leadership

21 Year-Old Sojourn Theatre announces change in Leadership Model

Sojourn Theatre is pleased to announce that after a 14 month internal re-design process, it will shift from a single Artistic Director model to a rotating Leadership Body model. As of July 1, 2021, Founding Artistic Director Michael Rohd has transitioned from leadership to ensemble member, and the first Leadership Body- Bobby Bermea, Courtney Davis, Jamie Rea, and Nik Zaleski (with a combined 69 years of Sojourn ensemble membership between them) has formally taken on company leadership for a two year term.

 Of the transition, Nik says she is, "Thrilled that the Sojourn leadership body will mirror the collaborative values that the company was founded on. We're taking our sense of 'ensemble' from the rehearsal room to organizational structure."  

 Sojourn Theatre, comprised of 15 artists based across the United States and consistently coming together in varying combinations to make work, has been exploring democracy as a core concern in its work since its origin. 2020 was the year that the company came to recognize the moment for not just imagining new leadership models but enacting them was upon us. Rohd says- “Co-founding Sojourn Theatre and co-creating with this family of artists is without a doubt the central creative journey of my life; but twenty years is long enough- too long, really- for a single leader to guide the vision of any organization committed to evolution, equity and discovery. I am thrilled to be part of the continuing journey of this company, and to keep having adventures with my artist family at Sojourn. I look forward to supporting the four tremendous individuals who have stepped up to guide us into our next chapter.”

ENSEMBLE

Bobby Bermea is the co-artistic director of The Beirut Wedding World Theatre Project, a member of Sojourn Theatre, and a long-standing member of Actors Equity Association. Bermea is a writer, director and award-winning actor and has appeared in theatres literally from New York, NY to Honolulu, HI. As a director, Bermea has recently helmed productions of My Soul Grown Deep and The Green Book with BaseRoots Theatre, Hollow Roots with BoomArts, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde and The Sexual Neuroses of Our Parents with Theatre Vertigo, Wait Until Dark at Northwest Classical Theatre, Fires in the Mirror and Blue Door at Profile Theatre and he co-directed Top Dog/Underdog at Street Scenes. Bermea has also done extensive work with youth and especially underserved populations, having worked through the Actors-to-Go at Artists Repertory Theatre, Higher Stages with Tears of Joy, the Haven Project, Playwrite, Inc., Young Audiences, Portland Youth Builders, the Cordero House.

Courtney Davis has been a performer-creator, designer, and ensemble member for over 15 years, cultivating a multi-disciplinary practice that supports community health and social change.  As a commercial interior designer, she designs public spaces with a focus on health, wellness, access, and equity. She is a faculty associate in the Interior Architecture program at ASU, and currently serves on Sojourn’s leadership body as the communications lead.

Jono Eiland is a founding member of Sojourn Theatre and has worked as a performer and creator since its inception. He is now based in Los Angeles where he is also a member of the classical companies the Porters of Hellsgate and Method & Madness. He is a graduate of Virginia Tech.

James Hart has worked with Sojourn as performer/creator/facilitator on Islands of Milwaukee, Catholic Charities USA, Finding Penelope, On the Table, Throwing Bones, Built, Good, The Visit, and Witness Our Schools. Other credits include three seasons at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival and eleven seasons with Harlequin Productions in Olympia, WA.  James is passionate about facilitating change and self discovery through his counseling work.  He loves spending time with his wife and three daughters.   

Kimberly Howard heads Education Initiatives as part of the Corporate Social Responsibility Team at Portland General Election and serves as Program Officer for the PGE Foundation.  Prior to coming to PGE Kimberly was the Trust manager of the Oregon Cultural Trust for five years, managing director at Portland’s Interstate Firehouse Cultural Center before that and education/outreach director for Artists Repertory Theatre. Howard is an accomplished actress, with credits in New York, the Williamstown Theatre Festival and several Portland theaters.  She is an ensemble member of Sojourn Theatre and received a Drammy Award (Portland’s version of the Tony Award) for her work in its production of Tartuffe: The Visitor.  After attending Wellesley College, Howard received her BA from Pacific Union College, where she majored in political economic history.  She holds an MFA in acting from Columbia University and has taught theater at Walla Walla University.

Soneela Nankani is a consultant at the intersection of the arts, civic engagement, and social justice, focused on encouraging dialogue around stimulating and supporting a culture of inclusion in the arts and nonprofit fields. She has been an ensemble member with Sojourn Theatre since 2002 and served as Managing Director from 2012-2020. She also co-founded Center for Performance and Civic Practice and served as CPCP’s Managing Director from 2013-2018 and CPCP's Executive Director from 2018-2020. She has over 25 years of experience as a community dialogue facilitator, co-creator, thought partner and performer in capacity-building and place-based projects around the nation. 

Additionally, Soneela is an award-winning audiobook narrator with over 200 titles to date. She has garnered 7 Earphone awards, and Audie nomination and a SOVAS nomination. Her audiobooks have been included in Best Audiobooks lists by AudioFile Magazine (2016, 2019) and The Washington Post (2018, 2020). She narrates across many topics and genres, and is particularly proud of the books in which she gives voice to the South Asian and Black experiences. www.soneela.com

Rebecca Martínez is a Brooklyn-based director, choreographer, deviser, and ensemble member of Sojourn Theatre. Rebecca has worked with INTAR, Fordham/Primary Stages, Working Theater, Signature Theatre, Manhattan Theatre Club, the Lark, The Playwrights Realms, New Dramatists, the 52nd Street Project, Radical Evolution, Brave New World Repertory Theatre, Artists Repertory Theatre, Milagro Theatre among others. International credits include: Cultural Center in Managua, Nicaragua, Teatro Trono in El Alto, Bolivia. Member of: Sol Project Collective, Lincoln Center Theater Directors Lab, INTAR’s Unit52, SDCF Observership Class, Latinx Theatre Commons Steering Committee, New Georges Jam, 2018-2020 Women’s Project Lab, 2017 Drama League Directing Fellow, Associate Member of SDC. Awards: four Portland Drammy Awards; Lilla Jewel Award. Rebecca is an artist with the Center for Performance and Civic Practice.  www.rebeccamartinez.org

A renaissance woman of the theatre, Jamie Rea is continually exploring this powerful tool of connection & change. From Germany's Grotest Maru to Wellington's dance ensemble JAVA, she serves as an award winning director, designer, & actor, as well as a production-stage manager. As Co-Artistic Director of Beirut Wedding, Founding Core with JTC, & long time member of Sojourn Theatre, Jamie is a firm believer in the power of collaboration. Let's build a more effective community.

Michael Rohd is a co-founder/member of the 21-year old national, ensemble-based Sojourn Theatre. In 2015, he received an Otto Rene Castillo award for Political Theater and The Robert Gard Foundation Award for Excellence. He is an Institute Professor at Arizona State University’s Herberger Insititute for Design & the Arts and is is author of the widely translated book Theatre for Community, Conflict, and Dialogue. He is an Artist for Civic Imagination at Center for Performance and Civic Practice and he was the 2013-2016 Doris Duke Artist-in-Residence at Lookingglass Theater Company in Chicago. In addition to Rohd’s creative work at venues and with partners across the nation, much of his current practice focuses on supporting local capacity for equitable, cross-sector, culture-based partnerships working for public good in civic and community systems.

Sara Sawicki has been a company member with Sojourn Theatre since 2015. With Sojourn, she has held various roles on productions of DON'T GO and HTEP as well as several conference engagements. Sara was previously Center for Performance and Civic Practice's Partnerships and Communications Manager where she also acted as a program manager. Sara tours internationally with Manual Cinema as a puppeteer in their productions of FRANKENSTEIN (Lord Byron); LULA DEL RAY (Lula's Mother); MEMENTOS MORI (Lady); and ADA|AVA. Other projects include work with: NetherRealm Studios (cinematic performance capture); For Youth Inquiry (performer & director); Actors Gymnasium (Youth Circus co-director and writer); & one step at a time like this in collaboration with Chicago Shakespeare Theater (performer). Sara designs and manages virtual gatherings and productions, recent credits include: THE NOURISH PROJECT with WP Theater; REP (Racial Equity Project) with Middlesex School and Sojourn; as well as gatherings with Goodman Theatre among others.

Shannon Scrofano designs spaces and conditions for performance, public conversations, and other time-based media.   She serves on the board of Los Angeles Performance Practice and collaborates with the newly founded Center for Performance and Civic Practice.  She teaches at California Institute of the Arts.

Joel Sugerman began working with Sojourn in Portland on Built and On The Table. Joel teaches theatre at The Wheeler School, an independent school in Providence, RI. For the last 15 years, he was the Director of Theatre at Lawrence Academy in Groton, MA. He has made, performed and taught theatre in Chicago, Minneapolis, Cleveland, the Czech Republic, as well as a smattering of other US and European locales. Joel earned his bachelor’s degree from Northwestern University and studied at the Dell’ Arte School of Physical Theatre in California.

Alejandro Tey  is a Chicago-based director, writer, actor and teaching artist. He was part of the original student ensemble for Sojourn’s HOW TO END POVERTY and has since worked on each iteration of the show in some capacity. He is a Resident Artist at Filament Theatre. Some favorite Chicago acting credits include: The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane (Filament Theatre), The Elaborate Entrance of Chad Deity (Red Theater) and The Compass (Steppenwolf). Tey is the creator of The Isle of Sugar, an RPG/Theatre event about his grandparent’s experience of the Cuban Revolution produced by Red Theater and Sojourn Theatre. Alex also does video game performance capture for NetherRealm Studios, for whom he's had the pleasure of playing evil kung-fu wizards, angry fire ninjas, genocidal tentacle robots and psychic talking gorillas, among others. Alex hosts RPG’s, to join him for a game, visit: www.alejandrotey.com

Maureen Towey is a director and writer working across artistic mediums. Towey has worked as a Creative Director for Grammy award-winning musicians such as Arcade Fire, Ray LaMontagne and Esperanza Spalding. She has directed music videos for Tune-Yards, Sharon Van Etten and Caroline Shaw. For The New York Times, Towey directed “Sensations of Sound” which won a Lumiere Award for Best VR Documentary of 2017. A highlight of her live performance work was directing Black Mountain Songs, which was conceived by Bryce Dessner (of The National) and starred the Brooklyn Youth Chorus (BAM in NYC, Barbican in London). Towey has been recognized as a Fulbright scholar (South Africa), a Princess Grace fellow, a TCG Leadership U grantee (Berkeley Rep), and as a PBS/AOL MAKER.

Hannah Treuhaft is a music maker and teacher in Portland, Oregon. As a long-standing ensemble member and the former Education Director of Sojourn Theatre, Hannah has led young people all over the Portland area in the creation of new performance. She serves on the National Board of the Center for Art and Civic Practice and on the board of the Parent-Teacher Club at her children’s school. 

Nik Zaleski is a theater artist, facilitator, somatic coach and cultural activist. She is a co-founder of the FYI Performance Company, which designs participatory theater experiences about sexual health and sexual violence. Professionally, she consults on arts-based strategy for social change organizations, with roots in reproductive and climate justice movements. Nik has directed performance for Redmoon Theatre, Northwestern University and Arizona State University, as well as for Sojourn, FYI and Erasing the Distance, where she is also an ensemble member. She completed her undergraduate degree in Performance Studies and Gender Studies at Northwestern University and holds an MA in Interdisciplinary Studies from DePaul University, which combined Public Health and Directing coursework.