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AMY KNOP (she/her) has been a prolific performer and producer of improv at ColdTowne since 2016, including as B. Iden Payne-nominated director of “My Own Worst Enemy”, “It’s Britney, Bitch”, and producer of sold-out runs of “Angola,” “Old Love,” “The Rose,” and more. She is a graduate of ColdTowne Conservatory and Advanced Studies programs and performs regularly with Prayer Circle Comedy (Denver Improv Fest, Dallas Comedy Festival, Big Little Comedy Fest). Amy has been in weekly cast for Sweet Lightning, Pioneers, and several ColdTowne mainstages, and a festival director of Austin Sketch Fest since 2019 (but most significantly, captain of the still-reigning champs of Improv Fantasy League, H-E-Bees 2018). She loves the ColdTowne community and wants to welcome you into it!
GARRETT ROJAS is an actor, improviser, multi-hyphenate from Austin, TX. Named after Garrett Morris, he was probably destined to become an improviser at some point anyway. He was named Rookie of the Year at the 2023 ColdTony’s and has appeared in a number of main stage shows since then. He’s a working actor who’s committed to continuing his education, having taken acting, improv, and elective classes weekly since January 2021. As a teacher and someone who also has a passion for playing pretend, he aims to help you on your creative journey while maintaining an environment that fosters fun. You can catch him this fall at Coldtowne performing in shows such as The Monster, The Misterios, and The Showdowne (hosting).
KAT ELLISON WILLIAMS has been improvising since 2018 and graduated from the Coldtowne Conservatory in 2021. He has played in many Coldtowne shows including Sextet, Hysteria, and Stool Pigeon. He loves live music, strange art, and the Harold.
TIANA STUART (she/her) is an actor, improvisor, musician, writer, and director. Tiana discovered a love for improv comedy when she lived in Amsterdam from 2016-2019 where she studied long-form improv at the world-renowned Boom Chicago under Michael Orton-Toliver, who combined curriculums from both Boom Chicago and The Free Association out of London. She then moved back to the U.S. where she graduated from Coldtowne’s conservatory program in 2022. You can now catch her goofing around on multiple House Teams at Coldtowne and in other troupes. Tiana co-wrote and directed Twinsies, a comedic short-film that has garnered 25 award nominations and 4 wins, including Best Comedy at the Austin Indie Fest. Tiana is also a co-producer of the Lysistrata Women’s Comedy Festival, a four-day comedy festival celebrating the collective power of women. You can catch her in HBO’s Love and Death and other films and commercials. She is represented by the Zephyr Talent Agency.
KEYLAN HAYNES is an Austin based actor and a graduate of ColdTowne Theater. He has taught in ColdTowne’s wonderful youth program, Excused Absence, and is a part of the B. Iden Payne award-winning improv troupe Sugar Water Purple.
EMMA HOLDER is an actor, improviser and sketch comedy writer with a background in theater and literature. She has been performing, writing and directing at ColdTowne theater since 2008 and has taught improv, sketch, youth improv, youth playwriting, and creative writing for over 10 years. Emma performs regularly with her improv teams Kinkade and Stupid but Brave. She was a founding member of one of the longest running ColdTowne sketch teams, Pendulum, and has written and produced two solo sketch comedy shows: Kennedy Women and I’ll Allow it. Emma has performed at UCB Theater’s Dell Close Marathon, Out of Bounds Comedy Festival, New York Sketch Fest and Austin Sketch Fest.
DREW WESELY graduated from ColdTowne Conservatory in 2008, started as a Teacher’s Assistant in 2011, and became an improv teacher in 2015. He graduated from ColdTowne Conservatory’s Advanced Graduate Improv Studies program in 2016. He hosted the ColdTowne Theater monthly improv jam, and currently hosts his independently operated weekly drop-in improv class/jam. Instructors from UCB, iO, The Annoyance and The New Movement have either coached or taught him in classes or workshops.
ROCHELLE MCCONICO is the founder and CEO of MoonCricket Productions a live entertainment company specializing in interactive, multisensory comedic events. She is a visionary, writer, producer, and performer. In June 2020, Rochelle launched the Amuse-Bouche Comedy Festival to showcase the many great improvisers, comedy podcasters and stand-ups in New Orleans and performed as all three. In 2022, she followed up by co-founding, programming, performing and co-headlining the Lysistrata Comedy Festival, an all femme comedy festival, in New Orleans.
Additionally, Rochelle performs standup, improv, and sketch around the country both individually and with the groups: Black Improv Alliance’s Wakanda Vs. Everybody, Black As Phuck, Switchblade, Edge Control, and No Lye Comedy.
Notably she has performed improv at the New York Comic Con (2022), Black and Funny Ocean City Festival (2022), and Baton Rouge Improv Festival (2022); sketch in the Dallas Comedy Festival (2018) and the Los Angeles Diversity in Comedy Showcase (2019), and stand-up in the the Black Girl Giggles Festival (2018) and Tower City Comedy Festival (2022). Rochelle also hosted during the Austin Sketchfest (2022) and will be appearing in the Moontower Comedy Festival in April 2023.
Rochelle also wrote, directed, and starred in three plays centering her alter ego character, billionaire media heiress Stangela Angela Hemsworth Kingsley Winthrop Farouk Adams III: I’m Only Here for the Snacks, and Stangela for President, and Stangela’s Swamp Thing. The first two plays were both featured at Infringe Fest in New Orleans (2018 & 2019).
ANTHONY ELLISON spent 9 years in Chicago writing, performing, teaching, etc. After dozens of sketch shows at Second City, Annoyance, CiC, he began to seek guidance in longer comedy within structure. He received an MFA in “The Art of Dramatic Structure”, and won the Scott McPherson Playwriting Award, while also directing for the OU Comedy Org – Black Sheep/Six to Midnight. His plays have been produced in Chicago, NYC, Austin, Liverpool, Athens OH, Muncie IN, and a lot more.
MATT ALSPAUGH is a seasoned improviser, director, and improv coach with a passion for developing dynamic teams through the creation of compelling scenes and authentic characters. Trained at renowned institutions such as UCB, The Magnet, The PIT, and Story Pirates in New York City, Matt brings his wealth of experience and expertise to his coaching here at ColdTowne Theater.
His directing portfolio includes productions like Gutenberg! The Musical! (Austin, ColdTowne Theater), .38 Special Character Showcase (Austin, ColdTowne Theater), Bored of Education (New York, The Producers Club), Stand Up Ditchberg (New York, The Arthur Seelen Theater at The Drama Book Shop), and Opening Night (New York, The Magnet). Matt has coached numerous house sketch teams for The Magnet (Dreadful Affair, Kinfolk, Just Karen) and The PIT’s Boogie Manja (Water House Party Time). Additionally, he has performed with his various improv and sketch teams in numerous comedy festivals such as The Del Close Marathon, Montreal Sketch Fest, The New York Sketch Festival, The Philadelphia Sketch Festival, and The Boston Improv Festival.
As a performer, Matt wrote and starred in the one-man character showcase High/Low Character Show (New York, The Magnet). He continues to improvise for audiences every Sunday night with his Harold team, All Night, All Night, All Night (Austin, ColdTowne Theater).
He is also a lover of cold brew, New Haven pizza, and dogs that look at you when their head is tilted to the side (you know that look).
KRISTIN HENN is a proud graduate of the ColdTowne Conservatory. Committed to continued training, she has taken additional classes and attended intensives regularly since 2009, including with The Annoyance Theater, IO Chicago, Improv Utopia, and visiting performers and practitioners from around the country. She holds a BFA in Directing and an MA in Theatre History and Criticism, both from Texas State University.
KYLE ROMERO is an actor and writer based out of Austin, TX. He is a graduate of the Upright Citizens Brigade Theater in Los Angeles and an improv and sketch faculty member at ColdTowne Theater and Fallout Theater. In Austin, he has appeared in the B. Iden Payne Award winning One Hour Til Air and the regional premiere of Bigfoot: The Musical, as well as directed the play Sex a.k.a. Wieners and Boobs. Kyle is a member of the sketch comedy collective Pendulum and is the Festival Co-Director for Austin Sketch Fest.
ASAF RONEN is the author of Directing Improv: Show the Way By Getting Out of the Way. He regularly performs, teaches and produces in Austin, was Education Director at The Institution Theater for eight years and is currently the Conservatory Director at ColdTowne Theater. He is also a Producer and Education Director of Austin’s annual Out of Bounds Comedy Festival. He has taught and performed improvisation in Canada, Great Britain, Norway and in twenty-eight of these United States with such groups as the B. Iden Payne Award winning Confidence Men (improvised plays in the style of David Mamet) and imp (mostly silent improv). He was also producer on TRUST US, THIS IS ALL MADE UP, a documentary on legendary improvisers TJ & Dave that premiered at Austin’s South by Southwest Festival in 2009 and helped develop the improvised film Days of Delusion with director Scott Myers. In 1999, Asaf founded the improv website, YESand.com of which he is Editor-in-Chief.
DAVE BUCKMAN has directed, taught and performed at some of the world’s leading improvisational comedy institutions. After several years studying and teaching improv in Chicago, Dave served as Artistic Director of Boom Chicago in Amsterdam for 2 years, where he was fortunate to work with and direct some of the funniest people working in television and web-based sketch comedy today. After Europe, Dave worked as a director and teacher at The Second City in Chicago. He has directed MainStage shows at ColdTowne: Bigfoot, the musical, Austin Translation, Barney Biller Dark Night, The Roast of St, Nick, Eye for an iPhone and Shanty Town Lake. The Second City: Who’s yer Baghdadi?” (Cleveland), World’s Gone Wild” (Touring Company) and Deficit Comedy Jam (Touring Company) Boom Chicago: Your Privacy is our Business, Europe, We’ve Created a Monster, The Future is Here and it is Slightly Annoying. In 2002, he directed “Boom Chicago: RockStars” only the second stage-swap with The Second City’s Main Stage in its 50 year history.
WILL CLEVELAND brings 20 years of theatre experience into his class. He has served as Artistic Director of ColdTowne since 2016 and trained in improv and sketch writing at New York’s Upright Citizens Brigade Theatre. He wrote and produced works for UCBComedy.com as well as produced for Above Average, Funny or Die, Official Comedy and more. His show “One Hour Til Air” (dir. by Chris McKeever) received the B. Iden Payne award for best Improv Cast in 2019.