Holly Eckert did not study at a prestigious dance school as a child. Instead, she grew up poor in a small town in the mountains of Idaho where a wonderful dancer from New York happened to run a small dance studio. Most of the town locals called this woman a witch. The only child in town that took dance classes at the studio, Holly grew up dancing with 5 lovely “hippie” housewives. She kept her passion for dance a secret, fearing the taunts of her classmates. When she was 18 years old, Holly’s family migrated to Washington. Homeless and living in tents, the family didn’t have money for dance classes, so Holly worked out a deal with a local bar. They agreed she could come in and use their dance floor in the morning before the bar opened. Finally Holly got herself to college where she studied dance and political science. After college, she performed the work of many Seattle choreographers including JoAnna Mendl Shaw, Lee Anne Hartley, and Shirley Jenkins.

Holly has been managing and producing her own work for fifteen years. In 1993, she choreographed and produced her first full-length dance work, Habeas Corpus. In this work, three dancers navigated a set comprised of 15-foot fishing nets hung from the theatre ceiling and large industrial barrels scattered on the theater floor. Acclaimed for its rich imagery, Seattle’s Room 608 Theater reproduced the work in 1995 as part of its Spotlight Series.

Holly’s second full-length production, Awaiting Grace, received Seattle’s Pretty Inclusive Theater (SPIT) Award for best locally produced dance of 1996. In this work, Holly collaborated with film/video artist Sean Stearns to create intriguing interplay between the virtual world of the screen and the real world of the stage. Awaiting Grace was reproduced in 1997 with a grant from The Bossak/Heilbron Foundation.

In 1999, Holly collaborated with choreographer Chris Kaufman to produce There, an evening of six dances addressing the theme of time. Continuing to build collaborations with other artists, she worked with choreographer, Richard Ayres, and guitarist, Mark Wilson, to create her third full-length production, and…uh, produced at Seattle’s Mime Theatre in the Spring 2001. For this production, Holly designed a set comprised of a large revolving door which regulated the flow of images on and off the stage. The show toured to Portland where it received high praise for its originality and composition.

In the Fall of 2001, Holly created Count/Recount. The work was performed as part of Square Root of 3, an evening of three dance works by three choreographers. This show was produced both in Seattle and Kirkland in 2001. Taking math as her guide, in this piece Holly explored humans’ fascination with numbers. She created and produced her fourth full-length work entitled Coming Unglued in March 2003. Collaborating with jazz pianist, Ryan Burns, and visual artist, Mandy Gulla, she created a dance work that explored the mysterious world of epilepsy. This production was funded by grants from the King County Arts Commission and The Bossak/Heilbron Foundation.

In 2004, Holly choreographed a local production of Fiddler On The Roof, and in March 2005, she completed a commissioned work for Seattle’s Next Stage Dance Company, a unique company of professional dancers all over the age of 40. Titled Synching, this piece depicted the common unraveling of human effort from enthusiasm to fatigue. Holly completed a second commission in 2005 for the ArtsWest Dance Festival. A generous grant from the Seattle Arts Commission helped make the creation of this unique, 30-minute piece possible. For the work, she used a large, diverse cast of dancers ranging in age from 15 - 40. Titled Scared Senseless, this piece probed the nature of fear as it proliferates inside the individual human psyche and culture’s collective conscious. Acclaimed classical guitarist, Mark Wilson, composed and performed an original score for the piece.

Amy Denio has been creating soundscores for dance, theater and film since 1983. Singer, multi-instrumentalist, composer, improviser, home-taper, she started Spoot Music in 1986, and she's released 6 cassettes, 2 Lps and 35 CDs solo and with diverse musicians from nearly everywhere.

She has received commissions to compose and produce soundscores for Italian National Radio, Berkeley Symphony, Relache Ensemble, Die Knodel (Austria), New York Festival of Song, Victoria Marks, Pat Graney Dance Company, Run/Remain Ensemble, Jeff Bickford, UMO Ensemble, veteran clown Lorenzo Pickle, and many others. She has been a long-time collaborator with David Dorfman Dance, and received a 1997 Bessie Award for Composition (NYC) for her soundtrack 'Sky Down.' She scored Jamie Hook's feature film 'The Naked Proof,' which received honourable mention at its premiere in the 2003 Seattle International Film Festival.

She also scored 2 animated films by Thomas Edward; 'Pangaea's Brood' which won 'Best Animated Film' at the 1999 NY Underground Film Festival, and 'Synchrony in Estrus' which won 'Strangest Film' at the 2003 Motion Arts Festival in California.

She's been touring N & S America, Asia and Europe since 1987 with groups such as Tone Dogs, Tiptons Sax Quartet, Curlew, Pale Nudes, Danubians, FoMoFlo, and solo.

Her collaborative efforts have been seen and heard at Carnegie Hall, the Brooklyn Academy of Music, Seattle Opera House, Detroit Institute of Art, Venice Biennale, Roman Theater Trieste, and at festivals in Buenos Aires, Belo Horizonte (Brazil), Tokyo, Hong Kong and Topeka Kansas.

On New Year's Eve, 2006, her Italian band Quintetto alla Busara accompanied a French circus & artists from Cirque du Soleil in the Piazza del Plebiscito in Naples Italy with 10,000 in attendance.

L.A. Heberlein is author of four books: the poetry collection Earthquake Babies, the reference Rough Guide to Internet Radio, and the novels Sixteen Reasons Why I Killed Richard M. Nixon and Every Man Must Build a Home. He edited the literary journal Square Lake for three years, and his poems and short stories have appeared in a variety of small journals.

Heberlein conducts an ongoing conversation with readers at the web site www.heberlein.net.

Randy Dixon has taught improvisational theater, script development, myth, and acting in Australia, New Zealand, Denmark, Germany, Austria, The Netherlands, Sweden, and Switzerland as well as all over the U.S. and Canada. He taught Improvisation & Storytelling at Henry Cogswell College and at Unexpected Productions Improvisation School. He has been a frequent master teacher and guest director at improvisational and theater festivals in Berlin, Munich, Vienna, Graz, Amsterdam, Zurich, Ljubljana, Vancouver, Los Angeles, Portland, Winnipeg and Chicago. His book on Improvisation, Being Present: Spontaneous Storytelling and the Art of Improvisation was published as Im Moment in German. He has written many plays including And That Is The Way of the World, Staring, A(n Improvised) Christmas Carol, and an adaptation of Vault of Horror. He has collaboratively generated many works including Even Lovers Drown, Newtons Third, Braided Tales, Citizen Scrooge, Persephone, and recently Every Angel.

As a director he has directed countless shows in Seattle for Unexpected Productions as well as other theaters. In 2004, he directed his show City Life at Stockholms Improvisational Theater which ran for over a year. His original narrative improvisation creations City Life, Blank Slate, Found Objects, Spoken, Thread, First/Last, Albert, Translation, Campfire, Domino, Half & Half, Feel You Up, Photo Album, Roethke and others that are performed around the world. Outside of his theater work, Randy served as a contributing editor for The Salt Journal: A Journal of Myth, Religion, Psychology and Ideas. His writing has been published in Alchemy on Sunday, and Manifestations: A Scholarly Journal of Mythological Writing. Mr. Dixon has a B.F.A. in Drama and a Masters Degree in Mythological Studies with an emphasis in Jungian Depth Psychology.

Brian Smith is a local artist born and raised in Seattle. He obtained his fine arts degree from Western Washington University. His medium of choice is oil or acrylic paint on canvas or board. Growing up biracial the young Smith navigated his way through life as a chameleon infiltrating cultures in search for self. Smith's work is a digestion of beauty within a dark dissatisfaction of social and political inequities. Smith encourages the viewer to find the beauty within the context of the message within his art.

Gary began his dance career performing in musical theater in Northern California, where his first major role was Jesus in Godspell. His studies led him to the University of Utah where he received a BFA in modern dance. He moved to Seattle in 1980 with his wife Karen Harp-Reed.

As a repertory modern dancer Gary worked with many national and north west based choreographers. He danced with Co-Motion Dance Company, a regional repertory modern dance group for 19 years, performing throughout Washington state and across the United States. In 1991 he toured to Chongqing, China with a Sister City Cultural Exchange where he taught dance in the People's Schools and performed for thousands of children and adults.

As well as many regional productions, his musical theater performances include West Side Story, Music Man, and Singin¹ In the Rain with the Fifth Avenue Theatre in Seattle. His favorite roles are The Emcee in Cabaret and the Scarecrow in Wizard of Oz, for BPA on Bainbridge Island, both of which he also choreographed.

Mr. Reed has choreographed over 10 musicals. He is currently working on a production of Urinetown with Lakeside High School. Mr. Reed also works with the nationally awarded children's group Tickle Tune Typhoon as a dancer and choreographer.

Javier has been training with Pacific Northwest Ballet's open program, as well as Velocity Dance Center in Seattle for the last 6 years. Recently, he performed with ACT Ballet Theater in their production of The Nutcracker. He also performed with Evergreen City Ballet's production of Cinderella.

Jana is from Montana. She grew up dancing with the Creative Arts Center in Helena under the direction of Charlene White. She graduated with a BFA in Modern Dance performance for the University of Utah and quickly moved to Seattle. Walrus Dance Productions and ARC Dance have kept her dancing alive in the Seattle area and is excited to see what happens next.

Tim is delighted to be participating in The Exile Project. Past roles include: Nathan Detroit (Guys & Dolls), Motel (Fiddler on the Roof), Lon (Meet Me in St Louis), Paul (The Maidens Prayer) and Peter (Narnia). Currently Tim is in the process of developing his one man show Chester Live. He is also in the process of finishing up the recording of his debut solo CD. Tim would like to thank his friends and family for their love and support.

Selena has been performing in the Seattle theatre community, doing radio and television commercials, since the age of 12. She enjoyed sold out audiences for her appearance as Judas in Theatre Babylons production of Jesus Christ Superstar, and was also critically acclaimed in Theater Schmeaters production of Home, and Book-it Repertory Theaters production of The Awakening. She has worked with Unexpected Productions performing in TheaterSports® and long-form improvisation shows. As a stand-up comedienne, Selena has appeared on television and traveled throughout the U.S. and Canada. She has opened for such people as Carolyn Rae, Lenny Clarke, Will Durst, Renee Hicks and Diana Jordan. She just finished supporting lead roles in two independent feature films by Lyle Holmes and Directors, Ltd. (directorsltd.com) called Last Stand as Corporal Jez, and Lost on the B-Side as Wilson. She is very proud to have a IMDb profile.

Carissa has worked as a director, choreographer, and performer in a wide variety of productions, including projects with Kirkland Center for the Performing Arts, The Driftwood Players, The New Everett Theater, and Civic Light Opera. Recent choreography credits include Oliver!, Joseph & The Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, A Christmas Carol, and Grease. She is also Creative Director of the new interactive dinner theater troupe Play With Your Food based in N. Seattle. Favorite performances include appearing as Theresa (Boy Gets Girl), Orlofsky (Die Fledermaus), Rosalia (Westside Story), Hansel (Hansel & Gretel) and Suzy (Wait Until Dark). She loves theater in all its guises.

In addition to the past 5 summers with the Seattle G&S Society, Wendy has performed @ Seattle Public Theater (most recently in Stop Kiss in 2007), Mae West Fest, Seattle Fringe Festival, Northwest Actors Studio, a special memorial concert of La Perichole in honor of Hans Wolff in November 2005, and The Merry Widow through the G&S Societys Second Stage (February 2007). Love to Glenn and the kitties, and my deepest gratitude to Holly for including me in this group of fantastic actors and dancers in this amazing production!

Miriam graduated from the University of Minnesota with a dance major and a biology minor. While in Minnesota, she was a dancer for Black Label Movement and had the opportunity to perform works by Hannah Stillwell, Marge Maddoux and Hannah Kramer among others. She has been in Seattle for a little over a year and has had the chance to work with several local choreographers including Jenna Veatch, Maki Morinoue and Jenny Gerber.