Jessica Thebus is a theater artist, director, and educator. She holds a PhD in Performance Studies from Northwestern University, and is currently Director of the Northwestern MFA Program in Directing. She has directed in Chicago and nationally for twenty-five years, and has long associations with many Chicago theaters, including the Goodman Theatre where she directed A Christmas Carol from 2000-2005, as well as plays by Tracy Scott Wilson and Sarah Ruhl.  Northlight Theater is also an artistic home for Jessica where she has directed ten plays including Shining Lives: A Musical which received a Joseph Jefferson award nomination for best new work. Favorite others include Steppenwolf Theater Company,  Lookingglass Theater Company, The Gift Theater, Writer’s Theater, and Court Theater.  Favorite projects nationally have taken place at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, The Huntington Theatre, Kansas City Repertory Theatre, The Marin Theater Company, as well as the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C. Jessica also creates outdoor spectacle projects in Chicago that celebrate community, joy and environmental justice.

** Denotes member of Stage Directors and Choreographers Society

Bobby Kennedy is the Director of Artistic Development at Writers Theatre. He has been the resident dramaturg at the theatre since 2008 and has led the theatre's new work program since 2014. Highlights of his tenure include the world premieres of Dhaba on Devon Avenue by Madhuri Shekar, Manual Cinema's Christmas Carol, Wife of a Salesman by Eleanor Burgess, Dishwasher Dreams by Alauddin Ullah, Witch by Jen Silverman, Trevor by Dan Collins and Julianne Wick-Davis, The Hunter and the Bear by PigPen Theatre Co., and Death of a Streetcar Named Virginia Woolf by Tim Sniffen; the national premieres of Quixote: On the Conquest of Self by Mónica Hoth, Claudio Valdés Kuri, and Georgina Escobar, and The Dance of Death by Conor McPherson; and the Chicago premieres of Natasha, Pierre & the Great Comet of 1812, A Distinct Society, Tiger Style!, Athena, The Last Match, The Niceties, Vietgone, Smart People, and Marjorie Prime. His dramaturgy credits also include the world premieres of Give It All Back (SideShow Theatre Company), Body and Blood (The Gift Theatre), Ibsen is Dead (Interrobang Theatre Project) and The Peacock (Jackalope Theatre Company), as well as the midwest premiere of The Luck of the Irish (Next Theatre Company). Kennedy co-founded The Spontaneous Theater Project in Boston and has also worked with Huntington Theatre Company and New Repertory Theatre. He is an alumnus of Boston University.