Creativity in Captivity

A Grammy-nominated comedian and podcaster with 10 appearances on the Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon and 4 appearances on Conan. His debut Comedy Central special, Full-Time Magic, and his debut album, Yelled At By a Clown, reached #1 on the iTunes Comedy Charts and remained on Billboard’s Top Ten Comedy Charts for weeks. Bargatze’s half-hour Netflix special on The Standups, premiered in 2017, and h...

A visual designer born in Montreal, raised in Cincinnati, now living in Las Vegas where he serves as co-director with David Copperfield and as David’s design director. Homer is often multi-tasking between conceptual drawing and design, cinematography, theatrical lighting design, script development, illusion staging, and video/music editing and sound design. Homer's illusion designs and cinematogra...

A producer, executive creative director, and Imagineer for over 31 years, Doris Hardoon, has just received the Buzz Price Thea Award recognizing her for “a lifetime of distinguished achievements.” Beginning her themed entertainment career in 1975 at Marine World Africa USA as a graphic designer, Doris was hired four years later by WED Enterprises (now known as Walt Disney Imagineering), working on...

Anna Condo is a filmmaker and a photographer born in Armenia and raised in France. From a young age, Anna enjoyed a passion for the arts and a love for the natural world's mysteries. As a teenager, she took art classes at the École des Arts Appliqués in Paris. Upon graduation, she enrolled at the Université Paris Nanterre for Art History and Archeology. That same year, she landed a TV role, transf...

A “Solo Show Powerhouse” and consummate storyteller with a full toolkit of characters, sound effects, impersonations and improvisation. Reed was nominated for three Primetime Emmy Awards for Dream On, The Cosby Show and Robert Townsend and His Partners in Crime. Reed was an advertising & promotion executive at NBC for two years, then did voice-work for cartoons such as Disney’s Gargoyles, Spider-M...

An award-winning American playwright, author, essayist, poet and professor at the David Geffen School of Drama at Yale. Her plays include The Oldest Boy, Dear Elizabeth, Stage Kiss, In the Next Room, (or The Vibrator Play) (Pulitzer Prize finalist, 2010); The Clean House (Pulitzer Prize finalist, 2005; Susan Smith Blackburn Prize, 2004); Passion Play (Pen American Award, Fourth Freedom Forum Playw...

An established Hollywood screenwriter and novelist whose credits include Arachnophobia, True Believer, Final Analysis, Wolf, A Nightmare on Elm Streetand the Martin Scorsese remake of Cape Fear. As a “script doctor” he has done production polishes on such films as Batman Returns, Face/Off and Mission: Impossible 2. Strick wrote the original script for Tim Burton’s unproduced Superman Lives. His fi...

An award-winning creative director for cultural attractions, theme parks, and destinations. Cynthia is a principal for Thinkwell Group, a global experience design company. She has gained a reputation for combining creative approaches to exhibition and education development with a focused understanding of experiences as a means of advancing equity, inclusion, early education, and visitor behavior....

An exceptional Photographer, Creative Director and Visual Storyteller known for his signature style with Beauty, Celebrity & Fashion Photography. His list of clients include Cardi B, Billy Porter, Priyanka Chopra, Lewis Hamilton, Ruby Rose, Kim Kardashian, Katy Perry, Prince, Taraji P. Henson, Jim Parsons, Queen Latifah, Betty White & Kelly Clarkson. He has gone on to direct music videos for Kelly...

A professional, confessional writer and producer who created the TV series The New Adventures of Old Christine and Call Your Mother. She served as co-executive producer on Will & Grace and is the author of a book of humorous and unflinching essays on midlife called Aren’t You Forgetting Someone? Essays from my Mid-Life Revenge. Kari started her career writing for the series Weird Science and creat...

A world-class illusionist and the choreographer & artistic director of Austin’s long-running musical/comedy review Esther’s Follies. Ray is the featured performer in this theatrical juggernaut blending illusion, comedy, and audience participation into one of the most carefully constructed performances in the magic world today. There isn't a dull moment when Ray is onstage. Performing immaculate an...

Journey is the Executive Director of the National Comedy Center, the nation’s official cultural institution dedicated to the art of comedy. Under Journey’s direction, the National Comedy Center leads the way in 21st Century museum design, featuring state-of-the-art technology, interactivity, and customization for visitors of all ages. Blooloop recognized Gunderson as one of the Top Museum Influenc...

The director and writer of the comedy martial arts movie The Paper Tigers, Bao tells global stories that have universal appeal. Mentored by master action director Corey Yuen, Bao Tran’s approach draws on spectacle through story and character. Screen Anarchy commended his written-and-directed short Bookie for its “flawlessly realized world populated by entirely fleshed out and believable characters...

An award-winning and accredited German art conservator for paintings and sculptures in Los Angeles with over 15 years of experience in the field of cultural heritage conservation. She completed graduate studies in Art Conservation and has held positions at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the Balboa Art Conservation Center, the National Gallery of Denmark, and for the German Government. Kamil...

Brian Regan is one of the most respected comedians in America and a veteran of Late Night TV with multiple appearances on The Tonight Show, The Late Show with David Letterman and Late Night with Conan O’Brien. His Netflix stand-up specials include: Brian Regan: On The Rocks and Brian Regan: Nunchucks and Flamethrowers, which is also available as a vinyl album. Brian stars in his own original half-...

Colette is an award-winning short fiction writer, teacher and mentor. Her short story collection Once Removed won the Flannery O’Connor Award for Short Fiction, the NYC Big Book Award for Short Story Collections, and the Juror’s Choice Award and the Short Stories Award from the National Indie Excellence Awards. Her work has appeared in The Chicago Tribune, Harvard Review, Kenyon Review Online, Sli...

A versatile musician and the co-founder of the Brooklyn-based alt rock band “They Might Be Giants” known for their uniquely experimental and absurdist style using surreal, humorous lyrics and unconventional instruments in their songs. John is a singer/songwriter, who plays accordion, baritone, bass saxophone, clarinet and keyboards. TMBG has released 23 albums and has two Grammy Awards. John share...

An award-winning librettist and lyricist that serves on National Council of the Dramatists Guild of America. Cheryl has been a Resident Playwright at Chicago Dramatists since 2008, and serves as the company’s Director of New Musical Theatre Development. She has co-written more than a dozen musicals that have been developed and showcased at the Eugene O’Neill Theater Center’s National Music Theater...

A Southern California artist whose practice is focused mainly on abstract and figurative painting, as well as sculpture, printmaking and music. Tim studied fine art at Otis-Parsons before entering the animation and illustration industries where he honed his technical skills. His complex color and design theories pushed forward a decidedly populist aesthetic, which has continued to develop and morp...

Jackie is 35 year veteran of stand-up comedy whose albums have been #1 on Amazon and iTunes and have over fifty million views on Spotify and Pandora. She is the host of two podcasts, the long running The Dork Forest and her new show The Jackie & Laurie Show co-hosted with fellow comic/writer, Laurie Kilmartin. Kashian’s list of acclaimed comedy specials include This Will Make an Excellent Horcrux,...

A world-class paleo artist who produces natural history and prehistoric life models for museums, publishing, and film. Gary has a degree in Art/Biology and he interned at the Smithsonian Institution and the British Museum of Natural History. He has created sculptures for National Geographic, the Carnegie Museum of Natural History, the BBC, The Discovery Channel, and The American Museum of Natural...

This creative director, feminist researcher, and writer resides at the intersection of art, technology, and social justice.  She is the Augmented and Virtual Realities Lead at the Atlantic Institute in Oxford, England. Alice is the founder of Herstory, a project that uses art and culture to engage people with women’s history. She has worked with Magic Leap, U2, The Gates Foundation, Tate, and Peng...

The author of Crazy Screenwriting Secrets: How to Capture a Global Audience and an accomplished international storyteller who wrote and produced the Chinese-language romance film 100 Days. Weiko is an associate professor at Emerson College, a Fulbright Senior Specialist, a Samuel Goldwyn Writing Award recipient, and an AMPAS Nicholl Fellowship finalist. He has written projects for The Walt Disney...

An accomplished actor who is the computer voice of the Starship La Sirena in the CBS All Access series Star Trek: Picard, the voice of Bellroc in tandem with Piotr Michael in Wizards; the third installment of Guillermo Del Toro’s epic trilogy Tales of Arcadia and the voice of Ana in Lara Croft: Rise of the Tomb Raider. Kay has choice voice roles in renowned gaming franchises such as The Last of Us...

A stand-up comedian, actor, and visual artist who is a nine-year veteran of Saturday Night Live is known for his characters Mr. Subliminal, Tarzan, and Franz (of Hans and Franz), and as an anchor on Weekend Update. Kevin was a series regular on Weeds, Man with a Plan, and Glenn Martin, DDS. A frequent guest on The Tonight Show, Jimmy Kimmel Live! and Conan. Kevin has made numerous guest appearance...