Amanda Dehnert (Director) is a resident director with the Trinity Repertory Company, and an Assistant Professor at Northwestern University. Recent projects include: Man of La Mancha (Cleveland Playhouse and Virginia Stage Co.); The Fantasticks (Trinity Repertory); and Asphalt Beach (American Musical Theatre Project at Northwestern University). Ms. Dehnert held various positions with Trinity Repertory since 1996, culminating in her serving as the Acting Artistic Director for the 2005-2006 season. Past productions for Trinity include: Cyrano de Bergerac; Henry IV, Parts I and II; West Side Story; A Moon for the Misbegotten; Annie; The Skin of Our Teeth; Peter Pan, or the Boy Who Would Not Grow Up; Noises Off; Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?; My Fair Lady; Othello; Saint Joan; We Won't Pay! We Won't Pay!; and A Christmas Carol. She also directed Julius Caesar, A Midsummer Night's Dream and Richard III for the Trinity Summer Shakespeare Project. Ms. Dehnert is a composer and musical director and has written original scores and songs for many of her productions. She will direct Cabaret for The Stratford Shakespeare Festival 2008 season.

Tom Burch (Scenic Designer) returns to Chicago Shakespeare Theater, where his credits include the Short Shakespeare! productions of The Comedy of Errors, Macbeth, and The Taming of the Shrew. Other Chicago credits include: Bad Dates, Studs Terkel’s The Good War, Red Herring (Northlight Theatre); Hatfield and McCoy, Ellen Under Glass (House Theatre); The Boys Are Coming Home (Northwestern AMTP); and shows for Apple Tree, Lifeline Theatre, American Theater Company, TimeLine Theatre Company, Strawdog Theatre Company, and Theatre on the Lake, among others. Regional credits include: Romeo and Juliet (Childsplay, Phoenix); and designs for Peninsula Players, Actors Theatre of Louisville, Stage One (Louisville), Williamstown Theatre Festival, The Human Race Theatre Company (Dayton), and The Phoenix Theatre (Indianapolis). He has received a Jeff Citation, two After Dark Awards and the 2005 Michael Maggio Emerging Designer Award.

Ana Kuzmanic (Costume Designer) returns to Chicago Shakespeare Theater, where her credits include How Can You Run With a Shell on Your Back?, and the Short Shakespeare! productions of Romeo and Juliet, The Taming of the Shrew, Macbeth and The Comedy of Errors. Other Chicago credits include costume designs for August: Osage County (at Steppenwolf Theater and on Broadway at the Imperial Theater); King Lear, directed by Bob Falls, and The Cook (Goodman Theatre); Argonautika (Lookingglass Theatre Company, directed by Mary Zimmerman); The Sparrow (The House Theatre), and productions at Cleveland Playhouse, Steppenwolf Theater Company, Milwaukee Repertory Theatre, Trinity Repertory Company, Arden Theatre and Greasy Joan & Co. She graduated from the Faculty of Applied Arts and Design in Belgrade and earned her Masters Degree in Stage Design from Northwestern University. She is an adjunct lecturer at Northwestern University and an Ensemble member of The House Theatre.

Ryan Davies (Lighting Designer) is the resident lighting supervisor at Chicago Shakespeare Theater. Design credits at Chicago Shakespeare Theater include CPS Shakespeare! Romeo and Juliet and CPS Shakespeare! Hamlet. Chicago area design credits include: The Misanthrope (Greasy Joan Theatre), and Fear of a Hood (Sansculottes Theatre). Other design credits include: Smoke on the Mountain (Brown County Playhouse), Arcadia (John Waldron Arts Center), and Patty Red Pants (Bloomington Playwright’s Project). He has also designed concert lighting for Jewel, Arlo Guthrie, Solomon Burke, and Judy Collins (Cain Park).

James Savage (Sound Designer) is head of the sound department at Chicago Shakespeare Theater, where his sound design credits include: Passion, How Can You Run with a Shell on Your Back?, Hamlet, A Flea in Her Ear, The Princess and the Pea, Seussical the Musical, Peter Pan, A Little Night Music, Much Ado About Nothing and work on other CST productions since November 2002. He has served as the lead mix engineer with the Alabama Shakespeare Festival and the Utah Shakespearean Festival. Regional design credits include sound design for Sondheim’s Saturday Night and assistant sound design for Hot Mikado (University of Cincinnati—College Conservatory of Music).

Melissa Veal (Wigs and Makeup) Chicago Shakespeare Theater design credits include: Othello, Passion, Cymbeline, Troilus and Cressida, The Three Musketeers, Short Shakespeare! The Taming of the Shrew, The Two Noble Kinsmen, Hamlet, Hecuba, A Flea in Her Ear, Henry IV Parts 1 and 2 (at CST and at the Royal Shakespeare Company, Stratford-upon-Avon), Much Ado About Nothing, Short Shakespeare! Macbeth, The Merchant of Venice, Romeo and Juliet, Measure for Measure, The Merry Wives of Windsor, King John, The Molière Comedies, A Little Night Music, Rose Rage: Henry VI, Parts 1, 2 and 3 (at CST and The Duke on 42nd Street), The Taming of the Shrew, and wig supervisor for The School for Scandal. Canadian credits include: 10 seasons with the Stratford Festival, where she was the recipient of four Tyrone Guthrie Awards, including the Jack Hutt Humanitarian Award, Canadian Stage Company, Canadian Opera Company, Tarragon Theatre, Mirvish Productions and long-time association with The Grand Theatre in London.

Christine Adaire (Vocal Coach) returns to Chicago Shakespeare Theater, where her credits include: Othello, The Two Noble Kinsmen, A Flea in Her Ear, Much Ado About Nothing, The Merchant of Venice, Romeo and Juliet, Troilus and Cressida, Twelfth Night, Othello and Richard III. Other Chicago credits include: The Iphigenia Cycle, Life Is a Dream (Court Theatre); Floyd and Clea Under the Western Sky (Goodman Theatre); Oliver!, Brigadoon (The Mariott Theatre); The Master and Margarita (Lookingglass Theatre Company); Orpheus Descending (American Theatre Company); and Frozen (Next Theatre). Regional credits include projects with Milwaukee Repertory Theater, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Shakespeare Santa Cruz and Theatre for a New Audience (New York). She has been a core company member of Shakespeare & Company in Lenox, Massachusetts for 24 years. She has taught at DePaul University, The National Theatre School of Canada, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, the Shanghai Theatre Academy in China, the Institut del Teatre in Barcelona, Spain, and currently is on the faculty of the Theatre Conservatory at The Chicago College of Performing Arts at Roosevelt University.

Larry Yando (Text Coach) returns to Chicago Shakespeare Theater where his credits include: the title role in Cymbeline, The Tempest, Timon of Athens, All’s Well That Ends Well, Antony and Cleopatra, The Merry Wives of Windsor, Henry IV Parts 1 and 2, The Taming of the Shrew, King Lear and Two Noble Kinsmen. Regional credits include: Scrooge in A Christmas Carol (Goodman Theatre); Travesties, Measure For Measure, The Importance of Being Earnest, An Ideal Husband (Court Theatre); Nixon’s Nixon, Bach at Leipzig, Rocket to the Moon (Writers’ Theatre); Mother Courage and Her Children (Steppenwolf Theatre Company); Titus Andronicus (Defiant Theatre); Angels in America, Amadeus, Arcadia (Milwaukee Repertory); I Hate Hamlet (Royal George Theatre) and Scar in The Lion King.

Bob Mason (Casting Director) is in his eighth season as casting director at Chicago Shakespeare Theater, where his classical credits cover more than two-thirds of Shakespeare’s canon, including 12 productions with Artistic Director Barbara Gaines. Other CST productions of note include a quartet of Stephen Sondheim musicals (Pacific Overtures, Sunday in the Park with George, A Little Night Music, and Passion) directed by Gary Griffin, as well as Rose Rage: Henry VI Parts 1, 2 & 3 (director Edward Hall) and The Molière Comedies (director Brian Bedford). Additional Chicago casting credits include: the Sondheim/ Hal Prince premiere of Bounce (Goodman Theatre and the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts); The Good War, The Immigrant (Northlight Theatre); The Boys Are Comin’ Home, Asphalt Beach (Northwestern University’s American Music Theatre Project); and I Love You, You’re Perfect, Now Change (Royal George Cabaret). Prior to casting, Bob enjoyed a 15-year career as a Jeff Award-winning Chicago actor and singer and has been a visiting educator for the School at Steppenwolf and Northwestern University.