." and "Mixtures." Nilaja was awarded the soloNOVA Award for Artist of the Year by terraNOVA Collective and was recently awarded a NYSCHA grant, through Epic Theatre Ensemble, to create her newest solo piece, "Pike St," which will have its world premiere at the Abrons Arts Center in November 2015. A native of the Lower East Side, she is a Princess Grace Award winner and has worked as a teaching artist in New York City for over 15 years.

Nora Tjossem is a Brooklyn-based actor by way of California. She graduated from Stanford University and now works with the Brooklyn Academy of Music and Extended Play. Highlights of four years with the Stanford Shakespeare Company include the roles of Iago (Othello, 2013) and Lear (Lear, 2015) among others.

Peca Ştefan studied dramatic writing at New York University, was a resident of the Royal Court International Residency and CEC ArtsLink Playwright in Residence at the Long Wharf Theatre in New Haven. He was the winner of the first dramAcum contest in Romania, in 2002. His work has been presented widely in Europe, South America, and the United States. His plays have won several awards, including the Heidelberg Stuckemarkt Innovation Award (2007) for Romania 21. He was also one of the 5 European Playwrights selected in the Berliner Theatertreffen Stuckemarkt 2010, with "Wire and Acrobats." In 2012, the production of his play "Targoviste de Jucarie" (Playground Targoviste) was selected in the New Plays from Europe festival in Wiesbaden. He was commissioned as one of the 35 European playwrights featured in the 35th Anniversary Edition of the Berliner Theatertreffen Stuckemarkt in May 2013. Peca is a partner of PopUP Theatrics, NYC.

Phillip Gregory Burke is an Aquarius, artivist, actor and writer living in New York City. You can follow him @PhillipGBurke on the gram and the tweets.

Phoebe Corde (she/her) is a dramaturg, writer, and illustrator from Westport, Connecticut, specializing in stories of the strange, magical, and otherworldly. She is currently Resident Dramaturg at The Civilians, where she is director of their artistic development group, the R&amp;D Group, and is a member of the creative board of directors at Off-Brand Opera. Her dramaturgical work has been seen on Broadway and Off-Broadway stages, including The Public Theater, Vineyard Theatre, A.R.T., Paper Mill Playhouse, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Ensemble Studio Theatre, and 59E59.

Rachel Dickstein (Artistic Director, Ripe Time) is the artistic director of Ripe Time in Brooklyn, NY. She has devised, choreographed, and directed the critically acclaimed Haruki Murakami’s SLEEP (BAM Next Wave Festival, Yale Rep, Annenberg Center for the Arts/University of Pennsylvania), THE WORLD IS ROUND (BAM-Fisher, Obie Award, Special Citation, Finalist for 2014 Richard Rodgers Award), SEPTIMUS AND CLARISSA (Joe A. Calloway, Drama Desk, Drama League, Drama Desk nominations) at the Baruch Performing Arts Center, FIRE THROWS (based on ANTIGONE) at 3LD, INNOCENTS, BETROTHED at the Ohio Theatre. Other: Kamala Sankaram's THUMBPRINT (LA Opera, Prototype), Vijay Iyer and Mike Ladd's IN WHAT LANGUAGE? (Asia Society, REDCAT, PICA. Winner of 2015 LPTW Lucille Lortel Award. Nominated for 2014 Alan Schneider Award and 2014 and 2015 Doris Duke Impact Award. BA, Yale College. Training: DellArte International (in Bali, Indonesia), Complicite, Norman Taylor (Lecoq.)  Other new works for New York Theatre Workshop (where she has been a usual suspect since 1994), New Georges, The Ohio Theatre, Lincoln Center Theatre Directorʼs Lab, Drama League Director's Project and Seattleʼs Annex Theatre. Residencies at the Drama League, LMCC, JCC in Manhattan, Ko Festival. Former resident director at New Dramatists and Assistant Director to Martha Clarke nationally and internationally. Recipient of commissions from BAM, CTG, NYSCA, MAP, P.S. 122 and the NEA/TCG Director's Fellowship. Associate Professor, Conservatory of Theatre Arts at Purchase College, SUNY where she teaches directing and ensemble creation and devising and has directed academic productions of plays by such writers as Anne Washburn, Alice Birch, Sophie Treadwell, Anton Chekhov, Sarah Ruhl, Ellen McLaughlin, and Naomi Iizuka.

Richard Lawson is the film critic for Vanity Fair. Previously he wrote about culture for the Atlantic Wire and Gawker, and he has contributed to Out magazine, the Guardian, the Awl and the Hairpin.

Sam Chanse’s plays include "Trigger," "The Opportunities of Extinction," "Monument, or Four Sisters (A Sloth Play)," "Fruiting Bodies," and "What You Are Now." A Lark Venturous Fellow and resident playwright at New Dramatists, her work has recently been developed with the Lark, Ma-Yi Theater, Ojai Playwrights Conference, Cherry Lane, EST/Sloan Project, and The Civilians, and is published by Kaya Press (Lydia’s Funeral Video) and TCG (The Kilroys List). She is a former fellow at MacDowell, Sundance Theatre Institute, and Playwrights’ Realm, and is an alum of Ars Nova’s Play Group and The Civilians R&amp;D Group. http://www.samchanse.com/

Sam Green is a New York-based documentary filmmaker. He received his Master’s Degree in Journalism from University of California Berkeley, where he studied documentary with acclaimed filmmaker Marlon Riggs. Green’s 2004 feature-length film, the Academy Award-nominated documentary "The Weather Underground," premiered at the Sundance Film Festival, was broadcast on PBS, and included in the Whitney Biennial. His most recent projects are the “live documentaries” "The Measure of All Things," (2014), "The Love Song of R. Buckminster Fuller" (with Yo La Tengo) (2012), and "Utopia in Four Movements" (2010). With all of these works, Green narrates the film in-person while musicians perform a live soundtrack. He is also a prolific maker of short documentaries and has received grants from the Creative Capital, Rockefeller and Guggenheim Foundations, as well as the National Endowment for the Arts.

Sara Morgulis is an applied theater artist and educator who is dedicated to engaging young people through accessible and inclusive theater practices. She holds an MA in Applied Theatre from the City University of New York and a BFA in Acting with a Minor in Education Studies from Syracuse University. Sara co-presented her master’s thesis research on using theater in peer education at the 2013 American Alliance for Theatre and Education conference. Her research about training young people to be applied theater peer facilitators will be published in an upcoming edition of Research in Drama Education: The Journal of Applied Theatre and Performance. She also teaches programming at Actionplay, an organization dedicated to providing people on the autism spectrum equal access to the arts through programming, professional development, and training modules. Sara has also worked onstage as a teaching artist and actor at several regional theaters across the country including People’s Light and Theatre Company in Malvern, PA, Syracuse Stage in Syracuse, NY, and Asolo Repertory Theatre in Sarasota, FL. Sara is the proud recipient of the 2015 TYA/USA Ann Shaw Fellowship Award. Sara used the award to visit Oily Cart Theatre in London in May 2015 to experience the re-launching of their show, The Bounce.

Sarah Schulman was born in New York City in 1958 and attended (High College) Hunter High School. She is a novelist, playwright, screenwriter, nonfiction writer, AIDS historian, journalist, and active participant citizen.

Siting Yang (she/her) is an interdisciplinary theater maker based in Beijing and NYC. Her body of work is motivated by a twofold impulse: revolution and nostalgia. By revolution, she seeks to explore radical aesthetical expressions of individual discontent, resistance, and digression in the oppressive system of everyday life. By nostalgia, she collects stories from the trajectory of history and literature that resonate with our modern souls, and reshape them with contemporary relevance. Her recent credits include: HoD (New York, 2021), The Tin Drum (Toronto, 2021), War Eagle (Beijing, 2019), Marat/Sade (Beijing, 2018). She received her B. A. at Peking University in German Literature and World History, and is currently pursuing her MFA in dramaturgy at Columbia University.

Srđa Vasiljević is a Bosnian-American director and the resident director of Theatre for One. He has developed new and revived works with companies such as New Dramatists, La MaMa and Ford's Theatre. Recent Projects include "LatinXoxo" (Joe’s Pub), "Gradiva Who Walked Through Hell and Back" (Mad. Sq. Art &amp; T41), "Independence" (Alchemical Theatre Lab), "Dust Can't Kill Me" (NYMF &amp; LPR) and "When I Started Dating Men" (Dixon Place). Srđa currently works as the Experiential Director of Adam Aleksander Presents. Member of The Civilians R&amp;D Group, ENCORES! Off-Center Artists' Board, Lincoln Center Directors' Lab and an inaugural member of the Directors Lab Mediterranean. Upcoming: "Me Alone with No Friends" by Joe Castle Baker at ArsNova. www.sr-da.com

Stacey is a proud Black woman, daughter, sibling and mom. Her work celebrates and explores Blackness, Black identity, Black history, body politics, and the dilemma of life as "other." Her work has been presented at: The Fire This Time Festival, The Lark, Rattlestick Playwrights Theatre, National Black Theatre, Pillsbury House Theater, and Barrington Stage Company. Stacey has held fellowships/residencies with The Dramatists Guild, The Playwrights' Center, Sundance Theatre Lab, The Goodman Theatre, The Civilians, and Tofte Lake Center. Her play AMERICA v. 2.1, won the inaugural The Burman New Play Award. AMERICA v. 2.1 and her play AS IS are featured on the 2019 Kilroy's list. Stacey's play LEGACY LAND also made the 2019 Kilroy's list as an Honorable Mention. She is a recipient of a 2019 Virginia B. Toulmin Foundation Womens Commissioning Grant in partnership with Rattlestick Playwrights Theatre.

Steve Cosson is the founding Artistic Director of the Civilians. He is a writer and freelance director, directing new plays, musicals and classics. Recent credits include "The Belle of Amherst" starring Joely Richardson, the Civilians' "The Great Immensity" at the Public Theater, and Anne Washburn's "Mr. Burns" at Playwrights Horizons. Steve won an Obie in 2004 for the work of the Civilians. He has been a Fulbright Scholar in Colombia, a MacDowell Fellow, Resident Director at New Dramatists, and he has twice participated in the Sundance Theatre Lab. His plays have been published by Oberon Books in the UK, Dramatists Play Service, and Playscripts Inc. in an anthology. He holds an MFA in directing from UC San Diego and a BA from Dartmouth College.

Susan Yassky is the Literary Associate for The Civilians and a New York City-based playwright and dramaturg. She was a Dramaturgy and Literary Management Apprentice at Actors Theatre of Louisville, where she worked on several productions in the 2019 Humana Festival of New American Plays. As a literary intern, she has worked at the Vineyard Theatre, Long Wharf Theatre and the York Theatre Company. Her plays have been developed at Actors Theatre of Louisville and Yale University. She received her B.A. in Theater Studies and Humanities from Yale in 2017. https://www.susanyassky.com

Suzanne Agins is a freelance director who specializes in new work. Off Broadway: world premiere of "Radiance" by Cusi Cram (Labyrinth, developed in Rising Phoenix’s Cino Nights series); world premiere of "Jailbait" by Deirdre O’Connor (Cherry Lane). Other recent projects include: "Alligator" by Hilary Bettis and "The Burden of Not Having a Tail" by Carrie Barrett (Eugene O’Neill National Playwrights Conference); "Fuente Ovejuna: A Disloyal Adaptation" by Cusi Cram, inspired by Lope de Vega's play (Princeton University, developed with Labyrinth); Noel Coward's "Fallen Angels" (Dorset Theater Festival); "Lucy and the Conquest" by Cusi Cram (World Premiere, Williamstown); "Wing It," a new musical inspired by Aristophanes’ "The Birds," by Gordon Cox and Kris Kukul (World Premiere, Williamstown); three Maddy Mann stage shows created with Ryan Migge (Ars Nova, soloNOVA festival at the DR2, Dixon Place); Maddy Mann's webseries "Quads!"; "The Secret Narrative of the Phone Book" by Gordon Cox (World Premiere, Kraine Theater). Ms. Agins served as Artistic Associate for New Plays at Williamstown Theatre Festival from 2005-2007. She holds an MFA in Directing from UC San Diego, is the recipient of a Princess Grace Fellowship, an adjunct faculty member at Princeton (her alma mater), and a member of SDC.

Talya Klein is an award-winning director, actor, writer and producer whose work has been seen in London, New York, Los Angeles and all over the US. Directing credits include: "Grounded" by George Brant (Manbites Dog Theater, NC), "Enron" (Duke University Department of Theater Studies), "Failure: A Love Story" (UNC Chapel Hill Department of Dramatic Arts), "Cymbeline," "Much Ado About Nothing" and "As You LIke It" (The Here &amp; Now, VT), "Born This Way" (BCC Rep, MA), "Parade," "All The Things You Are," "Three Sisters" and Aphra Behn's "The Rover" (Brown/Trinity MFA Program), "We Can Rebuild Him" (Brown University Mainstage/Brownbrokers), "Red Noses" by Peter Barnes and "Black Snow" by Mikhail Bulgagov (Kensington Drama Company, London), the American Premiere of Samuel Adamson's "Clocks and Whistles" (Origin Theatre Company, NYC) and the West Coast Premiere of Rinne Groff's "Orange Lemon Egg Canary." In addition, Talya has worked on staff or assistant directed at the National Theatre, the Royal Shakespeare Company, Pasadena Playhouse, Trinity Repertory Company, the Culture Project, Manhattan Theatre Club, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Weston Playhouse and the Public Theater. Talya received her BA in Theater and Social Struggle from Duke University. During her time there, she was awarded a Benenson Award, the Alex Cohen Award, the Dasha Epstein Playwriting Award, and named one of nine local "Artists to Watch in the New Millenium" by the Raleigh News and Observer. Talya earned her MFA in Directing in the Brown University/Trinity Rep MFA Program and is the founder of The Here &amp; Now, a company which produces one-off, site-specific theatrical events. Talya was the Project Manager for the Civilians' Let Me Ascertain You: Holy Matrimony! at Joe's Pub in 2013. Last year she was the Lillian Chason Directing Fellow at UNC Chapel Hill and a guest artist and visiting faculty member at Duke University. Talya is a member of the Lincoln Center Directors' Lab and the Directors' Lab West.

Tommy O'Malley is a Brooklyn-based writer and performer. He is a former Artistic Associate at the Civilians. He produces the storytelling show Big City Stories in Brooklyn and Manhattan. He regularly appears on the podcast "Race Wars," hosted by Kurt Metzger and Sherrod Small, and co-hosts its spin-off podcast "Unhireable" with comic Keren Margolis.

Tony Torn is an actor and director based in New York City. He was a member of the Civilians' R&amp;D group in 2013-14, directing Juliana Francis Kelly's "The Reenactors." The rock musical "Ubu Sings Ubu" — which he created, starred in, and co-directed with Dan Safer at the Abrons Arts Center — returned in January 2015 to the Slipper Room for two nights only (www.ubu-sings-ubu.com). Recently he appeared in Untitled Theater Company #61's "The Velvet Oratorio" at the Bohemian National Hall, Karin Coonrod's Production of "The Tempest" at La MaMa, Jay Scheib's "Platonov" at the Kitchen, and Jeanine Oleson's "Hear Here" at the New Museum. Known for his work with legendary experimental theater directors Reza Abdoh and Richard Foreman, he manages Torn Page, a salon space and classroom in Chelsea dedicated to the artistic legacy of his parents, Rip Torn and Geraldine Page (www.tornpage.org).

Travis Russ, Ph.D., is a writer and director and the founding Artistic Director of Life Jacket, a theater company focused on creating works based on real events. His plays include "Gorey," "Jack &amp; Jelly" (starring Nelsan Ellis) and "Norman’s Beard." Travis also leads the Storytelling Project, sponsored by Fordham University, where he helps people from diverse communities tell their real stories on stage in front of a live audience. He was a member of the Civilians’ Field Research Team and contributed material to their production of "The Way They Live," which premiered at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in 2015 as part of the company’s artists-in-residency. He is an Associate Professor at Fordham University where he teaches graduate and undergraduate classes in communication and performance. His doctoral degree is from Rutgers University. He has trained with Complicite, Tectonic Theatre Project, SITI Company, The Builders Association, Pig Iron Theatre Company, Frantic Assembly, and Elevator Repair Service.

Verity Healey is a London-based writer and filmmaker who writes for HowlRound, Ministry of Counterculture, The London Economic and Exeunt. verity is also a published short story writer (anthology).

Whit MacLaughlin is the OBIE and Barrymore Award-winning Artistic Director of New Paradise Laboratories. He has created 23 original works with the company since 1996, including the recent Hello Blackout! (2017), Gumshoe (2017), Spectre Vivant (2017), O Monsters (2016), The Adults (2014), and the web-based immersion pieces Extremely Public Displays of Privacy (2011) and Fatebook (2009). He has created work in Seattle, Minneapolis, Louisville KY, Princeton, at CalArts, and is currently working in Turkey, Kansas City, MO, and in the Free Library of Philadelphia. He has received Fellowships from the Pew Charitable Trust, the NEA, and the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts; grants from The Pew Center for Arts and Heritage, Mapfund, NEA, TCG, and the William Penn Foundation. His publications include Batch, An American Bachelor/ette Party Spectacle by Alice Tuan and Whit MacLaughlin, Humana Festival 2007; Prom, U of Minnesota Press, 2010; Live Movies, a Field Guide to New Media for the Performing Arts, ed. Kirby Malone and Gail Scott White, George Mason University, 2006. His work has been presented in NYC at the Ontological Theatre, the Connelly Theatre, and PS 122; at the Walker Art Center, Warhol Museum, Humana Festival of New American Plays, Fusebox Festival, Philadelphia FringeArts Festival, and Prague Quadrennial.

Whitney Mosery (Director) is a Brooklyn-based director, dramaturg, and art activist. Favorite credits: GIRL FROM NOWHERE (NYMF/St. James/Ed Fringe), presented in support of Planned Parenthood; FOREIGN BODIES (Princeton), a documentary piece about superbugs; and the play/ritual/bonfire/danceparty BACCHANALIA (US/UK/Greece). Associate Director: HARRY POTTER AND THE CURSED CHILD, AMERICAN PSYCHO, KING CHARLES III. Next up: dramaturging an as-yet-untitled Cirque du Soleil show, premiering in April 2020. Proud member of Orchard Project NYC Greenhouse, former Almeida Director in Residence, and Williamstown Theatre Festival Directing Corp alum. BA Princeton, MA RADA. www.whitneymosery.com

XANDRA NUR CLARK is a playwright, performer, journalist, and community-builder. Their works include POLYLOGUES (2021 Colt Coeur Production, 2020 Kilroys List); EVERYTHING YOU’RE TOLD (2023 O’Neill NPC Semi-Finalist, 2021 Chesley/Bumbalo Playwriting Award, 2019 La MaMa Reading); SEPARATED (2021 O’Neill NPC Semi-Finalist); ANTHOLOGY: CROWN HEIGHTS (2016 Weeksville Heritage Center Production); and RETURNING HOME (2013 General Oliver P. Smith Award for Local Reporting, broadcast on multiple NPR stations). They’ve received grants from NYSCA/Brooklyn Arts Council, Brooklyn Community Foundation, Foundation for Contemporary Arts, and Stanford Arts; and residencies from Roundabout Theatre Company/Berkshire Theatre Group, MASS MoCA, the Helene Wurlitzer Foundation, and Blue Mountain Center. Xandra is a 2018-19 Queer|Art Fellow, a Member Artist of Ensemble Studio Theatre, a singer with Ukrainian Village Voices, and a certified Crisis Counselor for the Anti-Violence Project’s LGBTQ hotline. BA Theater, MA Journalism: Stanford University. www.xandraclark.com

Yazmany Arboleda (b. 1981) is a Colombian American artist based in Brooklyn. An architect by training, Yazmany’s practice focuses on creating “Living Sculptures,” people coming together to transform their experience of the world through co-creation. His work engages communities in a process of reinvention by using our collective imagination. He believes that art is a universal language of invention and agency, through which we redefine culture, express our shared experience and envision all possibilities. Over the past two decades he has created public art projects with communities in India, Japan, Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, South Africa, Afghanistan, Spain, and Colombia. In the United States he has collaborated with Carnegie Hall, the Yale School of Management, and BRIC. He is currently the artist in residence at IntegrateNYC, the Director of Communications for Artists Striving To End Poverty, and a cofounder of the Artist As Citizen Conference. He lectures at UNC, MIT, and LPAC about the power of art in public space. At the heart of his practice is the idea that art is a verb, not a noun. To learn more visit yazmany.net.

Zack Zadek (Writer/Composer/Lyricist) is an award winning composer/lyricist, songwriter, and playwright. He has been named by Playbill as “A Contemporary Musical Theatre Songwriter You Should Know”, a 2017 Jonathan Larson Grant Finalist, a 2017 MacDowell Fellow and a 2017 VCCA Fellow. Zack won the 2017 Weston New Musical Award for his book, music, and lyrics to DEATHLESS (dir. Tina Landau) which received its world premiere at Goodspeed Musicals this spring and was a SigWorks Finalist. Other pieces in development include, THE CRAZY ONES (dir. Sam Buntrock, The 5th Ave Theatre), THE ROLE OF A LIFETIME (dir. Jerry Mitchell), and 6 (dir. Sheryl Kaller, NYMF, London Theatre Workshop). He has been a writer-in-residence at TheatreWorks Silicon Valley, The Mitten Lab, Legacy Theatre, and The Johnny Mercer Writer’s Colony and has presented concerts at The Kennedy Center by ASCAP and Lincoln Center. Zack holds a BA from NYU at The Gallatin School of Individualized Study; Clive Davis Institute of Recorded Music, and Goldberg Department of Dramatic Writing.

Zion “NO¡Z” Rose is a hip hop artist born, raised, and educated in West Charlotte, NC. He has been performing and writing rhymes since he was seven years-old. Zion counts among his influences; Andre 3000, Tupac Shakur, Nipsey Hussle, Kendrick Lamar, as well as countless Black American musicians and artists. He is currently cultivating his distinctive sound, which he describes as a mixture of southern sensibilities and synthesized soundscapes that bend and defy genre. Zion’s music can be found on all streaming platforms and you can follow him @zifromthewestside on Instagram for the latest and greatest.