Z Space

Rotimi Agbabiaka is an actor, writer, director, and teacher. He played Dancing Dan in Word for Word’s Holiday High Jinx, and has performed with Playwrights Horizons, Yale Rep, Cal Shakes, American Conservatory Theatre, Magic Theatre, and the San Francisco Mime Troupe, among others. He wrote the solo shows Homeless, Type/Caste (Theatre Bay Area award), and MANIFESTO, and co-wrote the musical, Seeing Red. As a teacher, Rotimi helps students from preschool through adulthood build their acting, movement, and play creation skills. When not on the stage or in the classroom, Rotimi can be found trying to get fluent in Spanish or playing with Bernini, his cat.

Carlos Aguirre is an actor, musician, vocal percussionist, and educator, performing and teaching in the Bay Area for over 20 years. He has shared the stage with The Roots, Eryka Badu, Black Eyed Peas, Mary J. Blige, Jam Master Jay, and L.L. Cool J, among others. He is currently producing his original rap and beatbox adaptation of Edgar Allen Poe’s The Tell-Tale Heart. Carlos is dedicated to the voice of the youth!

Ariel Allen’s strengths are illustration and costume design/construction. She received a degree from San Francisco’s Academy of Art University in Illustration and is currently working on another for Costume Design, while simultaneously working in theater as a designer. She loves to draw, sew, make cool stuff, spend time with family, and follow her cat’s orders to the letter.

Matt Bernarding is a director, writer, musician, and artist in multiple disciplines. His works include songs, books, scripts, photography, visual art, translations, recordings, as well as musical and theatrical performances. Matt has served diverse communities throughout the Bay Area by bringing theater arts into schools, directing plays, and teaching acting and directing. For him, the creative process is transformative and he feels blessed to see his own life and the lives of others touched by its magic. 

Siobhan Marie Doherty is an actor, writer, educator, and voice-over artist. Bay Area performing credits include Magic Theatre, Shotgun Players, SF Mime Troupe, and Killing My Lobster. After writing Swift History (300 years of American women’s history crammed into a rowdy 20-min powerpoint adventure), she is currently writing and producing the ongoing series, Feminist Breakfast Party!, an intersectional space in which she joyfully dismantles the patriarchy over waffles. Everyone’s invited!! 

Tony Fuemmeler was born in rural Missouri and currently lives in Portland, Oregon, where he works in multiple local theaters—as well as on stages across the country and abroad. Tony studied at the University of Kansas and Dell’Arte International, as well as with teachers in Bali and Italy. He has taught commedia dell’arte, puppetry, mask making, and mask performance for students from kindergarten through adulthood. Tony loves cooking, reading, learning languages, and being among the trees.

Gendell Hing-Hernandez was born in Havana, Cuba, and is proud to have called the Bay Area home since 1997, working as an actor, director, and teaching artist in theaters, classrooms, libraries, and jails. He believes in being as present as a Jedi, as undeniable as hip-hop, and as facile as Shakespeare while trying to understand this human experience and the social conditions we all share.

Lisa Hori-Garcia is an award-winning actor, director, teaching artist, and theatermaker based in Denver, Colorado. She has acted and taught for Word for Word since 2004, and has performed in multiple productions of Greg Sarris’s beautiful Stories from Sonoma Mountain. Lisa loves going on urban hikes and bike rides with her favorite pup, Alma. She received her BA from Smith College and her MFA in Acting from USC.

Laura Marlin is a director, playwright, dancer, and most of all, teacher. Laura is proud to be a teaching artist with Word for Word, Cal Shakes, and Berkeley Playhouse. She has written two musicals produced at Berkeley Playhouse: Bravado, and most recently, Becoming Robin Hood. As a modern dancer, Laura has performed with local choreographers such as Nina Haft and Co., Rogelio Lopez, Randee Paufve, Dana Lawton Dances, and Ruth Botchan. She lives in Berkeley, in her empty nest, with her dog, Oatie. 

Josh Matthews is a teacher, actor, and clown/circus performer. He has traveled around the world with his theater company, Under the Table, performing original plays. When he is not performing or teaching, Josh loves playing video games and hiking.

Peter Musante founded an immersive theatre festival for young audiences called the UP CLOSE Festival, has toured his original works internationally, and is a long-time member of Blue Man Group. Raised in San Mateo, his earliest memories are watching his mom perform improv with Flash Family and B.A.T.S. More than anything, Peter loves taking road trips with his boxer-pit mix, Palo, and making projects with K-12 students as a teaching artist in New York City.

Anakarina “AK” Swanson has been dancing for 17 years and teaching for 9. She is trained in ballet, jazz, lyrical jazz, modern, contemporary, musical theatre, and hip-hop. Anakarina has won numerous awards for her choreography and performed at halftime for the Golden State Warriors. She has lived in Sonoma County all of her life, and still does. Outside of dance she likes to cook, binge fun shows on Netflix, and play with her yellow lab, Lucy.

Valerie Weak teaches with Word for Word and ACT’s Young Conservatory and Studio programs, and has a 20-year history of teaching acting and theater-making with youth in the Bay Area. As an actor, she’s performed with SF Shakespeare Festival, Shotgun Players, CenterREP, and the Word for Word School and Library Tour. Valerie has a BA in Theatre Arts from UCLA and has trained with Anne Bogart and SITI company. When not in a theater, she can be found at yoga, the farmer’s market, or riding her bike!

Dan Wolf is a hip-hop artist who works with rap, theater, personal narrative, and history to give voice to the problematic world we live in. His projects have travelled all around the world, to concert halls, museums, schools, and memorial sites. As a teaching artist, Dan currently works with Word for Word and SFJAZZ, and is the Artistic Director of Sound in the Silence. Dan has two children, Isaac and Olive, and lives in Berkeley with his kids and his wife Deidre.

Phil Wong is an actor, director, comedian, musician, teaching artist, and rapper born and raised in the Bay Area. His regional credits include work with Shotgun Players, Bay Area Children's Theatre, Quantum Dragon Theatre, Killing My Lobster, The EXIT, Palo Alto Players, The Lamplighters, Los Altos Stage, Ray of Light, Word for Word, and TheatreWorks. Phil is a graduate of Oberlin College and received his physical theatre training at the Accademia dell' Arte in Arezzo, Italy. He has been a part of the Bay Area theatre scene since he was a teen and is working every day to make his art more relevant, conscientious, and empathetic.