AMY KLEINMAN | Board Chair
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Amy Kleinman has been the Chair of the CYS Board of Directors since 2017.
Currently retired, she was a director in the American Bar Association’s Meetings and Travel Department for 20 years. Prior to that, she was an event planner at the John Marshall Law School and an associate at a public relations firm. She is a graduate of Northwestern University, where she majored in theater and communications. Since retiring, Amy has been active in a variety of organizations and boards, and currently serves on the steering committees of the Women of Temple Sholom and the National Council of Jewish Women. She is a life-long learner with interests in theater, dance, yoga, literature and travel. She enjoys spending time her husband, her son, who is a director and professor of theater, and her daughter, who is a literacy specialist for children with Dyslexia. Favorite Shakespeare play: A Midsummer Night’s Dream (and she will be happy to tell you why). Amy's favorite quote is also from Midsummer, "And though she be but little, she is fierce." |
JACQUELINE CAMACHO RUIZ
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Jacqueline Camacho-Ruiz is a visionary social entrepreneur that has created an enterprise of inspiration. With 20 years of experience in the marketing and Public Relations industry, she has created two successful award-winning companies, established two nonprofit organizations, published 26 books, created a number of products, and held dozens of events around the world.
Jacqueline is currently the CEO of JJR Marketing, one of the fastest-growing top marketing and public relations agencies in Chicago, and Fig Factor Media, a media publishing company that helps individuals bring their books to life. Jacqueline is also the Founder of The Fig Factor Foundation, a not-for-profit organization dedicated to giving vision, direction, and structure to young Latinas as well as the President of Instituto Desarrollo Amazing Aguascalientes, the first youth center in Calvillo, Aguascalientes, Mexico, offering various hands-on experience, courses, and global connections to support international youth in defining their dreams. Jacqueline currently serves as a board member for the World Leaders Forum, The Fig Factor Foundation, and the Alumni Executive Board at the College of DuPage. Jacqueline earned her Assoc. from the College of DuPage. She has continued her education by completing numerous courses, including the Dale Carnegie Flagship, High Impact Presentations, and Leadership Courses, the IBESI Certificación: Inteligencia Interpersonal & Liderazgo Ético, the Stanford University Latino Business Action Network, and the Women Entrepreneurship Cohort 3 from DePaul University among others. |
LOUIS FANTASIA | Board Chair Emeritus
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Louis Fantasia is the director of The Los Angeles Shakespeare Institute, a joint project of the Shakespeare Center of Los Angeles and the William Andrews Clark Memorial Library at UCLA. He served as Director of the Shakespeare Globe Centre's Teaching Shakespeare Through Performance Institute from 1997 to 2002 and as Education Director of the Shakespeare Globe Centre's Western Region. Mr. Fantasia has produced and directed more than a hundred and fifty plays and operas worldwide, and was the first American to direct on the reconstructed London Globe stage, with a workshop production of Much Ado About Nothing in 1996. He has taught at the Juilliard School and the University of Southern California School of Theatre, the London Theatre School (Head of Acting and Director of Studies) and Schiller College-Europe University (Chair and Artistic Director of Theatre Programs).
Mr. Fantasia is the author of the critically acclaimed, Instant Shakespeare, A Proven Technique for Actors, Directors, and Teachers, published in the U.S. by Ivan R. Dee and by A & C Black in England; Tragedy in the Age of Oprah: Essays on Five Great Plays, published by Scarecrow Press; and Talking Shakespeare, published by Peter Lang Publishers. He is the General Editor of the recently released Playing Shakespeare’s Characters series for Peter Lang Publishers. Mr. Fantasia can be heard regularly on NPR's KCRW (89.9 FM) as a theatre critic and arts commentator.
Favorite Shakespeare play: "Whichever one I am directing at the moment." |
LAWRENCE GRIMM | Vice Chair
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Lawrence Grimm has been an actor and teacher for over 20 years. His teaching artist work includes extensive residencies in New York and Chicago’s public, private, and parochial schools, social services facilities, and with corporate businesses and ad agencies. In New York he worked with Lincoln Center Institute, Roundabout Theatre, Theatre for a New Audience, and Arts Connection. In Chicago his affiliations as a teacher include the Second City, Piven Theater Workshop, the Acting Studio, Writer’s Theater, Lookingglass Theater, The Illinois Arts Council, CAPE, Urban Gateways and Steppenwolf for Young Audiences where he serves as Senior Facilitator for Curriculum and Instruction.
Lawrence has a Masters in Education from DePaul University and was a high school English and Drama teacher at Stevenson High School for three years and Chicago’s public high school for the arts, Chi-Arts, for four years. He was the director of the Thresholds Theater Arts Project for seven years which brought the voices of adults who have suffered from mental illness to the stage. Additionally he has worked with the Memory Ensemble and those afflicted with Alzheimer’s through the Cognitive Neurology and Alzheimer's Disease Center at the Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine. As an actor, he is a founding ensemble member of A Red Orchid Theater and is the Director of Education and co-founder of their Youth Ensemble. He has worked extensively at Chicago’s prominent theaters including shows with Chicago Shakespeare Theatre, Steppenwolf, Lookingglass, Victory Gardens, Next, Timeline, Court, Collaboraction, Piven Theater Workshop and the Goodman. Film and Television roles include Welcome to Me (directed by Shira Piven with Kristen Wiig), Chicago PD, Unsolved Mysteries, Late Night with Conan O’Brien, Cicero in Winter and Perfect Manhttan. |
MARIE JACOBSEN
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Marie Jacobsen is currently the Director of Financial Services at Atla, a membership association of librarians and information professionals, and a producer of research tools, committed to advancing the study of religion and theology. Marie drives oversight of financial reporting, budgeting, forecasting, and monitoring of investments to assure financial stability for the Atla organization. As CFO of Atla, Marie also oversees all human resource and facility activities including payroll, health and general insurance, pension plan administration, payroll law, and regulation compliance. She has extensive experience in finance and accounting and human resource development. Previous positions include Assistant Controller for a large medical not-for-profit and Vice President of Finance for a Social Service Agency.
Marie completed her BS in Accounting at Northeastern Illinois University, earned an MBA from Regis University, and completed an MS in Human Resource Development in Education and Business from Indiana State University. |
JOSEPH LARKIN
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Joseph Larkin is a registered nurse and currently serves as the executive director of UChicago Medicine/Ingalls Home Care and Hospice. He studied theater design at the University of Connecticut. Joe has worked on dozens of productions at the high school, community, regional and college level, primarily as an actor, set designer, lighting designer and tech director, as well as working backstage. He has especially enjoyed mentoring new technicians and designers. Joe is very excited to join CYS!
Favorite Shakespeare play: Much Ado About Nothing |
WILLIAM LOESCH | General Counsel
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William Loesch is a principal at Goldberg Kohn Ltd where he chairs the firm's Corporate, Securities & Tax Group. He advises businesses ranging from start-ups to public companies in a variety of matters, including mergers and acquisitions, joint ventures and other strategic alliances, debt and equity financing, dealership and distributorship relationships, and employment and consulting agreements.
Clients for whom Mr. Loesch regularly provides representation span a broad range of industries, including consumer products, advertising, marketing, business services and equipment manufacturing. Mr. Loesch also has extensive experience in education law, particularly in mergers and acquisitions of post-secondary schools, both domestic and international. In addition, he has experience in contract matters relating to the Internet, including Web site development agreements, Web site hosting arrangements, and Web-based advertising and marketing agreements. |
SAMUELA NOUMTCHUET
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Samuela Noumtchuet is a CYS alum and Boston College graduate with a Bachelor of Arts in Theatre. After graduating, Samuela shifted her artistic passions to television, working behind the scenes on shows such as The Neighborhood, The Masked Singer, and The Bold & The Beautiful. Currently, she is working as a Creative Coordinator at Silvergate Media, a production company specializing in children's animation.
Acting credits include The Cherry Orchard, Stop Kiss, Big Love, and The Tempest. Writing credits include Two Face, produced by Speakeasy Stage Company for the 2017 Boston Theater Marathon. Directing credits include The Vagina Monologues at Boston College. Samuela was also awarded 2nd Runner Up in the Irene Ryan Acting Competition as part of the Kennedy Center American College Theater Festival Region 1. Favorite Shakespeare plays: A Midsummer Night's Dream, Macbeth, The Tempest. |
JAZMINE REYNOLDS
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Jazmine Reynolds is the Event Manager at GCM Grosvenor, a global alternative investment management firm. She has a background in theatre and performance and spent the first 15 years of her life on stage. Jazmine travelled for four years with The Young Americans teaching music outreach workshops to children and adults, and spent 2 summers at the Boyne Highlands Dinner Theatre in Petoskey, Michigan.
Although born and raised in the midwest, Jazmine has been blessed to travel the world. She earned her Bachelors in Business and Event Management at The University of Greenwich in London, England. Jazmine is excited to be back in Chicago and have the opportunity to share her passion for the arts again. She picked up a love of rugby while across the pond, and spends her free time doing yoga, is an active theatre-goer, and enjoys a nice cup of coffee and a great book. Favorite Shakespeare play: Twelfth Night |
BONNIE SEEBOLD | Treasurer
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Bonnie Seebold is a retired high school English teacher, having taught at Francis W. Parker School for over 40 years. Her courses included Reading and Writing in the Various Genres, Chamber Theater (Literature Adapted for the Stage), Contemporary Global Novel, and Shakespeare.
Bonnie has directed many scenes from short stories and Shakespeare as well as truncated hour-long versions of such plays as As You Like It, The Tempest, and Hamlet, and an adaptation of Gogol's The Nose for Chamber Theater. Prior to her tenure at Francis Parker, Bonnie taught for four years at Fenton High School, where she developed the school's Literary Magazine. Bonnie holds a B.S., in Journalism from the University of Illinois; M.A.T. in English Education from The University of Chicago; postgraduate work in Oral Interpretation in the Speech and Theatre Department at Northwestern University. Favorite Shakespeare play: "I cannot choose. Like Cleopatra, Shakespeare's 'infinite variety' never stales." |
MANON SPADARO | Founding Artistic Director
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Before founding Chicago Youth Shakespeare in 2013, Manon Spadaro was a theatre arts instructor and director for over 20 years. She served on faculty at Lake Forest Country Day School, Francis W. Parker School, Northwestern University’s Center for Talent Development, and Bernard Zell Anshe Emet Day School, among others. Manon studied acting at NYU's Tisch School of the Arts at Circle in the Square, and earned both her bachelor’s and master’s degrees in theatre from Northwestern University. She has directed somewhere upwards of 50 productions, including dozens of Shakespeare plays with young artists ages 13-24 years old.
Favorite Shakespeare play: Hamlet |
MAUREEN WEBER | Secretary
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Maureen Weber recently retired from Community High School District 230 where she taught English. She also worked as a Division Chair at Stagg High School and directed comedies and dramas in their theater program. Prior to working at District 230, she worked at Consolidated High School District 218. Again at Eisenhower School she taught English and directed plays and musicals. In 31 years of teaching she directed thirty plays at Andrew, Stagg and Eisenhower High Schools.
Maureen Weber is a graduate of Loyola University receiving a B.A. in theater and a M.B.A in Business, a graduate of Northwestern University receiving a M.A. in theater and Governors State University receiving a Master in Educational Administration. Prior to working as a teacher, Maureen worked at Kordos and Charboneau as a casting assistant and A-Plus Talent Agency as a talent agent. In addition she worked with the Commons Theater Company. Favorite Shakespeare play: Macbeth |
JOSHUA ZAMBRANO
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Joshua Zambrano is an alum of the CYS program and went on to graduate from Colorado College with a Bachelor of Arts in Organismal Biology and Ecology (OBE). While his degree may be in science, his heart has always been in the theatre and working with youth. After graduating, he worked as a tutor/mentor and site coordinator for Driven & Empowered Youth, Inc, a program aimed at providing free tutoring resources and summer programs to students in under-resourced CPS high schools on Chicago's northwest side. Starting in the fall of 2018, Josh was asked to serve as an interim science teacher at his alma mater, the Chicago High School for the Arts (ChiArts), where he served for two years. Currently, he is working as an instructor in the Theatre department at ChiArts, teaching acting techniques to first-year students.
Josh is a working actor and current ensemble member of Visión Latino Theater Company and Counter Collective, two theater companies whose missions are geared towards enacting positive change in the theater community of Chicago and telling the stories of those who are less likely to be heard. Favorite Shakespeare play: Macbeth |
NORMA ZAMBRANO
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Norma is an entrepreneur and a John Maxwell Certified Coach, Speaker and Trainer. Considered an expert in relationship building, Norma often speaks on topics related to all aspects of wellness and represents companies that help people break the cycle of physical, emotional, spiritual and financial poverty. Norma has worked in the financial industry for 21+ years, serving as Vice President of Citi Private Bank Law Firm Group, Vice President of International Services for The World Trade Center in Chicago, President and CEO of Total Natural Solutions LLC, Founder of Total Natural Fitness Studio, Business Development Consultant and PR for Negocios Now and Executive Director for The John Maxwell Company.
A passionate philanthropist, Norma has served as Advisory Board Chair of A Safe Haven Foundation (a shelter for homeless and veterans), a Board member of A Gift Of Value Foundation (an organization that empowers young women to understand their true value), a Board member of Inspiring Latinas Foundation (an organization that inspires matured women to pursue their dreams) and President of The Elisa Foundation, which provides personal development and leadership training to women with a focus on youth.
Favorite Shakespeare play: Macbeth |