The Ground On Which We Stand
Playwright and Dramaturg Bios
TURRON KOFI ALLEYNE , award-nominated Actor , has worked with some of Hollywood’s most esteemed A-List directors, producers, and actors such as: Spike Lee, Jonathan Nolan, Mark Wahlberg, Zoe Saldana, Michael B. Jordan, Lawrence Fishburne, and others. One of his most notable roles is his recurring guest star portrayal of Calvin Newcombe in the ABC series FOR LIFE. He’s been featured in Independent Films that have premiered at various prestigious Film Festivals which include Sundance, ABFF, LA Film Festival, Vails Film Festival and more. Turron also enjoys teaching acting where his students learn the difference between “performing”and “living truthfully” by guiding his students away from performing habits, into more organic real-life responses that spur and change from moment to moment. He accomplishes this through improvisational games, methods and techniques rooted in the Sanford Meisner Technique.In addition, Turron is also a Writer, Director and Producer for the screen; as well as the stage.He is happily married with three beautiful children and he honors, thanks, and dedicates his life, ministries, and career to Jesus Christ.
JENNY LYN BADER is an author whose plays include None of the Above (New Georges), In Flight (Turn to Flesh Productions/Workshop Theatre), and Mrs. Stern Wanders the Prussian State Library (Luna Stage). Her other past work at Luna includes Sad Maps (Vaccine Monologues), The Whole Megillah, Strange Happenings at the School Library (co-authored with Martine Sainvil), and My First Time (Voting Writes). Honors include the "Best Documentary One Woman Show" Award (United Solo Fest/Theatre Row), Think Fast "Audience Favorite" Award, Lark Fellowship, and Edith Oliver Award (O'Neill Center). Her audio work has streamed on five continents in 30 countries, and her audio play Tree Confessions (TINATC, w/ Kathleen Chalfant) is now available in Spanish. Her work has been published by Dramatists Play Service, Next Stage Press, Applause, Smith & Kraus, Vintage, Lincoln Center Theater Review, Plays International & Europe, and The New York Times. She is a summa cum laude graduate of Harvard University. www.jennylynbader.com
KAELA MEI-SHING GARVIN (they/she) is a writer, educator, and new work advocate. Plays include Call Out Culture (2022 O'Neill NPC Finalist, 2021 NADIA Festival, 2019 Ars Nova’s ANTFest), High School Coven (2023 Strand Theatre production, 2017 Corkscrew Festival), Harpers Ferry 2019 (2022 Know Theatre of Cincinnati production, 2021 Kendeda finalist), and Tiger Beat (2021 Bay Area Playwrights Festival, 2021 Seven Devils finalist). Kaela’s received six Kennedy Center awards and developed work with the Alliance Theater, the Coop’s Clusterf*ck, and Pipeline Theater Company’s Playlab. Commissions include work with EST/Sloan, Montana Repertory Theater, and College of the Holy Cross. They currently work at the Tank, teach playwriting at Cornish College of the Arts, and work as Literary Manager for Luna Stage. www.kaelameishinggarvin.com
SAKINAH HOFLER is a fiction writer, poet, and playwright. Her work has appeared in Kenyon Review Online, Hayden’s Ferry Review, Mid-American Review, among other literary journals, and her plays have been produced by Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park and the University of Cincinnati’s College-Conservatory of Music. She has won the Yemasee Poetry Prize, the Hurston/Wright Award for College Writers in Fiction, the Manchester Fiction Prize, and the Sherwood Anderson Fiction Award. Her work has received support from the Albert C. Yates Foundation, the Kingsbury Foundation, the Taft Research Center, and the P.E.O. Scholar Award. A former chemical engineer for the United States Department of Defense, she’s currently a lecturer in Princeton’s Writing Program.
STEPHEN KAPLAN’S recent productions include a NNPN Rolling World Premiere of Tracy Jones (Winner: Chameleon Theatre; Finalist: B Street New Comedies Festival, ScreenCraft Stage Play Contest, Trustus Playwrights Festival) and Branwell (and other Brontës): An Autobiography Edited by Charlotte Brontë at Loft Ensemble (Semi-Finalist: O’Neill). Currently under development: Un Hombre: A Golem Story (Finalist: Jewish Plays Project, Wild Imaginings Epiphanies, Gulfshore Playhouse New Works Festival, Chameleon Theatre Circle’s 22nd Annual New Play Contest). Other plays have been produced off-Broadway at 59E59 and regionally around the country. He is a 2021 Individual Artist Fellowship winner in playwriting from the New Jersey State Council on the Arts and his plays have also been finalists for Seven Devils and the Woodward/Newman Award and semi-finalists for PlayPenn and FutureFest. For more information visit www.bystephenkaplan.com
KYLE MAZER is a playwright, composer and stand-up comedian from Millburn, New Jersey now living in New York City. He graduated from Yale University where he studied under Donald Margulies as the recipient of the T. Whitney Blake Prize for excellence in English, music and community building. Kyle has written two award-winning plays, STALLED and Keep the Change, and, with his sister, wrote the musical The S.S. Cancelled, which won Best Musical Score and was nominated for Best Production at the New York Theater Festival in 2022. He loves storytelling, helping others learn to tell their own stories, and the New York Knicks.
KATHLEEN MCGHEE-ANDERSON A writer since childhood growing up in Detroit, Kathleen’s first writings were short stories about a storefront minister in her neighborhood, “The Preacher X” stories. She has been writing about neighborhoods, community, and the unseen connections between people ever since. Her work spans the genres of TV, film, theatre, non-fiction, poetry and journalism. Kathleen graduated from Spelman College, received her MFA from Columbia University, and was awarded an Honorary Doctorate from Spelman College for her achievement in the entertainment industry. Her recent theater work includes, “Bearden and Billie” about renowned artist, Romare Bearden, and his unknown romance with a fellow artist; “Miss Maybelline’s Nocturnal Flights of Fancy” which celebrates the historic black community of Oak Bluffs, Martha’s Vineyard; and the Broadway bound musical, “I’ll Be There,” about the journey of Motown’s legendary Four Tops, for which Kathleen penned the recent memoir of the last surviving member, Duke Fakir. Kathleen resides in Venice, California and Oak Bluffs, Massachusetts.
DIANE POLLEDRI is a singer/songwriter who performs solo as well as with John Hone in the duo Aloft, and with the band, quite aptly named, The Trainwrecks. Her musical influences range from Hoagy Carmichael to Metallica and everything in between. She’s thrilled to have been invited to compose a song for the wonderful Luna Stage, particularly for a project as inspiring as The Ground on Which We Stand. Special thanks, love, and tons of admiration for Ari and Reverend Anya.
MARTINE SAINVIL is a Brooklyn-based Playwright and Communications Strategist. Recent credits: Indispensable (2023 Bay Area Playwrights Festival Semi-Finalist), Pursuit (2022 EAC BarbouAwardFinalist), The Mary Lou Shine (2022 StatueFest: Monologues about Statue Worthy Women at Purchase College), Strange Happenings at the School Library co-written with Jenny Lyn Bader (Published by Next Stage Press; 2021 Luna Stage). Previously, Director of Communications at the Broadway League and was on the publicity team for various Broadway and Off-Broadway shows. For more visit MartineSainvil.com
MO SCHLICK is a speaker, actor and leadership development professional. She attended Mason Gross School of the Arts at Rutgers University where she studied theater. Mo also attended Penn State School of Theater where she taught undergraduate acting classes and earned an MFA in 2003.
TYLIE SHIDER is an American writer and the inaugural playwright in residence at ArtYard. A 2022-23 McKnight Fellow in Playwriting at the Playwrights' Center (PWC), he is a recipient of Premiere Stages' Liberty Live commission, two consecutive Jerome Fellowships (PWC), and an I Am Soul playwright in residence at the National Black Theatre (NBT). Recent projects include, the fall 2022 NJ premiere of Certain Aspects of Conflict in the Negro Family at Premiere Stages, The Gospel Woman (NBT), Whittier (PWC), and his filmmaking debut Sign O' the Times. Screenwriting credits include: Truant. He holds a BA in Journalism from Delaware State University and an MFA in Dramatic Writing from NYU. A proud member of the Dramatist Guild, he is currently a Professor of Playwriting at Augsburg University, and a staff writer for Minnesota Playlist. Follow him on IG: @theplaywright
MELISSA TOOMEY writes plays and comics. After wandering the West for a number of years, she is currently based in NJ. She has developed plays with The Actors' Studio, Luna Stage Company, The Tank, Fresh Ground Pepper, INKubator @ Art House Productions, Play Date @ Pete's Candy Store, NJ Play Lab, Theatre for the New City, and more. Her work has been published by Smith & Kraus. Current member of The Actors Studio Playwrights/Directors Unit, and alum of the 2021 Kennedy Center Playwriting Intensive with Gary Garrison and Mark Bly. She has recently been a Semi Finalist for the Premiere Stages Play Festival (2022), Pipeline Play Lab @ Pipeline Theatre Company (2021), Valdez Theatre Conference (2022), NJ Play Lab Residency (2022), and the Women's Playwrights Circle @ Speranza Theatre Company (2021). She creates outdoor theatre whenever possible, most recently with her group, Leave No Trace Theatre (www.leavenotracetheatre.org). She was once a full time traveler. She once lived at the Grand Canyon. BFA, Acting: SUNY Purchase.
RICHARD WESLEY was born in Newark and graduated from Howard University. His plays include: BLACK TERROR, SIRENS, THE MIGHTY GENTS, THE TALENTED TENTH and AUTUMN. He has written the libretti for operas performed at Newark’s Trilogy Opera Company, and for the 2020 Pulitzer Prize winning CENTRAL PARK FIVE, composed by Anthony Davis. His screenplays include UPTOWN SATURDAY NIGHT and LET’S DO IT AGAIN. Mr. Wesley is currently an Associate Professor in the Tisch School of the Arts at New York University and is married to the novelist, Valerie Wilson Wesley.