Justice: A New Musical

HEATHER AYERS (Sandra Day O’Connor) is honored to perform in this piece that speaks so powerfully to the role of women in our nation’s history. She is also thrilled to be back at ETC. Her previous shows here have been A Little Night Music, Sweeney Todd, Intimate Apparel, Women In Jeopardy and Chapter Two. Heather has performed on Broadway in Mel Brooks’ Young Frankenstein, Trevor Nunn’s A Little Night Music, On A Clear Day You Can See Forever starting Harry Connick Jr., Groundhog Day, and most recently, the revival of Our Town. Off-Broadway she has been seen in Five Course Love, Sarah, Plain and Tall, Forbidden Broadway, and five City Center Encores productions. Heather has enjoyed working regionally in such theaters as The Old Globe, The Yale Repertory, Goodspeed Opera House and Roundabout, among others. Her TV appearances include “American Vandal”, “Brockmire,” “Scandal” and “No Activity.” She sends her love to her always supportive family: Mom, Dad, Becca and Joe. Thank you also to her agents at AWA, especially Jodie. For more information about Heather, you can find her on Instagram @breathoffreshayers

JULIE GARNYÉ (Sonia Sotomayor) is thrilled to be making her ETC debut. She was most recently heard as a vocalist in the blockbuster 2024 film “WICKED” and was last seen onstage as Leah in the World Premiere of Prelude to a Kiss, the Musical at both South Coast Repertory Theatre and Milwaukee Repertory Theatre. Julie’s theatre credits include Come From Away (1st National Tour – Original Cast), CATS (5th National Tour – Jennyanydots/Grizabella), Man of La Mancha (Aldonza), HAIR and CHESS in Concert on Broadway (The New Amsterdam Theatre), three Hollywood Bowl Summer Musicals: Les Misérables, Chicago, and Mamma Mia!, It Shoulda Been You (Jenny Steinberg), and First Things Last at London’s Garrick Theatre. On TV and film, she can be seen in: “Law & Order SVU,” “Curb Your Enthusiasm” (FATWA! The Musical episode), Disney’s “Tinker Bell and the Lost Treasure” (the fairy Lyria), “The OSCARS®” (2013 Les Misérables ensemble performance), and “The Daytime Emmy Awards®” (In Memoriam soloist). Julie’s first book, The Stage Actor’s Handbook, co-written with Michael Kostroff, was published by Roman & Littlefield in 2022, along with the audiobook, available exclusively on Audible. As a recording artist, she has released two studio singles with Club44 Records in Nashville: “Forgiveness’ Embrace” with the legendary Stephen Schwartz and “Fields of Gold | Both Sides Now” with Lance Horne and cellist Eleanor Norton. She was also a vocalist on the film “A Christmas Story Live” for FOX TV and has been a featured singer with symphonies all over the world. Special thank yous to everyone at Across The Board Talent Agency, Nyle Brenner Management, Michael Kostroff, and Edward Sayegh, and all my love to my wonderful parents, my amazing and supportive friends, and my sweet little dog, Pepper. For more information, please visit JulieGarnye.com or @juliegarnye on all socials.

VALERIE PERRI (Ruth Bader Ginsburg) was most recently seen in the record-breaking production of Fiddler on the Roof as Golde, opposite Jason Alexander, for McCoy-Rigby Entertainment; followed by her critically acclaimed performance as Fräulein Schneider in 5-Star Theatrical’s production of Cabaret.  With a remarkable 45-year journey in entertainment, Valerie has graced stages, screens, and the hearts of audiences worldwide. Her illustrious career includes collaborations with theater and music legends like Harold Prince, Jerome Robbins, Nathan Lane, Sammy Cahn, Sheldon Harnick and Andrew Lloyd Webber. She has portrayed iconic characters such as Eva Perón in the Broadway National Tour of Evita, Norma Desmond in Sunset Boulevard, Dolly Levi in Hello, Dolly! and Emma Goldman in Ragtime, showcasing her incredible versatility. Other favorite stage credits include If I Forget (Fountain Theatre; directed by Jason Alexander), Admissions, Fireflies (Good Theater, Portland, ME), Beautiful (McCoy Rigby, Cape Playhouse) Indecent (Ahmanson Theatre). On television, Valerie has appeared in “Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story,” “Truth Be Told,” “Criminal Minds,” and in films such as “Grease,” “The Out of Towners,” “George of the Jungle,”  and “Dickie Roberts.” Her concert appearances span venues from Carnegie Hall to The London Palladium. A recipient of the LA Drama Critics and Ovation Awards, Valerie brings the same passion to her offstage life, where she enjoys singing with symphony orchestras and embraces the roles of wife to acclaimed photographer Cliff Lipson and mother to virtuoso musicians Jack and Benny Lipson. For more information, visit valerieperri.com
Instagram: @vperrimusic | Facebook: @valerieperri Represented by AMT Artists & Momentum Talent Management

JENNY SULLIVAN (Director) directed ETC’s The Children (with Nancy Travis, Linda Purl and Michael Butler), Tenderly: The Rosemary Clooney Musical (with Linda Purl and David Engel), Sleuth (with Daniel Gerroll and Matthew Floyd Miller); Rubicon’s Twilight: Los Angeles-1992 (with Chris Butler) and The Gin Game (with Joe Spano and JoBeth Williams). Some of Jenny’s favorite productions include Tom Dugan’s Wiesenthal (Acorn Theatre off-Broadway & The Wallis Annenberg) and Jackie Unveiled (The Wallis Annenberg); The Dresser at Royal Manitoba Theatre Centre (with Len Cariou and Granville Van Dusen); Geffen Playhouse: Nora & Delia Ephron’s Love, Loss, and What I Wore; Laguna Playhouse productions: The Year of Magical Thinking, Steel Magnolias and I Am My Own Wife; The World Premiere of Jane Anderson’s The Baby Dance: Pasadena Playhouse, Williamstown Theatre Festival, Long Wharf Theatre (CT Critics’ Directing Award) and Lucille Lortel Theatre off-Broadway; Other ETC productions include: The Legend of Georgia McBride, I Am My Own Wife (Indy Award), Baby Doll, Good People, Tea at Five, The Year of Magical Thinking, The Lion in Winter (Indy Award), The Mystery of Irma Vep (Indy Award), The Clean House (Indy Award), The Memory of Water and Dublin Carol (Indy Award). Rubicon Theatre: The Baby Dance: Mixed, The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, Darrow, Who’ s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, Hamlet, Defying Gravity, The Rainmaker. Jenny’s past Santa Barbara productions include Marat/Sade, The Way We Live Now: Theatre for Our Lives in This Crisis Called AIDS (Center Stage Theatre) and Listen for Wings (Access Theatre); Nancy Nufer’s Food Confessions, Mother Earth/Father Sky and The Shadow Box, all played at the Lobero Theatre. Jenny was a founding member of Santa Barbara’s “The Mime Caravan,” the creators of the annual Summer Solstice Celebration. Films: “Access All Areas” and “The Next Best Thing” (in which she had the good fortune to direct her father Barry). Her film “I Know Catherine, The Log Lady” is currently being screened across the country. Jenny’s most proud of the World Premiere of her play J for J starring Jenny, Jeff Kober and the late great John Ritter.

SIO (SHIO) TEPPER (Music Director) is a multi-instrumental performer, composer, music director, and singer-songwriter based between New York City and her hometown of Santa Barbara, California. She received her M.A. from Berklee College of Music NYC. Her compositional work has been featured at residencies and festivals such as Baryshnikov Arts, Jacob’s Pillow, the Odyssey Theater LA, Stomping Ground LA and Dance Gallery Festival, and has toured through Europe. Her background in theater consists of performing in the band of the Broadway production of A Strange Loop, and music-directing with companies throughout California and New York such as Montclair University, Berklee NYC, Strasberg NYU, Live and In Color, Musical Theatre Factory, Pace University, CAP21 Molloy College, Out of the Box Theatre Company, and Cuentos Del Pueblos at SBCAW. She also has extensive experiences with the development of new theatrical works. With a background in ethnomusicology, she approaches her work with the understanding that creating art is a deeply human act, and essential to humanity and vitality. She has co-created community theatre projects like the community art film “Labyrinth” with Joseph Velasco. She is currently in development with her own full-length two-woman show with original book, music and lyrics, Shadow in the Sun, and is co-producer of the Brooklyn-based micro-residency for multimedia artists, Salad.

LAUREN GUNDERSON (Playwright) is one of the most produced playwrights in America since 2015 topping the list thrice including 2022/23. She is a two-time winner of the Steinberg/ATCA New Play Award for I and You and The Book of Will, the winner of the William Inge Distinguished Achievement in Theatre Award, the Lanford Wilson Award and the Otis Guernsey New Voices Award; a finalist for the Susan Smith Blackburn Prize, Weisberger Award, and John Gassner Award for Playwriting; and a recipient of the Mellon Foundation’s Residency with Marin Theatre Company. She studied Southern Literature and Drama at Emory University, and Dramatic Writing at NYU’s Tisch School where she was a Reynolds Fellow in Social Entrepreneurship. Her play The Catastrophist, about her husband virologist Nathan Wolfe, premiered digitally in January 2021. She co-authored the Miss Bennet plays with Margot Melcon, and The Half-Life of Marie Curie premiered off-Broadway and is now at Audible.com. Her work is published at Bloomsbury (Revolutionary Women: A Lauren Gunderson Anthology, anthropology, I and You), Playscripts (I and You; Exit Pursued By A Bear; The Taming and Toil And Trouble), Dramatists Play Service (The Revolutionists; The Book of Will; Silent Sky; Bauer, Natural Shocks, The Wickhams and Miss Bennet) and Samuel French (Emilie). Her picture book Dr Wonderful: Blast Off to the Moon is available from Two Lions/Amazon. She is the book writer for musicals with Ari Afsar (Jeannette), Dave Stewart and Joss Stone (The Time Traveller’s Wife), Joriah Kwamé (Sinister), Kait Kerrigan and Bree Lowdermilk (Justice and Earthrise), and Kira Stone (Built for This). She is a board member of The Playwrights Foundation. LaurenGunderson.com

BREE LOWDERMILK (Music) is an award-winning musical theatre writer, composer, lyricist and orchestrator. Off-Broadway: The Mad Ones, Henry and Mudge. Regional: Ada Twist Scientist & Friends, Justice, Earthrise, Dr. Wonderful, ERNXST and The Bad Years, an immersive house party musical. Awards: Jonathan Larson, Alan Menken, Richard Rodgers. Concerts: Kennedy Center, Kimmel Center, Lincoln Center. Residencies: McDowell, Mercer. Albums: Kerrigan-Lowdermilk Live, Our First Mistake (#1 Singer/Songwriter chart), The Mad Ones (+30 million streams). Bree is a queer, non-binary trans woman. @breelowdermilk

KAIT KERRIGAN (Lyrics) is an award-winning bookwriter, lyricist, and playwright. BROADWAY: The Great Gatsby (book); WEST END: The Great Gatsby, The Time Traveller’s Wife (add’l lyrics with a score by Joss Stone and Dave Stewart); OFF-BROADWAY: The Mad Ones (book and lyrics), Henry and Mudge (book and lyrics). Also in 2025: The Heart (book and additional lyrics) at La Jolla Playhouse, The Great Gatsby in Seoul, The Mad Ones off-West End at the Other Palace, Indigo (book) at the Leicester Curve, UK. Additional regional credits include musicals: Justice (lyrics), Earthrise (lyrics); as well as plays: Father/Daughter, Imaginary Love, and Disaster Relief. Her immersive house party The Bad Years (concept, book, and lyrics) had two sold-out pop-up productions in Brooklyn. DIGITAL: A Killer Party (screenplay with co-writer Rachel Axler). Albums include The Great Gatsby, The Mad Ones, Kerrigan-Lowdermilk Live, and her debut with Bree Lowdermilk Our First Mistake, which hit #1 on the digital singer-songwriter charts. Her songs include viral hits “Run Away with Me” and “Go Tonight”. Her shows have been developed by La Jolla Playhouse, Page 73, Marin Theatre, Arizona Theatre Company, Aurora Theatre, and others. Awards: Kleban Award for libretto, Jonathan Larson Award for lyric-writing, Most Promising Lyricist Award from the Theatre Hall of Fame, Edgerton Award for FATHER/DAUGHTER; residencies at Page 73, Dramatists Guild Fellows, Rhinebeck, Goodspeed’s Johnny Mercer Project, and MacDowell. She is an alumna of Barnard College and the BMI Musical Theatre Workshop and a member of the Dramatists Guild. @kaitkerrigan on social media.

FRANÇOIS-PIERRE COUTURE (Scenic Design) is originally from Montreal and has had the privilege of working in Los Angeles and the United States for the last decade as a scenic, lighting and projection designer. He has been teaching at East Los Angeles College, UCLA, LMU and Pepperdine University, and is currently ELAC’s Scenic, Lighting and Projection professor. He has received multiple Ovation, LADCC, LA Weekly awards & nominations, and the Hilton Worldwide Award for outstanding Scenic Design at KCACTF 2014. François-Pierre has been a long-time designer at the Ensemble Theatre and is happy to return for this production of Justice. Some of his professional design credits include: Carmen Jones, Metamorphoses, Woyzeck, Husbands and Wives, and Everything is Illuminated (Ensemble Theatre Company); Constellations (Rubicon Theater); Médée and Teseo (Chicago Opera Theatre); A Picasso, Invisible Tango, and The Present (Geffen Playhouse, Romeo & Juliet by L.A. Dance Project (Sydney Opera House, La Seine Musical de Paris, Segerstrom Center, etc); Everything that Never Happened, With Love and Major Organ (Theatre @ Boston Court); Destiny of Desire (Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Arena Stage, South Coast Repertory and Goodman Theatre); Jackie Unveiled (The Wallis); The Mexican Trilogy, an American History (Los Angeles Theatre Center).

His artwork can be viewed at fpcouturestudio.com or on Instagram @fpcouture.studio

You can also follow his design work at fpcouture.com and on Instagram @FPcouturedesign

JARED A. SAYEG (Lighting Designer) is a nine-time Ovation Award Nominee and Winner of the Ovation, StageRaw, Garland and LADCC Kinetic Lighting Awards. Broadway designs: The Illusionists (Neil Simon Theatre, US Tours), Bravo Bernstein (Hudson Theatre), Gotham Glory at Carnegie Hall. Regional: Center Theatre Group, Pasadena Playhouse, 5^th Avenue Theatre, Sacramento Music Circus, 5 Star Theatricals, International City Theatre, Reprise, Ensemble Theatre Company, Laguna Playhouse, Virginia Stage Company, The Colony & Shakespeare Theatre of New Jersey. On the West-End he designed Rolling with Laughter at Her Majesty’s Theatre. Jared was on the design teams for the Broadway productions of PRIMO, The Woman in White, The Radio City Christmas Spectacular and the national tour of Blithe Spirit starring Angela Lansbury. Other designs include productions for Holland America Line & Norwegian Cruise Lines, and in 2008 had the honor of lighting Pope Benedict XVI for the Papal Rally in NYC.  Jared is principal designer for the USA International Ballet Competition and has overseen the last four competitions. His architectural designs are seen regularly in restaurants and exhibits as well as the Long Beach Aquarium of the Pacific. Jared is a member of the International Association of Lighting Designers; he became the youngest member of the United Scenic Artists-Local 829 and serves as Vice-Chair the executive board. www.jaslighting.com

ALEX JAEGER (Costume Designer) For ETC: The Children, Carmen Jones, The Mystery of Irma Vep, I Am My Own Wife, Babydoll and The Legend of Georgia McBride.  (Off-Broadway) Two Sisters and a Piano (Public Theater). Regional credits: Many productions for Oregon Shakespeare Festival; Mister Burns (Guthrie Theater); Other Desert Cities, A Parallelogram (Mark Taper Forum); Major Barbara (Theatre Calgary); Venus in Fur, Arcadia, Maple and Vine, Once in a Lifetime and others, (American Conservatory Theater); Rock N Roll, Prayer for the French Republic, Leopoldstadt, The Light in the Piazza (Huntington Theatre Company); The Nether, Eclipsed, The Paris Letter (Kirk DouglasTheatre); Extraordinary Chambers, Love, Loss and What I Wore, Third (Geffen Playhouse); Grey Gardens, Caroline or Change, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead, The Cripple of Inishmaan (The StudioTheatre); She Loves Me,  Amadeus, True West, All My Sons, and others (South Coast Repertory); The Baby Dance Mixed, The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, The Turn of the Screw, The Diary of Anne Frank (Rubicon Theatre). For more information visit www.alexjaegerdesign.com

RANDALL ROBERT TICO (Sound Design) marks his eighteenth design with this ETC production. Previously, he has designed sound and/or scored music for The Thanksgiving Play, directed by Brian McDonald, Measure for Measure, Everything is Illuminated, The Invisible Hand, and Macbeth, directed by Jonathan Fox, and The Children, Sleuth, The Legend of Georgia McBride, and Baby Doll, directed by Jenny Sullivan. Additional collaborations with Sullivan include Jackie Unveiled at the Wallis, The Baby Dance: Mixed, and the most recent production of Twilight: Los Angeles, 1992 at Rubicon Theatre Company. Other recent works include Anna Karenina for DCPA and Astoria Part One & Two, Othello, Anna Karenina, Shakespeare’s Amazing Cymbeline, The Imaginary Invalid, and Snow Falling on Cedars for Portland Center Stage (PCS), directed by Chris Coleman. Under the direction of Nancy Keystone at Critical Mass Performance Ensemble, Randall designed sound for After Iphigenia at the Getty Villa, Apollo at the Kirk Douglas Theatre (Garland Award and an Ovation Award nomination), Ameryka (2016 Ovation nomination), Suzan-Lori Parks’ The America Play (Theatre @ Boston Court), Antigone (Portland Center Stage for which he won a Drammy Award), The Ahkmatova Project, Dr. Faustus, The Rover, and Measure for Measure. Further works include Hamlet, The Winter’s Tale, the vocal score for David Hare’s version of Mother Courage, and music and sound design for The Glass Menagerie, all directed by Jessica Kubzansky.

ALEX JOHNSON (Props Design) is a Props Designer, Carpenter, Art Department Fabricator, and Scenic Artist working throughout Southern California on theatre and commercial productions. He regularly works with Mustache Productions, Rubicon Theatre Company, and Ensemble Theatre Company and is the Artist in Residence for Santa Susana High School’s Theatre Department. Some of his recent credits include Props Designer for Rubicon’s Bonnie and Clyde, Art Department on 2nd Try’s But Wait There’s More!, Carpenter and Scenic Artist on Ensemble’s Hamlet, Carpenter, and Scenic Artist on Rubicon’s Two Trains Running, Props Designer for Ensemble’s Million Dollar Quartet, and Art Department on the short film Stalling.
Alex is also a longtime volunteer at the Ojai Raptor Center, helping to rehabilitate native birds of prey. Ojai Raptor Center’s extensive efforts in wildlife conservation and their methodology for existing within the natural world, as well as Ojai’s surrounding community, continue to be profoundly significant and inspiring to him. He would like to give special thanks to Anthony and Mallory for their grace and support during this production. He would also like to thank his dog Ollie, even though he was no help whatsoever.