Deborah Stein is a playwright and filmmaker. Her play MARGINAL LOSS premiered at the Actors Theatre of Louisville Humana Festival in 2018. Other recent projects include THE WHOLEHEARTED (world premiere at the Kirk Douglas/Center Theatre Group and La Jolla Playhouse, New York premiere at Abrons Art Center) and CHIMERA (Under the Radar; Gate Theatre in London; Drama Desk nominee for Best Solo Performance). Deborah’s other plays include GOD SAVE GERTRUDE (Theatre @ Boston Court, Workhaus Collective), WALLFLOWER (Stages Rep), and NATASHA AND THE COAT (Minnesota Jewish Theatre). She is the director THE BITTER GAME by Keith Wallace, a commission from La Jolla Playhouse seen at the Public Theater in 2017, where Ben Brantley called it “a sharp reminder of the power of live theatre” in The New York Times. Her short film, DELPHINE, screened at Portland Film Festival, Cannes Indie Shorts, and Fairfax Film Festival (Best Director). Deborah has developed pilots with ABC Signature, Freeform, and Best Day Ever, and received support from NYSCA, Minnesota State Arts Board, Women in Film, and the Sloan, Jerome, Bush, and McKnight Foundations. She is currently under commission from Manhattan Theatre Club and Playwrights Horizons. Born and raised in NYC, she currently lives in LA with her family and teaches playwriting at UC San Diego.

Arlene Hutton (she/her/hers) is the author of Last Train to Nibroc, which received a New York Drama League Best Play nomination and was a finalist for the Francesca Primus Prize. Regional theatre credits include B Street, Chester Theatre, Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park, Florida Studio Theatre, Kitchen Theatre, Mad Cow, Rubicon Theatre, and Washington Stage Guild. Her plays, including I Dream Before I Take the Stand and As It Is In Heaven, have been presented at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, Off- and Off-Off-Broadway, in London and throughout the world. Her works have been published by Dramatists Play Service, Samuel French, Playscripts, and Dramatic Publishing and appear in textbooks and best play anthologies.

An alumna of New Dramatists and member of Ensemble Studio Theatre, Honor Roll!, New Circle Theatre Company, and New Light Theater Project, Hutton is a three-time winner of the Samuel French Short Play Festival, nine-time finalist for the Heideman Award, and recipient of the Lippman and Calloway awards. She has received commissions and grants from the EST/Sloan Foundation, NYSCA, the Bushwick Starr pet project, the South Carolina Arts Commission, the Educational Theatre Association, the Big Bridge Theatre Consortium, the Carthage College New Play Initiative, and Cherry Lane Alternative. Hutton has taught at the College of Charleston, Fordham University and the Sewanee Writers Conference and was twice named the Tennessee Williams Fellow at the University of the South. Residencies include the Australian National Playwrights Conference, Blue Mountain Center, MacDowell Colony, SPACE at Ryder Farm, VCCA, Winterthur and Yaddo. Based in New York City, she is on the faculty of Goddard College and teaches playwriting at The Barrow Group.

Orietta Crispino is an accomplished theatre artist, born in Italy. She is a graduate of the prestigious Piccolo Teatro School in Milan, where she worked with the major Italian directors Giorgio Strehler and Massimo Castri. She later taught acting and directing there. Among her many theatre projects are: Passport No. 23.922, a piece she wrote and directed on the life of Tina Modotti; and a three-year project in Trieste directing the plays of Pirandello’s Italian contemporaries. She is a member of the Lincoln Center Directors Lab and the League of Professional Theatre Women. In addition to her theatre work, Ms. Crispino has done art projects on the body in its performative aspect. Her body research culminated in a performance piece with the photographer Vibeke Jensen, Camera Obscura, shown at PS1 in New York, Bogota, and Trieste. Ms. Crispino is currently the Artistic Director at TheaterLab.

In addition to Let Me Cook For You, her most recent productions there are Three Sisters Come and Go and Snow in the Living Room, a retelling of the Brothers Grimm’s Snow White.

Kristina Poe spent the first twenty years of her theater career stage/company/production managing regionally and in New York, including a seven-year stint as company manager for LAByrinth Theater Company. Her first play, Love Sick, was produced in both L.A. (extended twice, and named one of the Top Ten Reviewed plays in L.A.) and NYC, and is published by Dramatists Play Service. Her next play, The Restlessness of Desire, closed out LAByrinth’s Barn Series and was a Semi-Finalist for the O’Neill Conference. The Idea of Me was selected as part of the 2015 Mentor Project at Cherry Lane Theatre (mentored by Chay Yew) and most recently was part of LAByrinth’s Barn Series. Her work has also been developed at Barefoot Theater Company, The Actors Studio, The Public Theater, NY Madness, Nylon Fusion Theatre Company, and Cincinnati Playhouse, and published by Dramatists Play Service and in Smith & Kraus Best Monologues of 2014. She has received the Celebrating Women Playwrights grant, attended University of North Carolina School of the Arts, and is a member of LAByrinth Theater Company and The Actors Studio Playwright/Directors Unit.