Fred Rohan Vargas
Playwright
Fred Rohan Vargas is a published playwright who has written several scripts produced throughout the United States and abroad. Before his years at Tisch School of the Arts, Fred began his theatre career by starting a dance theatre company with fifty performers playing in various venues such as Lincoln Center's Alice Tully Hall, Pittsburgh's Performing Arts Center, and Cami Hall with jazz greats, Dizzy Gillespie, and Horace Silver. He holds an MFA in dramatic writing from New York University.
Fred's love for writing songs has given him "Honorable Mention Awards" from The Billboard World Songwriters' Contest, John Lennon Songwriting Contest, the Great American Song Contest, Unisong International Songwriting Contest, and the Suggested Artist Songwriting Award. In addition, he has three songs on a compilation of CDs by the Nashville Songwriters Association International ("The Best of Holidays"), the Pick with Austin Foundation ("My Gift of Music"), and Paramount Song.com ("My Gift for Christmas"). Currently, some of his music is playing throughout Southeast Asia.
Over the years, Fred has served on the Huntington Arts Council, the theatre/dance grant's panel for the Queens Council on the Arts, the panel of judges for the Daytime Emmy Awards (sponsored by The National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences), the Board of Directors of the New York Children's Theatre and board and advisory member of Ripple Effect Artists, Inc.
Fred is a member of BMI Lehman Engel Musical Theatre Workshop, Theater Resource Unlimited (TRU), Dramatists Guild, Commercial Theatre Institute (CTI), and Off-Broadway Alliance.
Allison Astor-Vargas
Director
Allison has been the Manager of Special Projects and Education for Repertorio Espanol Theatre for the past 25 years. As an independent artist, Allison lasts directed Mujeres Fuertes, an evening of 3 monologues of powerful Latinx women opening the 2023 BAAD ASS WOMEN’S FESTIVAL at BAAD!; StatueFest: Put a woman on a Pedestal, produced by New Shokan Kitchen Project, which was a series of 15 monologues revering women whose contribution to New York City and beyond should not be lost to history from which Mujeres Fuertes was born.
She also directed several online pieces, including The Actors Studio BIPOC Fly on the Wall Series, Week 3 “Stand Back and Stand By,” The Neighborhood Watch by Janis Astor Del Valle and Daughter of the Seas and Sun also by Janis Astor del Valle for the Say Their Name Festival produced by BIWOC Hall of Fame. She produced her own adaptation of “The Scarlet Letter” entitled Scarlet Fever. She is an alumna of The Lincoln Center Directors Lab and a current participant of The Actor's Studio Playwrights and Directors Workshop.