The Steering Committee:

Jessica Bard has recently joined the Steering Committee, previously serving as the Production Coordinator for the Directors Lab West for six years.  She has lived and worked in Los Angeles as a Director, Stage Manager, Producer and Teaching Artist since 2001.  Jess has worked as a Directing Assistant with Gordon Davidson at the Mark Taper Forum (Stuff Happens), Warner Shook at the Mark Taper Forum (The Goat or Who is Sylvia?), Gordon Davidson at the Kirk Douglas Theatre (A Perfect Wedding), Tom Moore at the Ahmanson (The Royal Family), and Jennifer J. Yun at Playwright's Arena (Gumsimao).  Other directing projects: Pinup at EastWest Players, Red River Valley at Boston Court, [sic] for Project 601, interned on Baz Luhrmann's La Boheme, and co-produced and co-directed Dime, a Director's Festival.  She has worked extensively with The Virginia Avenue Project, an after-school arts mentoring program, as an artist and as the Production Coordinator.  At the Project she has taught acting classes, mentored kids in Playwriting classes, tutored, directed, produced, and stage-managed.   Last year she served as the Education Assistant for Center Theatre Group's Performing for Los Angeles Youth's (P.L.A.Y.) high school residency program, Speak to Me, at Lynwood High School. She is currently a Teaching Artist for Pasadena Playhouse's Allies in Art program and is a New Generations Docent. Before moving to Los Angeles Jess toured schools in the Mississippi Delta with a workshop entitled "Malcolm X's Assassin's Mock Trial," was the Director of a YMCA summer camp's theater program in Colorado, and served as an assistant Artist-in-Residence in Holyoke, MA.

Anne Cattaneo (Honorary Chair),is the dramaturg of Lincoln Center Theater and the creator and head of the Lincoln Center Theater Directors’ Lab. A three term past president of Literary Mangers and Dramaturgs of the Americas, she is the recipient of LMDA’s first Lessing Award for lifetime achievement of dramaturgy. She has worked widely as a dramaturg on classical plays with directors such as James Lapine, Robert Wilson, Adrian Hall, Robert Falls, Mark Lamos and JoAnne Akalaitis. As the director of the Playworks Program at the Phoenix Theater during the late 1970's, she commissioned and developed plays by Wendy Wasserstein (ISN'T IT ROMANTIC) Mustapha Matura (MEETINGS) and Christopher Durang (BEYOND THERAPY). For the Acting Company, she created two projects: ORCHARDS (published by Knopf and Broadway Play Publishing) which presented seven Chekhov stories adapted for the stage by Maria Irene Fornes, Spalding Gray, John Guare, David Mamet, Wendy Wasserstein, Michael Weller and Samm-Art Williams, and LOVE’S FIRE (published by William Morrow) responses to Shakespeare sonnets by Eric Bogosian, William Finn, John Guare, Tony Kushner, Marsha Norman, Ntozake Shange and Wendy Wasserstein. Her own translations of 20th Century German playwrights include Brecht's GALILEO (Goodman Theater 1986 starring Brian Dennehy) and Botho Strauss' BIG AND LITTLE (Phoenix production starring Barbara Barrie, published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux.) She is currently on the faculty at Juilliard.

Ernest Figueroa has been a dedicated director, producer, actor and playwright in theatre, film and television throughout the country. Figueroa serves as Producer at the newly opened Broad Stage, a 541-seat state-of-the-art presenting house located at the new of Santa Monica College Performing Arts Center. There he assists on the programming and coordinates production of the season that includes notable artists in the fields of opera, jazz, choral, chamber and orchestral music, theatre and dance. He was also recently appointed Artistic Director of The Group Rep at the Lonny Chapman Theatre in North Hollywood one of the oldest theatres in Los Angeles. Figueroa served as a Director and performer with the second longest running show in Los Angeles, the American Girl Revue from 2004-2006. He has served as the Associate Artistic Director for the Sacramento Theatre Company from 1996 – 1998 where he also served as casting director and literary manager. He directed several productions on the Main Stage, Second stage, and school tours including: A Christmas Carol!, Trashed!, Shakespeare’s Circus, Apparently Shakespeare, and The Search for Signs….. He also served as Associate Producer for Love Letters and the Great Performances Festival Rep. He worked as the national Education Director for Plays for Living, Inc. in New York City and worked twice on the professional staff of the Pasadena Playhouse. He currently works as a Director and Associate Producer with Bonnie Franklin’s outreach program, C.C.A.P. – Classic and Contemporary American Plays. With C.C.A.P. has directed staged-readings of All My Sons starring Ms. Franklin, A Touch of the Poet starring David Birney, Death of a Salesman starring Michael Gross, Toys in the Attic with Susan Clark and Broadway Bound with Harold Gould. In 2001, he was honored as a Drama League Fellow at the Roundabout Theatre serving as the Associate Director on Blue starring Phylicia Rashad, first working on the production at the Roundabout Theatre Company in New York, then working on the production at the Pasadena Playhouse, finally guiding the play onto the Arizona Theatre Company, Coconut Grove in Florida, and the Paper Mill Playhouse in New Jersey starring Leslie Uggams. He was a member director and presenter for the Lincoln Center Theater Directors Lab in New York in 1998 and 1999. He directed the New York premiere of Dos Corazones representing the Lincoln Center Theater Directors Lab Festival @ HERE in New York. From 2000 to the present he has served on the Steering Committee for the Directors Lab West in Los Angeles that now boasts over 300 alumni. His award winning productions include Oleanna at the Third Street Theatre and The Effect of Gamma Rays . . . at the Alternative Repertory Theatre. He has launched two active Improv companies , Loose Screws in Hawaii and Metro North Improv in Connecticut. Figueroa won the '96 W.A.V.E. award for his talk show Adelante! featuring Hispanic role models. He received his Masters of Fine Arts in Directing from the University of Hawaii at Manoa, and his Bachelor of Arts in Speech and Theatre Education from McPherson College in Kansas. Figueroa’s academic instruction experience has included teaching positions at Fairfield University Connecticut, University of Hawaii at Manoa, University of Alaska at Fairbanks, Citrus College and the Alliance for Drama Education in Hawaii. He is the creator of ImproVision a program offering public speaking techniques to business professionals. Figueroa spent five years as the Grants and Program Manager with the city of Pasadena leading the way on the bi-annual city-wide event called “ArtNight Pasadena” that grew in attendance from 4000 people to 14,000 people in less than five years. His professional training includes improvisation studies at the Groundlings School in Los Angeles and studies at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts. Figueroa is a Member of the Stage Directors and Choreographers Society.

Brendon Fox is a consultant and former Associate Producer for L.A. Theatre Works, directing and producing many acclaimed radio plays for NPR as well as numerous national tours with Ed Asner, John Heard, Hector Elizondo, and others. He has also worked as Associate Director at the Tony Award-winning Old Globe Theatre in San Diego for seven years where he directed AN INFINITE ACHE, SKY GIRLS, and MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING (with Billy Campbell and Dana Delany) among others. Regional directing credits include: OPUS, Playmakers Repertory Theatre; the L.A. premiere of THE LADY WITH ALL THE ANSWERS, Pasadena Playhouse; AS YOU LIKE IT, Weston Theatre Company; SIR PATIENT FANCY, The Julliard School and University of San Diego; TONIGHT AT 8:30, Antaeus Theatre Company; WHAT THE BUTLER SAW, Two River Theatre Company; THE PRINCESS AND THE BLACK EYED PEA, Ravinia Music Festival; ASSASSINS, University of Northern Colorado; RICHARD II, Writers Theatre Chicago; THE PAVILION, Merrimack Rep; A BRIGHT ROOM CALLED DAY (2006 San Diego Patte Award, Best Ensemble) and CLOUD 9, Diversionary Theatre. Mr. Fox has directed national tours of THE GREAT TENNESSEE MONKEY TRIAL (with Ed Asner), PRIVATE LIVES, and THE PRISONER OF SECOND AVENUE (with Hector Elizondo) with L.A. Theatre Works. Mr. Fox has taught and / or directed students at the University of North Carolina, University of Northern Colorado, The Old Globe/University of San Diego Professional Actor Training Program, the Academy of Classical Acting, the Alabama Shakespeare Festival professional actor training program, Warner Loughlin Studios, Antaeus Theatre Company, the Classical Theatre Lab, Theatricum Botanicum, and his own Shakespeare Gymnasium. He holds a BS in Performance Studies at Northwestern University and an MFA in Directing at UCLA. Reviews, pictures, and a more extensive bio can be found at his website at www.foxdirector.com

Kappy Kilburn served for four years as the Associate Director of Artistic Development at Pasadena Playhouse where she created and produced their new play development program “Hothouse at the Playhouse.” Director: Scarcity (Need Theatre – LA Times Critics Choice), Painting Churches (Group Rep), Psycho Beach Party (Chapman University), Safe (Circus Theatricals – LA Times Critics Choice), Shh! Art!, Work and Hindsight (Hothouse at the Playhouse), ABC’s Diversity Showcase, Three Hotels (Freemont Center Theatre),The Man Who Could See Through Time (Balcony Theatre at the Pasadena Playhouse), Watching War/Wanting Peace, Romancing Stereotypes (LATC), Fast and Furious at Sacred Fools, AMDA Showcase, Burn This (Corner Playhouse), All My Sons for Directors Lab West. Assistant Director: Mark Taper Forum: Frank Galatti (Homebody/Kabul by Tony Kushner, also at BAM), Gordon Davidson (The Talking Cure by Christopher Hampton), Lisa Petterson (Body of Bourne by John Belluso), Diane Rodriguez (The Lalo Project); Kirk Douglas Theatre: Scott Ellis (The Little Dog Laughed); Ahmanson: Sir Peter Hall (Romeo & Juliet), Lynne Meadow (Tale of the Allergists Wife and National Tour); Kansas City Rep’s Sherlock Holmes: The Final Adventure as Associate to David Ira Goldstein. She has worked with David Esbjornson on Broadway (Bobbi Boland) and Off Broadway (My Old Lady by Israel Horovitz). Producer: NEA’s Shakespeare in Los Angeles kick off event at MTF; All About Gordon Farewell Gala for Gordon Davidson; Stephen Sondheim’s 75th: The Concert at the Hollywood Bowl. Kappy was the Special Projects Coordinator for CTG’s Founding Artistic Director Gordon Davidson; the Company Manager for The World of Nick Adams celebrity staged reading benefiting Paul Newman’s Hole in the Wall Gang Camps at the Kodak Theatre; the Production Stage Manager for Relentless Theatre Company; Production Coordinator at GMU's Institute of the Arts; and Assistant to the Producing Director at Theatrical Outfit. She is a co-founder and Co-Producer for Directors Lab West, a spin off of Lincoln Center Theater’s Directors Lab in NY of which she is an alumna (DLW just celebrated its 10th anniversary.) Kappy is a graduate of the University of Missouri-Columbia, proud Kappa Kappa Gamma and Associate Member of SDC.