The Heiress

RUTH & AUGUSTUS GOETZ

Playwrights

RUTH & AUGUSTUS GOETZ (Playwrights) collaborated on many Broadway plays, such as Franklin Street (1940); One Man Show (1945); The Heiress (1947), which was loosely suggested by Henry James’ novel Washington Square; The Immoralist (1954), an adaptation from the novel by Andre Gide; and The Hidden River (1957), an adaptation of a novel by Storm Jameson. The Goetzes also collaborated on the following films: The Heiress (Academy Award, 1949), Sister Carrie (1950), Rhapsody, Trapeze and Stagestruck. Mrs. Goetz is the sole author of two plays: Sweet Love Remembered (1959), written after her husband’s death in 1957, and Madly in Love (1963). The Goetzes were active members of the Dramatists Guild. Their daughter, Judy Firth Sanger, is a poet and frequent reference source for productions of The Heiress. Their granddaughter, Katie Firth, is an actress working in New York.

SEEMA SUEKO

Director

SEEMA SUEKO (Director) joined the Arena Stage staff in July 2016 as deputy artistic director and has since directed The Price and Smart People at Arena. She previously served as associate artistic director at The Pasadena Playhouse and executive artistic director of Mo`olelo Performing Arts Company. Her directing and acting credits include Denver Center, The Pasadena Playhouse, People’s Light, The Old Globe, San Diego Repertory, Yale Repertory, 5th Avenue Theatre and Native Voices, 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, Chicago Jeff Awards, American Theatre Wing and American Theatre magazine. Seema developed the Consensus Organizing for Theater methodology, has done research on the neuroscience of acting and serves on the Diversity Committee of the Stage Directors and Choreographers Society.

MIKIKO SUZUKI MACADAMS

Set Designer

MIKIKO SUZUKI MACADAMS (Set Designer) designed for Arena Stage’s The Little Foxes and is happy to be back at Arena! Her work has been seen at Guthrie Theater, Berkeley Rep, Old Globe, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Long Wharf Theatre, Seattle Rep, Actors Theatre of Louisville, Yale Repertory Theatre, Cincinnati Playhouse, Cornerstone Theater Company and Opera Theatre of St. Louis, among others. Her Off-Broadway credits include Working Theater, Epic Theatre Ensemble, INTAR, Ensemble Studio Theatre and the National Asian American Theatre Company. She also designed the recent U.S. national tour of Dirty Dancing and in Japan at the Nissay Opera, Nikikai Opera, Kanagawa Kenmin Hall, Aichi Triennale and more. As an associate scenic designer, recent Broadway credits include My Fair Lady, Fiddler on the Roof and The King and I. She teaches at Rutgers University.

IVANIA STACK

Costume Designer

IVANIA STACK (Costume Designer) is delighted to return to Arena Stage, where she is previously designed The Price, Two Trains Running and Intelligence. Her work has been seen at many other DC area theatres including: Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company (Company Member), Ford’s Theatre, Round House Theatre (Resident Artist), Kennedy Center Family Theatre, Signature Theatre, Imagination Stage, Olney Theatre Center (Associate Artist), Studio Theatre, Theatre J, Constellation Theatre, Pointless Theatre, Synetic Theatre, Forum Theatre, Theatre Alliance, Rorschach Theatre, Metro Stage and Gala Hispanic Theatre. Her regional credits include designs for Seattle Repertory Theatre, Center Stage, Everyman Theatre, The Karski Project, Andy’s Summer Playhouse, The Second City and The Contemporary American Theatre Festival. She has an MFA in design from the University of Maryland, College Park.

SHERRICE MOJGANI

Lighting Designer

SHERRICE MOJGANI (Lighting Designer)’s recent designs include Two Trains Running (Arena Stage & Seattle Repertory Theatre); The Scottsboro Boys (Signature Theatre); Skeleton Crew (The Old Globe); Black Pearl Sings, Roz and Ray and HONKY (San Diego REP); and The Revolutionist, Blue Door and Trouble in Mind (MOXIE Theatre). Sherrice is an assistant professor in the School of Theatre at George Mason University. She holds a BA in Theater Arts from UC Santa Cruz and an MFA in Lighting Design from UC San Diego. http://www.smojgani.com

EMMA WILK

Sound Designer & Original Music

EMMA WILK (Sound Designer & Original Music) is a New York-based sound designer and collaborator. She is very excited to be working at Arena for the first time! Her designs have been heard at numerous New York theaters, including The Public, New World Stages, La MaMa, 59E59 and HERE. Some of her favorite designs were A Clockwork Orange, Bright Half Life, Machinal, The King Stag, The Crucible and Gorey: The Secret Lives of Edward Gorey. She has worked regionally in Connecticut, New Jersey, upstate NY, Idaho and Nebraska. Associate/assistant designer highlights include, on Broadway: Long Day’s Journey Into Night, Heisenberg and The Lyons; and Off-Broadway: Hamlet, Pass Over, What’s It All About and Fun Home. She is a graduate of Vassar College. Emmamwilk.com.

ANNE NESMITH

Wig Designer

ANNE NESMITH (Wig Designer) is pleased to return to Arena Stage following Indecent, and last season’s The Pajama Game, Nina Simone: Four Women and The Price. Her designs have been seen locally at Kennedy Center, Ford’s Theatre, Signature Theatre, Wolftrap Opera, Shakespeare Theatre, Folger Theatre and Washington Ballet. Regional work includes designs with Opera Philadelphia, Opera Boston, Annapolis Opera and Castleton Music Festival and internationally at Saito Kinen Festival and Hyogo Performing Arts Center in Japan. Anne was the resident wig/makeup designer for the Baltimore Opera and has constructed wigs for Scooby Doo! Live and 42nd Street (Asian tour). You can see her work in Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery programs, Ice Cold Killers for Investigation Discovery, the Military Channel’s Great Planes, MD Public Television and the U.S. Army’s tour Spirit of America.

JAN GIST

Voice and Text Coach

JAN GIST (Voice and Text Coach)’s Arena Stage credits include A Perfect Ganesh. D.C. credits include Romeo and Juliet, Shakespeare Theatre Company. At Old Globe (San Diego) Jan coached 89 productions; and is the head of Voice, Speech and Dialects for Old Globe/University of San Diego Shiley Graduate Theatre Program. Regional theater credits include American Players Theatre, Ahmanson Theatre, La Jolla Playhouse, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, American Shakespeare Center, Utah Shakespearean Festival, Alabama Shakespeare Festival, San Diego Repertory, North Coast Repertory, Milwaukee Repertory, PlayMakers’ Repertory, Indiana Repertory and Mo’olelo Company. Jan has led workshops at national/international conferences including Voice and Speech Trainers Association, Voice Foundation, London's Central School of Speech and Drama, and Moscow Art Theatre Teachers Exchange. She has been interviewed for and published in Voice and Speech Training in the New Millennium: Conversations with Master Teachers. Other publications include exercises in The Complete Voice and Speech Workout and More Stage Dialects, and poetry in VASTA Journals.

SUSAN R. WHITE

Stage Manager

SUSAN R. WHITE (Stage Manager) is thrilled to be working with Deputy Artistic Director Seema Sueko. Susan is a proud member of Actors' Equity Association.

JOSEPH SMELSER

Replacement Stage Manager

JOSEPH SMELSER (Replacement Stage Manager) is thrilled to return to Arena Stage where he last served as production stage manager on Anna Deavere Smith’s Let Me Down Easy. He is currently the resident production stage manager at the Shakespeare Theatre Company where he has managed 30 productions including Hamlet, Camelot and the upcoming Oresteia. Other work includes eight seasons at Seattle Rep and four seasons at ACT in San Francisco. He toured productions of Let Me Down Easy and Twilight: Los Angeles, 1992 (both with Anna Deavere Smith) and the first national tour of Proof.

MARNE ANDERSON

Assistant Stage Manager

MARNE ANDERSON (Assistant Stage Manager) is excited to be at Arena Stage for her 10^th season, starting as an Allen Lee Hughes Fellow in 2009. Some highlights include Indecent, Dave, Two Trains Running, The Great Society, Nina Simone: Four Women, A Raisin in the Sun, Moby Dick, All the Way, Erma Bombeck: At Wit’s End, King Hedley II, Five Guys Named Moe, Mother Courage and Her Children, The Mountaintop, Metamorphoses, Long Day’s Journey into Night, Arabian Nights, Duke Ellington’s Sophisticated Ladies. She is a graduate of the University of North Carolina School of the Arts and a proud member of Actors’ Equity Association.