La Egoista

a Dominican-American playwright, performer, and theatre maker from Reading, Pennsylvania. Her heartfelt and humorous plays ranging from topics of gentrification, women's rights, and cultural preservation have been presented with Power Street Theatre where she is proud to be Co-Artistic Director.  In 2018, her play Las Mujeres received The Bonaly Award for Creation of Community Joy and in 2019 her play Morir Sonyando was nominated for six Barrymore Awards including Outstanding New Play. Erlina has received the Amtrak Writer’s residency where she traveled across the United States in an Amtrak sleeper car, the Signal Fire Outpost Residency where she lived on the side of a mountain for a week, and in 2019 she gave the Keynote Address at the Delaware Writer’s Conference on the importance of nurturing your artistic community. In 2021 she began serving as secretary of the board for Theatre Philadelphia.
Erlina was a member of NEXUS with New York Stage and Film and is a two time recipient of the Leeway Art and Change Grant and the 2021 Leeway Transformation Award. In Fall 2021, she received her professional Philadelphia premiere with Young Money (Azuka Theatre) which went on to receive the ATCA/Steinberg New Play Award Citation. In 2022, her play La Egoista was selected for the LTC Comedy Carnaval in Denver, Colorado, going on to win the 2022 National Latine Playwriting Award and her new musical Siluetas was selected for the O’Neill National Musical Theatre Conference. She has taught playwriting with the University of the Arts, Power Street Theatre, and Blue Stoop. Erlina believes being an artist is a superpower; she believes in using her powers for good.

just finished directing WET: A DACAmented Journey by Alex Alpharaoh (Greenway Court Theatre). Prior to that, she directed Waiting for Godinez by Daniel Olivas (Garry Marshall Theatre), two musical monologues for So Proudly We Hail at the Hollywood Fringe (New Musicals Inc). She’s also directed for Playwrights' Arena, The Road Theatre, San Diego Rep/Latinx New Play Festival, The Robey Theatre, Circle X, Austin Latinx New Play Festival, The Fountain Theatre, FringeNYC, First Foot Productions, the Blindspot Collective, NYU, Columbia University, and LMU, where she currently teaches. Her directing debut at LMU was In the Heights before the pandemic hit, followed by Everybody by Branden Jacobs-Jenkins upon returning to campus.  She also directed Stranger by Kendra Augustin (Stage Black) in NYC, where she won Best Director and the AUDELCO nominated Not About Eve by Karl O’Brian Williams (Braata Productions). When she is not teaching or directing, she serves as a dramaturg for multiple productions and a culture consultant for Nickelodeon.

is a professional actor and model who has been featured in Vogue, Harpers Bazaar, Elle, ID Magazine and V Magazine as well as editorials for Barneys New York, Nike, Guess and Ralph Lauren. She studied at Los Angeles County High School For The Arts, Siti Company and NYU. Recent credits in theatre include “Jennet Device” in WITCH!, “Mary Shelley” in IT’S ALIVE, “Virginia Clemm” in The Assassination of Edgar Allan Poe (Heritage Square Musuem), Three Sisters (Shakespeare Center Of Los Angeles), and Macbeth (Pico House). She is repped by Eris Talent Agency and managed by Elkins Entertainment for both TV and Film. Catch her with superpowers in Disney’s Villains of Valley View as “Imager”, and “Janice” in an upcoming romantic comedy directed by Brian Hooks. @chanelcastaneda

Born in Downey, California, and raised in various cities across Los Angeles County, Lys Perez is a Queer, Latine, Actor, Director, and Writer who has never looked back after leaving a full-time, corporate finance career for a fresh start as an artist. Lys performed in the 20th Annual Disney (ABC) Television Discovers Talent Showcase as part of the Los Angeles cast. You can catch her in S.W.A.T. (CBS, Paramount+) and starring in Functional and The Fortnight (Youtube). The Official Latino Film and Arts Festival nominated her for “Outstanding Performance by an Actress in a Webisode/Sketch” in her directorial debut of two episodes of Functional.  She has starred in riveting theater productions including: Just Like Us (Latino Theater Company), Womxn in Herstory from “Chicanas, Cholas, y Chisme” (Casa 0101 Theater), and Eastside Queer Stories (Q Youth Foundation). Lys's primary goal is to uplift the stories of marginalized people through authentic storytelling and complex representation while having a damn good time doing it.