ABOUT
Photo by Katrin Talbot
Ariana is an actor, director, educator, and cellist currently based in southern California. She is the Artistic Director of the Incite Shakespeare Company Santa Fe, and teaches as a visiting instructor in the English and World Literature field group at Pitzer College in Claremont, CA. She previously taught acting technique at Colby College in Waterville, ME. Ariana is the producer and curator of Tabling: The Podcast, and Radio Shakespeare Lab, available on all podcasting platforms. In September 2019, she joined The Shakespeare Ensemble (curated by Ben Crystal) on a tour of Japan and performed Macbeth, Romeo and Juliet, and Hamlet in original pronunciation.
She has extensive teaching experience with a specific focus on empowering young people through ownership of Shakespeare’s language, textual analysis, creative problem solving, development of ensemble, and using movement to activate the text through the body. In addition to co-directing the Youth Shakespeare Festival Santa Fe from 2016-2019, she has also completed residencies and conducted workshops for actors of all ages throughout the US.
Ariana is an alumna of London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art (LAMDA) with a Masters degree in Classical Acting for the Professional Theatre. She received early theatrical training from Richard and Anne DiPrima at the Young Shakespeare Players in Madison, WI, a program that produces uncut Shakespeare with children ages 6-18. After receiving her BA in Literature-Theatre from Reed College, she returned to the Young Shakespeare Players as lead director and educator (2011-2012). She has made theatre in New York, London, Japan, Amesbury, MA, Waterville, ME, Portsmouth, NH, Santa Fe, NM, Portland, OR, and Madison, WI.
Besides classical theatre, Ariana also has a passion for playing cello, something she has enjoyed doing since the age of 5. Over the last five years she has incorporated original cello and vocal compositions into her theatrical work, writing the incidental music for The Winter’s Tale, Henry IV, Part I, King Lear, Twelfth Night, Chemistry, and The Enchantment. She was also a cellist for the Brooklyn-based progressive folk rock band, Satin Nickel.