Gender Play playbill
A Warm Welcome from About Face Theatre’s Artistic Director
Welcome to the world premiere of Gender Play, or what you Will. We’re so glad to share this theatrical journey of imagination, liberation, and joy with you.
About a year and half ago, we had the pleasure of producing the first live presentation of Gender Play right here at The Den. That experience was electric and inspired us to bring the work to a full production for Chicago audiences.
Since that night, Gender Play has been in a robust development period with residencies, workshops, and practice runs. Erin Murray and Will Wilhelm stayed committed to their earliest impulses while also inviting a stellar and courageous Chicago design team to expand and serve up the queer world of this experience.
That model of cross-organizational development and broad collaboration is critical for all new plays and building a lot of momentum for this one. I hope this is the first of many productions of Gender Play because this play has a major agenda.
Enjoy the experience of breaking boundaries and living in the moment that Gender Play offers. Beyond the binaries and trappings of how history gets passed down, there’s a new world waiting. Thanks for exploring the possibilities with us.
Megan Carney
About Face Theatre Artistic Director
About Face Theatre
| MEGAN CARNEY | LOGAN JONES |
| Artistic Director | Managing Director |
presents
Co-created by
Will Wilhelm and Erin Murray
Directed by
Erin Murray
Cast
| Will | Will Wilhelm* |
| u/s Will | Jonathan Moises Olivares |
Production Team
| Dramaturg | Linnea Valdivia |
| Text Coach | Kathryn Walsh |
| Casting Director | CATHERINE MILLER |
| Scenic Designer | STEVEN ABBOTT |
| Lighting Designer | Gabrielle Strong |
| Composers/Sound Designers | TRQPITECA: Natalie Murillo & Jaquelyn Carmen Guerrero |
| Costume Designer | Uriel Gomez |
| Properties Designer | LONNAE HICKMAN |
| Accessibility Coordinator | GIANNI CARCAGNO |
| Lead Electrician | Kieran O’Connor |
| Audio Programmer | Stefanie Senior |
| Carpenters | ALEX RHYAN, CHAS MATHIEU |
| Production Manager | AUDREY KLEINE |
| Production Assistant | THEO WAMPUSZYC |
| Production Stage Manager | Lucy Whipp* |
| Asst. Stage Manager | ANNA MARGEVICH |
| Photography/Videography | TIMMY SAMUEL/STARBELLY STUDIOS |
*Member of Actors’ Equity Association, the union of professional actors and stage managers
The tarot decks used in this performance are
STAR SPINNER TAROT, designed by Trung Le Nguyen, also known as Trungles;
DREAMING WAY TAROT, designed by Kwon Shina and Rome Choi; and
THE HEROINE TAROT, designed by Gina Schiappacasse.
Special Thanks
About Face Theatre extends a special thank you to Jess McLeod, Christian Bufford, Aimee Frank, Olena Hodges, Cindy Gold, Henry Godinez, Barbara Butts, Maya Michele Fein, Lucia Neare, Manny Cawaling, Andrew Russell, Beth Blickers, Bill Rauch, Amy Peter, The Theatre School at DePaul University, and Timeline Theatre.
This creation of this play was made possible by support from:
Island Shakespeare Festival
Northwestern University Department of Theatre
Wofford College Department of Theatre
GIG Fund Grant (Arts Midwest)
National Endowment for the Arts
Performer Bios
Will Wilhelm (they/them): Co-creator, Will
Will is a Chicago-based actor, writer, and educator.They are thrilled to return to About Face Theatre after understudying the world premiere of We Three Lizas at the Steppenwolf Garage over a decade ago! Select Chicago credits include Mr. Burns (Theater Wit), Straight White Men (Steppenwolf Theatre), Notebooks of Leonardo Da Vinci (Goodman Theatre), and My Wonderful Birthday Suit (Chicago Children’s Theatre). Regional credits include Rent (Portland Center Stage); Notebooks of Leonardo Da Vinci (Shakespeare Theatre Company); and Oklahoma!, As You Like It, and Macbeth (Oregon Shakespeare Festival), where they were the first openly non-binary company member in the festival’s history. With Erin Murray, they are also the co-creator and host of the video podcast series Teacakes & Tarot, produced by Island Shakespeare Festival in association with HowlRound Theatre Commons. A proud Northwestern graduate, Will is represented by Gray Talent Group. Gender Play marks their playwriting debut! www.WillWilhelm.com IG: @mx.willwilhelm
Jonathan Moises Olivares (they/she/he): u/s “Will”
Jonathan was born in Hollywood, CA, raised in North Carolina, and is happy to split the difference and make Chicago their new home. Some of their recent credits include How To Defend Yourself (Humana Festival); When Harry Met Rehab (Greenhouse Theater); Anna in the Tropics (Remy Bumppo) and most recently Same Sects (Haven Chicago). Jonathan is a graduate of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, a former Acting Apprentice at the Actors Theatre of Louisville, and part of the inaugural acting fellowship in Lena Waithe’s Hillman Grad Mentorship Program. This past year Jonathan completed THE ACADEMY at Black Box and participated in The School at Steppenwolf. They are beyond grateful for all the love and light their friends, family, and community have poured into them! Jonathan is represented by Gray Talent.
Production Bios
Erin Murray (she/her): Co-creator & Director
Erin has directed both nationally and internationally in her twenty-year directing career. In 2005, Erin directed the Irish premiere of Hedwig And The Angry Inch (Best Production at the Speigeltent), which was remounted at Project Arts Centre in 2006. Erin was Staff Director for Ireland’s Opera Theatre Company for three seasons and toured six fully staged English translation productions internationally. Favorite directing credits include Anne Washburn’s The Internationalist (Steppenwolf Garage), the Chicago premiere of Suzanne Heathcote’s I Saw My Neighbor On The Train And I Didn’t Even Smile (Redtwist), and the Seattle premiere of Annie Baker’s John (ArtsWest). She was the Executive Producer on the sold-out 2012 world premiere of Ariel Zetina’s Pink Milk: A Magic Tragedy Based On The Life Of Alan Turing at New York International Fringe and Chicago Fringe Festival. Erin has also adapted and created new work for audiences of all ages. She celebrated the world premiere of her adaptation, Cyrano De Bergerac: A Queeroic Comedy With Many Acts, with Island Shakespeare Festival in July 2022; her adaptation of Henrik Ibsen’s Ghosts premiered in Chicago in 2018. Erin worked with Seattle artivist Ana Maria Campoy to adapt and direct Seattle Shakespeare Company’s first bilingual school WA state tours Taming Of The Shrew/La Fierecilla Domada (2017) and Twelfth Night/Duodécima Noche (2018). Additional collaborations with Will Wilhelm include the video podcast series Teacakes & Tarot: Conversations With Queer Futurists produced by Island Shakespeare Festival in 2020 and later in association with HowlRound Theatre Commons. Education: MFA Theatre Directing, Northwestern University; BA, Trinity College Dublin. ErinMurrayDirects.com
Steven Abbott (he/they): Scenic Designer
Steven Abbott is a Chicago based scenic designer and artist. Scenic Design credits include Mosque4Mosque (About Face Theatre), The Magnolia Ballet (About Face Theatre), A Dybbuk, or Between Two Worlds (DePaul University), Polaroid Stories (DePaul University). Assistant Scenic Designer for Fur (New York Theatre Workshop), Hansel and Gretel (DePaul Opera). Scenic painting credits include The Notebook: The Musical (Chicago Shakespeare), The Sound of Music (Paramount), It Came From Outer Space (Chicago Shakespeare), Pearl’s Rolling In the Blues (Writer’s Theatre), Relentless (TimeLine Theatre Company). He graduated with a BFA in Scenic Design from The Theatre School at DePaul University in 2020.
MEGAN CARNEY (she/her): AFT Artistic Director
Megan is a director, playwright, and teaching artist. Recent Chicago directing credits include The Gulf, 20/20, and Time Is On Our Side (About Face), Winter, Grizzly Mama, Danielle Pinnock’s Body/Courage, American Wee Pie, and The Walls (Rivendell). Megan has written several plays based on true stories, including Women At War based on 75 interviews with women in the military (Rivendell); Open Systems about the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina (Goodman Theatre); Let Them Eat Cake about marriage equality (Dixon Place, NYC); and multiple large ensemble plays with About Face Youth Theatre, which she co-founded. Megan’s work in theatre and community building has been recognized with multiple After Dark Awards, the GLSEN Pathfinder Award, an APA Presidential Citation, induction into Chicago’s LGBT Hall of Fame, and a Rockefeller Foundation MAP Grant. Megan served as the Director of the Gender and Sexuality Center at the University of Illinois at Chicago, where she developed public arts-based programs and led interactive workshops. She is a certified mediator with the Center for Conflict Resolution, earned an MFA in Theatre with a focus on Directing and Public Dialogue from Virginia Tech as well as a BA from Kalamazoo College, where her ideas about art as a tool for social justice and activism began to take shape.
Lonnae Hickman (she/her): Properties Designer
Lonnae (Luh-nae) Hickman graduated from DePaul’s Theatre School with a double major in Theatre and History. She’s worked as a props designer with American Players Theatre, Steep Theatre, Definition Theatre, Teatro Vista, and among many others all in prop design. She’s honored to have also won a Jeff this year for puppet design! She’s also passionate about finding to tell stories that not only need to be told but have slipped through the cracks of the theatre world.
LOGAN JONES (he/they): Stage Manager, AFT Managing Director
Logan is a Chicago-based artist, administrator, and consultant. He has frequently collaborated with multiple theatre companies while utilizing his artistic and technical skills, organizational capabilities, and highly-collaborative working style. Logan has worked with Ensemble Consulting as Facilitator and Project Manager on various leadership transitions and organizational development projects since 2015. As a stage manager and production manager, he has helmed multiple productions for About Face Theatre, American Theater Company, The House Theatre of Chicago, Windy City Playhouse, Denver Center for the Performing Arts, 13Exp, and the American Music Theatre Project, among others. Logan holds a BA in Theatre and BA in Modern Languages from Kansas State University, a certificate in Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion in the Workplace from University of South Florida, and is a graduate of the Axelson Center Bootcamp for Nonprofit CEOs at North Park University.
AUDREY KLEINE (she/her): AFT Production Manager
Audrey is a Chicago-based artist and the Operations and Production Manager at About Face Theatre. She moved from Nashville, Tennessee, to Chicago to attend college and received a BA in Theater with a concentration in Stage Management from Columbia College Chicago in 2017. After graduating, she freelanced as an Assistant Stage Manager and Production Assistant for more than a dozen productions at Chicago theaters including Windy City Playhouse, The Goodman, About Face Theatre, Rivendell and more.
Anna Margevich (she/they): Assistant. Stage Manager
Anna is a recent graduate of Northwestern University, where they studied Theatre, Gender & Sexuality, Journalism, and completed the playwriting module. They’ve worked on Steppenwolf Theatre’s 1919, Chicago Shakespeare Theater’s Shakespeare in the Parks, served as the PSM for BoHo Theatre’s National Merit, and was most recently an ASM for About Face’s Mosque4Mosque. They also completed Jackalope’s Playwrights Lab this winter. Anna thanks the Gender Play team and About Face Theatre for exemplifying the importance of queer storytelling.
Catherine Miller (they/them): Casting Director
Catherine is the resident casting director for Jackalope Theatre and have cast productions for Raven Theatre, Haven Chicago, American Musical Theatre Project at Northwestern, BoHo Theatre, Sideshow Theatre, Griffin Theatre, Red Tape, and First Floor Theater, among many others. Catherine is also a dramaturg and gender consultant, working with Actors Theatre of Louisville, Paramount Theatre, The New Coordinates, Strawdog Theatre, Diversionary Theatre, Cygnet Theatre, Ion Theatre, and First Floor Theater. Catherine was a 2021 3Arts Make A Wave recipient and was recently featured in American Theatre Magazine’s Role Call. They also were on NewCity’s 2020 + 2019 Players: The Fifty People Who Really Perform for Chicago and the Windy City Times’ 30 Under 30 list. Catherine has a BFA in Dramaturgy/Criticism from The Theatre School at DePaul.
Kieran O’Connor (he/him): Lead Electrician
Kieran was born and raised in the suburbs of Chicago and fell in love with theatre at a young age. After graduating from Illinois Wesleyan University in 2021 with a BFA in Acting, Kieran moved into the city to begin his work as a theatre artist. He works as a freelance carpenter and electrician throughout the city all the while pursuing his acting career. He would like to thank About Face Theatre for the opportunity to be the lead electrician for this production. kieranjoc.wixsite.com/artist
TRQPiTECA (NATALIE MURILLO & JACQUELYN CARMEN GUERRERO): Composers/Sound Designers
TRQPiTECA is a Chicago-based artist duo and production company founded by DJs La Spacer & Cqqchifruit. Since 2015, they have been creating spaces for local and international artists who identify as queer (LGBTQIA+), BIPOC, and allies to experiment and thrive, with tropical, house, and techno music as the foundation. They curate unique and inclusive nightlife and festival experiences through the incorporation of installation art, video, dance music, and performances. Over the 8 years of TRQPITECA’s existence, they have worked with over 300 performance artists, visual artists, DJs, and musicians from Chicago and around the world, promoting underground art and dance music as powerful forms of activism with the power to unite individuals across generations, cultural backgrounds, and identities.
Linnea Valdivia (she/they): Dramaturg
Linnea is a bicoastal scholar and theatre practitioner. Her specialties include developmental dramaturgy, queer theatre and Latinx theatre. They have artistic credits at: the Lark, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, National Queer Theater, Curious Theatre, Art House Productions, Playwrights Realm and New Dramatists. Linnea is most interested in supporting and creating spaces for new work that re-imagine popular cultural narratives, challenge American folklore and explore histories that have undergone relentless historical erasure.
Kathryn Walsh (she/her): Text Coach
Kathryn is a director, educator, and person with many opinions about how we encounter and interpret Shakespeare. She has coached or taught Shakespeare’s text at Chicago Shakespeare Theatre, Theatreworks Colorado Springs, Remy Bumppo, Two Pence Theatre Co, and James Madison University, as well as other independent workshops. Recent directing work includes Twelfth Night for Theatreworks Colorado Springs and the world premeire of Nandita Shenoy’s The Future is Female at Flint Repertory Theatre in Flint, MI, where she is an Associate Artist. Her next date with Shakespeare will be directing Richard II this summer in Maine. KathrynWalshDirector.com.
Theo Wampuszyc (he/they): Production Assistant
Theo is a trans-masc teaching artist, actor, and comedian. He is currently a member of About Face Theater’s Green Room Collective, a leadership and skill-building program for early career LGBTQIA+ theatre artists. They also work as a clown for Vaudeville Chicago, a company that brings circus and variety comedy to senior living facilities with a focus on dementia and memory care. They have most recently performed their queer, trans-centric standup in “Gender Variety” at Dorothy’s Downstairs and “Notes on Masculinity” at the California Clipper.
Lucy Whipp (she/her): Stage Manager
Lucy is so happy to be working with About Face again after stage managing The Magnolia Ballet last season. She spends her days as a Governing Ensemble member with The Story Theatre, production managing Marie Antoinette and the Magical Negroes and At the Wake of a Dead Drag Queen. New plays are always her favorite projects, which makes Gender Play such a special treat. Other favorite management credits include Port of Entry (APTP), Anna in the Tropics, Routes (Remy Bumppo), Christmas at Pemberly (Northlight), Mr. Burns: A Post-Electric Play (Theater Wit), and Plano (First Floor Theater). Many thanks to her friends, her family, her partner Nigel, and the AFT team for continuing to bring her into such remarkable rehearsal rooms.
Our Mission
About Face Theatre advances LGBTQ+ equity through community building, education, and performance.
Our Vision
About Face Theatre envisions an affirming and equitable world in which all LGBTQ+ individuals are thriving and free from prejudice and discrimination.
Anti-racism Statement
About Face Theatre is dedicated to being an intentionally and increasingly anti-racist organization. Due to the intersectionality of our identities, we understand our work to advance LGBTQ+ equity as directly connected to movements for racial justice.
Thank you to our Generous Funders
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BECOME AN ABOUT FACE SUPPORTER TODAY!
Today, it’s more important than ever to tell bold, powerful LGBTQ+ stories on stage, in our communities, and now online. About Face Theatre’s work is a powerful catalyst for moving forward local and national conversations on sexual and gender identity. During AFT’s 2019-2020 season, we persisted through amazing challenges to continue to connect with our community and continue telling LGBTQ stories.
- Our in-person and virtual productions and educational programming reached almost 4,800 community members
- Our community outreach production adapted its stories for the internet, creating the amazing Power in Pride at Home web series
- AFT’s Youth Ensemble and Youth Task Force produced online cabarets that reached more than twice as many viewers as our in-person events
With your help, we will continue to adapt and expand our impact into Chicago communities and beyond.
