Below are the recipients of the SDCF Professional Development Program 2022-2023 Season: Cycle 2 opportunities. To read the full press release click here.
Shadows:
Gabbie Ballesteros (she/her):
Gabbie Ballesteros is a Filipino performer, dancer-choreographer, teaching artist, and arts administrator. She earned her BFA in Drama at NYU Tisch’s New Studio on Broadway with Double Minors in Education and Applied Theatre, and is currently the full-time Education Programs Manager at Manhattan Theatre Club. She has appeared in new works such as BREATHE: A New Musical (NYU Tisch, 54 Below), Payanam AlMuhajir (Bai-Ka/University Settlement), and UNBOUND (Thistle Dance, commissioned by the New York Public Library), and is drawn to collaborating with emerging and exciting voices.
Additionally, Gabbie is an advocate for arts education and is especially committed to providing young people universal access to the arts. She has served as choreographer on several educational and community productions, and facilitated dance workshops and classes across the New York and DC areas. A proud immigrant, she constantly remains passionate about lifting and advocating for Filipino and AAPI voices, and strives to celebrate her communities and their nuanced experiences through an intersection of art and activism. www.gabbieballesteros.com, @gabbie.martina
Irvin Mason Jr.:
Irvin Mason Jr. is a director, actor, poet and teaching artist born and raised in St. Thomas, US Virgin Islands. His work intersects expressive movement, live music, emerging technology, and Afro-Caribbean traditions and ritual to breathe new life to physical storytelling. He is a graduate from the UCLA School of Theater, Film, and Television, founder of The Color Box Production Company, and co-founder and co-artistic director of Jumbo Shrimp productions.
Irvin currently resides in New York City, where he has directed the Off-Off Broadway productions of Ain’t Misbehavin’ at Gallery Players Theatre, Stuck at Chain Theatre, and Dominique Morisseau’s Pipeline at Gallery Players Theatre. Recently, Irvin served as an observer to Rachel Klein on Pup! A Chew Story, which was featured at the National Alliance for Musical Theater’s 34th Festival of New Musicals. When Irvin is not in the rehearsal room, you can find him teaching New York City youth about all things theater and performance.
As an actor Irvin performed in a variety of plays, musicals, and web series. Some of his favorite roles include playing the titular role in Henrik Ibsen’s Brand, Travis Younger in a Raisin in the Sun, and the role of Chad in the web series SOCiAL. Learn more about Irvin and his work: irvinmasonjr.com, instagram @iirvinmason
Observers:
Felichia Chivaughn (she/her):
Felichia Chivaughn (she/her) is a writer, director, actor, advocate, and mom.
Born in Jamaica and raised in Ft. Lauderdale, FL by a single mom and four older sisters, she learned early on about the gifts of caretaking and storytelling. Felichia studied theatre at The University of Central Florida and would later study A Practical Approach to Directing at Yale School of Drama post-grad. However, serving in her local ministry and devising works with local artists would be the spark for her path as a director. She associate directed/cultural coordinated The Color Purple; for which she also played the role of Nettie, Once on this Island, and Apologies to You Lorraine Hansberry (You Too August Wilson). Other directing credits include Lady Day at Emerson’s Bar and Grill, Sweat, and The Mountaintop. For Chivaughn, this next chapter of artistry centers on radical joy, liberation, and collective healing. The work must decolonize our theatrical spaces and amplify the voices and stories of black women – unapologetically and with care.
Tianding He:
Tianding He, originally from China, is an experimental theatre director, multidisciplinary artists, and arts leader based in New York City. She is the founding artistic director of B·O·N·D International Virtual Performance Festival, and an arts leader of NYFA’s Incubator for Arts & Culture Leaders of Color. Through her work in object performance, physical theatre, and cutting-edge technologies, she hopes to challenge the anthropocentric ideology that permeates society. Tianding has directed various performances in venues and festivals including, HERE Arts Center, Rattlestick Theatre, New Ohio Theatre, La Mama, Dixon Place, Margo Feiden Gallery, Soho Gallery, and Williamsburg Arts Nexus, Dumbo Six Foot Platform in NYC and Brooklyn, Pao Arts Center in Boston, Shanghai Theatre Academy in China; Rattlestick Global Form Theatre Festival, New Ohio Theatre Ice Factory Festival, Object Movement Festival, Irvine Writer’s Festival, Wuzhen International Theatre Festival in China, B·O·N·D International Virtual Performance Festival, Segal Center Film Festival on Theatre and Performance, International Virtual Toy Theatre Festival, and UNFIX Festival. Additionally, she works as producers for off-Broadway shows and HERE Gala, and stage managers for Lincoln Center and The Little Island. She was a resident artist of Object Movement Residency, Orchard Project Performance Lab and Green Theatre Grant winner.
She received her first MA degree in Performance Studies from NYU, a second master in Theatre of Hunter College, and PhD from UC Irvine and UC San Diego.
Fellows:
Alexandra Haddad (she/her):
Alexandra Haddad (she/her) is an artist of new work, comedy, & postcolonial interpretation of classics. She centers those who are not wholly represented, including women, the queer community, & people of the Global Majority.
As well as directing, Alex is an intimacy choreographer affiliated with Theatrical Intimacy Education. She is a member of the 2021 cohort with Directors Lab North, and a member of the Consortium of Asian American Theaters & Artists. She was McCarter Theatre Centre’s Artistic Assistant/BOLD Fellow from 2021-2023. In that time, she was also the first intimacy professional to choreograph on McCarter’s stages. Alex grew up both in the United States and the United Kingdom, and speaks French natively as well as English. With her mixed cultural heritage, she identifies as a “Third Culture Kid.”
Select directing: A GENTLEMAN’S GUIDE TO LOVE AND MURDER with Penn Singers Light Opera, THE BROKEN BRAIN BREAKUP GAME with Breaking & Entering Theatre Collective, BARD OVERBOARD at the SoHo Playhouse, THE PENELOPIAD at Barnard, ALMOST, MAINE and BOY MEETS GIRL at Columbia, BEACH WEEK at Round House Theatre (Teen Performance Company).
Select intimacy choreography: SPRING AWAKENING with JHU Barnstormers, Breaking & Entering Theatre Collective’s PEA Fest, MEASURE FOR MEASURE at Shakespeare and Company, RIDE THE CYCLONE at McCarter & Arena Stage, THE APPEAL at Barnard, ROCKY HORROR PICTURE SHOW at Columbia. Additional credits as intimacy coordinator for the screen.
She graduated from Barnard with a major in theatre (concentrating in directing) and a minor in English (focusing on classics).
Kunal Prasad:
Kunal Prasad is a Theatre Artist and a lover of all things playful, caring and rigorously stupid. They have an interest in the intersection of dramatic poetry, gesture and social dance. They direct and lead workshops and residencies at San Francisco Shakespeare Festival and Magic Theatre. As an actor, they are featured in the indie film ‘Gone in the Night,’ starring Winona Ryder, and they perform in ‘Baloney’ at The Oasis nightclub. Other theater credits include: ‘Wives,’ (Aurora Theatre Company) ‘A Thousand Splendid Suns,’ (A.C.T.) ‘Taylor Mac: A 24-Decade History of Popular Music,’ (SF Curran) and ‘Hedda Gabler,’ (The Cutting Ball Theater.)
Kunal is a California native and a child of immigrants from the Fiji Islands.
His ancestors were from India and came to Fiji during the British Raj. His creative spirit springs from the colors, stories, music, and beauty from California, Fiji and India. www.kunalized.com On instagram follow @kunalized