Donja R. Love is an Afro-Queer playwright, poet, and filmmaker from Philadelphia. He’s the recipient of the 2018 Laurents/Hatcher Foundation Award, the 2017 Princess Grace Playwriting Fellowship, The Lark’s 2016 Van Lier New Voices Playwriting Fellowship, The Playwrights Realm’s 2016-2017 Writing Fellowship, and the 2016 Arch and Bruce Brown Playwriting Award. He is a Eugene O’Neill 2018/2017 National Playwrights Conference finalist and the 2011 Philadelphia Adult Grand Slam Poetry Champion. His work has been developed at Manhattan Theatre Club, Rising Circle Theater Collective, The Lark, and The Playwrights Realm. He’s the co-founder of The Each-Other Project, an organization that helps build community and provide visibility, through art and advocacy, for LGBTQ People of Color. Select stage-plays include: The Love* Plays (Sugar in Our Wounds, Fireflies, and In The Middle), a trilogy which explores Queer Love* during pivotal moments in Black History; and Soft. Select film work includes: Modern Day Black Gay (web series), and Once A Star (short film). Training: Juilliard, Lila Acheson Wallace American Playwrights Program.

Christie Chiles Twillie is a Music Director, Sound Designer and Composer. Composition credits include A Raisin in the Sun (Invictus); America 2.0 (Definition); The Niceties (Forward), VietGone (GEVA), The Way She Spoke (Milwaukee Chamber) and Milwaukee Black Theatre Festival productions Black Butterflies, Pretty Fire, Kill Move Paradise, Stew and Home. Film credits include The Pandemic Trilogy, The Clearing and Alone. Christie won the 2019 Footlights Best Musical Direction Award for a Professional Production, and a Rachel Rockwell Fierce Women Behind The Table. She earned a BTAA nomination for Best Music Direction – Original Score (Yellowman) and was a Chicago Broadway World Finalist for Best Music Direction, (Big Fish). Regional credits include Five Guys Named Moe, Newsies, and The Gospel at Colonus (Skylight) and Minnie’s Boys (Porchlight).

Rita Vreeland has been a frequent stage manager at Northlight since 2007, with Birthday Candles marking her 42nd production here. Other favorite recent projects include Ernest Shackleton Loves Me at Porchlight Music Theatre, A Christmas Carol at Drury Lane, The Luckiest at Raven Theatre, three years of The Polar Express Train Ride, and productions at Mercury Theatre, Victory Gardens, Route 66 Theatre Company, Theatre at the Center, and The Galway International Arts Festival in Galway, Ireland. She is the proud wife of actor Tom Hickey and mom to ten-year-old Charlie, and this year she celebrated her 22nd anniversary as a member of Actors’ Equity Association. Thank you for supporting live theatre!