Archives

Elana Fishbein is a performer and instructor at the Magnet Theater in New York City. She can be seen performing with her house team Ariana Grande, the Armando Diaz Experience, Magnet Theater Touring Company, and her solo improv show, Pepita. She has been featured at the Boston, Charleston, Chicago, Eau Claire, Edmonton, Omaha, Philadelphia, and Women in Comedy Festivals. Her two-woman play, Sisters Three, was a New York Times Critics Pick.

Elana has written and performed for The Truth Podcast and appeared on BBC America’s “Almost Royal,” SiriusXM Radio’s “Absolutely Mindy!” as well as in the original musical comedies “Girl Camp” and “Nightfall on Miranga Island.” She is a member of Story Pirates, a non-profit arts-in-education organization that takes stories written by kids and adapts them into hilarious sketches and songs. Elana is featured in the documentary short, “LMAO,” about the therapeutic potential of laughter and comedy.

Elana directs the Magnet Theater Youth Program and has taught improv for corporations, non-profits, and educational institutions all over the U.S., Canada, Scandanavia, South Africa, and more. She also co-created two professional development workshop series for teachers: “Beyond Winging It: Improv in the Classroom” and “Play.”

Elana earned her M.A. in Educational Theater from NYU and her B.A. in Drama from Vassar College. Her favorite succulent is jade.

Bianca Casusol is a performer based out of New York City. You can find her acting like a maniac on stage with her house teams SheWolf and The Friday Night Show. She’s been lucky enough to teach at the Magnet Theater, DSI Comedy Theater, and the North Carolina Theater Conservatory, and to learn from every person she’s ever played with. When she’s not doing make believe, she’s turning children’s short stories into sketches as a touring member of The Story Pirates or trying to pet every animal. Her work has been featured on The Truth podcast, Hot Mic with Dan Savage, Risk!, Bust Magazine, and Reductress. Please let her pet your dog.

Armando is widely regarded as one of the best improv teachers in New York City and beyond. His list of teaching credits is a long one: the ImprovOlympic Theater, Victory Gardens Theater, The Upright Citizens Brigade Theater, NYU and Michael Howard Studios. He has trained dozens of actors who have performed or written for “Saturday Night Live,” “Late Night with Conan O’Brien,” “Mad TV,” and “The Daily Show.”

A Chicago native, Armando studied improv under Del Close at the ImprovOlympic, Mick Napier at the Annoyance, and graduated from the Second City Conservatory. He performed in and helped create one of the most popular improvised long-form shows in Chicago, “The Armando Diaz Experience….” For the last decade, “the Armando” has been performed weekly in Chicago, and is now taught and performed in many other cities including Los Angeles and New York.

In addition to writing and producing short films, Armando wrote sketches for the show “Upright Citizens Brigade” on Comedy Central, and has performed on “Late Night with Conan O’Brien.”