| |
Playwright/Director
is an accomplished playwright, director, actress and educator. She is the former Artistic Director of Historyonics Theatre Company, where she wrote two to four plays a year for fourteen years, directing and editing the rest of the plays the company presented. Her final play written for Historyonics, Dancing on Air: The Katherine Dunham Story, was nominated for the Kevin Kline Award for Outstanding New Play or Musical. For nearly 11 years Patton has maintained an association with Gitana Productions with roles ranging from Artistic Director to Playwright and Drama instructor in the Global Education through the Arts program. Patton wrote Complacency of Silence: Darfur for Gitana in 2008 to incredible audience reviews. Patton currently teaches at St. Louis University, Washington University and the University of Missouri-St. Louis. She has a BA, MA and MFA in theatre.
Choreographer
is an accomplished actress, dancer choreographer, consultant and instructor. She has been a principal dancer with the Dunham Performing Arts Training Center troupe and the Arts and Education Director and Theatre instructor for Southern Illinois University-Edwardsville’s St. Louis Center. Vivian’s performance credits include work for the Muny Opera, North Carolina’s Black Theater Festival, the St. Louis Black Repertory Company and Historyonics Theatre Company. Vivian’s dance credits include choreography and performance at the 1984 Olympics in Los Angeles, the televised Gold Survivors for PBS and God's Musical World and productions of well-known musicals such as The Wiz and Ain't Misbehaving. Vivian has served on panels for Grand Center and the Missouri Arts Council. She currently has a youth theater and dance company that has performed onstage with Kirk Franklin; at half-time for the Harlem Globetrotters and at Washington University’s Black Alumni Benefit. Vivian has worked with Gitana Productions since 1997 as Artistic Director, Choreographer, Dancer and Master Teacher in the Global Education through the Arts program. Actors is delighted to appear in her first professional production. She is a student at St. Louis University where she has appeared on stage most recently as Antigone. Emily is majoring in English and Theatre with a minor in Education and works at SLU as a student production manager. She has been working with Gitana's Global Education through the Arts student program since January and is excited to continue her relationship with Gitana. After graduating from SLU in May 2010, Emily will begin a graduate program to earn a masters degree in teaching with an urban focus. She hopes to incorporate the arts into her classroom as a way of developing empathy, teamwork and conflict resolution skills, and cross-cultural awareness in her students. She is grateful to Gitana for allowing her to grow through work with the student group, SLU's theatre department for providing an excellent foundation, and her family and friends for their constant love and support.
, a St. Louis native, has a BS in English Literature and is currently completing her Masters from the prestigious Washington University in St. Louis, and was inducted in the Alpha Sigma Lambda National Honor Society. Myah has had the opportunity to perform with Shakespeare’s Glob in London England, St. Louis Shakespeare Company, St. Louis Black Repertory Company, the Repertory Theatre of St. Louis and numerous teaching, modeling, film and voice over credits. Myah also had the privilege of being the first African American to portray Queen Gertrude in a multicultural production of Hamlet on the main stage of the Katherine Dunham Theatre. Myah is honored to be a part of this groundbreaking performance.
is a graduate of Lindenwood University with a BA in Theater and a BS in Psychology. She is pleased to work with Gitana another season, as the global message presented by these productions are vital to the development of St. Louis as the proactive and forward thinking community that it is capable of becoming. When not on the stage, Jamie is the Director of the Graduate Placement Department with Allied College where she helps the graduate population attain the career goals that they set out to accomplish and change the paths of their lives and families as they are able to take control of their futures through education and stable employment.
is thrilled to play Mahira with Gitana Productions in My Heart Is Always Shaking. She is a secondary education and English double major with a minor in theater, which keeps her busy enough! She is also a very active member of SLU's Rainbow Alliance, and appeared in Ulna’s annual production of The Vagina Monologues. Healy could previously be seen on the SLU stage as Danielle in Language of Angels, Ismene in Antigone, and currently as a God in Good Person of Sezuan with Saint Louis Actors' Studio.
comes from Homewood-Flossmoor, a south suburb of Chicago. Her father was born in Baghdad, Iraq and her mother from Bacolod City, Philippines, making Amira a child of the world. She grew up playing the piano and violin and is currently a student at SLU studying Health Information Management and Informatics and minoring in Spanish. She has recently been studying acting with Patton Chiles and is thrilled to be involved in this play.
is making her theatrical debut in this important play. She is a 20-year old Junior currently majoring in Health Information Management with a Biology Minor (Pre-Medicine). After graduation, she plans to complete a Masters in Health Informatics in a year and half before going to Medical School. Erica was born in the Middle East in Muscat, Oman and moved to Austin, Texas when she was 11. Although of Indian origin, having lived in a different country and traveled to so many places in the world has exposed Erica to richness of many cultures. The only prior acting experience she had was through musicals as a member of her high school choir all four years. Erica decided to take an acting class at St. Louis University as a break from science classes, and has received from it much more than expected—after all, she is in this play now!
is an Iranian-American who is excited to be working with Patton Chiles and Gitana Productions on this play about Afghani women. She feels the play is extremely pertinent as it sheds light on the continuing hardship and oppression faced by Afghani women today. Roxane has performed with many theater companies in the St. Louis area, but for the past two seasons has spent the majority of her time with Metro Theater Company as both and actor and a teaching artist. Most recently, she has been seen as Mencha in New Kid, Stephanie Crawford in To Kill a Mockingbird, and a variety of animals in Fables. In her spare time, Roxane enjoys playing both the piano and the accordion and is working towards her Black Belt in Karate. She and her husband Chuck have two wonderful children, Erin who is 6 and Ian who has just turned 5.
is a Bosnian student attending Affton High School who is proud to be Muslim. She was born in Magdeburg, Germany where she lived for three years. Her family came to America on June 5, 1997. She has a younger sister Azra who is nine years of age, a lovely mother, Badema and, an amazing father, Amir. Erna’s family has struggled to learn the English language. When they came here the family didn't know about grocery stores so they shopped for food at a local gas station only because, her parents saw that it said "food mart" and it was the first English word they learned. Throughout Erna’s life, she has learned that it is ok to make mistakes as long as you know where you went wrong. When she was in the eighth grade, Erna started to love acting. She performed in a play High School Musical and battled to get the role she wanted as Gabriella through hard work and steady persistence. Ever since then Erna has loved the art of performing and eventually found out about Gitana Production’s Global Education through the Arts Program. Erna is learning acting, dance and about other cultures. It is there that she learned that all cultures have much in common and there is not much of a difference between them. We are ALL one.
is an Iranian born in Tehran. Ghazaleh's major is psychology and the area of her interest is social psychology. She became interested in theatre, when she took a theatre class with Lee Patton Chiles. She has been in the U.S for 4 years, and always wanted to be involved in cross-cultural activities. Playing in "My Heart is Always Shaking" is an opportunity to express herself and her talents. Ghazaleh is grateful that she is able to work with Ms. Chiles and other members of the production.
is a talented young student at St. Louis Catholic Academy who is dedicated to every aspect of his acting/singing/dancing career. He has performed with a line of organizations involving the arts such as COCA; Better Family Life and Six Flags' Junior Stars. Despite the hardships faced by Mr. Ferguson in his life, one being the disappearance of his brother Christian Taylor Ferguson, he has maintained a sense of dignity, respect, know how, and a genuine character. Connor joined Gitana Productions' youth performance group at Carpenter Library to continue his dedication to the arts. There he learned more about acting, dancing, monologue speeches, poetry, and cultural diversity. He was so astonished by what was and was to be in this group, that with the help of Ms. Cecilia Nadal, he came up with the name 'S2G Performers' for the Gitana youth group. (Southside to Global Performers) Through it all, Connor has, with the ever so gracious help of his mother, Mrs. Vivian Watt, Ms. Cecilia Nadal, and Ms. Lee Patton Chiles become immersed in the healing power of the arts!
Set and Light Designer has been the assistant professor of lighting and scenery/technical director for five years at the University of Missouri-St. Louis and has recently joined the faculty at Lindenwood University. Prior to that, he was on the faculty of McLennan Community College in Waco, Texas. He has designed for a wide variety of theater and dance companies in Austin, Kilgore, and Waco, Texas and locally with ACT Inc., MADCO, Shooting Star Productions, and Hot City Theater where he received a 2006 Kevin Kline nomination for outstanding set design for the production of The Last Days of Judas Iscariot. In 2008 Tim did the set and lighting design for a Gitana Production, Complacency of Silence: Darfur and again was nominated for Kevin Kline Awards in both categories.
Costume Designer
returns to Gitana Productions after assisting with costumes for last year’s Complacency of Silence. Recent St. Louis credits include Woyzeck, Aerwacol, The Concert, The Polish Eggman and Marija’s Pictures for Upstream Theater, The Odyssey, Othello, Antony and Cleopatra, Troilus and Cressida and The Winter’s Tale for St. Louis Shakespeare, Sabina, Kindertransport, Broadway Bound, The Merchant of Venice for New Jewish Theatre and Dancing on Air: The Kathryn Dunham Story and Eagle and Child for Historyonics Theatre, where Michele designed five seasons of historical theatre.
|
|
 |
