Theatre directing credits include The Iceman Cometh, Shuffle Along, or the Making of the Musical Sensation of 1921 and All That Followed (NY Drama Critics’ Circle Award and Drama Desk Award for Best Musical); Lucky Guy; The Normal Heart (Drama Desk); Jelly’s Last Jam (Drama Desk and Outer Critics Circle Award); Angels in America: Millennium Approaches (Tony Award and Drama Desk) and Perestroika (Drama Desk); Bring in ‘da Noise, Bring in ‘da Funk (Tony and Drama League Award); Topdog/Underdog (Obie Award); Twilight: Los Angeles, 1992 (Drama Desk); Elaine Stritch at Liberty (Tony for Special Theatrical Event); The Tempest; Caroline, or Change (Olivier Award Best Musical); and A Free Man of Color. From 1993-2005 Wolfe was the Producer of The Public Theater/New York Shakespeare Festival. He is the writer of the award-winning The Colored Museum, Shuffle Along…, he directed/adapted Spunk (Obie Award), and Harlem Song.

Morton was born in the Creole gentry of New Orleans in 1891, but was irresistibly drawn to the excitement of the infamous Storyville district where he made his reputation as a pianist. At a young age he left New Orleans to travel the country, landing in Chicago in the 1920s. He and his band, The Red Hot Peppers, became the top black recording artists for RCA Records in 1927-1928. Morton’s music integrated the sounds of ragtime, blues, African rhythms and French opera, establishing him as one of the great jazz pioneers. But by 1930 his music was considered old hat. He died in Los Angeles in 1941.

Susan Birkenhead received a Tony Nomination, a Grammy nomination and a Drama Desk Award for her lyrics for Jelly’s Last Jam, which she wrote with George C. Wolfe.  She was nominated for a Tony award for Working, and a Drama Desk Award for Triumph of Love. She won an Outer Critics Circle Award for What About Luv? and a Los Angeles Drama Critics Award for Minsky’s. She wrote additional lyrics for High Society on Broadway, and  was one of several writers of A My Name Is Alice and Stars of David off Broadway. The Secret Life of Bees, which she’s written with Lynn Nottage and Duncan Sheik, just finished a run in London and will open in New York in 2025. Boop, which she’s written with David Foster and Bob Martin, directed and choreographed by Jerry Mitchell, will go into rehearsals in January and will open on Broadway in April of 2025.

Luther Henderson was a composer, arranger, orchestrator, music director, and performer with a long and impressive career spanning multiple genres. Henderson worked on more than 50 Broadway productions. He served as the original pianist and orchestrator, arranger, and musical supervisor for Ain’t Misbehavin‘. For Lena Horne: The Lady and Her Music, he was the musical consultant and arranged several selections. He orchestrated the Tony Award-winning Raisin and Play On! As a dance arranger, Henderson‘s credits included Flower Drum Song, Do Re Mi, Funny Girl, and No, No Nanette. He also had a robust recording career, featuring albums with the Canadian Brass Quintet, Eileen Farrell, Columbia Records, the Duke Ellington Orchestra, the Andre Kostelanetz Orchestra, the Royal Philharmonic, Mandy Patinkin, Polly Bergen, Anita Ellis, and others. (Sources: National Endowment for the Arts, Playbill.com)

Co-Author and Director, Something to Live For at Pittsburgh Public (BroadwayWorld Best New Musical), The Three Musketeers at Oregon Shakespeare and The Acting Co. Tarell McCraney’s Choir Boy, Steppenwolf, Studio Theatre  (Jeff & Bay Area Critics Awards). LA: August Wilson’s Gem of the Ocean at South Coast Rep, Harriet’s Return at Geffen Playhouse. NYC: Barbecue at the Public, Lockdown at Rattlestick, Miss Evers’ Boys (NYC premiere) at Melting Pot. Select from 100+ Award winning Regional: Guys and Dolls at the Guthrie; The Wiz at Ford’s Theatre; “Master Harold”…and the Boys at Arizona Theatre Company; Tarell McCraney’s Wig Out! at Studio Theatre DC and Sundance; Jelly’s Last Jam; Pacific Overtures; Topdog/Underdog (Norton Award); God of Carnage; Five Guys Named Moe; Quiara Hudes’ Elliot, a Soldier’s Fugue; and 26 MILES, as the Associate Artistic Director at Alliance Theatre (2001-2009). Troilus and Cressida, Godspell, Twelfth Night, Guys and Dolls, Beehive, as Associate Artistic Director at Alabama Shakespeare Festival (1999-2001). Kent is the current Artistic Director at The Acting Company (2021-present) and Founding Director of New Studio on Broadway, Tisch, NYU. BFA: Carnegie-Mellon. MFA: UCLA.

Some Like It Hot (Broadway – Shubert Theatre); Motown: The Musical (Broadway – Nederlander Theatre); Yemandja the new Angelique Kidjo musical (music supervisor – world tour); Jelly’s Last Jam (guest conductor – New York City Center); Bob Fosse’s Dancin’ (Pre Broadway engagement – The Old Globe); Encore! on Disney+ (Ragtime episode); The Color Purple (Broadway tour and Paper Mill Playhouse); Wicked (substitute conductor – Pantages Theater); Memphis (Broadway tour); A Little Night Music, Ragtime, Little Shop of Horrors with M.J. Rodriguez (Pasadena Playhouse); Dear World with Tyne Daly (VPAC); Two By Two with Jason Alexander (Reprise); Passion (Boston Court); Jonathan Dove’s Innocence (Banff Centre). Full bio at darrylarchibald.com.

Dell is a New York based Virginia born choreographer/director. Selected credits: Forsyth County Is Flooding (Atlanta Opera), Malvolio (Classical Theatre of Harlem), Billy Strayhorn: Something to Live For (Pittsburgh Public Theatre), Toni Stone (Alliance Theatre and Milwaukee Repertory) It Came From Outer Space (Chicago Shakespeare Theater and TheatreSquared), Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Cinderella (Alabama Shakespeare Festival), Guys and Dolls (Guthrie Theatre), Paradise Square (Associate to Bill T. Jones, Berkeley Repertory Theatre), The Wiz (Ford’s Theater), WigOut (Studio Theater), The C.A. Lyons Project (Alliance Theater). Head of Dance at NYU/Tisch School of the Arts in the Department of Drama’s New Studio on Broadway. Upcoming: A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Summer 2024, Classical Theatre of Harlem), Mandela the Musical (Fall 2024), and Furlough’s Paradise (Spring 2025, Geffen Playhouse). IG: @aristotlejr

Ed is excited to be returning to the Playhouse where he last designed Crowns. Regional credits include: Arizona Theatre Company, Laguna Playhouse, La Jolla Playhouse, Geffen Playhouse, Muny Opera, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Mark Taper Forum, Ebony Repertory Theatre Company, South Coast Rep, Kirk Douglas Theatre, Berkeley Rep, East West Players, Hollywood Bowl, Marin Theatre Company, TheatreWorks, Intiman Theatre, Trinity Rep, Pittsburgh City Theater, Alley Theatre, Alliance Theatre, and many he can no longer remember. Television credits include: MTV’s Spring Break 2012 & 2011, Hip Hop Harry, The Tony Rock Project, and Culture Clash. Ed is the father of twins, Denis and Wesly, and husband to Director Elizabeth Bell-Haynes. edhaynes.carbonmade.com

Samantha (she/her) is thankful to be returning to Pasadena Playhouse, where she previously designed Stew. She is a costume designer and educator with previous design credits at Geffen Playhouse, Center Theatre Group, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Huntington Theatre Company, Goodman Theatre, Steppenwolf Theatre, Court Theatre, Paramount Theatre (Aurora), Drury Lane Theatre, Writers Theatre, Lookingglass Theatre Company, Chicago Children’s Theatre, TimeLine Theatre, Porchlight Music Theatre, Jackalope Theatre, Denver Center for the Performing Arts, Cleveland Playhouse, Kansas City Repertory Theatre, Alley Theatre, Seattle Children’s Theatre, First Stage Theatre, Skylight Music Theatre, Indiana Repertory Theatre, Peninsula Players Theater, and others. Current production(s): The Lonely Few (MCC Theatre). Her work can be viewed at samanthacjones.com.

Rui (he/him) Select Broadway: Skeleton Crew, Velocity of Autumn, Trip to Bountiful, Present Laughter, Dividing the Estate, Enchanted April. Off Broadway premieres: Paradise Blue, Horton Foote’s Old Friends and The Orphans’ Home Cycle (Hewes Award) (Signature Theatre), Happiest Song Plays Last (Second Stage), Just Jim Dale (Roundabout Theatre Company), Nightingale and Moonlight and Magnolias (Manhattan Theatre Club), The Carpetbagger’s Children and Far East (Lincoln Center Theater), Dinner with Friends (Variety Arts Center). Off Broadway revivals: The Piano Lesson (Signature Theatre), Talley’s Folly (Roundabout Theatre Company), Engaged (TFANA; Obie Award). Recent regional credits: Alley Theatre, Asolo Repertory Theatre, Center Stage Theater, Center Theatre Group, Dallas Theater Center, Ford’s Theatre, Guthrie Theater, Huntington, Oregon Shakespeare, The Old Globe. For Pasadena Playhouse, Fly, for which he received an LADCC Award. designbyrui.com.

Daniel is excited to return to The Pasadena Playhouse where he’s designed the Holiday Spectacular, A Little Night Music, Sunday in the Park with George, and Head over Heels. New York: The Public Theater, New York City Opera, 92Y, Roundabout, City Center, Atlantic Theater Company, and 59E59. Regional: Arena Stage, Arizona Theater Company, Geva, Milwaukee Rep, Geffen Playhouse, ACT, Merrimack, Saratoga Opera Festival, Virginia Stage, Long Wharf, as well as productions in Korea, Japan, China, Canada and Cuba. Broadway Associate: The Iceman Cometh (Tony Nomination), Significant Other, Violet, The Glass Menagerie, A Streetcar Named Desire, The Heiress, and The Nance (Tony Win). Danny is a member of IATSE, USA829, SDC and the Lincoln Center Director’s Lab. Graduate of Northwestern University.

Ursula is thrilled to return to the Pasadena Playhouse, where recent credits include the Holiday Spectacular, A Little Night Music, Sunday in the Park with George, and Head Over Heels. Other regional credits: The Wizard of Oz at ACT, Holiday at Arena Stage, King Lear at the Wallis Annenberg, The Wickhams at Arizona Theatre Company, Native Gardens at Merrimack and the world premiere of Stonewall with NYC Opera. As a composer, her work has been performed at Carnegie Hall, Miller Theatre, le Poisson Rouge, the Victoria & Albert museum, the National Portrait Gallery in London, as well as by festivals and ensembles across the country and around the world. Ursula received her B.A. in Music and Biology from Columbia University and her Ph.D. in Music Composition and New Media from UC Berkeley. More info at www.ursulakwongbrown.com

Theater: King Hedley II; Fat Ham; Twelfth Night; Black Cypress Bayou; Three Sisters; The Bluest Eye; Mountain Top; The Book of Will; Radio Golf; Anna in the Tropics; All’s Well That Ends Well; Seven Guitars; Gem of the Ocean: “THREE” Sisters; The Wiz; Open Fist; Picnic; The Great Jheri Curl Debate; Mommie & Clyde; A Midsummer Night’s Dream; The Lion King; The Direction Home; The Producers; Lady Day; Our West Side Story; Shooting Star; Two Trains Running; Beauty and the Beast; Drama Queens; Letters from Zora; I Go Somewhere; Heartbreak Hotel; Siamese Sex Show; The Story of Alice; Hattie: What I Need You to Know; Painting in Red; Dunbar Hotel. Film/TV: Something About Mother; Dragon Fly; Remember Me: The Mahalia Jackson Story. Shelia’s passion project is donating her services as the resident hair and makeup designer for Amazing Grace Conservatory, a non-profit Performing Arts organization for aspiring artists ages 7-18.

Joy is thrilled to be working at Pasadena Playhouse! Joy is a Los Angeles based intimacy coordinator, actor, and acting coach. Recent intimacy credits include Choir Boy; Hedda Gabler; Winter’s Tale; The High Table; Apartment Living; TJ Loves Sally 4Ever; and The Light. Television/Film: ACX-Cross, We’re Not Married, 4 to 6 Seconds, and Color of Autumn. Joy has facilitated workshops for CBS Studios Pipeline Challenge, Celebration Theatre, USC, and CSULB Theatre Departments. Memberships include: ICOC (Intimacy Coordinators of Color); National Alliance of Acting Teachers; SAG/AFTRA; AEA; and serves on the board of GMIC (Global Majority Intimacy Coordinators). Joy is a graduate of NC A&T University, Mason Gross School of the Arts, and Rutgers University. www.JoyDeMichelle.com

Rachel Lee Flesher (Fight Director) (they.she.he) Select Los Angeles: One of the Good Ones (Pasadena Playhouse); Pang Spa(Chalk Theatre); Cabaret, Destiny of Desire, Dial M for Murder (The Old Globe Theatre) Cassils Human Measure (RedCat Theatre) Radical (IAMA theatre Company). Select Chicago: Romeo and Juliet (Chicago Shakespeare Theatre) Twilight Bowl, Relentless (Goodman Theatre); The Burials (Steppenwolf for Young Adults); Constellations, I Am Not Your Perfect Mexican Daughter, The Most…Miz Martha Washington (Steppenwolf Theatre); The Displaced (Joseph Jefferson Award Nomination) (Haven Theatre); First Love is the Revolution (Joseph Jefferson Award Nomination) (Steep Theatre). Select Regional: As You Like It (Saint Louis Shakespeare); There’s Always the Hudson (Woolly Mammoth Theatre); Othello (Dallas Shakespeare Theatre); West Side Story (Lyric Theatre Oklahoma). Select TELEVISION: Intimacy Coordinator: GLOW (Netflix); You(Warner Horizons), Hunters (Amazon); The Summer I Turned Pretty (Apple TV+); Gaslit (NBC Universal). EDUCATION: Flesher is an Intimacy Coordinator on the SAG-AFTRA registry, the founder and CEO of Intimacy Professionals Education Collective (accredited by SAG-AFTRA), a Certified Intimacy Director and Intimacy Coordinator. Flesher is a SAG-AFTRA stunt performer, a Certified Fight Director and Fight Instructor with the Fight Directors Canada.

Ryan has made significant casting contributions to the film, television, and theater industry. With over a decade of experience working at one of the worlds premiere casting offices, The Telsey Office, Ryan has built a diverse portfolio spanning across various mediums. Ryan’s versatility in the world of casting speaks for itself. For the last eight years, Ryan has cast many theater productions in Los Angeles, including many shows at Pasadena Playhouse and The Wallis. Their portfolio also includes notable TV and film projects such as the Wicked movies, This Is Us, Atypical, and many more. Ryan puts inclusion and diversity at the heart of everything they do. Their mission is to celebrate and actively advocate for performers who reflect the full spectrum of human diversity to help expand a multiplicity of narratives; narratives that reflect the real world we live in and challenge conventional boundaries that currently exist in the entertainment industry. rbtcasting.com. @rbtcasting

Broadway: Two hilarious comedies, The Cottage and Chicken & Biscuits; the Pulitzer & Tony Award winning A Soldier’s Play, the iconic revival for colored girls… enuf and Stick Fly. lark has worked for the World Famous Apollo and has headed hundreds of productions regionally, among them: Alliance Theatre, Delaware Theatre Company, Indiana Rep, Arena Stage, Cleveland Playhouse, San Jose Rep, Arizona Theatre Co, Trinity Rep, MUNY, NC Black Rep as well as taken out several  tours. lark is a longtime Line Producer/Executive Assistant for Winston-Salem’s National Black Theatre Festival. Much love to my forever supporter, C.B.

Past Productions at Pasadena Playhouse include One Of The Good Ones, KATE (ASM), Inherit the Wind, The Sound Inside (ASM), The Father (ASM), Stoneface, Defiance, Showtune (The Music of Jerry Herman), and Sisterella to name a few. Over at Center Theatre Group Highlights include: Baz Luhrmann’s La Bohème, Curtains, Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson, Two Unrelated Plays by David Mamet, Bengal Tiger at the Baghdad Zoo, The Lieutenant of Inishmore, God of Carnage, Red, Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike, Bent, Zoot Suit, Archduke, Linda Vista, King James, The Old Man and the Pool, The Secret Garden, and A Transparent Musical. Other Los Angeles: Los Angeles Theatre Center in its heyday from 1985–1990, Geffen Playhouse. Regional: Seattle Rep, Intiman Theatre. New York: Public Theater. Tours: Europe — Quotations from a Ruined City, Law of Remains (with Reza Abdoh’s Dar a Luz company).

Miriam (she/her) is extremely excited to be returning to Pasadena Playhouse. Credits include One of the Good Ones, Inherit the Wind (Pasadena Playhouse); world premiere of Alma, Tambo & Bones (Center Theatre Group – Kirk Douglas Theatre); 2:22 A Ghost Story and The Secret Garden (Center Theatre Group – Ahmanson Theatre); world premiere of A Transparent Musical (Center Theatre Group – Mark Taper Forum); The Half Life of Marie Curie (Theatre SilCo). An El Paso, Texas native, Miriam teaches and works around the Los Angeles area. She is a company member of New Swan Shakespeare Festival and has worked for the Walt Disney Company’s Imagination Campus (formerly known as Disney Performing Arts). MFA in Stage Management from the University of California, Irvine.

Jessica is so excited to be back at Pasadena Playhouse! Past credits include: Inherit the Wind (Pasadena Playhouse); Galilee, 34 (South Coast Repertory); A Weekend with Pablo Picasso (LA Theatre Works Tour); 2024 LA Writers’ Workshop Festival, A Christmas Story, A Transparent Musical, The Secret Garden, 2:22 A Ghost Story (Center Theatre Group); The Gardens of Anuncia (The Old Globe); Ghosts, Orlando (Williamstown Theatre Festival); Peter Pan and Tinker Bell (Lythgoe Family Panto); Driving Miss Daisy, Clybourne Park, King of the Road (Laguna Playhouse); The Glass Menagerie (International City Theatre). She received her B.A. in Drama and Certificate in Arts Management from the University of California, Irvine.