EnTrance Theatre Talk

As Uno, a child with autism, faces the challenge of competing in his school's math competition, his friends with varying disabilities - ADHD, visual, hearing and physical impairment - rally in support. Through puppets and soaring music, Addy & Uno is a heartfelt and hilarious journey celebrating hope, big dreams, and the beauty of differences. https://www.addyanduno.com

Kirsten Wyatt is an award winning actress hailing from Clarksburg, WV. Her Broadway credits include Annie (Lily St. Regis), A Christmas Story the Musical (Crusty Elf/Mrs. Schwartz), Elf (Santa's Elf), Shrek (Shoemaker's Elf), Grease (Frenchy, 2007 revival), High Fidelity (Anna), The Pajama Game (Poopsie), Urinetown (Little Becky Two Shoes) and You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown (Lucy/Sally standby). Favorite regional roles include Agnes Gooch in Mame at the Goodspeed Opera House for which she won a Connecticut Critics Circle Award, Ellie Mae Chipley in the San Francisco Opera production of Show Boat, Charity in Sweet Charity, Annie in The Play That Goes Wrong and Miss Adelaide in Guys and Dolls. Kirsten's TV credits include Blue Bloods, Naked Brothers Band, As the World Turns and All My Children. Kirsten has her own coaching studio and is on staff at Lindsay Mendez and Ryan Scott Oliver’s Actor Therapy. She is a proud graduate of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music and is the creator and host of the web series Broadway Nosh. www.kirstenwyatt.net

Prospect Theater Company is dedicated to a bright future for the American musical. We develop and produce new works, envisioned and implemented by emerging artists. Our artists work in diverse genres and styles but share an interest in re-inventing the art form of musical theater for the 21st Century.

Annie has been seen on Broadway in Top Girls, Parade, Blood Brothers and Miss Saigon as well as in the National Tour of Les Misérables as Fantine. Off-Broadway and regionally she's performed at Manhattan Theatre Club, Second Stage, Playwrights Horizons, Ensemble Studio Theatre, NY Stage and Film, Williamstown Theatre Festival, McCarter Theatre, Baltimore Center Stage, The Huntington, The Eugene O’Neill Theatre Festival, Sundance Theatre Lab, Great Lakes Theatre Festival, Cleveland Playhouse, Northern Stage and others. She is the recipient of Back Stage West/Drama Logue and Garland Awards for her performance as Catherine Sloper in The Heiress (Berkeley Rep) and the New Hampshire Theatre Award for Best Actress in a Musical for her performance as the titular role in The Drowsy Chaperone. TV and film include “Seagull”, “Law & Order”, “Kidnapped”, “Gossip Girl” and the award winning “Albert Schweitzer: Called to Africa.” Recent performances include Shakespeare's Falstaff in The Death of Kings, Rose in Gypsy, Donna in Mamma Mia, and Emma in Stupid F*ing Bird (Santa Barbara Independent Award for "Outstanding Actor".) Her autobiographical play "A" TRAIN was awarded "Best Production" at the United Solo Festival in 2017, “Best Encore” there in 2018 and a Santa Barbara Independent Award in 2019. It has also been performed at The Los Angeles Skirball Center and at Playmakers Rep in NC. Annie is a Professor in the Dept. of Theater and Dance at UCSB. She is a graduate of Princeton University and The Juilliard School.

CO/LAB Theater Group is a non-profit organization dedicated to providing Creative Opportunities without Limits And Boundaries. CO/LAB offers individuals with developmental disabilities a creative and social outlet through theater arts.

Renee Harrison is a NYC based actor and founder of the online community, Black Girls Do Theater. She holds a BFA from The New School for Drama and is currently a member of The Bats, The Flea Theater’s resident acting company. Her most recent production was the world premiere of Mac Wellman’s “The Invention of Tragedy” at The Flea Theater. Black Girls Do Theater is a project of passion and a love letter to Black women, Black arts, Black theater, and those who define themselves as creators in each of those three realms. We are a curation of culture and resources for Black woman-identifying theater artists. We archive, we share, we support, and rally for the presence of Black voices, bodies, and hearts in the theater.

A multi-tasker extraordinaire and self-admitted workaholic, Kimberly Faye Greenberg is the first and only actor to play leading roles in two Off-Broadway musicals at the same time. In addition, Kimberly’s numerous portrayals of a Fanny Brice (4 shows/2 CDs) have been critically acclaimed by the New York Times, Huffington Post, and Associated Press. Kimberly has worked backstage as a Broadway wardrobe swing dresser on over 20 Broadway shows, including “Mean Girls,” “Something Rotten,” and “The Lion King.” As a performing arts consultant, Kimberly loves to inspire, educate and work with proactive artists to help conquer the New York market and as an all around go-to Broadway expert, Kimberly’s interviews, articles, and Broadway content has been featured and gone viral across a variety of news outlets. Kimberly loves to encourage all wanting to work in the performing arts community to embrace their own uniqueness, find his/her own niche and follow your own path and passion whether its onstage, behind-the-scenes or a mix of everything. www.kimberlyfayegreenberg.com www.fabulousfannybriceshow.com www.broadwayblogspot.com http://www.thebroadwayexpert.com/ https://www.instagram.com/kfgreenberg/ https://www.facebook.com/kimfaygreenberg/ https://twitter.com/kimfaygreenberg

Marissa Hecker is an actor, singer, dancer, cartoonist, writer, and master or runon sentences raised in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. She is a recent graduate of the University of Cincinnati, College-Conservatory of Music in musical theatre. After graduation she signed with The Price Group and soon booked the role of female swing in the national tour of SPAMILTON: An American Parody.

Rick Plaugher holds a BFA in acting from Boston University and a masters degree in educational theatre from City College, New York City. Rick has performed at The Groundlings Theater in Los Angeles, Upright Citizens Brigade, and the Peoples.Improv.Theatre. in New York. As a member of Blue Man Group, Rick held several backstage positions at the Astor Place Theater in New York before later going on to perform onstage as a Blue Man for over three years in New York, Boston, and Chicago. As an actor, Rick has performed at HERE, Manhattan Rep, the Huntington Theater, Boston Center for the Arts, The Gallery Players, ATA, Theater for the New City, and the New Perspectives Theater, among other venues. As a voiceover artist, Rick can be heard on several ESL tapes for MacMillan Books and in the Boston Children’s Museum. Rick is currently in his tenth year as the head child wrangler for Disney’s The Lion King on Broadway, rehearsing and “wrangling” the cubs backstage. He’s also a teaching artist, formerly of The Shakespeare Society, Lincoln Center Institute, Wingspan Arts, and Laguardia High School in New York City. Rick has completed three full marathons and over a dozen half-marathons.

DEBRA BARSHA won the Jonathan Larson Performing Arts Award for the score to Radiant Baby, (Public Theater) directed by George C. Wolfe. Composer credits: Songs From an Unmade Bed (NYTW), Sophie (JRT), NBC’s Policewoman Centerfold soundtrack, and her two one-woman shows Go to Your and A Womb With a View (CAP21/Cherry Lane Theatre). Barsha originated roles and was the music director for the original Off-Broadway companies of both Tony n’ Tina’s Wedding and Charles Busch’s Swingtime Canteen. She also served as music director for the Steven Sater/Serj Tankian musical Prometheus Bound (ART - dir. Diane Paulus). Her songs have been recorded by: George Clinton, Jackie Mason, Marty Balin, and Rebecca Luker. She conducted Karen O’s psycho opera Stop the Virgens !at St. Ann’s Warehouse and at the Sydney Opera House. Barsha wrote the vocal arrangement for the Yeah Yeah Yeah’s single Sacrilege, and Awolnation’s single I Am. She also arranged the vocals for Orange Is the New Black star Lea DeLaria's David Bowie tribute album, House of David. Her new musical A Taste of Things To Come (book, music and lyrics with Hollye Levin) ran at the Broadway Playhouse (Chicago) and off-Broadway at the York Theatre (dir. Lorin Latarro), and was recently published by Samuel French. Debra was the associate conductor for Broadway’s Tony Award winning musical Jersey Boys. This past year she served as associate conductor for the Broadway show Summer: The Donna Summer Musical. http://www.debrabarsha.com

On the road chatting with Marybeth Clark about Charleston Stage.

On the road chatting with Jessica Reese about Actors Theatre of Louisville

On the road chatting with Dan Knechtges about Theatre Under The Stars

On the Road chatting with Keith Cromwell about Red Mountain Theatre Company

EnTrance is one year old! Join past guests, Kirsten, Jenna and Jeremy as we celebrate the first year of EnTrance.

Artistic Director Dan Knechtges, Associate Artistic Director Megan Larch Dominick, and Actress Chryssie Whitehead geek out with Kirsten on a deep dive into A Chorus Line.

Aaron Kubey was the first Deaf and youngest Executive Director/President of the National Theatre of the Deaf. He had the opportunity of working on numerous television, film, theatrical productions, and concerts during his professional career. He regularly works as a Director of Artistic Sign Language (DASL) in the Washington, DC Metro area. He has most recently DASL’d Dear Evan Hansen, Falsettos, and Miss Saigon at the Kennedy Center, and 12 Angry Men and Into the Woods at Ford’s Theatre. He currently works as a Certified Deaf Interpreter (CDI) and Public Affairs Specialist for the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). Mr. Kubey is a 1994 graduate of the Model Secondary School for the Deaf (MSSD) at Gallaudet University in Washington, D.C. In 2006, he earned his Bachelor of Fine Arts (B.F.A) degree in Theatre Studies from the Theatre School, DePaul University in Chicago, Illinois, making him the first Deaf graduate from this prestigious institution. He is a Chicago native, and a diehard Cubbies fan who is thrilled they won a World Series in his lifetime and believes they win it all again and again!

Carolyn McCormick was born in Midland, Texas and grew up in Houston where she went to The Kinkaid School. Upon graduating she went to Williams College where she majored in theatre and graduated with honors after directing and translating Jean Paul Sartre’s No Exit for her senior thesis. For the next four years she lived in San Francisco getting her masters degree in acting at the American Conservatory Theatre. After two years as a student she joined the main stage acting company. Her first break in film was playing Jimmy Stewart’s daughter in The Late Christoper Beane but sadly the film was shelved after Carol Burnett backed out of the film for medical reasons. Her next break was a film in Germany with Dennis Quaid and Lou Gosset JR. directed by Wolfgang Peterson, Enemy Mine. After that she joined the cast of Spenser for Hire in Boston with Robert Urich. When that show ended she hit the road with her soon to be husband Byron Jennings working all over the country doing plays across the country from the Denver Center to Baltimore’s Center Stage, Seattle Rep, The Old Globe in San Diego and Yale in New Haven, before settling down in New York city to start her family. In the early 90’s she began working on Law and Order as the shrink Dr. Olivet and has played that role in every spinoff of that show over the past few decades. During that period she has relocated to LA a few times for various projects including the TV series Cracker and a TNT original film called You Know My Name with Sam Elliot, as well as Minuet Riker on Star Trek the Next Generation. Most of her time is spent in New York City and when she is not working in film and television she is performing in theatre on and off broadway and has an active voice over career doing myriad political spots, Ken Burns documentaries and audio books, including the Hunger Games series.

Rosie’s Theater Kids (RTKids) is an arts education organization dedicated to enriching the lives of children through the arts. They serve students who otherwise would not have the opportunity to experience theater, positively changing the trajectory of their lives by providing comprehensive classes in music, dance, and drama; thoughtful mentoring; and structured academic guidance.

With twenty-five plus years in the industry, Sydney has worked in various capacities including costume designer, costumer, senior manager, mentor, teacher, production manager and wardrobe supervisor. Sydney has experience working abroad and domestically in theaters and theme parks, for resorts and corporate events, with national tours, and on film locations. Designing and fabricating themed and theatrical costumes and developing large-scale puppets and animated character costumes with design teams and vendor partners has been a primary focus. As a senior leader in entertainment, Sydney has overseen costume design, production and operational teams- mentoring, hiring, and training. Whether managing a design and fabrication team of thirty, overseeing an operating team of a hundred and thirty, teaching students in a classroom, or partnering one-on-one with a colleague, Sydney has enjoyed all aspects of entertainment costuming. https://www.sydbacenas.com