The Other Americans at Arena Stage

John Leguizamo (Nelson)’s Broadway credits include Latin History for Morons (Tony Award and Tony nomination), Ghetto Klown (Drama Desk Award, Outer Critics Circle Award), Freak (Emmy Award, Drama Desk Award, Tony nominations), Sexaholix…A Love Story (Tony nomination). Select Film: The Infiltrator; To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything! Julie Newmar (Golden Globe nomination, ALMA Award); Moulin Rouge!; American Ultra; John Wick; Chef; Summer of Sam; Ice Age series; The Lincoln Lawyer; Romeo + Juliet. TV: The Green Veil, When They See Us, Waco (Emmy Award nomination), Bloodline, The Kill Point, ER, My Name Is Earl, The Brothers García, House of Buggin’, Miami Vice. Books: Pimps, Hos, Playa Hatas, and All the Rest of My Hollywood Friends: My Life; Ghetto Klown (Eisner Award nomination). He co-wrote the musical Kiss My Aztec! with Tony Taccone. John’s directorial debut Critical Thinking (with Michael Kenneth Williams) premiered in 2020. Awards: two Obie, three Drama Desk, three Outer Critics Circle, one Emmy, and six Cable ACE awards.

Luna Lauren Velez (Patti) is thrilled to be making her Arena Stage debut under the direction of Ruben Santiago-Hudson. Their first collaboration was The Happiest Song Plays Last at Second Stage. Other theater credits include Broadway’s Into the Woods, Picasso at the Lapin Agile at The Old Globe, and Water by the Spoonful at the Mark Taper Forum. Luna is proud to have been part of some of television’s most groundbreaking shows such as New York Undercover (ALMA Award) and HBO’s Oz (ALMA Award). Most recently, Luna costarred alongside Jeff Daniels in Season 2 of Amazon’s American Rust. She starred as Captain Maria LaGuerta on Showtime’s Emmy Award-winning series Dexter (ALMA Award). Luna reprised her role as Rio Morales in the critically acclaimed Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse (Imagen Award). Film credits include Transformers: Rise of the Beast, The First Purge, City Hall, America Adrift, and opposite Samuel L. Jackson in Shaft. Luna’s breakout performance in the cult classic film I Like It Like That earned her an Independent Spirit Award nomination. For Liz, familia siempre. Instagram: @lunalaurenvelez

Bradley James Tejeda (Eddie) is making his Arena Stage debut. He is a native Tejano from the Harlandale district of San Antonio, Texas. He trained at the University of the Incarnate Word (BA Theatre Arts, 2013) and then at the Yale School of Drama (MFA Acting, 2016). He just finished his first season as a company member at the 89th annual Oregon Shakespeare Festival where he played Will in Born with Teeth and Claudio in Much Ado About Nothing. On Broadway, he played Young Man 1 (Adam/Leo) in Matthew Lopez’s The Inheritance, and then reprised the role at the Geffen Playhouse for its West Coast LA premiere and the Audible production. Off-Broadway: The Night of the Iguana (La Femme Theatre Productions at Signature Theatre, Fight Coordinator). Regional: El Coquí Espectacular, The Bridge of San Luis Rey (Two River Theatre); Ralph in The Lord of the Flies (Nebraska Repertory Theatre); Biron in Love’s Labor’s Lost (St. Louis Shakespeare Festival); and company member of the Tennessee Williams Festival St. Louis since 2019: The Glass Menagerie; The Rose Tattoo; and Suddenly, Last Summer. TV/Film: CBS’s Blue Bloods and FBI; Comedy Central’s Alternatino; and Apocalyptic Artists Ensemble’s Julius Caesar.

Sarah Nina Hayon (Veronica / u/s Patti, Norma) is a bi-coastal actress and a three-time Drama Desk Award nominee. Passionate about new plays, she has developed many works on and off Broadway. Recent Theater: English (Berkeley Rep, Mina Morita), Richard III (The Public’s Shakespeare in the Park, Robert O’Hara), Wintertime (Berkeley Rep, Les Waters), Seascape (A.C.T., Pam MacKinnon, BACC nomination), Sweat (A.C.T., Loretta Greco), Swimmers (Marin Theatre, Mike Donahue, TBA Award). TV/Film: The Other Two, Fairyland, FBI, For Life, 13 Reasons Why, Succession, Danny DeVito’s Curmudgeons, The Surrogate. She is a proud graduate of NYU’s Tisch and a member of LAByrinth Theater Company.

Rosa Arredondo (Norma) is a multi-hyphenate and native New Yorker. Her most recent TV credits include Francey Jones on CBS’s So Help Me Todd, and Sheriff Valenti on Roswell, New Mexico. Other credits include Ava Duvernay’s When They See Us and Mare of Easttown with Kate Winslet as well as recurring and guest roles on Ordinary Joe, Quantico, Gone, The Equalizer, Blue Bloods, The Good Wife, Blindspot, and Blacklist. Her theater credits include the Broadway revival of A Streetcar Named Desire, Arena Stage’s Guys and Dolls, Sea Dog Theater’s Danny and the Deep Blue Sea, and her one-woman show I Walked Across the Ocean Floor at Royal Family Productions. Some film credits include Still Alice, The Secret Art of Human Flight, Pinball, and Babygirl.

Trey Santiago-Hudson (Nicky) is thrilled to be making his debut at Arena Stage with this premiere of The Other Americans! A proud graduate of the Acting Department at Binghamton University, Trey has also studied acting at Stella Adler and Oregon Shakespeare. Off-Broadway credits include Toros (Second Stage Theater) and Awake (The Barrow Group). TV credits include New Amsterdam (NBC), The Walking Dead: Dead City (AMC), and Shrinking (Apple TV+). Film credits include You Hurt My Feelings (A24) and Vineyards (fam4 Media).

Rebecca Jimenez (Toni) is an actor and writer from Miami, based in New York City. Off-Broadway: Comedy of Errors: Mobile Unit (The Public Theater), Our Dear Dead Drug Lord (WP/Second Stage). NY Theater: Superstitions (New Ohio), Sketchy Eastern European Show (The Players Theatre). She has developed work with New York Theatre Workshop, Roundabout Theatre Company, Page73, Playwrights Horizons, Ojai, Playwrights Realm, and others. BFA graduate from SUNY Purchase. Para mi familia.

Juan Francisco Villa (u/s Nelson) is a Colombian-American native New Yorker who made his DC debut in his award-winning solo show Empanada for a Dream at 1st Stage. He co-directed Jesus Hopped the ‘A’ Train and columbinus at 1st Stage and was awarded Helen Hayes Awards for them. Juan worked at The Public Theater (NYC) and graced the stages of Steppenwolf, the Goodman, and Teatro Vista in Chicago. He took his talents to LA where he worked with Oscar winner José Rivera at the Geffen Playhouse and was part of a sold-out run as Pablo Fu**ing Escobar in Our Dear Dead Drug Lord at the Kirk Douglas. You will catch him in the new season of Ryan Murphy’s Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story with Javier Bardem. He had recurring roles on Blue Bloods (CBS) and General Hospital (ABC). He’s used his voice acting talents to work with Ethan Hawke, Judy Reyes, Toni Collete, Dania Ramirez, Minnie Driver, Danny DeVito, and Aubrey Plaza. He is a company member of IAMA and the Playwrights Unit. He is a graduate of the Maggie Flanigan Studio (NYC). Instagram: @juanempanadavilla

Johnny Anthony (u/s Eddie, Nicky) is a NYC-based actor who is thrilled to be back at Arena Stage! Johnny graduated from Pace University, as well as completed the Uta Hagen Institute’s Core Summer Intensive at the prestigious HB Studio. Regional theater credits include B/Henry (u/s) in Sanctuary City at Arena Stage, L.C. Harold Dawson in A Few Good Men at Cumberland Theatre, Kyle in the NYC premiere of Tom, Officer Rizzo in the NYC premiere of When the Hen Crows, and Terry Malloy in On the Waterfront. On camera, Johnny can be seen in West Side Story (dir. Steven Spielberg), American Horror Story: Delicate, Law & Order, as well as various short films and commercials. Website: www.johnnyanthony.com Instagram: @thejohnnyanthony

Odette Gutiérrez del Arroyo (u/s Veronica, Toni) is thrilled to be making her Arena Stage debut! Recent credits include Janet Van De Graaff in The Drowsy Chaperone (Workhouse Arts Center), Daniela in In the Heights (NextStop Theatre), and Aggie in Finn the Musical workshop (The Kennedy Center). Other credits: Baker’s Wife in Into the Woods (The Arlington Players), Anita in West Side Story (Columbus Children’s Theatre), Vivienne in Legally Blonde (Off the Lake Productions). When not performing, you can find Odette practicing medicine as a Physician Assistant in the DMV area and most importantly, being a mommy to her 3-year-old son, Luca. Odette wishes to thank her husband, Jake, for his unwavering love and support! Instagram: @odette_gutierrezdelarroyo

John Leguizamo (Nelson)’s Broadway credits include Latin History for Morons (Tony Award and Tony nomination), Ghetto Klown (Drama Desk Award, Outer Critics Circle Award), Freak (Emmy Award, Drama Desk Award, Tony nominations), Sexaholix…A Love Story (Tony nomination). Select Film: The Infiltrator; To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything! Julie Newmar (Golden Globe nomination, ALMA Award); Moulin Rouge!; American Ultra; John Wick; Chef; Summer of Sam; Ice Age series; The Lincoln Lawyer; Romeo + Juliet. TV: The Green Veil, When They See Us, Waco (Emmy Award nomination), Bloodline, The Kill Point, ER, My Name Is Earl, The Brothers García, House of Buggin’, Miami Vice. Books: Pimps, Hos, Playa Hatas, and All the Rest of My Hollywood Friends: My Life; Ghetto Klown (Eisner Award nomination). He co-wrote the musical Kiss My Aztec! with Tony Taccone. John’s directorial debut Critical Thinking (with Michael Kenneth Williams) premiered in 2020. Awards: two Obie, three Drama Desk, three Outer Critics Circle, one Emmy, and six Cable ACE awards.

Ruben Santiago-Hudson (Director) is a Tony Award-winning actor and a WGA-, Emmy-, and Golden Globe-nominated writer. As a director, Ruben has been awarded the Drama Desk, Audelco, Outer Critics Circle, Lucille Lortel, Drama League, Helen Hayes, three Obie awards, and a Tony nomination. The Public Theater/NY Shakespeare Festival, under the leadership of George C. Wolfe, originally commissioned Ruben’s autobiographical play Lackawanna Blues. Ruben performed the play, garnering an Obie Award and a Tony nomination. Theater directing credits include Jitney, Othello, Paradise Blue, Skeleton Crew, Cabin in the Sky for Encores!, his own Your Blues Ain’t Sweet Like Mine, Things of Dry Hours, The Happiest Song Plays Last, The Piano Lesson, The First Breeze of Summer, and My Children! My Africa!.

Arnulfo Maldonado (Set Designer)’s Arena Stage credits include American Prophet and Exclusion. Broadway: Yellow Face; Home; A Strange Loop (Tony nominee); Topdog/Underdog; Trouble in Mind. Off-Broadway: Atlantic, CSC, Lincoln Center, MCC, MTC, New Group, Playwrights Horizons, Public Theater, Roundabout, Second Stage, Signature, Soho Rep. Regional: Alley Theatre, A.R.T., Berkeley Rep, CTG, Guthrie, Steppenwolf, Woolly Mammoth. Obie Award for Sustained Excellence in Set Design, Princess Grace Fabergé Theater Award, Lucille Lortel Award recipient and multiple-nominee, Drama Desk nominee, Henry Hewes Design Award nominee. arnulfomaldonado.com Instagram: @arnulfo.maldonado.design

Kara Harmon (Costume Designer) is thrilled to return to DC. Previous productions at Arena Stage include Native Gardens and Nina Simone: Four Women. Recent projects in the DC area include The Color Purple at Signature Theatre and The Wiz at Ford’s Theatre for which she received a Helen Hayes Award. Select off-Broadway productions include Cullud Wattah at The Public Theater, The Niceties at Manhattan Theatre Club, and the inaugural production at the Perelman Center in New York City of Watch Night. Regionally, Kara’s work has been seen at Goodspeed, the Goodman Theatre, the Alliance Theatre, the Guthrie Theater, The Old Globe, and many others. Please enjoy her work at www.karaharmondesign.com.

Jen Schriever (Lighting Designer) is a Tony Award-nominated lighting designer based in New York City. She has earned multiple prestigious recognitions, including a Tony nomination for her work on A Strange Loop, an Obie Award for Sustained Excellence in Lighting Design, and a Russian Golden Mask Award nomination for A Midsummer Night’s Dream at the Mariinsky Theatre. Jen's Broadway credits include Mother Play, Death of a Salesman, 1776, What the Constitution Means to Me, and more. She has also contributed to acclaimed Off-Broadway and regional productions, including The Preacher’s Wife and Hippest Trip. In opera, her work has been seen at the Metropolitan Opera and Seattle Opera. An adjunct professor at SUNY Purchase College, where she studied, Jen is also a proud mom.

Justin Ellington (Sound Designer), born in Alexandria, Virginia, and raised in Atlanta, Georgia, is a versatile composer and sound designer who is thrilled to make his Arena Stage debut. His impressive portfolio spans theater, film, and radio, with Broadway credits including Home, Jaja’s African Hair Braiding (Tony nomination), For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide/ When the Rainbow is Enuf (Tony nomination), Topdog/Underdog, Pass Over, and Clyde’s. Off-Broadway, he’s contributed to productions at New York Theatre Workshop, Lincoln Center, and The Public Theater. Justin has earned awards like the Obie, Audelco, and Henry Hewes Design awards, and has been recognized by ASCAP and the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences. He is currently a Lecturer in Sound Design at the David Geffen School of Design at Yale University.

LaShawn Melton (Hair Designer) is a native Washingtonian hair and wig designer. Arena Stage credits include Jaja’s African Hair Braiding, Tempestuous Elements, Snow Child, Nina Simone: Four Women, The Pajama Game, Smart People, and Disgraced. Theater: The Sensational Sea Mink-ettes, Fairview, Describe the Night, Botticelli in the Fire (Woolly Mammoth Theatre); On Your Feet! (GALA Theatre); The Watsons Go to Birmingham – 1963 (The Kennedy Center); Comedy of Tenors (Olney Theatre); School Girls (Round House Theatre); Raisin in the Sun, Emma The Musical, The Play That Goes Wrong (Utah Shakespeare Festival); Little Women (Montgomery College). Film: Lioness, White House Plumbers, Rustin. Education: Fashion Merchandising, Graphic Design, UDC. Stage Makeup, Montgomery College.

Timothy Johnson (Associate Director) most recently served as Associate Director for Empire The Musical, Off-Broadway at New World Stages. For his Off-Off-Broadway production of On Strivers Row by Abram Hill at Metropolitan Playhouse, The New York Times said “Timothy Johnson has shaped 16 striking performances here.” The production received four Audelco award nominations including Best Direction for Timothy and Best Revival. His other directing credits include: She’s Got Harlem on Her Mind, Metropolitan Playhouse; Destiny of Desire, The Old Globe (Associate Director); Cabin in the Sky, New York City Center Encores! (Assistant Director). Timothy is a member of Lincoln Center Theater Directors Lab. He’s performed onstage opposite Mary Martin, Carol Channing, Larry Kert, and in productions directed by Wynn Handman and Robert Wilson. www.igniteyourcreativity.org

Thomas Schall (Fight Director) Broadway: over 100 shows. An Enemy of the People, Cabaret, Purlie Victorious, Cost of Living, Company, A Soldier’s Play (Drama Desk Award, Outstanding Fight Choreography), War Horse, Romeo and Juliet. Public Theater: Othello, Hamlet, King Lear, Titus Andronicus. NYTF: Red Speedo, Othello, (Drama Desk nomination). Met Opera: Le Nozze de Figaro, Il Trovatore, Tosca.

Ann C. James (Intimacy Coordinator) made her debut as the first Black intimacy coordinator of Broadway for Pass Over. Broadway: Sunset Boulevard, A Wonderful World, Lempicka, Hamilton, Parade (Tony Award 2023 for Best Revival of a Musical) Sweeney Todd, Heart of Rock and Roll, The Outsiders, Jelly’s Last Jam. Off-Broadway: Empire Records, Shit. Meet. Fan., Table 17, Bad Kreyol, Sunset Baby, White Girl in Danger, How to Defend Yourself, The Comeuppance, Evanston Salt Costs Climbing, My Broken Language. Regional: Empire Records, The Light and the Dark. James’ company, Intimacy Coordinators of Color, was just awarded a Special Citation from the Obie Awards and the American Theatre Wing. James has partnerships with Adelphi University, New York University, Columbia University, American Conservatory Theater, Brown University, Trinity Repertory Theater, ART/New York, and the American Repertory Theater at Harvard.

Jack Phillips Moore (Dramaturg) is a New York-based dramaturg, teacher, and theater administrator originally from the District of Columbia. Jack works as the Associate Director of New Work Development at The Public Theater, where he has served the development of dozens of new plays and musicals over the last decade and leads the Emerging Writers Group. Projects Jack has dramaturged have premiered at theaters across the country and have received numerous honors including Obie Awards, Tony Award nominations, the Princess Grace Award, the Susan Smith Blackburn Prize, and the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. He has taught courses in dramaturgy, theater history, and administration at NYU, the Atlantic Theater School, the Sewanee Writers’ Conference, and the Tepper Semester at Syracuse University and has served as a juror/consultant for the Windham-Campbell Prize, the Leah Ryan Prize, and the Kilroys, among many others.

Caparelliotis Casting /David Caparelliotis and Joseph Gery (New York Casting) Select Broadway/Off-Broadway: Mary Jane; Prayer for the French Republic; Jaja’s African Hair Braiding; 2:22 A Ghost Story; Grey House; Summer, 1976; The Comeuppance; Ohio State Murders; Cost of Living; Macbeth; The Minutes; Skeleton Crew; Ink; Letters From Max; Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?; The Waverly Gallery; Boys in the Band. Select theatres: Signature NYC, Atlantic, Ars Nova, The Old Globe, CTG. TV/Film: New Amsterdam (NBC, series casting), The Boys in the Band (Netflix, original casting).

Raiyon Hunter (DC Casting) is a casting director, producer, and arts administrator from New Orleans, Louisiana. She currently works as the Casting Director/Line Producer of Arena Stage. Previously, she worked as the Casting Director of Children’s Theatre Company and the Spelman Leadership Fellow at the Alliance Theatre (Atlanta, GA) where she has contributed to a multitude of shows in varying capacities ranging from Casting Associate to Director on productions such, as Do You Love the Dark?, Darlin’ Cory, Bina’s Six Apples, Good Bad People, Confederates, and more. Additionally, she has been in residency at Oregon Shakespeare Festival under Nataki Garrett and The Repertory Theater of St. Louis under Hana S. Sharif.

James Latus (Stage Manager) began stage managing professionally 43 years ago and began his career as an assistant director at Arena Stage on Undiscovered Country. He stage managed at Shakespeare Theatre Company in DC from 1989–2011. Broadway credits include The Collaboration, The Kite Runner, Oklahoma!, True West, Farinelli and the King, Time and the Conways, Indecent, Jitney, All The Way, A Time To Kill, Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, Clybourne Park, The Pee-Wee Herman Show, How the Grinch Stole Christmas!, Elaine Stritch At Liberty, Stones in his Pockets, Bells Are Ringing, The Capeman. He worked Off-Broadway at The Public Theater, Shakespeare in the Park, Playwrights Horizons, BAM, and numerous regional and international productions. He sits on the board of the Stage Managers’ Association Foundation.

Ana Muñoz they/them/elle (Assistant Stage Manager) is a queer + Latine theater artist and a proud member of Actors’ Equity Association. They’re incredibly excited to make their Arena Stage debut. Past stage management highlights: Off-Broadway: Assassination of Julius Caesar (PSM, Bedlam), Arcadia (Sub ASM, Bedlam), Walk On Through (PA/Sub ASM, MCC Theater); other NYC: Music City (PSM, Reading, Bedlam), Sound Bites Eleven (ASM, TheatreNow NYC). Regional: Fisher Center @ Bard (NY), Central Square Theater (MA), Alabama Shakespeare Festival (AL), Hippodrome State Theatre (FL), Cleveland Playhouse (OH), TheatreSquared (AR), and Trans Theatre Fest Madison (WI). Education: University of Montevallo (PV!). Ana wants to thank their Papa, Dr. Johnathon Muñoz, for raising his kids to treasure their Latinidad, and their fiancé, Mars, for his love.