Meet The Team

Lenore Skomal is a theatre-maker, playwright and book author of over 20 books and published plays. She is the sole proprietor of Lenore M Skomal Productions, LLC, which produces her plays and Broadway Bound Theatre Festival (BBTF). In addition to BBTF, she produced her Off Broadway comedy THE EXES (2019) and BLUFF at Hudson Guild (2016), both licensed plays with current productions in community and regional theatres. THE LIGHTHOUSE KEEPER’S DAUGHTER, her first book, has been licensed by LA-based Little Warriors Productions. She has also co-produced BLEED LIKE ME, a feature-length film released in 2024. A proud member of the Dramatist Guild, Commercial Theatre Institute, Off Broadway Alliance, Theater Communications Group, the National Newspaper Columnists Association, Society of Professional Journalists (SPJ), and the American Society of Journalists and Authors (ASJA), Lenore is dedicated to empowering self-producing artists  www.lenoreskomal.org

Rick Sayers is a theatre producer and former newspaper publisher and editor as well as co-founder of Broadway Bound Theatre Festival, with over 50 years in the newspaper and communications industry. As a former editor of the Erie Times-News, publisher of the Connecticut Post, The National Sports Daily, Detroit News, and Boston Herald, he is a skilled manager at heart. Rick brings a passion to working with theatre professionals, especially playwrights, helping them develop their skills and hone their abilities to produce their own works with confidence and little stress. His motto: Even though we're in the drama business, we don't need drama in our business.

Deborah loves every aspect of theater!  She is an Actress/Producer/Director/ Set Decorator/Costume Designer/Sound Designer/Prop Master/Acting Teacher and currently Creative Director of Town Players of New Canaan, which has become her home away from home. After attending Emerson College, she left the theatre world for TV, working at the three major networks: WBZ-TV, WHDH-TV and WCVB-TV. In 2007, after moving to Stamford CT, the acting bug bit again and she landed her first role in community theatre. Since then, she has been cast in over 30 plays , many staged readings, has directed 7 plays, and has produced and designed all aspects of theatre except lighting. As President of Town Players of New Canaan at the Powerhouse Theatre in 2019, she guided the non-profit through the challenging pandemic years through innovative live-taped/streamed productions, and in 2023 became their Creative Director. Additionally she volunteers at PAWS, a cat shelter in Norwalk. 

David O’Brien is an MFA student at Columbia University studying Theatre Management & Producing. His work as a producer includes Dracula, A Comedy of Terrors (New

World Stages); Heard You Were Leaving, The Bridge, The Arrangement (Columbia University School of the Arts); 18 (Samuel French Off-Off Broadway Short Play Festival at The Vineyard’s Dimson Theatre). He has interned with The Nederlander Organization and serves as Associate Artistic Director of The Savin Rock Theatre Company.

Chris Phillips is an award-winning playwright, screenwriter and director. Raised in Austin, Texas, Chris found himself starved for authenticity at an early age and related way more to stuff like CAT ON A HOT TIN ROOF, WHO’S AFRAID OF VIRGINIA WOOLF?, and A SOLDIER’S PLAY than any sissy-gay-white-boy-pre-teen really should. His plays have been seen on both coasts in venues such as Celebration Theatre, SoHo Playhouse and the Cherry Lane Theater, receiving two GLAAD Media Award nominations, winning the award for Overall Excellence in Playwriting at the New York International Fringe Festival, and receiving a grant from the Robert Chesley Foundation, which supports LGBTQ playwrights.  After moving from L.A. to New York City and back again, shifting his focus to film & TV, he directed 7 short films – 4 from his own scripts – screening at festivals such as Outfest Los Angeles and the California Independent Film Festival, where he won Best Director of a Short, and the Austin After Dark Film Festival, where his short won Best Drama. Chris was a Top 50 semi-finalist for the Academy Nicholl Fellowship, a finalist for the Warner Bros. TV Writers Workshop, a semi-finalist for the NBC Universal Emerging Writers Fellowship, and a finalist for both the WB TV Pilot award and the Josephson Entertainment Fellowship at the Austin Film Festival. His first feature-length film, BLEED LIKE ME, is currently in post-production. 

Fred Rohan-Vargas is the author of several plays and musicals produced throughout the country and abroad. He holds an MFA in dramatic writing from New York University and founded Mixing It Up Productions, LLC, a multi-media entertainment company. He has co-produced the Off-Broadway musical Money Talks and was an Associate Producer for the Off-West End production of Flowers for Mrs Harris in London. He has also participated as a Broadway investor in the shows The Lightning Thief, Parade the Musical, Flowers for Mrs Harris, and the touring of Company. Fred is an eclectic songwriter and composer whose music is currently heard throughout Southeast Asia. He is a member of BMI Engel Lehman Musical Theatre Workshop and Dramatists Guild and serves on the advisory board of Ripple Effect Artists Inc. 

Theatre Reviews Limited was originally launched in 1997 as one of the first online websites dedicated to reviewing Broadway, Off and Off-Off Broadway, Cabaret, and Theatre Festivals in New York City. We are excited to share this re-launch of this important site with you. David brings his experience as an English Literature, Playwriting and Composition teacher to assess the structure and literary value of a performance. Joseph brings over 30 years of experience in theater, film and television and will focus more on the performance and entertainment aspect of the production. These two viewpoints will hopefully give the reader a better overall look and understanding of the content and execution of the new work.

Together they founded and created a professional theater company operating under the Equity Small Professional Theater Contract. Serving as Executive and Artistic Directors they produced more than 70 productions including drama, musicals, revues, and new works. The company also played host to The New Dance Series which featured noted choreographers in the medium of combining dance with spoken word.

Stuart Brown retired as Dean of Students at the Waterbury Campus of the University of Connecticut in June 2021 after a 33 year career.  Since that time, he has been focusing on writing 10-Minute plays, which have been and are scheduled to be staged at theaters in Connecticut, Massachusetts, New Jersey, Rhode Island, and Texas. In addition to writing plays, Stu is a theater critic with the Outer Critics Circle and as President of the Connecticut Critics Circle.  He reviews over 60 shows a year in Connecticut and in New York City. Stu also runs the SoundsofBroadway.com, a 24/7 online Broadway radio station featuring the best from Off-Broadway, Broadway and the London stages.

Robin Rice has authored over 60 plays (20 full length), and has been honored, published, produced Off -Broadway, from Florida to Alaska, Edinburgh to South Africa, Mongolia to South Korea. Her full-length productions include: WOMEN w/o WALLS premiere, Hollywood, CA (2015). LOLA AND THE PLANET OF GLORIOUS DIVERSITY workshop premier, NYC (2015). THE POWER OF BIRDS, HARMONY, EMBRACING THE UNDERTOAD, THE BREAST MONOLOGUES premiered in NY. ALICE IN BLACK A ND WHITE premiere in Louisville, KY (2013), second production Off-Broadway (2016). PLAY NICE! ran Off- Broadway (2011). LISTEN! THE RIVER premiere, Edinburgh Fringe Festival (2012-also seen in London, Off-Broadway and South Africa). SEARCHING FOR A NEW SUN staged readings, Berlin and NYC. FRONTIER and ALLIE'S APPENDIX received awards from Planet Connections Theatre Festivity (NYC). HUMANS REMAIN won the New Millennium international competition. HARMONY won Maxim Mazumdar international contest. ALICE IN BLACK AND WHITE won the StageWrite Women's Theatre Initiative Award. Honors include: Planet Connections Festivity (nomination for "outstanding playwriting "), StageWrite Women's Theatre Initiative, Maxim Mazumdar, Riv a Shiner, Karamu House, Moondance, Perishable, Drury, Finborough, Kernodle, Phoenix Theatre. Honorable Mention: Goshen Peace Play. Finalist: O'Neill, National New Play Network's Smith Prize, Barrington Stage, Reverie, Jane Chambers, Kitchen Dog. She is a member of Articulate Theatre Company (NYC); America-in-Play cohort playwright, 2013-2016; League of Professional Theatre Women; Dramatist's Guild of America; Manhattan Oracles; International Centre for Women Playwrights.

Emma Goldman-Sherman is the Resident Dramaturg at the 29th Street Playwrights Collective, and she runs the Write Now Workshop, a weekly space for play development. She also works for the Great Plains Theatre Conference and teaches playwriting and poetry/spoken word to adults and at-risk youth via New York Writers Workshop. Recent plays include FUCKT, Whorticulture, Hare Today for #Every28Hours, and Traffick directed by Caitlin Wees for the 1MPF at the New Ohio. Named a Risky Playwright by Cutting Ball Theatre in 2014 and 2015, Counting in Sha’ab, directed by Erin Gilley, was produced by Golden Thread as part of the 2015 ReOrient Festival of plays about the Middle East. Previous work was produced in NYC at Manhattan Theatre Source, Circle Rep Lab, Clemente Soto Velez Cultural Center, New Georges, The Women's Project; E.S.T.'s LA Project, regionally and in London and Zagreb.  She is a member of the Dramatists Guild, LPWT and NYWW. MFA: UI. Emma is the recipient of the "the Jane Chambers Award, as well as the Richard Maibaum Award. Her play Abraham's Daughters was part of the Lady Liberty Festival to combat Islamophobia at Urban Stages and part of the first Intersections International Play Reading Series. www.29thstreetplaywrightscollective.org