Lindsay Michele Krumbein (Gritty City Repertory) is a director and producer, a costume, set and sound designer, and a scenic painter and builder who founded GCRep in 2012.

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Gritty City Repertory Youth Theatre is Oakland's rigorous, pre-professional theatrical training program for youth of color. GCRep inspires young adults to risk and explore, developing their leadership, confidence, and compassion for the human family through the production of powerful theatre. We take artistic risks. We do not shy away from difficult subject matter. Our work is both relevant and accessible. By creating a welcoming and safe space for youth and communities of color to experience and process profound and impactful theatre, GCRep is engaging a new and diverse generation of theatre-goers.

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Krumbein's directorial and production credits include Black Salt by Robert Paige and Lindsay Krumbein, New Word Disorder by Chisa Hutchinson, Playfight, Krumbein’s first original play, ReEntry by KJ Sanchez and Emily Ackerman, Fugee by Abi Morgan, After Juliet by Sharman Macdonald, Caught Up, an original piece co-created by Krumbein, Tom Bruett, and re-written by Krumbein and Robert Paige, Anon(ymous) by Naomi Iizuka, and Shakespeare’s The Taming of the Shrew, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Macbeth, The Comedy of Errors, Much Ado About Nothing, and The Tempest. She has costume designed for BACCE and Those Women Productions, and currently builds educational curriculum for New Conservatory Theatre Center, as well as participating in the Hive Project, a cutting-edge audience lab, in collaboration with Crowded Fire Theater and Ubuntu Theater Project. Krumbein is thrilled to launch Gritty City Studios in the Flax Building in downtown Oakland, and hopes to use this new space to make an even more powerful contribution to the rich Oakland arts community for many years to come.

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Michael Socrates Moran (Ubuntu Theater Project) grew up in Richmond, California before attending Boston University where he pursued his BFA. He has worked as a professional actor in regional theaters in Chicago, Boston, San Francisco and at an off-Broadway house in New York City. He recently graduated from UC San Diego’s world-renowned MFA Directing program where he founded the award winning, Ubuntu Theater Project: a professional theater company based in Oakland, California dedicated to inspiring compassion across socio-economic and racial barriers.

 

Ubuntu is a Zulu proverb that means 'I am because we are' and 'I am a person through other people. My humanity is tied to yours.' Ubuntu Theater Project is a collection of artists that are committed to creating compelling works that unearth the human condition and unite diverse audiences through revelatory, heart-pounding theater.

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Michael now serves as Ubuntu’s Executive Director. Having directed over 15 productions, favorite professional credits include: Dance of the Holy Ghosts by Marcus Gardley, Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller, Waiting For Lefty by Clifford Odets, Othello by William Shakespeare, The Grapes of Wrath adapted by Frank Galati, Gospel of Lovingkindness by Marcus Gardley, Yellowman by Dael Oerlandersmith, Dutchman by Amiri Baraka, the West Coast Premiere of TO THE BONE & Exit Cuckoo: (A Nanny in Motherland) by Lisa Ramirez, and the World Premiere of Rashomon by Phililp Kan Gotanda. Michael is the recipient of the San Francisco Bay Area Theater Critics Circle Award for Best Director in the East Bay.

 

Kendra Barnes (K*STAR*PRODUCTIONS), trained in Contemporary & African Diasporic dance and has performed with the late Malonga Casquelourd’s Fua Dia Congo, Chitresh Das’ Chhandam School of Kathak Dance, and Carlos Aceituno as well as projects with Donald Byrd, Robert Moses, Bill T. Jones, and Rosangela Silvestre. Barnes’ work as co-choreographer of Black Odyssey was finalist for TBA’s Best Choreography Award. As Choreographer for the African-American Shakespeare Company - Black Eagles and For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide / When the Rainbow Is Enuf,  she received a Broadway World award for best choreography and TBA Finalist for Outstanding Ensemble of a Play. Most recent work includes choreographer for Crowded Fire Theater’s Production of Inked Baby. Barnes founded The Kendra Kimbrough Dance Ensemble (KKDE) in 1996.

 

The Ensemble’s mission is to bridge diverse cultures and communities through thought-provoking performances that address the common human experiences of its audience.  KKDE represents a range of ages and body-types and incorporates a variety of dance styles to inform audiences about a variety of sociocultural issues. The Ensemble creates and presents dance works that build upon a wide array of dance genres, including a fusion of modern dance with movement from African, Brazilian, and North Indian cultures.

 

In The Meantime was the 2017 recipient of PUSHfest Audience Choice Award for Best Choreography. She currently teaches dance at UC Berkeley, and is an arts administrator and former artist in residence at the Headlands Center for the Arts and CounterPULSE/SF. Barnes is the co-founder, director, and producer of the Black Choreographers Festival.