Company Profiles

Artistic Director - Robert Currier
Managing Director - Lesley Currier
Education Director - Luis Araquistain

Company

Guest Director - James Dunn
Fight Direction - The Academy of the Sword
Set Designer - Bruce Lackovic
Lighting Designer - Ellen Brooks
Composer - Billie Cox
Props Designer - Joel Eis

Staff
Administrative Assistant - Whitney Ward
House Manager - Karen West
Web Designer - J. Bell

Past Company

Guest Director - Rob Clare
Stage Manager - Heath Belden
Education Director - Josh Costello
Education Director - Jonathan Gonzolez
Education Director - Kate McGill
Guest Director - Robert W. Goldsby
Box Office Manager - Amy Hatch
Costume Designer - Pamela Johnson
Guest Director - Cynthia White
Administrative Assistant - Elias Escobedo

Robert Currier co-founded Marin Shakespeare Company in 1989. He holds a B.A. in Drama and an M.F.A. in Directing from U.C. Irvine, where he helped establish the Objective Drama Project with the legendary theatrical guru Jerzy Grotowski in the early 1980's. An actor, director, writer and designer, Robert co-founded Encounter With the Theatre at the Woodstock Illinois Opera House (artistic home of the young Orson Welles) in 1971 and the Ukiah Players Theatre in 1977. He and Lesley initiated Baja Shakespeare, Baja del Sur's only live classical theatre company in Los Barriles, Mexico in 2001. Robert has directed well over 100 productions. For Marin Shakespeare Company he has directed The Comedy of Errors (1992), The Tempest (1993), A Midsummer Night's Dream (Bay Area Theatre Critics Award, "Best Overall Production." 1994), Much Ado About Nothing (1995), Peter Pan (1996), Taming of the Shrew, ("Best Production in Marin" 1997), The Complete Works of WiIIm. Shkspr. (abridged) (1998, Critics Circle nominee, 1999).Twelfth Night (1999), The Merchant of Venice ("Best Production in Marin," 2000), The Servant of Two Masters (Dean Goodman Choice Award for Direction, 2001), Hamlet (2001), Macbeth (Choice Award for "Best Direction" and "Best Overall Production", 2002), The Merry Wives of Windsor (Choice Award for Direction, 2003) and A Midsummer Night's Dream (2003.) He has been an Adjunct Professor of Shakespeare Studies at Dominican University of California.

Lesley Currier is the founding Managing Director of Marin Shakespeare Company, which she has worked to develop as a community cultural and educational resource since 1989. She holds a B.A. in Religion from Princeton University, where she was awarded the Frances LeMoyne Page Award for Theatre. Lesley spent three years with the Ukiah Players, where she acted, produced and served as fundraiser coordinator for the Phase II building expansion. In 1988, while in Ukiah, she initiated the New American Comedy Festival. After a season acting at Ashland's Oregon Shakespeare Festival, she studied at U.C. Irvine's M.F.A. Program in Acting, before being invited to Marin with Robert to found Marin Shakespeare Company. Her original adaptation of A Thousand and One Arabian Nights, which she directed, was one of five nominees for "Best Overall Production of 2002" by the Bay Area Critics Circle. She also adapted and directed Alice in Wonderland for Marin Shakespeare Company in 2006. Lesley is past President of the Shakespeare Theatre Association of America, served on Theatre Bay Area's Theatre Service Committee for six years, and has twice served on grants panels for the National Endowment for the Arts. In 2007, Lesley was elected the Marin Women's Hall of Fame. [Women's Hall of Fame.]

Associate Artists

Heath Belden / Stage Manager
Heath came to Marin Shakespeare Company in 2004. He has recently stage-managed Laughter on the 23rd Floor for Center REPertory Company, A Streetcar Named Desire for Pacific Alliance Stage Company, Once Upon A Mattress, starring Lea DeLaria, for 42nd Street Moon, and five operas with Donald Pippin’s Pocket Opera. He has worked as an ASM at the American Conservatory Theatre and San Jose Musical Theatre. Heath has worked on such new plays as Sarah Ruhl’s Eurydice, Ken Weitzman’s Spin Moves, and Charles L. Mee’s Wintertime. He received an M.F.A. degree from UC San Diego and is a member of Theatre Bay Area and Actors’ Equity Association.

Rob Clare / Guest Artist
Formerly an actor with the Royal Shakespeare Company, Dr. Clare also worked as an Assistant Director to Sir Peter Hall before completing a D.Phil. at Oxford University on the theatrical interpretation of Shakespeare ‘s verse and prose. Rob has taught at many of the leading actor training schools in the British Isles, and now coaches actors at the Royal Shakespeare Company. He created and led the Masters Program in Classical Acting at London's Central School of Speech and Drama, and as an Adjunct Professor at Rutgers University he also taught Shakespearean Acting at London's Globe Theatre. He has also worked on Shakespeare in India, Germany, Ireland and Switzerland, and is currently a visiting Research Fellow at Warwick University, preparing a practical guide for actors and directors to differing approaches to Shakespearean verse, and how to give it theatrical life. Rob co-directed with Robert Currier the 2007 MSC productions of Henry IV, Part 1 and Henry IV, Part 2.

James Dunn / Guest Director
James is a native of Marin County and was Founder and Chairman of the College of Marin Drama Department, where he directed and taught for 30 years. In the 1960's he was co-founder and director of the California Shakespeare Festival. In the 1970's he was artistic director of the California Act Theatre. He has been a guest director with California Actors Theatre, the Old Globe Theatre in San Diego, the Julliard School in New York City, the Monterey Shakespeare Festival, the Marin Theatre Company, the Denver Theatre Center, Shakespeare at Stinson and the Marin Shakespeare Company. He has been the director of the Marin Mountain Play since 1994. He has received many awards including six "Best Direction" Awards from BATCC as well as Dean Goodman Choice Awards for his direction of Marin Shakespeare Company's As You Like It and Cyrano de Bergerac.

Ellen Brooks / Lighting Designer
Ellen has acted, directed and designed at theatres all over the Bay Area. She won a Dean Goodman Choice Award for Lighting Design for the 2001 Marin Shakespeare Company season.

Billie Cox / Composer
Billie has composed and designed sound for Marin Shakespeare Company since 1995. A multi-talented artist, Billie also directs children's theatre, writes original musicals, authors CD-Roms, and has composed for theatre, video and film. She is founder of Dig Deal Theatre Company.

Joel Eis / Prop Designer
Joel is a professional scenic/lighting designer and university professor. He has designed over 250 shows, and written two books on theatre. He and his wife Toni currently own The Rebound Bookstore in San Rafael. He loves finding ridiculous plastic do-dads for actors to stick in their belts, on their heads, and he likes getting lots of other stuff too.

Bruce Lackovic / Set Designer
Bruce has designed and built sets for Marin Shakespeare Company since 1996. A welder, sign-maker, and all-around technical guru, Bruce has served as a California Artist in Residence at Redwood High School and as Technical Theatre Consultant for the Ross Valley Community for Schools.

Richard Lane / The Academy of the Sword / Fight Direction
The Academy of the Sword was founded and is run by Richard Lane, a Certified Teacher/Fight Director with the Society of American Fight Directors. Richard has directed fights at Berkeley Repertory Theatre, the San Francisco Opera, Magic Theatre, Theatreworks and nationwide, amassing numerous awards. Richard has served as Fight Director for the Marin Shakespeare Company for more than ten years. He is the author of Swashbuckling: The Art of Stage Combat and Theatrical Swordplay.

Staff

Luis Araquistain - Education Director
Luis was the Executive Director of the Traverse City Children's Theatre in Traverse City, Michigan for five years. Previously, he served as Educational Outreach Director for Pacifica's Spindrift School of Performing Arts, and as a teaching artist with San Francisco Shakespeare Festival. His acting credits include San Francisco Shakespeare Festival and New Conservatory Theatre. Luis is a San Francisco native and is proficient in Spanish. With his wife, Margie, he sidelines as a web designer doing business as Hipcat Design.

Whitney Ward / Administrative Assistant
Whitney is back in the Bay Area after earning her M.A. in Linguistics at Yale University. Her previous theater experience includes two summers as Administrative Manager at Northern Stage in Vermont. She has also worked in Stage Management for Lamplighter’s Musical Theater, Ambit Theater, and as an undergraduate at UC Berkeley.

Karen West / House Manager
Karen's passions are theatre and literature. She worked for six years in author promotions for Barnes & Noble. Prior to that, she piloted a 5 year Theater-in-the-Galleries program, acting in and directing over 30 plays. She is a founding member of Courtyard Shakespeare and has acted with PCPA Theatrefest and run box office for PCPA and Cal State Fresno. She has a B.A. in Theatre from SFSU.

J Bell / Web Designer
Judy joined Marin Shakespeare in November of 2003. Formerly web mistress for the insider parent pages of RL Stevenson School, Pebble Beach, and webmistress at www.softech.org, she is a Jill of all trades. Over the years she has developed web pages, customized Word Press, Drupal, and other Content management systems, set up spreadsheets, phone directories, databases and helped her husband create the program that eventually computerized the Marin Swim league in the early 90s. She particularly enjoys the artistic process of working with the images that make the pages come alive. www.jbelldesigns.com

Past Associate Artists

Josh Costello / Past Education Director
Josh Costello received his BFA in Theatre Education and Stage Direction from Boston University and his MFA in Directing from the University of Washington in Seattle. He was the founder and first Artistic Director of Impact Theatre, a Berkeley company specializing in new work by emerging playwrights for today's younger generations. Josh has taught for the California Shakespeare Theatre, San Francisco Shakespeare Festival, American Conservatory Theatre, South Coast Repertory Theatre, UC Riverside, the American Academy of Dramatic Arts and Vector Theatre. As a director, he has worked at the Magic Theatre, The Marsh, Shakespeare-by-the-Sea and Impact Theatre, among others. www.joshcostello.com

Elias Escobedo / Past Administrative Assistant
A San Francisico native, Elias received his BA in Dramatic Arts from U.C. Davis. He has acted with Marin Shakespeare Company in Henry IV, Part 1; Henry IV, Part 2; King Lear and as Benvolio in Romeo & Juliet (Dean Goodman Choice Award.) Elias has worked with Cal Shakes, TheatreWorks, Berkeley Rep, SF Playhouse, Valley Shakes, New Conservatory Theatre, Theatre Rhino, Belrose Theatre, Curtain Theatre, and Summer Repertory Theatre. His commercial and TV credits include Albertson’s, Save-Mart, Longs Drugs, Kaiser Permanente, and Blind Date. He belongs to AEA, AFTRA and Theatre Bay Area. www.EliasEscobedo.com

Robert W. Golsby / Past Guest Director
Robert has had a long and distinguish career in the theatre. He is best known in the Bay Area as a founder of the American Conservatory Theatre's MFA Program, Chair of U.C. Berkeley's Theatre Department for 25 years, and a founder of the Berkeley Stage Company, which staged new work for ten years in Berkeley. He is a Moliere scholar and translator and he has directed at numerous major regional theatres including South Coast Rep and the Mark Taper Forum.

Jonathan Gonzalez / Past Education Director
A New Mexico native, Jonathan has taught and directed in numerous schools in Marin and beyond, most recently for Dixie Elementary, Neil Cummins, Rancho Elementary, St Isabella's, and the Coleman School.

He is an artist-in-residence with Youth-in-arts in San Rafael and runs the drama club for St. Catherine's middle school in Burlingame. In seven years with the San Francisco Shakespeare Festival, he directed tours of Romeo and Juliet and Macbeth, performed in six tours, and appeared in two seasons of Free Shakespeare In The Park.

In addition to leading numerous Marin Shakespeare Young Company sessions, Jonathan has directed Teen productions of The Taming of the Shrew, Love's Labour's Lost, She Stoops to Conquer, King Lear and Troilus and Cressida. In 2005 he is directing the Teen Touring Company's As You Like It.

In 2004 he taught a weekly Shakespeare class at San Quentin prison which culminated in a night of scenes and monologues featuring professional actors and inmates. As an actor, Jonathan has been seen at Berkeley Rep, The California, Stinson, and Carmel Shakespeare Festivals, Theatre Rhinoceros, Center Rep, Western Stage, and Pacific Rep, among others. For Marin Shakespeare Company, Jonathan appeared in Cyrano De Bergerac, Much Ado About Nothing (Dean Goodman choice award for supporting actor) A Thousand and One Arabian Nights, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Othello, She Stoops to Conquer, and Taming of The Shrew. Professional Directing work includes Town Hall Theatre, The Exit Theatre, Masque Unit, and Penninsula Youth Theatre.

Kate Magill / Past Education Director
Katel has found success in several realms of live theatre – she has worked, at one time or another, as an actor, a costume designer, a stage manager, a teacher/director and an arts administrator. For nearly a decade, she served as leading actress, theatre teacher and Resident Costume Designer for Gamut Theatre Group (Harrisburg Shakespeare Festival / Popcorn Hat Players Children’s Theatre) in Harrisburg, PA. Most recently, she spent several years in the Deep South, as the Education Program Coordinator for the Alabama Shakespeare Festival in Montgomery, Alabama where she was responsible for ASF’s SchoolFest (matinee) Program, reaching upwards of 45,000 students yearly. She also managed and taught in various summer camps, designed curriculum for outreach programs, including NEA-funded workshop for Shakespeare for a New Generation, and managed / taught in ASF’s Acting Academy, including developing a new wing of the Acting Academy geared toward homeschooled children. In addition, Kate has been an actor and stage manager for Open Stage of Harrisburg, and an Adjunct Professor of Costume Design/Resident Designer for Gettysburg College and a production assistant for Alabama Shakespeare Festival. Kate is married to actor Mark Robinson and they have two canine ‘babies’ – Ace and Angel.

Amy Young Hatch / Past Box Office Manager
Amy is a College of Marin graduate and a Journeyman member of IATSE Local #16, which services theatre, film, commercials and industrials, she has worked in a large variety of positions at many leading entertainment and cultural organizations and has been associated with Marin Shakespaere in various capacities for four years.

Pamela Johnson / Past Costume Designer
Pamela has been the resident Costume Designer at Sonoma State University since 1990 and has designed over 100 shows for theatres from Mendocino to San Francisco. She won a Dean Goodman Award for her Costume Design for Marin Shakespeare's Cyrano de Bergerac.

Cynthia White / Past Guest Director
Cynthia was Associate Director and Director of New Play Development at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival from 1991-1996. She has directed at many regional Theatres including Milwaukee Repertory Theatre, Alabama Shakespeare Festival, Utah Shakespearean festival and the Virginia Shakespeare Festival. Cynthia is artistic director of Golden Fish Theatre in Seattle Washington and hold an M.F.A. in Directing from Southern Methodist University

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