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STAFF

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 Jackson: Executive Director Suzy began working with Opening Act in 2003 as a teaching artist at Walton High School in the Bronx. She quickly fell in love with the students and mission of Opening Act and, in 2004, stepped up as Opening Act’s first-ever Creative and Development Director. She was proud to accept her current role as Executive Director in July 2008 and continues to work as a teaching artist in Opening Act's program at Cobble Hill High School. Suzy received her BFA in Drama from NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts, where she minored in applied theatre and studied acting at CAP 21 Musical Theater Studio, Trinity College in Dublin, and the Classical Studio. Hear what Suzy has to say about Opening Act.

Gina Grandi: Program Director Gina recently 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 be a part of 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.

Marie Cecile Anderson: Administrative Associate Marie hails from Nashville, Tennessee, but now calls Brooklyn home.  She has acted in over a dozen independent films, performed at UCB and the PIT, and is currently working on her songwriting skills with the help of her ukulele.  You can catch Marie, along side Katy Frame on accordion, performing original songs in their country western comedy band!  You can also see Marie’s starring role in the award winning independent feature film Sneakers and Soul. Marie is stoked to be back for her fourth year with Opening Act and is ready to conquer anything as their Administrative Associate!

Kate Perkins: Deputy Director Kate began working for Opening Act as a Volunteer Artist in Spring 2008. Since that first day of volunteering at the Samuel Gompers High School in the Bronx, Kate's belief in the importance of Opening Act's work has been strengthening with every student she meets. She is very proud and honored to be assuming the role of Deputy Director and eagerly looks forward to the incredible year to come. When Kate is not teaching Opening Act's workshops at the Walton Educational Campus or performing her Deputy Director duties, she spends her free time writing for film, television, new media, and Young Adult fiction. Kate holds a BFA in Dramatic Writing from NYU's Tisch School of the Arts with a minor in Producing for Film and Television. www.perkinskate.com

BOARD OF DIRECTORS

Yina Luo, Treasurer

Loren Black, Secretary

Kym Blanchard

Marisol Brekka

Robert Burton

Jonathan Dyck

Susan Elicks

David Hsia

Gene Levitin

Elizabeth Buckley Lewis

Jonathan Schorr

Rahul Tripathi

BOARD EMERITUS

Denise Fiallo

Charles Hull

Elisa Hyman

Julia Kamin

Jessye Lapenn

Sonia Mendez Castro

Jennifer Morello

Jennifer Olsson

Jeremy Pam

Stephanie Rappoport-Wahlgren

Sarah White

Opening Act Social Board

Leah Day, Co-Chair

Karoline Barwinski

Schuyler Beeman

Steve Bisogno

Kaitlin Collins

Greg Hall

Rishabh Kashyap

Rupal Patel

Alex Pecor

Sarah Scofield

Soyoon Sung

James Zheng

VOLUNTEER ARTISTS

Kristen Bell – actress

Daphne Rubin-Vega - actress, Rent

Michael Mastro – actor, West Side Story, Side Man

Laura Camien – producer and writer of Broadway’s Title of Show

Elizabeth Blue – Upright Citizen’s Brigade

The Stella Adler Studio of Acting

Filmmaker Demetrius Wren

2011-2012 Interns

Linette Alvarez

Emily Mansfield

Maggie Robinson

TEACHING ARTISTS

Our teaching artists are actors, educators, hip hop theater artists, and playwrights who have undergraduate and graduate degrees from such universities as Yale, NYU, Columbia, and Vassar College. Their combined experience includes working as public school teachers, Broadway actors, nonprofit managers, and founders of their own theater companies. As educators, they have taught classes in acting, improvisation, movement, mask making, writing, directing, solo performance, beat boxing, hip hop theater, and ensemble work all the way from New York to Missouri to the Liberian refugee camps of Ghana. We are enormously proud of the consistent high quality of our dedicated and talented staff.

Amissa Miller is a dramaturg, writer and educator.  Her dramaturgy credits include Diane Paulus’ adaptation of James Baldwin’s Another Country and Koffi Kwahule's Bintou.  Amissa co-wrote Step, a dance/theater hybrid that appeared at the New York Musical Theatre Festival, Ars Nova’s A.N.T. Fest and the Skena Up Festival in Kosovo.  She also developed and taught a social justice curriculum at the Brooklyn Young Mothers’ Collective.  Amissa holds a BA in Drama and Spanish from Spelman College, an MFA in Dramaturgy and Script Development from Columbia University, and is currently a Ph.D student in Educational Theatre at NYU.  She loves Opening Act!

Azza Satti is a producer, educator, and curator who is passionate about the arts and arts education for social change. She graduated from Tisch School of the Arts with an M.A. in Arts Politics ('09) and is currently working on producing a presentation of art, film, photography, theater, and spoken word works on the topic of the separation of North and South Sudan. Azza has previously worked for NYU's Future Filmmakers workshop, Rashid Diab Arts Centre in Khartoum, and Japan Society in New York. Azza loves to attend art openings, visit museums, watch plays and films, and just be plugged in to everything artistic and global, so she has created the blog www.acuteobservation.com to share her passion online.

Benjamin Lundberg is a Brooklyn based theatre maker and media artist. He trained at The Stella Adler Studio through the Tisch School of the Arts and spent a year studying collaborative theatre making and performance at The University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg. He currently works for the theater company Organs of State (organsofstate.org) as their Managing Director and is the creator of The Orange Hats (theorangehats.com), a video archive of vox pop audience responses to theatre, dance, performance art, and installation.

Cathleen Carr is an actor, writer and person of comedy. Her critically acclaimed two-woman comedy extravaganza, Two Girls For Five Bucks, has been seen all over the country, most recently at Ars Nova in New York City. Cathleen writes and performs with Naked Radio, the latest project from New York’s famed Naked Angels. She was a mainstage performer with Boston’s Improv Asylum for four years where she wrote and performed in multiple revues.  Cathleen studied improvisation in Chicago at Second City and was a company member of WNEP Theater, an Off-Loop ensemble dedicated to creating original works.  Cathleen earned her B.A. in Women and Performance Studies from Goddard College in Vermont. As a teaching artist, Cathleen specializes in improvisational acting and cultivating new female voices in comedy.

Christian Shaboo, originally from Kingston, NH,  is an actor/producer/filmmaker/educator living in New York City.  Christian is a founding member of New Have Theater Company and is an original member of the Funny Stages, NHTC’s traveling improv comedy troupe.  Christian recently made his film directorial debut with the documentary film Sanity Now!?, which chronicles Jon Stewart’s Rally to Restore Sanity. Past stage credits include: Long Wharf Theatre’s Finding the Sun (Benjamin), New Haven Theater Company’s Glengarry Glen Ross (David Moss) and The Red Room’s Two Rooms (Michael).  Christian can also been seen as street poet Eli in the soon to be released film Rising Star. Read what Christian says about Opening Act here.

Corinne Donly has spent the last four years creating collaborative performances in Berlin, Montreal, and New York City.  As writer/director, her work has received support from the Brooklyn Arts Exchange, The Canadian Arts Council, Springboard Danse Montreal, and The Harold Clurman Center for New Works in Movement and Dance.  As an actor, she has appeared under the direction of Adam Rapp, Steve Wangh, Tom Oppenheim, Sherrine Azab, Meghan Finn (and others) in venues such as The Kitchen, PS122, The Chocolate Factory, the Flea, The Kirk, and Walkerspace.  She is a graduate of NYU’s Experimental Theatre Wing and the Stella Adler Studio of Acting.  This is her third, proud year with Opening Act.

Danielle Levanas is an actor and teacher in her sixth year with Opening Act.  She started teaching drama in 2006 in Ghana, where she worked at Buduburam Refugee Camp.  In 2009, she co-founded Asmi International (www.AsmiInternational.org), a non-profit dedicated to empowering survivors through creative self-expression.  She is also a performer with Big Apple Playback Theater (www.BigApplePlayback.com).  Danielle holds a BFA in Applied Theatre from NYU Tisch and graduated from Columbia University’s International Trauma Studies Program in 2011.  A California native now residing in Brooklyn, Danielle lives with her partner Carlo, their mutt Domo, and three pet rats.

Emebeit Beyene is a 2010 graduate of New York University's Tisch School of the Arts where she studied at Stonestreet Studios and the Experimental Theater Wing.  She has been working with youth for over five years as a teaching artist, mentor, and tutor.  Currently, she is writing, producing and starring in a webisode series, The Girls, created through her new production company, 1990 Lex Productions. www.emebeitbeyene.com

Julia Sirna-Frest is an actor and musician living in Brooklyn.  She is a founding member of the theater group Half Straddle and has performed at various venues in NYC including St. Ann's Warehouse, The Public, HERE arts center and the Bushwick Starr.  She also sings and plays ukulele in a Dolly Parton cover band called Doll Parts.

Katie Proulx is an actor, improviser, and choreographer who loves Shakespeare, comedy, and dancing.  Prior to moving to New York, she was a cast member and Director of Choreography at ImprovBoston, with a specialty in improvised musicals.  She has worked in youth theater programs for years and is thrilled to be joining Opening Act.  Current projects include continuing studies in physical theater and ensemble creation with Movement Theater Studio NYC and learning to play the mandolin.  She received her MFA in Acting from Brooklyn College in 2010.

Kim Katzberg earned her MFA in acting from Columbia University and has a BFA in acting from The Experimental Theatre Wing at NYU.  She was a Fall Artist-In- Residence at Dixon Place, performing her solo show Penetrating the Space in October of 2010. Most recently she played Kate and Lucentio in Manhattan Shakespeare's NYC educational tour of The Taming of The Shrew. Off-Broadway productions include Benvolio in Classic Stage Company's Romeo and Juliet and Alison in The Arclight Theatre's Richard and Anne. Kim will be performing Penetrating the Space at HERE Arts Center from September 27th through October 16th.

LaTonia Phipps is an actor, spoken-word artist, and playwright. She is an alum of The Eugene O'Neil National Theater Institute and received her MFA from Brooklyn College. She was last seen in The Colored Museum at The Crossroads Theater, Wait Until Dark at The Ivoryton Playhouse, Dirty Little Black Girls at The Dixon Place Theater, and  All American Girls at the National Black Theater Festival (an NAACP Award Recipient piece). Currently, she is working with  Freedom Train Productions on a Solo-Perf. Spoken-Word show, Fishing in Brooklyn. She is thrilled to be serving as a Teaching Artist, yet another passion of hers, and to be a part of the team.

Lauren Orkus is an actor residing in Brooklyn. She has performed at theaters around the country including The Berkshire Theatre Festival, The Geva Theatre Center, Weston Playhouse, St. Louis Rep., and The Pennsylvania Shakespeare Festival as well as at The Abingdon, The Gene Frankel, and Dixon Place here in New York. She recently worked with the young women of Girls Inc. with their Project Grow theater class and is thrilled to be joining Opening Act. Lauren holds an MFA in Acting from the FSU/Asolo Theatre Conservatory and a BA in Theater from Penn State.

Lily Raabe, an Oregon native, moved to New York a year ago to pursue her MA degree in Educational Theatre at NYU. With strong interests in social justice, theatre, and arts activism, Lily is beyond excited to be a part of such a phenomenal company as they forge new ground in arts education. Previously, Lily earned her BA in Drama from the University of Portland in Portland, OR.  Over the last 10 years Lily has played the roles of teaching artist, actor, director, stage manager, costume designer, and any other arts-based job that has come along. She can't wait to get this year under way and help Opening Act youth develop their unique talents and theatrical voices!

Marcus Denard Johnson is an actor, singer, and educator hailing from Atlanta, GA. Acting Credits include: New York: American Bard Theatre Co., Much Ado, Promethean Theatre Co., Hamlet, New Media Rep., A Girl’s Trousseau,  Mannerz. Regional: Asolo Repertory Theatre, A Tale of Two Cities (Broadway Tryout), Equus, The Play's the Thing, To Kill a Mockingbird, True Colors Theatre Company, The Wiz. Television: ABC, One Life to Live, Starz,Gravity.  Marcus has worked in school systems in Georgia, Viginia, Florida, and New York.  Marcus received an MFA from the FSU/Asolo Conservatory for Actor Training, where he created and workshopped his one-man show, A People's Movement. He is a proud member of Actor's Equity Association

Patrick Cucuta is an actor, comedian, and improviser born and raised in the Bronx and one of Opening Act’s first Alums turned Teaching Artist. He began studying improv and acting under our very own Suzy Myers at Walton in 2003. After high school he went on to study at The Peoples Improv Theater, Upright Citizens Brigade, and Second City in Chicago. He has also studied acting at The NY Film Academy. He has performed in improv festivals in Chicago, Boston, and Baltimore, produced the show LatinoProv, and created the improv troupe "Bay-SIDE" with a fellow Opening Act Alum. He coaches and teaches in NYC and Philadelphia, and performs as a member of the PIT house team.

Patrick David Vassel is a director, writer, and teacher from Akron, Ohio currently based in Brooklyn. Directing credits include A Few Good Men, Inventing Van Gogh, Two Rooms, War (SoHo Playhouse) and Waiting for Lefty for the Working Theatre Director's Salon. Assistant credits include We the People: America Rocks! (TheatreWorks Nat'l Tour), Arts & Crafts (Joe's Pub), and WORKING the Musical at the Broadway Playhouse in Chicago. Upcoming projects include the first NYC revival of The Little Dog Laughed at The Gallery Players and the world premiere of Nothing Left to Burn at Ars Nova. Patrick is a certified special education teacher and has taught for several years at Explore Charter School, a high-achieving K-8 school in Brooklyn, New York.

Paul Barker has been studying improv for the past eight years. In 2007 he joined the Imps, a troupe based in Oxford, England.  In addition to performing in their weekly show, he contributed to various side projects, including an improvised musical, an improvised straight play, and a month-long sell-out run at the Edinburgh Fringe. In 2009 he directed Raggedy Band: An Improvised Musical at Fordham University. He has studied in New York at the Magnet, People’s Improv, and UCB theaters and he frequently teaches low-cost workshops in New York. This is Paul's third year teaching with Opening Act.