kanmp NYC

	Executive Producer/Creator - Joe Loera is an actor, dancer, and choreographer for TV, film and stage, and has been an active member of SAG and AFTRA for twelve years. He has worked with Director/Choreographers such as Rob Marshall, Wayne Cilento, Fatima Robinson, Adam Shankman, Rob Iscove, Otis Salid. Joe has traveled the world, perform in award shows, TV spots, commercials with Artists such as Will Smith, Jessica Simpson, Enrique Iglesias, Bette Midler, Bebe Neuwirth to name a few. He was a series regular on The Wayne Brady Variety Show. He has been teaching on LA Dance Magic, one of the top dance conventions in the nation, for seven years. Joe recently started 2inspire Prod. LLC with projects in production that include Soul Escape, a dance documentary.
	Director - Jen Bender is the Assistant Director of Avenue Q (2004 Tony Award, Best Musical) and the upcoming Broadway revival of Steel Magnolias. Directing credits include Like You Like It (Beckett Theatre), a reading of Jeff Whitty's Suicide Weather starring Debra Monk, Disfigured (American Theatre of Actors), Lives of Cells (Looking Glass Theatre) and numerous shows at Makor, The Knitting Factory, Birdland, and Ars Nova. Other recent projects: Sweet Smell of Success (Broadway), Kander and Ebb's The Visit (Goodman Theatre), Carousel (Carnegie Hall), and No Strings (City Center Encores). Jen is a co-founder of the New Voices Collective and a founding producer of the New York Musical Theatre Festival (www.nymf.org). She is a graduate of Northwestern University and president of the Northwestern University Entertainment Alliance.
	Director - Kate Marks’ plays Flyers and Other Tales is currently being produced in the Midtown International Festival. Converting Numbers and Flyers were produced in The Looking Glass Theatre Forum. She also participated in the Untitled Theatre Company's 24-7 playwriting festival where her play The Patriots: a protest play was produced after being written the night before. She was commissioned to write and direct a bilingual adaptation of The Odyssey for The Baracke Theatre in Germany. Other directing credits include The Fall, and Jack! at The Looking Glass Theatre; Nothing of Origins for Studio 42 at Urban Stages; Reproduction at The Riant Theatre; Faith at The Broadway Institute; In the Bedroom of Toots and Company at Makor, Selected Poems at The Messenger Theatre Company, Romeo and Juliet, Lola and the Planet of Glorious Diversity, Decent, and Bumping Umbrellas at The Looking Glass Theatre. Kate Marks has also written and directed for the 52nd Street Project and interned at New Dramatists. She is a graduate of Brown University where she received honors in playwriting.
	Vocal Coach - Richard Lissemore (www.richardlissemore.com) is an international recognized voice teacher, coach and pedagogue who specializes in vocal technique and performance for musical theater and pop music. His myriad of students perform on Broadway, New York's Radio City Music Hall, in both American and International touring productions and in theaters throughout the world. He has worked extensively with recording artist from many of top record companies in the United States. In addition, he has taught on the faculties of CAP 21, the musical theater conservatory of New York University, the American Musical and Dramatic Academy in NY, at Rutgers University and at Musical Theater International, an opera training program headed by famed Metropolitan Opera basso Jerome Hines. Richard is especially well known for his innovative and entertaining master classes in musical theater vocal technique and performance.
	Musical Director - Robert Grusecki is a musical director, pianist, composer, and recording artist. He has played keyboards for the Broadway productions Grand Hotel and The Madwoman of Central Park West and has served as conductor Off-Broadway for Manhattan Theatre Club, Musical Theater Works, and Soho Rep. As a composer, two of his musicals written with collaborator Anya Turner have delighted NYC audiences: Greetings from Yorkville produced this summer by the Woodstock Fringe; and After All presented by the York Theatre Company. More information about his two CD recordings and a recently published songbook is available at www.anyarobertmusic.com.
	Choreographer - Joey Dowling’s theatre credits include, the National Tour of A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum playing Vibrata, GiGi, Soul Possessed, No Strings, the Broadway show Dance of the Vampires w/ Michael Crawford, Mambo Kings and ‘Sweet Charity’ with Christina Applegate. After attending NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts, Joey toured w/ Mariah Carey on her Butterfly World Tour. She has performed on the VH1 Vogue Fashion Awards w/ Macy Gray, the MTV Music Awards w/ Jennifer Lopez, and went to the Cannes Film Festival performing w/ Nicole Kidman for the movie Moulin Rouge. She’s appeared on Sex & the City, Cedric the Entertainer, and was a featured dancer in the movie Chicago. Joey has juggled performing and choreographing all over the country, teaching people the secrets to being a working dancer.
	Choreographer - Jacki Ford graduated from the University of Utah ballet department with a performance/teaching emphasis. While still in Utah she to worked with such companies as Utah Ballet, Rocky Mountain Ballet, and Ballet West. Before coming to NYC she taught at the Broadway Dance Center-Tokyo. Since moving to New York, she has been in such shows as “Funny Girl”, “The Radio City Christmas Spectacular”, “Mack And Mabel” with Jerry Herman, and “Sinatra, His Voice, His World, His Way” with John Pizzarelli. Industrial/Television work includes: IBM, Q-Lube, Polaris, Intel, Tupperware, “As The World Turns,” and the 2004 Tony Awards, “One Night Only” with Hugh Jackman. She guest teaches at Broadway Dance Center and continues to travel around the country teaching master classes and choreographing.
	Acting Coach Film/TV - Sheila Gray trained and worked as an actress in theatre and film for many years in New York and Los Angeles. She began teaching creative writing and acting workshops eighteen years ago in public schools, shelters and hospitals. Based on the success of these classes, she opened her own studio in 1986, where she has taught ongoing scene and monologue, exercise and improvisation classes ever since. She leads intensive on-camera audition classes several times a year and has taught abroad in England, Spain and South America. In addition to her classes Sheila coaches privately and works on film and television sets. Although she is most frequently hired as an acting coach on set, she is also involved in script development and creative consulting with directors and writers. Sheila's credits include: "A Bronx Tale" (Dir. Robert De Niro); "Home Boy" (Dir. Michael Serenson); "Blank Check" (Disney Films); "Sammy The Bull" (ABC Movie of the Week); and, most recently, "The Transporter" (a Luc Besson production). Sheila has also worked recently as a creative consultant with Director Wayne Wang on "Maid in Manhattan.
	Acting Coach - Will Chase Broadway: Aida (Radames), The Full Monty (Jerry), Miss Saigon (Chris), Rent; National Tour: Miss Saigon (Chris) Regional Theater: A Little Princess (Captain Crewe, World Premiere), Assassins (Balladeer), …Black Patent Leather Shoes…(Jeff nom.), Mame, Electra, Son of Fire (Jeff nom.), Trask & Fenn (Jeff nom.); Film and Television: Shaft, Everyday People (HBO), Law and Order, Third Watch, Queens Supreme, Fling, All My Children, Guiding Light. Training: Oberlin Conservatory of Music (Percussion/Conducting).
	Acting 101, Monologue & Improv Comedy - Lori Chase was last seen on Broadway as Susan Hershey in Terrence McNally’s THE FULL MONTY. She was also in the International Production of MISS SAIGON starring Lea Salonga with husband, Will Chase, as well as one of the last and final tours of Broadway’s CATS as Bombalurina. She has performed in several regional productions, industrials, commercials, and voice-overs, having worked with people like Anne Reinking and Bill Cosby. One of the highlights of her career was when she was presented a Sarah Siddons Scholarship by Lucille Ball. Currently, Lori writes comedy for her stand-up act which she performs on the road and in New York City. As a comic, she hosted THE 8 O’CLOCK SHOW at Boston Comedy Club for a year, guest hosted THE EDGE on Fox-Charlotte, and emceed such Broadway benefits as Miss Saigon’s, “Beyond the Bikini.” Lori graduated from Northwestern University with a degree in theatre, and is one of the founders of the NU Entertainment Alliance in New York.
	Acting 101 - Greg Shamie’s NY credits include originating the role of Romeo in Joe Calarco’s critically acclaimed Shakespeare’s “R&J”, Six Available Men at HB Playwrights, The Unrepeatable Moment, Summer of the Swans, Down the Road, Julius Caesar, Tartuffe, The Cherry Orchard, and The Learned Ladies. Greg’s film/tv work includes Levity (by Ed Solomon), Bird in Hand (by Janet McAntyre), the hit indie feature Elephant Shoes (by Christos Sourligas, which recently won the audience award for best film at the Santa Fe Film Festival, Six Feet Under, Law & Order, as well as starring in an Orange Mobile campaign directed by Martin Scorsese.
	Shakspeare - MELISSA FRIEDMAN is a Founding Artist of Epic Theatre Center, an Off-Broadway theatre company where she is both the Education Director and a Company Actor. As part of Epic’s Off-Broadway seasons, she played Hannah in the NY premiere of Kate Fodor's award-winning play, Hannah and Martin, opposite David Strathairn. Other Epic acting credits include Time and the Conways, Little Eyolf, and the U.S. premiere of Habitat. Her many Shakespeare roles include Lady Mortimer in Henry IV (directed by Jack O’Brien with John Goodman as Falstaff and Richard Easton as King Henry), Beatrice in Much Ado About Nothing, and Rosaline in Love's Labour's Lost (with Richard Easton). Melissa’s directing credits include Romeo and Juliet, Antigone and Much Ado About Nothing. She is on summer faculty at the Shakespeare Sedona Institute and has been a Teaching Artist in the NYC Public Schools with many arts organizations in NYC including Brooklyn Academy of Music, Roundabout Theatre Company, and Theatre for a New Audience. She has also led workshops in Teaching Shakespeare at Lincoln Center and Brooklyn Academy of Music. Film/TV credits include the independent film, Santa Smokes, and the PBS series, An American Novel. She received a BA from Oberlin College and an MFA in acting from the Old Globe Theatre/University of San Diego.
	Mock Audition - Sara Schatz has been a casting director at Dave Clemmons Casting for 2 years during which time she has served as an associate casting director on such Broadway shows as Ring of Fire (Spring '06), The Boy From Oz (starring Hugh Jackman), Brooklyn, and Dracula. At DCC, she has cast national tours of Evita, Fiddler on the Roof, Crazy for You, and Fosse in addition to the Asian and European tours of West Side Story. As a performer Sara appeared in the National tour of RENT (Maureen).