Who we are…

Ben Yalom (artistic director) is founder and artistic director of foolsFURY. Recent directorial projects with foolsFURY include the world premiere of Monster in the Dark, the US premiere of Fabrice Melquiot’s The Devil on All Sides (which he also translated), Don DeLillo’s Valparaiso, the West Coast premiere of Martin Crimp’s seminal avant-garde work Attempts on Her Life, and others. In 2005 he directed the controversial musical Bangers’ Flopera with Inverse Theater (“Outstanding New Musical” Talkin Broadway, Summer 2005 citations). With San Francisco’s Traveling Jewish Theatre he directed Naomi Newman’s award-winning one-woman show Fall Down Get Up.

He teaches both playwriting and physical performance at California College of the Arts, and will be teaching movement for actors at the Lee Strasberg Institute (NYU/Tisch) in 2009. He has also taught at the La Mama Umbria Director’s Symposium, Stanford University, Vassar College, and the Berkeley Rep School of Theater.

Ben holds an MFA from the renowned Iowa Writers’ Workshop, and his fiction, essays and translations of plays have appeared in magazines nationwide. His play The Strange Case of the Jensen Files was produced as part of the 2005 FURY Factory festival of ensemble theater. He is currently at work on a book with Viewpoints originator Mary Overlie.

Debórah Eliezer (Associate Artistic Director) foolsFURY Education Dir., actor, dancer, puppeteer, holds a B.A. Cum Laude from SFSU. Recent foolsFURY credits include: Sera, Monster in the Dark, The Devil on All Sides (SF & NYC debuts), Apartment, and The Jensen Files. Choreographic credits include Monster in the Dark, Big Love, 12th Night or What You Will and Valparaiso with FoolsFURY, and Fall Down Get Up with TJT. She’s worked with other companies including Golden Thread, (which represented the U.S. in the ‘04 Cairo Int’l Festival for Experimental Theatre,) Woman’s Will, The Puppet Players, Abydos, Marin Shakespeare Co. and Antenna Theater. Before joining foolsFURY, Debórah was the Co Artistic Director of Eclipse Dance Theater for seven years. A pro voiceover, you may have heard her voice in Leapfrog Toys, Sims video games or radio ads.

Michelle has been a member of foolsFURY since 2007 and is the director of the company’s French Plays Project. She teaches at the French-American International School where this fall she is directing Sheila Callaghan’s “Kate Crackernuts”. Michelle studied and trained at Harvard, the Sorbonne, UCLA (M.F.A.) and L’Ecole Jacques LeCoq in Paris. Favorite recent theater performances include her one-person show, Gag me with a Dane, Re[main], Roberto Zucco, The Chekhov Machine and Steve Morgan Haskell’s how blue the sky was (roland barthes is dead), which was part of the 2007 FURYFactory festival. She has also carved out a niche playing white trash roles in television (CSI, Dragnet, Deadwood, One on One), independent films and music videos.

Alicia Coombes (Company Manager) is a dramaturg, director, and writer. Growing up in rural Oklahoma as an outsider with a flair for the dramatic, she wasn’t exposed to very much art or theatre outside of rodeos and Halloween Hell Houses. Luckily as a teenager her family returned to the Bay Area and she quickly immersed herself in all the area had to offer, and still has a particular soft spot for the dramatic (and clowns, perhaps from the rodeo days). She graduated from San Francisco State University with a BA in Theatre with an emphasis in Dramaturgy. She was Aurora Theatre Company’s Literary Manager and Artistic Assistant for four seasons and served as resident dramaturg for the 2011-2012 Season. She has done work on many aspects of theatre production (anything from stage management to casting to wardrobe) with several other Bay Area companies such as Crowded Fire, Marin Theatre Company, ZSpace/Word for Word, Golden Thread, Woman’s Will, and CalShakes.

Brian Livingston (performer) Brian Livingston is a long time Bay Area resident, a graduate of SFSU’s theater dept and a member of foolsFURY theater company. Brian has been seen in foolsfFURY’s productions of Twelfth Night, The Jenson Files, Monster the Dark, Turn of the Screw, The Devil on All Sides and Big Love. Brian has trained around the world and at home with foolsFURY, the SITI Company, Antero Alli, Stephen Wangh, Mary Overlie, Jim Kirkwood, Hiroko Tamano, Sara Shelton Mann, and a host of others. What you resist, persist. Brian’s love of performance and storytelling has led him to a lifelong pursuit of gathering, enriching, breaking and engaging our theatrical heritage.

Born and raised in South Africa. Bachelor of Arts (B.A.) in Clinical and Industrial Psychology, from the University of the Witwatersrand (WITS), Johannesburg, South Africa. Graduate Honors degree in Human Resource Management, Graduate School of Business Administration, WITS, Johannesburg, South Africa. Immigrated to the USA in 1986. Her professional experience has been in the field of community-building, public affairs, and marketing for a diplomatic mission. She was selected as a Wexner Heritage Foundation Fellow – a national Jewish leadership development program designed to groom outstanding professionals for the highest echelon of community leadership.

David Gimpelevich is a seasoned senior executive with over 20 years of experience across consumer goods, software, and consulting industries. He brings to the table deep experience in M&A, a string of successful turnaround efforts, as well as a solid record in growing global businesses. Most recently, he has been engaged in advising prominent private equity firms in identifying and packaging acquisition opportunities. Mr. Gimpelevich has worked opportunities in the restaurant chain, toy, sporting goods, consumer electronics, and video game industries and has collaborated with such firms as the Texas Pacific Group, Sorenson Capital, Hellman & Friedman, Sun Capital and H.I.G. Capital. Mr. Gimpelevich speaks fluent Russian and has extensive international experience. He received his MBA with high honors from the University of California at Berkeley Haas School of Business.

Sukhi Singh is a Consultant with Perficient Inc, with over 8 years of experience in providing both strategy and implementation advise to Fortune 500 companies including GE, IBM, Prudential, Aetna and Mckesson. Prior to Perficient, Sukhi also worked with a small startup in the areas of Strategy and Business development. He is a member of American Mensa, the High IQ Society. He received his Bachelor’s degree in Electronics Communication Engineering from Thapar University, India. He is currently pursuing his MBA from the University of California at Berkeley, Haas School of Business.

Davina Cohen (performer) joined foolsFURY as a Company Member in 2004 and is now an Associate Artist based in New York. Performances with fF: Big Love, What You Will (or Twelfth Night), Monster in the Dark (the original workshop), and Grimmly. NY credits include: David Greenspan’s adaptation of The Old Comedy at Classic Stage Company (Target Margin), a site-specific commission at the World Financial Center (the Women’s Project), Everyone Dies…Right? and 365 Days/ 365 Plays with members of the SITI Company and See; Water, a collaboration with Daniella Topol, Sheila Callaghan, and William Cusick at HERE Arts, and Zen Cabaret at the New York Clown Theater Festival. Add’l credits: mime/acrobat in Munich Staatsoper’s La Damnation de Fausto (SF Opera), Mary Zimmerman’s The Secret in the Wings (Berkeley Rep), numerous performances with SF Bay Area companies, and the infamous Trannyshack. Film and Video: Come Fly With Me Nude (orig. choreograph. and perf. poetry), My Movie Girl, and Pierre St-Jacques’s installation piece and. Davina has assisted Lauren Flanigan in her classes for American Opera Projects and appeared as a guest teaching artist at numerous colleges and with SF Arts Education. Ongoing training with SITI, add’l training with Victoria Clark, LUME Teatro, SF Circus Center, ACT, and workshops with members of Odin Teatret, Stephen Wangh, and numerous choreographers. Davina is a graduate of Columbia University and a yoga instructor in the Anusara tradition. Current and ongoing projects include: an adaptation of Deborah Hay’s solo I’ll Crane for You (SPCP 08) and an original duet inspired by Herman Hesse’s Siddhartha.

Ben Eckstein (performer) A company member since 2004 Ben has performed with foolsFURY in Grimmly, Temp Odyssey, Monster in the Dark, What You Will (or 12th Night), and The Strange Case of the Jenson Files. He holds a B.A. Cum Laude in Drama from San Francisco State University. He has additionally trained with American Conservatory Theatre, Mary Overlie, Anne Bogart, Deborah Sussel, The Canadian National Voice Intensive and many others. Ben lives in Los Angeles were he acts in both theatre and film.

Lillian Meredith (performer, director) is an actor, director, teacher, and administrator currently based in New York. A graduate of Vassar College, she has trained at National Theater Institute, BADA, LAMDA, with SITI Company and foolsFURY. Credits include: Diving in December (NYC Fringe); Air Conditioning (O’Neill Playwright’s Conference); One for the Road (Displaced Theater Company); and Negative Space and Hamlette (FullStop Collective). She has taught for the West Kortright Centre’s Summer Theater Games, Swivel Arts Theater Camp, and City Lights Youth Theater. For foolsFURY, she worked as the intern to the Artistic Director, the assistant to the Education Director, and helped to develop Monster in the Dark. Currently, she is the Marketing and Development Assistant at The Flea Theater in downtown NYC. She is a founding member and Marketing Director of FullStop Collective in New York, as well as a member of New Noise in New Orleans.

Angela Santillo (playwright, director) is a graduate of Saint Mary’s College of California where she directed and wrote the ACTF invited Red Umbrellas. As a member of foolsFURY she produced the 2007 FURY Factory, Malady of Death, Turn of the Screw, and Devil on all Sides at New York’s PS122. Her play Sera received a Incubator reading in 2008. Angela is currently pursuing her MFA in Theater at Sarah Lawrence College.

Ambra Sultzbaugh (designer) initiated her work with the fools for the production of The Strange Case of the Jenson Files, and forthwith became an Artistic Associate, designing costumes for Devil on All Sides, Big Love, and (with Kaibrina Sky Buck) for Monster in the Dark. After several years working in the Bay Area theatre scene with companies like Word for Word, Magic Theatre, and Shotgun Players, she has up and moved to Italy…whence she will be involved with fF in new and possibly mysterious ways. For updates and more visit www.ambrelladesign.com.

Allison Moon is an arts consultant and writer. She began her career in the arts at 14 years old as an apprentice theatrical lighting designer. She has managed the arts organizations Edgemar Center for the Arts, the Lily Tomlin Jane Wagner Cultural Arts Center, and is currently managing director of foolsFURY Theatre in San Francisco. She is also a curator, overseeing the first solo shows of nationally-known artists Peter Palladino, David Meanix (whose art was featured on HBO’s Six Feet Under) and feminist icon Ivy Bottini, as well as curating a number of shows for artists such as Mark Oberlin, Suzanne Shifflet, Julianna Parr, Ariel Vargassal, Gina Raphaela and many others. Allison has worked in nearly every aspect of the theater and the arts, from technical design for clients such as ESPN2 and The Do Lab and makeup for the Oberlin Opera Conservatory, to production for the WB television network and graphic design for the Los Angeles Gay & Lesbian Center. Her writing clients include Not for Tourists, Nerve.com, Psychopedia, and McSweeneys.net. She has just completed her first novel, Lunatic Fringe, which is about lesbian werewolves, and blogs about her writing process at TalesofthePack.com. She holds a B.A. from Oberlin College in Neuroscience, Theater and Cinema Studies.

Kaibrina Sky Buck (costume designer) is a textile designer and costumer with a BFA in textiles from CCA and an MFA in costume from NYU. She has also studied at the École des Beaux-Arts in France and apprenticed a master dyer in Saitama, Japan. She loves exploring color, texture, shape and image to seduce viewers into the world of the stage. Kaibrina’s designs are informed by her training in visual art and her experience as a dancer and performance artist. She has made work for dance and theater in New York and San Francisco including Theater Mitu, Misnomer Dance, Steven Koplowitz, foolsFURY, Shotgun Players, Banana, Bag and Bodice, Word For Word and others. Her design work, jewelry design and other pretty stuff can be seen at www.tangledesign.com.

Her line of fashion designs called “Tangle” is available at www.kaibrina.etsy.com.

Téana recently completed her M.F.A. in Contemporary Performance at Naropa University. Favorite roles include Cassandra in The Trojan Women directed by Kevin Kuhlke, Howie Newsome in Our Town directed by Steve Wangh, and both Ophelia and Polonios in Hamlet. She also wrote and acted in Fireworks in The Storm Drain, an original play examining bipolar disorder, which was mentored by Leigh Fondakowski of Tectonic Theatre Project. Prior to attending Naropa, Téana worked in the Bay Area with Traveling Jewish Theatre, Berkeley Repertory Theatre, California Shakespeare Theatre, Napa Shakespeare Festival, Marin Theatre Company, Playwright’s Foundation, Golden Thread Productions, as well as foolsFURY, where she has been a company member since 2004.

Csilla Horvath-Lewis (performer) is a member of foolsFURY Theater Company and a co-founder of WitsEnd Theatre Company. She received her BA degree in Theatre Arts from San Francisco State University. Past foolsFURY productions include The Turn of the Screw portraying the Governess, Viola in Twelfth Night’ both shows directed by Rod Hipskind. Livia in Valparaiso, The Creature, Attempts on Her Life directed by Ben Yalom and Lifting Belly which was directed by Marissa Wolf. She also appeared in Monster, performed at the SF Playhouse directed by Bill English. In the past year, she has also had the privilege to work with Shotgun Players on several different stage readings. She also had the honor of working with Kevin Rolston and Ronald Palmer on their new play Crystal Christian which was workshopped at the Magic Theatre back in August. Some past WitsEnd productions include Alex in On the Verge, Miss Simple in The Case of the Crushed Petunias and Marie in Woyzeck. She has also performed in independent films and appeared in the major motion picture, The Majestic directed by Frank Darabont.

Patrick Kaliski (sound designer) is a Bay area native, and our resident rock star. He began his exploration in music late in high school, and over the next few years fell deeply in love with creating music and sound. After college Patrick began playing drums in a number of unique bands, including the world-traveling Pagan Lounge ensemble, Rosin Coven, the quirky cartoon jazz quintet, Dr. Abacus, and the indie rock band, The Tongues. Besides the live scene, Patrick has been deeply involved with sound design and composition for nearly a decade, working with television, radio, film, web animations and theatre. He has worked on projects with Kids In the Hall, Sandra Bernhard, and Chris Elliot amongst others. Patrick is proud to be the resident sound designer for foolsFURY since 2002.

Ryan O’Donnell (performer) Ryan O’Donnell has been a foolsFURY company member since 2006, and has performed in What You Will (or Twelfth Night), The Devil on All Sides, All You Can Eat, and Big Love. He is also a company member with Shotgun Players, and appeared there recently in Ubu for President. Other favorite roles include, Taylor in K-2, Tom in Glass Menagerie, and Joe Pitt in Angels in America, for which he received a Dean Goodman Award. He currently teaches at Berkeley Repertory Theatre, and holds an MFA in Acting from DePaul.