Actors

Ken Ruta (SIR) midway in his sixth decade as a professional actor, appeared in San Jose Rep productions of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Las Meninas, The Underpants, Amy’s View and Later Life. An original company member of San Francisco’s American Conservatory Theatre (some 60 productions as actor/director), Minneapolis’ Guthrie Theater (over 40 productions as actor/director/associate artistic director) and Cincinnati’s Playhouse in the Park, he is an associate artist of San Diego’s Old Globe Theatre and has enjoyed a quarter century association with the Arizona Theatre Company. As well as extensive credits with the Lyric Opera of Chicago and the Minnesota Orchestra, he appeared in the Broadway productions of Inherit the Wind, Separate Tables, Duel of Angels, Ross, The Three Sisters and The Elephant Man. He is the proud recipient of the Actors Equity, the Dean Goodman and the Stolichnaya/San Francisco Magazine Lifetime Achievement awards, and many Bay Area Theatre Critics Awards, most recently for his performance in Spare Stage’s The Unexpected Man. For Craig, the two Charlies, Douglas and Richard whose presences are missed.

James Carpenter (NORMAN) has appeared at San Jose Rep in As You Like It; A Picasso; Wintertime; By the Bog of Cats; Ctrl-Alt-Delete; Sideman; and The Matchmaker. His Bay Area credits include ACT, The Aurora Theatre, Marin Theatre Company, Shakespeare Santa Cruz and TheaterWorks. An associate artist for 14 years with Berkeley Repertory Theatre, and now an associate artist with the California Shakespeare Theater, his out of town credits include: The Old Globe Theatre, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Intiman Theatre, Arizona Theatre Company, Dallas Theater Center and the Huntington Theatre Company. He is the recipient of many Critics’ Circle Awards, The Barbara Bladen Porter Award for Excellence in the Arts and is a 2010 Lunt-Fontanne Fellow. Screen credits include feature films, The Rainmaker and Metro, and independents Singing, The Sunflower Boy, Presque Isle, and the television series Nash Bridges.

Rachel Harker (HER LADYSHIP) recently played Amanda in San Jose Rep on Tour's production of The Glass Menagerie. Off-Broadway, she was Lois Wilson in Bill W. and Dr. Bob. In the Boston area, Ms. Harker won the Elliot Norton and the IRNE awards for her portrayal of Blanche in A Streetcar Named Desire at New Repertory Theatre. She also won the IRNE for her work in Harold Pinter's Ashes to Ashes and The Lover at New Repertory Theatre, and The Cutting at Stoneham Theatre, where she also appeared in The Odd Couple with Sherman Hemsley. Other productions include Lend Me a Tenor at Lyric Stage, Sherlock's Last Case at American Stage Festival and Amanda in Private Lives at The Public Theatre, Lewiston Maine. Film work includes Disney's The Gameplan, The Invention of Lying, Don MacKay and The Legend of Lucy Keyes. Ms. Harker is looking forward to her next project at the Rep, Legacy of Light.

Lynne Soffer (MADGE) has been seen at San Jose Rep as Nat in Rabbit Hole, the Italian- speaking Costanza in Enchanted April, and in Blithe Spirit and The Innocents. She has acted with the American Conservatory Theater, Berkeley Repertory Theatre, San Francisco Opera, California Shakespeare Theater, Sacramento Theatre Company, Arizona Theatre Company, Magic Theatre, The Aurora Theatre Company, Word for Word, Campo Santo, PCPA Theaterfest, Alaska Repertory Theatre, Sherwood Shakespeare Festival, Acadia Repertory Theatre of Maine, and in New York City with the Direct Theatre and the 29th Street Project. She also teaches acting, speech and text work, and has served as dialect and/or text coach on over 190 theater productions around the country, including 24 for San Jose Rep and the World Premiere of The Laramie Project at the Denver Center and in New York City. She is an associate artist at California Shakespeare Theater.

Blake Ellis (OXENBY/UNDERSTUDY NORMAN) is happy to return to the San Jose Rep stage, where he was last seen in As You Like It. He also appeared in Berkeley Repertory Theatre’s production of The Lieutenant of Inishmore and California Shakespeare Theater’s production of Richard III. Mr. Ellis has worked in such theatres as The Shakespeare Theatre (Persians, Comedy of Errors, Othello, Love's Labour's Lost) and the Royal Shakespeare Company (Love's Labour's Lost), and he can be seen in the soon-to-be-released George Lucas film, Red Tails, starring Cuba Gooding Jr. and Bryan Cranston.

Julian López-Morillas (GEOFFREY/UNDERSTUDY SIR) has appeared at the Rep in productions of Secret Order, Sonia Flew, Sons of Don Juan, The Sea Gull, Room Service, Death of a Salesman and The Miracle Worker. He has also directed Rep productions of The Servant of Two Masters and The School for Scandal. In addition, Mr. López-Morillas recently performed at the San Jose Stage Company in productions of Rock ‘n’ Roll, The Seafarer and The Pillowman. He has also acted and directed with the American Conservatory Theater, Berkeley Repertory Theatre, California Shakespeare Theater, Marin Theatre Company, TheatreWorks, Long Wharf Theatre, McCarter Theatre, American Players Theatre and Denver Center Theatre Company, to name a few, and has appeared in all 38 of Shakespeare’s plays.

Blythe Foster (IRENE) is thrilled to be performing with San Jose Repertory Theatre. She recently appeared in To Kill A Mockingbird (Mayella Ewell) at TheatreWorks and in boom (Jo) at Marin Theatre Company. Ms. Foster has also worked locally in Berkeley with Berkeley Repertory Theatre and the Shotgun Players (Mark Jackson’s Macbeth and Faust, Part I), and foolsFury Theater in San Francisco. In New York, she performed at Classic Stage Company, The Lion Theatre at Theatre Row, Repertorio Español and the Riverside Theatre at Riverside Church. Ms. Foster earned an MFA in Acting from Columbia University’s Graduate School of the Arts in NY. She also trained in Poland with Gardzienice Theatre, and apprenticed at Bread and Puppet Theater in Vermont. Music projects have included: the botticellis, kuma/koshka and sandy & kuma.

Drew Jones (ENSEMBLE/KNIGHT/ALBANY/UNDERSTUDY OXENBY) is a senior at San Jose State University majoring in Theatre Arts, and he is honored to be making his debut at San Jose Repertory Theatre. Drew’s recent productions include Twelfth Night (Malvolio) and The Sea Gull (Dorn) at San Jose State University, various characters in An Adult Evening of Shel Silverstein at Dragon Productions Theatre Company, and Little Shop of Horrors (Seymour) and Arsenic and Old Lace (Dr. Einstein) at South Valley Civic Theater. He would like to thank the company of San Jose Repertory Theatre for this amazing experience.

Jason Kapoor (ENSEMBLE/GLOUCESTER) is thrilled to make his debut with San Jose Repertory Theatre in this production. He is currently pursuing a degree in theatre arts at San Jose State University. Last summer, Mr. Kapoor performed with The Shady Shakespeare Theatre Company in The Merchant of Venice (Morocco) and Much Ado About Nothing (Claudio). Credits with San Jose State University include Dog Sees God (Matt), Twelfth Night (Orsino) and The Colored Museum (Guy, Narrator). Born and raised in San Jose, he attended Bellarmine College Preparatory, and while at San Jose State, he received improvisation training from David Razowsky, the former artistic director of the Second City Training Center. Mr. Kapoor thanks his family, friends and instructors for their love, support and guidance.

Shane Rhoades (ENSEMBLE/KNIGHT/GENTLEMAN) is very excited to make his debut with San Jose Repertory Theatre. His acting credits include: The First Day of School (Jonah) with City Lights Theater Company, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead (Tragedian) with Shady Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet (Tybalt) and Lysistrata (Kyraphios of Man) with Revolutionary Enlightenment, and Between Yesterday and Tomorrow (Tim Anderson) at the Notre Dame de Namur Theatre Festival. Mr. Rhoades recently graduated from San Jose State University with at B.A. in theatre arts. Some of his productions at San Jose State include The Colored Museum, Secret in the Wings and One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest. Mr. Rhoades can be seen next in City Lights Theater Company’s production of Equus.

Adam Sessa (ENSEMBLE/KENT) is very excited to make his debut with San Jose Repertory Theatre in this production of The Dresser. He is a graduating senior at San Jose State University, where he has participated in productions for several years. His most recent credits include Twelfth Night (Sebastian), The Mummified Deer (Don Guero/Chorus), Death of a Salesman (Happy Lohman) and TRFT Independent’s (SJSU’s television, radio, film and theatre student-run organization) Urinetown (Senator Fipp). Mr. Sessa’s film credits include Super Hero Party Clown and Birdemic: Shock and Terror. He would like to thank his family and loved ones for their support.

Designers

Kent Dorsey (SCENIC DESIGNER) has designed San Jose Rep productions including Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, The Wind Cries Mary, Enter the Guardsman, The Master Builder and The Innocents. New York theater productions include Alligator Tales, About Time, The Cocktail Hour, Yankee Dawg You Die, Suds, Another Antigone and Silence. He has designed scenery or lighting on over 95 productions for San Diego’s Old Globe Theatre and has designed for most of the major resident theater companies, including the Kennedy Center, The Ahmanson, American Conservatory Theater, La Jolla Playhouse, the Geffen Playhouse, Seattle Repertory Theater, Oregon Shakespeare Festival and Berkeley Repertory Theatre. In opera, Mr. Dorsey’s designs include The Conquistador (San Diego Opera); The Lighthouse (San Diego Opera and Chicago Opera Theatre); La Bohème and Samson et Dalila (Palm Beach Opera); and The Crucible, Madama Butterfly, Werther and The Merry Widow (Opera San Jose).

Cathleen Edwards (COSTUME DESIGNER) is delighted to return to San Jose Rep, having previously designed costumes for Sonia Flew. Well-established in the Bay Area, she has designed the costumes for numerous productions at American Conservatory Theater, Berkeley Repertory Theatre, American Musical Theatre of San Jose, TheatreWorks and a number of other companies. Among her several awards are two Drama-Logues (Pacific Overtures and Follies) and two Bay Area Theatre Critics Circle awards (Pacific Overtures and Crucifer of Blood). Her work has been seen as far away as New York (Hard Times at the Joyce Festival), Alaska (Noises Off, All My Sons and Watch on the Rhine for Alaska Repertory Theatre) and Moscow (Desire Under the Elms at the Moscow Theatre Festival).

David Lee Cuthbert (LIGHTING DESIGNER) returns to San Jose Rep, having previously designed scenery and media for Secret Order and As You Like It, and lighting for Rabbit Hole, The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee, Groundswell and The Kite Runner, for which he received the Bay Area Theatre Critics Circle Award for best lighting of a play. He lit Billy Crystal’s Tony® Award winning 700 Sundays on Broadway, as well as its International tours. Mr. Cuthbert’s work has also been seen at Opera San Jose, Arena Stage, South Coast Repertory, Intiman Theatre, San Diego Rep, American Repertory Theatre and Arizona Theatre Company. He was a resident artist at Sledgehammer Theatre, where he designed over a dozen productions, and is the theater arts department chair and an associate professor of design at the University of California, Santa Cruz.

Steve Schoenbeck (SOUND DESIGNER) is happy to return to San Jose Rep where his sound designs include Secret Order, Groundswell, The Foreigner, The Immigrant, Enchanted April, Bad Dates, Wintertime, Humpty Dumpty and A Flea In Her Ear. Mr. Schoenbeck’s sound design credits also include SF Playhouse’s Animals Out of Paper, The Sunset Limited, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest and Shining City; Marin Theatre Company’s Frozen and Love Song; American Conservatory Theater’s The Little Foxes; Traveling Jewish Theatre’s The Model Apartment; Culture Clash’s Water & Power; Edinburgh’s Assembly Theatre’s Finder’s Fee; and TheatreWorks’ Harold and Maude: An Intimate Musical, Be Aggressive and Bat Boy: The Musical, among others. He has also designed sound for short films, animation and mixed numerous musicals. Currently, Mr. Schoenbeck is the sound supervisor at San Jose Rep.