Brian Yorkey (Writer) received the 2010 Pulitzer Prize for Drama, the 2009 Tony Award for Best Score, and the Outer Critics Circle Award for Next to Normal and was also nominated for the Tony Award for Best Book of a Musical. He partnered again with the Next to Normal team on If/Then(Tony Award Nominee for Best Score) starring Idina Menzel. Brian co-wrote the libretto for The Last Ship (Outer Critics Nomination, with John Logan), with a score by Sting. He wrote lyrics for the Disney Theatricals musical adaptation of Freaky Friday, which also became a Disney Channel Original Movie. Brian most recently served as the Executive Producer and Co-Showrunner for the Netflix series Echoes. Prior to that, Brian was the Creator, Executive Producer and Showrunner of 13 Reasons Why for Netflix and Paramount Television. He has also directed for theatre and television. Brian is a graduate of Columbia University, where he was artistic director of the Varsity Show, an alum of the BMI/Lehman Engel Musical Theatre Workshop and a proud member of the Dramatists Guild, the WGA, and the DGA.

Pascale Florestal¹, she/her/hers (Director and Choreographer) is a first generation Haitian American Queer Woman. She is an Elliot Norton Nominated Director, Educator, Dramaturg, Choreographer, Writer and Collaborator based in Boston, MA. Recent Directing Credits: MidSummer; Kinda? Written and Directed by Pascale Florestal at Suffolk University, World Premiere of Phaedra Michelle Scott’s DIASPORA! With New Repertory Theater, Magic Flute with MassOpera, Fairview with SpeakEasy Stage, Spring Awakening at Brandeis University, The Colored Museum with The Umbrella Performing Arts Center, Once On This Island with SpeakEasy Stage, This Girl Laughs, This Girl Cries, This Girl Does Nothing with Emerson Stage, Everybody with Boston Conservatory and others. As an Assistant to the Director she has worked with Timothy Douglas, Liesl Tommy, Billy Porter, Paul Daigneault and M. Bevin O’Gara. Pascale served as the Associate Director to Gil Rose on X:The Life and Times of Malcolm X with Odyssey Opera and Kimberly Senior on Our Daughters, Like Pillars at The Huntington Theater. Pascale also serves as the Associate Director for The Broadway National Tour of Jagged Little Pill. Pascale was named one of the WBUR ARTery 25 Artists of Color Transforming the Cultural Landscape in Boston. In 2020 she won the Inaugural Greg Ferrell Award for her excellence in teaching and supporting young people. She serves as the Director of Education for The Front Porch Arts Collective in residence at The Huntington Theater. She is an Assistant Professor of Theater at Boston Conservatory at Berklee College of Music and Visiting Guest Artist Professor in Practice in the Theater at Suffolk University. SDC Union Member

Cassie Chapados she/her/hers (Director) is a director and educator from Wisconsin, who has lived in the Boston area for the past ten years. As a director, the majority of her work has been on new plays and she is thrilled to be making her Central Square Theater mainstage debut with the world premiere of Beyond Words. Recent directing credits include honeyhole (Moonbox New Works Festival); Inventing Samanta (Central Square Theater); Something Rotten, She Kills Monsters (Watertown Children’s Theater), and The Space Between Us (Boston Theater Marathon). When not directing, Cassie is the Technical Supervisor for the Theater, Dance, and Media program at Harvard University, an avid reader, and a lover of all kinds of yarn crafts.