THE TEAM
MEET THE CREATORS
DAVID BYRNE
Though I moved to New York City with hopes of being an artist, I'm mostly known as a musician, especially in connection with the band I was in for many years, Talking Heads. I was inspired by the innovative downtown theater scene when I moved to NYC, and I eventually ended up working with some of those companies: Robert Wilson, Twyla Tharp and Mabou Mines. More recently I have done some art installations and some theater work on Here Lies Love and Joan of Arc: Into the Fire. My ongoing interest in neuroscience and its implications led me to bring those worlds together for Theater of the Mind.
MALA GAONKAR
I research technology trends for my work at Surgo. I've tried to apply what I’ve learned to help set up a few primarily public health focused non-profit groups. These projects all require some model of how people decide to act. And yet, talking to the labs that partnered with us, it seemed some of my most basic intuitions on how we decide to act were incorrect. The experiments and ideas of the labs we met, several of which we embedded in our narrative, are as engaging and creative as any piece of theatre. We had a lot of fun bringing some of that open engagement into Theater of the Mind.
ANDREW SCOVILLE
DIRECTOR
Andrew is a director specializing in immersive layouts, technological landscapes, and hybrid-genre theater-making. He has a passion for integrating science ideas into experiences. Recent credits include Money Heist: The Experience (NYC production with Netflix, Fever and JJLA), The Brobot Johnson Experience (Bushwick Starr, NY Times Critics Pick), Escape the Planet (NY Hall of Science commission with astronomer Moiya McTier), People Doing Math, LIVE! (live podcast with National Museum of Math, Public Theater Under the Radar Festival, Strand Book Store, etc), Piano Tales (La MaMa, Lincoln Center, Bouley Test Kitchen, etc). Associate director: Here Lies Love (dir. Alex Timbers, Public Theater, National Theater UK, Seattle Rep), Sweeney Todd (dir. Bill Buckhurst, Barrow Street Theater), Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson (dir. Alex Timbers, Broadway). Graduate and current faculty at Playwrights Horizons Theater School, NYU Tisch. Co-director FGP NYC. andrewjscoville.com
ABOUT THE CREATIVE TEAM
MELISSA CASHION
PRODUCER/PRODUCTION MANAGER
Melissa joined the DCPA team in 2014 as Associate Production Manager and was part of the production management team that oversaw more than three dozen plays during that time. She also production managed all of Off-Center’s immersive and experiential work including Sweet & Lucky (created by Third Rail Projects) and The Wild Party. From 2008-2014 she served as Production Manager and Special Events Coordinator for Dallas Children's Theater where she also worked as a Director, Puppeteer, Lighting Designer, Stage Manager, and Voice Over Artist. In 2017, Melissa joined the DCPA artistic team as Artistic Producer and has been producing for the Theatre Company and Off-Center since. Melissa loves bringing new, experiential work to life.
NATE KOCH
PRODUCER
Nate is a Lortel Award-winning (Sweeney Todd, 2017) and Drama Desk Award-winning (Queen of the Night, 2015) producer and creator of immersive works. His company, ENVEEKAY, specializes in providing executive producing and general management for complex immersive projects and boundary-pushing theatrical entertainment businesses and brands. Current creative projects include Theater of the Mind and multiple new immersive works in development including projects with VICE Media, Virgin Voyages, and Constellation Immersive. Current ENVEEKAY clients include David Byrne's Arbutus Foundation; Seaview Productions; KORINS Studio; P3 Productions; Fiona Rudin Productions; Marathon Digital; and Soho Rep. Past creative partners and clients include Punchdrunk, Secret Cinema, Madison Wells Media, Superfly, Google, Arkham Asylum, Ars Nova, the TEAM, and Sleep No More. enveekay.com @nate__koch
CHARLIE MILLER
PRODUCER
Charlie is Associate Artistic Director at the Denver Center for the Performing Arts. He is the co-founder and Curator of Off-Center, credited with bringing immersive theatre to Colorado and helping establish Denver as a national hub for immersive art. Off-Center’s large-scale immersive and experiential projects over the last eight years have garnered local and national praise and attracted a new audience to the DCPA. His most recent project, Camp Christmas, brought in rave reviews and holiday cheer to over 135,000 in its first two years. Charlie is a sixth-generation Denverite and loves producing new theatrical experiences for his hometown.
LEEANN ROSSI
PRODUCER
LeeAnn is a creative producer. She works with artists to ensure their vision is brought to life in whatever form that may take — from books, albums and film to theater and live performance.
AMANDA BERG WILSON
ASSISTANT DIRECTOR
Amanda is Artistic Director of The Catamounts, a Colorado company dedicated to theatre for the adventurous palate (thecatamounts.org), and a freelance theatre artist specializing in site-specific, immersive, and boundary-pushing works. As director: The Wild Party and Between Us: The Whiskey Tasting (DCPA Off-Center); 9 to 5, Pride and Prejudice, and Steel Magnolias (Creede Repertory Theatre); God's Ear, Failure: A Love Story, Rausch, Men On Boats, United Flight 232, and Land of Milk and Honey, among others (The Catamounts). As performer: Sweet & Lucky (DCPA Off-Center), Detroit (Curious Theatre Company), There is A Happiness That Morning Is and Beowulf: A Thousand Years of Baggage (The Catamounts). Select awards: 2014, 2016, 2018, and 2021 True West awards; 2017 and 2018 Henry nominations (Best Choreography and Best New Work.)
BETTY HART
ASSISTANT DIRECTOR
Lady Day at Emerson’s Bar and Grill (DCPA Garner Galleria & Vintage Theatre); By the way, meet Vera Stark (Fine Arts Center at Colorado College), Once on this Island (Town Hall Arts Center), Blackademics (Vintage Theatre), To the Moon and An Iliad (Creede Repertory Theatre), Polaroid Stories (Metropolitan State University), The Scottsboro Boys and Crowns (Vintage Theatre); Hooded, or Being Black for Dummies (Aurora Fox); The Darker Face of the Earth; Evelyn in Purgatory; A Thousand Circlets; Jim Crow and the Rhythm Darlings (Essential Theatre); Loose Change; On Empty (Kaiser Permanente Arts Integrated Resources). Co-director of 2021-22 Local Lab, Local Theater Company’s annual new play festival. Betty is an associate artist of Local Theater Company. Special/Awards/Training: 2018 & 2021 True West Award winner.
HEIDI BOISVERT
TECHNOLOGY DESIGNER
Heidi is an artist, scientist and creative technologist who interrogates the neurobiological and socio-cultural effects of media and technology. Simply put, she studies the role of the body, the senses, and emotion in human perception and social change. She architects expanded reality and transmedia storytelling experiences, and devises networked dance and theatre using biocreative technology. She is the founder of futurePerfect lab, a boutique creative agency and think-tank that harnesses the power of pop culture, emerging technology, and neuroscience to ignite culture change. Heidi is currently Assistant Professor of AI and the Arts at the University of Florida, an MIT research affiliate and a member of NEW INC’s Creative Science track. She received her PhD in Electronic Arts from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. futureperfectlab.com
SARITA FELLOWS
COSTUME DESIGNER
Selected credits include A Bright Room Called Day (Public Theater), Native Son (The Acting Co), Original Sound (Cherry Lane Theater), Hatef**k (The Women’s Project), and A Chronicle of the Death of Two Worlds (New York Theater Workshop). Regional credits include Top Girls, Her Portmanteau (A.C.T); The Royale (A.T.C.); Ain’t Misbehavin’ (Signature Theatre); Pipeline (Studio Theatre); School Girls; Or, the African Mean Girls Play (Pittsburgh Public Theater); Haunted Life (M.R.T); Two Trains Running (Weston Playhouse); Berta Berta, A Late Morning with Reagan (C.A.T.F); Having Our Say (Philadelphia Theater Co). MFA NYU/Tisch. saritafellows.com
JEANETTE OI-SUK YEW
LIGHTING DESIGNER
Jeanette Oi-Suk Yew is an award-winning multi-disciplinary theatrical designer for theatre, dance, opera, musicals, music performances, installation, immersive experiences and digital productions. Her designs have been seen across US cities and internationally. As a designer, Jeanette aims to create a visual environment that is organically integrated into the landscape and language of the production. NY Times described her designs as “clever” and “inventive”. Her most recent immersive design was with En Garde Art’s “part art installation, part immersive theater” experience A Dozen Dreams (NYC) and NEVERMORE PARK, an immersive art experience powered by the imagination of artist Hebru Brantley (Chicago). With DCPA, Jeanette designed Vietgone and Smart People and the upcoming Choir Boy. Recipient of the NEA/TCG Career Development Program.
NEIL PATEL
SCENIC DESIGNER
Born in Wales and educated at Yale College and the Accademia di Belle Arti di Brera, Neil has applied his passion for design and storytelling to distinguished work in Theater, Opera, Dance, Film and Television. Recent credits include “Dickinson” (Apple TV+), “The Path” (HULU), Little Boxes (Netflix), Dil Dhadakne Do (Excel Entertainment), Some Velvet Morning (Tribeca Films), Time and the Conways (Broadway), Father Comes Home from the Wars (Parts 1, 2 & 3) (Royal Court London), Mughal E Azam (NCPA Mumbai and Delhi), Alcina (Washington National Opera), Norma (LA Opera) and Shadowland for Pilobolus throughout the world.
GRADY SOAPES, CSA
CASTING
Grady (he/him/his) is the Director of Casting and Artistic Producer with the Denver Center for the Performing Arts. Selected casting credits include Rattlesnake Kate, Goodnight Moon, Indecent, A Doll’s House and A Doll’s House, Part 2 in repertory, Oklahoma!, Last Night and the Night Before, The Who’s Tommy, The Wild Party, A Christmas Carol, This Is Modern Art. Grady also works as a Casting Director for Sylvia Gregory Casting where he has cast commercials for Subaru, Fruit of the Loom and has been an associate on several tv, film and video games projects. Choreography credits include Goodnight Moon, Anna Karenina, As You Like It, Drag Machine, Lord of the Butterflies, DragON (Denver Center); Comedy of Errors (Colorado Shakespeare Festival); The Liar (Arvada Center); The Music Man (Perry-Mansfield) as well as Artist in Residence at Colorado State University in 2010. Grady is the producer of the Colorado New Play Summit and former producer of the Colorado New Play Festival.
CODY SPENCER
SOUND DESIGNER
Cody’s work as Sound Designer includes Broadway Bounty Hunter, Joan of Arc: Into the Fire, Here Lies Love (Lortel Award) and The Pee Wee Herman Show. Some of his work as Associate Sound Designer includes Mean Girls, Lazarus, Beautiful, Book of Mormon, Bring It On: The Musical, and Annie. In addition to theatre, Cody has co-designed some of New York’s biggest concert venues including Brooklyn Steel, Terminal 5 and Webster Hall.
BROOKLYN RESEARCH
TECHNOLOGY CONSULTANT
Brooklyn Research is a creative technology consultancy working at the intersection of art and technology and has worked with a wide variety of partners including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Google and Jim Hodges. The team for this installation consists of Patrick Rummage, Johnny Lu, and Ezer Longinus. Brooklyn Research was founded in 2012 by Alex Dodge, Ezer Longinus, and Johnny Lu as a co-research space for independent researchers building new technology in Brooklyn, NY. brooklynresearch.com
slow immediate
TECHNOLOGY CONSULTANT
slow immediate is the creative engineering R&D studio of Xin Liu and Gershon Dublon. With projects from immersive theatre and multi-sensory virtual reality to outer space robotics, the duo applies science, engineering and design to create unexpected, intimate moments of perception that bridge the inner self and the outside world. Through both original commissions and collaborative productions, the studio's work has been shown in venues including the Sundance Film Festival and Ars Electronica. Based in New York City, slow immediate is an incubee of the New Museum's NEW INC Creative Experiments program. Theater of the Mind marks their Denver debut.
DCPA OFF-CENTER
PRODUCERS
Off-Center produces unexpected theatrical experiences that put the audience at the center of the story. What began in 2010 as a small theatrical test kitchen has grown into a signature line of programming for the Denver Center for the Performing Arts, credited with bringing immersive theatre to Colorado and helping establish Denver as a national hub for immersive art.
Off-Center’s large-scale productions that have garnered local and national praise include: Sweet & Lucky created with Third Rail Projects, The Last Defender with The House Theatre of Chicago, Perception featuring live music by Tom Hagerman of DeVotchKa, a 360-degree staging of The Wild Party, and Camp Christmas with artist Lonnie Hanzon. With support from the Doris Duke and Wallace foundations, Off-Center has been recognized as a national leader in developing new programming that attracts new audiences. Through Off-Center, the DCPA is the only professional regional theatre in the country regularly developing and producing large-scale immersive and experiential work.
