BLAIRE BARON Co-Artistic Director, Co-founder
A native Angeleno, Blaire began working professionally at age 20 in television comedies. Desiring a theater background, she moved to New York at age 24 to study under Geraldine Page, Estelle Parsons, (The Actors Studio) and The New School (NYU). In New York, she performed on Broadway with The Roundabout Theater, the renowned Ensemble Studio Theater, and Playwrights Horizons. Blaire returned to Los Angeles in 1992 and since, has appeared in over 50 films and television shows.
Having made her living for two decades as an actor, Ms Baron was recruited by the Education Wing of the Los Angeles Shakespeare Center to work with under-served youth via the arts disciplines. Ms Baron directed an original play (via Fringe Benefits/Theatre for Social Justice) at Wilson High School in East L.A. about hate crimes against gay youth, based on stories from the students. In addition to her work with the Los Angeles Drama Club, Blaire founded The Hero Program, for Larchmont Charter School’s 2005 “launch year.” In all her performance and teaching work, she incorporates kundalini yoga, and the techniques of Viola Spolin and Agosto Boal.
She founded the Los Angeles Drama Club in 2004 with former Royal Shakespeare Company member, Sophie Heyman-Uliano. Since then, she has directed Midsummer Night’s Dream, Macbeth: Conscience, Twelfth Night, Henry IV, Part ii, Timon of Athens, and Merchant of Venice, and has co-directed The Tempest, The Winter’s Tale, and Cymbeline. Between shows, she wrote and produced the documentary, WOMEN IN BOXES about magic assistants; she also wrote and produced a satirical radio series, called RAVENHURST for AIR AMERICA.
She is married with two children who might be in these plays.
JULIA WALKER WYSON, Co-Artistic Director
Julia began acting in Chicago, where she performed with many of Chicago’s foremost theater companies, including Bailiwick Repertory, Chicago Shakespeare Theater, Court Theater and Pegasus Players, and has worked in regional theaters across the country. Shakespearean roles include Juliet in Romeo & Juliet, Rosalind in As You Like It, Cordelia in King Lear, Lady Percy in the Henry IVs, The Queen in Richard II and Hermia in Midsummer Night’s Dream.
She received her BS in Theater from Northwestern University, and her MFA in Shakespeare from the Alabama Shakespeare Festival Professional Actor Training program, and has studied at the Actors’ Center in Chicago and at the Laban Institute in New York.
Julia has worked extensively performing for and with children. She has taught acting and movement workshops to children all over the country from inner-city Chicago, to rural Alabama and Illinois, to Pasadena and Glendale.
As a director and movement coach, she has created shows for Chicago Actors Ensemble, Bailiwick Repertory, and MoMing Dance and Arts Center in Chicago, and Zoo District and the Northwestern U. Entertainment Alliance in Los Angeles.
Julia joined Blaire as Co-Artistic Director of the Los Angeles Drama Club in 2007. Since then, she has directed Pericles, Macbeth: Consequence, As You Like It, Henry IV, Part i, Much Ado About Nothing and Comedy of Errors, and has co-directed The Winter’s Tale, and Cymbeline.
ZEYNEP BILIK, Artistic Associate
A native of Istanbul, Zeynep began her theatrical training at STUDIO, a performance lab founded by renowned Turkish actress, playwright, and director Sahika Tekand.
After receiving a BA in English Language & Literature, she attended the Stella Adler Studio of Acting, where she completed the 2 Year Conservatory Program. Over the next five years, she participated in over a dozen NYC stage productions and continued training in numerous Shakespeare/Classical voice & speech workshops led by Yoshi Oida, Patsy Rodenburg, Kristen Linklater, Andrea Haring and Fights 4.
Zeynep cannot forget the amazement of her first visit to the Brookledge Theater. New to LA, and there to take a newly discovered yoga class called Kundalini, she met the evening’s host, Blaire Baron Larsen, and first learned of Los Angeles Drama Club. A while later, she found herself in the basement of The Wilshire United Methodist Church, amazed again, as she watched Blaire at a piano, feather in hair, direct a dress rehearsal of The Tempest. Since 2008, she has had the privilege of being a part of the LADC team as Artistic Associate on Macbeth: Conscience & Consequence, As You Like it, Twelfth Night, Henry IV Parts i & ii, The Magic of Shakespeare, Meet the Characters!, and as assistant director on Timon of Athens and Merchant of Venice.
A union projectionist for the past twelve years, Zeynep currently works at the DGA, WGA and AMPAS Theaters.
She is also an avid student of Indian classical dance at the Shakti School of Bharata Natyam, here in Los Angeles.
ELIZA LAUREN DEAN, Artistic Associate
Eliza is a dance major at UCLA. She grew up in the theatre, the daughter of parents who are both actors and theatre directors. Eliza is a founding member of Les Enfants Magiques!, the childrens’ classical theatre ensemble at The Lost Studio, where she continues to teach and choreograph. Eliza starred in numerous productions at the Thousand Oaks Civic Arts Plaza with the Southern California Children’s Theatre. She was a series regular in The Simple Life with Judith Light on CBS. Other stage credits include Michael Elias’ Catskill Sonata directed by Paul Mazursky at the Hayworth, Marie in Georg Buchner’s Woyzeck at LACHSA, Bridget in Harold Pinter’s Moonlight directed by John Pleshette at The Lost Studio, and Juliet in Romeo and Juliet at The Hillis Outdoor Theatre.
