Tanika Baptiste (Playwright and Co-Director, An Evening with the San Diego Black Artists Collective), recently named the BroadwayWorld San Francisco 2019 Person to Watch (Female), is an award-winning actor/singer originally from San Diego and is based in both San Diego and the San Francisco Bay Area. Her most recent directorial credits include The Review, or How to Eat Your Opposition and At the Wake of a Dead Drag Queen (Theatre Rhinoceros), Rachel (South Bay Musical Theatre), Black Flag (Common Ground Theatre/Poway Unified School District), The desTROYers (as assistant director, co-adaptor, and costume designer; Southwestern College), and Fires in the Mirror (Trinity Theatre Company). Baptiste served as Artistic Director for the inaugural Artists 4 Black Lives Festival at Balboa Park in San Diego this past Juneteenth. She is slated to direct Program B of the Plays by Young Writers Festival in February. She is a proud member of Actors’ Equity Association.

Lamar Perry (he/him/his) (Co-Director, Celebrating Community Voices; Co-Director, An Evening with the San Diego Black Artists Collective) is a Queer Black director, producer, and writer originally from Windsor, Connecticut. In addition to working as a freelance director and educator, he currently serves as the Globe’s Artistic Associate, having formerly served as Producing Associate at Classical Theatre of Harlem. His recent projects include the podcast Gather Round! (The Old Globe) and audio plays Punchbowl Spaces and The Family Sound (Blindspot Collective/La Jolla Playhouse). Recently he taught, directed, and conducted a semester-long devised-theatre project at UC San Diego in their graduate acting program with their second-year M.F.A. acting candidates. He is a 2020–2021 Roundabout Theatre Company Directors Group member and a 2020 National Alliance for Musical Theatre Observer. Perry was recently featured in American Theatre magazine’s “Roll Call: People to Watch” and is an alum of Schusterman Family Foundation’s REALITY Storytellers program (2019). He holds a bachelor of science from St. John’s University and is an alum of The American Academy of Dramatic Arts.

Dea Hurston (Playwright), a highly regarded activist in the arts community, is a patron, advocate, and philanthropist. With a strong focus on inclusion and diversity, she has supported women leaders and has encouraged arts organizations to provide access to the arts for children. She is a former Commissioner of Arts for the City of San Diego and has served on numerous boards of directors. Hurston is also an award-winning playwright for her play I Want to Marry Little Stevie Wonder, which has recently received a commission from The Old Globe for further development. She is currently working on 1222 Oceanfront: Home, a Black Christmas musical scheduled for production by New Village Arts in December 2021. Playwrights Project is set to produce her play Family as part of the 2021 Mosaic Project. The play you see tonight, In Sickness and in Health, was made into a short film she hopes to release soon.