Meet Our Emerging Artists

BROADWAY: A Raisin in the Sun. OFF BROADWAY: Nollywood Dreams (MCC Theater), (A) Loft Modulation (American Vicarious), Hurt Village (Signature). REGIONAL: Welcome to Matteson (NJ Rep), King Hedley II, A Raisin in the Sun, Seven Guitars (Two Rivers Theater), Detroit ’67 (Playmakers Rep), The Mountaintop (Northern Stage), Father Comes Home from the Wars (ART), Clybourne Park, Beneatha’s Place (Baltimore Centerstage); The Piano Lesson (Yale Rep), Master Harold and The Boys (Portland Stage Company); Fly (Crossroads Theater), Richard III, All the King’s Men, Cyrano de Bergerac (Trinity Rep), Mother Courage (Public Theater/NYSF), Threepenny Opera (WTF). TELEVISION: Archive 81 (Netflix), Manifest (NBC), The Night Of (HBO), NCIS: Hawaii (CBS), Shades of Blues (NBC), The Good Fight (CBS), Unforgettable (CBS), Forever (ABC), The Rosa Parks Story (CBS), and A Raisin in the Sun “Revisited” (PBS). FILM: Roxanne, Roxanne; Complete Unknown; Twelve; Newlyweeds; Lillian. TRAINING: Alabama State University and Brown University/ Trinity Repertory Consortium. I would like to thank my family for their love and support!

Antu Yacob is an Oromo, Ethiopian born, U.S. raised artist. As a playwright, she is currently under commission through InterAct Theatre’s The Philly Cycle, with a world premiere production slated for Spring 2025. She is a cohort of The Fire This Time Festival’s New Works Lab Cycle 4. Her plays have premiered in Kampala International Theatre Festival, United Solo Theatre Festival, Project Y Theatre, Theatre167 and Mile Square Theatre. As a screenwriter and producer, her film Love in Submission is part of Full Spectrum Features’ collection: Our Right to Gaze: Black Film Identities. It screened in numerous festivals including New York African Film Festival, Women of the Lens and Black Muslim Girl Fly Festival (Honorable Mention). She also served as producer for Adrian Luke Sinclair’s film Conjure, winner of the 2017 Hip Hop Film Festival Vanguard Award. An Associate Producer with Project Y Theatre, she created and curates the annual All Hands on Deck, a series that shares new works by female playwrights of the African Diaspora. As an actress, Antu’s onscreen credits include Rob Peace (written/directed by Chiwetel Ejiofor), Inventing Anna, The Other Two, Night Comes On, The Other Two, Daredevil, Gypsy, Law & Order: SVU, Adieu Lacan, Brooklyn Park, Signs of Aging. Her onstage credits include work with The Fire This Time Festival, American Slavery Project, Primary Stages, Sheen Center, Project Y Theatre, Crossroads Theatre, Goodman Theatre, Luna Stage, Cincinnati Playhouse, Philadelphia Theatre Co, Peterborough Players, Mixed Blood Theatre, Pangea World Theatre, Pillsbury House Theatre. Her voice can be heard on Malcolm Gladwell’s Revisionist History (Druid Hills) and in the audiobook Addis Ababa Noir by Maaza Mengiste. MFA: Acting, MGSA at Rutgers University.

Karen Alvarado is a theater artist from south Texas with Latina and indigenous ancestry.
Alvarado works as an actress, director, producer, and college instructor. She received her MFA in acting from the conservatory at Rutgers Mason Gross. Her artistry draws on Meisner-based
acting, Ping Chong + Company methods of devising, Williamson movement, as well as
culturally rich and history inspired storytelling. Alvarado has been an instructor of acting at
Rutgers University, NJPAC, Luna Stages, Poetic Theatre Productions and CoLAB Arts. As an
actor, she recently appeared in repertoire as Thea Elvstead in Hedda Gabler and Camillo in
Winter’s Tale (Bedlam/Irondale Center), Mistress Quickly in BEDLAM: the Series, and Johnna
in August: Osage County (Delaware REP). As the co-artistic director of Thinkery & Verse she
has produced award-winning plays at Edinburgh Festival Fringe and the critically acclaimed
Thou Shalt Not in New Brunswick, New Jersey. Learn more about Karen's artistry at
www.karenalvarado.com and www.thinkeryandverse.org.

A long-time New Jerseyan and Mendham resident, Will Strauss arrived as a young architect to teach at the NJ School of Architecture. Over a long career, he found his passion in teaching and designing schools and safe places for kids. He raised two boys (and many cats), coached Little League, traveled and sketched, and read to children—his own and others at the Madison Library. Inspired by children’s literature and his love of music, he has completed his first children’s book. With hand-drawn illustrations and rhyming verse, Leo and the Misfits follows a young boy and his feline friends in a story of adventure, friendship, and music-making.