Ginna Hoben is an actor/director/playwright based in Queens, New York. Her specialty in solo performance covers the writing, acting, directing, and consulting of one-person plays. She premiered her solo play The Twelve Dates of Christmas (Playscripts, Inc.) at American Shakespeare Center in 2010. The play has since enjoyed over one hundred productions nationally and worldwide. Her critically acclaimed solo play No Spring Chicken premiered in D.C.’s 2015 inaugural Women’s Voices Theatre Festival, and will be produced next month by Endstation Theatre Company in Lynchburg. Above Ground, her most recent solo play, has been developed as part of The Dramatist’s Guild’s Friday Night Footlights, Forestburgh Playhouse’s New Works Festival, a benefit performance at The Green Room in Staunton, VA, and its first fully staged production with City Gate Productions in NY.

Other produced plays include the four-female holiday comedy, Decked! (Theatre B in Fargo, ND); pierced! (New York and Edinburgh Fringe Festivals); the wind-chill factor (The Actors Theatre of Louisville); and the short plays: telephone (ATL); Spit Spat Splendor Spite (from “Shakespeare in Mind,” Dramatic Publishing); and A Song of Good Life (Vermont Shakespeare Company.)

Previously a writer/post-producer for Food Network’s Hungry Games and National Geographic’s Emmy-nominated Brain Games, Ginna also writes and voices for the children’s podcast Who Smarted? www.ginnahoben.com. IG: @ginnabeans.

Heidi Winters Vogel is a director, improv. storytelling performer and Theater faculty at Wabash College in Indiana. Recent productions include: As You Like It, Where is Our Beloved Community (devised), ANON, and The Pitman Painters. Virtual productions: international collaboration of The Romeo and Juliet Project, director (Organizational Theatre), The Race, director (Wabash College), Everybody Be Nice (reading with playwright Julia Lukshina and translator Anne Fisher), CLUE, director (Crossroads Repertory Theatre) and performer of Playback Theatre for global audiences. Heidi has also directed professionally for Pennsylvania Shakespeare Festival, Next Stage, Avalon Theatre Company and Unreal City, among others.

Sarah Levine McClelland is an actor and acting coach who has performed Off-Broadway, in Great Britain, and regionally throughout the United States. Favorite roles include Artemisia Gentileschi in Artemisia’s Intent here at SMS, Celia in As You Like It (Valley Shakespeare Festival, CT), Lady Percy in Wars and Whores: The Henry IV Musical (Philly Fringe), Alison in Fun Home (4th Wall Theatre, NJ), Little Red Riding Hood in Into The Woods (Roxy Regional Theatre, TN), and Mina Harker in Dracula (The Old Rep, Birmingham). Originally from New York, she holds a BA in theatre from Sarah Lawrence College and also completed the conservatory program at The Atlantic Acting School. She earned her MA with distinction from The Royal Birmingham Conservatoire in the UK where she had the privilege of working with Cicely Berry of the Royal Shakespeare Company, and on the stage of Shakespeare’s Globe. Locally, she’s worked as a director and/or teaching artist with Mary Baldwin University and Bridgewater College, serves as the executive director of Eunoia Theatre and as an artistic associate at Silk Moth Stage. She makes her home in the Shenandoah Valley with her husband and their rescue pup, Henry.

David Vogel earned his B.A. in theatre arts from the University of Minnesota and his M.F.A. in theatre production from Penn State University. He has been teaching theatre design and production (scenery, lighting, & technical direction) for thirty years, most recently at Wabash College in Indiana. Professional credits beyond Silk Moth include the Shakespeare Festival of St. Louis, the St. Louis Ballet, and the Phoenix Theatre Cultural Centre in Indianapolis. Recent designs include scenery for Artemesia’s Intent in 2024 on the Silk Moth Stage and, at Wabash College this season, Lenin’s Embalmers and 
Windswept Beaches, a devised setting of Owen Booth’s epic poem. From designing to engineering and building, David’s career seeks to make use of all that theatre has to offer to audiences and communities alike.

Lesley Larsen is the Artistic Director of the Historic Wayne Theatre.  Lesley holds a BFA in Acting from Brigham Young University as well as an Masters of Literature (MLITT) and MFA in Shakespeare and Renaissance Literature in Performance (ACTING) from Mary Baldwin University/The American Shakespeare Center. On the Teaching Artist roster for the Virginia Commission for the Arts,  Lesley has been working professionally in the theatre for more than 20 years as a director, actor, improv comedian, and voice actor. A collaborator and advocate for consent-based theatre, Lesley is fiercely committed to filling the rehearsal room and stage with elevated, vulnerable, playful work.  Lesley is the founder of the Improvisators: a Teen-Improv troupe specializing in long-form improv.  Serving on the Virginia Theatre Association (VTA) Board, Lesley is the Co-Chair of Community Theatre.  Alongside her colleague, Corey Holmes, Lesley has created Professional Development for educators on the topics of: “Improv to Improve Classroom Culture for the Gen Ed Space.” Lesley and her colleagues were presenters for the 2024 National Conference for the League of Historic American Theatres (LHAT) on “Mindful Collaboration for the Non-Profit Theatre.” Lesley has taught acting and theatre at James Madison University, Mary Baldwin University, and Washington & Lee University.

Favorite companies she has performed with include the American Shakespeare Center (Blackfriars Playhouse), redumbrella, and the Actor’s Repertory Theatre Ensemble (ARTE) .  Lesley’s selected directing credits include The Tempest (Southern Virginia University), You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown (Washington and Lee University), Into the Woods (FAIR), and The History Boys (540). Wayne Theatre Directing Credits include: Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat (Wayne at Wintergreen), Nickelodeon the SpongeBob Musical, Something Rotten, Deep Into the Darkness: An Adaptation of Poe’s Works (adapted by Lesley Larsen & Whitney Larsen),  Deathtrap, The Wizard of Oz, A Christmas Story, the Musical, The Importance of Being Earnest: Boy Band Edition, Little Shop of Horrors, Disney’s The Little Mermaid, Elf the Musical, Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice adapted by Melissa Leilani Larson, as well as various children’s productions. Lesley is currently directing Singin’ in the Rain and Children of Eden for the Wayne Theatre.

Dr. Angelica Perez-Johnston (she/ella) serves as the Associate Dean for Engagement & Belonging at Carnegie Mellon University College of Fine Arts. With more than a decade of work centered on intentional support of marginalized communities through a lens of equity and shared knowledge creation, she was drawn to the work of Mental Health Coordination to work towards creation of theater spaces that prioritize the wellbeing of cast, crew and guests. Dr. APJ earned her Bachelor’s in Psychology and Master’s in Mental Health from Edinboro University and her Doctorate in Public Administration from West Chester University. She is a certified clinical Trauma specialist and working towards completion of her certification for mental health coordination. Honoring her many identities, she approaches the work of equity, well being and belonging utilizing shared learning and her clinical experience and education to find the “entry points” to conversations and create spaces of engagement and welcoming.

Ysa (pronounced ee-suh) is a Charlottesville-based folk/indie artist. 

The Hot Mamas are a Punkalacchian eclectic collective of femme multi-instrumentalist singer-songwriters. Like a junkyard bathtub full of homemade instruments on sparkly pink roller skates, The Hot Mamas combine grit, humor, harmonies and sass as their vehicle taking audiences on madcap adventures. Their writing styles range from jazzy to pop, from funky punk to murder ballads, soulful blues to drinkin’-when-you’re-sad country tunes. The Hot Mamas are quirky, fun, profound and sincere and not to be missed!