Smart People

LYDIA R. DIAMOND

Playwright

LYDIA R. DIAMOND (Playwright) is a 2013/14 Arena Stage resident playwright. Award-winning plays include Smart People, Stick Fly, Voyeurs de Venus, The Bluest Eye, The Gift Horse, Harriet Jacobs, The Inside and Stage Black. Theaters include Broadway’s Cort Theatre, The Arden, Chicago Dramatists, Company One, Congo Square, Goodman, Guthrie, Hartford Stage, Huntington, Jubilee, Kansas City Repertory, Long Wharf, Lorraine Hansberry, McCarter, Mo`olelo, MPAACT, New Vic, Playmakers Repertory, Plowshares, Second Stage, Steppenwolf and True Colors. Commissions from Arena Stage, Steppenwolf, McCarter, Huntington, Center Stage, Victory Gardens and Roundabout. Lydia was a W.E.B. Du Bois Institute non-resident fellow, TCG/ NEA playwright-in-residence at Steppenwolf, Huntington playwright fellow, Sundance Institute Playwright Lab creative advisor, Radcliffe Institute fellow and serves on the Dramatists Guild Legal Defense Fund Board of Directors. She is a Northwestern University graduate and has an honorary doctorate of arts from Pine Manor College.

SEEMA SUEKO

Director

SEEMA SUEKO (Director) joined the Arena Stage staff in July 2016 as deputy artistic director. She previously served as associate artistic director at Pasadena Playhouse and executive artistic director of Mo`olelo Performing Arts Company in San Diego. Her directing and acting credits include Pasadena Playhouse, People’s Light, The Old Globe, San Diego Repertory, La Jolla Playhouse, Yale Repertory, 5th Avenue Theatre, Native Voices and Mo`olelo, among others. As a playwright, she received commissions from Mixed Blood Theatre and Center Stage. Her work has been recognized by the California State Assembly, NAACP San Diego Branch, San Diego Theatre Critics Circle, Chicago Jeff Awards, American Theatre Wing and American Theatre magazine. Seema serves on the Diversity Committee of the Stage Directors and Choreographers Society.

MISHA KACHMAN

Set Designer

MISHA KACHMAN (Set Designer) has worked at Arena Stage, Asolo Repertory, Center Stage, Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park, the Kennedy Center, Milwaukee Shakespeare, Opera Lafayette, Opera Royal Versailles, Portland Center Stage, Round House, Shanghai Dramatic Arts Center, Signature Theatre, Skylight Music Theatre, Studio Theatre, Syracuse Stage, Theater J, Wilma Theater and Woolly Mammoth, among many other companies in the United States and abroad. He is a company member at Woolly Mammoth and an associate artist at Olney Theatre Center. Misha is a Helen Hayes Award recipient and a graduate of the St. Petersburg Theatre Arts Academy. He serves as the associate professor of scene and costume design and head of M.F.A. in design at University of Maryland.

DEDE M. AYITE

Costume Designer

DEDE M. AYITE (Costume Designer)’s Off-Broadway credits include Marie & Rosetta (Atlantic Theater Company); The Royale (Lincoln Center); Ugly Lies the Bone (Roundabout); brownsville song (b-side for tray) (LCT3); and ToasT, Urban Retreat and Manahatta (The Public). Regional credits include The Last Tiger in Haiti (La Jolla, Berkeley Repertory); Bella: An American Tall Tale and Stagger Lee (Dallas Theater Center); The Wiz (Oregon Shakespeare); Between Riverside and Crazy (Studio Theatre); The Blood Quilt and Five Guys Named Moe (Arena Stage); Marie Antoinette (Steppenwolf); The CA Lyons Project (Alliance Theatre); A Raisin in the Sun (California Shakespeare Theater); The Piano Lesson (Yale Repertory); The Music Man in Concert (Two River Theater, NJPAC); and Fried Chicken & Latkes (National Black Theatre). TV credits include Comedy Central, Fox Shortcoms (FOX Network) and COPPER Project (Improv Everywhere/BBC America). She received an M.F.A. from the Yale School of Drama.

XAVIER PIERCE

Lighting Designer

XAVIER PIERCE (Lighting Designer)’s Off-Broadway credits include Yours Unfaithfully and A Day by the Sea (Mint Theatre), and Emmet Down in My Heart (Castillo Theatre). Regional credits include Harvey (The Guthrie); Fences (California Shakespeare Theater, Long Wharf, McCarter Theatre); Mountaintop (Playmakers Repertory, Triad Stage); Red and Common Enemy (Triad Stage); A Raisin in the Sun (Westport Country Playhouse); Two Trains Running (Arden Theatre Company); Intimate Apparel, Peter and the Starcatcher, Detroit ’67 and 4,000 Miles (Playmakers Repertory); and Fly (Florida Studio Theatre). National and international tour credits include DRUMLINE LIVE! He has received a Handy Award for Best Lighting, Thomas C. Fichandler Award for Excellence in Lighting, Marvin Sims Fellowship at the Kennedy Center and was an Allen Lee Hughes Lighting Design Fellow.

ANDRE PLUESS

Sound Designer

ANDRE PLUESS (Sound Designer)’s Broadway credits include 33 Variations, I Am My Own Wife and Metamorphoses. Regional credits include Victory Gardens, Berkeley Repertory, Oregon Shakespeare, Lookingglass Theatre, Steppenwolf Theatre Company, La Jolla Playhouse, Goodman, Shakespeare Theatre Company, American Conservatory Theater, Williamstown Theatre Festival, Arena Stage, Yale Repertory, Lincoln Center, McCarter Theatre and California Shakespeare Festival. Awards include multiple Joseph Jefferson Awards and Citations, Ovation Award, Drama Critics’ Circle Award, Barrymore Award, Drama Desk and Lucille Lortel nominations for composition and sound design.

JARED MEZZOCCHI

Projection Designer

JARED MEZZOCCHI (Projection Designer) received the 2012 Princess Grace Theater Fellowship as the first projection designer to receive the honor. He is a company member at Woolly Mammoth, most recently having designed Women Laughing Alone with Salad. D.C. credits include Intelligence (Arena Stage), Yellow Face (Theater J), Astro Boy and the God of Comics (Studio Theatre) and BELL (National Geographic). New York credits include Vietgone (MTC); Downtown Loop (3-Legged Dog); You Are Dead. You Are Here. (HERE Arts Center); and JET LAG 2011 (The Builders Association). Regional credits include Milwaukee Repertory, Cleveland Play House, Center Stage and the Wilma. He has designed for Big Art Group at the Vienna Festival (Europe, Canada and U.S. tour), Connect4Climate, Alcantara (Design Week, Milan) and the atrium of the World Bank in D.C. Jared teaches at The University of Maryland.

ANNE NESMITH

Wig Designer

ANNE NESMITH (Wig Designer) returns to Arena Stage, where her design credits include A Raisin in the Sun, Watch on the Rhine, Carousel, The Little Foxes, All the Way, Oliver!, Destiny of Desire, Fiddler on the Roof, Mother Courage and Her Children, and The Music Man. Her recent work includes Titanic (Signature Theatre), La Boheme and L’Opera Seria (Wolf Trap), Cosi fan tutte (Nishinomiya, Japan) and Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf (Ford’s Theatre). Her designs have been seen at the Kennedy Center, Opera Philadelphia, Shakespeare Theatre Company, Washington Ballet and Saito Kinen Festival in Matsumoto, Japan. Anne was the resident wig/makeup designer for the Baltimore Opera and has created wigs for Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery programs, Investigation Discovery’s Ice Cold Killers, Maryland Public Television and the U.S. Army’s tour Spirit of America.

ZACH CAMPION

Vocal Coach

ZACH CAMPION (Vocal Coach) is a freelance voice, speech and dialect coach, and former education manager at Studio Theatre. D.C. credits include dialect coach for Hand to God (six Helen Hayes nominations), Chimerica, Terminus (Helen Hayes nomination) and Between Riverside and Crazy (Studio Theatre); the world premiere of The Gulf (Helen Hayes nomination, Signature Theatre); Dial M for Murder and Sweeney Todd (Olney Theatre Center); Angels in America Part 1 and 2 (Helen Hayes nomination, Round House); and the upcoming My Fair Lady (Olney Theatre Center). Zach is a certified teacher of Fitzmaurice Voicework© and is a member of the Studio Theatre Acting Conservatory faculty. He received his M.F.A in theater pedagogy from Virginia Commonwealth University and his B.F.A. in performance and production from Texas State University. www.voicecoachdc.com

CAPARELLIOTIS CASTING

NY Castings

CAPARELLIOTIS CASTING (NY Castings)’s current Broadway shows include The Glass Menagerie; A Doll’s House, Part 2; and The Little Foxes. Recent and select Broadway and Off-Broadway shows include Jitney, The Front Page, Les Liaisons Dangereuses, Blackbird, The Father, Fish in the Dark, It’s Only a Play, An Act of God, Airline Highway, Disgraced, Sex With Strangers, Lost Lake, The Country House, Casa Valentina, Holler If Ya Hear Me, The Trip to Bountiful and Fences. Regional credits include Signature Theatre, Atlantic, LCT3, Ars Nova, Old Globe, Goodman, Arena Stage, McCarter and others. Film/TV credits include American Odyssey (NBC), How to Get Away With Murder (pilot, ABC), Ironside (pilot, NBC) and Steel Magnolias (Sony for Lifetime).

KURT HALL

Stage Manager

KURT HALL (Stage Manager)’s Arena Stage credits include Watch on the Rhine, Carousel, The Year of Magical Thinking starring Kathleen Turner, Born for This, All the Way, Sweat, Destiny of Desire, The Blood Quilt, Our War, The Shoplifters, Smokey Joe’s Café, Mother Courage and Her Children starring Kathleen Turner, Maurice Hines is Tappin’ Thru Life, Good People, Red Hot Patriot: The Kick-Ass Wit of Molly Ivins starring Kathleen Turner, The Normal Heart, Red, Ruined, every tongue confess starring Phylicia Rashad, Duke Ellington’s Sophisticated Ladies, Looped starring Valerie Harper, Next to Normal starring Alice Ripley, Awake and Sing! and The Goat, or Who is Sylvia. Additional regional credits at the Kennedy Center, Roundabout Theatre Company, McCarter Theatre, Shakespeare Theatre Company and Signature Theatre. Thanks to his family for all their support.

KRISTEN MARY HARRIS

Assistant Stage Manager

KRISTEN MARY HARRIS (Assistant Stage Manager) is thrilled to be part of this production at Arena Stage. Favorite Arena Stage credits include The Little Foxes, Disgraced, The Blood Quilt, Fiddler on the Roof, Mother Courage and Her Children, Red, The Normal Heart and Oklahoma! (Helen Hayes Award). Additional D.C. credits include Titanic, Road Show, The Threepenny Opera, Miss Saigon, and the world premieres of Kid Victory and Crossing (Signature Theatre) and A Christmas Carol (Ford’s Theatre). Kristen holds a B.F.A. in theater production from the University of Arizona and is a proud Actors’ Equity Association member.