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Kevin
Connors
(Executive Artistic Director
& Co-Founder)
Professional musical theatre composer and director for over 30 years. Off-Broadway credits include Prime Time Prophet, Jukebox Saturday Night, The Abandoned Loves of Frederick R., Life Anonymous, Lover - The Valentino Musical, Babes Off Broadway(finalist for the Michael Stewart Production Award), Saloon and Suzy Q. Connecticut directing credits include numerous professional productions including The Fantasticks, It’s A Wonderful Life: A Live Radio Play, Babes in Toyland, Bah Humbug! (all at Stamford’s Rich Forum); Grand Re-Opening of the Palace Theatre starring Skitch Henderson, Louise Pitre, James Naughton and Joan Rivers; Baby (Polka Dot Playhouse), Christopher Columbus andOperetta in Red, White and Blue (New England Lyric Operetta). Mr. Connors began his career as a performer touring his own act with Bob Hope, Henny Youngman and Johnny Mathis, and his debut CD - The Things We Never Say - was released in October 2000. In 1987 he co-founded Music Theatre of Connecticut with Jim Schilling, and has since directed many of the Equity MTC MainStage productions including Yours, Anne (Connecticut Critics Circle award nominee), It’s A Wonderful Life: A Live Radio Play (2008 Moss Hart Award Winner), A Little Night Music, Edges, john & jen, Doubt, My Way: The Music of Frank Sinatra and The Last 5 Years; as well as writing original music and lyrics for more than 10 children’s musicals. His latest work, Mothers and Sons (with playwright Joe Landry) had its critically-acclaimed World Premiere on the MTC Mainstage in January 2009 and is currently in development for Off-Broadway. He has served as Adjunct Professor of Musical Theatre at The Hartt School of Music/University of Hartford, Guest Teaching Artist in Acting at Sacred Heart University, the University of Bridgeport, and at Musical Theatre Works in NYC. He has created many of MTC’s educational programs including the nationally-recognized College-Bound in the Performing Arts, which he now presents at theatre schools throughout the country. Kevin is a proud member of AEA, ASCAP and The Dramatists Guild. www.kevconnors.com
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Jim
Schilling
(Managing Director
& Co-Founder)
co-founded MTC in 1987 and has served as teaching artist, Artist in Residence, director, general manager, actor, producer and currently as Director of the School of Performing Arts. He has directed a number of MTC MainStage productions including Something’s Afoot, Some Enchanted Evening and I Do, I Do. He has also directed numerous Student Productions including Anything Goes, Oliver!, The Music Man, 42nd Street, Guys and Dolls, Annie (all at the Westport Country Playhouse) The Sound of Music, Grease (3x),Godspell (3x), Funny Girl, (at the Quick Center) Annie, Annie Get Your Gun, Once On This Island, Zombie Prom and Lucky Stiff. Acting credits include Upper Broadway starring Nanette Fabray (Westport Country Playhouse), Hamlet (starring Tony Roberts), The Fantasticks (Rich Forum), It’s A Wonderful Life: A Live Radio Play (3x), and on MTC’s MainStage in Jacques Brel is Alive and Well..., Three Guys Naked from the Waist Down,and Yours, Anne. Film credits include Bullets Over Broadway, Cadillac Man, Soapdishand Dead Man Walking. As an arts educator, Jim has created a number of programs for MTC School of Performing Arts and for MTC’s ArtReach programs in area schools including Briggs High School (Norwalk),Weston Public Schools, Minds In Motion (Westport/Weston/Wilton), Rogers Magnet School (Stamford), Six-to-Six School (Bridgeport) and Coleytown Middle and Elementary Schools in Westport. Jim holds a BFA degree in Musical Theatre from Otterbein College with an emphasis on children’s theatre, was trained at the Actors’ Theatre of Louisville, Playwright’s Horizons in New York City and Improv Asylum in Boston. Jim, a graduate of the National Guild of Community Schools of the Arts’ AMICI Arts Management Program, continues as a Blue Ribbon Panelist for the Daytime Emmy Awards, and a member of “Who’s Who in the American Theatre” from 1991-present. Member AEA, SAG, AFTRA and the Theatre Artists’ Workshop. |
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Rebecca Barko (Faculty)
holds a Master of Music in Vocal Performance from The Hartt School, a Bachelor of Music in Vocal Performance from Bowling Green State University and studied on scholarship at the American Institute of Musical Studies in Austria. Rebecca, a proud member of Actors Equity Association, has performed in numerous musicals, operas and as a concert soloist across the Northeast and Midwest. Most recently, she performed alongside the Tony Award winning Cady Huffman in Theatre By The Sea's production of Hello Dolly. Other recent projects include joining the Off-Broadway production of Flanagan's Wake, performing the role of Gwendolen Fairfax in Ernest In Love and originating the role of Mary O'Neary in the world premiere production of the Oler/Hubbard musical Buddy's Tavern. In the fall 2008, she performed the role of Laura Pennington in the world premiere production of The Enchanted Cottage at the Spirit of Broadway Theatre, which garnered her the award of Best Leading Actress at the 2008 Spirit Awards.
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Marty
Bongfeldt (Faculty)
joined the faculty of
Music Theatre of Connecticut in the fall of
2001. Marty has a wide range of experience in
many different aspects of show business. She
started working professionally as a child doing
commercials and theatre, later adding feature
film and television credits with such directors
as Ron Howard and Brian DePalma. Early in her
career, Marty received such honors as being
chosen from a very select group of actor/singers
to be coached by the
legendary Mary Martin. Honors and recognition
have continued throughout Marty’s career,
one recent honor: of the many actresses who
have performed Val in A Chorus Line, it was Marty who was asked to perform “Dance
Ten, Looks Three” for Marvin Hamlisch at
the awards ceremony for Mr. Hamlisch’s
Lifetime Achievement Award directed by Tony
Award winning director Tommy Walsh. New York
and regional stage credits include Comanche
Cafe & Domino Courts, Gillette, Steel Magnolias and Biloxi Blues. Musicals include Amalia
in She Loves Me, Tiger Lily opposite
Cathy Rigby in Peter Pan, Pam in Baby,
Carrie in Carousel, Lily St. Regis in Annie and Bonnie in Anything Goes opposite Van Johnson. Ms. Bongfeldt has originated
roles in many new works produced in NYC including
Alexander Zhurbin’s A Nervous Splendor,
Hell’s Belles, A Murder is Foretold,
and Madly in Love. Marty is a teacher
and a professional choreographer/director, and
has served many times on film sets as dialogue
coach and legal guardian to under-aged actors.
Marty has worked as a casting assistant for
commercials and live industrials in NYC and
served as the casting coordinator for Square
Route and Twin Tiger’s Productions as well
as production coordinator for HYT Productions
in New York City. Member AEA, SAG and AFTRA. |
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Jennifer Devine (Faculty) comes to MTC with more than two decades of teaching and performing experience. Jennifer trained in New York City at the American Academy of Dramatic
Arts, and privately with several Master Teachers including the late Joseph Chaikin. She also studied Improv in NYC with Chicago City Limits. In 2004, she graduated Summa
Cum Laude from Hunter College in NYC where she completed her B.A. in Theatre Arts
with a Concentration in Acting. Her theater experience spans the entire spectrum of
the discipline from acting and teaching to technical theatre, house management, literary
work with the famed Ensemble Studio Theater, and arts administration. In addition to acting in numerous productions on New York's Theatre Row, including an award-winning
one-act Family Names, Jennifer has extensive performing experience in youth theatre.
She toured regionally throughout the eastern seaboard with the Vermont-based youth
theatre company Icefire Performance Group. She also performed several seasons at
the Grove Street Playhouse in New York's West Village. Jennifer's passion for theatre
dates to her earliest childhood, when she would recite poems for family gatherings.
She availed herself of every opportunity to perform, officially beginning with her role as
the Littlest Angel in her elementary school's Christmas pageant at age 6. Some of her
favorite roles and productions include: The Bacchae in the First Annual NYC Fringe
Festival, Laura in The Glass Menagerie, Fair Liberty's Call at the Duplex, and Janice
(understudy) in Italian American Reconciliation at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. Her
own positive performing experiences early in life, led to her desire to pass along those
experiences to future generations. She taught her first youth workshop in 1995, and has
continued to teach ever since. She has developed and delivered numerous Creative
Drama programs to schools, day care centers, and private clients in the NYC metro area
under the moniker Mocking Bird Arts. Jennifer is a resident of Westport, CT where she
lives with her baby daughter, Charlotte, and husband Nicholas. After taking a hiatus
from "the business" to relocate and start a family, Jennifer is delighted to be back in
action as part of the MTC family. |
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Alisa Hauser (Faculty) is thrilled to join the faculty of MTC. She has taught theatre, voice, and dance in the tri-state area for the past nine years. As a performer, Alisa has appeared on Broadway in the original cast of Thoroughly Modern Millie (Alice), Grease! (Frenchy), and in the original cast of Disney's Beauty And The Beast (Silly Girl). Some of her favorite regional and stock roles include Peggy Sawyer in 42nd Street (Theatre-By-The-Sea), Judy in A Chorus Line (Stages St. Louis), and Her/Barb in Romance/Romance (Fulton Opera House). Other theatre credits include shows at Paper Mill Playhouse, Seven Angels Theatre, Music Theatre Wichita and the Goodspeed Opera House. She is a graduate of the Cincinnati Conservatory Of Music with a BFA in Musical Theatre. Not only does she love teaching and performing she is also a lyricist and book writer. An alum of the prestigious BMI/Lehman Engel Musical Theatre Writing Workshop, she wrote book and lyrics for the new concert version of Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol with composer Bob Christianson. CD available on iTunes or amazon.com or achristmascaroltheconcert.com She has also written the short musical The Weather Man with composer Philip Palmer, which had its world premiere at the New Works Festival at Clear Space Productions in Delaware. She also wrote an original song (music and lyrics) for the Weston Playhouse production of Stuart Little. For television she has written lyrics, with composer Stephen Sislen, for the Disney Channel's Johnny And The Sprites. Her cabaret songs have been performed at various venues around New York City and beyond including Ars Nova, Joe's Pub and most recently in Dayton, OH at Encore Theatre Company's Big Fat Concert Series. |
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Deborah
Levy (Faculty)
has been on the faculty
at MTC since 1989! Aside from teaching and directing
at MTC, Deb worked at the Johnston Talent Agency
for thirteen years. Deb was a commercial agent
for two well known children’s agencies
in New York; Abrams Artists and Associates,
and Jordan, Gill and Dornbaum. After graduating
from Mount Holyoke College, Deb studied acting
at Circle in the Square in NYC. She performed
in several Off Broadway productions including
Inside Out and Mrs. Warren’s Profession.
Summer Stock credits include Fiddler on the
Roof at the New Jersey Festival Theatre,
as well as roles with Keene State Theatre, Hope
Theatre, and The Summer Theatre at Mount Holyoke
College. Deb also performed in a live Industrial
for Pepsi Cola (where she met her husband, Mark),
and she also appeared in several soap operas
including One Life to Live and As
the World Turns. Currently Deb performs
with Steppin’ Out Entertainment, a local
theatre group that does murder mysteries, musical
revues and the holiday show at the Spinning
Wheel Inn in Redding, CT. She lives in Trumbull
with her husband and their daughters, Leah (a
graduate of the MTC College-Bound program) and
Justine. Member AEA, AFTRA. |
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Kimberly
Porio (Faculty)
began her dance training
in jazz, tap and ballet with Mikki Williams
at A Dance Class in Westport, Connecticut in
1975. She later performed all across the tri-state
area with “The Jazz Troupe” directed
by Ms. Williams, including performances at The
Levitt Pavilion, the SoNo Arts Festival and
“A Tribute to Tony Bennett” at the
St. James Theatre on Broadway. Kimberly taught
Jazz classes at A Dance Class prior to attending
Providence College where she studied Modern
Jazz and Ballet. Kimberly taught a Master Jazz
Class at Providence College and was a contributing
choreographer for the first annual PC Dance
Company performance. She continues her training
at D’Valda and Sirico Dance Center in Fairfield,
where she taught both ballet and jazz from 1999-2002
and teaches Jazz Dance to the Dance Club at
Green Farms Academy during their Winter term.
She is excited and proud to be continuing her
teaching career here at MTC. |
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Stephanie Wittenberg (Faculty)
Originally from Sydney Australia, Stephanie began dance training at a young age. She holds a Certificate IV in Performing Arts from ED5 International in Australia, where she trained in Jazz, Contemporary, Ballet, Hip Hop and Tap.
Stephanie was a member of the prestigious Australian Girls Choir where she performed for such people as Nelson Mandela, Pope Benedict XVI and many past Presidents and Prime Ministers. Her favourite shows she has performed in are 'The Boy from Oz' and 'West Side Story'.
Stephanie has previously taught at Premier Dance School and Aus Girls Dance. She continues her training at Broadway Dance Center and Steps on Broadway in NYC.
She is thrilled to be part of MTC.. |
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