MARSIAN DE LELLIS
CREATOR, WRITER,
PERFORMER, DESIGNER
Marsian De Lellis is a Los Angeles-based interdisciplinary artist who investigates contemporary forms of animism, death, sexuality, mental illness, and addiction. In their work, they employ artificial figures, cutouts, pop-ups, performing objects, and wearable architecture.
MICHELE SPEARS
DIRECTOR
Michele Spears is a director/choreographer, performer, theatre producer, and arts educator based in Los Angeles. As a director/choreographer her work has been presented at theatres across the country and overseas including The O’Neill Theater Center, The Ojai Playwrights Conference, The Oregon Shakespeare Festival, The New York Musical Theatre Festival, Disney/ASCAP Musical Theater Workshop, The Broad Stage, REDCAT, Cornerstone Theatre, The Carpenter Center, The Pasadena Playhouse, The Colony, The Cinegrill, Stage 72/The Triad, The El Portal, The Gary Marshall Theater, the Edinburgh Theatre Festival, London’s Covent Gardens, and the Migrant Youth Theatre Project. Her work has received New York Nightlife, L.A. Weekly, Saturn, UNIMA, Stagescene L.A., Dramalogue, and Santa Barbara Independent Awards, and has been nominated for Ovation and American Choreographer awards.
On screen she choreographed the feature film Billy’s Hollywood Screen Kiss, the independent films The Wizard of Id and Nightingales, and the web series Learning Town. With Page One Productions, and executive producer Marc Platt, she produced the critically acclaimed west coast premier of An Oak Tree, starring British writer/performer Tim Crouch; and the completely improvised musical, One Night Stand, which played to sold out houses at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival two years in a row.
As an actress, Michele continues to work in theatre, television and film, and is a founding member of the award winning and critically acclaimed long-form improvisational theatre company, Impro Theatre. She is a director for the company and an instructor at the Impro School. She has also taught acting, movement, voice, dance, improvisation and writing for institutions including USC, UCLA, LA Unified Artists In Residency Program, and Harvard-Westlake School. Michele is a graduate of NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts and a member of the Directors Lab West.
ANDREW SCHMEDAKE
LIGHTING DESIGN
Andrew Schmedake is a Los Angeles-based lighting designer for theater, dance and live events. Recent credits include designs for Carmen (Opera Modesto), Native Son (Center Theatre Group), Beyond the Fluffy (Gabriel Iglesias), Steel Magnolias, The Man Who Came to Dinner, The 39 Steps, 33 Variations (2017 LA Stage Alliance Ovation Award) (Actors Co-op) One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (2018 LA Stage Alliance Ovation Award), Dogfight (After Hours Theatre Company), Native Son (2018 LA Drama Critics Circle Award) (Antaeus Theatre Company), and The Art Couple (Sacred Fools). Andrew holds an MFA from the School of Drama at Carnegie Mellon University and teaches as a guest lecturer in lighting design at UC Santa Barbara.
REBECCA KESSIN
SOUND DESIGN
Rebecca Kessin is a sound designer working in Los Angeles and regionally since 2006. Favorite credits include Die Mommie, Die! for Celebration Theatre Company and CTG’s KDT Block Party, Priscilla! Queen of the Desert for Celebration Theatre Company (Ovation Nominee – Best Production, 2019), This Land for Company of Angels, Peter Pan – The Boy Who Hated Mothers for The Blank, and Niagara Falls (World Premiere) at Theatre of NOTE.
Other credits include Dream Boy (Los Angeles Drama Critics Circle Nomination – Best Sound Design, 2017), Bootycandy, The Homosexuals, and Revolver, with Celebration Theatre Company, The Antiscians, The Apricity Project at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe 2018, Laughter on the 23rd Floor at The Gary Marshall Theatre, Fixed with The Echo Theater, Out of Our Father’s House, Red Compass Productions at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe 2016, A Singular They and The Why for The Blank, The Savannah Disputation, On Golden Pond, and The All Night Strut at The Colony Theatre.
Rebecca is also a faculty member at California State University, Fullerton, where she teaches sound design. She has also taught at Santa Monica College, Cal Poly Pomona, and the Orange County High School for the Arts. Seeing her students flourish in their chosen field brings her great joy.
LUPE LUCERO
PRODUCTION MANAGER
Lupe Lucero’s passion for management has been a hybrid of her life both professionally and personally. Her curiosity for theatre began in High School and since curiosity killed the cat, she went on to attend California Institute of the Arts for Theatre Management.
She’s thrilled to be a part of Object of Her Affection since the very beginning and continue to see it evolve to what it is today.
Directors that she’s worked with include Lee Sankowich, Lillian Groag, Laurie Smith, John Miyasaki, Maria Morett, Maureen Huskey, Jose Luis Valenzuela, Jon Lawrence Rivera, and Lars Jan.
Collaborating theatre work involves Cornerstone: Teatro Jornalero, Independent Shakespeare Co., Shakespeare Center of Los Angeles, Company of Angels, La Colectiva Chorizo y Maguey, The Latino Theatre Company, The Zephyr Theatre, Las Ramonas, The Getty Villa – Theatre Lab, and The Antaeus Company.
AUTOMATA THEATRE
Automata is a non-profit organization located at 504 Chung King Court in the Chinatown District of Los Angeles. They are dedicated to the creation, incubation, and presentation of experimental puppet theater, experimental film, and other contemporary art practices centered on ideas of artifice and performing objects. They stand at the fulcrum points between objects and performance, artifacts and ephemera, magic and mechanics, artifice and interface.
Automata is dedicated to creating and nurturing new work that is engaged in cutting edge art practices, and in deep conversation with our contemporary culture of simulation and mimicry while embracing the aura of the handmade and hand-operated. They seek to radically redefine and re-contextualize the notion of object performance, locating it at the intersection of contemporary performance, media, visual art, sound art and experimental writing.
Automata has a particular interest in intimate viewing situations, similar to those that have been the provenance of traditional puppet theater and early film: living rooms, storefront windows, and tiny theaters. They are interested in the intimacy and informality that exists when the artists and audience can actually see each other.
Automata was founded in 2004 by artists Susan Simpson and Janie Geiser. Since that time, they have been presenting intimate performances of original work, film screenings of contemporary and historical avant-garde film, lectures, workshops, and exhibitions in a variety of spaces in Los Angeles. They have invited playwrights and composers, puppeteers and designers, visual artists, and new media experimenters to collaborate and create new works using performing objects. From 2007-2009 they operated The Manual Archives, a micro performance and exhibition space dedicated to newly invented folklore for the city of Los Angeles.
MUSIC
Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
STAGE MANAGER
Kajal Ardestani
PRODUCTION ASSISTANT
Lupe Lucero
SOUND EFFECTS
Grant Baciocco
SOUND ASSISTANT
Christian Lee
LEAD SOFT FABRICATOR
Christine Papalexis
LEAD HARD FABRICATOR
Chris Sheets
LEAD DOLL FABRICATOR
Liz Watson + Peter Ceili
CANTONESE LANGUAGE COACH
Felix Kamchung
FABRICATORS
Alison Mork
Andrea Wheeler
Clarissa Estrada
Erika Montenegro
Felicia Funderbunk
Pat Brymer
Hunter Wells
Jessica Scott
Kat Vinegrad
Kate Katz
Kristin Charney
Leah Olbrich
Liz Hara
Lupe Lucero
Marissa Parr
Milena Hunter
Nate Pontius
Nick Shoob
Sarah Oh
Tim Lagase
Yomy Lopez
DOCUMENTATION
Kelly Stuart
Rafael Hernandez
Steve Gunther
Alex Griffin
Gema Galiana
Justin Streichman