This is Tom Jones!

EMILY N. WELLS + Director

Emily is an award-winning theatre director, creative producer and educator with over 25 years experience including a significant emphasis on new plays and musicals. She joined The Human Race Theatre Company as its 4th Artistic Director in 2022, and directed Grounded to kick off her first season. Emily also directed the recent Houston Grand Opera World Premiere Another City, a new opera that tells the true stories of un-housed Houstonians and those who aid them, composed by Jeremy Howard Beck to a libretto by Stephanie Fleischmann. This winter, she will direct A Doll’s House, Part 2 at Wright State and serves on the Advisory Board for the Sinclair Department of Fine and Performing Arts. Other directing credits include Rice University, Gulfshore Playhouse, Circuit Playhouse, Theatreworks/USA among others. She holds an MFA in Directing from the University of Memphis, a BA in Theatre from Washington University in St. Louis, and is an SDC and AEA Member. In her early career, Emily stage managed on and off Broadway, regionally and on national tours. She is proud to call Dayton home.

STEVE GOERS Music Director

Steve is thrilled to be making his Human Race debut. He is a member of the CCM musical theatre faculty where he both teaches in the classroom and serves as musical director for department productions. Since moving to Cincinnati from Chicago, Steve has become an in-demand regional music director, and has provided music direction for over 100 productions at companies such as Cincinnati Playhouse-in-the-Park, Ensemble Theatre Cincinnati, the Carnegie Center for the Performing Arts, and the Children’s Theatre of Cincinnati. Steve is a composer and orchestrator for film and stage, his works include ten feature films, including the award-winning “Over-the-Rhine,” and thirteen internationally distributed musicals for young audiences. Steve’s session work includes the Grammy-nominated “Ella Jenkins and a Union Friends Pulling Together.” When not working on a show, Steve plays keyboards and sings in several local bands, including the Clyde Brown Band, Aja: a Tribute to Steely Dan, the Ultrasonics, and Just Strange Brothers. MM CCM/UC, BM DePaul University.

DEBBIE BLUNDEN-DIGGS Choreographer

Debbie became Artistic Director for Dayton Contemporary Dance Company (DCDC) in 2007. In 2019, she was named Chief Artistic & Producing Director. For over 20 years she performed with the company, appearing in most of the company’s repertoire. Before becoming Artistic Director, she served as the company’s Associate Artistic Director, Deputy Director for Arts and Operations, and Resident Choreographer. In addition to her choreographic and artistic leadership, Ms. Blunden-Diggs is the Executive Director of Jeraldyne’s School of the Dance, the cornerstone to Dayton Contemporary Dance Company, and she works closely with DCDC’s pre-professional company, DCDC2. She has created works for the company, which have become part of the company’s artistic blueprint. Her notable works include Configurations, Kaleidoscope, Fragments, In My Father’s House, and Traffic. Her first piece, Variations in Blue, composed when she was 17, was submitted as an entry in the Young Choreographers Showcase and selected for inclusion in the National Choreographic Plan. She has contributed an impressive body of work, including No Room, No Place, No Where, for which she received a Monticello Award in 1982.

In May 2002, she adjudicated the Regional Dance America Northeast Competitions. Ms. Blunden-Diggs was Co-Director/Choreographer for The Human Race Theatre’s production of Crowns, as well as Director/Choreographer for Central State University’s original production of In the Pursuit of Wind among others. She created ballets for and worked with students at University of Dayton, Sinclair Community College, Wright State University, Central State University, South Dayton Dance Theatre, and Stivers School for the Arts.

She served on the Board of Directors for the International Association of Blacks in Dance (IABD) from 2000 to 2006. She has received numerous awards and accolades. Among them are honors from Regional Dance America, Monticello Choreographic Fellowships in 1979 and 1980, and two Individual Fellowship Awards from the Ohio Arts Council in 1981 and 1984. She received the Black History Month Congressional Award for Community Service by Congressman Mike Turner (OH-10) in recognition of 40 years serving the community through dance and dance education.

The Fisk University Alumni Association honored her with an Excellence in Artistry Award, and she was awarded a Montgomery County Arts and Cultural District Master Fellowship for artistic excellence and community outreach initiatives in 2000. In 2014, she received the Image of Hope Youth Advocacy Award for her contributions to improve the lives of youth in the Greater Dayton area. Ms. Blunden-Diggs is an adjunct professor at University of Dayton in the Theatre, Dance, and Performance Technology Program, and serves on numerous boards: membership chair of the IABD, secretary for the national Board of Trustees of Dance/USA since 2020, and the Seedling Foundation Board for Stivers School for the Arts.

k. Jenny Jones Intimacy and Fight Director

k. Jenny is so very happy to be joining The Human Race for this fantastic production of This is Tom Jones!. She lives in Cincinnati where she is on faculty at the College-Conservatory of Music and the resident Fight and Intimacy Director for the Theater Division. Regionally she has choreographed at the Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park, Ensemble Theatre Cincinnati, the Repertory Theatre of St. Louis, Actors Theatre of Louisville, and Cincinnati, Lexington & Dayton Operas. An internationally recognized master teacher of stage combat, k. Jenny travels the US and abroad teaching her innovative form of unarmed staged violence called Scrappy Fighting. Long Live The Human Race Theatre – what a great space.

MARK TYNAN * Production Stage Manager

Mark is thrilled to be back in his native Ohio and able to see his great nephews, Elliott, Gabriel, Rowan, and Luca (and the rest of his family) in person rather than on the Facebook. Mark got his BFA from Wright State University with his first two years at The Ohio State University. He is a proud 38-year member of Actors’ Equity Association. His career includes Radio City Music Hall, subbing on Broadway, national and international tours, regional theatre and corporate events. It is an honor to be working with The Human Race Theatre Company, very grateful.

TAMARA L. HONESTY # ^ Scenic Designer

Tammy is excited to return to her artistic home of The Human Race Theatre, now as a Resident Artist. A few of her favorite designs include Gloria: A Life!, Banned from Baseball, Family Ties, Crowns, Other Desert Cities, Becky’s New Car, and Lombardi. She also enjoys designing theatre for young audiences, having designed, ten shows for Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park’s Educational Touring Company. This past fall, she designed the world-premiere of The Memory Exam, and it was her Off-Broadway debut. Tammy’s designs have earned awards and recognition on many levels. Her work has been showcased in World Stage Design 2013 & 2022 digital gallery, the USA-USITT Prague Quadrennial Digital Gallery Exhibit (along with her student’s work), USITT, and USITT Ohio Valley’s Peggy Ezekiel Board’s Choice Exhibit. Her designs have been on stages from New York City to the Midwest as far south as Florida and broadcast nationally on PBS.

Currently, she is an Associate Professor of Scenic Design at West Virginia University’s School of Theatre & Dance. She is a native Ohioan with a B.A. degree in Theatre from Wilmington College of Ohio and an MFA in Scenic Design from West Virginia University. Tammy is an active member of United States Institute for Theatre Technology (USITT) at both the regional and national level. Currently, she is the chair of USITT’s Women in Theatre Group. Being involved in the various facets of USITT has helped her become a better educator, designer, and professional. Tammy is also a member of USA Local 829 as a scenic designer.

In addition to designing scenery, Tammy has been a scenic artist. Examples of her painting talents have been cruising the world on various cruise lines and on display at various corporate theatre events. Recently, Tammy and a student team at Kent State University painted a nearly full-scale 3D-printed replica of Pio Fedi’s Liberty of Poetry which was on display at the Ellis Island National Immigration Museum. In 2018, the book she co-authored, The Fake Food Cookbook, was published. Check out her website at www.tammyhonesty.com

JANET G. POWELL ^ Costume Designer/Resident Artist

Janet is costuming her twenty-fourth show for HRTC. Recent costuming credits include Deadline, Incident at Our Lady of Perpetual Help, Airness, and The Revolutionists. She has costumed productions for Yellow Brick Theater, Town Hall Theatre, joint productions for CCM and The Carnegie Visual and Performing Arts Center, Dayton Playhouse, Beavercreek Theatre, and Memorial Hall in Cincinnati. As a former Norwood City Schools artistic director/educator, she directed, and costumed numerous shows over a period of 37 years. She continues to support youth theatre by volunteering her time and support to the Yellow Brick Theater Company.

JOHN RENSEL Lighting Designer

John is the long-term Resident Lighting Designer for The Human Race Theatre Company, Muse Machine, the Dayton Philharmonic Orchestra Pops series, and the Dayton Opera Association. He also serves as the long-time Technical Director for the Fraze Pavilion and has provided advanced technical production coordination, lighting designs, automation programming, and performance operation services for many artists and productions that have visited that venue. John also has a diverse dance lighting background, having provided lighting designs and technical production services for many years to The Dayton Ballet and Dayton Contemporary Dance Co. John’s national credits include a lighting design package for a National Touring Production of the Elton John/Tim Rice collaboration Aida. Some of his most recent local credits include all the designs for The Human Race’s season at the Loft Theatre; Muse Machine’s productions at the Victoria Theatre and the Dayton Opera Association’s season at the Schuster Center. “After 3 & 1/2 years of dealing with cancer, I’m still here!”

emily c. porter Sound Designer

This is emily’s first production with The Human Race. She has worked on productions in Canada, the USA and internationally and teaches university theatrical sound design and technology. She would like to thank her family for their continued support.