Share:
Justin Campbell is a Montclair State University alum and a New York native, as well as a professional actor, singer, dancer and choreographer. Originally from Staten Island (P.S. 44 and I.S.72 alum), Justin is now based in Brooklyn. He has performed throughout the US and internationally, appearing in shows such as The Little Mermaid and Sister Act the Musical (Arrow Rock Lyceum Theatre), Chicago (Theatre By the Sea), the reimagined works of Carmen and Semele (Opera Philadelphia) and the premiere of the hybrid opera We Shall Not Be Moved directed by Bill T. Jones. He recently appeared in Francesca Zambello's Carmen and Peter Kazaras' La Bohème (Kennedy Center) and Carmen at the Lyric Opera of Kansas City.
A former Muse of the NY-based company ALMANYC, Justin recently joined Sarah Berges Dance and Born Dancing, continuously working on city-based projects and works of his own, such as choreographing, teaching and even freelance illustration. As a performer, educator and visual designer, Justin strives to be a well-rounded artist through discipline, play and hard work, expressing his creative voice in many different art forms, hoping to close the gap and be a true storyteller. To learn more about Justin, visit justincampbellnyc.com.
Gamze Ceylan hails from Berlin, Germany. She was born into a Turkish family that immigrated to Germany in the 1970s. Gamze has moved from Berlin to Istanbul, where she attended middle and high school, then moved to London, UK, where she attended drama school. After a decade in London, Gamze found herself in New York, which she still calls home. She is a graduate of the William Esper Studio, under the tutelage of the late, great William Esper. Gamze has acted in the UK and US, and she recently moved into writing. Her first short film Ubermensch was completed in 2023 and is making the rounds on the film festival circuit. Gamze started her work as a teaching artist in 2018, with her own company Skip Theater in Istanbul, mostly with Syrian refugee children. She has been with TDF since 2021, first as an assistant teaching artist, and now leading residencies throughout NYC schools introducing students to theatre.
Neil Dawson is a Harlem-based, award-winning actor and master teaching artist originally from the Bronx who is equally passionate about both vocations. Favorite acting credits include The Mountaintop (Weston Playhouse), Parable of the Sower (LA tour), Stick Fly (Majestic Theater), The Blacks (Classic Stage Company), New Amsterdam and Law & Order, with national commercials, voice-overs and industrials in the mix. Neil educates young people in theatre throughout the NYC area and is currently a master teaching artist with the DreamYard Project, New Victory Theater and TDF. He finds joy in sharing his art with young people in his hometown. When he’s not teaching, auditioning or acting, he serves as a mentor to high school boys at the Eagle Academy for Young Men. He is a member of Actors’ Equity Association, the Screen Actors Guild, Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity, Inc. and holds an MFA in Acting from the University of Washington Professional Actor Training Program.
Carrie Ellman-Larsen (she/her) is a born and bred NYC theatre-maker and teaching artist. Carrie has been creating community and student-based theatrical work for almost two decades. As a teaching artist, she has worked with students and adults to create original theatre based on social issues that they care about. She also works in classrooms using theatre as a tool for language acquisition of ELLs, community building, connecting to literacy and social studies curriculum, and developing life skills with students with disabilities. She works for arts, theatre and community-based organizations including the Roundabout Theatre Company, TDF, ArtsConnection and Strike Anywhere. She has also worked for the People's Theatre Project, Marquis Studios, Girls Leadership Institute, the Museum of the City of New York and others. Carrie served as the arts education consultant for the Grand Pistachio, a theatre company that uses puppetry and masks to create shows for young audiences in NYC and nationally. Carrie recently joined Keen Company, an Obie- and Drama Desk Award-winning Off-Broadway theatre company as its Education Director. Carrie created and produced The Staten Island Dialogue Project, a documentary theatre piece in which she interviewed Staten Island residents about the life experiences that influence their vote. She is a recent recipient of the DCLA Premiere Arts Grant from Staten Island Arts for Buried Stories: An Oral History Project about the Fresh Kills Landfill. Carrie can acts and directs with local theatre companies such as Ghostlight Players and the Staten Island Shakespeare Company. Education: MA in Applied Theatre, CUNY SPS and BA in Drama, NYU. carrieellmanlarsen.com
Irisdelia Garcia is a Nuyorican interdisciplinary practitioner and educator exploring the body as archive, theatre as ritual and intergenerational storytelling. She explores gender politics and the idea of becoming while interrogating embodied (de)coloniality using interview based-theatre, devising and movement-centered practice. Garcia is currently investigating "conjuring" and memory's mutation in performance. Holding a BA in English (summa) from Amherst College with a Digital Humanities concentration and a Multicultural Theatre Practice Certificate, Garcia is pursuing an MFA in Contemporary Theatre and Performance at The New School minoring in Creative Community Development.
Danny Gomez is a Colombian-American artist from Queens, New York, and a LaGuardia alumnus, dedicated to developing works that spotlight the Latine experience. A Unit 52 member at Intar Theatre, he debuted Off-Broadway in 2023 in Jose Rivera’s Sonnets For An Old Century. He is a versatile comedian, singer, dancer, writer and graduate of the Meisner Technique program at the Neighborhood Playhouse. Select theatre credits include How to Feel Without Touching (Eros) at Chain Theatre; Coyote Oughta Eat That Salesman (Coyote) at Under St Marks; Pansy Craze (Manuel) at Jamaica Center For Arts & Learning; A Boy Called Lobo (Lobo) at Intar Theatre; The Climate Fables: Ogallala (Antonio Ramirez) at Under St. Marks; But Soft (Jesse) at The Barrow Group; Extraordinary Aliens (David/Voice) at the Tank; Bodies & Beds (Dakota) at the Drama League, Sonnets For An Old Century (Ghosts of the Highway) at Intar Theatre; Masked: The Musical (Alejandro) at Theater 71. Film/TV credits include In Good Company, Invisible People, POKENO and The Shot. As an arts educator with Park Avenue Armory, TDF and The Met, he enriches NYC public schools by blending creativity with academic learning, celebrating diverse cultures and pioneering new art experiences. @dannygomezz
Nancy Katheryn Gomez is a Colombian-American actor/arts educator based in Queens, New York. She aims to create art for systemic change and seeks to generate narratives to represent marginalized groups through storytelling. She has appeared in staged productions including Significant Other, Arsenic and Old Lace and Dreams/Nightmares. Her film credits include More Than a Woman and Where Do You Draw the Line. Nancy co-directed the show Women/Mujer, celebrating stories by Black and Latinx women. She trained in theatre at Talent Unlimited High School, Baruch College, is currently studying the Meisner Technique at the Neighborhood Playhouse and is a Unit 52 member of INTAR Theatre. She is an arts educator at the Park Avenue Armory, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, TDF and CUNY Creative Arts Team.
Gianfranco Lentini (he/him) is a NYC-based queer playwright, teacher and first generation Italian American. Gianfranco's work has been developed and produced across New York, New Jersey, North Carolina, Texas and Toronto. His work has also been published by Fire Island Tea, Apricity Magazine, The Coachella Review, Mini Plays Review and Molecule Literary Magazine. He is currently an Adjunct Professor at NYU for Tisch Drama's New Studio on Broadway and a Wendy Wasserstein Project mentor for TDF. He is also a proud member of the Dramatists Guild of America. Learn more at heygianfranco.com and on Instagram at @HeyGianfranco.
Taryn Matusik is a theatre and visual arts teaching artist, museum educator and education consultant with more that 20 years of experience in arts and educational institutions at home and abroad. She engages learners of all ages and abilities in experiences with theatre and visual arts in museums, classrooms and virtual spaces. As a staff developer for Morningside Center for Teaching Social Responsibility, Taryn coaches school administrators, counselors and educational staff in their fostering of greater well-being within schools through the development of their own skills and knowledge around restorative practice, social-emotional learning and intersectional equity. Taryn has taught courses and workshops at higher education institutions including Columbia University, City College and NYU. Her work as an artist spans the realms of theatre and the visual arts, with particular focus puppetry and the fiber arts. Her embroidered sampler project “Lessons in Thread; Unstitched” was awarded NYSCA grant support. As an avid backyard farmer, Taryn grows food to eat, preserve and share, and serves as a caretaker to her egg-laying friends Haricot, Aubergine and Courgette.
Raphael Peacock is an award-winning actor. Peacock also works as a teaching artist, director and fight choreographer. Selected acting work: Film/TV-Proud, Brother to Brother, Everything’s Jake, The Last Step, The Courtroom, Showtime’s City on the Hill, Blue Bloods. Selected theatre: New York Theatre Workshop, Barrow Group, Classic Stage Company, Arden Theater, MCC Theater Company, Huntington Theater, Utah Shakespeare Festival, Milwaukee Rep, Virginia Stage, Kansas City Rep, Shakespeare Theater of New Jersey and Weston Playhouse. Selected teaching artist work: The Kennedy Center, Atlantic Theater Company, TDF, Bank Street College, Brooklyn College, Hunter College. Lincoln Center Theater's Learning English and Drama, High School and Shakespeare Programs. Juilliard K-12 programs and initiatives. Cultural exchanges through the US State Department in England, Jamaica, Barbados, St. Vincent and the Grenadines. Training: London Shakespeare Studio and the MFA Program at American Conservatory Theater.
Crystal Skillman is an internationally award-winning playwright, fictional podcast writer and comic book author. She has written for Stories Podcast (Wondery Kids), Girl Tales, Adventure Time comics, and Marvel comics. New Plays include The Rocket Men and Rain and Zoe Save the World. She is the author of the New York Times' Critic's Pick plays Open, Geek, Cut and King Kirby, which you can listen to on Broadway Podcast Network. She currently teaches writing at CoPA at The New School and the History of Television at Pace University. She is passionate about teaching playwriting to young playwrights and teaches for educational programs for teens with TDF, The Alley Theatre and the Dramatists Guild Institute. crystalskillman.com
Lisa Strum is an actor, director and playwright. Acting credits include Dream, Girl! at the Apollo Theatre, Death of a Salesman on Broadway, and King Lear and The Sound of Music at the Utah Shakespeare Festival. Directing credits include Fall at Ensemble Studio Theatre, Torn Asunder at Luna Stage and A Raisin in the Sun at Bristol Riverside Theatre. Awards: Young Howze Theatre Award for “Mind Blowing Shortie” of the Year for her play By the Way...; finalist for the Doric Wilson Independent Playwright Award; recipient of the Djerassi Resident Artists Program; nominated for a Best Actress New York Innovative Theatre Award; Received a United Solo Festival Best Solo Show Award for her play She Gon’ Learn; Broadway World Best Actress Award for Fences.
Eric "Wally" Wallach has directed, choreographed, written, produced and performed in new musicals and original happenings primarily in New York City since 1995. Shows include Suc Daddy: an urban operetta (Culture Project, 1997); The Jack of Tarts: a bittersweet musical (La MaMa E.T.C. 2007), The Breasts of Tiresias: A Surrealist Musical (Knitting Factory, 1996 & La Reine Blanche, Paris, 2010) and Radical Jew, 33, his public crucifixion in Astor Place protesting the Iraq War (2005). Since 2010, Captain Wally, aboard his Spaceship Kaleidoscope, offers FLIGHT18, Earthbound space travel for all. Wally is also co-director of Brooklyn Arts for Kids and a popular teaching artist with TDF. He brings his own approach to theatre collaboration to students of all ages throughout New York City and beyond. Wally has a BA in Theatre from San Diego State University where he honed his multi-arts exploration of theatre. Wally is a torchbearer of the artists he has had the honor of working with, such as Jack O’Brien, Edward Albee, Robert Wilson, Joseph Chaikin and Penny Arcade. His writing is included in the Bridge Journal and The Brooklyn Rail, along with his own creative nonfiction THE AUDIENCE MAKES THE SHOW & other insights, prose, and plays and the forthcoming MAKE THEATRE NOW: A Playbook for Teachers. He is a longtime member of SAG-AFTRA and a founding member of the Lower East Side Biography Project. Finally, he is a proud Girl Dad and avid BikeDancer. For a collection of his work, please visit ebwally.com.
Tickets