The Bipoc Superhero Project

Gloria Bond Clunie is an award-winning playwright, educator, and director. She is a founding
member of the Playwriting Ensemble at Chicago’s Regional Tony Award-winning Victory Gardens
Theater where her plays NORTH STAR, LIVING GREEN and SHOES premiered and the founding Artistic
Director of Evanston’s Fleetwood-Jourdain Theatre. Other works by this Northwestern University
graduate (B.A. Theater, MFA-Directing) include SWEET WATER TASTE, SMOKE, QUARK, BUCK NAKED,
BANKRUPTCY, TALL ENOUGH, ASHOT#LOVESTORIES INSPIRED BY BLACK LIVES MATTER,MY WONDERFUL BIRTHDAY SUIT and THE LAST STOP ON MARKET STREET. Her plays have been produced and workshopped in a variety of theaters across the country including Victory Gardens Theatre, Goodman Theatre, Fleetwood-Jourdain Theatre, ETA, Alliance Theatre, Triad Stage, Her Story Theatre, MPAACT, Chicago Children’s Theatre, American Blues Theatre, Southern Appalachian Repertory Theatre, Penobscot Theatre and Orlando Shakespeare Theater.

A Production of Gloria Bond Clunie’s play will be at the Alliance Theatre.

Sean Joseph Takeo Kahāokalani Choo is a multi-hyphenate and multi-ethnic theatre artist and advocate.  As a Resident Ensemble Member at Honolulu Theatre for Youth, he has composed and performed original music for numerous theatrical and television productions, including the devised theatre works Shocka:  The Story of Energy in Hawai’i, The Adventures of  Pinocchio and ‘Ōpala Remix.  Most recently, he composed and performed for the theatrical film Stories of Oceania as well as composing music and co-directing the TV special Da Holidays, which won a Regional Emmy in the category of Arts/Entertainment-Long Form Content.  

A Production of Super Aunty was done at the Honolulu Theatre For Youth in February 2024.

Idris Goodwin is an multi award winning storyteller of stage, audio, screen and page. Currently serving as Artistic Director of Seattle Children’s Theater, Idris writes, directs, programs and /or produces relevant content for intergenerational audiences.  Goodwin is the author of over 60 dynamic and diverse original plays, such as How We Got On,  Hype Man: A Break Beat Play, The Boy Who Kissed The Sky and the ground-breaking Free Play: open source scripts for an antiracist tomorrow. Committed to access and impact, Goodwin’s work is widely produced across the country by professional, community and academic institutions alike. His storytelling prowess extends to creating original content for Nickelodeon, HBO Def Poetry, Wondery and more. His first picture book, ‘Your House is Not Just A House’, is forthcoming on Clarion/Harper Collins 2024. Prior to Seattle, Goodwin served as Executive Director of The Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center at Colorado College and StageOne Family Theatre in Louisville, Kentucky. As Board President of Theater For Young Audiences/USA, Goodwin champions the essential role of the performing arts in society.

A Production of J.Sonic and the Unknown was at Phoenix College: Childsplay Theatre in September of 2025.

Prentiss (He/Him/His) is from Atlanta, Georgia. Prentiss earned a BFA in Theatre from Valdosta State University in May of 2020. He is a multi-hyphenated theatre artist, focusing on acting, playwriting, directing, and teaching artistry. Prentiss recently completed a 9-month Playwriting Fellowship at The Union for Contemporary Art Theatre. Where he fully dived into his artistic practice. He discovered his deep love for storytelling, decolonizing story structure, and Afrocentricity. During his fellowship, Prentiss created a new piece called “The Golden Loc”, a TYA (Theater for Young Audience) play inspired by African Mythology. After creating “The Golden Loc” Prentiss has been traveling around the country doing playreadings at festivals, conventions, and public libraries. Prentiss was a finalist in The Purple Crayon Players 16^th Annual Fresh Works Festival in Evanston Illinois and the 2024 season of the Obsidian Theatre Festival in Detroit Michigan.

A Production of Micah Meets a Mami Wata was at the Fonseca Theatre Company in 2025.

Alvaro Saar Rios is a Texican playwright living in Chicago. His plays have been seen in New York City, Mexico City, Hawaii, Chicago, Seattle and all over Texas.  His other plays include On The Wings of a Mariposa, The Mole Hill Stories and Carmela Full of Wishes.  He is currently adapting his award-winning play Luchadora! into a novel and his new stage adaptation of Pam Muñoz Ryan’s novel Esperanza Rising will premiere in 2025 at Milwaukee’s First Stage.  Mr. Rios is a proud veteran of the US Army.  He teaches playwriting at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee.  alvarosaarrios.com  Instagram: @realcrazymex 

A Production of Quetzali and the Comic Book Queen VS The Alebrije of Darkness. Live in the School Cafeteria was at Lexington Children’s Theatre in February 2025.

Sigrid Gilmer makes black comedies that are historically bent, totally perverse, joyfully irreverent
and deal with issues of identity, pop culture and contemporary American society. Sigrid’s Harry and
the Thief – an action film/historical/time travel play about a thief who is blackmailed into traveling
back in time to deliver a cache of arms to Harriet Tubman – has been produced across the country,
including Pavement Group (Chicago), the Know Theatre (Cincinnati), and the Skylight Theatre (LA).
Additional plays include: Slavey (Clubbed Thumb), Seed: A Weird Act of Faith, It’s All Bueno
(Cornerstone Theater Company), Mama Metal (IAMA Theatre Co.). Sigrid is a USA Artist Fellow.
Her TV and film work includes: Claws (TNT) and Gossip Girl (HBO Max). Killy Whitey (Hideout
Pictures). Sigrid has an MFA in Writing for Performance from Cal Arts and lives in Los Angeles.

A Production of Joy in Uncertainty: A Glory Chicken Adventure will be at Cal State Fullerton, featuring The Breath of Fire Latina Theatre Ensemble in 2026.

June Carryl was raised in Denver and attended Brown University, where she studied Political Science and English Literature. Her plays include N*GGA B*TCH (developed at Nancy Manocherian’s the cell theatre and the Vagrancy), THE WRONGED PARTY (2022 IAMA Theatre’s Shonda Rhimes Unsung Voices Commission), COLOSSUS (2023 Ojai Playwright’s Conference, semi-finalist 2021 O’Neill Playwrights Conference), BLUE (2023 Scotsman First Fringe Award, Edinburgh Fringe Festival), FLORENCE & NORMANDIE (Playwrights Arena and UCLA Diversifying the Classics, publiahed Dec. 2024) and GIRL BLUE (developed at CTG L.A. Writer’s Workshop). An actor as well, her theater credits include Fraulein Schneider in Cabaret (Celebration Theatre), Gerty Fail in Failure: A Love Story (Coeurage Theatre), the Nurse in Romeo & Juliet (A Noise Within), A.C.T’s Insurrection: Holding History, Berkeley Repertory’s Civil Sex and Thick Description’s Venus. Film and Television credits include: “Joker 2: Folie a Deux,” “Kemba,” “Y: the Last Man,” “Helstrom,” and “Mindhunter.”

A Production of (In)Visible Me will be at In Other People’s Shoes Productions.

Carolyn M. Dunn, MFA, PhD.,‘s  life as a storyteller encompasses both poetry and playwriting with works about family, grief, resilience, and the landscape in all genres and in between. In addition to the award-winning Outfoxing Coyote (That Painted Horse Press, 2002), her books include Through the Eye of the Deer (with Carol Zitzer-Comfort, Aunt Lute Books, 1999), Coyote Speaks (with Ari Berk, HN Abrams, 2008) Echolocation: Poems, Stories and Songs from Indian Country: L.A. (Fezziweg Press, 2013), The Stains of Burden and Dumb Luck (Mongrel Empire Press, 2017), a forthcoming collection of plays, The Frybread Queen, Soledad, and Three Sisters: Three Plays by Carolyn Dunn (edited and with an introduction by Sarah dAngelo, No Passport Press, 2024) and Decentered Playwriting, coedited with Leslie Hunter and Eric Micha Holmes, Routledge, 2023).  Her plays The Frybread Queen, Ghost Dance, and Soledad have been developed and staged at Native Voices at the Autry, and her current works in progress are the pow wow comedy Chasing Tailfeathers, commissioned by Oklahoma Indigenous Theatre Company and Coyote Woman, a TYA play commission for Rising Youth Theatre in Phoenix. Stage acting credits include Desert Stories for Lost Girls, The Bingo Palace, Citizen , Neechie-itas, Sliver of a Full Moon, and the musicals Distant Thunder and Missing Peace.

A Production of Carolyn Dunn’s play will be at Rising Youth Theatre

Emilio Rodriguez began his theatre career at the age of 2 by performing one-kid adaptations of The Wizard of Oz in his parent’s living room using a funnel, a broom and a pair of his mama’s high heels. Since then, he has gone on to have his plays produced in Miami, Sacramento, Lancaster, Portland, Houston, Dallas, Austin, Ann Arbor, Minneapolis, and Puerto Vallarta. Emilio is the recipient of a Kresge Detroit Artist Award, a National Association for Latino Arts and Culture Catalyst for Change Grant and the Victor Bumbalo/Robert Chesley LGBT Playwriting Award. He was the guest playwright for the 2017 Theatre Kalamazoo Festival and the 2019 Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival Midwest Region. He has taught theatre and playwriting at Michigan Actors Studio, Detroit Institute of Music Education and Kalamazoo College. He currently teaches playwriting and acting at the University of Michigan. 

A Production of An Unlikely Hero was at The Metro Theater Company October 2024. It will also be produced at The Arkansas Museum of Fine Arts and Trike Theatre in September-November 2025 and January-February 2025.

Kwik Jones has been writing, directing, and producing plays for thirty years. A theater major at Goddard College. Kwik has developed plays such as: A Strange Seed, Forgotten Soul, Voices, Black Like Me, Jupiter is Stormy, Spotlight, The Code, Puzzle Dream, Conversations, Organ, L.U.S.T, Both Sides of the Fence, Sweet Mother Jones, Memphis Bound, Water Boyz, A Cup of Life, Man’s Favor, Devil’s Plan, and many more.
Winner of the 2024 NACCP Theatre Award for Best Playwright fora 99-seat theatre for his play: Man’s Favor, Devil’s Plan, which was nominated for 14 NAACP
Theater Awards and took home six.
Kwik’s success continues in 2024, as his ten-minute play The Blind Thief was accepted into the Black Men Talk Play Festival in Chicago, Illinois, and his one-act The Ride was accepted into the 12th Annual Columbus Black Theatre Festival, in Columbus, Ohio. His stellar play, A Cup of Life will be read this summer at the Atlanta Theater Festival in Atlanta, Georgia.

A Production of Kwik Jones play will be at the Consciousness Theatre

Mara Palma (she/her) is a Filipina-American playwright, director, and performer. Her writing was part of Company One’s PlayLab Unit in 2016 (ECHOES OF EMPIRE), 5th Avenue Theatre’s First Draft: New Voices Summit in 2018 (STEADY AS SHE GOES), and the inaugural 14/48 Hollywood: World’s Quickest Theatre Festival in 2022 (SPIED AND SEEK; A TOUGH SHELL). Her first TYA play, GODDESS OF LOST THINGS, was co-created with Tara Ricasa and received its first workshop reading with Bocón Arts. Mara honors her ancestral and artistic lineage with her work. She also teaches musical theater, playwriting, creative expression, and improvisation across LAUSD and online. Mara is most drawn to artistic projects that seek to build stronger bridges between Self and Community. www.marapalma.com

A Production of Mara Palma’s play will be at Bocon Arts

Manuel A. Morán is an award-winning Puerto Rican artist and the Founder and Artistic Director of Teatro SEA, NYC’s Latino Theater for Young Audiences. A versatile writer, director, producer, actor, singer, and composer, he has established and produced various arts and theater festivals in NYC, including the groundbreaking International Puppet Fringe Festival. Morán’s theatrical and literary works have been published in Cuba, Puerto Rico, and the United States. Visit www.manuelmoran.com for more information.

A Production of Heatwave will be at Teatro SEA in the Fall of 2025.

José Casas is a playwright and Assistant Professor who heads the Playwriting Minor in the Department of Theatre & Drama at the University of Michigan. He is a member of The Dramatists Guild as well as a Board Member of Children’s Theatre Foundation of America. His plays include la rosa grows beyond the wall, all brown all chingon, aDoBe, a million whispers all at once, the vine, la ofrenda, somebody’s children and Flint.

A Production of Jose Casas’ play will be at Seattle Children’s Theatre.

Lee Cataluna’s plays include Heart Strings (Atlantic Theater, NYC; Filament Theatre, Chicago), Flowers of Hawaii (Kumu Kahua: Native Voices workshop; Chautauqua Institute; University of Hawaii), and Home of the Brave (La Jolla Playhouse; Honolulu Theatre for Youth.)  Current commissions include Emalani for Arena Stage, Super Aunty for the national BIPOC Superhero project, and Sons of Maui for San Francisco Playhouse, which was a Eugene O’Neill 2023 finalist. Her work has been supported by NEA grants and the ReImagine TYA/USA grant. She was a member of the inaugural Oregon Shakespeare Festival Indigenous Playwrights Cohort and was part of the 2024 Ojai Playwrights Conference. She is Native Hawaiian. 

A Production of Super Aunty was done at the Honolulu Theatre For Youth in February 2024.

A Production of Fallenstar: The Watchoverers was at New Native Theatre in October 2024.

Described as “serious whimsy” in The Washington Post, Hamashima creates theater with an emphasis on spectacle, surprise, and design. Full-length plays include American Spies (Washington, D.C., The Hub Theatre, Helen Hayes Recommended, 2018 Kennedy Center Undergraduate Playwriting Award and the University of Michigan Hopwood Award in Drama, Dennis McIntyre Prize, and Roy Cowden Fellowship), Supposed Home (TheatreWorks Silicon Valley, Bay Area Playwrights Festival, Seattle Public Theater), Shoyu Tell (Lexington Children’s Theatre), Possessing the Resurrected (San Francisco Playhouse). Hamashima’s work has been presented and/or developed by the Kennedy Center, Stanford University, National Queer Theater, Lyric Stage Boston, the Workshop Theater, and the Japanese American Citizens League. They are the 2nd recipient of Seattle Public Theater’s $10,000 Emerald Prize. They are currently under commission from Chicago Children’s Theatre. Hamashima is a graduate of the University of Michigan’s Musical Theater program Rep: United Talent.

A Production of Wabisabi will be at the Chicago Children’s Theatre.

SUSAN H. PAK (she/her) has taught playwriting, screenwriting, television writing, and
webseries writing at the university-level for over a decade. Past productions and readings of her
work include: Masks Off and Election at the Goodman Theater, Miguk Saram at Local Lab 2021,
The Fixer at the Steppenwolf Theater, Marabar at Chicago Dramatists, Ghost Girl at the
Workshop Theater, T.A.B. at New York’s Downtown Urban Theater Festival and the Manhattan
Repertory Theater Festival, and Incredible Invisible at Chicago’s Bailiwick Director’s Fest.
Susan’s adaptation of The Name Jar by Yangsook Choi, premiered in the spring of 2024 as a co-
production by Stages Theatre and Theater Mu in Minneapolis. Susan’s adaptation is published
and available through TRW Publications. Susan was also awarded a commission with the BIPOC
Superhero Project and the Interlochen Arts Academy for her play The Great MC, which will be
produced in March 2025.

Productions of Susan Pak’s play will be at both the Interlochen Center for the Arts and Dennos Museum Center in March 2025.

Mabelle Reynoso is an award-winning playwright and educator. Her work has been performed all over the country in theatres, community centers, and correctional facilities. Mabelle is co-host of the podcast Hey Playwright and leads TuYo Theatre’s Pa’ Letras, a workshop for emerging Latinx playwrights. She is a founding member of Teatro Las Hermanas, a collective of female-identifying theatre artists. Mabelle was proudly born in Tijuana, Mexico.

A Production of Mabelle Reynoso’s play will be at the Northwest Children’s Theatre & School.

Mariah received her BA in Communications from the University of New Mexico and an MFA from Smith College in Playwriting. She started her career as an actor and worked at the American Film Institute. Mariah is the writer/director/producer of 4 short films, two of which screened in the St. Louis International Film Festival. She directed the film, Honorable by Mia Bible. Mariah is the commissioned playwright of 13 plays with the two currently in production: The Caregivers Project and Axolotlman. She has won an HBO/New Writers Award and a Kevin Kline Award. She was part of the Nine PBS show, Drawn In, as a staff writer and voice of Lady Magnitude, which won an Emmy in 2023. She is producer of Delilah Shares Our World, a short form YouTube show. Currently, she is an Assistant Professor in Mass Communications at St. Louis Community College at Florissant Valley.

A Production of Mariah Richardson’s play will be at The Circle Theatre & The Rose Theatre

Jesse J. Sanchez is a composer-lyricist, writer, and music director. A two-time recipient of the National Alliance For Musical Theatre Frank Young Grant and a recipient of the Milagro Latino Artist Fund Grant, he has received commissions from Zach Theatre, Boston Lyric Opera, Oregon Cabaret, Portland Opera, TYA/USA, The 24 Hour Plays, Camelot Theatre, and more.  Jesse is an alumnus of Musical Theatre West New Works Festival, NAMT, The Orchard Project, The Johnny Mercer Writers Grove at Goodspeed, Austin Latinx New Play Festival, Prospect Theatre’s Musical Theatre Lab, Oregon Shakespeare Festival’s Black Swan Lab, and New York Theatre Barn Core Programs, including the Barn On Fire Festival of New Musicals (mentored by Jerry Mitchell). His work has been showcased at major regional theaters, off-Broadway, opera houses, and other performing venues, including a sold-out concert of his music at The Green Room 42 in NYC, Songwriter Showcase at NAMT, Broadway League’s The Jimmy Awards (2023 & 2024), the Broadway Housing Committee Gala hosted by Lin-Manuel Miranda. Jesse is also working with the Dr. Seuss Estate and The Old Globe on a spanish version of their Broadway musical, How The Grinch Stole Christmas. Jesse’s music is available for streaming on all major platforms and is featured regularly on Sirius XM Broadway and Musical Theatre Radio.

A Production of Zapata: The Folkloric Superhero Musical will be at The Zach Theatre

Rhiana Yazzie is a 2021 Lanford Wilson and 2020 Steinberg Award winning playwright, a director, and filmmaker. A Navajo Nation citizen (Ta’neeszahnii dóó Táchii’nii), she is the Artistic Director of New Native Theatre, which she started in 2009 as a response to the lack of connection and professional opportunities between Twin Cities theaters and the Native community. New Native Theatre is the recipient of the 2023 Headwaters Bush Prize. In 2018, Rhiana was named a Bush Foundation Leadership Fellow and was recognized with a 2018/17 Sally Award for Vision. Her new play, The Other Children of the Sun will premiere at The Kennedy Center in 2025. She is currently writing plays for Washington, DC’s Solas Nua & Ireland’s Fishamble theaters, Long Wharf Theatre & Rattlestick Theater, and the University of New Mexico. In 2023, she directed the US premiere of Missing at the Anchorage Opera and is now working on her first libretto, Little Ones, with Annishinaabe composer, Danielle Jagelski. She wrote, produced, and directed her debut feature film, A Winter Love, which has been in mainstream and Indigenous film festivals around the globe. She is a graduate of the University of Southern California’s Masters of Professional Writing where she produced events featuring Stephen Hawking, Herbie Hancock, and Spalding Gray. Rhiana is a writer on AMC’s Dark Winds seasons 2 & 3, and is working on her second feature film.

A Production of The Other Children of the Sun was at The Kennedy Center in February/March 2025.

Marcus Yi is an award-winning theatre writer/composer/director and performer based in New York. Marcus was an inaugural member of the 92nd Street Y Musical Theater Development Lab Collective, a 2021-2022 New Victory LabWorks Artist, and a Resident Artist with the American Lyric Theater.

He has been commissioned by The Kennedy Center, Queens Council on the Arts, American Lyric Theater, Atlanta Opera, Really Spicy Opera, and First Stage.

Selected work includes Lucky 88 (QCA Commission), Micro Shrimp The Musical (Winner of 11th Annual NJ Playwrights Contest), 29x/y (Wild Project, Paradise Factory), Pretty Little Mouth (Roy Arias), The Procedure (Gene Frankel Theater),The Ephemeral Lightness of Dreams: the dream plays (Lynn Redgrave Theatre), Thicker Than Water: the blood plays and Baby Baby!. 

A Production of Emily Song and The Queen of the Night was at the First Stage Theatre from January 31 – Feb 16, 2025

Shavonne Coleman (she/they) is a fabulist, facilitator, teaching/performing artist, writer, director, and cultivator of community from Detroit, MI.  Shavonne has a Bachelors in Theatre from Grand Valley State University (2007) and a MFA from Eastern Michigan University for Applied Drama/Theatre for the Young (2017). She has performed as a storyteller and actor in many spaces ranging from applied theatre (devised, community, educational theatre) to professional roles in theatre and short films. Shavonne has directed Roll of Thunder Hear My Cry by Ed Shockley, The Incredible Jungle Journey of Fenda Maria by Jack Stokes, and Butt Naked by Gloria Bond Clunie among many other community and youth productions. She’s used her passion and deep belief in the power of theatre as a catalyst for social change while directing ReACT! (GVSU) and Theatre for Dialogue (UT), both interpersonal violence prevention ensembles using Forum Theatre.

Productions of Cause Play were at both Eastern Michigan University and Spinning Dot Theatre in April 2025.