The Company

Morgan Ludlow, Artistic Director

Morgan is the recipient of the 2013 San Francisco Bay Area Theatre Critics Circle Award for Best Original Script for his play GORGEOUS HUSSY: An Interview with Joan Crawford. Morgan has produced more than 30 productions in the past 15 years. In 2008 he founded Wily West Productions in San Francisco and his play, NYMPH O' MANIA was listed as one of the of "Best Productions of 2011" by the SF Bay Times. RUTH AND SEA was also listed as one of the "Best New Plays of 2010" by the Bay Area Reporter. He has served as the Producing Director for the Playwrights Center of San Francisco. He has directed a couple plays for Pacific Play Company in Seattle. In Salt Lake City, Morgan produced the Belle of Amherst, procuring the McCune Mansion for a 6-week engagement and raised more than $7,000 in revenue to benefit the Susan G. Komen Foundation. Morgan was a full-time staff member for the Salt Lake Acting Company (a fully professional Equity theatre devoted to producing new American plays), and he also served as the Producing Director for Plan-B Theatre Company, a cutting-edge theatre troupe that was recently voted Best Theatre Company by Salt Lake City audiences.

Jaene Leonard, Media Maven

Jaene trained in New York City at David Mamet’s Atlantic Theater Company, Stella Adler Conservatory and with original Group Theater member Bobby Lewis. She has studied with, or been directed by, Golden Globe- , Emmy-, Tony-, and Oscar-winning artists including Mr. Lewis, Mr. Mamet, Bartlett Sher and William H. Macy. She also was a regular at Naked Angels’ Tuesdays at Nine in NYC. Jaene’s first play, CHIC BAND -- a scene from which was published in Smith & Kraus' Best Stage Scenes 2000, received a workshop production in NYC and staged readings with Playwrights’ Kitchen and at Track 16, both in LA. WHAT ABOUT BOO was part of Yankee Rep's (NYC) End of the Line, and in which she also served as head writer and actor. The first of her ARIZONA PLAYS TRILOGY was a semi-finalist for the Eugene O'Neill Playwrights Conference in 2008. HOME$ICKNESS, a short play about the fast and furious mortgage debacle, had a developmental reading with Playwrights’ Center of San Francisco in 2010, and OIL AND WATER about the BP Oil Spill, was produced in San Francisco’s Sheherezade in 2011. AS IS - NO WARRANTY received a staged reading with Berkshire Playwrights Lab in August, 2009, under the direction of Jim Frangione, and starring Grant Shaud of Murphy Brown fame. Jaene recently added solo performance to her resume, developing, writing and performing LAST OF ELEVEN, and IT'S THE END OF THE WORLD, AWKI and MY SISTER'S MEDICINE in W. Kamau Bell’s Solo Performance Workshop, directed by Martha Rynberg. LAST OF ELEVEN was part of the Maui Fringe Festival. Jaene also has written screenplays and is currently in rewrites on her YA fantasy novel, Less Watercress: The Tales of Juniper.

Genevieve Perdue, Associate Artist

Actor, costumer, scenic painter Genevieve Perdue is thrilled to join Wily West as a company member. Genevieve is currently appearing in two of our fall shows as well as serving as the costumer and scenic painter. She first appeared with Wily West in SHEHEREZADE 14 this past summer. Other recent roles include being a part of the ensemble production ALMOST, MAINE (City College), Ellen Pazinski in OVER THE TAVERN (Actor's Ensemble of Berkeley), Antonia in THE TEMPEST and Marty in CIRCLE MIRROR TRANSFORMATION (City College), as well participating in the PCSF produced staged reading of BLOODLINE as Olympias. Before recently returning to her home state of California, she gallivanted around receiving an eclectic theatrical education from unlikely sources in Wyoming, Colorado, and North Carolina.

Brady Brophy-Hilton, Associate Artist

is a freelance theater director and producer in the San Francisco Bay Area. She began her directing career in Seattle, directing a number of shows with Book-It Repertory Theatre, Cornish College of the Arts, and Groundwork Theatre. In the Bay Area, she has directed It's All in the Mix for All Terrain Theater, Sheherezade 2011 for PCSF, Boys Clinging Together for the SF Fringe Festival, readings of The Cocktail Plays, Ashtad and Dardanos, and Love in the Time of Zombies for Wily West Productions and "TGIF" Monday Night Foreplays for PianoFight. She has served as a producer for Sleepwalkers Theatre and is the Staged Readings Producer for the Playwrights’ Center of San Francisco (PCSF). She was the Education Director for Teatro ZinZanni for a year and a half where she developed and ran their circus educational program Camp ZinZanni and she worked as the Education Associate for Book-It Repertory Theatre for three years. Brady graduated from the Cornish College of the Arts with a BFA in Original Works, cum laude and trained with the Young Conservatory at ACT.

Jason Jeremy, Associate Artist

Jason got his start doing radio theatre as a kid, corrupted by such lovable kooks as the Firesign Theatre troupe and NPR’s Dr. Science. Jason has been a part of Wily West from the very first show, The Widow West and is one of the founding members of the company. He has appeared as the Mighty Magora in Maidrid's Bow and also in San Francisco Stories both Wily West Productions, as Matthew in Private Eyes (Spare Stage), and in numerous roles over the years for Sheherezade, Playwrights' Center of San Francisco's annual play festival.

Kat Kneisel, Associate Artist

Kat has been an artist for Wily West since the very beginning when she took a lead role as Mrs. Brannan in THE WIDOW WEST for the maiden production in 2008. Kat has been a principal artist with the company ever since. She last appeared in Wily West's world premiere of LAWFULLY WEDDED. Since then she has served as the Assistant Director for MAIDRID'S BOW and took a lead role in Wily West's smash hit NYMPH O' MANIA. Kat also served as director for Wily West's production of the PCSF annual short play festival SHEHEREZADE in 2012 and 2013. Kat has studied at Sarah Lawrence College in New York and the British American Drama Academy in London. She had a brief theatrical career in Manhattan before moving to the Bay Area in 2005. She most recently played Lisa in Donald Margulies's COLLECTED STORIES with Expression Productions which played for several months in SF. She has worked with the Olympian's Festival, Playwrights' Center of San Francisco, PianoFight and the Actor's Ensemble of Berkeley.

Bridgette Dutta Portman, Associate Artist

Bridgette Dutta Portman’s plays have been read and produced in the San Francisco Bay Area, across the country and overseas. Her short comedies have been part of Sheherezade, co-produced by Wily West for the Playwrights' Center of San Francisco, for four consecutive years. One of them, AUTO-INCORRECT (2013), went on to several productions in the UK. Bridgette was among the writers for Wily West’s 2013 Showdown competition and 2014 Superheroes project. One of her full-length plays, FRIAR LAZARO, OR THE KING OF TERRORS, was part of Wily West’s Spooky Cabaret series in 2012. Bridgette is a board member and literary committee chair of the Playwrights’ Center of San Francisco, as well as a member of the Pear Writers’ Guild (Pear Avenue Theatre, Mountain View) and the City Light Source playwrights group (City Lights Theater, San Jose). She is excited to be joining Wily West.

Karl Schackne, Associate Artist

Karl Schackne is an actor and playwright. Raised in the Bay Area, he earned his BA in Film at San Francisco State University, then shifted gears years later and started acting at City College of San Francisco. He continues to be involved in CCSF stage productions, appearing in MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING (Claudio), CIRCLE MIRROR TRANSFORMATION (Schultz), THE TEMPEST (Sebastian), ALMOST MAINE, and A FLEA IN HER EAR (Tournel). He has also performed with the Primitive Screwheads in MUCH ADO ABOUT LEBOWSKI, the Playwrights’ Center of San Francisco in their reading series’ and semiannual 24-Hour Playfest, SF Olympians, and Theatre Pub. His short plays include: LITERALLY, produced by the PCSF for the 24-Hour Playfest (2013); CHOCOLATE, produced by Seoul Players for both the Daegu Play Festival and Seoul 10 Minute Play Festival in 2014; SUPERHEROES CONFERENCE OPENING ADDRESS, produced by Wily West for Superheroes (2014).