Cooking Oil was produced as an international collaboration between artists in East Africa and the US. The project’s reality is ultimately the result of a long-standing partnership between California Institute of the Arts and the Interdisciplinary Genocide Studies Centre in Rwanda and Theater Factory, the UNCC and others in Uganda. Playwright Deborah Asiimwe moved from Uganda to the US to study at CalArts, where she met director Emily Mendelsohn and the rest of the US-based team. After graduating, Emily Mendelsohn lived for a year in Uganda on a Fulbright Fellowship. The project is the result of a deep commitment to mutual understanding, and friendship, developed over time.

The performance at the National Theater of Uganda was co-produced by Miranda Wright and the Nyonyozi Cultural Troupe, with the support of the US Embassy in Kampala, the Los Angeles Department of Cultural Affairs, the Durfee Foundation’s Artist Resource for Completion grant program, and a group of over fifty individual supporters. In Rwanda, we were presented by Ishyo Arts Centre and the Centre x Centre Theater Festival, with support from Project Troubador and private individuals.






CORE COOKING OIL TEAM MEMBERS



Deborah Asiimwe, playwright

Currently working as Specialist for Sundance Institute’s East Africa initiative, Deborah Asiimwe is a playwright and performer from Uganda. Forgotten World, Cooking Oil, Appointment with gOD and Untitled received readings and workshops in the United States of America. Lagoma is Searching, You are that Man, and My Secret were produced at the Uganda National Cultural Centre/National Theatre. Asiimwe has participated in many artists’ gatherings and conferences, including, the annual Arts in the One World Conference (CalArts, Valencia, California), a project of More Life Initiative: Genocide and Cultural Studies, a collaboration between CalArts and the Interdisciplinary Genocide Study Center in Kigali, Rwanda; Eti! East Africa Speaks at Dartmouth College (2008); the Women Playwrights International Conference in the Philippines (2003); and is the 2003 Sundance Theatre Lab international observer. Asiimwe received her MFA in Writing for Performance from California Institute of the Arts. She is the Overall Winner for the 2010 BBC World Service African Performance playwriting competition.



Emily Mendelsohn, director

Emily Mendelsohn is a theater director from Los Angeles interested in art and social change. Emily was a 2010-2011 Fulbright Fellow to Uganda and is a five-year collaborator in IGSC/ CalArts/Brown University summer exchanges to Rwanda and Uganda, and Arts in One World Conference in US. Her work has been presented in US, Uganda, Rwanda, South Africa, and Lithuania. With JB Kyabaggu, she is directing a Ugandan/American production of Maria Kizito by Erik Ehn for his upcoming Soulographie: Our Genocides project at La MaMa, NYC. She has worked as a guest artist or lecturer at Makerere University, NYU, CalArts, Ishyo Art Center (Rwanda), Arts Printing House (Lithuania), and Vassar’s Powerhouse Theater Program. She earned her MFA in directing from CalArts.



Miranda Wright, US producer

Miranda is an independent producer for live performance, and the co-founder of The Center for Sustainable Practice in the Arts, based in Los Angeles. She is the editor in chief of the CSPA Quarterly, a publication dedicated to exploring sustainability in all arts genres. Her most recent work as a producer includes The Closest Farthest Away, an international collaboration between artists in Los Angeles and Havana, Cuba, for which she produces all US-based events and performances. Miranda has an MFA from the California Institute of the Arts School of Theater.


Shannon Scrofano, designer

Shannon Scrofano is a designer based on the west coast. Working to create original devised work with a focus on site, integrated media, civic engagement and dialogue strategies, her collaborations include live performance, installation and film projects throughout the US and internationally. Selected work has been seen at PICA : TBA, REDCAT, the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago, Baryshnikov Arts Center, the Orchard Project, St. Ann's Warehouse, Evidence Room, Woolly Mammoth, Manual Archives, Miami Light Project, Highways, Montreal Fringe, Tribeca Film Festival, the Berlinale, the Academy Awards, and with Project Por Amor, El Teatro Público and the Festival Internacional del Nuevo Cine Latinoamericano in Havana, Cuba. Her site work has taken place in car dealerships, state legislatures, barns, condo showrooms, plazas, libraries, warehouses, medical labs, skyscrapers, open fields, kitchens, crumbling cathedrals, parking lots, school buses, hotels, an elk farm, and rooftops in multiple cities. She has taught or lectured at universities including Georgetown University, Northwestern, Cal State, the Art Institute of Chicago, Fordham, Portland State, Pacific Northwest Film Center and at various festivals and conferences. She is a company member of Sojourn Theatre and the performance collective TENT, a graduate of Northwestern University, and holds her MFA from California Institute of the Arts, where she currently teaches.




Kyabaggu John Bosco, EA producer

Kyabaggu John Bosco is a Ugandan-based Arts Manager. He currently serves as Production Manager for Uganda’s National Cultural Center. An Honors graduate of Drama (Makerere University), he has taken up key administrative roles as Associate Editor for Uganda Theatre Network Gazette and Production Manager for the East Africa premier of Sonke C. Weiss’s play, Butterflies of Uganda, 2008 in Uganda. In 2007, John Bosco was identified by The Eastern African Theatre Institute to represent Uganda’s Youth Theatre Professionals at the 6th International Drama/ Theatre and Education Association (IDEA) Conference, Hong Kong. Kyabaggu has worked as a consultant with British Council Uganda, Managing the Creative Lives Arts program – WAPI, and is just finishing his term as Theatre Factory’s Relations and Marketing Manager. He is collaborating with Emily Mendelsohn on Erik Ehn's Maria Kizito at La MaMa NYC, November 2012.


Albert Mubiru, dialogue producer

Albert Mubiru is the programme director of the Pablo Live Show on WBSTV. He is a regular coordinator of a summer arts and activism exchange with Brown University and has led arts trainings with NGOs in Kampala. He has performed in Radio Dramas (including Rockpoint 256 and a theater for development project with USAID) and in several National Theatre productions (including 2008 play of the year One Night Stand, and 2007 play of the year Buried in the Dark- All authored by Asiimwe Deborah). As a dancer and choreographer, he creates work that fuses contemporary and Latino dance.


Kathy Carbone, archive consultant

Kathy Carbone is the performing arts librarian and manager of the institute archive at the California Institute of the Arts (CalArts) as well as a dancer, choreographer, improviser, and teacher who for 17 years has been collaborating with musicians and dancers through improvisation and set material in theater and gallery based live performance events. Currently a Ph.D. student in the Department of Information Studies at UCLA, Carbone's research investigates the transformation and transmission of artistic knowledge and memory in and between the archive, the collective memories of audience members of live performance events, and the body memories of performing artists in order to create dynamic archival spaces that reveal the relationships between and connect the places where artistic knowledge and memory reside, situating the archive as a repository for performing arts knowledge and memory and as a lively generator of cross-disciplinary thinking, practice, and production. Carbone holds a BFA in Dance, a MA in Dance and Music, and a MLIS.


Monica Howe, graphic design

Monica Howe is a graphic designer, copywriter, singer and cyclist in Los Angeles, California. Recent works have included layout designs for Amor Fati literary magazine and a rap song about gold lamé. Monica studied photography and performance art at Art Center College of Design. www.monicahowe.squarespace.com



RWANDA PARTNERS

Solange Umuhire, aka Kamikazi Liza, who is an actress, journalist, film producer, and known as the pop star Liza, who had a top ten hit in East Africa. She's currently on tour with the play The Monument in Canada. Solange has two nominations as best best female in east african music awards and an afro fusion concert in the UK.

My name is Flora Kaitesi; I'm a journalist by profession but a lover of the arts. I have been involved in theatre productions for many years and featured significantly in plays performed at the Kenya National Theatre between 2004 and 2007 such as The Trials of Dedan Kimathi, Our husband has gone mad and so on. Now based in Rwanda I am involved in comedy productions with Ishyo Arts Centre such as U&Me and I have also featured in the play called Hannah and Hanna. Recently I took part in a play-reading of Cooking Oil.

My names are Mazimpaka Jones Kennedy,I'm 51 yrs old married with 6 children/ 4 boys and 2 girls. I'm a Rwandese and a christian. I'm a freelance bussinessman dealing in videos and audios. I'm an actor both local and international,on stage and film. And I'm a mentor in Kwetu Film Institute teaching acting both on stage and in front of the camera. Among my business is commercial adverts.


UGANDA PARTNERS

Aggrey Barusya, Uganda producer

Aggrey is a Radio Producer and Presenter for Uganda Broadcasting Corporation and Director of Nyonyozi Cultural Troupe. The troupe performs cultural dancing and singing for Kwanjura and Kuhingira functions, cocktails and any other event. They also perform Theatre for Development mainly used by NGOs. Aggrey's work includes creative writing and production for Radio, Tv , Film and Stage, Acting and directing for the same media. He has a Bachelor of Arts in Drama from Makerere University, Diploma in Secondary Education, Postgraduate Diploma in Mass Communication.


Audrey Kukunda, music director

Audrey Kukunda holds a Bachelor’s Degree of Arts and Music from Makerere University. She has been training, directing, and participating in various Ugandan music and dance performances with Nyonyozi Cultural Troupe for the past three years. Her goal is to develop her career with every opportunity, as well as to impart behavioral change in society through the performing arts.


Nantume Rachel Walakira, costume designer

Nantume Rachel Walakira is a Graduate of Drama from Makerere University and Certified Costume designer with the East African Theatre Institute, Uganda Theatre Network. She has been an actress with previous roles in The marriage of Anansewa, and has previously Directed Wole Soyinka’s famous play The Lion and The Jewel. She is passionate about style, art and African performance. In the course of her work on Cooking Oil, she has closely collaborated with another budding theatre and film costume designer, Kamoga Adam.


Wasswa Alex Lusiba, technical director

Wasswa Alex Lusiba is the Center Manager for Center of Performing Arts and Culture in Jinja, Uganda. A director by training, he holds a bachelors degree in Drama from Makerere University. Has previously acted in The Marriage of Anansewa, The Back Mamba and King Lear. His body of work ranges from acting, directing and Performance Management.




Cast

Kagasuru Allen (Ndeeba) holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Arts from Makerere University. She has worked with YEAH as a radio drama actress since 2006, and has worked with ZOOTZEE, a Dutch company that stages plays about HIV and AIDS. While undergoing her studies, Allen worked for MAPRO and did make up and costuming. She holds a ROCKPOINT award for Best English Actress of 2008, and has a passion for Latino Flavor Night at the National Theatre. She would like to work in more professional plays, to perform beyond Uganda, and to be an inspirational reference to others.

Kijogwa Robert James (Ensemble/Musician) has performed in Betrayal in the City, Hands off my People, and Soldier Tale. He is currently the instruments demonstrator at the department of Music Dance and Drama at Makerere University, and has performed in Kenya, Khartoum, Djibouti, Norway, and The Sudan. Robert plays the tube fiddle, xylophone, African flute, thumb piano, drums, panpipes, lyre, and adungu. He has a new album called “wekazabaaba” with six tracks of integrated Western and African instrumentation.

Kaya Kagimu Mukasa (Neeza) has spent over twenty years in the field of theater. She most recently directed a stage play, Muduuma Kwe Kwaffe by Wycliff Kivingi, which was performed at the National Theatre as part of the fi7y-year celebration of theatre in Uganda. Ms. Kaya works toward upli7ing the standards of performing arts across the board, to building an artistic performance empire that would enhance Uganda as a globally visible creative center. She has much appreciation, respect, and celebration for Deborah’s international artistic achievement.

Kabebasiza Mehame Kenneth (Ensemble/Musician) underwent professional training at Makerere University where he graduated with a Bachelor’s Degree in Drama. At university, he participated in departmental performances, especially in people’s theater. Cooking Oil is Kenneth’s come back to the stage, where he hopes to become a renowned performer.

Samuel Lutaaya (Kafuko) has performed with the KADS on two productions, and is now involved as a contemporary dancer who has worked with various companies in Uganda and Africa. He is a student pursuing at the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants Qualification. Working on this project has allowed him the opportunity to express his views on the shortcoming of the system of foreign aid distribution.

Harriet Mbalinda (Ensemble) is a Theatre practitioner who holds a diploma in Music Dance and Drama, and a degree in Drama. She is a trainer in Music Dance and Drama for all ages, and also writes project proposals.

Edwin Mukalazi (Bataka) is a graduate of Drama at Makerere University and a holder of a certificate in TV and Radio Production. This 29-year old has formidable stage presence and a great talent of delivering sketch comedy peppered with hilarious one-liners. He has recently starred in a leading role in Wycliffe Kiyingi’s play Muduuma Kwe Kwaffe, held as part of the commemoration of 50 years of the existence of the National Theatre. Edwin acts with Theatre Factory and serves as Production Officer at the National Theatre.

Norman Mushemererwa (Ensemble/Music) has performed with various drama groups such as Kigezi Kinimba Actors, and Kigezi Universal Artists where he has been awarded prizes in Eskimo Johannesperg. He is currently performing with Nyonyozi Cultural Troupe. His goal is to become a better performer, and to provide for his family.

Tonny Muwangala (Silver) is famously known for his news reporting skills at NTV Uganda, and the satirical news segment “Point Blank.” Tonny is no stranger to the stage. A graduate of Drama, he has starred in various Pan African and Shakespearean plays over the past seven years.

Namagulu Rehema (Ensemble) performs in many stage performances in school, such as People’s Theatre at MDD. She has participated in “Rock Point,” a radio drama on KFM, as well as in the film “Down This Road I Walk.” Her goal is to be a successful comedian, a movie actress, and musician, of course after graduating and beginning a family!

Achola Rosario (Maria) has performed at the Albert Hall in London with over twenty groups singing the Brahms Requiem in unison. Her professional goals include stretching the limits of the imagination, and to be involved in projects that are not only informative and entertaining, but push story telling to the limits. She would like to thank the writer and director, as well as the amazing team.

Cooking Oil is made possible in part by the City of Los Angeles Department of Cultural Affairs,
the American Embassy in Uganda, and the support of many private individuals.