Teaching Artists

Bia Borinn is a Brazilian American actress, producer and educator based in Los Angeles. With over 20 years of experience, she brings an interdisciplinary approach to education and the arts. She holds a Bachelor’s degree in Theater from the University of São Paulo and a specialization in Portuguese as a Heritage Language from Plurall by BEM. Bia is the co-founder of Brazilian Play and Learn, where she developed innovative Portuguese language and Brazilian culture programs for children and families in partnership with the Brazilian Consulate. Her training in commedia dell’arte includes work with The Actor’s Gang (US). Esio Magalhães (BR) and a workshop with Enrico Bonavera from Piccolo Teatro di Milano. Early in her international career, she interned with the production of Neighborhood Watch, written and directed by Sir Alan Ayckbourn, at the Stephen Joseph Theatre in Scarborough/UK. Bia is a SAG-AFTRA member, LAUSD Conservatory of Fine Arts Educator and recent credits are The Gringo Hunters (Netflix), I Love LA (HBO) and All’s Fair (Hulu). Currently, she is producing the musical play ‘Carmen Miranda: The Queen of Samba’ and ‘Marilyn Times’. She’s fluent in Portuguese, English, and conversational in Spanish.

Christopher Cid is a Chicano writer, producer, production coordinator, theatre deviser, and teaching artist born and raised in the San Gabriel Valley of California. As a production coordinator, he has worked on various projects with organizations across Los Angeles, including Center Theatre Group: The Ahmanson (VIP Coordinator for Ben Platt: Live at the Ahmanson), Center Theatre Group: The Mark Taper Forum (Writing Assistant for Larissa FastHorse on Fake It Until you Make It; Script Coordinator for the CTG’s Annual Gala 2025-Current), Pasadena Playhouse (Assistant Touring Stage Manager for The Lizard and El Sol), Theatre of NOTE (Associate Producer for The Allstore), and Directors Lab West 2024 & 2026. Artistically, Christopher’s first and main love is writing and storytelling. His written work spans genres and mediums, including satirical theatre pieces, eco-horror films, and heartfelt comedies that often center Latino culture. As an educator, Christopher has worked with many organizations such as Theatre of NOTE, Pasadena Playhouse, and California State University, Los Angeles. He is a Truman Capote Literary Trust Scholar & a recipient of the 2024 Hollywood Foreign Press Association Scholarship. He received his BA in Theatre from CSU Long Beach and MFA in Writing for Television, Film, & Theatre from Cal State LA.

Claire Simba is a theater educator, director, and actor based in Los Angeles, California. Originally from Cameroon, she began her artistic career in Paris before moving to the United States. Her work as an educator is grounded in collaboration, imagination, and the belief that theater can foster empathy, confidence, and critical thinking across diverse communities and learning environments. Claire has taught and developed work with organizations including Pasadena Playhouse, The Old Globe, Moxie Theatre, Scripps Ranch Theater, Théâtre de l’Orme, and Théâtre du Nord-Ouest. As a director and teaching artist, she is drawn to collaborative processes, movement-based storytelling, reimagined classics, multilingual work, and stories centered on women and the African diaspora. She is the recipient of the Shiley Endowed Scholarship and the Craig Noel MFA Award.

Emoria Weidner is a theatre actor, teaching artist, director, and producer. She has over 15 years experience of professionally teaching, performing, and directing classical and modern theatre, to ages from 3 to adults. She is also a published author.

J.J. is a veteran multi-cultural teaching artist and arts curriculum specialist in social emotional learning through the ensemble-building tools of dance, theatre and stagecraft, with a personally dedicated emphasis on language arts and literacy for all. Special note: the voluntarily drawn portrait was by a student out of their sheer enthusiasm for art!

Jack Novak is a playwright, performer, and teaching artist based in Pasadena, CA. His most recent play is “X-Out,” a ghost farce about cheerleaders getting possessed by ghosts, which was commissioned, developed, and produced by CSU Fullerton in April, 2026. Other works include “The Great Lt. Sprinkle Didn’t Save Me,” a ghost play about cops (Production: Field Trip Theater); “Transferal,” a play about love, death, and Tekken (Workshop: Rorschach Theater & Spooky Action Theater); “Dr. Automaton’s Android,” a play about a robot learning how to be human (Commissioned by Only Make Believe and performed virtually for children in hospitals across the country) and numerous others. Jack teaches playwriting and physical comedy at CSU Fullerton. He has an MFA in Playwriting and Screenwriting from the UC Riverside Palm Desert Low-Residency MFA program, and studied theater at Northwestern University.
www.jackjacknovak.com

Lameece Issaq is an actor, writer and co-founder/former artistic director of Noor Theatre, for which she won an Obie Award, alongside her co-founders. She has appeared in several regional and off-Broadway productions, including her most recent play, A Good Day to Me Not to You, which premiered off-Broadway at the Connelly Theater in 2023 and was produced by Waterwell and Plate Spinner Productions; and in spring 2026 was produced at Arena Stage in Washington D.C. The play was developed at Williamstown Theatre Festival, New York Theatre Workshop, The Cape Cod Theatre Project, Noor Theatre, and Theatre Aspen’s Solo Flights Festival. She’s written various short plays produced by The New York Arab-American Comedy Festival; as well as Noor & Hadi Go to Hogwarts (Theater Breaking Through Barriers, Golden Thread Theater); Orb Weaver (24/6) and Nooha’s List, part of the compilation play, Motherhood Outloud (Hartford Stage, The Geffen and Primary Stages). Her full length play Food and Fadwa (2011 recipient of the Edgerton Foundation New American Play Award) premiered off-Broadway at New York Theatre Workshop in a co-production with Noor Theatre in which she starred and in which Variety magazine praised her performance as “stunning.” Food and Fadwa was a part of the Arab Voices Festival in both Abu Dhabi and Beirut and was published in the anthology “Contemporary Plays By Women of Color,” second edition. She co-wrote the feature film Abe, directed by Fernando Grostein Andrade, which premiered at the 2019 Sundance Film Festival. Lameece is a member of AEA and SAG/AFTRA. 2016 NYFA Finalist in Playwriting/Screenwriting. www.lameeceissaq.com

Liz Vacco is a Los Angeles based arts educator, performer, and choreographer. She has performed in NYC, LA, nationally, and internationally, She is a founding member of the New York based performance collaborative, Immediate Medium, with whom she has created and produced shows and performed since 2001. She also created a series of instructional dance videos for children entitled Petite Feet and offers dance classes in the LA area under the same name. From 2013-2023, she led the dance and arts department at Gabriella Charter Schools, public charter schools where all students receive arts instruction on a daily basis. She received her BA from Yale and her MA in education from Cal State LA, where she also received her multiple subject and kinesiology teaching credentials. She has always been a dancer who acts and an actor who dances, and she draws from both of these disciplines in her teaching and performance

Maureen Shay holds a BA/MA from Trinity College, Dublin, Ireland, where she studied at the Samuel Beckett Centre. She then raced off to the circus and professionally trained in physical theatre and embodied performance at the École Jacques Lecoq, International School of Theatre in Paris, France, where she especially loved learning object puppetry and Commedia dell’Arte masque work. She received her PhD in Postcolonial/Global Anglophone Literature and spent several years teaching theatre, literature, and critical theory at UCLA and CalArts, and working with a Los Angeles-based refugee non-profit as a storyteller and creative writing instructor. Her debut picture book, Midnight Motorbike (Neal Porter Books), was released to critical acclaim and named one of the best picture books of 2025.

Sam Rotengold is a puppeteer, writer, and arts educator based in Los Angeles. As a Thomas J. Watson fellow, Sam trained in traditional forms of puppetry around the world while exploring empathy and projection across the animate/inanimate divide. His work has been supported by the Jim Henson Foundation and featured at theaters and festivals on five continents. Alongside his art-making, Sam is the Lead Teaching Artist and In-School/Family Engagement Administrator here at the Tony Award-winning Pasadena Playhouse, where he creates opportunities for audiences of all ages to explore the performing arts inspired by the shows featured onstage. To the role he brings fifteen years of experience teaching for organizations including The New Victory Theater, Lincoln Center, and the Kennedy Center, through which he continues to offer Arts Integration professional development opportunities for classroom teachers across the country. More information at: www.samrotengold.com

Taleen Shrikian is an Armenian-American performer, choreographer, and educator born and raised in Southern California. Taleen is a graduate of Boston College where she was a member of the BC Dance Ensemble and earned her BA in Theatre Arts and Minor in Education. After graduating, Taleen returned to Southern California and has been working consistently as a professional performer in the Theatre/TV/Film industry, represented by Bloc Talent Agency. Some of Taleen’s favorite performing credits include: Evita (2019 National Tour); Grease (La Mirada/McCoy Rigby); The Wizard of Oz (Musical Theatre West); Prince of Egypt, Saturday Night Fever, and Kinky Boots (Moonlight Amphitheatre); A Christmas Carol ’15-’19 and The Madwoman of Chaillot (A Noise Within); West Side Story and Mamma Mia! (5-Star Theatricals); In the Heights (Lewis Family Playhouse); Legally Blonde (Candlelight Pavilion); Cabaret (Alaska PAC); Kiss Me Kate (SoCal Symphony); and an episode of Nickelodeon’s The Thundermans! Taleen has also choreographed over 25 dance concerts, plays, and musicals at the middle school, high school, and college level and is currently a member of the Arts Faculty at Sage Hill School. She can be seen on stage this summer in Musical Theatre West’s production of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat!

Tonoccus McClain is an actor, musician, music director, writer, and teaching artist whose career spans musical theater, opera, studio recording, and international performance. A graduate of the P.S. ARTS Teaching Artist Summer Intensive (TASI) and the Entertainment Community Fund’s Teaching Artist Training Program, he is passionate about helping students discover confidence, creativity, and empathy through storytelling and the performing arts. He has taught musical theater and performance throughout Los Angeles and internationally, including a lecture tour across China with the School for International Art (SIA), and has worked with students through the LA Music Center, Altadena Arts Magnet, Fountain Arts Theatre, Theatre of Hearts, and Village Arts Theater. His professional performing credits include over 2,400 performances of Disney’s The Lion King North American tour, LA Opera’s Pulitzer Prize-winning Omar, and vocals featured on more than 50 film and television soundtracks.

Zach Steel has been teaching at the USC School of Dramatic Arts since 2014 and is currently an Associate Professor of Theatre Practice and Director of Comedy. He has taught at The Clown School in Los Angeles and is currently teaching at The Idiot Workshop. He also serves as the Director of USC Comic+Care, a program that utilizes the practice of various comedy disciplines, including improv and medical clowning, to strengthen community and support the healing process. USC Comic+Care has partnered with LAC+USC, CHLA, Norris Cancer Center, The Adolescent and Young Adult Cancer Program @ Norris Cancer Center, The Children’s Bureau, and various other Los Angeles healthcare organizations. He has performed original work in multiple theatres in L.A., São Paolo, Brazil, and took his original, award-winning show, Me Rich You Learn, to The Telluride Playwrights Festival in Colorado. He has appeared on several television shows for Disney, Showtime, NBC, Comedy Central and Fox.