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Julia Stemper - Artistic Director Jeffrey Golde - Executive Director Molly Bunder - Outreach Liaison Nicole Goeden - Education Liaison Diana Golde - Design Liaison Eric Mercado - Production Liaison Ken Miller - Student Liaison Ishbel McFarlane - Scotland Consultant Robin Nuna - Local Liaison Chad Ramsey - Texas Consultant Mel McCray - Artistic Associate Samie Jo Johnson - Artistic Associate Theo Zucker - Artistic Associate |
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Molly Bunder was brought up to believe that a little free food, and a lot of community spirit, go a long way towards making the world a better place. After producing three successful readings for Stone Soup in Scotland, she looks forward to working with Stone Soup in the Midwest. In Chicago, she is a member of the Acting Company at Filament Theatre Ensemble, teaches drama workshops for Third Dimension, and voice and piano for the David Adler Arts Center. In the UK, she has performed in A Mind’s Eye Theatre’s production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Stone Soup’s Bill’s Belle’s Brew-ha-ha, the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama’s Hamlet, and as Lord Clifford and the Duchess of York at Shakespeare’s Globe with the RSAMD. While a student at Randolph-Macon Woman’s College, she developed a one-woman show under the direction of Mary Coy (of the American Shakespeare Center) called Shrews, Schemers, and Queens: Unruly Women in Shakespeare.
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Nicole Goeden grew up in the small town of Dillon, Montana and discovered the joy of theater when she performed in her first community production at the age of ten: Lewis & Clark: Rolling Down the River, a musical. She participated in many other children's theater shows, and was then introduced to Shakespeare by an especially wonderful high school drama coach and director while acting in productions of A Comedy of Errors and The Merry Wives of Windsor. This sparked an immediate fascination with the Bard's work. After spending her first year of college in a different field of study, Nicole followed her heart and completed her BA in theater at College of St. Benedict/St. John's University in Minnesota. While there she also had the opportunity to spend a Fine Arts semester abroad in London and attended several wonderful Shakespeare productions at The Globe and other UK theaters. Since then she has performed with various companies in Minnesota, DC, and the Chicago area and is excited to work more closely with Stone Soup to bring Shakespeare to broader audiences--a mission that is near and dear to her heart.
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Born and raised in Sweden, Diana Golde started singing as a result of her mother's involvement with children's activities at the local churches. Her favorite part of the year was right before Christmas when Lucia, the celebration of light and a day based around singing, came around. Diana discovered her love for theater in two ways, first when she played Gretel in a school production and later via television when she saw Elizabeth Taylor play Maggie in Cat on a Hot Tin Roof by Tennessee Williams. She realized that was the job she wanted. After an education in musical theater, Diana decided to focus on the finer points of acting and attended Drama Studio London. During this time, she fell in love with Shakespeare's plays until she moved to London to attend Drama Studio London. Through her now husband Jeffrey she found a deep appreciation and love for these plays. Diana resides in New York City and is very happy to be a part of Stone Soup.
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Having grown up surrounded by classical music Jeffrey Golde brings his sharply tuned ear to the company. He never heard any music but Classical until he was 12 at which point the floodgates opened and a world of diverse musics began coming into contact with his ear. Beginning with Barbara Streisend and Neil Diamond duets led to Bryan Adams' Canadian rock. A crush opened up a world of '50s and '60s pop classics and shortly after heavier fare like Led Zepplin and learning how to dance led him to the world of jazz. This story of course leads directly to Jeffrey's involvement in theatre. Somewhere along the line, his love of jazz, swing music and pursuit of a History degree led to hosting an NPR style radio show. Now lest you think all Jeffrey has thrown into the pot is music, you should note that he plays and usually injures himself playing baseball, basketball and all sorts of sports. He also majored in History and throws into the pot an interest in comic books, food and following developments in technology. With all these elements at play in the soup that makes up Jeffrey, it was the addition of ballroom dance that the first theatrical notions began entering his head. Defying all logic, he made the finale of his senior college piano recital a 10 min dance/theater number choreographed to Frank Sinatra and Glenn Miller. Eventually he found himself in Washington DC working for public television and radio in marketing and advertising. It was there he finally started pursuing an itch he had to scratch in acting. Lucky for him, co-founder Julia Stemper also worked in DC and through a mutual friend shoved him into the theatre pot head first. 3 years later after working in community theatre and helping to found with Julia a company in DC, Jeffrey left for England to pursue his new found love of theatre. Three years in New York, a tour of the US and an off-Broadway performance, not to mention having the opportunity to teach, struggle with the life of an artist and to meet the woman he would marry, Jeffrey has never been more excited then to throw all this into the Stone Soup Shakespeare pot to find out what all these experiences combined with those of other talented artists and a willing community will produce.
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Mel McCray is a woman who is passionate about the pursuit of life and real stories. She uses theatre and dance as her way to empathize and share human experiences. She graduated with a BFA in Acting from Missouri State University in 2016. Since then, she has performed and worked closely the St.Louis Black Rep Company, and later began writing one acts, choreographing, and teaching Musical Theatre at Joplin, Missouri’s Briley Performing Arts Company. She has also travelled doing interactive theatre for preteens with Christ In Youth’s Superstart team, and has recently toured and performed in Shakespeare’s Taming of the Shrew with Stonesoup Shakespeare. Mel is currently an apprentice with St. Louis’s very own Consuming Kinetics Dance Company, and is privileged to hoan movement and dance as a part of her artistry. She looks forward to all of the learning opportunities to come and the new adventures to have with those she will work with in the near future.
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Originally from the Sunshine State, Eric Mercado is a director, writer, designer, production manager, and all around mensch based in Brooklyn. He discovered his love of theatre early on - in the womb, according to his mother who saw a heinous production of Cats while 8 months pregnant and claims he is in the theatre to right this wrong.
He attended New York University’s Tisch where he studied creating original work at Playwrights Horizons Theatre School. His directing and devised work has been seen in New York and around the country, and he is a founding member of the devising collective Merkins, Daniello & Sons. As a designer, his work has appeared at numerous New York venues, and he is on the technical staff at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in the Concerts & Lectures Department and at National Sawdust in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. Eric directed As You Like It for Stone Soup’s 2014 Tour, The Comedy of Errors last year and is thrilled to be directing Julius Caesar this year. He is dedicated the making theatre that is challenging and accessible to all audiences. |
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Though born in Illinois, Ken Miller was raised on Canada’s west coast in beautiful British Columbia. Through twists and turns and a brief year in Missouri he’s found his way back to Illinois. Since finishing up his degree at Millikin University he has been living in Chicago working with this, that and the next theatre company while going through various day jobs to support the unhealthy habit of acting. Ken started his adventure with Shakespeare early when his older sister was watching Gibson’s Hamlet for an English class and he got drawn in (he has since grown to prefer Tennant and Brannagh’s despite Julia’s disdain for the latter). It wasn’t till many years later that he performed any of the Bard’s work but regardless the seed sown. Being a big believer in the power of not only stories but communal story telling Ken is immensely pleased to be a part of the Stone Soup team.
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Ishbel McFarlane teaches drama and English across Central Scotland, as well as working as a professional actor and director. Much of her own work as a theatre maker is about making poetry and art accessible to new audiences, whether that's by performing poems on trains or making theatre from an art history lecture. She has undergraduate and postgraduate degrees in English Literature and Art History from the University of Edinburgh, as well as a postgraduate degree in acting (Classical and Contemporary Text) from the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland.
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Raised in the forests of Southern Illinois, Robin Nuna started doing theatre at the age of six. After spending several post-high school years in Lima, Peru, they made Chicago their home where they recently graduated with their BFA in performance studies from UIC. Oly participated in Stone Soup’s inaugural tour of Romeo and Juliet as the Nurse, as well as Puck in A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Most recently they directed the Chicago reading of Julius Caesar. Other Chicago credits include Romeo and Horatio with Muse of Fire theatre, and collegiate projects under the direction of Yasen Peyankov, Derrick Sanders, Heidi Stillman, Rob Clare, Dado, and Timothy Douglas. As a set designer Oly created the space for THE STORM at Walkabout Theatre, and assisted Joey Wade on Grand Concourse at Steppenwolf. At UIC Oly designed the set for Ivanov and assisted John Musial on SNAFU. Their lighting design credits include the operas Lucia Di Lammermoor and Abduction from Seraglio for the Southern Illinois Music Festival and Huckleberry Finn for the Stage Co. Oly loves theatre, adores their buddy Bill, and couldn’t ask for a better company of artists of whom to be a part.
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Chad Ramsey
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Julia Stemper created Stone Soup Shakespeare after contemplating the idea for 3 years. While persuing her Masters at the Royal Scottish Academy of Acting in Glasgow she decided that there was no need to wait - sometimes it's better just to jump. Prior to studying in Glasgow, Julia lived in Washington, DC where she worked for the Kennedy Center, the Smithsonian Museum of American History and myriad theater companies around the capitol. Julia credits most of who she is to her family, a little of her imagination to Ingrid Deetz and nursery school and a smidge of her positivity to Mary Tyler Moore - cause who isn't inspired by berets being tossed in the air. All of this she brings to the company along with a near feverish love of Shakespeare that she owes primarily to her Great Aunt Terri. Terri (also known as Aunt Millie) grew up during the depression. She did not finish high school. She married and had one son. She lived in South Dakota. And she knew Shakespeare backwards and forwards. She loved the writing, the stories and the excitement. She passed this love onto Julia. Julia was not always sure what to do with Shakespeare - truth be told she preferred jazz hands and chorus lines to iambic pentameter for awhile, but things change. A wonderful production of The Merchant of Venice at SIUC's McLeod Theatre in 1995 was perhaps the turning point. All of a sudden the potential of Shakespeare's words were on-stage in a production that made sense. It was energetic and as the tale of Shylock unfolded before her Julia understood why her Great Aunt held such deep affection for the Bard. Of course Julia also brings a love of baking pies, belting jazz tunes, teaching yoga and cheering on college basketball and NHL hockey to Stone Soup. Hey, a lot can be said for the epic quality that is March Madness!
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