Lingering Voices

Karen Miller

Professor of History, LaGuardia Community College

Karen Miller is Professor of History and American Studies at LaGuardia Community College and the CUNY Graduate Center. She is the author of Managing Inequality: Northern Racial Liberalism in Interwar Detroit (NYU Press, 2014) and co-editor, with A. J. Yumi Lee, of Prehistories of the War on Terror: A Critical Genealogy (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2024). Her research covers U.S. empire, the history of the Philippines, and U.S. urban history, and her current work examines internal migration programs and settler colonization rooted in U.S. empire in the Philippines over the long twentieth century. She holds a Ph.D. in History from the University of Michigan.

Kevin Nadal

Distinguished Professor, John Jay College

Kevin Nadal is Distinguished Professor of Psychology at John Jay College of Criminal Justice and the CUNY Graduate Center. A counseling psychologist trained at Columbia University, he studies how microaggressions affect the mental and physical health of people of color, LGBTQ people, and other marginalized groups. He has published more than 100 works and 14 books, including Filipino American Psychology, Microaggressions and Traumatic Stress, and Queering Law and Order. He was the first openly gay president of the Asian American Psychological Association, is a National Trustee of the Filipino American National Historical Society, and received the American Psychological Association’s 2017 Early Career Award for Distinguished Contributions to Psychology in the Public Interest.

Jeremy Rafal

Playwright & Producer

Jeremy Rafal was born in the Philippines, raised in Hawai‘i, and is now a Queens-based multi-hyphenate artist: writer, actor, musician, filmmaker, and educator. His solo play The Boy from Bantay has garnered international recognition, receiving the Asian Arts Award for Outstanding Male Performer at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe and touring nationally and abroad. His playwriting credits include Where Voices Linger (Kinsman Quarterly Holiday Playwright Contest Prizewinner; Chain Theatre Festival), Funhouse Funk (NY Theater Fest), and Waiting (Take 10 Fest). As a screenwriter, his film Exit 15 won Best Short Film and Best Screenplay at the Southeast Asian Film Festival and was an official selection at the SOHO International Film Festival, HAAPI Fest, and the All-Asian Independent Film Festival.

As an actor, he was recently seen in Galas (Little Island). Other stage credits include Heart Strings (Atlantic Theater), The King and I (Interlakes Theatre), Machinal (The Mechanicals), and King John and Richard III (American Theatre), among others. Film and TV credits include FBI, Raising Kanan, and I’d Kill for You. A classically trained pianist, Jeremy is a prizewinner of the International Shostakovich Piano Competition, the Brevard Piano Competition, and the Kankakee Concerto Competition, and he has performed in Italy, Russia, Austria, Taiwan, the Philippines, and throughout the United States. He holds a doctorate in music from Indiana University’s Jacobs School of Music and continues to create work at the intersection of music, memory, and the Filipino diaspora.

Dennis Yueh-Yeh Li 李岳燁

Director

Dennis Yueh-Yeh Li is a director and playwright originally from Ruifang, Taiwan. His work explores themes of sexuality, power structures, and diaspora, often culminating in devised, immersive, and participatory theatre that invites audiences not only to witness, but to experience the stories being told. He is particularly drawn to adapting rarely produced modern classics, reimagining them through the lens of contemporary sociopolitical issues.

Dennis’s directing portfolio spans plays, musicals, dance theatre, and opera. He holds an M.A. in Performance Studies from New York University and is an alumnus of the Drama League’s New York Directing Fellowship and the Institute Fellowship at Target Margin Theater. He is also a member of the Lincoln Center Theater Directors Lab. Previously, Dennis served on the artistic leadership team at The Living Theatre and is a founding member of Al Límite Collective. He currently serves as the Director of Performance, Storytelling & Community at the Museum of Chinese in America (MOCA).

dennisyuehyehli.com

Ariel Estrada

Actor 1 · Elder Antonio Santos · he/him/his/siya

Off-Broadway: A Persistent Memory, MBL Productions (Jessi D. Hill, dir.); Double Falsehood, Letter of Marque (Andrew Borthwick-Leslie, dir.); Far East, Lincoln Center Theater (Daniel Sullivan, dir.); Shogun Macbeth and Cambodia Agonistes, Pan Asian Repertory Theatre. Selected indie and regional: The Legionnaire/Danny in What the Constitution Means to Me, Perseverance Theatre (Leslie Ishii, dir.); Full Contact, Perseverance Theatre (self-penned solo performance, Leslie Ishii, dir., NNPN Rolling World Premiere); Blended 和 (Harmony), History Theatre/Theater Mu (Lily Tung Crystal, dir.); Made in China (NYT Critics’ Pick), Wakka Wakka (Gwen Warnock, dir.). TV/Film: Nero, Title VII, The Night Agent, Blue Bloods, The Americans.

Aaron Banes

Actor 2 · Younger Antonio Santos

Aaron Banes is a Filipino American performer, composer, teaching artist, and astrologer from Honolulu, HI. A graduate of NYU Steinhardt, his theater credits include PJ Masks Live! (international tour), and The Big One-Oh! and Heart Strings (Atlantic Theater). He’s proud to have worked on several short films highlighting Filipino stories, including Saksesyon, directed by Jeremy Rafal. Aaron has composed music for many of Maria Camia’s shows, including The Healing Shipment and Aricama Liberation. His EP with Sienna Aczon, The Princess and the Witch Boy, can be streamed online.

aaronbanes.com

Martyna Reczka

Actor 3 · Nurse Eleanor Brooks, Grace Hartwell, Miss Beatrice Whitman, Zofia Kowalska

Martyna Reczka is a Polish-American actress, musician, and instructor. She loves diving into new work and is so excited to be part of the Lingering Voices cast. Some of her favorite roles have been Dr. Fine (Next to Normal) and Shelby (Steel Magnolias). When not in the theatre, Martyna can be seen on screen in short indie films you’ve never heard of and in local NYC jazz bars you probably have, like Birdland and The Triad. She stays constantly inspired by the connection that theatre and music bring to those of all ages and is grateful for the people in her life who always believe in her.

Ruthellen Cheney

Actor 4 · Ruth Bennett, Nurse Agnes Graves, Mrs. Hartwell, Customer #1, #3, Woman, Staff #3

Ruthellen Cheney has appeared in over 30 plays and operas and more than 20 film and television projects, while also writing numerous plays and screenplays. She is the co-founder of Tall Poppies Productions with Georgia Long, whose debut short film Darling It’s Better is currently entering the festival circuit.

Alongside her longtime collaborator Alexis Confer, Ruthellen is a Founding Partner and New Works Curator of The Mechanicals Theater Company. In this role, she has co-produced over a dozen plays and performed roles including Helena (A Midsummer Night’s Dream), Imogen (Cymbeline), Jaques (As You Like It), and Olivia (Twelfth Night). With The Mechanicals she starred in the world premiere of her original play The Gothic Hour at The Flea Theater. Last fall, she premiered her original horror play Séance as part of the company’s ten-year anniversary season. She also wrote the company’s stage adaptations of Dracula and Frankenstein, developed for their annual Halloween programming.

In addition to her stage and film work, Ruthellen is a creator and producer of The Horror Digest, a horror-focused podcast and anthology film developed in collaboration with fellow artists. She most recently starred in, wrote, and produced the feature film Carsick, now distributed by X4 Pictures.

Tim Wolfendon

Actor 5 · Edmund Prescott, Eugene, Man, Customer #2, #4, Doctor, Staff #1

Tim Wolfendon is a New York–based actor, writer, and director. Past credits include Anthony in Outside Mullingar, Emperor Creon in Antigone, and Jason in Mankind. Past writing credits include Fortune’s Fools: Three Tales to Titillate, as well as a writing residency at the Matthew Corozine Studio in spring 2025. He also writes poetry.

twolfendon.com · Instagram @twolfendon

Juancho Rodriguez

Actor 6 · Enrique Valdés, Music Shop Owner, Ship Steward, Emilio, Judge, Staff #2

Juancho Rodriguez is an actor and award-winning filmmaker whose credits span film, television, and theatre. He played Jason in The Brunch Club, Tobias in Safe Space, Benito and the Moon in José Rivera’s References to Salvador Dalí Make Me Hot, Nicholas in Heston-Gable, Richard Roe in Sophie Treadwell’s Machinal, King Edward IV and Stanley in Richard III, and Paris and Montague in Romeo & Juliet. Most recently, he led Latin Lover at LaGuardia Performing Arts Center, and was featured on Hulu’s Dear Killer Nannies, led by John Leguizamo. Rodriguez is represented by MC Talent Consultants.

Sienna Aczon

Stage Directions

Sienna Aczon developed her latest new work, Celestial Siblings: Adapted Filipino Folktales, as a resident of the Object Movement Festival at the Center at West Park and a recipient of the Queens Arts Fund. Theatre: Heart Strings (Hoku, Atlantic Theater Company); Do You Speak? (solo show, 59E59 Theaters); The Healing Shipment (puppeteer/singer, La MaMa). TV/Film: FBI (CBS).

Andrew Kasper

Stage Manager

A. Kasper has been a stage manager, musical director, sound designer and engineer, and technician for Broadway and Off-Broadway theaters including SoHo Playhouse, Gene Frankel, Triad, Dixon Place, MOCA, Wild Project, Teatro LATEA, Theater for the New City, Theatre Row, New Victory, Lyric Theatre, New York City Center, Secret Theatre, The Players Theatre, and many others across New York City and the U.S. He has worked in TV and film for CBS, HBO, Amazon Studios, and Netflix, and is an accomplished musical conductor, performer, and voice actor.