Theatre Lumina – Monica Payne

“Each human being carries within her/him all the continents, but each of us knows only one of them. So when a person with one known continent and a mass of dark continents meets someone else whose condition is the same, and they communicate, there is illumination for each.” – Peter Brook

Theatre Lumina is a group of artists devoted to cross-cultural collaboration and international exchange, founded by Monica Payne in 2014. Through the selection of diverse artists, subject matter, scripts, and influences, we seek to deepen our audiences’ perspective and care for the world in which we live. We generate film and theatre that center ritual, the body, and theatricality itself. As citizens of the world, we embrace the power and potential of our shared humanity.

Monica Payne, Artistic Director

Josiah Davis

Josiah Davis (he/him) is a multi-disciplinary artist from Dallas.

A director, choreographer, designer and actor, his work intersects expressive movement, live music, emerging technology, and ritual to breathe new life to physical storytelling. Asking, how do we create space for people to be in sync when we are pulled apart by invisible systems?

He is a graduate from the UCLA School of Theater, Film, and Television, a Brown/Trinity MFA Directing 2020, a company member of Theatre Lumina, a NYTW 2050 fellow, a National Black Theatre Soul Resident, and Associate Artistic Director of On The Verge Theatre Festival in Santa Barbara.

He also does work in projection, video editing, sound, and lighting design. Most recently he was the video designer/editor for Lessons In Survival (Vineyard Theatre) and CAPSULE by Whitney White and Peter Mark Kendall at Under The Radar (Public). He has Assistant Directed under William Friedkin, John Rando, Tyne Rafaeli, Oliver Butler and Rainn Wilson. He works in production at The Geffen Playhouse, the Walt Disney Concert Hall REDCAT Theatre, The Los Angeles Theatre Center, and Steppenwolf West. He has also appeared on Transparent, Glee, Idiotsitter, Killer Kids, and Buzzfeed.

Jodi Gage

Jodi is a Chicago-based actor, singer, and director who grew up in North Carolina and Ohio. While she has lost her southern drawl, she still prefers “y’all” for its efficiency!

Most recently, Jodi appeared in the devised work Song of Home (Theatre Lumina), which toured to Poland and Moldova in Feb. 2020 and as Darby Whitlock on Chicago Med, Season 6. Regional credits include five seasons of A Christmas Carol (Pittsburgh CLO), Lady Windermere’s Fan (Pittsburgh Irish & Classical Theatre), Becky’s New Car (The REP Playhouse), [Title of Show] (The Company of Pittsburgh). Chicago credits include Teenage Dick (Theater Wit), La Boheme (Lyric Opera of Chicago), Pericles, As You Like It, Women Beware Women, and Cardenio (Shakespeare Project of Chicago).

As a director, she feels at ease in both opera and experimental theatre projects. Recently, Jodi was the Associate Director alongside Robert Falls on his production of Don Giovanni at Lyric Opera of Chicago and Dallas Opera. Jodi has been the Assistant Director on over 15 major opera productions, working alongside the likes of Bartlett Sher, Francesca Zambello, and many others.

As an educator, Jodi has taught at Point Park University, Wheaton College, and North Park University, addressing a wide range of material, including movement-based experimental theater, opera scene study, and opera stage management.

She holds an MFA in Acting from Point Park University and a Bachelor of Music in Opera Performance from Oberlin College & Conservatory. She also has extensive professional training in many forms of dance and movement-based theater, including the SITI Company Intensive (Suzuki/Viewpoints) in 2013.

Kaitlin Huwe

Kaitlin Huwe is an Artist, Producer, and Embodiment Educator based in Los Angeles. Kaitlin plays regularly as an actress in film, theatre, and television. She writes, records and performs original music under her name, and in the Folk/Americana trio The Wholesome. She is a proud member of The Road Theatre Company, SAG AFTRA, and seeks to cultivate creative community through her interdisciplinary production company wonderwell creative.

Film Credits: “The Nowhere Inn” (Sundance, SXSW, Tribeca) “Deany Bean is Dead” (Utah Film Awards, Cambria Film Festival) and “So Far So Good” (Pasadena International Film Festival)

Television Credits Include: LA’s Finest, Animal Kingdom, and Workaholics.

Kaitlin originated the role of Samantha in “Through the Eye of A Needle” by Jami Brandli and has workshopped countless new plays at The Road Theatre in Los Angeles.

Kaitlin is an alumni of UCLA’s School of Theatre Film and Television, The Baron Brown School, and The Groundlings School of Comedy.

Andrew Perez

Andrew Perez acts and writes for film & theatre. Recent film roles include David Miscavige in BBC’s My Scientology Movie (Magnolia Pictures) and he plays Young Suleyman Pavlovich in the upcoming FX series The Old Man, which stars Jeff Bridges and Jon Lithgow. Andrew also wrote, produced, and starred in Bastards y Diablos, a feature film (now streaming on Amazon Prime) which premiered in competition at the Los Angeles Film Festival, won multiple awards on the festival circuit, and received a nationwide theatrical release in Colombia (where it was filmed).

His award-winning one-man show, The Second Coming of Klaus Kinski, ran for two years in Los Angeles where it garnered an L.A. Ovation nomination for Lead Actor in a Play before traveling to the Oregon Shakespeare Festival to serve as special event for the 2019 Ashland Independent Film Festival. Andrew has written a new feature with Bastards y Diablos director A.D. Freese – and they’re currently working to get it made.

Malena Ramirez

Malena Ramirez is a Puerto Rican actress graduated with an M.F.A in Acting from Penn State University, where she currently works as a Lecturer for the School of Theater. She is a member of the Spanish Repertory Theater in New York City where she performed in plays like In the Time of the Butterflies, Don Quixote, Discreet but in Love, among others.

Her favorite credits in theater include: Veronica in The Motherf**ker with the Hat, Clytemnestra in The Oresteia, Minerva Mirabal in In the Time of the Butterflies, Bianca Morrison in Quintuplets, Sir Andrew Aguecheek in Twelfth Night, Ursulain Trash Story, Miguelina in I.D. which touredSouth Africa, and Miss Margarida in Miss Margarida’s Way, her self-produced one woman show. She is currently writing her first solo piece “Grounded”. She was part of the devising and performance team for Lumina’s Song of Home.