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Leah Abramson is a songwriter, composer, and instructor from Vancouver, B.C. After touring internationally with indie rock and folk bands, Leah released her fourth album of original material, Songs For a Lost Pod.
Songs For a Lost Pod—a collaboration with Pacific Northwest orcas that turns whale vocalizations into beats, and scientific research on marine mammals into lyrical and narrative fodder—is under development as an interdisciplinary stage show, to be produced in 2021.
Along with her MFA in Creative Writing (focus on lyrics) at the University of British Columbia, Leah has studied classical music at Capilano University, and traditional Appalachian balladry.
Barbara Adler is an interdisciplinary artist whose work brings together literary performance, composition, event making and design. Her work has been presented through multiple solo and band albums, publication in spoken word anthologies and performances at major music and literary festivals. Recent collaborators include choreographer Lesley Telford (Ballet BC/Inverso), composer Leah Abramson, documentary filmmaker Jan Foukal and theatre artist Kyla Gardiner. In 2016, she joined Cole Schmidt and James Meger to launch Sawdust Collector, a weekly performance series presenting new, experimental and improvised works by established and emerging artists in an interdisciplinary context.
Carmen is a best-selling author, actor, and playwright. She was born in Santiago, Chile to parents who were teachers and activists. After spending much of her teenage years and early adulthood in South America working for the underground resistance movement against the Pinochet dictatorship, Carmen returned to Vancouver in 1990 to attend Studio 58. It was while attending theatre school that she wrote her first play, In a Land Called I Don’t Remember. Since then, much of her writing has been autobiographical and unabashedly left wing, exploring themes of exile, loss, alienation, and isolation. Carmen has written and co-written twenty-five plays, including Chile Con Carne, The Refugee Hotel, The Trigger, Blue Box, and adaptations for the stage of Eduardo Galeano’s, Jorge Amado’s, and Julio Cortazar’s work.
Originally from Mexico, Carmen Alatorre is a Latinx artist who earned her MFA degree in Theatre Design at UBC (2010) and lives in the unceded traditional territories of the Musqueam, Squamish and Tsleil-Waututh First Nations (Vancouver) since 2006. Some of her recent design credits include companies such as: Arts Club Theatre Company, Bard on the Beach, Globe Theatre Regina, Royal Manitoba Theatre Centre, Citadel Theatre and Electric Company. Carmen has taught at UBC and is currently a sessional instructor at UVic. She is also a recipient of three Jessie Richardson Theatre Awards.
Elaine Avila, a Canadian playwright of Azorean/Portuguese descent, has a passion for exploring untold stories. Frequently incorporating music, politics and humor, her work is described as “bold, intelligent, forthright, spirited, compassionate… inviting, wide-ranging” (Caridad Svich), “open, generous” (Erik Ehn) and “a wonderful writer, tremendously gifted, reliable, and innovative.” (Suzan-Lori Parks).
Currently Bana lives as an uninvited immigrant on the land of the xʷməθkwəy̓əm (Musqueam), Skwxwú7mesh (Squamish), and Səl̓ílwətaɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) peoples. This stage of their artistic development is focused on bringing the worlds that occupy their mind to life. Bana writes with a deep desire to memorialize the whispers of spirits and the stories they tell to only those who listen. Writing and art making have been the spark of magic that Bana has relied on to inhabit their body comfortably. When the emotions overflow, from pore to paper they go.
Tanya Banerjee is a multi-genre writer born in India, raised in the US, and now based in Vancouver. Her work explores interculturality, race, and intergenerational trauma through characters of color. She was shortlisted for the 2020 Orwell Dystopian Short Story Prize; a 2022 Playwrights’ Gym participant at Green Thumb Theatre; a 2023 VIWFF Screenplay Competition semifinalist with her TV pilot, Process; and a 2023 ArtStarts Explores workshop leader. Current projects include a young adult fantasy novel and an album of original, self-produced songs. Tanya has an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of British Columbia and an MA in Prose Fiction from the University of East Anglia. You can find her writing, reading, drinking mochas, and listening to music, often simultaneously at a café. Tanya’s excited for her PTC Block A journey!
Mercedes Bátiz-Benét (she/her) is a Mexican-born multi-disciplinary artist, writer, and award-winning director, privileged and grateful to live, work, and create on the unceded traditional territory of the Lək̓ʷəŋən, WSÁNEĆ, and Wyomilth peoples of the Coast Salish Nation. Known for her emotionally potent and surrealist style, she has written, co-written, and directed numerous plays that have toured nationally and internationally. In 2014, Mercedes won the Canadian Stage Award for Direction at the SummerWorks Festival in Toronto with her play El Jinete – A Mariachi Opera. In 2015 she was chosen as the Distinguished Alumna of the Faculty of Fine Arts at the University of Victoria, and in 2020 she directed Fado, The Saddest Music in the World by Elaine Avila (Firehall/Puente), which won the JAYMAC Award for Outstanding Production at the Greater Victoria Regional Arts Awards. Mercedes is the artistic director of Puente Theatre where her mission is to advocate for the inclusion, representation, and development of immigrant, IBPOC, and culturally diverse voices.
Molly Beatrice (she/her) is a queer theatre artist living and creating in Vancouver, Canada: the traditional, unceded, and occupied territories of the Coast Salish peoples of the xʷməθkwəy̓əm (Musqueam), Skwxwú7mesh (Squamish), and Səl̓ílwətaɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations. She is a recent graduate of the Phoenix Theatre and primarily works as a director, deviser, puppeteer, and producer. Recent directing credits include Prey (Belfry Theatre’s Incubator Program 2020), Home (Impulse Theatre’s Peek Show 8), The Children (Belfry Theatre, Assistant Director 2019), The Lonelies (Belfry Theatre SPARK Mini Plays 2019), and Ernie and Bethy (Victoria Fringe 2018). Some favourite producing credits include serving as the Peek Fest Associate Producer (Impulse Theatre), BC Culture Days Ambassador, and Travelling Puppet Show Coordinator (IslandLink Library Federation). Molly is grateful to be able to develop her writing skills alongside the Block A winter cohort.
Santana Berryman was born in Whitehorse, Yukon, traditional territory of the Kwanlin Dün First Nations and the Ta’an Kwäch’än Council. Trained initially as an actor, Santana has gone on to work and train as an emerging director and creator. Her artistic practise focuses on equitable collaboration, game-ifying work and delving into the uncomfortable. Currently, she works as an Associate Instructor with Carousel Theatre for Young People. Santana has been working with youth for over 10 years, and holds a TEFL: Performance and Play certificate from Educo Italia. Acting credits include Peter and The Starcatcher (Cap U Theatre), The Shape of Things (The Guild), and a cross-Canada tour of Map of The Land, Map of The Stars. (Gwaandak Theatre). Santana’s directing credits include Society of Transformative Zoology (IGNITE! Youth-Driven Arts Festival) and co-direction of The Bitter Tears of Petra Von Kant (Vancouver Fringe).
Alina Blackett (she/her) is an interdisciplinary artist living and working on the unceded territories of the Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh First Nations. Recent acting credits include Agamemnon (Stone’s Throw Productions), Pieces of Eight (Publius Productions), and Fishbowl (Ignite! Festival). Alina has directed two short plays in the Brave New Play Rites Festival, and voices a recurring role on Duggan Hill: A Radio Drama (Time Signal Productions). Alina is passionate about exploring narratives that surround the theme of mental health in her writing and hopes to cultivate empathy, community and healing with her work. Alina is a graduate of the Acting program at Studio 58.
Larissa‘s parents each immigrated to Canada as children, from Nederland and Jamaica. They met and married in Toronto (Treaty 13A), then moved to Calgary (Treaty 7), where Larissa was born and raised. Larissa completed her BFA (glass) at AUA (formerly ACAD). In 2009, she moved to Vancouver (illegally occupied) and began pursuing visual arts opportunities, including public art, creating interactive arts events, curation, and exhibitions. In 2019, Larissa gave herself terrifying improv classes for her birthday, and found a welcoming community to explore. She has performed a handful of times, and is now developing her writing.
Leanna Brodie is an award-winning writer, translator, and performer whose work, including the plays The Vic, Schoolhouse, For Home & Country, and The Book of Esther, has been seen across Canada and the US. In 2015, Brodie collaborated with New Zealand composer Anthony Young on Ulla’s Odyssey, the Flourish Prize–winning opera which toured the UK for two years with OperaUpClose. Salesman in China (co-written with Jovanni Sy) is now running at the Stratford Festival and will transfer to the NAC in January 2025. Brodie is also a leading translator of contemporary Québécois and Franco-Canadian playwrights. Recent premieres have included David Paquet’s Wildfire (Factory Theatre, Toronto: 2022 Dora Mavor Moore Award for Best New Play, Director, and Production); Anaïs Pellin’s Clementine (Kleine Compagnie/Carousel Theatre/PHT, Vancouver); Fanny Britt’s Benevolence (Ruby Slippers Theatre/Pacific Theatre); and Rébecca Déraspe’s I Am William (Stratford Festival, Théâtre le Clou). This season sees the premieres of Sébastien Harrisson’s From Alaska (Belfry Theatre) and Catherine Léger’s Home Deliveries (Ruby Slippe Theatre/Jericho Arts Centre. Brodie recently served as Assistant Professor (Playwriting) at UBC’s School of Creative Writing and is currently Artist-in-Residence at Concordia University. www.leannabrodie.com
Britney (Mocca) Buren is a Vancouver artist who enjoys teaching, performing and creating new works. She has gained many of these skills through her completion of a Bachelor’s degree in Performing Arts, an Associates Degree in Psychology and a Musical Theatre Diploma from Capilano University. Her recent performance work includes Trudeaumania! at Vancouver’s 2020 Fringe festival and choreographer on the crazy 8’s film Tryst. In addition to working as a performer Britney has been working on developing a screenplay, poetry and movement based on a collective reflection of the last two years. She aims to elevate her practices by incorporating historical and cultural material into her work and sharing it with her community.
Scott (he/his) is a creator working in film, television and theatre. His TV pilot script NIGHT PASSING is a semi-finalist in the Screencraft Screenwriting Fellowship (2020) and the Diverse Voices Competition (2020), it is also a “Second-Rounder” in the prestigious Austin Film Festival. Recently, his quarantine-themed film/theatre hybrid DESIREE AMA was commissioned by Upintheair Theatre. Scott is the lead writer at the Research-Based Theatre Collaborative at the University of British Columbia. With the Collaborative, he is currently writing and producing ROCK THE BOAT, a series of films that explore fraught student and faculty relationships. His plays VIVA (Theatre BC Playwriting Award-Best One Act), THE HUNGER ROOM & DESIRE(E) have received local production, and DESIRE(E) has been published in an anthology of new work. He is an inaugural member of the Arts Club Theatre Company’s Emerging Playwrights Unit. Scott’s writing often features multi-faceted LGBTQIA2S+ lead characters. Upcoming: Night Passing podcast (Arts Club Theatre), and a play for youth with Green Thumb Theatre. These days, he is grateful to be spending the pandemic with his wonderful husband, Chris.
Davey Samuel Calderon (he/they/siya) is a director, performer, writer, producer, drag artist, dramaturg, and settler on the unceded lands of the hən̓q̓əmin̓əm̓ and Sḵwx̱wú7mesh speaking peoples. He was the Co-Founder of New(to)Town Collective (2014-2024), an experimental theatre collective. His work has been on stages (Big Queer Filipino Karaoke Night! and BQFKN! ONLINE), film (RUN part of the shorts program of the 2018 Vancouver Queer Film Festival), and other mediums (contributor to Canadian Theatre Review, Drag! Vol. 185, Winter 2021). Currently, he is Playwrights Theatre Centre’s Dramaturg, Public Engagement. Select dramaturgy credits include: God’s A Drag by Jessica Lemes da Silva (2023 Vancouver Fringe Festival, 2023-24 Fringe New Play Prize Winner), The Frontliners by Zahida Rahemtulla (2022 Vancouver Fringe Festival, Fringe New Play Prize Winner), Before They Cut Down Our Tree by Karter Masuhara (2023 Vancouver Fringe Festival, VACT’s 2022 MSG 2 and 2021 MSG1 programs), and it lives in my bedroom by Mily Mumford (PTC’s 2021-24 Associate). Current play in development: Deep Fried: A Pinoy Musical!, a show about Filipinx-Canadian and racialized service workers that serve us in our daily lives, learn more at playwrightstheatre.com/programs/collaborations
Tim Carlson is a playwright, dramaturg, curator and the artistic producer of Theatre Conspiracy. He led the creation of Foreign Radical which won the 2015 Jessie Award Critics Choice Innovation prize and a 2017 Edinburgh Fringe First Award. He was researcher/ interviewer for Berlin-based Rimini Protokoll’s latest show, Top Secret International, seen at the 2017 Under the Radar Festival in New York. His new documentary play, Victim Impact, premiered at The Cultch in Vancouver in June 2018. The show Extraction, won the 2013 Rio Tinto Alcan Award, Canada’s largest prize for new play development.
Chelsea McPeake Carlson is the Managing Producer of Savage Society and has worked for over twenty years in arts management and theatre production. She worked for 11 years at the Vancouver Playhouse Theatre Company, where she produced and managed the development, premiere and tours of Kevin Loring’s Where the Blood Mixes. She has been working as Managing Director of Savage Society since 2010 and is a 2019 recipient of the John Hobday Awards in Arts Management. Chelsea is on the Board of Directors for 2 Rivers Remix Festival and Royal City Musical Theatre and sat for two terms on the Arts Commission of the City of New Westminster. Chelsea was a participant in the Playwrights Theatre Centre Block D (Dramaturgy) Cohort in 2023 and is looking forward to furthering the development of this project with the support nd involvement of the good folks at PTC.
Marc Castellini is a librarian, archivist and theatre artist, currently residing on the unceded and ancestral lands of the xʷməθkwəy̓əm (Musqueam), Skwxwú7mesh (Squamish), and Səl̓ílwətaɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) First Nations. He holds a BFA in theatre performance from Simon Fraser University, and a Masters of Library and Information Science from the Pratt Institute in New York. As a dramaturg, Marc has worked primarily with new scripts in development, and with projects engaged with forms of memory and accumulations of material history. Also a playwright, Marc has had his work produced at the rEvolver Theatre Festival, and been a recipient of Staircase Theatre’s “Movin’ On Up” New Play Prize in 2016. Across all his work, Marc remains fascinated by questions of the materiality of the past, and the ongoing construction of the present.
Pedro Chamale is a Latinx-Canadian theatre artist, born and raised in Chetwynd, British Columbia. He received his BFA in Theatre Performance from SFU’s School for the Contemporary Arts. He then went on to form rice & beans theatre with Derek Chan. Pedro is a director, playwright, and performer and was the Artistic Resident at Neworld Theatre in 2014, guest curator of the 2018 rEvolver Festival and one of the playwrights in the 2019 Playwright’s Lab at the Banff Centre. Pedro was also part of the second cohort of Banff’s Arts and Culture Leadership program in partnership with NTS in 2019. He is a co-founder of the Canadian Latinx Theatre Artist Alliance and part of the Latinx Theatre Commons. Pedro has also worked behind the scenes with local Vancouver theatre companies including: Full Circle First Nations Performance, Leaky Heaven, Boca del Lupo, Neworld Theatre and The Only Animal. Some of Pedro’s plays include Mis Papás and Small Town Hoser Spic. Pedro premiered Made in Canada: an agricultural song cycle in 2021 and is currently working on his new play Peace Countrywith PTC’s Heidi Taylor as dramaturg. With Peace Country, Pedro is exploring cultural intersections, friendships and environmentalism in BC’s small towns.
Derek Chan (陳嘉昊) grew up in colonial Hong Kong, studied in Norway, and currently lives in Vancouver. He received his BFA in theatre performance from Simon Fraser University. A playwright, director, performer, translator, and producer, Derek has been co-artistic director of rice & beans theatre since 2010. He has also worked with Playwrights Theatre Centre (artistic director apprentice), Vancouver Asian Canadian Theatre (associate artistic producer), and the rEvolver Festival (guest curator).
In 2015, Derek was awarded the Vancouver Fringe New Play Prize with Starstuff: per aspera ad astra. At the 2016 Glassco Translation Residency hosted by Playwrights’ Workshop Montréal, Derek translated Jovanni Sy’s A Taste of Empire (Cantonese title: 食盡天下/Sik Zeon Tin Haa). The play was subsequently nominated for a Dora Award (Best Touring Production) in 2018. His play, Chicken Girl (2019/20), won the Sydney Risk Award for Outstanding Original Play by an Emerging Playwright, and was nominated for Outstanding Original Script at the Jessies. Derek was part of the 2020 Banff Playwrights Lab, and has been a National Arts Centre English Theatre Artist in Residence (19/20) with yellow objects, a new play about the ongoing pro-democracy movement in Hong Kong.
Derek has also worked on: tonight, just the two of us (writer, fu-GEN/The Transformation Project); Carried Away on the Crest of a Wave (assistant director, Arts Club); No Foreigners (performer/translator, Hong Kong Exile/fu-GEN); Pick a Number (co-writer/performer, Boca del Lupo/FUSE). With rice & beans: Loomings; or The Whale (playwright/director), Mis Papás (performer), Last Train In (director); and Sik Zeon Tin Haa/A Taste of Empire (translator/performer, with Gateway Theatre’s Pacific Festival (2016) and Cahoots Theatre (2018).
Garvin Chan 陳嘉泓 (They/them) is an emerging theatre maker/director from Hong Kong, currently situated in the unceded territories of xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), and səlilwətaɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations. Graduating from Simon Fraser University’s theatre performance program with honours in 2022, they have since featured in Pedro Chamale’s Peace Country, received a residency with Rumble Theatre, and participated in programs with vAct, Arts Club, and Whatlab.
Garvin explores identity through dark humour, contrasting the spiritual with the mundane. Recent directorial works include “What the F-Word is Going On?”, “Year of the Frog”, and scenes from Stefanie Kuo’s “Final Boarding Call”.” Social Media is just Instagram “@garvinachan”, though I’ll mostly be posting coffee pictures.
Arthi Chandra (she/they) is a Vancouver based director, writer, and performer. She studied contemporary theatre performance and directing at Simon Fraser University. Her practice is based on text-based devising, and adapting canonical work. Select performance credits include Maria von Trapp in Bombogenesis (SFU), Clytemnestra in Agamemnon (Stone’s Throw Productions), and herself in Where the Quiet Queers Are (Amplify Choral Theatre). Most recently, Arthi directed and adapted John Osborne’s Look Back in Anger. Select devising credits include Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, directed by Cole Lewis, and Bombogenesis directed by Steven Hill. Arthi is interested in work that confronts politics, engages with queerness, and explores the concept of radical empathy. She’s currently alternating between an adaptation of King Lear, which centres on the trauma between mothers and daughters, and a YA novel about magic sort of things and detectives.
ellis cheadle (she/her) is a theatre-maker living and working on the stolen territories of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm, Sḵwx̱wú7mesh, and Səl̓ílwətaʔ/Selilwitulh Nations. She is drawn to slow creation processes, and is increasingly dedicated to creating malleable theatrical set-lists that can responsively adapt to requirements of scale, duration, location, and collaborator skill-sets/curiosities. She values playfulness and experimentation, and strives to make theatre that invites the audience into a shared game of finding links between seemingly incongruous images, texts, themes, and materials.
Monica is a Punjabi filmmaker, researcher and community facilitator. Her films blend fiction and non-fiction to explore the surreal, inviting viewers to drift and dance across difficult geographies. Recent shorts Let Us Try Again (Ao Phir Koshish Kariye) and When It Falls Apart reflect on land, labor, and resource extraction as it relates to colonial railway histories and ‘ghost’ towns. She enjoys using poetry and prose as ethnographic tools in her films; a way to speak to absences in archives and memory. Monica also works as a community facilitator– teaching filmmaking in schools and helping build spaces for discussions about harm reduction, gender equity, indigenous sovereignty, and the politics of urban space.
Jasmine writes from a first generation Canadian/ancient Punjabi/contemporary Sikh/ female perspective in her hometown of Vancouver. Her work seeks to explore the construction of identities as praxis and how these may be influenced by cross-cultural, cross-spiritual theatre production from lenses of indigeneity.
Edie Reaney Chunn (they/she) is a writer based in so-called “Vancouver”, on the unceded traditional territory of the Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil- Waututh Nations. Edie is the 2021 first-prize winner of the Norma Epstein Foundation National Award for creative writing, and their poetry can be found in Untethered Magazine, Maisonneuve, and elsewhere. Their first play, How the Light Lies (On You), was produced by Eastern Front Theatre and New Pants Project in K’jipuktuk/ Halifax in 2021. Edie enjoys working collaboratively and inefficiently on theatre projects, and other pursuits.
Monique Flynn Coe is an interdisciplinary artist of Cayuga and European descent. Monique is a storyteller whose work focuses on topics of culture, identity, class, gender, and art as a vehicle for education and creative change. Her work incorporates spoken word, song, dance, video, photography, and installations created from everyday materials. Monique asks her audience to bear witness to the intimate stories she shares as she creates space for community, collective healing, and sociopolitical dialogue. She holds a Bachelor of Arts from the State University of New York, Albany.
Karla (she/they) is a poet, editor, translator, educator, and arts administrator. Born and raised in the Philippines, she is spending her quarantine listening to Tito music, aka middle-of-the-road, soft rock music that should’ve been left in the 1970s but enjoys an enduring popularity in the Philippines. Her work has appeared in or is forthcoming in Contemporary Verse 2, filling station, Room Magazine, Poetry is Dead, among others. She thinks that wearing dresses and skirts exclusively is a personality trait. In 2019, she hosted the Sinag-Araw Writing Workshop, a poetry workshop series created for Filipino youth in the diaspora. Do not get on her bad side or she will put a hex on you in her poetry.
Christina Cook (she/they) is an interdisciplinary theatre artist, arts-based scholar, and therapist. When Christina was a kid, she wanted to be a counsellor like her favourite character, Deanna Troi, on Star Trek, OR she wanted to act alongside Deanna Troi, starring in her favourite TV show, Star Trek. She feels lucky that, as an adult, she gets to do different versions of both. Christina’s playwriting focuses on trans, nonbinary, and gender non-conforming narratives, and her work advocates gender liberation for all. She is writing and performing in her newest piece, Postcards. Christina’s previous writing credits include the play Quick Bright Things, which was nominated for a Governor General’s award, and ‘A practical (if dated) treatise on the art of genderqueer dancing’ in Evan Tsitsias and Bilal Baig’s This is Beyond: A Time Capsule of Queer Experience. In addition to her artistic work, Christina is a counselling psychologist, and she strives to foster interdisciplinary work born from passionate commitments to mental wellness and theatre.
Reese Cowley (she/her) is a Sri Lankan-Canadian actor, director and playwright, born and raised in New Westminster, BC and is now based in Toronto, ON. She is a recent graduate of the Theatre and Drama Studies program at the University of Toronto Mississauga and Sheridan College. Recently, she performed in the English language premier of Emma Hache’s Less in Frogetting with Pleiades Theatre in Toronto. Reese is thrilled to be joining this year’s Block A cohort, and looks forward to developing her first play!
Wendy Judith Cutler is a radical teacher, writer and Jewish lesbian feminist activist. She co-authored the book Writing Alone Together: Journalling in a Circle of Women for Creativity, Compassion and Connection and edited and contributed to Finding Home: Collected Stories from Salt Spring Island Circles of Women. Her essay “Dear Mom and Dad” was included in the first lesbian coming-out anthology, The Coming Out Stories. She was a fellow in Lambda Literacy’s Writer’s Retreat for Emerging LGBTQ Voices. She gratefully lives (with her lovergirl Corrie, dog Rosey, cats Lotus and Luna and their constellation of intimates) on the unsurrendered and stolen traditional lands of the Coast Salish Peoples, specifically the Tsawout First Nation (Salt Spring Island), where she guides sacred circles of women and queers writing together. She is currently writing her first play, An UnDutiful Daughter.
Howard Dai is a Taiwanese-Canadian theatre-maker; who works and lives on the traditional, ancestral, and unceded territories belonging to the Qayqayt, Musqueam (xʷməθkʷəy̓əm), Squamish (Skxwú7mesh), Tsleil-Waututh(səl̓ilwətaɁɬ) Nation. He is a recent graduate of the BFA in Theatre Performance program at Simon Fraser University School for the Contemporary Arts. As a theatre artist, Howard is interested in works that break through the barrier of architecture to become more accessible and immersive for a wider audience. He also writes music sometimes, and is dipping his toes in design and coding. He kind of does a bit of everything, but wishes he is actually good at something.
Véronique Darwin (she/her) is a fiction writer and teacher living in Rossland, BC. In 2019, she wrote, directed and produced Neverland: A Ski Town Musical. She recently had short stories published in McSweeney’s Quarterly Concern and PRISM International, and her lyric essays appear in carte blanche and Porter House Review. She is a regular contributor to The Literary Review of Canada, EVENT Magazine and Geist. In 2022, Véronique completed her MFA in Creative Writing at the University of Guelph in Toronto, where she wrote an existential seagull novel in mentorship with Sheila Heti. She is currently writing Dogs (the musical). www.veroniquedarwin.com and @veroniquedarwin on Twitter
Jesse Del Fierro is a second-generation, non-binary, Filipinx – Canadian theatre creator, performer and dramaturg with the privilege to work in both Moh’kinstsis on Treaty 7 Territory and on the unceded, ancestral territories of the Coast Salish peoples colloquially known as Calgary AB and Vancouver BC respectively. They are so eternally grateful for the love and support they’ve received working with Vertigo Theatre, Chromatic Theatre, Downstage Theatre, Theatre Alberta, PBG and the PBB, Vancouver Asian Canadian Theatre, Playwright’s Theatre Centre and PuSh International Performance Art Festival amongst others. Intersectionality is their only reality. Say hello at www.jessedelfierro.com
Jan Derbyshire (JD) is an established multi-disciplinary artist, producer, inclusive designer and educator. She specializes in the design a facilitation and delivery of playful, inclusive, interactive, and participatory experiences that push forward ideas of diversity, belonging and interdependent communities.
Dave Deveau is an award-winning writer and performer whose work has been produced across North America and in Europe. He is the Playwright in Residence for Vancouver’s Zee Zee Theatre who produced his plays Nelly Boy, Tiny Replicas, the critically-acclaimed My Funny Valentine (Sydney Risk Prize, Jessie Nomination, Oscar Wilde Nomination – Dublin), Lowest Common Denominator and Elbow Room Café: The Musical (with Anton Lipovetsky). His first three theatre for young audiences plays were all commissioned and premiered with Green Thumb Theatre, and have subsequently continued into other productions: Out in the Open, tagged (Dora nomination) and Celestial Being (Jessie Nomination).
Cara Masten DiGirolamo (they/them) writes fantastic fiction–from music that can cause earthquakes, to fairie drag balls, and queer scholars riding language-dragons. They are a graduate of the 2015 Odyssey Writing Workshop, have an MFA from UBC (2022), and a PhD in Linguistics from Cornell (2017). Their short play, “Weather Report,” was produced as part of the 2020 Brave New Play Rites festival, and an excerpt of “Sway,” a queer competitive ballroom dancing romcom/sitcom, was read at the Vancouver Cold Reading Series. Their short fiction can be found at Beneath Ceaseless Skies, Fantasy Magazine, and Cast of Wonders. See more at caradigirolamo.com.
Bonnie is a Finnish-Canadian theatre artist who holds a BFA in Acting from the University of British Columbia (where she received the Joy Coghill Award in Acting), and a certificate from the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in London, England. Most recently: Carousel Theatre for Young People: The Tempest (Assistant Director); Spinners Collective: Spinning You Home (ASM). Bonnie has worked extensively as an actor in Vancouver, and has specialized in the adaptation and performance of classical works. She is excited to focus on creating her own original contemporary pieces! Bonnie is also a Teaching Artist at Bard on the Beach Shakespeare Festival and Arts Umbrella.
Chloe Edbrooke is a writer, radio producer, and teacher born and now based in Vancouver on the unceded territory of the Coast Salish peoples of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), and səlilwətaɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations. She recently performed her first five minutes of stand-up comedy, and is curious to see how this may inform her writing. Chloe is grateful for the opportunity to explore a new medium with her Block A cohort.
Driven by curiosity, Randi (she/her) wears many hats in the world of theatre, including producing, directing, performance, and design. Her passion for puppetry has taken her across the country and, more recently, the globe. She has a background in devising new works for a wide range of audiences and has worked in numerous artistic capacities with Chemainus Theatre Festival, Neworld Theatre, Caravan Farm Theatre, the Canadian Academy of Mask and Puppetry, the National Arts Centre, and Western Canada Theatre. Randi is grateful to create on the unceded Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh territory in Vancouver and unceded Secwepemc territory in Kamloops.
Sean (He/Him) is a playwright who engages audiences through dark and tragicomic stories, drawing on his deep knowledge of classic myth, lore, and legend from around the world to create modern-day fairy tales for the stage. He lives on Vancouver Island, in British Columbia, Canada, where he’s been his whole life, except for that one time he tried and failed at living in Mackenzie. Sean’s completed plays include Dispossessed, a one-act horror-comedy which was selected two years in a row for Western Edge Theatre’s New Waves Festival for emerging artists, and his newest work: Famous Writers, a full-length play about substance abuse, love and mental health which he completed in 2020 during quarantine. He’s currently working on a new anthology of ten-minute folk-plays inspired by his recent diagnosis of ADHD.
Sarvin Esmaeili is an Iranian-Canadian actress, writer, progressive activist and storyteller. Sarvin will be graduating from Studio 58’s acting program in December. She is a recipient of the 2019 BC Arts Council Scholarship. Sarvin is a co-creator/star of Can We Fix It?, One of a Kind, One of a Kind Too and Doors of Choice. She recently directed a virtual play called, Papa Records Everything as NTS’s Art Apart. Sarvin is the co-head coordinator and head facilitator of Studio 58’s Diversity committee. Sarvin’s next project is performing at East Van Panto: Alice in Wonderland, a web pilot and her one woman show at Studio 58.
Kendra Fanconi has worked since 1994 as an actor, writer, director, theatre creator and producer of original, often site-specific work. She has created plays in swimming pools, treetops, elevators, on False Creek, and in a theatre built of snow and ice. Kendra is the Artistic Director of The Only Animal. Kendra’s short play Finale has been produced in New York City, Chicago, Norway, Lithuania, Brighton U.K. Her production Nothing But Sky won the 2014 Jessie for Significant Artistic Achievement. She created NiX, Canada’s first theatre of snow and ice, which premiered at ATP’s playRites Festival in Calgary and was a centrepiece production in the Vancouver 2010 Cultural Olympiad up in Whistler.
(she/they)- a Theatrical and Visual Artivist with a fervent belief in decolonizing our community, encouraging and aiding in bold cultural endeavours, and constructing an ethical and inclusive artistic legacy. Works include projects with The Arts Club Theatre, The Search Party, & Zee Zee Theatre. Fergie is currently Design Coordinator for The Stratford Festival. She gratefully stands in resolute solidarity with her hosts and stewards of the occupied lands and waters both the Treaty Territories of the Attawandaron, Anishinaabeg, Wendat, and Haudenosaunee Confederacy, and the qiqéyt (QayQayt), xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), Sḵwx̱wú7mesh Úxwumixw (Squamish), and səl̓ilw̓ətaʔɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations.
Araceli Ferrara is a non-binary Canadian theatre artist. They graduated from the University of British Columbia in 2023 with an MFA in Creative Writing and Theatre, and graduated from York University in 2021 with a BA in Theatre, specializing in Dramaturgy and Devised Theatre, with a minor in History. Born and raised in Toronto, Ontario, she is the daughter of a refugee and celebrates both her Chilean and Italian heritage. Their past credits include: fried chicken (playwright, Brave New Play Rites Festival 2022), Bug (director/playwright, New Work Play Festival 2021), There’s a Ghost in the House (director/playwright, playGround Festival 2020), and SOL (playwright, Tarragon YPU 2019, Ergo Arts Pink Fest 2018). Araceli is a lover of theatre; you can often find them working on their own play or helping with someone else’s.
Marya Folinsbee (she/her) is a clown, actor, playwright, and teaching artist from Edmonton/Amiskwaciy Waskahikan, who now lives in the Slocan Valley/Sinixt Territory, in the West Kootenays. Marya studied theatre at the Victoria School of the Arts and McMaster University, and independently with artists including David Diamond (Theatre for Living), Jon Davison (London Clown School), Deanna Fleysher (Don’t Call it Clown), and others. Marya has written & independently produced several plays, including “In Transit” (Nextfest 2001); “Be/Longing” (2018, co-written with Martina Avis); and “Domesticated Disputes (2020). Select acting credits include Peter in Peter Pan; Bottom in A Midsummer Night’s Dream; Moon in The Real Inspector Hound; Le Geographe and Le Renard in Le Petit Prince; and Constance Ledbelly in Goodnight Desdemona (Goodmorning Juliet). Marya facilitates clown and theatre workshops for all ages, and is currently writing and devising two new works – PLAY! and The Mosquitos.
Alyssa Formosa is an aspiring playwright in Vancouver. Alyssa’s plays include Oh Brother, Redd, Odd Man Out, Donuts and Bagels, and Dream On. Alyssa’s work has been produced at the National Theatre School (NTS) Drama Festival and had been developed by the Arts Club through their LEAP writing program. Awards include: Association of British Columbia Drama Educators (ABCDE) YouthWright and NTS Drama Festival Outstanding Original Script in 2016, 2017, and 2018.
Alex is a multidisciplinary settler creator born on Treaty 6 land and now based in the traditional, ancestral, and unceded territory of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm, Sḵwx̱wú7mesh, and Səl̓ílwətaʔ/Selilwitulh Nations. An actor, playwright, and producer, he is the founder of K.I.A. Productions, performing his plays in collaboration with his wife and co-artistic director Keltie Forsyth on stages across Canada. Alex holds a Master of Fine Arts in Acting from East 15 (London, UK) and a Bachelor of Arts in Drama and Creative Writing from the University of Alberta.
Allyson is an award-winning director and writer from Kelowna. Directing credits include East of Berlin, Boy (Dalliance Theatre Collective), The Diary of Anne Frank, Posh (Fighting Chance), Seven Minutes in Heaven (Eternal Theatre Collective), and Gridlock (UBC Brave New Play Rites). Playwriting credits include An Assertive Girl (Quand Même Festival, Pull Festival) and Carrots, Baby (Tomo Suru Players). Allyson holds a bachelor’s degree in Motion Picture Arts from Capilano University and by day works at a talent agency in the animation and voice-over department.
Tristen Foy (he/him) is a theatre artist from Winnipeg now based in Vancouver. He’s a graduate of the Studio 58 Acting Program as well as having previously studied theatre at the Universities of Winnipeg and Alberta. Since graduating theatre school he hopes to further develop more as a playwright and director in addition to acting. In 2022 he had his first play Everyone Loves a Mystery produced as part of the Six of One play festival at Studio 58. Selected acting credits include The Importance of Being Earnest, Round and Round the Garden, and Tom Thomson is Missing.”
June is a Japanese-Canadian inter-disciplinary theatre artist with a BFA in Theatre Performance and a Certificate in Sustainable Community Development from Simon Fraser University. June is the Co-Founder of New(to)Town Collective, an artist collective with a mandate to create new experimental works, provide ongoing accessible physical theatre training and experimental research workshops called Training Jams. June is also the Co-Artistic Director of Popcorn Galaxies, an experimental theatre company interested in re-enchanting the everyday through unconventional site-responsive and site-specific works. Popcorn Galaxies has produced over eleven independent productions in seven years and has been presented at Centre A Gallery, Vancouver Fringe Festival, BC Culture Days, rEvolver Festival, The Array: First Contact, and will be presenting a new work at PuShOFF 2021.
Additionally, she was the Assistant Dramaturg at the Playwrights Lab at the Banff Centre for the Arts in 2019 – 2020 and the Emerging Dramaturg for Vancouver Asian Canadian Theatre’s MSG program in 2019. She independently produces the Nikkei Artist Mixer, the Emerging Dramaturg Mixer, and is the founder of Dyslexic Players Canada. Her artistic practice includes: experimental theatre creation, acting for theatre/film, performance, clown, dramaturgy, directing, producing, curating, Japanese language translation and language coaching, and cultural leadership.
Rosemary Georgeson is a Coast Salish/Sahtu Dene artist, storyteller and writer from Galiano Island. Born and raised in the commercial fishing industry, and with a background in the Culinary Arts, she was the Aboriginal Storyteller at the Vancouver Public Library and has worked as an artist and community liaison for Vancouver Moving Theatre and urban ink productions. She co-wrote We’re All In this Together and Storyweaving.
Winona Gillera (they/them) is a writer and Filipina immigrant-settler. They have a background in performing and visual arts and have performed in Singapore, the Philippines, and here in so-called Canada. Their writing career so far includes arts journalism, radio hosting, and copywriting. In their creative pursuits, they were spotlighted as a featured writer for SAD Mag, worked with Halfie Films as an actor and writer, and recently won the title of Grand Slam Poet for Under the Table’s Vancouver Pride Society 2023 Poetry Slam.
Kagan Goh is an award-winning documentary filmmaker, published author, spoken word artist, mental health advocate and activist who uses writing, film and spoken word storytelling to educate the public about mental health issues and break the silence about the taboo of mental illness and fight the stigma against people with mental health challenges. Surviving Samsara is a 60-minute multimedia, multidisciplinary live theatrical production bringing together theatre, spoken word, music, film, audiovisuals, etc. Created by artist Kagan Goh based on his struggles with manic depression, this work breaks the taboo of silence about mental illness. Surviving Samsara traces his journey towards recovery, acceptance and unconditional self-love. The show spans two decades as Kagan struggles to survive the highs of mania and the lows of depression. The work offers intimate insights into an ‘insider’s’ experience of madness as a survivor. Kagan exposes the damaging effects of the stigma of mental illness and explores manic depression not only as a disorder but also as a spiritual emergence – a vehicle for personal growth, healing and transcendence.
Taryn Goodwin (she/her) is a queer, inter-disciplinary, social practice artist and community organizer invested in supporting connections that celebrate and center well-being, leadership, and re-imagining mental health and community-care in learning ecologies and educational politics. Across all her works, Goodwin highlights and addresses The Body of Knowledge as a value-based practice. Using collaborative structures, critical pedagogy, interviews, and empathy as tools for gathering, learning, slowing down, and meaning-making she examines the pivotal possibilities of the post-pandemic world as a vital form of recovery and examination. Experimenting with the realms of attendance, participation, and disability justice Goodwin uses the reach of online mediums and community training as models for dialogue, participation and systems change to shape her work, as they translate to the stage.
Tai Amy Grauman is Metis, Cree and Haudenosaunee from Ardrossan, Alberta. She has a BFA in Acting from UBC with a minor in First Nations Studies. Tai recently received this year’s Jessie Richardson award for most promising newcomer. She was also Vancouver’s Mayor’s Emerging Theatre Artist of 2015, nominated by Margo Kane. Tai is currently Savage Society’s Artist in Residence. She is also working with Nightswimming on a commission of a new play which will be developed over the next five years called Her name is Marie. Over this upcoming season, she will also be developing her play You used to call me Marie. Her name is Marie and You used to call me Marie are companion pieces which centre the history of the creation of Treaty 6 through the perspective of Marie Callihoo. Tai is also co-creating a play called And she fell from the Sky… for YPT’s Leaps and Bound initiative. Recent acting credits include: Thanks For Giving (Arts Club), THOWXIYA (Axis Theatre), The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (Carousel Theatre) and Weaving Reconciliation (Vancouver Moving Theatre). Tai also wrote and directed Her name was Mary at the 2017 Vancouver Fringe Festival. She was recently in Lytton as Kevin Loring’s assistant director for Savage Society’s play The council of Spider, Ant and Fly. Upcoming Tai will be participating in Native Earth’s Weesageechak Festival as part of the acting company and with her play You used to call me Marie.
Originally from Alberta, Jenn is grateful to live, work and play on the unceded territory of the Coast Salish peoples. As a playwright, Jenn was awarded the Sydney Risk award in 1999 for best emerging playwright with her first play Drinking with Persephone. She is a former Associate at Playwrights Theatre Centre where she created a multi-disciplinary play, The Long Call. In 2017, Jenn received an Arts Club Silver Commission for a new comedy entitled House and Home, which premiered at the Firehall Arts Centre in January 2020. As an actor, Jenn recently performed the role of Elizabeth Stockman in The Enemy at the Firehall Arts Centre, the role of “Vi,” in Western Gold’s production of Caryl Churchill’s Escaped Alone, and was part of the ensemble cast in Theatre Conspiracy’s Victim Impact at The Cultch. Jenn will be playing Jenn has been honored with several Jessie Richardson Theatre awards and nominations for writing and performing. She has also worked regularly in film and television and was nominated for a Leo award as “Maeve,” in Marshall Axani’s feature, The Cannon. Jenn also provides comic commentary for modern dance at “BLOOM,” Mascall Dance.
Emmett Hanly (he/him) is a member of the Métis Nation of British Columbia and a recent graduate of Trinity Western University’s BFA-Acting program. Selected acting credits include Kevin in The Snow Queen, Gilbert Blythe in Anne of Green Gables: The Musical, and Niels Bohr in Copenhagen (SAMC Theatre), Ethan in It’s a Glorious, Wonderful Life (Morrow’s Lark Theatre), and Eduardo in disPLACE: Refugee Stories in Their Own Words (Dark Glass Theatre). Emmett is an aspiring playwright, having co-written two short plays with his brother Samuel Hanly: The Wake of Leroy McGuinness (Gallery 7 Theatre) and Reach (SAMC Theatre). Emmett is passionate about creating genre-bending theatre that is both surreal and politically engaged, specifically focusing on topics such as queerness, religious trauma, and decolonization. Emmett also writes his own music ranging from acoustic ballads to punk anthems and spends his free time nerding out about Dungeons and Dragons.
Shanti Harris (she/they) is an actor and writer living on the traditional, unceded, and ancestral territories of the xʷməθkwəy̓əm (Musqueam), Skwxwú7mesh (Squamish), and Səl̓ílwətaɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations. Shanti is a recent graduate of X University, where she received her Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in acting and found her love for writing in many forms. She is excited about boundary-pushing, gut wrenching theatre that strives to explore all aspects of the human experience. Recent playwriting credits include a workshopped production of Juice at the New Voices Festival. Select acting credits include Rabbit Hole (XU, Nina Lee Aquino), Love and Information (XU, Dustin Wills), and The Duchess of Malfi (XU, James Wallis). Shanti wants to continue to explore many performance forms including Shakespeare, clown, film, and comedy. She is grateful to Block A for presenting an opportunity to spark her imagination and to write, write, write!
Jessica Harvey (she/her) is a writer, theatre and film maker, musician/composer, teacher and mother. A UBC BFA Acting graduate, Jessica has created and performed work with companies including The Only Animal, Radix, Pi Theatre, Seven Tyrants and Universal Limited. She sang funk-rock vocals with Vancouver’s Two Apple Tobacco and gypsy jazz with Trotsky Tulsky in Belgium. Recently, she assembled an 8 piece band to perform a concert of her original music. Her short play ‘Real Company’ was produced at the 2018 Pull Festival. Jessica delights in telling stories that unearth lost worlds and shine light through the cracks in our foundations.
Krystal Kavita Jagoo (she/her) graduated with a Bachelor of Arts degree in 2008 and a Master of Social Work degree in 2010. Jagoo is passionate about equity, as can be seen from her writing and facilitation work for Scarborough Arts, Saskatchewan Writers’ Guild, etc. She was published over 100 times in 2021. Her visual art, “University Ableism Bingo” was featured in Pandemic: A Feminist Response, and the zine, CRIP COLLAB. Jagoo is working on her collection of essays, entitled, “They Colonized Even My Tongue,” thanks to the support of Ontario Arts Council and Toronto Arts Council grants.
Andy Kalirai (he/him) is an actor and playwright from Vancouver. He trained with Railtown Actors Studio and Tempest Theatre. Some of his performances include Guards At The Taj (Pick of the Vancouver Fringe 2019), All’s Well That Ends Well (Bard on the Beach), and Dooja Ghar (Monsoon Festival) which he also co-wrote.
Arno is a Vancouver-based Bharatanatyam dance artist and instructor. She has studied Bharatanatyam and Manipuri under esteemed Gurus in Bangladesh, India and Canada including C.V. Chandrasekhar, Jai Govinda, Bragha Bessel, Sharmila Banerjee and Belayet Hossain. A graduate in Architecture, her experience and training in various art disciplines and dance styles like music, mime, theatre and other contemporary dance forms, has complemented her work as a dancer. Over the past few years, Arno has been an integral part of Mandala Arts as an instructor and as a solo performer. Arno’s rich repertoires of performances have taken her across the globe at various festivals in USA, Germany, India and Bangladesh. She is currently working on projects that create a bridge between the traditional framework of Bharatanatyam and Bengali poetry and music of Rabindranath Tagore.
Like many Canadian artists Hiro has forged a career wearing many hats: actor, playwright, screenwriter, teacher. His plays range from the war crimes drama Tiger of Malaya (Factory Theatre, National Arts Centre, Gateway Theatre) to the Christmas fable The Patron Saint of Stanley Park (Arts Club, Halifax Theatre for Young People, Theatre NorthWest) to the Puccini sequel Tom Pinkerton: The Ballad of Butterfly’s Son with music by David MacIntyre (short-listed for the 2012 Playwrights Guild of Canada New Musical Award).
Rene (They/Them) is an emerging multidisciplinary artist and essayist from the MENA region. Rene’s philosophy of creative work is deeply informed by their journey of exile through multiple experiences of displacement. Their work engages with themes of identity and the politics of representation. Initially trained in classical music, they’ve expanded into dance, multimedia art and theater, developing their distinctive voice as a multi-disciplinary artist and writer. Rene’s work spans essay writing, film, dance, and public speaking. Their creations have been featured in the French newspaper Libération, showcased at Paris Pride and Festival de Solidarité Paris, and exhibited at Te Manawa Museum in New Zealand/Aotearoa.
Ayush is currently a student at UBC Vancouver majoring in Psychology. His past experience is mostly related to writing a couple of street plays. His work seeks to provide modern adaptation to age-old folk tales, revisiting past historical figures through a different perspective and shedding new light on old tales.
Franki Katz (she/her) based in Vancouver, BC is a fantasy novelist and singer-songwriter. Her current written works reflect on themes of isolation, power, and the making of the world, while her current album in progress uses a fairytale backdrop to explore the embodied impact of capitalism. Franki’s music sits on the edge of antifolk and alternative pop, focusing on piano and string instrumentals and dreamy vocals.
khattieQ is a musician and performer from Puerto Rico. She has played as a professional musician with over 20 bands, notably touring as lead drummer for queer femme core band The Tuna Helpers. She was the creator of punk band BLXPLTN, and served as lead vocalist from 2013 to 2015.
Anthony Kit Lee is a Vancouver-based filmmaker, theatre-maker and educator from Hong Kong. His interdisciplinary practices involves film and immersive theatre, and is keen to speak for cultural diaspora and post-colonial Hong Kong anarchism. A graduate of the film production program at Simon Fraser University, Anthony has worked with numerous film and theatre companies including Progress Lab 1422, Radix, Rumble, rice & beans theatre, the Cinematheque,Vancouver Asian Film Festival, and Noema production. He is currently looking for a pot of sundews for his micro backyard. GFHG SDGM
Taran (born 1993 in Cold Lake, AB) was a Denésuliné and Nakoda Sioux actor, spoken word poet and playwright. He received his Acting for Stage & Screen diploma from Capilano University in 2015, was signed with Premiere Talent Management, and was in Full Circle’s First Nations Performance Ensemble. Past written projects included work with the SOAR Aboriginal Arts Program, Cuywsti and Tom Cone’s Sacred Space Festival.
Jenny Larson is an interdisciplinary theatre artist. She is a director, devising artists, and performer. She has an MFA from the University of British Columbia. Credits include: From the Pig Pile by Sibyl Kempson, with the Rude Mechs and Salvage Vanguard Theater, Guest by Courtesy, devised with Hannah Kenah, has played Fusebox Festival, SHE MAKES THEATER festival in Sofia, Bulgaria, and Brooklyn Yard.
Jessica Lemes da Silva (she/her) is a playwright, sound editor, musician, and educator. Born and raised in Miami, Florida, Jessica received her B.A. in Music from the University of Miami. Headshot: Jessica Lemes da Silva. A woman with long curly brown hair and glasses sits outside in the corner of a brown fence with a casual smile. Photo by Fiona Steele. In 2006 she shifted gears to study Sound Design for visual media at the Vancouver Film School. Shortly after, she joined Skywalker Sound in California and worked on feature films such as Beowulf, Iron Man, and Despicable Me.
Refocusing her passion for storytelling, Jessica turned to writing for stage and screen exploring themes of building chosen families and bridging the worlds of queerness and religion. She completed a creative writing certificate from Simon Fraser University’s The Writer’s Studio, where she laid the groundwork for her limited-series audio drama, Sacred Hearts. Currently, Jessica’s taking part in the Emerging Playwright’s Unit with the Arts Club Theatre Company. Jessica is grateful to write, teach, parent, and live on the unceded, traditional lands of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), and səlilwətaɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) —hay č xʷ q̓ə [hands raised], thank you.
Robert Leveroos is a multidisciplinary artist and insatiable tinkerer. Using elements of live art, animation, and handmade objects, he aims to strike imaginations and skew perceptions by exploring worlds where weight is given to the minute, the understated and overlooked to uncover something recognizably human.
Under the moniker macromatter, Robert creates original performance pieces for all ages that have been presented in festivals and venues locally and otherwise. He also collaborates as a performer and scenographer with a number of Vancouver and Canadian companies. For ten years he trained with The Children’s Theater Company in Minneapolis, Minnesota, and graduated from The National Theatre School of Canada in Montreal (acting 2008). Robert served three seasons as Youth Program Manager at The Cultch in East Vancouver, and continues to work with young artists. He holds an MFA in Interdisciplinary Studies from Simon Fraser University.
Andie Lloyd is a queer interdisciplinary artist and community advocate. A member of Chimerik似不像 Collective since 2018, Andie has worked with a multitude of disciplines including production management, lighting design, projection design, programming for interactive new media and a variety of visual art mediums. She has recently worked with companies such as Ouro Collective and Arts Club Theatre Company in Vancouver, and toured to Berlin, Taipei and Gwangju for a vast array of projects. More recently, Andie has been exploring writing and frontline activism to promote freedom of speech and perspectives of the decolonial left. Her two current projects, radically separate from each other, are KTV: an interactive exploration of international karaoke culture, a play which she will develop while in the Block A cohort, and Du Li Bubble Tea, a small business venture inspired by the pandemic and an obsessive passion for bubble tea.
J.K. Malmgren has been a writer and creator across a multiple of mediums for many years. Recents stints on the stage and zoom sparked a renewed interest in both performance and playwriting, and confirmation of the immense power of the play as a thing. Borne out of COVID and a deadline, a one-act play emerged. The product was far less interesting than the process – he looks forward to the emersion into that world that Block A will bring.
Sydney Marino is a playwright and educator based on the traditional, ancestral, and unceded territories of the Squamish (Skxwú7mesh), Musqueam (xʷməθkʷəy̓əm), and Tsleil-Waututh (Səl̓ilwətaɁɬ) Nations. Her plays have been produced by the Brave New Play Rites Festival and Killarney Theatre, and one has received a staged reading as part of the LEAP playwriting intensive. Sydney is also a theatre and writing educator, teaching classes at Arts Umbrella and the Arts Club Theatre Company. She is a recent graduate of UBC’s Creative Writing BFA program. Sydney is excited to develop her writing with her Block A cohort.
TANYA MARQUARDT is a genderqueer writer and performer, whose book Stray: Memoir of a Runaway was published in 2018 and named a Best Queer History & Bio in LGBTQI2S+ Magazine The Advocate. The performance version, commissioned by Theatre Conspiracy and written with Tim Carlson, toured both Canada and the US. Their play Transmission was published in the Canadian Theatre Review, and Some Must Watch While Some Must Sleep, about Tanya’s life as a sleeptalker, was the subject of an NPR Invisibila podcast. Their essays have appeared in Medium, Huffpost, Howl Round, Grain, DanceGeist, and Plentitude Magazine. Tanya has performed with Jerome Bel, Mabou Mines, Jess Barbagallo, Ballez, the only animal, radix theatre, and the Leaky Heaven Circus. Their theatre works have been presented at Dixon Place, BAX, PuSh, VIDF, Dancing on the Edge, The Tank, Summerworks, foldA, PIVOT Festival, the Collapsable Hole and the Brooklyn Museum. They graduated with a BFA in Theatre from Simon Fraser University, an MFA in Creative Writing from Hunter College and are grateful to live and dream on the lands of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm, Səl̓ílwətaʔ, and Skwxwú7mesh Nations of the Coast Salish peoples, and in Lenapehoking, the homeland of the Lenni-Lenape people. Currently, Tanya dances in their kitchen, writes memoir, and sends you all queer love during this strange, strange time. IG: @tanya.marquardt
Alex Masse (they/them) is a writer and musician from what is colonially known as Surrey, BC. Their work has been seen everywhere from the Scholastic Writing Awards to Autostraddle, as well as in collaboration with Vancouver Pride, Simon Fraser University, and more. They’re also a neurodivergent nonbinary lesbian, which greatly affects their process.
For Alex, art is a means of expression and connection, both with themself and others in their community. When not writing, they’re making music, and when not making music, they’re writing. Occasionally, though, they can be seen working on their degree, or cozied up with their cat.
Karter is a non-binary emerging artist. They live on the ancestral and unceded homelands of the hən̓ q̓ əmin̓ əm̓ and Sḵwx̱wú7mesh speaking peoples. Their play Before They Cut Down Our Tree was chosen for development work through Vancouver Asian Canadian Theatre’s MSG 1 and 2 Play Development Program and has gotten two public readings. Before They Cut Down Our Tree will have its first full presentation at the 2023 Vancouver Fringe Festival. Currently Karter is doing their Masters in Screenwriting at Leeds Beckett University in the UK.
Sophie McNeilly (she/her) is a dramaturg, playwright and game designer, based on the unceded ancestral territories of the Musqueam, Squamish and Tsleil-Waututh nations. She holds a BA in English literature from UBC, an MA in theatre and performance studies from the University of Toronto, and has worked previously with Arts Club Theatre Company, Soulpepper Theatre, the Chutzpah! Festival, and UBC’s Brave New Play Rites Festival. Her work focuses on building experimental and playful dramaturgies for new work development, and on modes of self-representation for marginalized performers. Check out more of her work at https://sophiemcneilly.wordpress.com/!
Sandra Medeiros is an actor, producer, storyteller, writer, and mother of two hilarious and precocious teenage twin daughters (please send prayers). Sandra has been writing in various forms her whole life, including co-writing two short films and two sold out site-specific Fringe plays, Three Chicks in a Tub and FESTA! The latter has spawned the making of a pilot for a comedy series, Tia Maria’s Cafe, based on being raised as daughters of Portuguese immigrants. Currently, Sandra is writing more episodes with her partner Maria J. Cruz (Portuguese Buns Productions). Sandra is also artistic director of the Jessie award nominated theatre company Naked Goddess Productions and is a crazy cat lady.
Hannah Meyers (She/They) Hannah’s practice is centered around performance, creation, direction, and production. She is the General Manager of Tara Cheyenne Performance and co-founder of Lo-fi Spectacle Club. With LFS Club, Hannah is currently developing The Pippa Bacca Parable, a dance-theatre work surrounding themes of safety, sacrifice, and voice, as well as medicine cabinet, a book of photos, prose, the profane and the profound. Outside of TCP and LFS club she is the drummer of the queer rock band Hot Dyke Party. Other recent work includes Passenger Seat, The Library Performance Co, The Albertine Workout, Simon Fraser University, New Societies, Re:Current Theatre.
hannah-meyers.com // instagram: @h_meyers
Marita resides on the traditional ancestral territories of the xʷməθkwəy̓əm (Musqueam), Skwxwú7mesh (Squamish), and Səl̓ílwətaɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations. She is a library worker, quilter, former caregiver, future cartoon character and wannabe everything. Previously, she played in post-punk bands and wonky pop groups. She is currently a theatre performance student at SFU’s School for Contemporary Arts.
Erika Mitsuhashi (she/her) is an interdisciplinary artist based on the unceded lands of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm, Səl̓ílwətaɬ, and Skwxwú7mesh Nations. Her practice spans performance, installation, film, scenography, and projection design. She is ever delighted by contending with the materiality of the present and using the body as the site for conceptual, existential and tender curiosity. Her work has been presented by Surrey Art Gallery, VIVO Media Arts, PushOFF, Ehkä Productions (FIN), La Serre’s OFFTA, and the Western Front. Locally, she collaborates with Alexa Mardon (Mardon + Mitsuhashi), Francesca Frewer, and is part of the producing and curatorial team behind Boombox, an underground performance venue in a shipping container. www.erikamitsuhashi.com
Eli Morris is a non-binary film and theatre human from Gadigal country (Sydney, Australia). They immigrated to unceded Coast Salish territories in 2016 after winning Best Picture at the No Small Stories Film Festival for their short film Carded. Eli holds a BA in Acting for Screen and Stage and an MA in Public Relations and Advertising. Their short film Ember was a 2020 Crazy8s Top 12 finalist. Eli is currently writing Don’t Put Me In A Box, a multi-disciplinary theatrical work about gender and sexuality which has received support from the Canada Council of the Arts.
Renae Morriseau is Cree and Saulteaux from Manitoba. She works across Canada and the US in theatre, film, television and music. Recently, Renae toured internationally with her singing group M’Girl; served as Aboriginal Storyteller at the Vancouver Public Library and directed Down2Earth, an APTN TV Series on green-energy developments and sustainability projects in Maori (New Zealand) and First Nations (Canada) communities. Community building projects include the winter outdoor production Contest of the Winds with Caravan Farm Theatre, the community play Tuwitames with Splatsin Language Program (Secwepemc Nation)/Runaway Moon Theatre, and co-writing In the Heart of a City: The Downtown Eastside Community Play and Storyweaving with Vancouver Moving Theatre.
Mily Mumford (they/them) is a queer, trans and disabled writer and director in film and theatre. They have written and directed over fifteen short and full length works that have been produced for the stage and recent film works include the short films Gemini (2018, Cannes Short Film Corner, London Sci-Fi Festival +15 festivals), First Bite, (2019, Winner Best Film Circus Film Contest, Best Film East Van Showcase), and Operation Gingham (2020). Recent theatre work includes the workshop production of Controller at rEvolver Festival (2022), a choose-your-own adventure play about technology and violence which they developed as a member of the inaugural Arts Club Emerging Playwright’s Unit (2019). They are currently a playwright Associate with Playwrights Theatre Centre (Vancouver) with their immersive horror play in development It Lives in My Bedroom. They were a part of the Warner Brothers Discovery Canada Access Writer’s Program 2022 developing their sci-fi series Nostalgica.
In addition to creative work they hold a BSc. in Neuroscience and an MSc. in Interactive Technology and have worked as a science consultant and science communicator.
Teddy is a Filipino-Chinese immigrant by way of Singapore, Thailand, and Indonesia. As a nomadic citizen who grew up in multiple countries, his work centers around bridging cultures and intercultural identities. An all-rounder exploring various disciplines, he is particularly curious about the relationships immigrants have between our homelands and how we came to be in this land. He celebrates the differences and commonalities between immigrants of different generations. From the weird, the wondrous, to the borderline soapy, Teddy considers all facets of the human experience to uplift those around him and celebrate the threads that connect us all.
Keely O’Brien is an interdisciplinary artist based in Vancouver, BC, on the unceded territories of the Coast Salish Peoples, including the territories of the xʷməθkwəy̓əm (Musqueam), Skwxwú7mesh (Squamish), and Səl̓ílwətaʔ/Selilwitulh (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations. Her art practice incorporates intricately handmade objects with immersive, innovative theatre creation. Devoted to a thoroughly handmade, DIY process, Keely’s work includes puppetry in miniature and enormous scales, immersive installations, imaginative ephemera, and interactive experiences. As a community engaged arts educator Keely creates and facilitates participatory and collaborative artwork with community members and organizations. Deeply site-responsive and engaged with questions of place, home, and belonging, Keely’s work aims to celebrate the potential for creativity and community in the place and people around her. Keely is Co-Artistic Director of experimental theatre company Popcorn Galaxies. She holds a BFA in Theatre Performance from Simon Fraser University.
Babaloluwa (Lolu) Oyedele is a Nigeria-born, South-Africa raised interdisciplinary artist, performer and writer. He has a BFA in Interdisciplinary Performance from UBC Okanagan and has had the pleasure of being Coquitlam Heritage’s Artist in Residence, culminating in the creation of The Porter’s Revival, a solo performance about the serendipitous meeting between the ghost of a black sleeping car porter and a young artist. Babaloluwa is priviledged to be part of the Unbound Reading Series team as well as a past member of Pacific Theatre’s Working With writing cohort. He is currently working and living in the unceded territory of the xʷməθkwəy̓əm (Musqueam), Skwxwú7mesh (Squamish), and Səl̓ílwətaɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations, otherwise known as Vancouver, B.C.
Abigail Padilla is a Vancouver-based Filipino-Canadian emerging filmmaker and theatre actor. Behind the scenes, she has worked in research, development and technical work for documentaries, MOWs and corporate videos. Her directorial debut in short filmmaking earned her work “Thank You Mila” a finalist spot on Mighty Asian Moviemaking Marathon 2020. On stage, she has performed with Kathara, a Filipino indigenous dance group, and promoted Filipino folk dance and culture in various festivals such as Talking Sticks, Vine Arts and Surrey Fusion. A current Studio 58 student, she advocates for respectful diverse cultural collaboration.
Kayla Papania is an aspiring actor and writer based in Vancouver, BC. Recently graduated from an international school in Bali, Indonesia, she is taking a gap year to strengthen her writing skills and begin her path in the film and performing arts industry. Her passion for performing began at age six with her first dance class. Since then she has been building her skills and knowledge in areas such as: acting, dancing, singing and writing, in hopes of one day working in the industry. Within the past year Kayla has written a short novel, six songs and produced an independent short film while studying film, literature and theatre. She has been involved with programs including but not limited to: Arts Umbrella Junior and Senior Troup, Theatre Under The Stars, VADA, Vancouver Young Actors School, and Carousel Theatre for Young People. This year she will be working on editing and publishing her music and short novels while participating in Block A’s writing program.
Jack (he/him) is a Vancouver launched devisor, director, dramaturg, translator, and theatre maker. Projects have ranged from contemporary devising, cross-cultural, multi-disciplinary and multi-lingual events to main stage and classical theatre in contemporary form across Canada, UK, Europe and Indonesia. He is the co-founder of Mad Duck Theatre Collective (Vancouver – 2002-2009), Bouche Theatre Collective (Vancouver), and Global Hive Labs., a network of international independent artists working together in shared practice. Jack Trained at Circlein the Square (NYC, USA), GITIS (Moscow, RU), SENI (Denpasar, IND) and received his MFA in Direction from East15 (London, UK.
Rebecca (she/they) is a genderqueer white anti-racist theatre director. They’ve been making theatre for 35 years, first as an actor at Studio 58, then as a director of new works and all-female cast classical plays in NYC. They have a MFA in directing from UCLA. Recently they began exploring writing original plays and are passionate about writing the spoken word. They are currently working on a new play, The Psychopath’s Sidekick, exploring gentrification, white supremacy (the everyday kind), the epidemic of loneliness and suicide, and the hunger for intimacy, closeness, belonging and meaningful relationships within the white settler community.
Mónica Perea (she/her) is a Mexican performing artist who lives in Vancouver, Canada since 2021. As a playwright, she had performed more than 25 plays, standing out 6 Shakespearean rewrites from the women’s character point of view. In 2018, she started the League of Theater Woman in Mexico, which reunites more than 300 women and advocates for their rights in the field. Her company, Theatre on Bike, not only produces plays but takes cyclists to different venues in Mexico City as audience. She was granted with national distinctions in Mexico and is now looking forward to find new opportunities in Canada. www.monicaperea.com/
Louisa is a director and writer based in Vancouver, BC. A graduate of Capilano’s Bachelor of Performing Arts program, Louisa is a multi-disciplinary artist, successfully working in the BC film and television industry for over a decade. Her short film Hope and Grace had its world premiere this past October at the Edmonton International Film Festival, and she recently produced and directed a production of Beirut by Alan Bowne as part of the 2020 Vancouver Fringe Festival Dramatic Works Series.
Brenda Prince (she/her), AKA, Middle of the Sky, is a Winnipeg born artist who writes in various genres; poetry, playwriting and screenplay writing. She holds a BFA and MFA in Creative Writing from the University of British Columbia. Middle of the Sky’s work centres around the Anishinaabe Ikwe experience in today’s world. Her use of humour and spirituality figure prominently in all her work. She is of the Bear Clan and in her spare time she performs stand-up comedy.
Zahida Rahemtulla grew up in Burnaby, BC and later spent years living in Metchosin, Abu Dhabi, and Toronto. Her first play, The Wrong Bashir, premiered in Vancouver and Toronto to sold-out, critically acclaimed runs (Touchstone Theatre, 2023 and Crow’s Theatre, 2024) . Her second play, The Frontliners, a comedic drama about refugee resettlement, won a Playwrights Guild of Canada Tom Hendry Award, the Fringe New Play Prize, Theatre BC’s Play of Special Merit Award, and was runner-up for the national Voaden Prize in Playwriting. Zahida is currently working with Nightswimming Theatre and Talk is Free Theatre to start acting training programs for community actors of colour over the age of 55 to build capacity in this demographic and support older people to train professionally and join the industry. Zahida teaches and is currently an instructor in the Community Development and Outreach Department at Capilano University, where she teaches Adult Education. She also works at Blind Tiger Comedy in access.
Amal Rana is a Pushcart Prize nominated poet and queer Muslim futurist whose work been published and performed widely. Amongst other creative projects, they co-founded Breaking the Fast, an interdisciplinary arts showcase featuring queer, trans and gender marginalized Muslim artists. Amal also co-created Tomorrow Is Ours, one of the first creative writing series on BIPOC futurisms in the city. In 2019, she completed an arts residency with Carnegie Community Centre. As part of the residency, they co-wrote and directed a play about gentrification and decolonial futures with DTES community members. Amal’s art practice is grounded in a long cultural tradition of poets as both witnesses and catalysts for change.
Iris Rhian is a theater maker and artistic collaborator. She holds a BFA in Drama with Honors from New York University’s (NYU) Tisch School of the Arts, and a Minor in the Business of Entertainment, Media, and Technology from NYU Stern/Tisch. She specializes in acting, playwriting, and directing. When not making theater, you can find her attempting to learn a variety of musical instruments, reading the latest Booker Prize winning novel, or seeking out nature.
Lili Robinson (she/they) is a theatre artist, poet and facilitator based on the unceded territories of the Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh First Nations. Lili is passionate about centring voices at the intersections of queerness, Black diaspora, socio-economic diversity and femme identity in their work. Since graduating Studio 58 in 2018, Lili has worked and trained with an array of theatre companies including Theatre Replacement, Playwrights Theatre Centre, Rumble Theatre, New Harlem Productions, the frank theatre, UpintheAir Theatre, Neworld Theatre, and the Arts Club. Lili’s debut play, Mx, was the winner of the 2019 Fringe New Play Prize and the 2019 Cultchivating the Fringe Award, and was subsequently presented as a digital production in the Cultch’s 2021/2022 season. Currently, Lili is the Resident Curator at rEvolver Festival; she is also developing two new plays, “Infest” and “Maroon”. While theatre is Lili’s primary practice, poetry and spoken word are her first loves. Lili has been featured as a part of the Vancouver Writer’s Festival, Queer Arts Festival’s “Queerotica” and “Futurosity in the Midst of History” events, and online as part of Brick Books’ Brickyard online platform. In their spare time Lili loves napping, geeking out on Afrofuturism, and cooking food that connects them to their Black Southern roots.
Chlöe Rowat is a UBC undergrad student studying English and Creative Writing. She recently finished her Associate’s Degree in Creative Writing at Douglas College, and while attending was a First Reader for Event magazine. She is also a theatre educator and has developed two musical theatre programs for youth and teens across Metro Vancouver. Chlöe spends her spare time directing plays, song-writing, and is currently learning to spreche Deutsch. She also enjoys (re)watching television shows with subtitles.
Duncan is a writer, director and actor who currently resides in Vancouver. Duncan has spend most of his 20’s travelling the globe, with his leather bound notepad jotting down whatever comes to mind. Since graduating the University of Windsor’s B.F.A Acting Program in 2016, Duncan has written and produced three plays under his theatre company Greenlight Theatre. A student of theatre, Duncan alway’s looks for ways to improve his craft, having a laugh along the way.
Born in Belize, Joy Russell is a writer and poet living in North Vancouver on the unceded traditional territories of the xʷməθkwəy̓əm (Musqueam), Skwxwú7mesh (Squamish), and Səl̓ílwətaʔ (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations. Her writing has received support from the Canada Council for the Arts and the BC Arts Council and has appeared in numerous publications, literary journals and anthologies in North America, the UK and Caribbean, including Canadian Literature, The Capilano Review, The Caribbean Writer, The Great Black North: Contemporary African Canadian Poetry, Red: Contemporary Black British Poetry, and The Best Canadian Poetry in English, (2007, 2017). Her commissioned work includes The Moonlighters (The Polygon Gallery, Parallels 03), a historical, poetic essay on the The Moonlighters Trinidadian Steel Band at the Cosmos Club on the North Shore and PodPlay, Days of Old (Neworld Theatre/PTC), highlighting Strathcona’s Black community. Her work draws on her training in contemporary, African, and Latin dance and work as a researcher and assistant producer for television documentaries in London, UK including Rebel Music: The Bob Marley Story, Pump Up the Volume and BAFTA-nominated, The Hip Hop Years. She is currently an MA student in the Department of Geography at SFU.
Mannu Sandhu is a Canadian actress/ model now residing in Mumbai to pursue her career in Indian Cinema as an actress. She studied political science and criminology from Douglas Collage and the Justice Institute of British Columbia. She then pursued her career in acting and starting coaching at the Actors Foundary, Vancouver. Her first Canadian Feature Film was Footsteps into Gangland, a topic which is of high importance in Canadian households today. The film was about a teenager living in a foster home and getting sexually abused at home and influenced by the drug dealers of Vancouver on the streets. She gives high importance to topics that bring awareness to her community. She has done five feature films so far and is working on new projects in India. She also holds the title of Miss Universe Canada Miss Humanitarian for her ongoing community work in Canada. She has been spearheading the most prominent South Asian Film Festival in the City of Vancouver for the past five years and she has become a force between India and Canada to help join the two countries in the Entertainment Sector.
Ishan is an actor and writer who currently resides on the traditional, ancestral and unceded territories belonging to the Squamish (Skxwú7mesh), Musqueam (xʷməθkʷəy̓əm), Tsleil-Waututh(səl̓ilwətaɁɬ) Nations. He came here to pursue his higher education and recently graduated with a BFA in Acting and BA in Economics from UBC. Some of his favourite acting credits are: The Wars (Sergeant Singh), Commedia Dell’arte (Arlecchino), The Changeling (Antonio). Ishan discovered his passion for story telling at a very young age, when he would often find himself fabricating stories to escape punishments from his parents. As a theatre artist Ishan is interested in creating contemporary work. He loves to structure his stories around the barriers that Race, Income and Sex create in our society. He is currently working on writing scenes centred around the theme of ‘lovers during the pandemic’.
Kamila Sediego (she/her/siya) is a first-generation Filipinx settler and playwright, privileged and grateful to live on the unceded territories of the Squamish, Musqueam, and Tsleil-Waututh Nations. Her work is a celebration of the richness of her culture, the dramas of family dynamics, and the complexities of the Filipinx diaspora. Her favourite thing is to weave humour and magic with the tragedies of every day. It is only with the care and support of many around her that she is expanding her skills into dramaturgy and currently developing two of her shows, Homecoming and Engkanto. Over the years, she has graciously worked closely with Urban Ink, Vancouver Asian Canadian Theatre, PTC, and incredible mentors like Corey Payette, Reneltta Arluk, Joanna Garfinkel, Hazel Venzon, Rachel Ditor, and many more. If she isn’t writing, she’s drinking bubble tea and/or convincing her baby niece to say “tita.” Find Kamila on Instagram: @kamilasediego Photo: Noelle Sediego, @ncsed on Instagram
For more than twenty years, Tetsuro Shigematsu has been telling stories across an array of media. He is a playwright, actor, scholar, broadcaster, author, filmmaker, and theatre artist. At the age of 19, he became the youngest playwright to compete in the history of the Quebec Drama Festival. Originally trained in the fine arts, he found a similar creative outlet writing for CBC Television’s This Hour Has 22 Minutes. Then in 2004, he became the first person-of-colour to host a daily national radio program in Canada when he took over The Roundup on CBC Radio, where he co-wrote and co-produced nearly a thousand hours of network programming. His most recent theatre work, 1 Hour Photo garnered five Jessie nominations, including best original script.
Shanae is excited to be working with DiverseTheatreBC to help racialized voices find a greater presence in theatre. As one of the establishing members of Studio 58’s Student Diversity Committee, Shanae spearheaded it’s work to give voice and strength to marginalized groups within the theatre community, while empowering students with the tools and knowledge to engage the conversations of diversity around them. This experience helped him discover his love for producing work that helps the stories of marginalized voices find a more prominent place in our society. Shanae currently works as the Associate Producer Intern at Green Thumb Theatre Company, while also producing Mx by Lili Robinson (winner of PTC’s Fringe New Play Prize) for the Fringe Festival in September, and assistant directing with Anita Rochon on 4000 Miles by Amy Herzog at The Belfry Theatre.
Quelemia Sparrow is busy on a variety of new play projects. With PTC, she developed O’wet/Lost Lagoon, co-produced by Alley Theatre and Full Circle: First Nations Performance, originally commissioned by Full Circle: First Nations Performance.
Alexander is an actor and playwright, born and proudly raised in the Rose City of Windsor, Ontario. The work he is exploring on paper, is the work he is exploring day to day. Endeavouring to engage in uncomfortable conversations in the name of truth and growth. Practicing vulnerability in his thoughts and feelings and being brave enough to have his mind changed in public, and potentially say the wrong thing. Embracing the ugly and the honest, Alexander hopes to create work that inspires transformative justice, empathy and a will to live together.
Alexander is a graduate of the Ryerson Theatre School where he was awarded the Lou Taube Memorial Award for excellence in, and dedication to theatre, and has also studied at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, and Ecole Philippe Gaulier. His debut play ENOLA_GAY earned him the Robert Beardsley Award for Emerging Playwrights from the Playwrights Guild of Canada and the Arts and Letters Club of Toronto.
Jovanni Sy is a Montreal-based playwright, director, and actor. He is the former Artistic Director of Gateway Theatre (Vancouver) and Cahoots Theatre (Toronto).
Since his professional career began in 1992, Jovanni’s artistic mission has been to create bridges across cultures with a particular interest in reimagining Western classics through an Asian Canadian lens.
Jovanni’s plays include: Salesman in China (co-written with Leanna Brodie) which premiered at the Stratford Festival in August 2024; The Five Vengeances, a comic kung-fu adaptation of The Revengers Tragedy; Nine Dragons, a detective story set in 1920s Hong Kong; and A Taste of Empire, a solo cooking show which has been translated into Cantonese and Tagalog. His plays have received a Jessie Richardson Award and two Tom Hendry Awards. A Taste of Empire and Nine Dragons have been published by Talonbooks.
Jovanni is currently developing three new works: The Tao of the World, an adaptation of The Way of the World set in modern-day Singapore; Kowloon Bay, a prequel to Nine Dragons; and a new farce titled Fan Tan Alley through a Silver Commission from Arts Club Theatre.
Peihwen J. Tai (she/her) is a Taiwanese/Canadian writer and performer. After graduating with a double-major BFA (Theatre Acting and Japanese) in 2023, she has worked with What Lab, The Parallel Project, Rumble Theatre, and Real Wheel Theatre. She is developing a play called Moth Boy, which is about a boy who metamorphoses into a moth after succumbing to catatonic depression. When she’s not watching anime, crocheting, or working with kids, she also works in generative AI. She wishes to express immense gratitude towards PTC for their support. She would also like to thank her close friends, family, and partner for their love.
As an aspiring actor and director, Avery is forever grateful and humbled to experience and work on the Coast Salish lands in which she grew up, believing they assisted her journey to discovering her love of writing. Many summers outside led to many notebooks filled with half-finished stories, finding inspiration in the trees and natural treasures of the land. After recently graduating with a BFA in Theatre performance, she has been working with UBC, directing their radio production of Little Women. Avery continues to hone her craft of writing whenever she can, through songs, short stories, and plays, hoping to finally finish something.
Celia Taylor (she/her) is a Vancouver theatre artist. Her previous writing credits include The Flying Doctor, Onions and Garlic, and Hardboiled (Empress of Blandings Productions – Edmonton); Pseudolus (Mainline Theatre – Montreal) Civis Sum (Hapax Theatre – Victoria); and The Cult of the Clitoris (Workshop West – Edmonton). She is also the artistic director of Empress of Blandings and sits on the board of directors for Realwheels Theatre. When not doing theatre-y things, Celia can be found playing the harp (very badly), practicing law (quite well), and cuddling her cat (with consummate skill).
Yasmin Tayob (she/her) has been an actor in theatre and film for 20 years and splits her time between that and teaching French and Spanish. She is from a mixed cultural background of Indian, Portuguese, Muslim and catholic parents and is interested in bringing these aspects of her experience into her writing. She has recently written a play about living with mental illness and is excited to bring it to life through this program.
José Teodoro is an artist working across disciplines such as theatre, literature, cinema, and music. His plays include Cloudless, Mote, Steps, and The Tourist. He is a current Playwrights Theatre Centre Associate and an alumnus of previous developmental residencies with PTC and the Banff Centre. Alongside composer-musician Stephen Lyons, José is one half of Applied Silence, whose debut LP Screen Door is available online and on limited edition vinyl via Offseason Records. Applied Silence recently traveled to the Cali International Film Festival with Binary Star, a short film related to José’s play in development in PTC, which was screened with live voiceover and music. José’s literary nonfiction has appeared in publications such as Brick and The Fiddlehead. His interviews, essays, and reviews have appeared in publications such as Film Comment and Bloodvine. José’s current projects include a screen adaptation of Cloudless; a book of conversations with filmmaker Peter Mettler; a song cycle about labour and migration with Applied Silence; and a nonfiction novel called Without Destination.
Leysan Timirboulatova (she/her) is a Kyrgyzstan-born, Tatar actress and writer creating on the shared, unceded and ancestral territories of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm, Sḵwx̱wú7mesh, and səlilwətaɬ Nations. She earned her Bachelor’s Degree in Liberal Arts at Sarah Lawrence College in New York, majoring in theater and political science. Her cultural and experiential identities have gifted her with a unique perspective and passion for women’s rights. Leysan’s work is driven by clear intention: to ignite women (and all historically silenced humans) to unravel their voices and resurrect their spirits.
Basil has been leading a double life since he began writing as a teenager. A queer family-oriented urbanite farmer, he loves to savour all the mysteries of life. He studied Drama and Comparative Literature at the University of Alberta, but has spent most of his professional career working in public relations and administration. He is currently developing a one-person interactive show, three short plays and a nearly completed full-length play. He may even finish one of them someday! He believes successful storytelling should continue in the hearts and minds of the audience long after the show is over.
Jocelyn Tsui (she/her) is a mixed-race Chinese Canadian theatre producer and performer based on stolen Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh territory. She is passionate about propelling the performing arts industry towards a more progressive and inclusive future, starting with youth and emerging artists. In 2020, Jocelyn co-founded The Parallel Project with Argel Monte de Ramos. She has since produced the MSG Lab with vAct (Vancouver Asian Canadian Theatre) and currently works as an arts administrator at the Arts Club Theatre Company. Some recent performing credits include Seussical (Align Entertainment), Joseph…Dreamcoat (Gateway Theatre), and Cinderella (Theatre Under the Stars). She holds a Diploma of Musical Theatre from Capilano University and will graduate from Simon Fraser University with a Bachelor of Arts in 2024.
SJ Valiquette is a queer white settler living and working on the unceded territories of the Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh nations. She is an actor, an internationally published poet and photographer, and the creator and curator of the (re)markable project. She has a BFA from the University of Victoria and has studied at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, and the Banff Centre for the Arts. Favourite theatre credits include The Quiet Environmentalist at the Victoria Fringe Festival, Macbeth at the Greater Victoria Shakespeare Festival, and Open Face Beholding at the Fifty Fifty Arts Collective.
Thule van den Dam is an interdisciplinary artist from the Netherlands, currently based in Vancouver on unceded Squamish, Musqueam and Tsleil-Waututh territories. She completed a BA in Human Ecology at the College of the Atlantic as a David Scholar, with a concentration in international environmental policy, critical theory, and theatre. She has trained with Double Edge Theatre and Jodi Baker and is an artistic associate with Canadian-German theatre company Mammalian Diving Reflex.
Cole Vandale is a Disabled Métis filmmaker who has studied acting and filmmaking in Calgary, New York and Vancouver. He has worked professionally on a variety of union and non-union productions both in-front and behind the camera. His last short film Starlight was nominated for Best Live Short at the 45th American Indian Film Festival and was a finalist for the Sundance Ignite Fellowship. He recently was a participant in the 2022 CBC Access Scripted Stream and produced Rylan Friday’s film Terror/Forming which premieres at VIFF this year. Also, he worked with Mosaic Entertainment on the reality television series Bears’ Lair as an associate producer, co-writer and director which airs on APTN in September 2022. His goal is to help make filmmaking and theatre more authentic, sustainable, diverse and welcoming.
Sara Vickruck is a queer theatre artist and musician. She has recently performed in This Here with Babelle Theatre, Fun Home at the Arts Club, NeOn at rEvolver Festival, Kill Your Lovers at Buddies in Bad Times Theatre’s Rhubarb Festival, and Circle Game at the Firehall Arts Centre. Sara co-founded the all-female theatre company, Poiema Productions, with whom she created, produced, and toured three plays. Sara also self-produced her album Prologue, available on iTunes, Spotify and saravickruck.ca. She’s the winner of an Ovation Award for Best Female Performer (Love Bomb, Shameless Hussy Productions), and the E.V. Young Award for her portrayal of Anybodys in West Side Story (Theatre Under the Stars). Sara’s a Grant MacEwan Graduate.
Nora Vision is a playwright, drag queen, and robotic emissary sent from the future. “Born and raised” on Treaty 1 territory, she has produced and performed in the Winnipeg Fringe Festival, Toronto SketchFest, and Ladyfest in Montreal. As an artificially intelligent robot, Nora’s theatrical work uses science fiction to explore power and class structures, internet culture, and queer trouble-making. Her drag is conceptual and camp, varying from high femme to creature drag and often a combination of the two. To her, drag is an expression of queer gender and sexuality, unrestricted by cultural hang-ups and expectation. It should be messy, it should be authentic, and it should be punk. In her writing, drag is a theatrical form of self-reference. Through writing her drag persona into her work, Nora wishes to explore a meta-narrative, putting one’s identity at the forefront of everything as a means of survival. Nora is a graduate of the playwriting program at the National Theatre School, and was recently an artist in residence at Rumble Theatre. She is published in “This is Beyond: A Time Capsule of Queer Experience”.
David is an actor, writer, and producer, and a recent graduate of UBC’s BFA Acting program, which he completed with the Jessie Richardson Scholarship. Most recently, David finished a Master of Management and plans to use his new skills off stage to facilitate indie theatre for the Vancouver community. Writing credits include: Ten Years Later (Steveston-London), The Minimum Wage Dame (Eternal Theatre Collective). David is currently developing a true crime play for digital performance.
Savannah Walling, born in Oklahoma, USA, is a first generation immigrant to Canada and twelfth generation descendent of refugees from Europe; her tangled bloodlines travel further than she has concrete knowledge. A writer/theatre artist trained in dance, mime and music, Savannah is co-founder /artistic director of Vancouver Moving Theatre, with whom she has toured four continents; created a series of community-engaged productions for/with/and about Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside; and served as associate artistic director of the Downtown Eastside Heart of the City Festival. She collaborates with artists of many genres, traditions and cultures to create productions that interweave localized content with accessible storytelling, spectacle and live music. She co-wrote Storyweaving with Rosemary Georgeson and Renae Morriseau.
Nicola Wanless is a Vancouver based writer, and holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Creative Writing from the University of British Columbia. They have been involved with theatre for almost ten years, in a number of roles both artistically and technically. Their past theatrical writing credits include two self-produced Fringe Festival shows, and a staged production at UBC’s 2018 Brave New Playrites festival. They are currently writing and co-producing an ongoing podcast called The Rest is Electric. For more information about them and their future projects google “local disaster warnings”.
Rayne Weinstein (she/her) is a Jewish writer, artist and musician. Rayne was born and raised in Hong Kong, and now resides in Vancouver on the unceded territories of the Musqueam, Tsleil-Waututh and Squamish peoples. She has had short fiction published in Room Magazine, Solstice Literary Magazine and The Warren Undergraduate Review, won FreeFall magazine’s 2022 fiction contest, and was shortlisted for Room Magazine’s 2021 fiction contest as well as for The Fiddlehead’s 2021 fiction contest. Her short plays Ripe and Cumulus have been staged for the Brave New Play Rites festival. In her fiction, plays and music, Rayne explores climate change, family, cultures of war, the fragility of time and memory, and tenuous relationships with religion and the divine.
Veronique is a playwright, dramaturg and educator of Polish descent, based on unceded Coast Salish territories (also known as Vancouver). Her work is informed by her lived experience of mental health issues, as well as her interest in the intersections of mental health, politics and identity. She is an Associate at Playwrights Theatre Centre, the Resident Emerging Artist at Boca del Lupo, the Devised Writing Teacher at Green Room Theatre and the LEAP Assistant at the Arts Club. Previously, she has been the Literary Assistant at the Arts Club and a Playwriting Instructor at Gateway Theatre. Her plays include: Intrusion (winner of Tarragon Theatre’s 20/20 Playwriting Competition), Marrow (Resounding Scream Theatre/Alley Theatre) and Where the Devil Can’t Go (in development with PTC). As a dramaturg, she has worked for the Arts Club, Playwrights Theatre Centre, Neworld Theatre, South Asian Arts Society, Alley Theatre, Resounding Scream Theatre, rEvolver festival and festiVALT. She is a member of the Playwrights Guild of Canada and the Literary Managers & Dramaturgs of the Americas. In addition to her artistic practice, she provides peer support to people recovering from eating disorders through the Looking Glass Foundation’s Hand in Hand program.
Anais is a queer writer, actor and producer of Polish descent, as well as a settler on occupied Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh territories (colonially called Vancouver). Anais’ work merges theatre with other art forms to examine the multiplicitous natures of desire, identity, and culture. Her projects include the video-play hybrid Kill Your Lovers, (Buddies In Bad Times Theatre’s Rhubarb Festival, Toronto, and the Fresh Fruit Festival, NYC) and the slam poetry musical Poly Queer Love Ballad, co-written with Sara Vickruck. Poly Queer Love Ballad won PTC’s Fringe in Play Prize and the Georgia Straight Critics’ Choice Award, then went on to be nominated for two Jessie Richardson Awards including Outstanding Original Script and Outstanding Production in Musical Theatre. The show toured Turtle Island (Canada) in 2019, with presentations at the Queer Arts Festival in Vancouver, the SkirtsAfire Festival in Edmonton, and Theatre Passe Muraille in Toronto. Anais is currently writing Underground Absolute Fiction (UAF), an interdisciplinary performance that combines monologues, music videos and queer ‘zines. UAF was presented as a reading at the Queer Arts Festival and as a short film at Rumble Theatre’s Tremors Festival in 2020. As an actor, Anais has worked with Theatre la Seizieme, the Only Animal, Rumble Theatre’s Tremors Festival, the Arts Club and more. She is the frank theatre company’s Operations Manager & Associate Producer, where she most recently produced She Mami Wata & The Pussy WitchHunt by d’bi young anitrafrika at the 2020 PuSh Festival. Photo by Kimberly Ho.
Adrienne Wong asks audiences to “re-see” the familiar and reimagine the everyday. Works include a series of site-specific audio plays (PodPlays, developed with Martin Kinch), a participatory show for kids about city planning (Me On The Map, created with Jan Derbyshire), an SMS show performed simultaneously in two cities (Landline, created with Dustin Harvey), and an analogue version of Facebook (Placebook, created with Mirae Rosner and Marcus Youssef ). Adrienne is a Associate Artist at both Neworld Theatre and SpiderWebShow.ca. She has two kids and no plants.
Jordyn Wood (she/they) is a queer theatre artist & playwright living and working on the traditional ancestral territories of the xʷməθkwəy̓əm (Musqueam), Skwxwú7mesh (Squamish), and Səl̓ílwətaɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations, in so-called “Vancouver”. They will be graduating from SFU’s theatre performance program in December. She is currently working on creating a devised adaptation of Euripides’ Medea through SFU’s School of Contemporary Arts. Past credits include co-playwriting for CYPT’s Grounded, performing in Cole Lewis’ 1690 Matthews, and interning with Theatre Replacement. They strive to create work that explores the temporal relationship of space & memory.
Sangeeta Wylie is an emerging playwright, and actor in film, television and theatre. A ‘closet-writer’ since she could hold a pencil, Sangeeta worked with Heidi Taylor (Playwrights Theatre Centre, in collaboration with Vancouver Asian Canadian Theatre) on her first full-length play, we the same, in development since 2017 and inspired by a true story of Vietnamese refugees in the 1970s. She is grateful for the opportunity to work with PTC on a new play. Sangeeta acts on the Board of Directors for the Cultch, plays classical piano, and holds degrees in Chemistry with a Music Minor and Dentistry.
Natasha (she/her) is an actor, producer, and inclusive arts facilitator living on the unceded territories of the Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh nations. Through Block A she looks forward to continuing to learn how to craft theatrical explorations around mental health. Recent projects/opportunities include: Write from the Wings, Arts Club Theatre Company; Scandi Noir, R&D residency in Copenhagen exploring adapting crime fiction to the stage, supported by the Canada Council for the Arts; the Oh Canada! F(eh)stival in London, a festival celebrating Canadian theatre and Canadian artists abroad. Natasha is a graduate of the UBC BFA in Acting program.
Melicia (they/them) is a queer, Chinese-Indonesian multidisciplinary artist who dances between costume design, visual art, and personal essays. Their work is a love letter to colours, finding small joys, community building, and celebrating silliness. As a costume designer for stage and screen, they are passionate about designing for new works and designing through a dramaturgical lens. In their free time, they love solving crosswords, being surrounded by trees, and sharing hotpot with loved ones. Melicia is grateful to live and create on the unceded territories of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), and səlilwətaɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations. More info: bio.site/melicia & localcolour.substack.com
