About Us

Our Mission

Porchlight Theatre Company is an ensemble-based company that believes in the power of great dramatic literature and the live theater experience to develop and celebrate community. Through our summer season of outdoor productions and our year-round readings and workshops, we connect Bay Area audiences and artists with timeless and language-based works.

Our Values

Collaboration—

We’re a company built on the idea of collaboration—between artists, between artists and audience, between company and community. True partnership is only possible where there is an atmosphere of trust, honesty and integrity—these ideas underpin everything we do.

Quality—

We believe in works that are rich and complex that offer the kind of truth, drama, beauty, nuance, and wit that elevate and challenge us. We reject the trite exhibition, the easy answer, the solely commercial, in favor of the long-term, the in-depth and the finely crafted.

Community—

We believe the live arts are unique in providing the kind of connection we crave in a disconnected world. We create work that fosters dialogue and we are interested in connecting with our community in novel and exciting ways.

Exploration—

We believe in “slow art” taking time to unfold a performance, create an ensemble and explore the ideas of a great play with our audiences.

Wonder—

We delight with our audiences in the joy, magic, and enchantment that result when we connect with an extraordinary work of art in our magical redwood forest.

Our Company Members

Ann Brebner (Vision Director) ann@porchlight.net

Ann’s unpublished book, “All My Mothers” was adapted as a stage play for the first major fundraiser for Porchlight Theatre.  Later, she  both directed and compiled from Oscar Wilde’s lesser known works an evening for four actors, A Wild Wilde Night,  also a fundraiser which Porchlight hopes to produce again in the future.. As a member of the Core Ensemble, Ann has been associated with the company since its inception. She was born and educated in New Zealand.  As a stage director she trained at London’s famed Old Vic Theatre School.  She has directed Off Broadway and throughout the Bay area.
In the world of film she was an agent for actors, a  screen writer and a casting director. She has written three screen plays, and adapted, along with Laurel Graver, Anne Lamott’s book  “Hard Laughter”,  which was produced in San Rafael in 2008, and will be read in New York in 2009.
She has worked as a Casting Director and written a book for actors, “Setting Free the Actor”.

Rebecca Castelli* (Company Manager) rebecca@porchlight.net

Rebecca Castelli first joined Porchlight Theatre Company as an associate artist in the fall of 2007. Several years prior, Rebecca made her California stage debut at the Marin Art & Garden Center in Porchlight’s production of Wild Honey (summer of 2003). Currently, she is working on the role of Natasha for Porchlight Theatre’s summer 2009 production of Chekhov’s Three Sisters.
Rebecca holds her MFA in Acting from the University of Tennessee-Knoxville. At UT’s International Actor Training Academy, Rebecca had the opportunity to study and work with directors and teachers from Russia, Poland, Hungary, Romania, Argentina, Korea, Bulgaria, and Belgium.
Rebecca is an experienced voice teacher, as well as professional actress and singer. Besides teaching out of her private voice studio in El Cerrito, she currently teaches musical theatre and voice at Berkeley Repertory School of Theatre. She holds a bachelor’s degree in voice and theatre along with her MFA and has studied voice for over fifteen years with teachers from Boston Conservatory, Peabody Conservatory, Oberlin College, Syracuse University, and Florida State University. For her performance as Mabel in the operetta The Pirates of Penzance, she received a Seattle Times Footlight Award for “great performance in a musical”. She also had the honor of performing with Judy Kaye in Gypsy at the Fifth Avenue Theatre in Seattle. Rebecca is the author of a one-woman show, The Booby Trap, which she performed in the 1999 Seattle Fringe Festival. In the spring 2008, she was seen in Cinnabar Theatre’s hit production of Noel Coward’s Private Lives.

Thais Harris (Marketing Director) thais@porchlight.net

Thais started acting in Brazil, where she is originally from. She studied acting and theatre production at CIC (Integrated Cultural Center of Florianopolis), Edson Nunes Academy and UFSC (Federal University of Santa Catarina). Her credits in the US include Picasso at the Lapin Agile, Best Little Whorehouse in Texas, The Good Doctor (nominated for the Anna Awards), and Deadwood Dick with Royal Palm Players (FL); Breaking Legs with Lemon Bay Playhouse (FL); A Few Good Man with Venice Little Theatre (FL); Hedda Gabler with Actor's Ensemble of Berkeley and the upcoming Three Sisters at Porchlight Theatre Company. Thais has acted in films, tv and commercials, and has experience behind the scenes as a set designer, director, graphic designer, and producer/fundraiser. She has a Bachelor's Degree from CIIS in Interdisciplinary Studies, and is currently studying Nutrition at Bauman College. She is blessed to be married to Nick Sholley, a fellow Porchlight core member. Thais is a Graphic & Web Designer, and you can check out her website here: www.thaisharris.com

Tara Blau* (Co-Founder, Interim Artistic Director) tara@porchlight.net

Tara Blau’s credits include: Doris in Same Time Next Year, Amanda in The Glass Menagerie, Lois in Wonder of the World, and Lucy in You’re a Good Man Charlie Brown all at Pacific Alliance Stage Co. At Cinnabar Theater Co, Tara has played Amanda in Private Lives, Mrs. Cheveley, in An Ideal Husband and directed The Clean House, by Sarah Ruhl (Outstanding Play 2007 - Bohemian). At Porchlight Tara has played,  Masha in The Seagull (Dean Goodman Award), Anna Petrovna in Wild Honey (Dean Goodman Award, and Bay Area Theatre Critics Award nomination for Outstanding Actress), and Lizavetta in A Month in the Country. Tara was the founder of PTC's Children's Touring Company bringing the poetry of Langston Hughes and the Black Arts Movement to over 10,000 children in the SF Bay Area. Other Bay Area credits include: La Luna Theatre Collective, Playhouse West, Sacramento Theatre Company, Aurora Theatre Company, TheatreWorks, Plaground, Berkeley Rep and The Willows Theatre Company. Regional credits include: Blue Rider Theatre Company, Bailiwick Theatre Company and Body Politic in Chicago, and Off-Broadway. She is co-founder of La Luna Theatre Collective and Porchlight Theatre Company and holds an MFA in Theatre from the National Theatre Conservatory in Denver. She wishes to thank her parents for all their support.

Candace Brown (Company Member) candace@porchlight.net

Candace is a teacher and professional actor who has only recently returned to the stage. She has performed at the Marin Fringe Festival, College of Marin, Theater Rhinoceros and the Lesher Center for the Arts. Her favorite role was Maggie Mundy in Dancing at Lughnasa directed by Molly Noble and performed at the College of Marin. She was nominated for a Bay Area Theatre Critics Award for her performance in Condoms at the 2008 Marin Fringe Fall Festival. Other roles include Nurse Becky Hedges in Bad Habits and Mrs.Archer in the original production of Serenity in Central Park and will be appearing as Anfisa in Chekhov's Three Sisters in the upcoming 2009 Porchlight production. She has also done several television spots and some movie background work. Candace is proud to be represented by LOOK talent in San Francisco. Candace received her BA and Teaching Credential from Sonoma State University and has taught drama at Drake High School, Marin Catholic and is currently a teaching artist with Marin Theater Company. She directed many school productions, her favorites being The Music Man, The Fantastiks, The Crucible and Arsenic and Old Lace. She will be teaching a playwriting class for middle schoolers at Marin Theater Company this summer.

Nick Sholley* (Company Member) nick@porchlight.net

Nick Sholley moved to San Francisco to study at ACT in 1996. Since that time, he has been a regular as an actor in the Bay Area, working with the Exit Theatre, SF Shakespeare, Marin Shakespeare, Shakespeare at Stinson, Playground, Magic Theatre, Center Rep, San Jose Stage, AlterTheater, Brava, among others. His favorite roles include Quentin in After the Fall, (AlterTheatre), Stephen in Long Christmas Ride Home (Magic Theatre), and Frederick in Enchanted April (Porchlight). He has written many short plays for Playground and was featured as an emerging playwright in 2001's Best of Playground. He has just finished his Master's degree in Psychology with a concentration in Somatics. You can view his website at www.nicksholley.com

Molly Noble*

Co-founder, former Artistic Director (2002 - 2008), and former Board President (2008 - 2010). www.mollynoble.com

*Member of Actors’ Equity Association.  

Our Board

Ron Krempetz

David Wientjes

Jonathan Smith

Peter Donat (Honorary Board Member)