Neighborhood: Jackson Heights
Website: http://www.paulhufker.com

Paul has been a playwright, AEA actor, and director in New York City for eight years. His one act, The Dark Land of the Sun, was produced at the National Comedy Theatre and the Manhattan Repertory Theatre’s Summerfest 08’. His full-length, The Landlord, had a successful reading produced by The Drilling Company (directed by John Gould Rubin). Another of his full-length plays, The Land of Snow and Ghosts, was workshopped by The Dramatic Question Theatre Company (NYC) as part of their “Fresh Faces 2012/2013” and has been published online by Independent Playwrights.

Paul’s play Smallpox in the Blankets has been produced as part of Variations Theatre Group’s “Harvest Theatre Festival,” where it advanced to the “finals.” Smallpox was also performed this summer in Toronto, Canada as part of Newborn Theatre’s “Odds and Ends Festival.” His play The Horses in Central Park was produced as part of AND Theatre Company’s “Eclectic Evening of Shorts” and Emerging Artists Theatre’s (EAT) 10th Annual New Work Series.

Paul is excited to be working with Variations Theatre Group and Theatre Southwest on two new projects this fall. Paul is a Eugene O’Neill Award Semi-Finalist, and a 2011 participant of the prestigious Sewanee Writers’ Conference. He is a proud graduate of Webster University where he received a BFA in Theatrical Performance. Follow him on Twitter at @PaulHufker.

Neighborhood: Jackson Heights
Website: www.goldenphoenixproductions.com

Jade Wu
Hyphenated Artist/Jill of all Trades
Golden Phoenix Productions, Inc.
a 501(c)(3) organization

Jade has dedicated four decades of service to the pursuit of social and human justice through the arts. She has worked on Presidential political campaigns and was a Mayoral appointee as Artistic Producer of a 1400-seat vintage RKO theater where she booked talents such as Chris Rock, George Carlin, Four Tops, Faith Hill, and Martina McBride.

Jade is a screenwriter/executive producer and has worked for ABC Daytime Drama Series “General Hospital” and “One Life to Live” as well as scripted/directed documentary films which have screened at the IFP Market, Asian American Int’l Film Festival, Sundance Producers’ Conference, and the Anthology Film Archives in New York City.  She was a Disney/ABC Writing Fellow, Jerome Foundation Fellow, Film/Video Arts Fellow, BlueCat Screenplay Semi-finalist, and a PEN USA Rosenthal Emerging Voices Writing Fellowship Semi-finalist. Jade’s stage plays have had public readings at the Nuyorican Poets Café, Urban Stages, Santa Clara Experimental Theatre Festival and La Jolla Studio Stage.

She served as a New York State Council on the Arts Individual Artist Grant Panelist for three years and as an International Emmy Awards Juror in Drama Series and Documentaries for five years.

Prior to the film industry, Jade was Principal, Creative Director and Head Copywriter of her own 22-person advertising firm whose clientele included HBO Global, ARTNews, Ford Foundation, Chase Manhattan Bank, Bank of America, Security Pacific, and Merck Pharmaceuticals.

In the corporate arena, while as Vice President of Marketing and Communications, she was responsible for creating an in-house agency umbrella-ing Waverly, Inc.’s four domestic and international advertising and marketing divisions into what is now known as Lippincott/Waverly, a global leader in medical publishing.

In the acting arena, Jade has had recurring roles in television on NBC’s “Homicide: Life on the Streets,” Warner Bros. TV’s “The Adversaries,” and ABC’s “One Life to Live.” On stage, she has worked directly along side Meryl Streep and Kevin Kline in New York’s Central Park production of “Mother Courage and Her Children” written by Oscar and Tony Awardee Tony Kushner and directed by Tony award-winner George C. Wolfe.  Her stage credits include working with other iconic directors: Alan Schneider, Blanka Zizka, Liv Ciulei, JoAnne Akalaitis, Gerald Gutierrez, Wendy Goldberg, Dan Wackerman, and Frances Hill, as well as award-winning writers Lucy Thurber, Chung-mi Kim, Rehana Mirza, Ruth Wolff and Lanford Wilson.  She has performed roles at the Shakespeare Theatre, The Public Theatre, New York Shakespeare Theatre, Arena Stage, The Wilma Theater, Minetta Lane Theatre, Urban Stages and toured at the Edinburgh Festival in Scotland and Adelaide Festival in Australia. In film, she is most noted for her lead role in Michael Kang’s Sundance pedigree film, “The Motel,” along with roles in numerous major studio films directed by Tony Scott, Browen Hughes, Andrew Fleming and Spike Lee.

As an educator, Jade’s teaching background includes the Fashion Institute of Technology, University of California/San Diego, New York Film Academy, Raul Julia Institute for the Performing Arts, and private coaching. She has been a return Lecturer at Bard College on Drama in Social and Human Justice and the philosophies of Michel Foucault’s Fearless Speech in relation to dramatic text and dialogue.

She holds a BA in Drama and Literature, BS in Biochemistry and matriculated in the MFA Theatre Program at the University of California, San Diego.