Artistic Staff Bios
ELLEN SIMON (Playwright) wrote the screenplays for One Fine Day, How to Lose a Guy in Ten Days and Moonlight and Valentino. Her stage plays have been performed at the Duke Broadway Preview series, Stages Repertory Theatre in Houston and Pasadena Playhouse. She also wrote for the television series, “thirtysomething,” and made a sitcom pilot for NBC back in the day. Simon has two adult children and a grandson, and lives in Santa Barbara with a bunch of little rescue poodles.
KAREN AZENBERG (Director) This marks Karen Azenberg’s sixth season as Artistic Director at PTC, and she directed the season opener, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time as well as Newsies, the World Premiere of i and the concert version of In the Heights. Originally from New York, her work there includes Lyrics and Lyricists (92nd St. Y), Blocks (a collaboration with Jonathan Larson), Prom Queens Unchained and choreography for Richard Greenberg’s The Dazzle (Roundabout Theatre Co.). Among her other credits are National Tours of Carousel and Brigadoon, West Side Story (over 15 productions), and productions at Indiana Rep., Geva Theatre Center, Alabama Shakespeare Festival, Goodspeed and Utah Shakespeare Festival. Karen is on the Board of the New York Musical Theatre Festival and a past president of the Stage Directors and Choreographers Society (SDC). Her favorite productions are her son Alexander and her daughter Emelia.
BRYAN SOMMER (Stage Manager) first worked for Pioneer Theatre Company in 2012 and is thrilled to be back to join the ASS staged reading company. Other selected regional theatre credits include: Cambodian Rock Band and Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing (workshop) at South Coast Repertory; Shakespeare in Love, Romeo and Juliet, Julius Caesar, The Odd Couple, King Lear and Les Misérables at the Utah Shakespeare Festival; Porgy and Bess at Ensemble Theatre Company of Santa Barbara. When he can’t be found in a regional theatre, you’ll find him sailing the seas on cruise ships stage managing for Norwegian Creative Studios on cruise lines such as Regent Seven Seas and Oceania. Sommer is a proud member of Actors’ Equity Association.