I’ve spent over half my life as a vegetarian and love to adapt my own recipes. I am an animal lover, bookworm, and sci-fi geek. Born and raised in Orange County, California, I joined youth theatre, choir, and dance teams all by the age of 9. I fell in love with the community and joy of performing. These days I spend half my time on stage and the other half working behind the scenes, as an educator, director, or coordinator. My time at Free To Be Me Performing Arts Academy has been one of the most fulfilling jobs I’ve ever had. Working with kids and seeing their joy and passion for performing and self-expression often reminds me of why I do it myself, especially when things get tough. Personally, I am dedicated to making the theatre world a more inclusive and welcoming space for all artists and advocating for diversity in the rehearsal room and on the stage. 

COMING SOON.

I was memorizing Shakespeare FOR FUN at age 12. That was the kind of nerd I was… and, let’s face it, still am.  That’s when I started acting and I have known, since I stepped out on that stage opening night as Miss Hannigan in Annie, that I wanted a life in the theatre.  I never thought I could be more passionate about anything than acting, but in graduate school, I walked into my first classroom as an instructor and found my true calling.  I’ve performed in and directed theatre in Chicago and Southern California for 20 years, I was Education Director for a Children’s Theatre Academy in Lake Forest, IL and I have taught theater at 15 different colleges.  Particular artistic passions of mine include voice and movement for the actor, Theater for Youth, surrealist plays, and everything involving Shakespeare.  I’m also a dog enthusiast, my giraffe collection is a thing of legend, I’m a hiking junkie,  and I believe that travel is the greatest gift we can give ourselves.  

KCACTF came into my life as an undergrad at CSU Fullerton when I competed as an Irene Ryan competitor and partner. It was such a fulfilling and valuable experience that, when I became an educator, I continued to coach and respond for Region 3. Then during the interview for my position at Mt. SAC, I specifically asked if I could bring their theater program into KCACTF if I was hired.  And that is exactly what I did.  I’m also proud to have recently joined the Orange County Theater Guild’s Equity and Diversity Committee so I can fight for a more inclusive and welcoming space for all artists in our theater community. A worthy fight, indeed. 

BA in Acting – CSU Fullerton; MFA in Acting – Illinois State University 

I am an empath and an animal lover. I grew up in Houston, Texas, and studied Musical Theatre. While in undergrad, I attended KCACTF every year and was even honored to perform at the Kennedy Center in DC in our production of “The Laramie Project”. It was a magical experience attending those festivals and being surrounded by fellow theatre-artists!  I even had the opportunity to stage-manage a new play! After earning my Bachelor’s degree, I moved to NYC and lived there for 10 years while pursuing my career as a performer, director, and choreographer. I always knew I wanted to be an educator, but was uncertain about which grade/age group I would love working with most. While in NY, I taught all ages and realized that college was my niche. I then got my Master’s in Educational Theatre for Colleges and Communities at NYU, which then led me to move to California to get another Master’s degree, this time at CSU Fullerton for Directing. I recently got married during a pandemic, and own two cats. I am a believer in teaching lessons in being a compassionate, empathetic, and inclusive human. You never know someone else’s story. 

Sam Houston State University, NYU, at CSU Fullerton

Look at me now and I seem to blend in with the crowd. That was not always the case. When I was 7, my family moved us from New York to Arizona at a time when it was not very accepting of “different.” I was an under height, overweight, non-athletic, arts-loving Jewish child in a very non-Jewish society, suffering the slings and arrows of anti-Semitism, bullying, and body shaming. In order to avoid blatant attacks, my generation was encouraged to assimilate into our local community while keeping our, for lack of a better term, “differences” to ourselves. Theatre was where I found (and still find) find acceptance just for whom I am, the way I am. In the “outside world,” we are all considered “different,” but the sharing of ideas, the passionate discussions over our favorite plays/actors/playwrights/designers, and the discovery of new talent and works bond us all in a very special community. I am so excited that this new generation seems more enlightened, more accepting, and more celebratory of all the different aspects of each other that enrich us as people, as artists, as communities. No more hiding; no more being made to feel ashamed of who we are; only being true to oneself with pride. Now that is something I want to assimilate into.

Originally from California’s Central Valley, Carin is an Assistant Professor of Acting and Directing in the Theatre Department at CSU Stanislaus, where she teaches all levels of Acting, Directing and Introductory courses, in addition to directing in the production program. 

She has a BA in Drama from CSU Stanislaus, and received her graduate acting training from the Theatre School at DePaul University, where she studied the acting method of Jerzey Grotowski and the Linklater vocal method. Overseas, she studied at Richmond College in London, focusing on British Theatre Studies, Shakespeare’s tragedies and the history of the West End Musical. She earned her Master of Fine Arts in Theatre, with a concentration in Performance and Directing, from Humboldt State University. Her graduate projects included plays by Sam Shepard and Shakespeare, as well as adaptations of classical Greek Drama. Her Master’s thesis focused on female characters in abusive and violent circumstances.

Carin has worked in theatre locally and far away for about 25 years. Some favorite gigs include the London International Festival of Theatre, where she worked in production and marketing for international directors such as Deborah Warner as well as South Africa’s Market Theatre, and a stint at Portland Stage Company, where she worked as an assistant director, assistant dramaturg and assistant literary manager. Carin has directed and performed at Sonora’s Sierra Repertory Theatre, where she directed original plays for children’s theatre in local elementary and high schools as well as directing on the Fallon House Stage in Columbia State Park. She spent ten-years running the Theatre program at Merced College as well as founding their Standardized Patient program for actors and the Allied Health program. 

Carin takes creative interest in the Theatre of the Absurd, the Margolis Method for Actors, the plays of Sam Shepard, Tennessee Williams and Sarah Ruhl, New Works, and, in particular, adapting the works of the Ancient Greeks and William Shakespeare.

Holding an MFA in Musical Theatre from San Diego State University, Chris is a Professor of Theatre and Cinema at College of the Sequoias in Visalia, CA, where he serves as director, fight choreographer, and scenic designer.  At COS, he has directed Stupid Fucking Bird, Hookman, The Three Musketeers, Macbeth, The Crucible, Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson, In the Heights, Tartuffe, Animal Farm, Metamorphoses, Company,  A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Julius Caesar, Urinetown: The Musical, The Hobbit, The Grapes of Wrath, As You Like It, Something Wicked This Way Comes, Rashomon, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, Dracula, Our Country’s Good, and Richard III as well as designed the sets for such ambitious productions as The Phantom of the Opera, Sweeney Todd, and The Secret Garden.  In addition to his work at COS, Chris has directed at regional theatres throughout California and designed and built puppets for productions of Avenue Q and Shrek: The Musical.  As an actor, Chris has worked across the nation in such venues as Milwaukee Repertory Theatre, Court Theatre: Chicago, and Lamb’s Players, and even adapted his own one-man production of Dicken’s A Christmas Carol.  He currently resides in Visalia with his wife and best friend, Diane, and their beautiful daughter, Sage. 

Coming Soon

COMING SOON.

(Prefer: Jess to Jessica. She/Her/Hers) I am a devoted yet somewhat unexceptional performer, an intense and driven director and stage combat choreographer, and a brutally pragmatic theatre administrator and educator with bouts of devil-may-care whimsy. A gen-x-er born in Georgia, raised in Vermont, that  lived 20 years in Alaska and now resides in Hawai’i with 30 years of arts admin experience to date, I am a continual work in progress with a foundational desire to champion the arts, creativity, innovation, performer safety, and representation.

MFA University of Hawai’i at Manoa (Asian Theatre)