AUTHORS

Brad Carroll is a recognized regional theatre director, music director, and composer whose work has taken him all over the world. Mr Carroll is perhaps best known nationally and internationally for his work as composer for Lend Me A Tenor: The Musical, which celebrated a successful run at the Gielgud Theatre on London’s West End and is currently enjoying first class productions throughout Germany, Russia, Poland, and in select cities across the United States. He is the co-creator of the new musical, Christmas Is Here Again, based on the animated feature by Robert Zappia. Other produced works include Sherlock Holmes and the Great Royal Goose Chase for the Hunterdon Hill Playhouse in Hampton, NJ; A Christmas Carol: On The Air for the Utah Shakespeare Festival; Amelia Lost (librettist) with composer, Larry Delinger; Cio Cio San, a new opera-theatre piece (composer/arranger); Christmas Is…A Musical Memory, and Robin Hood. Musical scores composed for dramatic productions—Cyrano De Bergerac, King Lear, As You Like It, Measure for Measure, Death of A Salesman, and To Kill A Mockingbird. Also, writer, director, and musical arranger for Walt Disney Entertainment, TokyoDisneySea. As a director, Brad’s work has been seen at such places as PCPA-Pacific Conservatory Theatre, Utah Shakespeare Festival, Phoenix Theatre, Shakespeare Festival St. Louis, and more. He is currently Resident Artist/Artistic Associate for the Pacific Conservatory Theatre (PCPA) in Santa Maria, CA.

Charles Dickens (Author of A Christmas Carol) created some of literature's best-known fictional characters and is regarded by many as the greatest novelist of the Victorian era. His works enjoyed unprecedented popularity during his lifetime, and by the 20th century, critics and scholars had recognized him as a literary genius. His novels and short stories are widely read today. Dickens's literary success began with the 1836 serial publication of The Pickwick Papers, a publishing phenomenon. Within a few years, Dickens had become an international literary celebrity, famous for his humor, satire and keen observation of character and society. His novels, most of them published in monthly or weekly instalments, pioneered the serial publication of narrative fiction, which became the dominant Victorian mode for novel publication. Cliffhanger endings in his serial publications kept readers in suspense. The installment format allowed Dickens to evaluate his audience's reaction, and he often modified his plot and character development based on such feedback. For example, when his wife's podiatrist expressed distress at the way Miss Mowcher in David Copperfield seemed to reflect her own disabilities, Dickens improved the character with positive features. His plots were carefully constructed and he often wove elements from topical events into his narratives. Masses of the illiterate poor would individually pay a halfpenny to have each new monthly episode read to them, opening up and inspiring a new class of readers. His 1843 novella A Christmas Carol remains especially popular and continues to inspire adaptations in every creative medium. Oliver Twist and Great Expectations are also frequently adapted and, like many of his novels, evoke images of early Victorian London. His 1853 novel Bleak House, a satire on the judicial system, helped support a reformist movement that culminated in the 1870s legal reform in England. A Tale of Two Cities (1859; set in London and Paris) is regarded as his best-known work of historical fiction. The most famous celebrity of his era, he undertook, in response to public demand, a series of public reading tours in the later part of his career. The term Dickensian is used to describe something that is reminiscent of Dickens and his writings, such as poor social or working conditions, or comically repulsive characters.

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (Creator, Sherlock Holmes) was born on 22 May 1859 at Picardy Place, Edinburgh. Doyle was educated in Jesuit schools and later studied at Edinburgh University, qualifying as a doctor in 1885. After graduation Doyle practiced medicine until 1891, when he became a full time writer. Creativity was apparent in Doyle’s ancestry: his grandfather was a famous caricaturist and his uncle was a well-known illustrator. Doyle’s father was an architect, designer and book illustrator. Doyle himself was an admirer of Edgar Allan Poe and Emile Gaboriau.In developing his own literary character, Doyle based Sherlock Holmes on Doctor Joseph Bell, a surgeon and teacher he had studied with while attending Edinburgh University. Dr. Bell had the uncanny ability to reveal a patient’s symptoms, diagnose patients and report on their origins before they would speak a word to him about their afflictions. Sir Henry Littlejohn, who taught forensic medicine to Doyle also made a large impression and contributed to the development of Holmes’ character.As far as Holmes’ name, his last name may have been based on American jurist and fellow doctor Oliver Wendell Holmes and his first name may have come from Alfred Sherlock, a prominent violinist of his time. Dr. John Watson, a fellow Southsea doctor and Portsmouth Literary and Scientific Society member who served time in Manchuria, received the honour of having Holmes’ partner named for him.Doyle worked backwards from the solution of a case to create his stories. A Study in Scarlet was his first story and novel and introduced the characters of Holmes and Watson and included how they met. A Study in Scarlet was written in three weeks in 1886 and published in 1887. The second Sherlock Holmes story, The Sign of the Four, was written for the Lippincott’s Magazine and the later stories appeared in the Strand Magazine. By 1893 Doyle had tired of Holmes and killed him off in the The Final Problem. In the story Holmes meets Moriarty at the fall of the Reichenbach in Switzerland and disappears. Nevertheless, public demand and a lucrative income brought the return of Holmes, with stories appearing until 1927.The characteristics that make Holmes attractive to readers: his integrity, trustworthiness, sensibility, rational decisiveness, lack of emotionalism, and intellectual superiority are measured and reported by Watson. Watson (a doctor like Doyle), brings humanity to Holmes, who without Watson’s sympathetic telling, would come off cold, inaccessible and unpleasant. “It may be that you are not yourself luminous,” Holmes tells Watson, “but you are a conductor of light. Some people without possessing genius have a remarkable power of stimulating it.” Doyle’s other publications include non-fiction, plays, verse, memoirs, short stories, and several historical novels and supernatural and speculative fiction. The Lost World is perhaps the best known of his other fictional works.

Brandon Scott Grayson is a New York based composer, lyricist, music director, and orchestrator for the theatre. He earned a Master of Arts in Writing and Production for Musical Theatre from BerkleeNYC, as well as a Bachelor of Interdisciplinary Studies in Musical Theatre Composition & Performance from Southern Utah University.  Brandon’s work has been heard at Berklee Power Station, 59E59 Theaters, Edinburgh Fringe Festival, Utah Shakespeare Festival, Majestic Repertory Theatre, Creede Repertory Theatre, and Southern Utah University. His major compositions include Madame X  and The Brain That Wouldn’t Die. Others include bloodline, Clown Bar 2, Pizza Boy, Best Foot Forward!, As You Like It, Minutes: A Song Cycle, and Heart of the West. In addition to his compositional work, Brandon has served as a music director, arranger, and orchestrator for many productions in New York City, Las Vegas, and Utah. He currently serves as a Staff Accompanist and Music Director at CAP21/Molloy University, and he previously served as the Resident Music Director and Accompanist for Southern Utah University's Department of Theatre Arts and Dance. Brandon is a proud member of The Dramatist's Guild.

Ken Ludwig may well be the most performed playwright of his generation. He has had six productions on Broadway and eight in London’s West End. His 34 plays and musicals are staged throughout the United States and around the world every night of the year. They have been produced in over 20 languages in more than 30 countries, and many have become standards of the American repertoire. His first play, Lend Me a Tenor,was produced on Broadway and in London by Andrew Lloyd Webber. It won two Tony Awards and was called “one of the classic comedies of the 20th century” by TheWashington Post. Crazy For You was on Broadway for five years, on the West End for three, and won the Tony and Olivier Awards for Best Musical. It has been revived twice in the West End and is currently touring Japan. Since its European premiere at Chichester Festival Theatre in 2022, Ludwig’s adaptation of Agatha Christie’s Murder on the Orient Express has had hundreds of international productions. In addition, he has won the Edwin Forrest Award for Contributions to the American Theatre, two Laurence Olivier Awards, two Helen Hayes Awards, the Charles MacArthur Award, and the Edgar Award for Best Mystery of the Year. He was also nominated for an Emmy Award for writing the Kennedy Center Honors. His other plays include Moon Over Buffalo; Leading Ladies; Baskerville; Sherwood; Twentieth Century; Dear Jack, Dear Louise; A Fox on the Fairway; A Comedy of Tenors; The Game’s Afoot; Shakespeare in Hollywood; and Moriarty. They have starred, among others, Alec Baldwin, Carol Burnett, Tony Shaloub, Joan Collins, and Kristin Bell. His most recent world premieres were Lend Me A Soprano and Moriarty, and his newest plays and musicals include Pride and Prejudice Part 2: Napoleon at Pemberley, Lady Molly of Scotland Yard,Beginner’s Luck,and Easter Parade. He has been commissioned to write plays by Agatha Christie Limited, the Royal Shakespeare Company, The Old Globe Theatre, and the Bristol Old Vic.

Kirsten Sham is the co-author of Toyland. She has served as a professor of movement and dance in Southern Utah University’s Department of Theatre, Dance, & Arts Administration. Her recent choreography includes BTC’s inaugural hit, Pump Boys and Dinettes, and SUU-TDAA productions of The Prom, Legally Blonde: The Musical, Toyland, Chicago: The Musical, and Bat Boy. For nine seasons Kirsten served as director/choreographer of the Tony Award winning Utah Shakespeare Festival’s The Greenshow, creating 27 original 45-minute outdoor, musical pre-shows between 2005-2015. In that span, Kirsten also served as USF’s choreographer and movement coach, staging dances and movement for 20 main-stage, festival productions. Before moving to Cedar City, Kirsten served as director of The Academy at EPAC, a professional training program for dance, music, and acting at the historic Eichelberger Performing Arts Center in Hanover, PA. Before that she served as choreographer and principle dancer for Hunterdon Hills Playhouse in Hampton, NJ, choreographing numerous musicals and revues. Her career as a dance instructor and choreographer spans over 30 years and includes teaching assignments at Broadway Dance Center, Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, and Steps in New York City; The Eleanor Connell School of Dance in Annandale, NJ; as well as teaching and assisting on various workshops throughout Paris and Morocco. Kirsten has taught a variety of movement techniques on the East Coast and in Utah, including Ashtanga yoga, Pilates, aerobic kick boxing and she is the creator and developer of her own intensive stretch technique. An Interlochen National Music Academy dance scholarship winner at a young age, Kirsten attended Walnut Hill School of the Performing Arts and studied ballet, tap, hip-hop and jazz extensively in New York, NY as the protégé of Cecelia Marta and with such renowned master teachers as Frank Hatchett and Peff Modelski.

Peter Sham is perhaps best known nationally and internationally for his work as bookwriter/lyricist for Lend Me A Tenor: The Musical (Brad Carroll, composer), which celebrated a successful run at the Gielgud Theatre on London’s West End and is currently enjoying first class productions throughout Germany, Russia, Poland, and in select cities across the United States. Peter is currently at work on two other musicals planned for the West End, To Catch A Thief, based on the David Dodge novel which was made into the Academy Award winning Hitchcock classic starring Cary Grant & Grace Kelly, and The Ghost & Mrs. Muir, from the novel by R.A. Dick which was also adapted into a classic film, directed by Joseph Mankewicz, and starring Gene Tierney & Rex Harrison. Peter wrote the book and lyrics with Brad Carroll (composer) for the Hunterdon Hills Playhouse world premiere musical comedy, Sherlock Holmes and the Great Royal Goose Chase. He is also the author of the musicals One Night Only, Toyland, and It’s a Dog’s Life: Man’s Best Musical; the plays, A Christmas Carol: On the Air, its sequel Frankenstein: On the Air, Shakespeare’s Moby Dick, a classical adaptation of Herman Melville’s American novel, and Twinkle, Twinkle, Killer Kane, with William Peter Blatty (The Exorcist), adapted from Mr. Blatty’s Golden Globe Award-winning Best Screenplay. Peter has also written the screenplays, Somewhere, The Playhouse, and Hag. Peter wrote and directed the feature horror film, Far Remote, which garnered an Honorable Mention at the prestigious HorrorFest International Film Festival in 2021. He is also in development on A Penny Urned, a 9-episode television streaming series, written with Roger Bean, author of The Marvelous Wonderettes series, Life Could Be A Dream, and more. Peter holds an MFA in Acting from the University of Delaware’s acclaimed Professional Theatre Training Program, and for the past 20 years, he’s served as professor of theatre at Southern Utah University. Peter is the recipient of the Utah Shakespeare Festival’s Michael & Jan Finlayson Award for Acting; an SUU Thunderbird Award-winner for Professor of the Year; a recipient of SUU’s Scholar of the Year Award; a recipient of SUU’s highest honor, The Board of Trustees Award for Excellence; and has garnered national recognition as the recipient of the Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival’s Excellence in Education Award.