Robert Benz (Dr. Eugene Sorn) This is Robert’s first appearance with Edmonton Actors Theatre. Selected Theatre: A Christmas Carol (Citadel); 10 out of 12, The Realistic Joneses, Passion Play, Shining City, The Pillowman (Wild Side); Scaramouche Jones (Blarney); Romeo & Juliet, Love’s Labours Lost, Coriolanus, As You Like It, The Taming of the Shrew (Freewill); Equivocation, The Black Bonspiel of Wullie MacCrimmon, God of Carnage, Gordon Winter, A Christmas Carol (Persephone); Where the Blood Mixes (Network, Aquarius, WCT); Hamlet, The Merry Wives of Windsor, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Antony & Cleopatra, The Tempest (Shakespeare on the Saskatchewan); Where the Blood Mixes, Buz’Gem Blues, Wawatay (Saskatchewan Native Theatre); The Beauty Queen of Leenane (Magnus). Selected television: Corner Gas, renegadepress.com, The Englishman’s Boy, & Prairie Giant: The Tommy Douglas Story. |
Zoe Glassman (Nina) is an Alberta-based actor and dancer. She trained at the Edmonton School of Ballet before completing her BFA in acting at the University of Alberta. Select acting credits include Subway Circus (Blarney Productions), Control (Major Matt Mason), Bloody Poetry, Love’s Labour’s Lost, Blood Wedding, Tribes (Studio Theatre), and a co-created children’s show called For When She Wakes (Skirtsafire Festival). Zoe teaches dance at La Girandole in Edmonton, and is a collaborator with the Major Matt Mason Collective in Calgary. MMM's devised piece Little Red (in collaboration with Ghost River Theatre) will premiere this spring. |
Ben Stevens (Dev) was born and raised in Edmonton and has recently been seen in Anxiety (Theatre Yes), Much Ado About Nothing (Thou Art Here), Never Swim Alone (Blarney Productions), For the Love of Cynthia (Teatro la Quindicina), and Gordon (Theatre Network). As a performer and playwright, Ben is an active creator of new works, including Emily Etterson's Economical Eco-friendly Water Service (For Chairty!) (Two Little/ SKAMpede), The Van (Found Festival), Brake, Home Video (Heartmeat), Herbert and If I Had a Horse (Ben, Dave, Steve). Ben is an Artistic Associate with Thou Art Here Theatre, Edmonton's site-sympathetic Shakespeare company. 
Paula Humby (Mash) is an Edmonton based actor and musician. Recent credits include: A Christmas Carol (Theatre Calgary), For the Love of Cynthia (Teatro la Quindicina), Ursa Major (Catch the Keys/Workshop West), Les Blues des Oubliées (L'Unithéâtre) and Economical Eco-friendly Water Service (For Chairty!) which she co-wrote with her partner-in-crime Ben Stevens for the Skampede Festival in Victoria. She has also had some fun TV appearances, including competing in a French Canadian Reality show about singing families, and hosting an eco-friendly mini-series called Sustainable Me for Telus Optik. Catch her next, right here in the Backstage Theatre this April, in Bone Wars (Punctuate Theatre). 
Mat Simpson (Con) is a graduate of the BFA acting program here at the University of Alberta and is incredibly excited to be performing this play with such a fantastic company. Past credits include Horatio in Hamlet, Algernon in The Importance of Being Earnest, Bunny Booher in Dead Centre of Town and Ferdinand in Shakespeare in the Park’s production of The Tempest. Enjoy the show! |
Melissa Thingelstad (Emma Arkadina) is an Edmonton-based theatre artist originally from Saskatchewan, Melissa received her B.F.A. in Acting at the University of Alberta. She is Associate Producer for theatre no. 6 and an Artistic Associate with Theatre Yes. Selected credits include: 10 Out of 12 (Wildside Productions), The Supine Cobbler (The Maggie Tree), The Laws of Thermodynamics and The List (Theatre Yes), Proud and The Fever (theatre no. 6), Fatboy (Edmonton Actors Theatre), Three Sisters (Broken Toys Theatre), Kill Me Now (Workshop West Theatre), An Accident (Northern Light Theatre), and Hedda Gabler at Rutherford House (Vault! Theatre of Invention). She has received two Elizabeth Sterling Haynes Awards for her acting. 
Ian Leung (Doyle Trigorin) is an Edmonton-based actor, director, playwright and producer. He holds a B.F.A. in acting and an M.F.A. in theatre direction, both from the University of Alberta. As an actor, he has worked for companies across Canada, including Workshop West, Theatre Network and the Citadel Theatre in Edmonton, and the Gateway Theatre, Neptune Theatre, the National Arts Centre and the Stratford and Shaw Festivals elsewhere. He is also the Artistic Producer of theatre no. 6, which he founded in 2008 to present work that asks questions, pertinent and impertinent, about Canada and its identity. For that company, he has produced and directed U: The Comedy of Global Warming, The Fever, and Proud. Recent acting credits include Kulygin in Three Sisters, David in Murderers Confess and Christmastime, the Judge in Fatboy, and Leo in En Anglais S.V.P. Most recently he has performed Wallace Shawn's one-person play The Fever in private living rooms for theatre no. 6. 
Stephanie Bahniuk (Production Design) is a independent set, lighting and costume designer based out of Edmonton. She is a graduate of the University of Alberta's Bachelor of Fine Arts in Theatre Design program. Stephanie has had the pleasure of working within the Edmonton theatre community as well as in Massachusetts as an Assistant Costume Designer for Williamstown Theatre Festival. Recent local credits include lighting design for The Moon at Midnight (Prairie Dance Circuit), set and lighting design for Alberta Opera's Hansel and Gretel, costume design for Twelfth Night (Studio Theatre) and production design for Peter Fechter: 59 Minutes with Cardiac Theatre. Her upcoming projects include costume design for Jesus Christ Superstar (Mayfield Dinner Theatre) and Into the Woods (MacEwan Theatre). www.stephaniebahniuk.com |
Dave Horak (Director) is Artistic Director of Edmonton Actors Theatre that has produced Burning Bluebeard, Fatboy, 70 Scenes of Halloween and The Waste Land. Other directing work includes The Search for Signs of Intelligent Life in the Universe (Teatro La Quindicina), Footloose (MacEwan University) A Few Good Men (Keyano Theatre), Measures, The Musical, The Inspector General, Cloud Nine (Citadel Theatre Young Company), Sartre’s Shorts, Act Without Words (Surreal SoReal Theatre), Curtains (MacEwan University), and Eurydice (U of A Studio Theatre). Dave has taught movement for actors at MacEwan University’s Theatre Arts Program since 2003 and holds BFA (Acting) and MFA (Directing) degrees from the University of Alberta and was a participant in the 2015-16 Citadel/ Banff Professional Theatre Program.
Rachel Rudd (Stage Manager) is thrilled to join the team at Edmonton Actors Theatre after working with Dave on The Search for Signs of Intelligent Life in the Universe with Teatro la Quindicina. Rachel is an ensemble member of that company and has stage managed there for the past 13 seasons, including shows such as What Gives, The Hothouse Prince, and Pith. She will return to the new Varscona for Teatro’s 2017 season. Most recently Rachel worked with Trunk Theatre’s production of Fen, after being on the team for The Colleen Bawn & One Flea Spare. She has also worked with Workshop West, The Maggie Tree, Citie Ballet and Concrete Theatre in recent seasons.
Aaron Posner (Playwright) is a playwright and director who has written and adapted about 20 plays, but ones that will have professional productions in the coming season include Life Sucks and Stupid Fucking Bird, both irreverent variations on plays by Anton Chekhov, a new family musical called THE GIFT OF NOTHING, adaptations of Chaim Potok's THE CHOSEN and MY NAME IS ASHER LEV, WHO AM I THIS TIME? (AND OTHER CONUNDRUMS OF LOVE), based on short stories by Kurt Vonnegut. He is a founder and former Artistic Director of Philadelphia's Arden Theatre and has directed at major regional theatres from coast to coast including the Folger Theatre and Milwaukee Rep (he is an Artistic Associate at both), Actor's Theatre of Louisville, The Alliance, The American Repertory Theatre, Arizona Theatre Company, California Shakespeare Theatre, Seattle Rep, and many, many others. He was raised in Eugene, Oregon, but was born in Madison, Wisconsin. He currently lives outside of Washington DC with his wife, Erin, and their amazing nearly three-year-old daughter, Maisie.