About East 3rd Productions

	East 3rd Productions email The mission of East 3rd Productions is to facilitate art anytime, anywhere, any way, empowering artists to create multidisciplinary work which communicates across social, cultural, and political lines. Through its four divisions – East 3rd Ensemble, East 3rd cinema, East 3rd Visual, and East 3rd Education – the company seeks out innovative, intellectual, and exciting work, nurturing the creative impulses of its permanent members, collaborators, and future theatre artists.
	Ricardo Riethmuller email (Artistic Director, CEO) Ricardo Riethmuller is a director, performer, and producer as well as a graduate of the Tisch School of the Arts at New York University and a founding member of East 3rd Productions, LLC. He attended the Atlantic Theater Company Acting School, the Experimental Theater Wing and studied in London at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts as well as at the Institute for Contemporary Art. He has also trained with the SITI Company, The South Wing, P3, and Raina von Waldenburg. Mr. Riethmuller appeared at Japan Society in The South Wing’s production of Aoi!. He also participated in the development of The South Wing’s original production of The Gospel According to Jack Vitrolo in their intensive program at the Watermill Center, which then had it’s premier at the H.E.R.E. Arts Center in New York, NY. In collaboration with the HERE Arts Center and The South Wing, he participated in Suzan Lori-Parks’s 365 Plays/365 Days festival, which premiered at the Public Theater. He wrote and directed Multitudo Vulgaris, a one act play based on Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s short story “A Very Old Man With Enormous Wings” for and with the Bare-Naked Players. He directed a much-acclaimed site-specific version of Jean-Paul Sartre’s No Exit for Fehomj Group. In 2008 Mr. Riethmuller founded East 3rd Ensemble and set out staging readings of his second play Seeing It Clearly; Euripides’s Alkestis; and Krueger, The Weird Sisters, and Mentors, Marriages, and Madmen, all written by Zack Calhoon. Later that year Mr. Riethmuller founded East 3rd Productions, LLC, alongside multimedia artist Charles Alexander Khaikin and Harvard-A.R.T. alumna actor Lorraine Rodriguez. These artists' mission was to build a creative family to serve as a foundation for expression via a diversity of media in addition to theater and film. In their first mainstage production the company fully designed and produced Calhoon’s The Weird Sisters, which Mr. Riethmuller directed to its premiere at the Gene Frankel Theater. East 3rd Productions has since gone on to produce Pulitzer Prize winner Nilo Cruz’s A Bicycle Country in its New York premiere on Theater Row: The Lion Theater on 42nd Street, as well as the company’s first short film Tapeworm, written and directed by fellow Tisch alumna Margaret Laney. Mr. Riethmuller recently returned to the stage in a staged reading of Barefoot Theater Company’s Honest-to-God Schnozzola and 70/70 Horovitz Project: Horovitz Marathon as part of Barefoot Theatre Company's 70/70 Horovitz Project to celebrate Obie-winning playwright Israel Horovitz. His next producing venture is an original piece developed for and by East 3rd, to be helmed by director Chris Petit and playwright Nick Zagone. As an actor, Mr. Riethmuller will begin filming The Exquisite Corpse (working title) an indie comedy written by Olde English, while as a director he will be participating in aMios Theater Company's Hot SHOTZ benefit event in May. Please stay tuned to the East 3rd website for more about Mr. Riethmuller and/or these and more future events!
	Lorraine Rodríguez Reyes email (Managing Director/Producer) Ms. Rodriguez received her MFA from the American Repertory Theatre/Moscow Art Theatre School at Harvard University and her BA in Theatre Arts from SUNY New Paltz. Some of her production credits include: Associate Producer for “CAPICU” which won Best Short at the Poconos Film Festival, the Latin USA Film Festival and was also an official selection for the Havana Film Festival. She had the pleasure collaborating with On a Quest Productions as an Associate Producer for Rising Sun Falling Star (78th St Theatre Lab) The Room ( Howl Theatre Festival, NYC) and Verizon’s Hispanic Heritage Month. Acting Credits include: BAAL directed by James Dacre at The Riverside Church, Dog Day Afternoon directed by Francisco Solarzano (Theatre Row) Three Sisters directed by James Dacre at Columbia University, K.J. Sanchez' Pants on Fire (ART Institute), Melancholy directed by Scott Zigler (ART Institute), Romeo and Juliet (American Repertory Theatre), Dostoevsky's Demons (Moscow), The Bacchai (Moscow), and the award winning World Premiere of Chained Dog, For the Love of Liz (L.E.F.T.), and her OOBR award winning performance in De Donde also directed by Solarzano at The Looking Glass Theatre. Favorite roles include Marisol in Marisol, Starvling Fairy in Midsummer Nights Dream (New Perspectives Theatre Company), and Libation Bearer from The Oresteia (in ancient Greek) directed by Lee Bruer. Most recent TV credits: Nurse Villa in The Sopranos (HBO); Negligent Nanny (ABC Prime Time); Cookin' in Brooklyn (Discovery Learning Channel), and The Making of Traps (PBS). Lorraine can also be seen in Muneca, an independent film written by Christina Soto now being submitted on the festival circuit, Stick Up Kids directed by Hawthorne James, and Willets Point, an independent film directed by TJ Collins. She can also be seen in various national commercials.
	Debora Balardini email (Director of Educational Development) Debora Balardini has been a teaching and performing for the past twenty years in several countries including Japan, Argentina, United States, France and her native Brazil. She has an extensive dance background (including ballet, jazz, and tap dancing), as well as Hatha yoga. As an actress, she has been exposed to various movement and voice techniques such as Suzuki, View Points, and most recently Choreographic Theatre and Roy Hart Technique which she studied with at the PanTheatre Company in Paris. Some of her credits include the Opera “U” with the Klingon Terrain Research Ensemble from Holland at the Watermill Center, The Three Penny Opera, The Cherry Orchard, Latinas don’t PMS, Don Quixote de La Mancha. She can also be seen in one of the episodes of “A Haunting in Connecticut” for Discovery Channel and the Feature “LA Frontera” to name a few. She is one of the founders of the Nettles Artists Collective. She is proud to be one of the trainers, workshop leaders and a member of East 3rd Ensemble. In her free time she sings and recites poetry in a band.
	Shari Perkins email (Creative Assistant, Dramaturg) Shari Perkins is a freelance dramaturg based in New York City. Shari has thirteen years of experience working in professional theatre. She attended Cornell University, where she pursued training as an academic, director, and stage manager. Ultimately, Shari was chosen by the faculty for an honors program which allowed her to stage manage a full-scale Equity production while still an undergraduate. After receiving her BA in Theatre Arts, Shari moved to New York and interned off-Broadway at the Pearl Theatre Company. She has since worked On-and Off-Broadway on productions such as The Violet Hour, Bad Dates and A Day in the Death of Joe Egg with Eddie Izzard. In her theatre work, Shari is often called upon to use her aptitude for synthesizing language, literature, research, and images. In 2006, she earned an MFA in Dramaturgy at American Repertory Theatre’s Institute for Advanced Theatre Training at Harvard University. While at ART, Shari provided dramaturgy for successful productions ranging from Euripides’ The Bacchae to the Pulitzer Prize nominated rock opera Orpheux X to original, company-devised pieces. Her work has been seen in the United States in Boston, Providence, and New York, and internationally in Edinburgh, Scotland, Moscow, Russia and Hong Kong, China. Shari was a finalist for a 2006-2007 Fulbright Grant to Russia and spent a year and a half living in Moscow. While in Russia, Shari participated in the vibrant theatre culture at Chekhov’s Moscow Art Theatre. She is a graduate student at Middlebury College’s Russian School with a planned focus on Russian drama and film. She is an advanced Russian speaker and has a reading knowledge of French. Shari is a critic for TheaterOnline.com and offoffonline.com. Please visit www.shariperkins.com
	James Bigbee Garver email (Composer) James creates sonic inventions for performance installations, interactive media, theatre, and dance using a palette of composed and sampled music, sound effects, and live signal processing. He draws upon a very wide variety of sources to bring together a sometimes spacey, sometimes beat-driven and playful pastiche of otherworldly music. Some of the places his sound designs have been presented in New York City include Japan Society, Joyce SoHo, The 92nd St. Y Harkness Dance, Performance Space 122, St. Ann's Warehouse, The American Museum of Natural History, and Robert Wilson's Watermill Center (on Long Island). His work on the Web includes soundscapes for the Intrepid Sea, Air and Space museum and Food & Water Watch. In 2006 he created the Tiny Dance Film Series with choreographer Peter Kyle, a collection of very short and very small dance films screened on tiny viewing devices for an audience of one. The series has been on view at various galleries and festivals in New York, Chicago, Amsterdam, Scotland, and Norway. Learn more about Mr. Garver at his Web site www.bigbee.org
	Scott Hali email (Lighting Designer, Web Developer) Scott earned his BFA in Lighting Design from The State University of New York at Purchase College’s Design/Technology program. He was also a guest at the Broadway Lighting Master Classes in New York. Currently the Principle Lighting Designer for East 3rd Ensemble, Scott is enamored by all visual stimuli and tries his hand at every aspect of lighting design. He designs lighting for theatre, dance, television, film and events and has even been known to dabble in photography and web design as well. Scott has collaborated with the likes of Melanie Stewart Dance Theatre and Paule Turner’s court, and has designed lighting for private and corporate events for Calvin Klein, Adidas, FOX Home Entertainment, and others. Scott was the lighting director for ESPN’s live morning show, Cold Pizza, and was the head electrician for the off-Broadway experience Drumstruck at New World Stages. Theatre being his true passion and favorite medium, Scott’s most recent lighting design credits include (A)broadness and GenerationMe with At Play Productions; Have I None and Runaway/Secret House at Columbia University; and The Weird Sisters for East 3rd Ensemble. Please visit http://shali.atspace.com
	Michael Mallard email (Production Designer/Photographer) Michael received his MFA from the National Theatre Conservatory. He is a photographer and designer as well as an actor. He approaches his set design work from an actors point of view and has created sets for Studio 12 Ensemble's production fo Second and most recently A Bicycle Country for East 3rd Productions. Michael believes set design should adhere to being innovative in the marriage between creativity and function. Michael's acting credits include: Romeo & Juliet (NEA & Arkansas Rep.), The Diary of Anne Frank (Denver Center), You Cant Take It With You (Denver Center), and Mentors, Madmen and Marriages (East 3rd Productions). Please visit http://www.mallardshots.com
	Joanna Leigh Jacobsen email (Company Manager, Stage Manager, Production Manager, Screenwriter) New York Stage Management credits include: A Bicyle Country, Wrestling the Alligator, Fire Throws, The Weird Sisters, McReele, Dog Day Afternoon, Hannah and the Hollow Challah, The Roots of Rap, Vital Signs Theatre Festival, NewLand, The Lady Swims Today, Betrothed, Oklahoma Samovar, Israel Horovitz's New Shorts and The Secret of Mme. Bonnard's Bath, Catherine FillouxÕs LemkinÕs House, Jeffrey SweetÕs Bluff, Balm In Gilead, NewLand, A Winkle In Time, MCC's youth program Uncensored 2006 and Uncensored 2005. Edinburgh Fringe Festival 2007 credits include: Extropia, and A Day In Dig Nation. Film credits include: Other Than Emily, Shy of Serenity, and ongoing projects with A2K Productions. She is a 2004 graduate of Kenyon College and is also a member of the Barefoot Theatre Company, the Actors Equity Association, and the Stage Managers Association.
	Jonathan Santos email (Executive Assistant, Screenwriter) A native of New York, Jonathan was first introduced to the industry by his aunt, Lorraine Rodriguez, and hasn’t looked back. He has a strong love of writing and all things physical. His training includes, acting and improvisation training at Luna Stage. The CAST program (Communication Arts and Sciences Training) at Clifton High School. Jonathan also has extensive experience in multiple martial arts disciplines and sports which include Goju-Ryu Karate, Brazilian Ju-jitsu and Football. Jonathan’s work includes serving as Production Assistant for Willet’s point produced and directed by T.J. Collins; Assistant Stage Manager for A Bicycle Country produced by East 3rd Ensemble; Production Assistant, Craft Services and Personnel Driver For Tapeworm Produced by East 3rd Cinema; Stage Manager for Henry V reading at La Tea directed by Gil Ron.