Guest Artists

**Marnie Andrews**

Director: Family: Can't Live With Them, Can't Live Without them

Marnie has a wide-ranging career as actor, director, singer, writer, and teacher. In recent years, she has starred in several world premieres of new plays.

She guest-starred in numerous TV series and movies of the week, including E.R, Murder One, Jag and Wonder Years, and had a recurring role on Reasonable Doubts for two years with Mark Harmon and Marlee Matlin on She’s performed in regional theatres over thirty years in such diverse roles as Guenevere in Camelot and George in The Killing of Sister George. Much of her career has been in developing new plays.

Among her directing credits, Marnie directed Steven Wolfson’s adaptation of Trojan Women, which was chosen for an international theatre audience at the Getty Museum in LA. She conceived and dramaturged a piece called View from the Hudson which was awarded a Geraldine Dodge Foundation grant for the NJ company, Randy James Dance Works. Marnie taught for NYU and USC Graduate Film Schools. At NYU, she directed Three Sisters, and A Piece of My Heart. Marnie served for several years on the board of the National Repertory Theatre Foundation, which awarded yearly grants for new plays. She is currently honorary board member and singer with the New York City Master Chorale. Email: marniejean@aol.com

**Samuel Buggeln**

Director: Arcadia, All In The Timing

New York: the acclaimed Off-Broadway premiere of Rum & Vodka by Conor McPherson. Other productions at the Ohio Theatre in SoHo, where he is an Artistic Associate of that theatre’s Obie-winning resident company Soho Think Tank: his adaptation of Marguerite Duras’ Blue Eyes Black Hair (developed at a New York Theatre Workshop summer residency at Dartmouth College); David Foley’s The Last Days of Madalyn Murray O’Hair and Cressida Among the Greeks, both co-produced by the Wash & Fold Theatre Project, co-founded by Buggeln. Over its two-year existence, the WFTP received grants from the Dramatists’ Guild and the Peg Sandtvoord Foundation, and a Drama Desk nomination for Mark Huang’s sound design on Cressida. Other New York credits include New Day (Theater for the New City), Sex is My Religion and Agamemnon vs. Liberace (both HERE), and The Murders at Argos (FringeNYC), which also received a Peg Sandtvoord grant. Regional work: Sleuth (Portland Stage Co), Rites of Passage, Play by Play and Dirty Blonde (StageWorks/Hudson, where he is an Artistic Associate). In Vancouver, Canada: 2-2-Tango, Come On! and The Two-Headed Roommate (Liquid Theatre, a company devoted to site-specific work, co-founded by Buggeln); the held-over hit The Night Larry Kramer Kissed Me. Alumnus, Lincoln Center Directors’ Lab.

**David Bunce**

David Bunce (Fight Choreographer) is an Actor/ Combatant with the Society of American Fight Directors and resident combat choreographer at the New York State Theatre Institute. At the institute, he has choreographed violence for Man of La Mancha, The Killings Tale, King Of Shadows, Wait Until Dark, Dial "M" For Murder, Witness For The Prosecution and others. David has acted as fall/stunt coordinator for several productions of Noises Off including the UAlbany production. Last year he choreographed the battle at the end of the Schenectady County Community College production of Richard III. Film work includes the violence in Nate Dogg for Damage Films, Arachnia for Edgewood Studios and Face Of The Enemy for Mercer Films.

**Ward Dales**

WARD DALES holds a BFA in Acting from New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts. Mr. Dales has performed, designed and directed for the theatre and cabaret stage in NYC and in Europe, but has called the Capital Region his creative home for nearly 15 years. He grew up in this area, which brings the total to well past 30 years on local stages.

He co-founded Actors’ Collaborative Inc. (ACI), and served as its Co-Producing Artistic Director throughout its tenure as Resident Theatre Company both at the Egg and the Arts Center of the Capital Region. For ACI, Mr. Dales directed Red Roses and Petrol, Reckless, Middle-Aged White Guys, and A Perfect Ganesh, and appeared on stage for the company in The Baltimore Waltz, Les Liaisons Dangereuses, Private Eyes, Stoppers and Toppers: A Tribute to Broadway, and As Bees in Honey Drown. The company held the reputation of being the area’s premiere acting and communication training organization for over a decade.

Local audiences have also seen his work on stage with Capital Repertory Co., the New York State Theatre Institute (including their celebrated Time Warner video production of A Tale of Cinderella), Albany Civic Theatre, Schenectady Civic Players, Schenectady Light Opera Company, and Three Dollar Bill Productions. For Heritage Artists at the Cohoes Music Hall, he instituted the Friday Night Cabaret Series and performed in all of their Gala Award benefits. He recently played Marvin in Falsettos at the WAMC Performing Arts Center and premiered his one-man nightclub act for the Albany Medical Center, Ward Dales: Taking the Wheel, which played the State Room in Albany. A professional singer, Mr. Dales can be heard in area clubs, with performances slated for this fall and spring at Savannah’s in downtown Albany.

A regular adjudicator for regional theatre festivals, he will be judging for the 2006 ESTA Fest this spring. Mr. Dales developed the drama portion of the performing arts program at Philip Livingston Magnet Academy in Albany, where he served as an instructor and Director of the Magnet School Programs for 11 years. As Volunteer Adjunct Professor through the SUNY Albany and Hudson Valley Community College University in the High School programs, he is responsible for developing and teaching the Career Exploration in Communications and Performing Arts Program at Albany High School, and directs the after-school drama program there as well. He is a member in good standing of the Screen Actors Guild and Actors’ Equity Association.

**Chad Larabee**

Director: Antigone

Chad Larabee is a New York City based Director who recently staged Ain’t We Got Fun in London starring Siobhan McCarthy. He is working with Lori McKelvey on her new musicals Georgia and Camilla. Recent directing credits include Evita, Singin’ In The Rain, Into The Woods, and Sweeney Todd. He directed the world premiere of Cyndi Coyne’s play The Secret of Blue as part of the Iowa New Play Festival for which he won the I-RAM Awards for Outstanding Direction. He is a proud graduate of The University of Iowa, and Florida State University where he received his MFA in Directing. Last year he associated directed a new version of The Mystery of Edwin Drood starring Sally Struthers and Brian d’Arcy James. Chad is a member of The Society of Stage Directors and Choreographers. For more information please visit: www.chadlarabee.com

**Matthew Maraffi**

Scene Designer: Arcadia

Recent designs: Cats, The Complete History of America (abridged). Regionally Topdog/Underdog, Chalk Circles, Spinning into Butter, and Bach @Leipzig, Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, and Romeo and Juliet (Hangar Theatre). The Underpants, Sly Fox, Veronica’s Room (Florida Repertory Theatre), Old Man River (New Victory Theatre, Theatre West LA), The Devil‘s Music (Florida Stage), Wit (Syracuse Stage), The Fabulous Fifties(Tampa Bay PAC,) Cobb (Melting Pot Theatre, Lucille Lortel Theatre, Penguin Rep). He is a member of the Adobe Theatre Company. He is the Scenic Designer on the U.S. Tour and Italian productions of RENT.

**Laura Margolis**

Laura Margolis is the founder and Artistic Director of Stageworks/Hudson, one of the Hudson Valley's premiere Equity theater companies. Distinguished in 2007 as the Best Theater Company by Metroland Magazine, under her leadership, Stageworks was donated its permanent home, the former Kaz industrial building located in Hudson, NY. For their partnership in bringing a positive effect on the quality of life in Hudson and the mid Hudson Valley, Stageworks and Kaz are the co-recipients of the 2005 Crystal Apple Award from the Columbia County Chamber of Commerce. Directing highlights for Stageworks include Dog Stories (World premiere), Omnium Gatherum, Lebensraum, The Drawer Boy, Brutal Imagination, The Laramie Project, Wit, A Wedding Story (American premiere) and numerous one-act premieres for Stageworks' annual PLAY BY PLAY festival of new short plays. She has received the Columbia County Arts Award for Artist “for excellence in developing and fostering the arts in Columbia County” and the Certificate of Recognition from the Columbia County Board of Supervisors for providing original and creative opportunities to the community. She received her MFA in Arts Administration from Brooklyn College.

**Gretchen Michelfeld**

Vocal Coach: Tartuffe

Acting credits include; New Georges, The Women's Project, The Actors Company Theatre, American Living Room, The McCarter Theatre in Princeton, NY Stage and Film, and Shakespeare's Globe Theatre in London. This summer, she starred in Beatrice Terry's adaptation of The Arabian Nights (directed by Ms. Terry) at the Actors' Shakespeare Company in Riverhead, NY. Gretchen is also a writer, Shakespeare teacher and co-creator of the award winning, international hit, Lesbian Pulp-O-Rama! In 2002 she was a guest artist at Texas A&M University and in 2001 she taught at the American Academy of Dramatic Art in NYC. She holds a BA in English and Drama from Vassar College, and an MFA in Theatre from Sarah Lawrence College.

**Jeffrey Mousseau**

Director: The Birthday Party and Famous by Their Birth: Shakespeare’s Power Plays

UAlbany Director credits: Jesus Hopped the ‘A’ Train, The Birthday Party and Famous by Their Birth: Shakespeare’s Power Plays.  NYC: world premiere of Aunt Leaf at HERE Arts Center in January 2010.  He is member of HERE’s Artist in Residence Program and he also recently launched StartHERE: Innovative Theater for Young People, presenting Denmark’s Sofie Krog Teater’s puppet performance, Diva.   Regional credits: 110 Flights, Proctors Theater, Schenectady, and I Am My Own Wife, Stageworks, Hudson.  Boston credits:  Founding Artistic Director, The Coyote Theater, recipient of Elliot Norton and Independent Reviewers of New England Awards.  Coyote directing credits include:  Miss Julie, Uncle Tom’s Cabin, Bash, American Notes, Marisol and Fool for Love.  He has served as a grant reviewer and jurist on numerous panels for the Lower Manhattan and Massachusetts Cultural Councils.  BA, American Studies, University of Notre Dame; MFA, Theatre, Brooklyn College.

**Normi Noel**

Vocal Coach: The Trojan Women

Normi Noel is a voice teacher and a long-time member of Shakespeare & Co. in Lenox, Massachusetts. She trained with Kristin Linklater, taught voice at Boston University for six years, and also worked at New York University Experimental Theatre, among others. She has coached two Broadway shows (Frankie and Johnnie and Match) and acted as a consultant on a three-year project with Carol Gilligan at Harvard University, studying girls’ voices and healthy resistance. Currently, she is teaching voice at Smith College and working with women veterans.

**Eric Renschler**

Scene Designer: Twelfth Night

His Broadway designs include scenery for As Long As You Both Shall Laugh (including a national tour and PBS special) and Mamaloshen. Off-Broadway credits include designs at the New York Shakespeare Festival, Circle Repertory Company, Pan-Asian Repertory Theatre, Puerto Rican Traveling Theatre, and The Juilliard School. Regional credits include Cincinnati Playhouse, Chautauqua Opera, Barrington Stage Company, Merrimack Repertory Theatre, Adirondack Theater Festival, Hangar Theatre, and Seattle Repertory Theatre. As an associate of designer John Lee Beatty, he worked on over forty Broadway productions and tours including The Color Purple, Doubt, Chicago, Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf, Footloose, Proof, Wonderful Town, The Redwood Curtain, and How the Grinch Stole Christmas. He holds an MFA in Theatre Design from the University of Michigan and is a member of IATSE (International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees) and USA (United Scenic Artists). Eric is currently the Scene Design Professor at the University of Evansville. Previously, he taught at the University of Connecticut.

**Arthur Sainer**

Current published books: "The New Radical Theatre Notebook," Applause Books. "Zero Dances," a biography of Zero Mostel, Limelight Editions. Critiques: Forthcoming -- On Cynthia Ozick's novel, "Heir to the Glimmering World," published by Houghton Mifflin. Review to appear in American Book Review. Recently -- On Chaim Potok"s "Old Men at Midnight," published by Alfred A. Knopf, appeared in Midstream, Sept.-Oct. 2004. Playwriting awards include grants from the National Foundation for Jewish Culture, Ford Foundation, Rockefeller Foundation, Office for Advanced Drama Research at the U. of Minnesota and the John Golden Foundation. Have taught at Bennington, Wesleyan, Hunter, MIddlebury, Sarah Lawrence, Adelphi, C.W. Post, Hampshire and the New School. Have been a panelist at NYSCA, Vermont Arts Council and the NEA. Plays performed in New York at LaMama, Theater for the New City, Playwrights Horizon, Open Space, Theatre Genesis and the Cubiculo. In Minneapolis at the Firehouse Theatre. In Los Angeles at the Odyssey Theatre. In Columbus, Ohio at Ohio State. In Boston at the OM-Theatre Workshop. In Parma, Italy at the Teatro Reggio (opera house). Have participated in workshops with Jerzy Grotowski's Laboratory Theatre in Wroclaw, Poland. Early member of the Open Theatre. Wrote drama and occasional film criltiques and political articles for The Village Voice for two decades, literary editor of Voice Books in the early Sixties.

**Nancy Saklad**

Vocal Coach: A Midsummer Night's Dream

Nancy has been working in professional theater for 25 years. When not teaching, she directs and coaches voice and acting. Directing credits include: MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING at Boston’s Publik Theatre, HOW I LEARNED TO DRIVE and MOLLY SWEENEY at Durham Center Stage in NH, OTHER PEOPLES’ MONEY and LOST IN YONKERS at Seacoast Repertory Theater, LYSISTRATA and ANTIGONE at the University of NH and the Moss Hart award-winning production of THE DIARY OF ANNE FRANK at Seacoast Repertory Theatre in Portsmouth, NH. She has taught acting, voice and directing at the University of Miami, FL, the University of NH, Regis College in MA, Queens College in NY, and The American Musical and Dramatic Academy in New York City. Nancy is a certified Fitzmaurice Voicework practitioner with additional specialized training in Lessac Voicework and Michael Chekov technique. She is also a recipient of the Kennedy Center Medallion for service to the New England Region and recently began an affiliation with the Pearl Theatre in New York City as a Fitzmaurice Voicework coach. Nancy is delighted to have joined the performance faculty at SUNY-New Paltz this Fall.

**Sara Schatz**

Sara Schatz is the Director of the casting dept. at Richard Frankel Productions where she currently does additional casting for The Producers (Broadway, Vegas), The Fantasticks (off-Broadway), Porgy & Bess (West End, Broadway), Company (Broadway) as well as development for Broadway, National and International tours. During her fours years at Dave Clemmons Casting she served as an associate casting director on multiple Broadway shows including Ring of Fire, In My Life, The Boy From Oz, Brooklyn, and Dracula. Sara cast the European/Asian tours of West Side Story (directed and choreographed by Joey McKneely) and The King & I (directed by Bobby Garcia), as well as numerous national tours including Jesus Christ Superstar (starring Ted Neely), Evita (directed by Hal Prince), Fosse, Crazy for You, and Fiddler on the Roof. Off-Broadway: Bare, Bingo, Captain Louie, the NYC premier of Charles Mee’s Big Love (Theatre for a New Audience). Numerous NY readings and workshops including Tom Kitt’s Feeling Electric (2005 NYMF Festival), Mask (directed by Richard Maltby Jr.), The Me Nobody Knows (directed by Scott Schwartz). Regional: Marriott Lincolnshire, Goodspeed Opera House, Pittsburg CLO. She has co-taught master classes at several of the countries finest musical theatre training programs including NYU, Carnegie Mellon, CCM, Boston Conservatory, Elon, Baldwin Wallace, Sam Houston State, Oklahoma City, Point Park, and North Carolina School of the Arts. As a performer, Sara starred Off-Broadway in The Donkey Show, and played Maureen on the national tour of RENT. She holds a BA in Theatre Arts from Brandeis University.

**Eileen Schuyler**

Eileen Schuyler has performed in classic and contemporary plays for professional theaters including New York, regional, stock and touring companies, including Studio Arena Theater, Fulton Opera House, Capital Rep, Soho Repertory Theater, New York State Theater Institute, Williamstown Theater Festival, Queens Theater in the Park, The Producer's Club, The Kennedy Center, Danny Kaye Playhouse, Cohoes Music Hall, and StageWorks. A professional voiceover artist, she won an AUDIE award for her work on the Warner Video of A Tale of Cinderella, and has recorded scores of voiceovers for radio and TV commercials, radio dramas and PBS documentaries. She has appeared in both studio films, including Scent of a Woman, Seabiscuit, and The Human Stain, and independent shorts and features. Eileen is a member of Actor's Equity, Screen Actors Guild and AFTRA. She has taught acting to students of all ages across New York State as a teacher/artist with New York State Theater Institute, and collaborated with students on numerous original and scripted productions. Eileen studied at H B Studios and the School for Film and Television in NYC, Shakespeare and Company in Lenox, MA and holds an MA from SUNY Empire State College. e-mail: erschuyler@aol.com

**Ingrid Sonnichsen**

Ingrid Sonnichsen has been an actress for over thirty-five years, working on Broadway (Best Friend), Off-Broadway (Dylan, Measure for Measure) and in numerous regional theaters nationwide (the Guthrie, the Mark Taper Forum, Long Wharf, the Huntington, ART, the Charles, Ford’s Theater, etc.) She has appeared in national commercials, taught acting in Japan, directed in South Africa, and has been teaching acting at Carnegie Mellon for the last thirteen years. She taught previously at Northeastern University in Boston, Harvard, and Colby-Sawyer in New London, NH. In 1995, while teaching acting at Harvard she was awarded a Certificate for Distinction in Teaching by Harvard University. Ms. Sonnichsen co-authored two books: Buy This Book, It’s Deductible: A Guide to Performer’s Taxes and The Source, (a guide for theater professionals in the New England region – now in it’s 14th Edition.) She was a member of the Shear Madness companies in Boston and at the Kennedy Center for ten years. Locally she has appeared in The Credeaux Canvas at the City Theatre, and in Major Barbara, The Dead and Hedda Gabler for the Pittsburgh Irish and Classical Theatre, and The Crucible and Le Grand Meaulnes for Quantum Theater. Currently she is performing at the Pittsburgh Public Theatre as the Abbess in Comedy of Errors. She can also be seen with Gus, “the second most famous ground hog in Pennsylvania”, as a fortune teller reading his paw.

**Charles Steckler**

Scene Designer: Playboy of The Western World, Top Girls

Charles Steckler is a studio artist and theatrical designer. He has exhibited his work - drawings, prints, photographs, collages and dioramas - in numerous one-person and group exhibitions and he has designed stage sets for over 100 shows. He has been a Yaddo Fellow, an Associate at the Atlantic Center for the Arts, a Resident Artist at the Vermont Studio Center and a Prix de Rome Finalist. He received his B.A. from Queens College (NY) and his M.F.A. from Yale University where he studied with Donald Oenslager and Ming Cho Lee. In search of new ideas and images for his design and studio work Steckler has traveled to Mexico, Russia, Thailand, Nepal, Bali, Korea and frequently to Western Europe. In 2006, he had a 35-year retrospective exhibition in Union’s Mandeville Gallery.

**Candace Taylor**

Director: Flyin' West

Vocal Coach: Measure for Measure

Candace Taylor has performed with the Colorado Shakespeare Festival in Macbeth, Richard III, The Importance of Being Ernest, and Comedy of Errors. Other credits include Cleopatra in Antony and Cleopatra, Dallas Shakespeare Festival; Narrator/Mrs. Crachit in A Christmas Carol, Dallas Theatre Center; The Most Massive Woman Wins and The Love of Bullets, Public Theatre in New York City; and Much Ado About Nothing and Henry V, John Houseman’s Acting Company (New York). She has taught at Southern Methodist University, University of Delaware, SUNY/Albany and University of Colorado. M.F.A., Professional Theatre Training Program at the University of Delaware; B.S., Northwestern University.

**Beatrice Terry**

Director: Tartuffe

Beatrice is a director and playwright based in Manhattan. This summer she adapted and directed The Arabian Nights for The Actors Shakespeare Company in Long Island. Prior to that she directed Marivaux' Double Infidelity at The Pearl Theatre Off-Broadway. At the end of 2003, she was privileged to assist director David Jones on the acclaimed Broadway production of The Caretaker, with Patrick Stewart and Kyle MacLachlan. Other directing projects have included Art and Betrayal at Vermont Stage Company, My Father's Funeral and Accident at Ensemble Studio Theatre in New York, and A Perfect Analysis Given by a Parrot at HERE Arts Center in New York. In December she will travel to Sweden for a three-city tour of Lesbian Pulp-O-Rama!, a loving satire of the lesbian pulp fiction novels of the '50's and '60's, which she co-writes, co-directs and performs in. As a writer she has had productions and workshops at HERE, the Vital and New Georges in Manhattan. Beatrice is an affiliated member of New Georges in Manhattan, an alum of The Women's Project and Productions Directors Forum, and a 2002 recipient of The Drama League/Roundabout Directors Fellowship. Beatrice would like to thank everyone at U Albany for their hospitality and kindness. She sends a special shout out to the crew, designers and most especially the cast of Tartuffe, who have given their all with such grace, dedication and joy.

**Elizabeth Wong**

Director and Author: Letters To A Student Revolutionary

Elizabeth Wong has just been named 2007 recipient of the Tanne Foundation Award honoring poets, performance artists, and playwrights who significantly contribute to the American cultural landscape. Honolulu Theatre for Youth commissioned and produced the world premiere this Spring of Wong’s new musical for young audiences, “The Magical Bird,” about a bird that turns people into stone by pooping on them! Wong is a graduate of NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts, with an MFA in dramatic writing. Her award-winning play China Doll, about the sensual and glamorous life of America’s first Chinese-American movie star Anna May Wong, premiered Off-Broadway at the West End Theatre. Her other plays include: Letters to a Student Revolutionary, Kimchee & Chitlins, The Love Life of aEunuch, and Dating & Mating in Modern Times. Her work has been produced by Mixed Blood Theatre in Minneapolis, Denver Center Theatre for the Performing Arts, Omaha Magic Theatre, Orphan Girl Theatre, Cincinnati Playhouse In the Park, Honolulu Theatre For Youth, Actors Theatre of Louisville, to name a few. The Kennedy Center commissioned her to write an opera libretto from her adaptation of Oscar Wilde’s “The Happy Prince,” with Grammy Award-winning composer Michael Silversher. Wong was a Disney Writing Fellow, and writer on ABC’s ground-breaking sitcom with Margaret Cho, All-American Girl. She is also a recipient of a Yaddo fellowship, a UCROSS Foundation fellowship, and she was the inaugural 2005 writer-in-residence at the Ecole Cantonale d’art du Valais in Sierre, Switzerland. She is a member of PEN, Dramatist Guild, ASSITEJ, and the Writers Guild of America, West. Her website is www.elizabethwong.net