Artists

Mission, Vision and Value

Mission

The Artist's Laboratory Theatre is a collective ensemble company that is dedicated to storytelling through the process of experimentation.

Vision

Our vision is to create theatre of extraordinary quality that encourages both local community participation and national collaboration.

Value

We believe that the scientific and artistic principles of exploration ask the same fundamental questions, and that through experimentation of story, we may further expand our understanding of the human experience.

Company Members

Erika Wilhite | Artistic Director, Movement and Voice Director

Erika is an actor, producer and teaching artist. She received her MFA in Theatre from the University of Central Florida and her BFA from the University of Central Oklahoma. She also trained in Viewpoints with Anne Bogart and SITI Company in 2007.

Erika produced and performed in the one-woman show "X: The Rise and Fall of an Asylum Star," by Jill Dowse, with which she won the Newbie Award at the Orlando International Theatre Fringe Festival. She co-produced and co-developed "Orson Welles’ War of the Worlds," an exploration of media- induced fear through the perspective of the Public. She relocated to Fayetteville when her husband, Rodney, was accepted into the MFA Creative Writing program at the University of Arkansas, and found herself in a rich and vital arts community.

She is a freelance teaching artist and is so glad to be in Fayetteville, creating a theatre company in such a beautiful part of the country with deeply talented and exciting artists.

Check out her work at www.erikawilhite.com.

Alan Schwanke | Co-Artistic Director, Resident Scenic Designer

Regionally, Alan's design work has been seen in the Chicago Shakespeare Theatre, the Milwaukee Repertory Theatre, the Theatre at the Center in Indiana and the Spokane Opera Company. In the Pacific Northwest, Alan has designed for theatres such as the Third Rail Repertory Theatre, The Salem Repertory Theatre, Bag&Baggage Productions, The Lakewood Theatre Company and the Broadway Rose Theatre Company.

Among his various honors, in 2010 Alan received the Award for “Outstanding Scenic Design” from the Oregon Theatrical Awards Society and a nomination for “Outstanding Scenic Design” from the Portland Area Musical Theatre Awards. In 2008 Alan was chosen to display his work at both the USITT Young Designer’s Forum in Houston and Ming Cho Lee’s legendary Clambake Portfolio Review in New York City. Alan has also received several commendations for “Excellence in Scenic Design” from the Region VI Design Chair of the Kennedy Center's American College Theatre Festival.

Alan received his MFA in Scenic Design from Northwestern University in Chicago and his BFA in Theatre Design and Technology from the University of Central Oklahoma.

Joseph Fletcher | Associate Company Member, Lab Director

Joseph Fletcher is a stage manager, director, and designer. Originally from Florida, he currently resides in Astoria, New York. Joseph earned his BFA in Theatre from the University of Central Florida. He has been chasing the muse for over a decade now and believes strongly that the theater should be a social service that represents the communities it lives in.

He is currently developing a national forum for collaboration using the principal of "Open Source Programming" started in the online computing world. It will allow artists to share, develop, and devise new theater pieces from anywhere in the world, bringing together diverse perspectives to works that can be tailored to specific communities and the missions of producing organizations. The collaborative process is about creation without ownership, an "Open Source Theatre" challenges this to an extreme only possible in today's globalized society.

Joseph is also a founding member of The Progressive Theatre Society. "An open forum where artists can share and grow in their craft, relationships, opportunities, and business. To inspire collaboration, interests, opinions, and passions freely and openly. And above all, to recognize our responsibility, as artists to uphold excellence in theatre. We recognize it takes a village of support for our own and each other's success." Think of it as part support group and part artist's dojo for a ragtag collection of up and coming theater professionals in New York.

Past companies have included Cellblock Tour of Chicago the Musical, Walnut Street Theatre, Cirque Du Soleil, Target Margin Theater, Prospect Theatre Company, Hippodrome State Theater, Orlando Shakes/Opera/Rep, Utah Shakes. Favorite productions include War of the Worlds, The Pillowman, Candide, and China the Whole Enchilada.

Seqour Musa.

Christy Hall | Associate Company Member

Christy just graduated with a BA in Drama from the University of Arkansas, and is thrilled to be a part of the lab.

She was most recently seen as Sr. Mary Hubert in NUNSENSE at St. Paul's Episcopal Church, and in The New Play Fest at Nadine Baum Studios. Some of her favorite roles include Mrs. Muller in DOUBT, Tituba in THE CRUCIBLE, The Pupil in THE LESSON, The Woman/The Stranger in DEAD MAN'S CELL PHONE, and Reggie Fluty/Zackie Salmon in THE LARAME PROJECT.

She is a teaching artist with Trike Theatre for young audiences, and will be going on tour with their show, DIGGIN’ UP ARKANSAS, next school year.

Tobias | Associate Company Member

Tobias is a poet, playwright, theatre critic, translator and actor. Currently, he is pursuing his MFA through the Arkansas Programs in Creative Writing and Translation at the University of Arkansas for which he is also the assistant to the director.

He has been published in the journal Phoebe, Liminal Literary Magazine and elsewhere and was a finalist for the 2010 Black Warrior Review Prize. He also teaches Creative Writing and Composition at the University of Arkansas.

Tobias has worked with Theatre de la Jeune Lune, Park Square Theatre and the Minnesota Fringe Festival in Minneapolis and St. Paul. He is thrilled to be developing a new collaborative work with The Artist’s Laboratory Theatre exploring our attachment to place and permanence.

He co-organizes the 9 by the Light reading series in Fayetteville and in his free time is learning how to walk on stilts and play the guitar.

Sean Phillip Mabrey | Associate Company Member

Sean is completing his BA in Drama at the University of Arkansas, where he has appeared as Simon Stimson in Our Town, Dr. Chasuble in The Importance of Being Earnes, Jacob Marley in A Christmas Carol, Moises Kaufman/Rev. Fred Phelps in The Laramie Project, Lawrence Jameson in Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, Uncle Ben in Death of a Salesman, and Caldwell B. Cladwell in Urinetown, among other roles. In 2008, he participated in the sixth annual International Cabaret Conference at Yale University.

Regionally, Sean has appeared as Stephano in The Tempest(Trike Theatre), Gavin Rhyng-Mayne in Alan Ayckbourn's House and Garden (The Playhouse Theatre, Tulsa), as Levi ("Those Canaan Days") in Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat (starring Brian Lane Green) with TheatreArts Productions, Prince Escalus in Romeo & Juliet (American Theatre Company/Philbrook Museum of Art), King Herod in Jesus Christ Superstar (Grace Ann Productions/Kirby Kasting), three seasons with Light Opera Oklahoma/The Gilbert & Sullivan Society of Tulsa (appearing in The Mikado, The Pirates of Penzance, My Fair Lady, The Merry Widow, and Die Fledermaus, among others), and in Every Christmas Story Ever Told (And Then Some) with TheatreSquared.

Along with Jordan Haynes and Thomas Hunter, Sean is also a founding member of Dan's Party, Fayetteville's first-ever long-form improv comedy troupe, who have been ranked in the top four of the region by the Chicago College Improv Festival, and placed first (and audience favorite) in TheatreSquared's 2010 24-Hour Play Festival.

Sean has studied improvisation with Artemis Pebdani (The Groundlings, It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia on F/X), Viewpoints with Michael Landman, musical theatre with Amy Herzberg, acting/movement/voice with Stephen Bel Davies (Juilliard Group 36), French cabaret style with Andrea Leap (LOOK). Sean also co-wrote and performed in The Artist Laboratory Theatre's found-text performance piece Show and Tell: A Sheet Fort Experience.

Visiting Artists

See who's working on the next show.

	Anna Brenner is a New York based theater director. Recent projects include an original ensemble devised piece Are We Here Yet? (undergroundzero festival PS 122); a multimedia concert Uncanny Littlefield); more...
	Merri Biechler received her MFA in playwriting from Ohio University. Her plays have been read, workshopped, and produced around the country including New York City, Los Angeles, and Chicago. more...