LOCAL GRANDMA

Leonie Bell is a German-American theater artist from Berlin, based in New York. Leonie’s pieces feature live song, genre-fluid dance and physicality, and frequently include voluntary audience participation and communal rituals. She creates highly physical, dark humor theater landscapes populated by pseudo-historical, multilingual narratives that often center matriarchal lineages and imagine nature as a main character. In NYC, she has presented work at Target Margin Theater, The Brick, Performance Space NY, BAM, The Whitney Museum, Center for Performance Research, and other venues. Leonie produces much of her work through her free-form theater company LOCAL GRANDMA. She is an alumna of the Clubbed Thumb Directing Fellowship, Mabou Mines Resident-Artist-Program, and BAX Upstart Program. leoniebell.org / @leonbellstein

CHEEKS is a clown who appreciates all that is stupid and beautiful. She’s thrilled to be back for her fourth collab with LOCAL GRANDMA! She’s appeared internationally at Théâtres de la Ville du Luxembourg, and in venues across NYC (Caveat, BCC, BK Art Haus, MoMA PS1). Catch her clowning around at The Idiot’s Hour. @cheeeeeekss

Theodor Gabriel is a multinational theater producer, performer, and dramaturg. Most recently he helped create a queer festival at WildHeart Center in Wallkill, NY. He has presented work at FEST in Skillinge, Sweden, an international theatre conference merging performance practice, ecology, and social transformation. Recent collaborations include Petty Tyrant (Carla Kissane, Shakespearean Cabaret); The D Project, an adaptation of Women of Trachis conceived and directed by Ivan Talijancic (WaxFactory); and TRACES, a Sophie Calle retrospective created by Rachel Jendrzejewski and WaxFactory and presented at the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis. He holds an MFA in Dramaturgy from Columbia University. theodorgabriel.com / @theodor.gabriel

Julliette Holliday is a Brooklyn based, Black, multi-hyphenate artist. As a theatre-maker she has collaborated with The Eugene O’Neill Theater Center, La Mama Experimental Theatre Club, The Tank NYC, The Miranda Family Fellowship, and more. In her creative writing, Julliette explores themes of displacement, disembodiment, intimacy, and racial/ethnic belonging. A graduate of Sarah Lawrence College, her creative nonfiction and poetry has received support from Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference, Kenyon Writers Workshop, McCormack Writing Center, and VONA. Currently, she teaches acting, improv, devising, and musical theatre across NYC public schools with All The World Collective. @jullietteh

John R. Howley is an actor best known for his lead role in Bleeding, a Cineverse feature named one of The New York Times’ “Best Genre Movies of 2025.” He will next be seen as the leading man of the upcoming television series Perfect Sundays and the feature film Helen & Edgar (from the creators of The Moth Radio Hour). Recent theatre credits include: The Edge of the World (Williamstown Theatre Festival), Timon of Athens (The Elif Collective), Hamlet (NY Circus Project), The One Good Thing (Seven Angels Theatre). John is a graduate of Columbia University and is proudly represented by ATB Talent and 3G Management. @johnrhowley

Marcella Murray is a New York-based theater artist from Augusta, Georgia. She is a playwright, performer, collaborator, and puppeteer. Murray’s work is heavily inspired by the observed ways in which people tend to segregate and reconnect, themes of identity within a community, and forward momentum in the face of trauma. Her work has been seen at Performance Space NY, Abrons Arts Center, Mabou Mines, Dixon Place, St. Ann’s Warehouse, Chez Bushwick, Detroit Institute of Art, The Brick, French Institute; Alliance Française, The Loading Dock, La MaMa, UNC Chapel Hill/Carolina Center for Performing Arts, UW Madison, MCA Chicago, and BAM. Murray is a co-curator of the Object Movement Puppetry Residency and teaches at Sarah Lawrence College. @marcirenee04

Stella Oh is a NYC-based Korean American-Canadian actor, writer, singer-musician, and occasional sound designer who’s delighted to be working with Local Grandma for the first time! She’s greatly interested in an holistic artistic practice that investigates text and movement through play and physical theater. Past credits include her solo show Even Monkeys Fall From Trees (ChuanFest 2026) and Molly-Kate in CRINGE (Fishmarket Theatre Co.). Many thanks to her 엄마, 언니, 오빠, friends, and mentors for their loving support and, most importantly, don’t forget your local grandma! @stella._.oh

Hanna Westi is a diversely trained singer, actress and dancer based in New York City, originally from Hamburg, Germany. She is a graduate of the American Musical and Dramatic Academy (AMDA) Integrated Program. Hanna has been a permanent cast member of the Galli Theater New York. She also recently took on the role as Associate Director of the monthly running Chasing Dreams NYC Cabaret Series and has previously danced with Rumbamena Dance Company. Hanna has also proven to be a passionate teaching artist for children and teenagers. Hanna’s recent credits include New Year - One Vision - Two Concerts by Hanna Westi at the Reepschlaegerhaus, SchmidtSmithSchmidt by Leonie Bell at the Brick Theater, Cinderella, Snow White, Rapunzel, Little Red Riding Hood, Puss in Boots and Beauty, and the Beast by Johannes Galli at the Galli Theater NY. hannawesti.com / @hannawesti

Karen Boyer is a costume designer based in NYC.  She has a background in sculpture and textiles that continues to inform her work and process of building and approaching costumes.  Past and recent collaborators include choreographers Sidra Bell, Faye Driscoll, Catherine Galasso, Kat Sotelo, Liz Gerring, Cherylyn Lavagnino and Abigail Levine, and her work has been seen at theaters such as Alte Munze (Berlin), the Edinburgh Fringe Fest, LaMama Etc., the Bushwick Starr, the Brick, Baryshnikov Arts Center, NYLA, Playwrights Horizons, and Outside In Theatre (LA).  BFA: Maryland Institute College of Art; MFA: NYU Tisch.  karenrachelboyer.com / @karenrboyer

Forest Entsminger is a NYC-based scenic designer. Credits include Dad Don’t Read This (Greenwich House Theater, St Luke’s); Not Not Not Not Not Enough Oxygen (Torn Page);Time Passes (Target Margin, IRT, Mabou Mines); Meow! (Loading Dock); Faust (Heartbeat Opera); Cankersore Paradise,The Threepenny Opera (Lenfest Center); Two Girls, The Monkeypox Gospel (Ars Nova); Sweet Bird of Youth (Barn at Lee, Provincetown TWF); Meaghan Robichaud is the Greatest Show on Earth, I want to hold onto something beautiful and empty, u are the dream, Horsefacts.gov/, Babies on the Street, Goldhaven, Sleeping Car Porters (The Brick); The Salvagers (Yale Rep). M.F.A. - Yale School of Drama. bentscenic.com / @forestbents

Celia Krefter is a director, choreographer, writer, musician, and lighting designer who creates original works of dance-theatre. Current and recent works: HOW TO BE NORMAL AND REGULAR (Brick Aux), Math Live! (Collapsable Hole), MUDPIT (Movement Lab), Everything Changes, Nothing is Lost (Brick Aux). Celia is a repeat collaborator with companies including Experiments In Opera, LOCAL GRANDMA, and Object Collection. Celia is from Hamburg, Germany and Cape Cod, MA, and plays accordion in the musical duo the Outdoor Cats. celiakrefter.art / @galactic_celia

Jon Schatzberg is a Brooklyn-based designer and fabricator for theater and film. His work has been featured across basements, attics, nooks and crannies, as well as in music videos, commercials, shorts, and features. Select works: We’ve Been Here Before (Soho Playhouse); Baby Butcher Choke for Free (The Brick); Gooey’s Toxic Aquatic Adventure (The Bushwick Starr); TRAD (Exponential Festival @ Loading Dock); Floating Carousel (Woodstock Film Festival); “Call Me a Liar” (Tribeca Film Festival). Upcoming: The Body of Mary (The Gym at Judson); LBJ: The Play (Paradise Factory). Say hi! @jonschatzberg / jonathanschatzberg.com / @jonschatzberg

Bailey Van Schepen is an NYC-based fight director from Northeast Texas who has dedicated their career to giving actors from all mediums, all walks of life, and every corner of the world the opportunity to find control in out-of-control situations. She began her journey as an acting student at the American Musical and Dramatic Academy, then went on to work as a teaching assistant at NYU under fight master J. David Brimmer. Bailey has attended Summer Sling’s Fight Director workshop and has broadened the scope of her toolbox drastically by learning from professionals such as Tonya Lynn, Jon Rubin, and many more. They have also traveled abroad to train with the renowned Roberta Carreri at Odin Theatre in Denmark, and it was there that she introduced actors from different corners of the world to the works of stage combat - some of them for the first time. baileyvanschepen.com / @baileyvanschepen

We Live to Die: The Grieving Widows Club is a three-part dark humor, mixed media mockumentary miniseries about community theater-doing maids + grieving widows + murder.

Episode 1 premiere: January 31st, 2022 (Exponential Festival ’22) · Episode 2 premiere: January 30th, 2023 (Exponential Festival ’23) · Episode 3 premiere: January 27th, 2025 (Exponential Festival ’25)