CAAP Artist Lab Participants BIOGRAPHIES

LENA CRUZ Lena is a graduate of the Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts. Theatre highlights include her debut as Jenny in The Threepenny Opera for Western Australian Opera, Lady Macbeth in Macbeth for Bell Shakespeare, Mother Courage for Belvoir, Monkey- Journey to the West for Theatre of Image, Miss Bell in Fame, Hair, and creating the role of Cynthia in the original production of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert the Musical. Most recently, she has appeared in STC’s The Wharf Revue. Film and television highlights include starring as Rory Van Dyke in The Wannabes, Margarita in The Night We Called it A Day, Cassandra in Upskirt, Sofia Martinez in Shortland Street, Pet in Bargain Coast, Jody Lim in Dirt Game, Comedy Inc, Watch With Mother, All Saints, The Very Trevor Ashley Show, and Kiki and Kitty. She has co- written and co-starred in the cabarets The Singer’s Guide To The Universe, About Face, and one-woman shows I’m A Stranger Here Myself directed by Tony Sheldon and Bitter Sweet, for which she was nominated for the Sydney Fringe Festival Drum Media Show-Stopping Individual Performance Award and the Best Of People’s Choice Award.

HAPPY FERAREN Happy Feraren is a Filipino actor and improviser based in Sydney with 11 years experience. She has performed in over 500 shows in a wide range of improvisational theatre formats both locally and internationally (including Manila, Sydney, Hong Kong, Amsterdam, Chicago and New York). In the Philippines, she began as a presenter for national radio and television as well as live events and was a supporting actor in the feature film ‘My Candidate’. She continues to be part of Asia’s premier improvisational group SPIT and the production team behind the biennial Manila Improv Festival, the largest in the region. In Sydney she has performed in festivals such as Short and Sweet and the Sydney Fringe. She is currently the artistic director of improv training centre Laugh Masters Academy with branches in Melbourne and Sydney, and creative director of the Australian Improv Festival, launched in 2019.

RYUICHI FUJIMURA Ryuichi Fujimura is an independent dance artist based in Sydney. Over the last fifteen years, he has collaborated as a performer/devisor with both emerging and established artists in various dance, theatre, opera and site-specific performance projects. The artists and companies with whom he has collaborated include Xavier le Roy, Tino Sehgal, Asad Raza, Vicki Van Hout, Jim Sharman, Alan Schacher, Force Majeure, De Quincey Co., La Fura dels Baus and Flightpath Theatre. His most recent performance credits include “A night parade of one hundred goblins” for Sydney Festival 2020 and “We, the lost company” for Sydney Fringe 2020 with Clockfire Theatre Co. He is currently rehearsing for Justin Shoulder’s AEON†: EPISODE I for Performance Space’s Liverworks 2020. Ryuichi began creating his own performance work in 2013. In collaboration with Kate Sherman, he has created two site-specific performance works (Under Harry’s Circumstances at three CBD office buildings designed by Harry Seidler in 2014 and Under Different Circumstances at Carriageworks in 2013). He has also created three solo works (Fall! Falter!! Dance!!! (work-in-progress), How I Practice My Religion in 2017 and How Did I Get Here? in 2015).

AILEEN HUYNH Aileen is an acting graduate from WAAPA, and also holds a Bachelor of Creative Arts in Performance from The University of Wollongong. In 2019 she made her directorial debut with Sam Wang’s comedy stage show ‘Skyduck: A Chinese Spy Comedy’ with Belvoir, 25a. It received two honourable mentions for “Best of 2019 on stage in Sydney” in Timeout and Audrey Journal. As a content creator she has worked independently on short comedy skit videos and was nominated in 2014 for an Australian Online Video Award for Best Comedic Music Video for ‘Got Rice’. She then went on to work with comedy legends Tim Ferguson and Marc Gracie on their feature film ‘Spin Out’ (Sony), acting as the social media and exercised-obsessed Merline. Acting theatre credits include her one-woman show, ‘Gobbledygook’, Theatre of Image’s ‘Monkey…Journey to the West’; ‘Flight Paths’ for NToP; ‘Gloria’ for MTC; ‘The Big Time’ for Ensemble Theatre, ‘The Merchant of Venice’ and ‘The Crucible’ for Sport For Jove and The National Australian tours of ‘4000 Miles’ (Critical Stages) and ‘Hello, Goodbye & Happy Birthday’ (Performing Lines). Television credits include ‘Better Man’ (SBS); ‘Neighbours’ (Network 11); ‘Cleverman’ 1& 2 (ABC), ‘Black Comedy 3’ (ABC) and ‘The Commons’ (STAN).

JUSTICE JONES MAASAAD Justice Jones Massaad is a recent graduate from the National Institute of Dramatic Arts, Master of Fine Arts, Directing. Prior to her studies at NIDA, she completed a Bachelor of Music Performance, Classical Voice at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music. In 2020 she was assistant director on Sydney Theatre Company’s production of Home, I’m Darling and was selected as an emerging director in Riverside Theatre’s Director’s Development. She was also a finalist in the Create NSW x Griffin Incubator Award, where she spent 3 months developing a new work under the mentorship of Griffin Theatre Company. In 2019 she received the BBM Global Industry Performing Arts Scholarship, which will provide her the opportunity to travel to Europe and research the ways in which opera can sustain longevity in the 21st century. As a performer she has studied both locally and internationally in the UK and Italy. Justice is signed with International Casting and Creative Management and has studied screen acting at The Actors Pulse Sydney and Screenwise Acting School. As a mixed-race Filipino, Lebanese creative, Justice’s passion is for creating new works and giving voice to minority stories.

ANDREW LEE Andrew (undi) Lee is a queer, Australian-born Korean director, writer, producer & production designer. He is both a graduate from UTS (Design) and AFTRS (Drama Directing). He has designed; art directed and set decorated short films that have screened at the Berlin Int. Film Festival, Venice Int. Film Festival, Sundance, Tribeca and Clermont-Ferrand. As a writer director, he has been awarded the “Kenneth B Myer award for exceptional Talent”. While also being awarded Young Australian Korean filmmaker Award by the Korean Consulate of Australia. Andrew has been also nominated for Best Short Film and Best Director at the 2017 Dendy Awards for his film “MELON GRAB” – Sydney International Film Festival. While also being nominated for the Australian Director's Guild award for Best Direction in a short drama. Most recently he has received development funding from Regional Development Australia (NSW) and Arts Central for his feature film about a Korean Australian family living in a small Coastal town. Other upcoming projects have Andrew taking on various roles including; writer for ABC and Essential Media’s green lit project “TROPPO”, writer and director of Aquarius Films development funded TV series “PARENT UP”, and an untitled Create NSW and Screen QUEENSLAND development funded TV series currently in development for Rhapsody Films.

MELISSA LEE SPEYER Melissa is a playwright, screenwriter, dramaturg and fledgling producer who tells stories for third-culture audiences. Melissa is a writer and devisor for theatre and screen. TV screenwriting credits include Season 1, Episode 23 of “The Heights” (ABC Drama and Matchbox Pictures) and multiple episodes of Season 2 of “Random and Whacky” (Eleven and Ambience Entertainment). Short film credits include co-writing “Jadai: The Broome Brawler” which won the 2018 Lexus Fellowship and premiered at Sydney Film Festival. Theatre credits include "TickTickBoom” (2018, The Actors Pulse) which won the 2015 Silver Gull Play Award; “A Christmas Carol” (2017, KXT Bakehouse); and “TRADE” (2017, Adelaide Fringe and Old 505 Theatre). She is a founding member of The Collective, an Asian-Australian performing arts collective.

MICHELLE LIM DAVIDSON Michelle’s theatre credits include Torch the Place and An Ideal Husband (Melbourne Theatre Company); Banging Denmark, How to Rule the World, Top Girls & Power Plays (Sydney Theatre Company), The Feather in the Web and The Lysicrates Prize (Griffin Theatre Company); Play School Live (ABC); The Laramie Project (STC Education); The Plant & Seminar (Ensemble Theatre); Far Away (Black Swan Theatre Co) & as the guest star alongside John Cleese in the Just for Laughs Comedy Festival. Television credits include Harrow, The Secrets She Keeps, Black Comedy, Get Krack!n, Top of the Lake: China Girl, Utopia, Doctor Doctor, Live from Planet Earth, Big Ted’s Big Adventure, Nursery Rhyme News Time & Jay’s Jungle. Michelle is also a regular presenter on Play School. Film credits include Ivan Sen’s Goldstone & the short film Beyond the Bubble selected for the Sydney Film Festival 2017. Michelle is on the writing team for the new television series Parent Up with Buster Productions and Aquarius Films and in the Writers Room for a new comedy television series. For her performance in The Feather in the Web, Michelle was nominated for Best Female Actress in a Mainstage Production at the Sydney Theatre Awards & was the recipient of the 2013 Mike Walsh Fellowship & the 2016 Equity Award for Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Comedy Series for Utopia.

NICOLE PINGON Nicole Pingon is a multidisciplinary artist, theatre maker, director and performer working across theatre, live art and digital mediums. She thrives in devised and collaborative processes, and is fascinated by synergies between the physical, visual and sonic, particularly where movement and live sound intersect. Recent performance credits include: The Gaslight Project (Ninefold / PACT), Chorus (Bontom / Old Fitz), Extended Play (Little Eggs / City Recital Hall), Table (White Box / Seymour Centre), Doing (Puddle or Pond / KXT), and The Rime of the Ancient Mariner (Little Eggs / KXT). Writing and directing credits include: Spider In My Soup (Bondi Feast, Shopfront), and Organs! (Shopfront). Nicole is also a workshop facilitator for film, drama and community performance, with experience collaborating with Young People at Shopfront, Little Eggs and within schools, and Chinese Seniors with the City of Sydney. Nicole has been a Shopfront ArtsLab artist-in-residence, a member of KXT’s Step Up Program and CuriousWorks’ Makers Space Program. She is a 2020 participant in The Wheeler Centre’s Signal Boost programme, exploring podcasting, radio and sound art. Nicole enjoys commuting short distances via bicycle, swimming in the ocean, and encounters with small creatures in the garden.

JENNIFER RANI A first generation Australian, Jennifer’s cultural lineage sprawls from India to Indonesia to Singapore; from Wales and England, to Tasmania. Her creative lineage is as miscellaneous and transitory: an ex-Army soldier; a café consultant to new businesses in a sea of London fried chicken shops; a developer and producer of seemingly impossible and unexpectedly moving events including Dark Mofo’s inaugural Nude Solstice Swim, Ryoji Ikeda’s Spectra and Patricia Piccinini’s Skywhale. Jen is an actor for stage and television, directs and produces theatre and in Sydney has worked with Sydney Theatre Company, Belvoir, Sport for Jove, Carriageworks, Force Majeure and Sydney Festival. Somewhat randomly, she also works for the NSW government designing, developing and delivering a $75 million grant program to support the advancement of renewable energy across the state. She has been awarded an Australia Council Theatre Board grant for Emerging Cultural Leadership; was Associate Artist for the inaugural WITS Festival Fatale; was part of the programme and delivery teams for four international arts festivals in Australia and is a selected participant in the CAAP/STC Director’s Initiative. Jen holds a Batchelor’s degree with honours in post-colonial literature and these days worries less about her wayward odyssey to a career in the creative arts, instead embracing it as excellent, if not wacky, bio content.

MONICA SAYERS Having parents in the entertainment industry meant, for Monica, an inevitable path for her to follow. She started off her studies at ACA (Actors Centre Australia) and ATYP (Australian Theatre for Young People) where she then continued her training at NIDA (National Institute of Dramatic Art) and graduated with a Bachelor in Dramatic Art in 2004. Over the years she has worked across various mediums including television, film, voiceover and theatre. Her most recent tv appearance was on ABC's Rake. Highlights include Love My Way, All Saints, UK’s The Royals, and Ireland’s The Clinic. Monica is featured in corporate videos, short films, and many commercials - the first commercial was when she was 6 years old for Red Rooster, in which her entire family featured in. Monica has been fortunate to have worked with the Sydney Theatre Company, Melbourne Theatre Company, The Sydney Opera House, Belvoir St Theatre and Darlinghurst Theatre Company, not to mention other independent companies too. Her main theatre highlights are The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui and Chimerica for STC, Hay Fever for MTC and Kasama Kita for Belvoir St Theatre. Monica is looking forward to extending her skills to writing and directing – something that has always caught her interest. She wants to invest in these skills to help tell, not only her family stories, but to help others that have something to say - something to teach us, something to make us laugh, something to inspire us.

KHYM SCOTT Khym Scott has previously worked for Contemporary Asian Australian Performance as Stage Manager: Double Delicious (development), Stories Then and Now; and for Performance 4a: The Serpent's Table (development). His other theatre credits in stage management include: for Griffin Theatre Company as Stage Manager: Superheroes, Family Values, First Love is the Revolution, City of Gold, Prima Facie, Good Cook. Friendly. Clean., Kill Climate Deniers, Festival of New Writing, The Witches, Girl in Tan Boots; and as Broadcast Director: Griffin Lock-In; Griffin Award 2020; for Griffin/Bell Shakespeare: The Misanthrope: for Belvoir/Malthouse: Barbara and the Camp Dogs; for Belvoir: The Dance of Death, Miss Julie, This Heaven; for Sydney Festival: Lady Rizo: Red, White and Indigo; and for Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras. From 2013 to 2017, Khym was Assistant Stage Manager of The Australian Ballet, and toured with the company regionally, nationally, and internationally. Khym is a graduate of NIDA and The University of Sydney, and teaches advanced calling and score reading at NIDA.

JORDAN SHEA Jordan Shea is a writer and teacher. After completing an MA – Writing for Performance at the VCA, he has gone on to have plays performed/developed/workshopped at Sydney Theatre Company, Belvoir Theatre, Old 505, ATYP, Old Fitz Theatre and has worked across the screen sector for In-Between-Pictures and Fremantle Media. Jordan is one of the Philip Parsons Fellows for Belvoir Theatre, and has completed a yearly residency for an arts organization every year since 2017. As an educator, he has worked as a secondary school English teacher since 2019. He has taught playwriting workshops for schools, City of Sydney and major universities. Jordan is a Filipino-Australian, dedicated to showcasing the narratives of Asian-Australians and how they relate to our conversation around national identity.

MICHAEL TOISUTA Michael Toisuta is a composer, sound designer and writer working in stage performance, video art installation, film, sound art and music. For the stage, Michael has sound designed productions of Sydney Theatre Company, Belvoir, Griffin, Legs on the Wall, National Theatre of Parramatta, and numerous independent projects. He was also sound designer of a work by TerryandTheCuz in New York City and Kuala Lumpur in 2018 and 2019. He has collaborated on visual art installation projects with Taloi Havini; a shadow play performance with Jumaadi; and with dance and film artists Linda Luke and Martin Fox. These works have been exhibited in Art Gallery of NSW, Asia Pacific Triennial, Barcelona Film Festival, Vancouver Art Gallery and Palais de Tokyo in Paris. Through CAAP initiatives in playwriting with Playwriting Australia and in directing with STC, he was part of a community of Asian Australian performance makers who eventually formed The Collective. Its members continue to support each other in creating Asian Australian works. Michael divides his time between Australia and Indonesia, continuing to compose music, create sound designs and write for stage and film.

JENIFER WONG Jennifer Wong is a Chinese-Australian writer and performer from Sydney who’s worked as a stand-up comedian and writer/producer for online, radio, and television. She began working in television as a writer for Good News Week in 2008, and has since worked for Roving Enterprises, CJZ, and Blackfella Films. Bringing together her bookishness, keen interest in storytelling, and commitment to the rule of three, she’s performed in solo stand-up and group shows at arts and comedy festivals in Australia, Edinburgh, and Shanghai since 2011. In 2014, she was a writer/performer in The Serpent’s Table, the sold-out Sydney Festival food-meets-theatre co-production by Performance 4a and Griffin Theatre. In 2016, she wrote and presented Bookish on ABC iview, which featured interviews with writers and comedy sketches about reading. In 2017, her stand-up show, How to English Harder, had a sold-out run at the Melbourne International Comedy Festival and Sydney’s Belvoir St Downstairs. She’s the creator and producer of live shows such as Pitch a Classic Today, Comedy vs Racism, and Book Club Impro. Since 2018, she’s worked as a reporter at ABC Life where she writes and makes videos about mental health, food, and culture, sometimes incorporating Cantonese and Mandarin language.