Heaven in Your Pocket

The late Composer & Lyricist MARK HOUSTON is best remembered for his long running satirical review, Six Women with Brain Death or Expiring Minds Want to Know, a breakout hit at the 2004 Edinburgh Fringe Festival and featured in the 2005 NY Musical Theatre Festival. Other works include Commedia Paradia, Tommyknockers, Reggie and the Riddle, Harbledown, incidental music for A Christmas Carol at Missouri Repertory Theatre, and a world-premiere opera, Hazel Kirke, commissioned by the Lake George Opera Festival. The delightful Changin' Lanes, produced regionally, is now finding new life as Heaven in Your Pocket.

Co-Librettist/Director FRANCIS J. CULLINAN has directed over 125 productions for professional theatres and opera companies throughout the USA and Canada. His work has been seen at Eisenhower Theatre in D.C., Boston's Huntington Theatre, Missouri Repertory Theatre and The Perry Street Theatre in New York City. He is a regular guest director at Creede (Colorado) Repertory Theatre and The Opera Institute of Boston University's School of Fine Arts and his work will soon be seen at Opera Omaha, where he will direct Pirates of Penzance. He has served as Associate Professor of Theatre at the University of Missouri at Kansas City where he was the principal coordinator for the MFA professional directing program and supervisor of the studio theatre series. He is currently a member of the Board of Directors of the Arts Council of Henderson County (NC).

Dramatist DIANNE SPOSITO partnered with late composer Mark Houston on three musicals: Commedia Paradia with Pamela Berlin, the poignant Harbledown and Heaven in Your Pocket with Francis J. Cullinan. Solo work includes Almost Full Circle at the Guggenheim and When There's a Will, They're Away! both produced at Emerging Artists Theatre. Current projects are: Officials of the Stardust Mission, Time Squared, What'll the Neighbors Think? and the screenplays Boris, Me, Boris and Suddenly, Lasagna! Ms. Sposito teaches in the Speech, Communications & Theatre Arts Department at BMCC (CUNY) and is a member of The Dramatists Guild of America. She is thrilled, honored and grateful to be part of the New York Musical Theatre Festival!

A native of Texas, TEX ARNOLD has pursued a career as a pianist, arranger, music director and composer. For over 25 years he was musical director for the legendary Margaret Whiting, arranging and conducting for her performances on radio, television, and records, and with major symphony orchestras. He has written orchestrations for the Lincoln Center American Songbook series and for Carnegie Hall tributes to the song-writing teams of Alan and Marilyn Bergman, Betty Comden and Adolph Green. As a pianist, he has accompanied Broadway stars Melissa Errico at the Cafe Carlyle in NYC, and Barbara Cook in concerts throughout the country, including performances at the LA Music Center and Carnegie Hall. An instructor for the annual Cabaret Symposium at the Eugene O'Neill Theater Center for many years, he has continued in that capacity for its successor program, the Cabaret Conference at Yale University. Mr. Arnold is a member of ASCAP and Local 802, American Federation of Musicians.

Artistic Director and Founder of Emerging Artists Theatre, PAUL ADAMS (Co-Producer) has been at its helm for 15 years, producing over 30 full-length original plays and over 200 new one-act plays. He is also a member of the Steering Committee of League of Independent Theatre and a committee member of The New York Innovative Theatre Awards. Paul has directed Layout by Richard Ploetz, Real Danger by Jeff Hollman, My Sister the Cow by Greg Fletcher, Reunion by William Borden, Counter Girls by Jonathan Reuning and most recently Sisters' Dance by Sarah Hollister. Paul is extremely proud and happy to be producing Heaven in Your Pocket, Emerging Artists' first venture into musicals.

ALAN SOUZA is a busy, freelance director who just directed the world premiere of the musical The Little Hours by David Bucknam, based on the short stories of Dorothy Parker, for the New Jersey Repertory Theatre. Other recent projects include The Full Monty for the Maltz Jupiter Theatre, I Do! I Do! for the New Theatre in Kansas City, and two very different productions of Side by Side by Sondheim - one for the Walnut Street Theatre and one for Virginia Musical Theatre. Coming up: regional productions of Ears on a Beatle and Little Women. He and Becky Spencer were separated at birth. Find out more at www.alansouzaonline.com

REBECCA SPENCER recently returned from Las Vegas, where she created the role of Madame Giry in Phantom — The Las Vegas Spectacular. This role reunited her with Hal Prince, for whom she had played Carlotta in his Hamburg, Germany Phantom Company. While in Las Vegas, she also performed the American premiere of Jerry Springer - The Opera (Irene / Mary) at MGM's Hollywood Theatre, hosted the 2007 Liberace Piano Competitionsand headlined a full-length solo concert evening. Among her numerous theatrical leading roles, Rebecca created the role of Emma Carew in the Alley Theatre world premiere of Jekyll & Hyde and was later an original Broadway cast member. Her diverse recording experience includes the first cast album of Ragtime, Irving Berlin's Watch Your Step ( Birdie O'Brian), and A Linda Eder Xmas (Bravo). She has been a guest soloist with leading American Symphonies, under the direction of Keith Lockhart, Marvin Hamlisch, and Rob Fisher, including five seasons with ENCORES!, Carnegie Hall's Gershwin Centennial (PBS) and the NYC Cabaret Convention produced by the Mabel Mercer Foundation. Her television appearances include Third Watch & Law and Order: SVU. Her critically acclaimed debut solo recording, Wide Awake and Dreaming, earned the 2004 Back Stage Bistro Award. Her newest release Fair Warning is available in stores and thru ITunes, and both are distributed on the LML Music label. Please visit www.RebeccaSpencer.com.

Seen in the 2007 NYMF production of Austentatious, LISA ASHER appeared in the world premiere of Almost Heaven, John Denver's America for the Tony Award Winning Denver Center Theater Company and can be heard on the original cast recording. She has toured nationally with Broadway's The Who's Tommy and appeared in the Off-Broadway hit Woody Guthrie's American Song, which received a Drama Desk Nomination for Best Musical. Sharing the stage with such notables as Bruce Springsteen, Ani DeFranco, Pete Seeger and Arlo Guthrie, Lisa was featured in a concert tribute to Woody Guthrie produced by The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. A recipient of a New York Nightlife Award, a MAC Award, and a Back Stage Bistro Award for her solo work in cabarets in New York, Lisa made her national television debut in a solo vocal performance on the Emmy Award-winning The Rosie O'Donnell Show. A veteran studio musician, Ms. Asher can be heard on television themes, audio projects for numerous publishing companies, as well as commercial and educational children's products, including products for Sesame Street and Berlitz. Please visit her at www.LisaAsher.com

This is PHEONIX VAUGHN's first appearance with Emerging Artists Theatre Company. She recently appeared in A Piece Of My Heart with the Red Fern Theatre Company and The Best Party Ever at the Richmond Shepard Theater. Originally from California, Pheonix has appeared in over a hundred regional musicals and plays with her favorites including Blood Brothers, My Fair Lady, and Little Shop Of Horrors. LA credits include The People vs. Friar Laurence and originated roles in Fools, Shakespeare's Greatest Hits, and Trombone. For more information visit www.pheonixvaughn.com.

Having recently moved to New York from the Midwest, this is CLAIRE SLEMMER's first stage appearance in the city. Favorite regional credits include: After the Fall (directed by Rebecca Miller), Hamlet, March of the Falsettos, Lips Together Teeth Apart, the world premiere of Michael Weller's Help!, and numerous British pantomimes in which she played the principal boy. Claire has performed widely as a vocalist and guitarist, and can be heard on voiceovers and audiobooks and seen in The Shawshank Redemption and The Insider. For more info, visit www.claireslemmer.com.

MARK SHOCK is very glad to be working with Emerging Artists Theatre and the NYMF. Regionally, he has been in such shows as Almost Heaven, Shear Madness, Taming of the Shrew and Once Upon a Mattress. In NYC Mark has performed at the Apollo Theater in the civil-rights musical If This Hat Could Talk and most recently at The American Girl Place Theater in Circle of Friends. For a closer look at Mark's work check out www.markshock.com.

This is CHUCK SACULLA's second venture with Emerging Artists Theatre. Originally from Chicago, he now proudly calls New York City home. Broadway: Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, Aida. National Tours: Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, Aida, Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat starring Donny Osmond, West Side Story, Leader of the Pack, Evita. Off-Broadway: The Madwoman of Chaillot (Theatre Unplugged) and Sisters' Dance at EAT. Film/TV: The Sopranos, The Dave Chappelle Show, All My Children, One Life To Live and Blood of a Champion. Chuck is one of Rosie O'Donnell's "Broadway Boys." He is represented by Noble Talent Management. Member, AEA.

This is TIM McMATH's third time with Emerging Artists Theatre, having designed Claymont and the 2008 Spring EATfest. Other Favorites: Guilty (Cell Theatre) Six Degrees of Separation (Gallery Players), Volume of Smoke (14th Street Theater), The Wild Party and A Winters Tale, both at Columbia University and The Eumenides (NYU), Scapin and Buddy (both at POTS, Memphis). He is a graduate of the College of William and Mary and holds an MFA in scenic design from the University of Washington, Seattle. Do visit him at www.timmcmath.com.

Recent projects include: Urinetown at Theatre Three; Lobby Hero, Pirates of Penzance, and Anna in the Tropics at Lehman College; Goodbye April, Hello May at Here Arts Center, Hair at Elizabethtown College, Zephyr's Pond, Romeo and Juliet with the Trinity Rep/Brown University Consortium, Vanishing Point: The Triangle Project, A New Musical with the Act One Company at Williamstown Theatre Festival, The Crucible, Golden Boy at NYU's Tisch School, Diary of a Chambermaid with Dramahaus NY and Late Night Cabaret '02 at Williamstown Theatre Festival. Please visit www.gbenjaminswope.com

Sound designs: Anything Goes (Walla Walla, WA), Fame (Herricks, LI, NY), Take Me Out (Gallery Players), Emerging Artists Theatre's Triple Threat (2006) and EATFests (Fall 2004-Fall 2006), Isabella & the Pretty Ugly Spell (NYMF-2005), The Miss Education of Jenna Bush"(NY Fringe Fest Audience Favorite), Movie Lover (TOSOS II) and "Andomanina (HERE Arts Center, NYC).

JENNY LEE MITCHELL is a singer, actor, musician, vaudevillian and producer and has performed throughout Europe for 10 years. Highlights include the world premiere, Dance of The Vampires, directed by Roman Polanski and the Austrian/Swiss tour of Fame as Miss Bell. She is currently co-artistic director of TheaterTHE, a dadaist theater company dedicated to music, performance and video art. She plays clarinet and sings with TheaterTHE's The Renaldo The Ensemble and with The clown band and The Maestrosities. Proud member of Emerging Artists Theatre where she has curated 3 seasons of their developmental series for one-woman pieces and clown and puppetry work. Member of AEA.

KATIE ROSIN / KAMPFIRE FILMS PR (Marketing/PR) Off-Broadway: Play About the Naked Guy, Claymont, & Sisters' Dance, BPAC; Mother Load, Sage Theater; Wasps in Bed & Anaïs Nin: One Of Her Lives, Beckett Theater; 2007 Drama Desk Nominee (mis)UNDERSTANDING MAMMY: The Hattie McDaniel Story, Theater 5. Rosin launched of the Broadway musical Brooklyn. Rosin's clients include: Emerging Artists Theatre, New York Innovative Theatre Awards, Nicu's Spoon, & T.Schreiber Studios. Rosin teaches Marketing the Arts at NYU. www.kampfirefilmspr.com.