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about us |
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Who We Are
Julia Kamin Founder Julia Kamin has a life–time commitment to public education. She previously taught high school and worked for Advocates for Children of New York for eight years as an advocate, education specialist and program director before founding Opening Act in 2000. Ms. Kamin is also the founder and director of CitizenJoe.org, a policy awareness and citizen empowerment website.
Suzy Myers Executive Director Suzy has worked as a teaching artist in New York City for the past nineyears, including work with Opening Act the past six years at Walton, Graphic Communication Arts, Gompers and Cobble Hill High Schools. Suzy received her BFA in drama from NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts, where she also minored in applied theatre. |
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Mary, at Clara Barton High School. December 2005
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Teaching Artists
Heather Acs begins her sixth year with Opening Act in the Fall of 2009. This also marks her sixth year at Clara Barton High School. She holds a B.A. in Theatre Arts from Marymount Manhattan College and an M.A. in Performance, Educational Theatre, and Social Change from the Gallatin School of Individualized Study at New York University. Heather is a theatre performance artist and actor with a focus on original work, solo performance, and independent film.
Marie Cecile Anderson hails from Nashville, Tennessee, but now calls Brooklyn home. Her first acting role was a piece of seaweed in the Nashville Children’s Theatre production of The Little Mermaid. Since then Marie has gone on to act in over a dozen independent films, a national Food Network commercial, improv shows at the Upright Citizens Brigade Theatre, and is currently working on her songwriting skills with the help of her ukulele. Marie is thrilled to announce that her latest feature film, Sneakers and Soul, will be shown at various film festivals throughout the country. Marie played one of the lead characters and hopes that some day it will be showing at a theatre near you! She has also appeared in numerous NYC and regional stage productions and is extremely honored to be back for her second year teaching with Opening Act.
Paul Barker is thrilled to be beginning his first year as a teaching artist with Opening Act. Last May he completed his BA in English and Philosophy at Fordham University, and has taken classes in improv comedy at the UCB and Magnet theaters in New York. He currently performs with the indie improv troupe Smashface and teaches improv at Cristo Rey High School in Harlem. Paul hails from St. Louis, Missouri, whose airport no longer services direct flights to New York.
Corinne Donly This is Corinne’s first year with Opening Act, where she is thrilled to be working at Columbus High School. As a teaching artist, she has also worked in the Stella Adler Studio of Acting’s Outreach Program and with “I Can Act.” As an actor, she has performed under the direction of Adam Rapp (world premiere of Rapp’s Bingo with the Indians), Steve Wangh, Tom Oppenheim, Judith Smith, Meghan Finn, Sherrine Azab, Steve Stout, Cory Einbinder, and others. She is also the writer/director of two original pieces—Body of Work (Play) and The Brutes—the latter of which was created in collaboration with Canadian choreographer Kate Hilliard and which will begin touring Canada in the fall of 2010. Administratively, Corinne has worked for Tamar Rogoff Performance Projects and for Elevator Repair Service Theater Company (2008 intern). She graduated from NYU in 2007 with degrees in English and Acting, having trained at the Stella Adler Studio and the Experimental Theatre Wing.
marcus d. harvey is an award winning actor/singer/writer, originally from Halifax, NC and is a graduate of UNC-Chapel Hill with dual degrees in Dramatic Arts (Acting) and Communication Studies (Performance). As an actor/singer he has performed on stages in North Carolina, Illinois, Maryland, New York, and New Jersey. Some of his favorite shows/roles include: Blues for Mister Charlie (Richard), Before it Hits Home (Junior), Fires In the Mirror (George C. Wolfe, et al.), Dreamgirls (Marty), Master Harold and the boys (Willie), RECK (Hammer Jones). His one man show Are We Not Men?: an exploration of masculinity, religion, and HIV/AIDS won him the Wallce Ray Peppers Award for the Performance of African and African American Literature as well as induction into Order of the Golden Fleece, the nation's oldest honors fraternity while a student at UNC-Chapel Hill. Currently a Harlem resident and graduate student in Dramatic Writing and Performance at the Gallatin School of Individualized Study at New York University where he has studied under Anna Deavere Smith, Christina Marin, Selma Thompson and is advised by Michael Dinwiddie. marcus is working on his thesis which is a documentary solo performance theatre piece entitled BABA: A young black boys search for manhood about being young, black, and male growing up without his father.
Susan-Kate Heaney is thrilled to be teaching with Opening Act again this year! She is an actor whose favorite past roles include Kat in Love in the Title and Lina in One Thing I Like to Say Is. Susan-Kate is a graduate of New York University's Tisch School of the Arts, with a BFA in Acting. She is always working on new things, from recording audiobooks to studying improv at UCB to producing readings of new works. Opening Act is a dream for Sue-Kate, because it combines her passion for learning, teaching and especially acting with her desire to change lives through the medium of theater. For more information, see www.susan-kate.com.
Cornelius Jones Jr. Cornelius LIFE Jones was born and raised in Richmond, VA, and was a former resident of Washington, DC (his second home). In 1999 he arrived in New York City after completing his undergraduate studies in musical theater at The University of The Arts and at Syracuse University. NYC theaters credits include Broadway’s The Lion King, and Thou Shalt Not, on tour: Smokey Joes Café, Off-Broadway: Skylar’s Story (Three Lions Stage), and Off-Off-Broadway: FlagBoy. His regional credits include: Dreamgirls, A Chorus Line, The Wiz (under the direction of Tony Award Winner George Faison), and Big River. Cornelius LIFE also had roles in the television and film industries, with appearances in Law&Order: SVU, Loa, Finding Kevin, Old School Hip Hop, StoryPorch, and The Vernon Johns Story. The one-man show, FlagBoy, written and performed by Cornelius LIFE marked his debut as a solo-show artist and playwright. It received an Outstanding Performance in a Solo-Show nomination at the 2008 Ninth Annual Midtown International Theater Festival. As a poet, his works “Momma Said…(A Hard Life)” and “Chicken N Shrimp Gumbo” received honorable mention status in The Writer’s Place 2007-2008 and 2008-2009 Poetry Competition and appears in The 2008 and 2009 Writers Place Poetry Review. He’s currently pursuing graduate studies at New York University, with a focus in Dramatic Writing and Social Theater (Theater of the Oppressed) and works as a teaching artist for Opening Act New York. He is also busy completing a book of poetry, personal essays, and a stage play, which are loosely based on his one-man show FlagBoy. He’s also a contributing writer for TheBlackTraveler.com and co-founder of TheFutureForward.net, in which his weekly column, Arts.Advocacy+Wellness with Cornelius Jones Jr., appears every Wednesday. For up to date information visit Cornelius online at www.corneliusjonesjr.com.
Danielle Levanas is an actor, writer, and teaching artist originally from Los Angeles. She started teaching drama in 2006 in Ghana where she worked at Buduburam Liberian Refugee Camp and the University of Ghana. A new member of the Big Apple Playback Theater Company (bigappleplayback.com) and a writer for Broke-Ass Stuart’s Website (brokeassstuart.com), some recent projects include Political Subversities at The People’s Improv Theater, and Caravan Man and Help Yourself at Williamstown Theatre Festival. In 2008, she founded the non-profit LYDIA (LYDIAafrica.org ) dedicated to bringing arts and literacy training to refugee youth in Liberia. This is her 4th year with Opening Act, and she totally loves it.
Kobi Libii is an actor and improviser originally from Fort Wayne, Indiana. In scripted theater, Kobi’s work has been seen at Yale Rep (King Lear, Comedy of Errors) Theater for a New Audience (Ohio State Murders), The Cherry Lane (Boiling Pot) The Ohio (Hotel Savant’s The Cenci) The Ontological (Target Margin’s Great Ape Love Song) MCC (Zero- reading), Emerging Artists (Honky- reading), Edinburgh Fringe Festival (Rolin Jones’ The Jammer) among others. As an improviser, Kobi has performed with Chicago City Limits, Broadway’s Next Hit Musical, Symposium, Yale’s Just Add Water and One Night Stand-An Improvised Musical. Recent on-camera credits include FOX’s webseries Brainstorm and Washington, a pilot directed by Casey Neistat (HBO’s Neistat Brothers.) Kobi studied theater at Yale University and improvisation at Second City Chicago. This is Kobi's third year with Opening Act and he is thrilled to be a part of the team.
Meg McInerney is absolutely trilled to be teaching with Opening Act for her fifth year at Columbus Campus! Since a very young age, Meg has experienced the transformative power that theater can have in a person’s life. She graduated from New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts with a BFA in Theater and minors in both Applied Theater and Psychology. Meg is also currently the Co-Founder and Managing Director of The Arts Effect, a premiere creative arts development company that uses a unique combination of theater arts exploration, mentorship, and new media innovation to create exciting and accessible transmedia experiences that inspire children, challenge communities, and raise awareness.
Amissa Miller is honored to join the Opening Act team as a teaching artist at the Columbus High campus. She holds a BA in Drama and Spanish from Spelman College, and she recently completed her MFA in Dramaturgy and Script Development at Columbia University, where her dramaturgy credits included Diane Paulus’ adaptation of James Baldwin’s ANOTHER COUNTRY. She co-wrote the book and lyrics for STEP, which premiered at the 2007 New York Musical Theatre Festival, was produced at Ars Nova as a part of their 2008 A.N.T. Fest and was a part of the 2008 Skena Up International Film and Theatre Festival in Kosovo. She is currently revising and working towards producing her translation of Francisco Arriví’s seminal Puerto Rican play VEJIGANTES, along with several other writing projects that are kicking around in her head. She has also worked in Government and Community Affairs at Brooklyn Academy of Music, and currently assists the Deputy Director at the Dwyer Cultural Center in Harlem. Amissa sees her own personal mission reflected in the work that Opening Act does, and she is thrilled to join this community of artists and world changers.
Kate Perkins is excited to be back for another year at Opening Act! After years of screenwriting and writing for new media, Kate is venturing into the world of Young Adult fiction. Now finished with her first YA supernatural novel, The Protectorate, she is working on several new book projects. Though her themes may differ from work to work, she highly enjoys exploring antiheroism in coming-of-age characters. Kate holds a BFA in Dramatic Writing with a minor in Producing for Film and Television from NYU's Tisch School of the Arts.
LaTonia Phipps is an Actor, Spoken-Word Artist, and playwright. This will be her first year as an Assistant Teaching Artist for Opening Act. She is an alum of The Eugene O'Neil National Theater Institute and has received her MFA from Brooklyn College. She was last seen in The Colored Museum at The Crossroads Theater as woman 1; Wait Until Dark at The Ivoryton Playhouse as Suzy Hendrix, and Dirty Little Black Girls at The Dixon Place Theater as Chinara. Currently, she is working with a theater company for new emerging playwrights, Freedom Train Productions, on a Solo-Perf. Spoken-Word show titled, Fishing in Brooklyn, which will mark her first debut as a solo-artist. Opening Act is yet another stepping stone in her professional career and she is thrilled to be serving as a Teaching Artist, yet another passion of hers, and to be apart of the team.
Azza Satti is an arts activist and curator originally from Sudan and Somalia, and grew up in France and Kenya before she moved to the United States to pursue higher education. She received a B.A. in Media Studies from Hunter College and an M.A. in Arts Politics from New York University. In 2006, Azza returned to Sudan and worked at the Rashid Diab Arts Centre in Khartoum for two years where she produced exhibitions, workshops and social forums but always felt the need to learn improv theater to include it in the arts education program of the Rashid Dian Arts Centre. In spring of 2009, Azza volunteered with Opening Act while she attended NYU as part of a Hip Hop Theater course, and she was inspired by the work of the teaching artists and Opening Act to pursue learning and teaching theater for years to come before returning to Sudan. |
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Board of Directors
Alexandra Kamin, President
Denise Fiallo, Treasurer
Jesse Cutler, Secretary
Loren Black
Kym Blanchard
Robert Burton
Susan Elicks
David Hsia
Gene Levitin
Yina Luo
Jonathan Schorr
Advisory Board
Charles Hull
Elysa Hyman
Sonia Mendez-Castro
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Gina Grandi Creative and Development Director Gina just moved to New York from San Francisco, where she worked in the San Francisco Unified School District for 13 years, teaching 4th and 5th grade for almost a decade before moving to high school. As a founding teacher of Metropolitan Arts and Technology HS, Gina designed and implemented the school-wide drama program. She is beyond delighted to join an organization that shares her belief that drama education can make a significant impact on the community and culture of a school and the lives of students. Gina has a BA from Vassar College, a Masters in Educational Theatre from NYU, and an extensive finger puppet collection. |
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