LA Writers' Workshop

Christina Pumariega acts and writes. Often simultaneously. This spring she performed in the world premiere of her play ¡VOS! at Two River Theater. ¡VOS! was developed at the Ojai Playwrights Conference and received the Edgerton Foundation New Play Award. This summer she develops and performs in VIDAS PRIVADAS, inspired by Noël Coward’s PRIVATE LIVES, at New York Stage & Film and TRT. She attends Hedgebrook this fall. Other plays include LABOR (Leah Ryan honorable mention), JOAN DARK (Denver Center for the Performing Arts Summit), HARBOR GIRLS and HER MATH PLAY (EST/Sloan Grant). She is currently under commission by MTC/Sloan, DCPA and TRT. TV writing credits include Disney+ and NBC. Acting on and Off-Broadway and in television and film, Pumariega has cross examined Coach Taylor, made out with the Fly and set a Cuban pharmacy ablaze in a corset. MFA, NYU Graduate Acting Program. christinapumariega.com 

ERIKA SHEFFER (Playwright). Plays include Russian Transport (The New Group, Steppenwolf), The Fundamentals (Steppenwolf commission and world premiere) and Vladimir (Manhattan Theatre Club). Honors include the Paula Vogel Playwriting Award, The Vineyard Theatre’s 2012 playwright-in-residence, multiple TCG Edgerton Grants, and an Outer Critics Circle nomination. Her plays have been developed by MTC, South Coast Rep, Geffen Playhouse, The New Group, Steppenwolf, The Vineyard, Ars Nova, and SPACE on Ryder Farm. Alumna of Ars Nova Playgroup and SPACE’s Working Farm. Commissions from Steppenwolf, Geffen Playhouse, and Manhattan Theatre Club. Television and film credits include Apple TV’s Little America, Netflix’s The Beast in Me, as well as multiple shows and features in development for Apple, Starz, and others. BFA from Syracuse University. 

Keiko Green (she/her) is a playwright, TV writer, and performer based in Los Angeles. Plays include: You Are Cordially Invited to the End of the World! (South Coast Rep; Oregon Shakespeare Festival - Upcoming), Empty Ride (Old Globe), Exotic Deadly: Or the MSG Play (Old Globe; SF Playhouse; Porkfilled Productions - Upcoming), Hells Canyon (Theater Mu; WET - upcoming), The Bed Trick (Seattle Shakespeare Co; Artists Repertory Theatre - Upcoming), Sharon (Cygnet Theatre), and Hometown Boy (Actors Express; Seattle Public Theater). Her plays have been developed at the Kennedy Center, the National New Play Network, Playwrights Realm, Ensemble Studio Theatre, and twice by the O'Neill National Playwrights Conference. Awards/Honors: Susan Blackburn Prize Finalist, Kilroys Web, San Diego Critics Circle Award (Outstanding New Play), Gregory Award (Outstanding New Play). She holds commissions from Manhattan Theatre Club/Sloan Foundation and Atlantic Theatre Company. Current/Past Affiliations: Old Globe Resident Artist, Geffen Writers Group, Chance Resident Playwright, Theater Mu's Mu Tang Clan, Seattle Rep Resident Writers Group, ACT Core Company Member. For TV, she wrote on Hulu’s “Interior Chinatown” and AppleTV's upcoming "Margo's Got Money Troubles." As an actor, she has performed at theaters nationwide and originated the role of Connie in Lauren Yee’s The Great Leap at the Denver Center and Seattle Rep. BFA: NYU Drama - Experimental Theatre Wing, MFA: UCSD Playwriting. www.keikogreen.com

Maddox Pennington (he/they) is a performer, director, and playwright; a citizen of the Cherokee Nation, he is originally from Tulsa, Oklahoma. He received an MFA in Creative Nonfiction from Columbia University; his debut bibliomemoir, A Girl Walks Into a Book: What the Brontës Taught Me About Life, Love, and Women’s Work was published by Hachette Books in 2017. Their work for the stage has been developed with LA’s Native Voices, The Moving Arts MADLab, the 2024 Creative Nations First Storytellers Festival in Boulder, CO, and the Center for the Arts at Kayenta in Ivins, UT. Play readings have been presented by NYC’s FRIGID Queerly Festival Off-Off Broadway, the Theatre Viscera Podcast, and the 2023 T/GNC Reading Festival. He’s performed as an actor in The Fountain Theater’s White Rabbit Red Rabbit (Nassim Soleimanpoor) and will appear this fall in Native Voices’ rolling World Premiere of Tara Moses’ Haunted as Ash. Their latest directing projects include Madeline Sayet’s The Fish at SparkFest in Fort Worth TX and Dillon Chitto’s Pigeon at the Native Voices upcoming New Plays Retreat.

With his production company Gaybones, Pennington has written, directed and produced award-winning plays with majority nonbinary/trans casts. He recently co-produced The Joy Who Lived Festival with LaserVision productions, facilitating acting and writing workshops as well as directing a debut presentation of LOVE CHICKEN: The Musical, for which he wrote the book. You can find them online at MaddoxKPennington.com and @MKPinLA.