What is Penguin Productions?
Penguin Productions unites youth leadership and adult mentorship to co-create theater and cultivate a healthy, equitable, thriving future through:
-Empowering confident, thoughtful youth leaders
-Making invigorating, inspiring, joyful theater
-Creating diverse, inclusive spaces where everyone belongs
-Nurturing artistic discovery and growth
-Providing cost-free programming
Meet the Penguins
Shana Bestock
Shana is a writer, educator, theater artist, and non-profit leader based in Seattle, WA. She has directed over 200 productions with youth ensembles and overseen over 120 professional productions. Shana works with both classic and contemporary texts, and has commissioned, produced, and directed many world premieres.
As the Producing Artistic Director, and founder, of Penguin Productions, Shana facilitates creative adventures in community arts to fuel the future with a focus on youth development and leadership, gender equity, and environmental justice. She is also ACT Theatre’s Artistic Associate, Education. She is also a Fulbright Specialist, working internationally at the intersections of theater, social justice, and community building. She was a member of the ArtEquity cohort of 2016-17 and of the Leadership Tomorrow Class of ’21, engaging with cross-sector leaders around regional issues through an equity lens. From 2001-2016 Shana served as Seattle Public Theater’s Artistic and Education Director. Through her creative and community work, she strives to increase our capacity to connect, reflect, and create in order to make a more curious, compassionate and creative world.
To learn more about Shana, visit www.shanabestock.com
Kyle Gerstel
Kyle is a passionate writer, director, performer, and producer. He is a sophomore at Mercer Island High School, where he performs with the drama program and serves on the editorial board of the school newspaper, The Islander. He firmly believes in the importance of innovative, equitable storytelling in theatre, journalism, film, and literary arts. In the past, he served on the Penguin Advisory Council, co-founded Penguin’s Youth Playwright Cohort, wrote for Finding Trails, assistant directed Metamorphoses, and co-directed The Sasquatch Society. As Penguin’s Producing Artistic Associate, he strives to increase access to arts education and produce more new work by teen playwrights. Outside of his work with Penguin, Kyle spends his time directing, editing articles for the TeenTix Blog, and getting made fun of for his love of Walter Isaacson’s biography of Steve Jobs.
Production History
Penguins Who Took Flight
Anna Klein, Sarah Albertson, Kyna Shilling, Kayla Brooks, Bella Zhou, Noelle McCabe, Linda Yan
Sara Albertson
Kayla Brooks
Anna Klein
Eileen MacDonald
Noelle McCabe
Kyna Shilling
Linda Yan
Bella Zhou
