MEET THE ARTISTIC / PRODUCTION STAFF

ROBYN FLATT

DCT Founder and Executive Director

Robyn Flatt co-founded DCT in 1984 with start-up funds of $500. Under her artistic leadership, the theater’s creative and operational stature has grown over the past 38 years to reflect its current annual budget of more than $4 million. Her theatrical career has brought her acclaim as a professional director, actor and lighting designer. During her tenure as a member of the Dallas Theater Center Resident Company, she served as Assistant Artistic Director and Director of Theater-in-the-Parks. She holds a MA degree from Baylor University and studied under Paul Baker, Juana Laban, and Hanya Holm. Ms. Flatt’s many acting credits include two roles she created for award-winning world premiere productions: Dewey Dell in Journey to Jefferson and Martha Ann Sickenger in Preston Jones’ The Oldest Living Graduate. Her directing credits at DCT include several world premiere adaptations by Linda Daugherty of Steven Kellogg’s stories which have also toured nationally. Other critically acclaimed productions include: Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, The Miracle Worker, And Then They Came For Me, To Kill a Mockingbird, Mufaro’s Beautiful Daughters: An African Tale, Treasure Island Reimagined!, and Yana Wana’s Legend of the Bluebonnet. She has served on the boards of AATE, ASSITEJ/USA, and CTFA. She is a recipient of The 500, Inc.’s prestigious Ken Bryant Visionary Award, Dallas Historical Society’s 1999 Excellence in Community Service for Creative Arts, the 2002 Leon Rabin Standing Ovation Award, and the Excellence in Nonprofit Management Award. Ms. Flatt is a member of the College of Fellows of American Theatre and served 5 years as Treasurer of the Children’s Theatre Foundation of America. She was nominated by The Dallas Morning News arts staff for the Texan of the Year Award in both 2010 and 2015, and was honored in 2016 with the Orlin Corey Award for Artistic Excellence from the American Alliance for Theater and Education.

Nancy Schaeffer

Artistic Director

Nancy has directed numerous DCT productions including Junie B.’s Essential Survival Guide to School; Dragons Love Tacos; Schoolhouse Rock Live!; Disney’s Beauty and the Beast; Ella Enchanted: The Musical; Magic Tree House’s Holiday Musical: A Ghost Tale for Mr. Dickens; Goosebumps the Musical: Phantom of the Auditorium; Junie B. Jones Is Not a Crook; Teen Brain: The Musical; Skippyjon Jones; Rapunzel! Rapunzel! A Very Hairy Fairy Tale; Go, Dog. Go!; Dr. Seuss’s The Cat in the Hat; Pinkalicious, The Musical; How I Became a Pirate; dont u luv me?; Madeline’s Christmas; EAT (It’s Not About Food); Goodnight Moon; The Secret Life of Girls; and 12 productions of The Best Christmas Pageant Ever. Nancy also directed DCT’s highly successful touring production of The Stinky Cheeseman and Other Fair(l)y (Stoopid) Tales which toured the U.S. and then traveled to Shanghai, China, playing at the 2006 Shanghai International Children’s Culture and Arts Expo. Nancy has directed for The Dallas Opera and Shared Stories for the Sixth Floor Museum. She has also directed the Christmas Celebration for the Dallas Symphony Orchestra. She serves as DCT’s Education Director and Artistic Director.

Mara Richards Bim

Playwright / Production Director

Mara is an award-winning playwright and director, and is the founder of the nationally recognized Cry Havoc Theater Company with which she has created 13 original productions over the past nine seasons. Under her leadership, Cry Havoc was awarded the Theatre for Young Audiences/USA’s National Community Impact Award in 2018, was named “Best Thing to Happen to Local Theater” by D Magazine in 2019, and was the subject of a five-episode podcast by KERA/NPR in 2020 about the company’s 2018 production of Babel. Mara is a two-time recipient of Special Projects Grants from the City of Dallas Office of Arts and Culture for the creation of public art installations to accompany Cry Havoc Theater Company productions. In 2020 Mara received the Holloway Family Foundation’s Visionary Leadership Award, and in 2021 she was named one of D Magazine ’s “78 Women Changing the Face of Dallas.”

Emily Bernet

Choreographer

Emily Bernet is a dancer, choreographer and movement director. She has created for Cry Havoc Theater Company, Southern Methodist University’s Spring Awakening, Ruben Carrazana’s The Cube, and Fair Assembly’s Macbeth. She is also co-founder and artistic director of Bombshell Dance Project, a nonprofit contemporary dance company based in Dallas, Texas.

Natalie Rose Mabry

Scenic Designer

Natalie (she/they) is a Trans-Queer Scenographer with a MFA in Design from SMU. Natalie is a nationally established Designer, last having designed at DCT for Junie B.’s Essential Survival Guide to School. Natalie seeks to make theater spaces accessible for Queer and BIPOC designers. Website: Natalierosemabry.Art IG: Nrmabryartistry

Vinchenzo Locascio

Lighting Designer

Vinchenzo is excited to join this production of Endlings! After earning a BFA in Design and Technology from UTA, he traveled the world as a technician before returning to DFW at the height of COVID-19 to pursue lighting design. He’d like to thank his friends and family and the other professionals that have guided him with their continued support.

Marco Salinas

Sound Designer

Marco has designed many, MANY shows for DCT over the last 22 years. He is also a recipient of numerous awards for his sound design work in the Dallas/Fort Worth theater scene, and has designed for shows as far away as New York City and even Ireland. He is also the Director of Educational Tours with Shakespeare Dallas where he writes and directs local area tours that teach children and teens about William Shakespeare.

Sally Fiorello

Props Designer

Sally began her association with Dallas Children’s Theater in 1984 and has since served as a director, designer, actor and consultant for numerous DCT productions. She is a Master Puppeteer and senior designer with the critically acclaimed Kathy Burks Theatre of Puppetry Arts and has designed and performed in over 40 original puppet productions including such DCT favorites as The Nutcracker and The Tale of Peter Rabbit. She most recently created Leroy the dog for DCT’s Dragons Love Tacos and props for Junie B.’s Essential Survival Guide to School and Harry Connick, Jr.’s The Happy Elf. Sally is a recipient of the Dallas-Fort Worth Theatre Critics Forum Award.

RAVEN LANUZA-BROWN

Costume Designer

Raven Lanuza-Brown is grateful to be here! Her previous work includes Harry Connick, Jr.’s The Happy Elf (Properties Assistant) and Squirrel Girl Goes to College (Costume Adviser). She has also costumed locally at Theatre Three in Maytag Virgin (Costume Designer) and the movie Twelve Mighty Orphans (Stitcher). She would like to thank her family and friends as well as her new DCT family for supporting her.