CREATIVE TEAM
Book by Jay Paul Deratany
Music by Coyote Joe Stevens & Keaton Wooden
Lyrics by Stevens, Wooden, and Deratany
JAY PAUL DERATANY
Jay Paul Deratany is a GLAAD nominated writer and activist. Deratany’s earlier plays include Veronica (VictoryGardens), Two Grooms and A Mohel (BailiwickTheater), and Haram Iran, for which he received a London Arts Counsel grant and a GLAAD award nomination for best theatrical writing in California. He is also the author of the feature films Saugatuck Cures (Cinema Diverse Film Festival, Palm Springs; Q Flix Film Festival, Philadelphia & REELING 32 Film Festival, Chicago) and FosterBoy, currently in production. Deratany continues to be an advocate for global LGBT youth rights and built a career in Chicago as one of the top 100 lawyers in the country and human rights advocate.
COYOTE JOE STEVENS
Joe Stevens is a transgender Americana singer-songwriter, composer, and trans rights advocate. Originally from Sacramento, Stevens recorded five albums and toured extensively with such notable acts as Indigo Girls, Melissa Ferrick, Girlyman, and Lowen & Navarro. Stevens is best known for his contribution as one of the first wave of transgender performers to break through into public consciousness. Recently, Joe and Keaton’s musical “Albert Cashier” won “Best New Musical” for the 2018 Chicago Jeff Awards, permanently changed the gendered categories of Chicago theater awards. Their next musical "Hills On Fire" was recently a Finalist for the 2023 Relentless Awards, the largest musical theater prize in the US.
KEATON WOODEN
Keaton Wooden is a Rhodes and Emmy-nominated writer, composer, and producer. Most recently developing the award-winning musical “Albert Cashier” w/ co-composer Joe Stevens in a reading with Tony-winner Michael Mayer, the scifi series “Dark Star” with oscar-winning producers of “Crazy Heart”, and “Hills on Fire”as Finalist for the 2023 Relentless Awards. As a screenwriter, he was winner of the AFM Pitch Conference, Finalist for the London Film Awards, NexTV Pilot Competition, and Script Pipeline. As a social impact producer, his film “TKOKC” is a social justice film Executive Produced by Morgan Freeman. Wooden specializes in art towards positive social change, to directly impact the community. To date, he has helped raise millions for charity, and multiple award-winning projects in the arts around the country.
RICHARD ISRAEL - DIRECTOR
Richard Israel is a New York and Los Angeles-based theatre director specializing in the development of new musicals. He has been a member of the Los Angeles theatre community for over 20 years and is the recipient of the Los Angeles Drama Critics Circle Milton Katselas Award for Career Achievement in Direction, as well as multiple LA Stage Alliance Ovation Awards. Richard is currently working on several original musicals, including ROCKET SCIENCE, HOME STREET HOME, THE MOLLYHOUSE, A VERY BRADY MUSICAL, and THE BABY PROJECT. Richard is currently on the musical theatre faculty of AMDA-LA and is a member of the board of the Foundation for New American Musicals.
PRODUCERS
Produced by
Christine Russell & Jay Paul Deratany
Co-Producer Robert Ulrich
CHRISTINE RUSSELL
Christine Russell (Producer) is an Executive Producer on the Tony Award winning show “Beautiful: The Carole King Musical”, a project she developed for ten years based on the music of her first client, lyricist Gerry Goffin (Natural Woman, Locomotion, Upon the Roof). She served as the Lead Producer on Broadway’s ground breaking musical “Head Over Heels”, a comedic Elizabethan romp based on Sir Philip Sidney’s Arcadia featuring the song’s of The Go-Go’s.
Evolution Music Partners, a leading Hollywood based talent agency representing national and international composers for film and television. Russell’s career in the music industry began as a recording artist signed at Rondor Music, founded by Herb Albert and Jerry Moss, now owned by Universal Music Publishing. Following her time as a professional singer/songwriter, she transitioned to representation and a career as a Broadway producer.