Fall Masterclasses

Rebecca Campana

Create and Collaborate

Rebecca Campana is in her 17th season in Arena Stage’s Community Engagement Division, where she is the school programs manager, co-camp director and a teaching artist. She manages the D.C. Ticket Partnership, the theater’s ticket program for D.C. public and public charter schools, teaching workshops in dozens of D.C. schools each season. She edits the theater’s study guides and curriculum connections. She also directs and devises theater for social change for Arena’s Voices of Now program both locally and internationally. Rebecca is an annual guest artist at the University of Notre Dame, specializing in teaching how to write 10-minute plays. She holds a dual honors B.A. in English literature and journalism from St. Bonaventure University. She begins her masters in writing (fiction) at Johns Hopkins University in 2021.

Timothy Douglas

Freeing the Intuitive Voice

Timothy Douglas is an award-winning stage director, actor, and Designated Linklater Voice Instructor, who is represented at Arena Stage with his productions King Hedley II, Disgraced, and Nina Simone: Four Women, and currently serves as Distinguished Artist in Residence at Emerson College. timothydouglas.org

Parker Esse

Choreography

Parker Esse is a multi-award-winning and story-driven director/choreographer. After performing regionally, in national tours, and as a featured performer on Broadway in the Tony Award-winning Fosse, he began collaborating exclusively on multiple regional and Broadway shows as associate director/choreographer, including Broadway's Tony, Drama Desk, and Outer Critics Award nominated Finian's Rainbow and A Tale of Two Cities, as well as five-star studded NY City Center Encores! productions. As a choreographer, Parker exploded onto the scene with the groundbreaking and re-imagined Oklahoma! (Arena Stage) as well as Stephen Sondheim and Wynton Marsalis’ A Bed and a Chair directed by John Doyle (NY City Center Encores!). Parker has directed/choreographed for numerous NYC, regional and international theatres and is an eight-time Helen Hayes Nominee for Best Choreography, winning for Arena Stage's Oklahoma!, The Pajama Gamestarring Donna McKechnie, and most recently for Anything Goes starring Corbin Bleu. Recent director and/or choreographer credits include: the highly acclaimed revival of Rags (Goodspeed); La Traviata (The Kennedy Center’s WNO); pre-Broadway Toronto engagement of Jukebox Hero featuring Foreigner's Greatest Hits (Ed Mirvish Theatre); pre-Broadway world premiere of Love And Other Fables (Theatre By The Sea); 45 Minutes From Coontown(York Theatre Co.); The Buddy Holly Story (Casa Manana); Lyrics & Lyricists Celebrates Oklahoma! at 75 (92nd St. Y); seven seasons for the Physician’s Mutual of Omaha Symphony Orchestra Christmas Celebration; and multiple pre-Broadway new works, Equity showcases, and 29-Hour Readings. Most recently, last fall DC saw Parker’s Helen Hayes nominated choreography for the record-breaking hit show Disney’s Newsies (Arena Stage). BFA NYU Tisch.

Ashley Forman

Create and Collaborate

Ashley Forman is the director of education at Arena Stage in her 18th season. She is responsible for the design and development of Voices of Now, Arena Stage’s devised theater program. Through a partnership with the U.S. Department of State, Ashley has implemented Voices of Now in India twice (2012 and 2014), Peru (2014), Croatia twice (2013 and 2019) and Bosnia and Herzegovina (2019). She has presented on devised theater at numerous conferences, including the American Alliance for Theater and Education; the Association for Theater in Higher Education Conference; the National Bereavement Camp Conference; and the International AIDS Conference. Ashley has trained university professors and students, cultural attaches, pre-K through high-school public school teachers, teaching artists, professional artists, and young artists. Through Voices of Now she has devised autobiographical plays with numerous populations. Ashley oversees all lesson planning and curriculum for Arena Stage’s education programs. She graduated from Syracuse University with a B.S. in theater, concentration in directing, and a minor in child development.

Nick Hernandez

Hip Hop Theater

Nick "tha 1da" Hernandez's (DJ/Producer/Sound Design) recent work includes: The Hip-Hop Children's Trilogy with playwright Psalmayene 24 (Imagination Stage); Fences (Ford's Theater); Native Son and Les Deux Noir (Mosaic Theater); Word Becomes Flesh (Helen Hayes Award, Outstanding Production) at Theater Alliance; Long Way Down and Darius & Twig (The Kennedy Center); and Havana Hop and All the Way Live with sibling Paige Hernandez (Discovery Theater). Additionally, Nick has produced theme music & projects for Hot 97 FM, Red Bull Music, Netflix, DC Public Library, Smithsonian Associates, and Words, Beats & Life, Inc.

Roc Lee

Sound Design

Roc Lee is a Helen Hayes Award winning DC based Composer/Sound Designer. He holds a Master of Music in Stage Music Composition from CUA. Roc previously found a passion for teaching through several fun-filled summers at Camp Arena Stage (Best Summer Ever!) and has recently been interested in developing techniques for spatial audio in Virtual Reality. Having dabbled in music and sound for theater, video games, film, podcasts, and dance the focus of Roc's work has always been on storytelling and emotion: how can sound connect with the audience beyond the bounds of the stage or screen?

Credits include: May 22, 2020, Voices of Now: Inside Voices, Snowchild, The Price, The Year of Magical Thinking, Mother Courage at Arena Stage; Crossing Mnissose at Portland Centerstage; Small Mouth Sounds, Doll House 2 at Roundhouse; Kid Prince and Pablo, The Watsons Go to Birmingham 1963 at Kennedy Center TYA; Fairview, Describe the Night at Woolly Mammoth Theatre; Admissions, Curve of Departure at Studio Theatre; The Lathe of Heaven at Spooky Action Theater; CHARM, Hooded: Or Being Black for Dummies, Ulysses On Bottles, Oh God! at Mosaic Theater; Aubergine, The Importance of Being Earnest at Everyman Theatre; Singin' In The Rain, Matilda The Musical!, Tiger Style!, The Invisible Hand, On The Town, Aubergine, Annie, Thurgood, Fickle Fancy Farce, Dial M for Murder at Olney Theater Center; AIDA at Constellation Theatre; In This Hope: A Pericles Project; Hello My Name Is... at Welders; [410]Gone at Rorschach Theatre; FAME!; In the Heights at GALA Hispanic Theater. https://roclee.net

Naysan Mojgani

Dramaturgy

Naysan Mojgani is a freelance dramaturg and the Literary Manager for Arena Stage, where he is a key member of the new play development program and serves as in-house production dramaturg. As a theatre scholar, director, and dramaturg, Naysan has worked on new and classic work with theatres around the country, including MOXIE, Theatre de la Jeune Lune, Theatre Squared, and Malashock Dance, and has taught at UC San Diego and George Mason University. Naysan holds a PhD in Theatre & Drama from UC San Diego, and a BA from Carleton College.

Mauricio Pita

Create and Collaborate

Mauricio Pita was born in Caracas, Venezuela and is currently Arena Stage’s community programs manager. Previously he was GALA Hispanic Theater’s director of education where he led the Paso Nuevo Youth Performance Group. In addition, Mauricio has worked as an educator for Young Playwrights Theatre, as a performer and educator for Superhero Clubhouse and The Society of Educational Arts (Teatro SEA) in New York City and has worked extensively as an performer with NYC Spanish Repertory Theatre, INTAR, Astoria Performing Arts Center (APAC), The Kennedy Center, The Director’s Company and Studio Theatre. He was part of the artistic team for multiple devised theater productions at Columbia University and is a graduate of the Acting Program at Marymount Manhattan College and the Shakespeare Conservatory for Actors at Yale University.

Aaron Posner

Personal Playwriting

Aaron Posner is an award-winning director, playwright, teacher, former Artistic Director of two LORT theatres, and an Associate Professor of Theatre at American University. He has directed more than 150 productions at major regional theaters across the country including Arena Stage, American Repertory Theatre, American Players Theatre, Folger Theatre, Portland Center Stage, Ford’s Theatre, Studio Theatre, Signature Theatre, Chicago Shakespeare, Milwaukee Repertory Theatre, Round House Theater, Seattle Rep, South Coast Rep, Imagination Stage, The Kennedy Center, and many more. As a playwright, his re-imaging of Chekhov’s The Seagull, entitled Stupid F**king Bird, was one of the ten most produced plays in the country in 2015 and has had more than 150 productions worldwide. Other plays include JQA, The Heal, Life Sucks, No Sisters, District Merchants, Who Am I This Time? & Other Conundrums of Love, The Chosen, My Name Is Asher Lev, The Gift of Nothing, ME…JANE, and many more. He has won numerous awards for his work including six Helen Hayes Awards, two Barrymore Awards, The Outer Circle Critics Award, a Joseph Jefferson Award, an Elliott Norton Award, The Bay Area Theatre Critics Award, The John Gassner Prize, and more. He lives in Maryland with his wife, the exceptional actress, teacher and mother, Erin Weaver, and his amazing daughter, Maisie.

Ivania Stack

Costume Design Workshop: Character Costume Collage

Ivania Stack (Costume Designer) is delighted to be part of the Arena Stage artist community, where she designed costumes for The Heiress, Right to be Forgotten, The Price, Two Trains Running, and Intelligence. Her work has been seen at many other DC theatres including: Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company (Company Member), Ford’s Theatre, Round House Theatre (Resident Artist), The Kennedy Center, Signature Theatre, Imagination Stage, Olney Theatre Center, Studio Theatre, Theatre J, 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, Baltimore Center Stage, The McCarter Theatre, Philadelphia Theatre Company, 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.

Psalmayene 24

Hip Hop Theater

Psalmayene 24 is an award-winning playwright, director, and actor. Psalm—as his colleagues call him—is currently the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation Playwright in Residence at Mosaic Theater and the Doris Duke Artist in Residence at Studio Theatre. Directing credits include PASS OVER by Antoinette Nwandu at Studio Theatre, NATIVE SON by Nambi E. Kelley at Mosaic Theater Company, WORD BECOMES FLESH (recipient of five 2017 Helen Hayes Awards, including Outstanding Direction of a Play) by Marc Bamuthi Joseph at Theater Alliance, and THE SHIPMENT by Young Jean Lee at Forum Theater . Psalm is one of the writers of Arena Stage’s coronavirus pandemic film, May22, 2020, and he wrote “Double Entendre”, the fifth episode of Roundhouse Theatre’s ten-part pandemic influenced web series Homebound. His play, LES DEUX NOIRS (2020 Charles MacArthur Award Nomination for Outstanding Original New Play or Musical and Venturous Capital Grant recipient), is inspired by a legendary 1953 confrontation between famed writers Richard Wright and James Baldwin in a Paris café and received its world premiere production at Mosaic Theater Company. Psalm has received commissions from the African Continuum Theater Company, Arena Stage, Imagination Stage, The Kennedy Center, Theater Alliance, Solas Nua, Mosaic Theater Company, and Theatrical Outfit. His one man play, FREE JUJUBE BROWN!, is recognized as a seminal work in Hip-Hop Theatre and is published in the anthology, Plays from the Boom-Box Galaxy: Theater from the Hip-Hop Generation (TCG).