Native Voices Presents 11th Short Play Festival: Home

Claude Jackson, Jr. (Akimel O’otham/Pee-Posh) is a member of the Gila River Indian Community. He is married to Lea, and they have three kids: Zaryk, Kaleb, and Naiya. Six of his plays were featured in previous Native Voices Short Play Festivals, including Cashed Out , which won the 2019 festival. Jackson co-wrote, co- produced, and co-directed a feature film, In Circles , which can be seen on Amazon Prime and other streaming outlets.

Alan Kilpatrick (Cherokee) currently lives in Belgium with his wife and their three dogs. He is the author of some 30 plays. His recent works include the award-winning short, Peetie’s Friend , filmed in 2019 by the Royal Birmingham Conservatoire, and his monologue, Amour-Propre , performed by the Troubadour Theatre. A live stage performance of his one-act, Hygiene , was performed this summer at the Lion and Unicorn Pub in London, as was his ten-minute comedy, Article 13, or How Manhattan Was Sold at the Adobe Theater, Albuquerque, New Mexico. His radio play, Tatiana, was produced by the Eclectic Full Contact Theatre, and his full-length audio play, Shade , recorded by the Springline Radio Players (Oxfordshire, U.K.), will be broadcast this fall.

Ryffin Phoenix (Navajo, Omaha) is a writer and performer. Born and raised on the beautiful lands of the Navajo Reservation, her passion for storytelling led her to train in the craft of acting. She has performed in several productions for Native Voices at the Autry, and her most recent performance was as Jacqueline in Rhianna Yazzie’s play Nancy for the Playwrights’ Center. Phoenix spends her free time writing short stories and screenplays.

Dustin Tahmahkera (Comanche) is the Wick Cary Chair in Native American cultural studies at the University of Oklahoma. As a critical-creative writer and scholar of sound, film, and theatre in Indian Country, he authored the books Tribal Television and Cinematic Comanches , a TED-Ed film about his relative Quanah Parker, and has written articles on Indigenous artists and media. Tahmahkera is currently writing a radio theatre series on borderlands relations between Comanches and settlers in the Comanchería.