Exclusion

KENNETH LIN

Playwright

Kenneth Lin (Playwright) is an award-winning playwright and screenwriter whose plays Exclusion, Kleptocracy, Life on Paper, Warrior Class, Intelligence-Slave, Fallow, Po Boy Tango, and said Saïd have garnered widespread acclaim. His awards and honors include the Princess Grace Award, Kendeda Graduate Playwriting Competition, L. Arnold Weissberger Award, and TCG Edgerton New Play Prize. He has written and produced several film and television projects and was nominated for an Emmy for his work on House of Cards. Education: Yale School of Drama, US Fulbright Fellowship. Upcoming: Farewell My Concubine with composer Jason Robert Brown. Kenneth currently resides in Los Angeles with his wife and sons. kklin.com

TRIP CULLMAN

Director

Trip Cullman (Director) Broadway: The Rose Tattoo, Choir Boy, Lobby Hero, Six Degrees of Separation, Significant Other. Select Off-Broadway: Moscow Moscow Moscow Moscow Moscow Moscow, Yen, Punk Rock (Obie Award), A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Gynecologic Oncology Unit at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center of New York City (MCC); Days of Rage, The Layover, The Substance of Fire, Lonely, I’m Not, Bachelorette, Some Men, Swimming in the Shallows (Second Stage); Unknown Soldier, The Pain of My Belligerence, Assistance, A Small Fire (Drama Desk nomination), The Drunken City (Playwrights Horizons); Choir Boy (MTC); Murder Ballad (MTC and Union Square Theatre); The Mother, I’m Gonna Pray For You So Hard (Atlantic); Roulette (EST); The Hallway Trilogy: Nursing (Rattlestick); The Last Sunday in June (Rattlestick and Century Center); Dog Sees God (Century Center); U.S. Drag (stageFARM); and several productions with The Play Company. London: The Colby Sisters of Pittsburgh, PA (Tricycle). Select regional: Geffen, Alliance, Old Globe, La Jolla, South Coast Rep, Bay Street, Williamstown Theatre Festival.

ARNULFO MALDONADO

Set Designer

Arnulfo Maldonado (Set Designer) last designed American Prophet at Arena Stage. Other D.C. credits include: A Strange Loop, Shipwreck (Woolly Mammoth); Everybody (Shakespeare); Pipeline (Studio). Broadway: Topdog/Underdog, A Strange Loop, Trouble in Mind. Off-Broadway: Shhhh (Atlantic); one in two (The New Group); Nollywood Dreams, School Girls… (MCC); Sugar in Our Wounds [Lucille Lortel Award] (MTC); A Strange Loop [Special Citation Obie], Selling Kabul, Dance Nation (Playwrights Horizons); To My Girls (Second Stage); A Case for the Existence of God [Lucille Lortel nominee], Fires in the Mirror (Signature). Regional: Alley Theatre, Berkeley Rep, CTG, Guthrie, Huntington, Steppenwolf. International Tour: The Magnetic Fields: 50 Song Memoir. Arnulfo was a Tony nominee for Best Scenic Design of a Musical for A Strange Loop, 2020 Obie Sustained Excellence in Set Design, Princess Grace Fabergé Theater Award, Henry Hewes Design Award nominee. arnulfomaldonado.com IG: @arnulfo.maldonado.design

SARAH CUBBAGE

Costume Designer

Sarah Cubbage (Costume Designer)’s favorite designs include: Crazy for You, directed by Susan Stroman, David Geffen Hall; Triumph of Love and Hippolyte et Aricie, directed by Stephen Wadsworth, The Juilliard School; Beauty and the Beast, Disney Creative Entertainment. Off-Broadway: Soho Rep, Theater for the New City, Aquila Theatre Company, Urban Stages, Ohio Theatre, Atlantic Theater Company. Regional: Round House Theatre: The Tempest, co-directed by Aaron Posner and Teller, Spring Awakening,  The Heal, co-produced with The Getty Villa; Signature Theatre: A Chorus Line; Center Stage: That Face; American Repertory Theater: The Lily’s Revenge; Syracuse Stage: Disgraced, In the Next Room; Folger Theatre: King John; Studio Theatre: Kings, The Wolves, The Hard Problem; Olney Theatre: The Crucible, Labour of Love; Mosaic Theater Company: Unseen; Theater J: Compulsion, Actually. Dance: Dark Lark (BAM, Kate Weare Company); The Radio Show (Bessie Award, Kyle Abraham/Abraham.In.Motion). Member USA 829. www.sarahcubbage.com

ADAM HONORÉ

Lighting Designer

Adam Honoré (Lighting Designer) is a Harlem-based designer for plays, musicals, and live events. His résumé includes Broadway productions, regional shows, and international premieres. Adam is a Drama Desk, Henry Hewes, Elliot Norton, and Helen Hayes Award nominee; AUDELCO Award recipient; and is listed on Live Design Magazine’s “30 Under 30.”

SUN HEE KIL

Sound Designer

Sun Hee Kil (Sound Designer) is from South Korea. Design credits include Off-Broadway: As You Like It [Shakespeare in the Park], Suffs [Henry Hewes nomination], The Visitor (Public Theater); A Man of No Importance (CSC); Regional: The Sound of Music (Paper Mill Playhouse). Associate design credits include 2018 PyeongChang Winter Olympics Opening and Closing Ceremonies; Broadway: Choir Boy (Tony Award), Bernhardt/Hamlet, The Rose Tattoo; Off-Broadway: Emmet Otter (New Victory); Greater Clements (Lincoln Center); International Tour: Dreamgirls. Associate Professor of Sound Design at SUNY New Paltz. www.sunheekil.com

HSIN-LEI CHEN

Original Music

Hsin-Lei Chen (Original Music) is a composer based in Taiwan. She holds bachelor’s degrees in composition from Taipei National University of the Arts and a doctoral degree from the College-Conservatory of Music at the University of Cincinnati. Her works have won numerous awards and have been performed at prestigious venues around the world. Chen has collaborated with various orchestras, ensembles, and choirs, and has recently been invited to create works for the Luxembourg Music Festival with MYX'D Quartet in Bulgaria. She also serves as Secretary-General of the ISCM-Taiwan, Artistic Director of Spring Sprouts Chamber, Resident Composer of Whispering Choir, and Adjunct Assistant Professor at National Tsing Hua University and National Taichung University of Education.

ANNE NESMITH

Wig Designer

Anne Nesmith (Wig Designer)’s Arena Stage design credits include Seven Guitars, Jubilee, Indecent, The Heiress, Nina Simone: Four Women, A Raisin in the Sun, The Little Foxes, All the Way, Fiddler on the Roof, and Mother Courage and Her Children. Upcoming work includes La Bohème (Seiji Ozawa Music Festival), Semele (Wolf Trap Opera), Don Giovanni (Hyogo Performing Arts Center, Japan), and Sweeney Todd (Signature Theatre). Her designs have been seen at the Kennedy Center, Opera Philadelphia, Washington Ballet, Ford’s Theatre, and Opera Boston. Anne was the resident Wig/Makeup Designer for the Baltimore Opera and has created wigs for the National Museum of African American History and Culture, Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery programs, Investigation Discovery’s Ice Cold Killers, Maryland Public Television, and the U.S. Army’s tour Spirit of America.

SORDELET INC.

Fight Director

Sordelet Inc. (Fight Director) Rick and his sons, Christian Kelly-Sordelet and Collin Kelly-Sordelet, created Sordelet Inc., a Native-owned action movement company with 30 years of experience. They have done 80 Broadway productions, including The Lion King, Beauty and the Beast, Wolf Hall, Waiting for Godot, Tina, and Jesus Christ Superstar; National Tours with 52 first-class productions worldwide, including Beauty and the Beast UK Tour, West End production, and soon Broadway; opera, with many productions at The Met, La Scala, The Royal Opera House, as well as serving as resident fight/intimacy directors for Santa Fe Opera since 2015; films, including, The Game Plan starring Dwayne Johnson, Dan in Real Life starring Steve Carell, Ben is Back starring Julia Roberts, Respect starring Jennifer Hudson, One True Loves starring Simu Liu, and Blue Light; and loads of television productions. They teach at William Esper Studio, HB Studio, CUNY Harlem, Montclair State, Kean University, and 22 years at Yale School of Drama. Rick is a board member for Red Bull Theater.

JOCELYN CLARKE

Dramaturg

Jocelyn Clarke (Dramaturg) is senior dramaturg at Arena Stage in Washington, D.C. He was Theatre Advisor to the Arts Council of Ireland for ten years. As a dramaturg, Clarke has worked with writers such as Katori Hall, Taylor Mac, Lydia Diamond, Abhishek Majumdar, Eduardo Machado, Charles Randolph-Wright, Lisa Kron, Craig Lucas, Carl Hancock Rux, Mary Kathryn Nagle, Tanya Saracho, and Karen Zacarías. He was a script editor on several Irish films, including Young Offenders, and was executive story editor on all three seasons of the BBC/RTE TV series Young Offenders. He is a writer on the second season of P-Valley, Katori Hall’s acclaimed TV series for Starz. His new adaptation of Elizabeth Swados’ musical The Beautiful Lady, will be directed by Anne Bogart at La MaMa Theatre in New York in 2023.

ZOË ELIZABETH LILLIS

Dramaturg

Zoë Elizabeth Lillis (Dramaturg) is a director, producer, playwright, and dramaturg. While typically based in New York, Zoë is thrilled to have joined Arena Stage’s 2022/23 Season as an Allen Lee Hughes Fellow. She had the honor of assistant directing Arena’s world premiere of My Body No Choice. Zoë has worked on Broadway with Manhattan Theatre Club and Second Stage, Off-Broadway with The Public Theater, the cell, and Theatre Row, and regionally with Arena Stage, The Huntington Theatre Company, and Hawaii Performing Arts Festival. She earned her BA in Directing and Dramatizing History at NYU Gallatin, where she focused on the relationship between narrative and the process of production. As the descendant of Exclusion Era Chinese immigrants, Zoë is incredibly proud to be a part of this production. zoelillis.com

JOSEPH PINZON

Casting Director

Joseph Pinzon (Casting Director) is the founder and creative producer of the contemporary circus company Short Round Productions and its award-winning show Filament. With over 25 years of performing experience, he has worked internationally with renowned companies such as Cirque Éloize, Compagnia Finzi Pasca, Cirque du Soleil, and The 7 Fingers. He holds an MS in Arts Leadership from USC, a BA in Psychology from UCLA, and graduated from the National Circus School in Montreal with a specialization in aerial techniques. He was the casting and resident director for Chamäleon Productions (Berlin) and Constellation Immersive (CAA’s experiential affiliate). He is also a member of the Creative & Independent Producer Alliance and a founding board member of the American Circus Alliance. You can see him causing chaos on season 6 of Nailed It! on Netflix, where (spoiler alert) he is a part of the series’ first three-way tie. 

KELLY GILLESPIE, CSA

New York Casting

Kelly Gillespie, CSA (New York Casting) is the Casting Director at Manhattan Theatre Club, where she has been on staff for the past fifteen years. Favorite recent MTC projects include Prayer for the French Republic, The Best We Could, Skeleton Crew, Ink, Choir Boy, and The Explorers Club. She has also cast plays for the WP Theater, The Old Globe, Two River Theater, Actors Theatre of Louisville, McCarter Theatre, Philadelphia Theatre Company, Repertory Theatre of St. Louis, Marin Theatre Company, Miami New Drama, City Theatre, Merrimack Rep, The Foundry Theatre, EST, 13P, T.A.C.T., and Keen Company, as well as a few radio projects for WNYC. She is a graduate of the University of Michigan.

CHRISTI B. SPANN

Stage Manager

Christi B. Spann (Stage Manager) has been working as a stage manager in DC since 2011. Favorite Arena Stage productions include A Raisin in the Sun and Junk. She previously spent 12 seasons on the stage management staff at the Denver Center Theatre Company and has also worked with The Great River Shakespeare Festival in Winona, MN and Virginia Repertory Theatre in Richmond, VA.

EMILY ANN MELLON

Assistant Stage Manager

Emily Ann Mellon (Assistant Stage Manager) is returning to Arena Stage for their seventh season and twenty-second production. Selected DMV credits include: The Till Trilogy (Mosaic Theater Co); There’s Always the Hudson (Woolly Mammoth Theatre Co); Souvenir (Rep Stage); A Doll’s House, Part 2 (Round House Theatre); Girlfriend (Signature Theatre); Wig Out! (Studio Theatre); and The School for Lies (Shakespeare Theatre Co). Additional regional credits include: The Niceties (Geva Theatre Center) and The Upstairs Concierge (Goodman Theatre). Television credits include: Inside Edition and Good Day New York.