Mia Dillon is a Tony-nominated stage actress whose Broadway credits include Our Town, The Miser, The Corn Is Green, Hay Fever, Agnes of God, Crimes of the Heart, and Da. She has worked extensively off-Broadway and regionally from San Diego to Dublin, and her work has been honored with the Connecticut Critics Circle Award, a Drama Desk nomination, the Clarence Derwent Award, and a Dramalogue Award, among others. Her film and television appearances include all three Law & Orders, Brain Dead, The Jury, Mary, Rhoda, Gods and Generals, The Money Pit, Ordinary World, All Good Things, Never Rarely Sometimes Always, and Are You There, God? It’s Me, Margaret.
Santino Fontana is known for his Outer Critics Circle, Drama Desk, and Tony Award–winning portrayal of Michael Dorsey/Dorothy Michaels in the Broadway production of Tootsie, and for voicing the character Prince Hans in Disney’s Academy Award–winning animated feature Frozen. With Encores!, he has starred in off-Broadway productions of God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater; 1776; and Zorba. On Broadway, he has starred in The Importance of Being Earnest, for which he won a Clarence Derwent Award; Brighton Beach Memoirs (Drama Desk Award); Act One; Billy Elliot; Cinderella (Tony nomination); and Hello, Dolly! His onscreen credits include the currently airing Grotesquerie, as well as The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, Crazy Ex-Girlfriend, Sisters, Shades of Blue, Mozart in the Jungle, Submissions Only, Off the Menu, Fosse/Verdon, and Evil, with forthcoming roles in Lost & Found in Cleveland and his film directing debut in Death Wish. Fontana recently starred in the Classic Stage Company’s revival of I Can Get it for You Wholesale, for which he received Lucille Lortel and Drama Desk Award nominations.
Tania James is the author of the novels The Tusk That Did the Damage, Atlas of Unknowns, and the short story collection Aerogrammes. Her fiction has appeared in Boston Review, Granta, Guernica, One Story, A Public Space, and The Kenyon Review. Her latest novel, Loot, was longlisted for the 2023 National Book Award.
Anthony Marra is the New York Times bestselling author of The Tsar of Love and Techno and A Constellation of Vital Phenomena, winner of the National Book Critics Circle’s John Leonard Prize and the Anisfield-Wolf Book Award in Fiction, and longlisted for the National Book Award. Marra has contributed pieces to The Atlantic, Granta, The Rumpus, The New York Times, The Washington Post, and others. His most recent novel, Mercury Pictures Presents, was released in 2022.
Elizabeth McKenzie is the author of the novel The Portable Veblen, which was longlisted for the National Book Award and shortlisted for the Baileys Women’s Prize; a collection, Stop That Girl, shortlisted for The Story Prize; and the novel MacGregor Tells the World, a Chicago Tribune, San Francisco Chronicle, and Library Journal Best Book of the Year. Her work has appeared in The New Yorker, The Atlantic, and The Best American Nonrequired Reading. Her latest novel, The Dog of the North, was published in 2023, and was longlisted for the Women’s Prize for Fiction and is a Finalist for the LA Times Book Prize in Fiction.
Rita Wolf has been featured in Edward Albee's A Delicate Balance with the Transport Group and Out of Time at The Public Theater, both co-productions with The National Asian American Theatre Company; and The Michaels and What Happened? The Michaels Abroad, written and directed by Richard Nelson, at The Public Theater and Hunter College. Additional theater credits include An Ordinary Muslim at New York Theatre Workshop, The American Pilot at Manhattan Theatre Club, for which she was nominated for a Drama Desk Award, and the premiere of Tony Kushner's Homebody/Kabul at New York Theatre Workshop and BAM. Last spring, Wolf was a Beinecke Fellow at the David Geffen School of Drama at Yale University while appearing in Caryl Churchill's play Escaped Alone.
Meg Wolitzer is the New York Times bestselling author of The Female Persuasion, The Interestings, The Ten-Year Nap, The Position, and The Wife. She is a faculty member in the Creative Writing and Literature Program at The Lichtenstein Center at Stony Brook University, where she co-founded and co-directs BookEnds, a one-year, non-credit intensive for emerging novelists. Wolitzer, who was the guest editor of The Best American Short Stories 2017, is the radio and podcast host of Symphony Space’s Selected Shorts.
CREDITS
“The Facts of Life,” by Anthony Marra. Commissioned by Symphony Space. Copyright © 2023 by Anthony Marra and Symphony Space.
“Leave Me in St. Louis,” by Tania James. Commissioned by Symphony Space. Copyright © 2023 by Tania James and Symphony Space.
“Hope Ranch,” by Elizabeth McKenzie, from Stop That Girl (Random House, 2005). Copyright © 2005 by Elizabeth McKenzie. Used by permission of Brandt & Hochman Literary Agents.
