American Voices New Play Festival

Martín Zimmerman (Playwright, Simona’s Search) is a playwright and screenwriter whose plays include Seven Spots On The Sun, On The Exhale, White Tie Ball, The Making Of A Modern Folk Hero, The Solid Sand Below, and Let Me Count The Ways, and have been produced or developed at The Kennedy Center, Goodman Theatre, Cincinnati Playhouse In The Park, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, La Jolla Playhouse, Center Theatre Group, Alley Theatre, Roundabout Underground, Rattlestick Playwrights Theater, Traverse Theatre, LCT3, New York Theatre Workshop, Victory Gardens Theater, The Eugene O’Neill Theater Center’s National Playwrights Conference, Primary Stages, Teatro Vista, Ojai Playwrights Conference, Playwrights Foundation, and Cara Mía Theatre Co among others. Martín is the creator and an Executive Producer on Netflix’s Puerta 7, a Writer/Producer on Netflix’s Ozark, was a writer on Netflix’s Narcos, and is a Playwright in Residence at Teatro Vista. MFA in Playwriting: The University of Texas at Austin. BA in Theater Studies, BS in Economics: Duke University.

Christina Pumariega (Playwright, Her Math Play) acts and writes. Often simultaneously. Her play Lei Chiede (She Questions), inspired by her Italian-American grandmother’s experience interrogating POW’s in Baltimore Harbor, was commissioned by the Ammunition Theatre Company and will be workshopped this summer supported by New Georges. “Her Math Play” has been developed at Joe’s Pub at the Public Theater, and her work has been seen at the Lark and Ammo’s inaugural Writers’ Lab. Pumariega’s television writing credits include the upcoming Turner & Hooch (Disney+) and Bluff City Law (NBC). Acting on and Off-Broadway, regionally and in television and film, Pumariega has cross examined Coach Taylor, made out with the Fly and set a Cuban pharmacy ablaze in a corset. She leads the collective Más Páginas, which dares more pages from diverse womxn writers. Born and raised in the south, her father is Cuban, her mother is Italian-American. MFA, NYU Graduate Acting Program.

Georgina Escobar (Playwright, Ash Tree) is a queer Mexican playwright and maker of sci-femme narratives, ultra-humanistic mythos, and frontera-funk stories. She works textually and visually with plasticity, the impossible, and the Latin American perspective. Residencies include MacDowell, Djerassi, Fornés Workshop, and she is the recipient of the Darrell Ayers Playwriting and Outstanding Service to Women on the Border national awards. Her work has been featured in the Kilroy’s List, 50PP, and The Mix, and on print in The Texas Review, Lxs Bárbarxs, McSweeney’s, and New Passport Press. Her work appears in “Scenes for Latinx Actors,” “Lighting The Way”, and “El Fuego: Fueling the American Theatre with Latinx Plays” (upcoming).  Her plays have been seen across the USA, México, Denmark, and Sweden. Artistic homes and presenters include INTAR, New York Children’s Theatre, Dixon Place, Clubbed Thumb, Lincoln Center, Bushwick Starr, Two Rivers, Milagro, Aurora Theatre, and the University of Texas at El Paso.

Melia Bensussen (Director, Simona’s Search) joined Hartford Stage in the summer of 2019 as the sixth Artistic Director of the organization. A homecoming of sorts, her first professional theatre experience was assisting Emily Mann on Hartford Stage’s production of A Doll’s House. She then returned to Hartford Stage in 2003 to direct Edwin Sanchez’s production of Diosa. Since then she has directed extensively at leading theatres throughout the country, including productions at the Huntington Theatre Company, Sleeping Weazel, Shakespeare & Company, Actors’ Shakespeare Project, La Jolla Playhouse, Baltimore Center Stage, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, the New York Shakespeare Festival, Manhattan Class Company, Primary Stages, Long Wharf Theatre, Cincinnati Playhouse, Actors Theatre of Louisville, Merrimack Repertory Theatre, People’s Light and Theatre Company, Bay Street Theatre and Playwrights Horizons, among others. Raised in Mexico City, Melia is fluent in Spanish and has translated and adapted a variety of texts, including her edition of the Langston Hughes translation of Federico Garcia Lorca’s Blood Wedding, published by Theatre Communications Group. She has received an Obie Award for Best Director (Off-Broadway’s top honor), as well as receiving several awards from the Princess Grace Foundation, including their Statue Award for Sustained Excellence in Directing. A graduate of Brown University, Melia previously served as the Chair of the Performing Arts Department at Emerson College, and currently serves as the Chair of the Arts Advisory Board for the Princess Grace Foundation. She also serves on the executive board of the Stage Directors and Choreographers Society (SDC). Melia loves directing new works as well as classics, viewing every production as an opportunity to introduce an audience to a new story and a different perspective. She is thrilled to be a part of this great theatre, and a new resident of Hartford.

Bevin O’Gara (Director, Her Math Play) is currently serving as the Interim Executive Artistic Director at the New Repertory Theatre in Watertown, MA. As a director she has worked at the Huntington Theatre Company, the Kitchen Theatre Company (where she previously served as Producing Artistic Director), SpeakEasy Stage Company, the Geva Theatre, Actors Shakespeare Project, Company One, Central Square Theater, Boston Playwrights’ Theatre and the Lyric Stage Company. She has also developed new works at the Denver Center for the Performing Arts and Cleveland Playhouse. She is the recipient of the Lois Roach Award for Outstanding Commitment to the Boston Theatre Community. mbevinogara.com

Kim McKean (Director, Ash Tree) is a theatre and film director based in El Paso, TX. Some favorite directing credits include: ANN (TheatreSquared and Stages), Love and Information (Trap Door Theatre, “Best of 2019 in Chicago Theatre” by Picture This Post), The Humans (U.T. El Paso), Masterclass from a Broken Angel (KTEP), Gruesome Playground Injuries (New York Film Academy), and Monsters We Create at U.T. El Paso which she developed with playwright Georgina Escobar. She won several national awards from the Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival including “Outstanding Director of a Play” and “Outstanding Production of a Play” for her production of Lydia by Octavio Solis. Her short film, The Arrangements, was nominated for “Best of the Borderscene” at the Borderscene Film Festival. In addition to her directing work, McKean serves as an Assistant Professor of Theatre at University of Texas at El Paso.

Jasmin Agosto (she/they; Curator, Director Producer/Lead Curandera, Yerba Bruja: In Memory Of) is the founder of Sageseeker Productions, an event/experience curation company based in Hartford, CT that centers Black womxn, womxn of color, non-binary folks, and the queer POC community. By day, she is the Education and Community Outreach Manager at the Hartford History Center at Hartford Public Library. She has been working with artists, activists, healers, students, and elders to organize cultural arts and history/herstory focused events, exhibitions, festivals and programs for more than 15 years. Jasmin holds a BA in Educational and American Studies from Trinity College and a MA in Artist Entrepreneurship and Sustainable Community Development from NYU Gallatin School of Individualized Study.