100 Shades of Green Presents THE FOURTH MESSENGER World Premiere, 2/6-3/10

Tanya Shaffer's (Playwright/Lyricist/Producer) plays have been produced by Berkeley Repertory Theatre, San Diego Repertory Theatre, A Contemporary Theatre, TheatreWorks, and the Eureka Theatre, and have toured to more than 40 cities nationwide. Her solo show Let My Enemy Live Long! ran for six sold-out months in the Bay Area and was awarded a Bay Area Theatre Critics Circle Award for solo performance. Her play Baby Taj, which premiered at TheatreWorks in 2005, was selected by the San Francisco Chronicle, the San Jose Mercury News, and the Oakland Tribune as one of the Top Ten Shows of the Year and nominated for a National Theatre Critics Association Steinberg Award for the best play to premiere that year outside of New York City. It has since been published by Samuel French, Inc. She's also the author of the critically acclaimed travel memoir, Somebody's Heart is Burning: A Woman Wanderer in Africa. Her stories and essays have appeared on Salon.com and in numerous anthologies. Ms. Shaffer is currently a resident playwright at Playwrights Foundation. tanyashaffer.com

Vienna Teng (Composer/Lyricist) is a singer, songwriter and pianist who has released four studio albums and one live album on the Virt and Rounder labels. Her albums Waking Hour and Warm Strangers both reached the top five of Amazon.com's bestseller list, and she won the 2010 Independent Music Awards' Vox Pop vote for her album Inland Territory. She has appeared on The Late Show with David Letterman, NPR's Weekend Edition, CBS's Early Show, and CNN's News Night with AaRon Brown, and has toured with Joan Baez, Brandi Carlile, Duncan Sheik, Madeleine Peyroux, Joan Osborne, Sarah Harmer, Marc Cohn and the Indigo Girls, among others. In addition to her performing and composing career, Vienna is currently studying at the Erb Institute for Global Sustainable Enterprise at the University of Michigan, and will graduate with an MBA/MS this May. She is a native of Saratoga, California, and holds a Computer Science degree from Stanford University. viennateng.com

Matt August (Director) directed the Broadway, Los Angeles and Nationally Touring productions of Dr. Seuss' How the Grinch Stole Christmas! The Musical. This production broke Broadway box office records both in 2006 (Hilton Theatre) and 2007 (St. James Theatre) and continues to tour the country each holiday season. He was recently nominated for the prestigious Helen Hayes Award for outstanding direction for the original musical LiberTy Smith, which premiered at Ford's Theatre, in Washington DC. Los Angeles Times hailed his production of Two Gentlemen of Verona for San Diego's Old Globe Theatre as one of the Top Ten Productions of the Year. Other directing credits include the Australian production of The Full Monty (Helpmann Award nomination for Best Director); Sixteen Wounded, starring Martin Landau, for the Long Wharf Theatre; Pig Farm, Food Chain and Time Flies for the Old Globe Theatre; Two Gentlemen of Verona and Merry Wives of Windsor for The Acting Company (off-Broadway and touring productions); and many others. Mr. August directed the world premiere of Tanya Shaffer's play Baby Taj at TheatreWorks in 2005. His short film How to Get to Candybar is currently touring the film festival circuit. It has played the Manhattan Film Festival, the Monaco Charity Film Festival, and the Cape Fear Independent Film Festival, winning the Best Comedy Award.