RAIN AND ZOE SAVE THE WORLD
The Creative Team
Hersh Ellis
CRYSTAL SKILLMAN - Writer is a four time NYT Critics’ Pick honoree, as well as a bookwriter for the award winning musical MARY AND MAX (with composer Bobby Cronin). Plays include NYTimes Critics’ Picks OPEN (The Tank Theatre/AFO), GEEK (Vampire Cowboys), CUT (Theatre Under St. Marks), and KING KIRBY (The Brick, Co-writer Fred Van Lente), now launched as a four part audio drama on Broadway Podcast Network. Awards include the Earth Matters On Stage Prize (RAIN AND ZOE SAVE THE WORLD), two Alfred P. Sloan commissions, a Clifford Odets Ensemble Play commission, and she is the winner of an NY Innovative Theater Award for Outstanding Play (THE VIGIL OR THE GUIDED CRADLE). This past year Crystal was selected as one of eight playwrights for the Playwrights’ Center’s 2020-23 Core Membership, a winner for SDSU’s New Musicals Initiative with musical POSTCARD AMERICAN TOWN (Composer Lynne Shankel), presented in The Civilians R & D Group “Findings” series with THIS SHOW IS MONEY (music by Gaby Alter), and announced as bookwriter for A NEW CITY (Composer Sam Ratelle). Crystal was just selected for the Orchard Project Audio Lab this summer with THE MAGICIAN’S MAGICIAN in production with BOOM Integrated/John Marshall Media for release in Fall 2021. Her play OPEN, which inspired the series, was filmed and live streamed to a world-wide audience this summer. She is currently developing the half hour musical comedy OVERNIGHT SUCCESS with co-conceiver songwriter and actress Lauren Elder (Kampfire Films) as well as her YA animated series COSMIC CRITTERS (with songs by Bobby Cronin). Crystal’s credits also include the graphic novel EAT FIGHTER (Webtoon), “ADVENTURE TIME” comics (BOOM! Studios), and work with Marvel Studios. Crystal Skillman IG: @crystalskillman
BOBBY CRONIN - Composer multi award-winning composer/writer of Mary & Max  with book writer Crystal Skillman (World Premiere Theatre Calgary 2018, European Premiere at Austria's Theatre Linz 2019 [streamed on YouTube during Covid]; Winner of 2018 MUT Critics Award, Pace New Musicals 2018, SigWorks Finalist 2018); ‘Til Death Do Us Part (World Premiere 2020 - Covid Canceled, 2018-2020 SDSU New Works Award; 2017 SigWorks Finalist; 2016 Overtures Series) with book writer Caroline Prugh; Concrete Jungle, set to play London's Leicester Square Theatre summer 2020 (Covid Canceled); Till Soon, Anne  with Christine Toy Johnson (O'Neill Writing Residency); Daybreak (winner of the 2011 New Jersey Playwrights Contest) premiered in Wayne, NJ & London’s Tristan Bates Theatre spring 2012. PSYKIDZ was commissioned in 2018 and will be made into a film during Covid quarantine by The Prep NJ. 2014 York NEO. Other: Numerous award winning short musical films, 54 Below, Lincoln Center Songbook Series, Birdland, Symphony Space, London’s The Players Theatre & St. James Theatre, etc. "Reach The Sky: Live" & “The Concrete Jungle International Studio Cast Recording” on all digital platforms.  Bobby Cronin IG: @croninbobby 
Jared Mezzocchi - Director is an Obie Award-winning theater artist, working as a director, multimedia designer, playwright, and actor. Mezzocchi’s work has appeared at notable theaters nationwide, including the Kennedy Center, the Geffen Playhouse, Arena Stage, Woolly Mammoth (company member), and many more. In 2016, he received the Lucille Lortel and Henry Hewes Award for his work in Qui Nguyen’s “Vietgone” at the Manhattan Theatre club. In 2020,, the New York Times spotlighted his multimedia innovations alongside the pandemic work of four other theater artists, including Andrew Lloyd Webber and Paula Vogel. His work on Sarah Gancher’s “Russian Troll Farm” (co-director & multimedia designer) was also celebrated as a New York Times critic pick, and praised for being one of the first digitally native successes for virtual theater. In 2021, Mezzocchi also co-directed “What If If Only,” a world premiere of a new Caryl Churchill play, alongside Tony Award nominated director Les Waters.
Mezzocchi also created and performed two new works of digital theater during the pandemic: “On the Beauty of Loss” (Vineyard Theatre, NYC) and “Someone Else’s House” (Geffen Playhouse, LA). He is currently working on a new commission through Vineyard Theater and Engarde Arts for the 2023-24 season, as well as a new online commission for HERE Arts new URHERE digital platform called “Section 230.”
Mezzocchi is a two-time Macdowell Artist Fellow, a 2012 Princess Grace Award winner, and is an Associate Professor at The University of Maryland, where he teaches in the MFA Design program for the projection and multimedia track. He is also co-director of The Maya Brin Institute for New Performance.
Over the pandemic, Mezzocchi founded Virtual Design Collective (VIDCO), which has aided in the development of over 50 new digital works over the last 18 months. This year, he is finishing his book, “A Multimedia Designer’s Method to Theatrical Storytelling,” which will be published through Routledge.
Mezzocchi has a BA in theater and film from Fairfield University, and an MFA in performance and interactive media arts from Brooklyn College.
He grew up in New Hampshire, and returns every summer to serve as Producing Artistic Director of Andy's Summer Playhouse, an innovative children’s theater producing original work by professional artists from across the country.
Evan Bernardin Productions – General Manager
Evan Bernardin Productions is a full-service theatrical management company that provides general and production management for productions, tours, and immersive experiences in North America. Select: Seven Deadly Sins by Moisés Kaufman's, Afterglow, We Are The Tigers, Douglas Carter Beane's Fairycakes. Touring: CocoMelon, Million Dollar Quartet, Charlie Brown Christmas, Million Dollar Quartet Christmas, Counting Sheep. Additional collaborative projects have included performances at Lincoln Center, The United Nations, The Harvard Club, The White House, Cornell University, Georgetown's Gaston Hall, The Culture Project, The Ohio Theatre and The Metropolitan Museum of Art.