Post-Play Dialogue

Thursday, October 20 (8PM curtain)
Playhouse Assistant Artistic Director Liam Lonegan and will discuss with Ramin Ganeshram, Executive Director of Westport Museum for History and Culture, the Great Migration as it was experienced by African Americans who settled in Westport and Connecticut. 

Ramin Ganeshram (Executive Director, Westport Museum for History and Culture) Ramin Ganeshram is passionate about making the Westport Museum a community hub that honors Westport’s past while creating a vibrant present and future. Ramin has worked as an executive level cultural strategist for a major market research firm as well an executive level editor in publishing companies such as Ziff Davis Media, CMP Media, AMI, and others. Ramin brings strong business and personnel management knowledge to the position as well as extensive historical knowledge and a creative background.

In addition to her business and management background, Ramin was educated as a journalist at Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism and has spent her career researching and writing about culture and history as both a features writer and editor and through the context of food and travel. She is also a professionally trained chef. As a writer Ramin has written seven books as either principal or co-writer and has contributed articles on historical America, immigrant foodways and colonial New York cuisine and commerce to the Oxford Encyclopedia of Food & Drink In America, Savoring Gotham, and the Food Cultures of the World Encyclopedia. Ramin has also been a peer reviewer for the Journal of Food, Culture, & Society. She has been a speaker at City University of New York, The New York Folklore Society, the American Library Association and others.

Liam Lonegan (Assistant Artistic Director, Westport Country Playhouse) Before founding Egg & Spoon Theatre Collective in 2017, Liam (he/him) received his BFA from Syracuse University, where he was the Managing Director of Black Box Players while directing and assisting on numerous productions. Most recently he co-directed The Rats and directed The Killer for Egg & Spoon’s second season. Other assisting credits include Fiorello! (Off-Broadway, dir. Bob Moss); In the Heights (dir. Marcos Santana); Man of La Mancha (dir. Mark Lamos); and Thousand Pines (dir. Austin Pendleton). He is currently the Assistant Artistic Director at Westport Country Playhouse, and an Associate Member of the Stage Directors and Choreographers Society.

Post-Play Dialogue

Sunday, October 23 (3PM curtain)

David Kennedy will lead a discussion of the bringing From the Mississippi Delta to the stage as well as its themes and topics with the cast.

Claudia Logan (Woman 1) hails from the city of hustle, Detroit, MI, and is a current resident of Brooklyn, NY. She thanks Mother/Father God for her gifts, talents, and purpose. She is eternally grateful to be a vessel for the Almighty. She thanks her family, loved ones, and agents for endless support. Theater credits include: Don Juan (Westport Country Playhouse), Exception to the Rule (Roundabout Underground), Hudson Valley Shakespeare Festival (2021), Penny (Dallas Theater Center).

Tameishia Peterson Though born in Dayton, Ohio, Tameishia was raised in Memphis, TN and considers herself a midwestern southern belle. With New York as her amusement base, she has spent the last few years building her resume with co-stars on “Ghost Power Book” (Starz), “WuTang: American Saga” (Hulu) as well as upcoming Netflix feature, The Perfect Find. Tameishia is a proud alumni of Thee Ohio State University and have trained at Michael Howard Studios and Fiasco Conservatory. When her schedule permits, she enjoys quality time with her 4 nieces, roller skating to her Beyoncé/Donna Summer playlist and creating content for @BedroomMonologues on IG.

Erin Margaret Pettigrew With roots in Belize and the American South, Erin is a first generation Los Angeles native. As a mover, storyteller, and collaborator, Erin’s artist-journey has been shaped with many communities and creators such as Manhattan Theatre Club, Page 73 Productions, JAG Productions, and more, while facilitating and learning alongside institutions such as UCSB, NYU, CUNY, and many other vibrant communities. Erin is grateful and blessed to expand the love of that community here at Westport Country Playhouse with this cast and crew of For the Mississippi Delta. Together, through story, we can create a path of hope, healing, love, light, and wellness for our minds, bodies, souls, and future.

David Kennedy (Associate Artistic Director, Westport Country Playhouse) Westport Country Playhouse: 4000 Miles, Doubt, Don Juan, The Understudy, Appropriate, The Invisible Hand (Connecticut Critics Circle Awards for Outstanding Production and Outstanding Director), And a Nightingale Sang, Nora, Loot, Tartuffe, Suddenly Last Summer, Beyond Therapy, Dinner with Friends. Kennedy joined the Playhouse in March 2009 as associate artistic director. He previously served as associate artistic director at Dallas Theater Center from 2004 to 2007 and as acting artistic director for their 2007–08 season. He has also staged productions at the Wilma Theater, Hartford TheaterWorks, Clarence Brown Theatre Company, Shakespeare Theatre of New Jersey, 78th Street Theatre Lab, Prospect Theater Company, and Kitchen Dog Theater, among others. He was a founding artistic director of The Lunar Society in Toronto and Milkman Theatre Group in Halifax, Nova Scotia. Kennedy teaches in the graduate directing program at the University of Alberta, and is a former Phil Killian Fellow at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, a Drama League Directing Fellow, and a graduate of Yale School of Drama.

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Post-Play Dialogue

Friday, October 28 (8PM curtain)

Playhouse Assistant Artistic Director Liam Lonegan will lead the discussion on justice and representation with Anderson Curtis, from the American Civil Liberties Union of Connecticut.

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Anderson Curtis serves as senior policy organizer for the American Civil Liberties Union of Connecticut (ACLU-CT). In his role, Anderson’s primary responsibilities include mobilizing ACLU-CT members, recruiting and developing campaign leaders who have been directly impacted by the criminal legal system and police violence, engaging Connecticut voters, and leading the ACLU-CT’s public education efforts. Anderson is a proud alumnus of Gateway Community College Drug and Alcohol Recovery Counselor (DARC). He completed the Community Leadership Program Cohort 24. Anderson’s passion for change is fueled by his lived experience of 20 years on the treadmill of moving in and out of the criminal legal system. After 14 years of seeking paths of healing and freedom, Anderson lives with hope and dignity, advocating for people to access employment and housing despite the barriers of discrimination and disparities.

ACLU of CT is comprised of three nonpartisan, nonprofit organizations: the ACLU of Connecticut, a 501(c)(4) organization which does legislative and organizing advocacy work; the ACLU Foundation of Connecticut, a 501(c)(3) which does litigation and public education work; and the ACLU of Connecticut Rise PAC, a 527 organization which builds the necessary relationships, public awareness, public narratives, and pressure felt by politicians in order to build the political power of people directly impacted by civil rights and liberties issues.

The ACLU of Connecticut defends, promotes, and expands the civil rights and civil liberties of all people in Connecticut through litigation, community organizing and legislative advocacy, and civic education and engagement. We are an inclusive, nonpartisan, and statewide organization within the nationwide American Civil Liberties Union network, powered by our supporters, partners, staff, interns, cooperating attorneys, and our board of directors.

Liam Lonegan (Assistant Artistic Director, Westport Country Playhouse) Before founding Egg & Spoon Theatre Collective in 2017, Liam (he/him) received his BFA from Syracuse University, where he was the Managing Director of Black Box Players while directing and assisting on numerous productions. Most recently he co-directed The Rats and directed The Killer for Egg & Spoon’s second season. Other assisting credits include Fiorello! (Off-Broadway, dir. Bob Moss); In the Heights (dir. Marcos Santana); Man of La Mancha (dir. Mark Lamos); and Thousand Pines (dir. Austin Pendleton). He is currently the Assistant Artistic Director at Westport Country Playhouse, and an Associate Member of the Stage Directors and Choreographers Society.

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Post-Play Dialogue will now be a podcast

Playhouse Assistant Artistic Director Liam Lonegan will lead the discussion with Neelu Shruti, about her research and article “BIRTH JUSTICE DENIED: The Continued Marginalization of Community Birth Settings and Midwives …”

Recording available shortly. (Previously scheduled for October 25 post-play dialogue.)

Neelu Shruti is the founder of Love Child; specializes in Fertility, Prenatal, Postnatal and Baby & Me Yoga; and is an RN, Full-Spectrum Doula, Breastfeeding Counselor and Midwifery Assistant in NYC and a Midwifery student at Jefferson University. Born in Hyderabad, India, she was fortunate to be introduced to yoga while attending Rishi Valley, a boarding school founded by the philosopher J. Krishnamurti. Neelu moved to the US in 2003 to pursue an architecture degree at the University of Texas at Austin and to NYC in 2007 where she worked at several high-profile architecture firms. Teaching yoga on the side, and seeing the impact she was having as a pre/postnatal yoga teacher and doula, in 2015, she quit her day job, founded Love Child – a support space for expecting and new parents – and has never looked back. During the COVID-19 pandemic, Neelu has worked to open a birth center in NYC; additionally, as a grassroots advocate – working with elected officials in NYC, NYS, and the NY Governor’s office, and local and national birth and midwifery advocacy organizations – she has pushed to eliminate legislative barriers for community midwifery and birth centers in New York State. She is the founder of New York Birth Policy Project to advance maternal health legislation policies in NYC & NYS. Her writing, highlighting the historical marginalization of community birth and midwives, has been published in The Indypendent and Yale University’s Distilled periodical.

Liam Lonegan (Assistant Artistic Director, Westport Country Playhouse) Before founding Egg & Spoon Theatre Collective in 2017, Liam (he/him) received his BFA from Syracuse University, where he was the Managing Director of Black Box Players while directing and assisting on numerous productions. Most recently he co-directed The Rats and directed The Killer for Egg & Spoon’s second season. Other assisting credits include Fiorello! (Off-Broadway, dir. Bob Moss); In the Heights (dir. Marcos Santana); Man of La Mancha (dir. Mark Lamos); and Thousand Pines (dir. Austin Pendleton). He is currently the Assistant Artistic Director at Westport Country Playhouse, and an Associate Member of the Stage Directors and Choreographers Society.