About ATW
Leadership & Governance
Actors Theatre of Windsor
Organizational Structure: Not-for-profit Incorporated
On November 3, 2006 Letters Patent for Incorporation as a Not for profit entity were issued for Actors Theatre of Windsor.
Registered Charitable status application in progress: In June 2009, an application to achieve Registered Charitable Status with Revenue Canada will be submitted, in order to raise funds for the production of professional theatre and issue tax deductible receipts for contributions made to the company.
Actors Theatre of Windsor, Artistic Director & General Manager
Mona el Baroudi is the Artistic Director of Actors Theatre of Windsor, and the producer of the Windsor International Fringe Festival.. Mona is a trained acting professional (BFA Concordia & MFA York). She is a member of Canadian Actors Equity Association (CAEA) and the Association of Radio and Television Artists (ACTRA). Mona has directed a number of productions in Windsor over the past 10 years including : "Les Belles Soeurs" & "It's a Wonderful Life" for Theatre Windsor; The Vagina Monologues for the SACC"; and Inherit the Wind"," 12 Angry Men", & "To Kill A Mockingbird" as Legal Benefit Productions for ATW.
Mona has been living in downtown Windsor for the past 10 years, with her husband and co-founder Gordon Mackenzie and their two daughters, Jacqueline and Mercedes. They have both been active working in theatre, film and multi-media respectively, in Ontario and Michigan during this time.
Actors Theatre of Windsor Board of Directors
Kenneth Shawn Marley, CHAIR ATW Board of Directors
Criminal Lawyer, Windsor, Ontario
Ken is a criminal defense lawyer with offices in Windsor and Kingsville. An avid theatre goer, Ken has worked tirelessly to advocate for the importance of developing full-scale professional theatre in the Windsor-Essex region, and has come to see the virtues of smaller scale theatre through his work on the Windsor Fringe.. Ken has experience on stage, behind the scenes with ATW and has acted on legal matters for ATW. He has held the key leadership role at Actors Theatre of Windsor since 2008. Ken join the ATW board of directors when ATW became not for profit incorporated in 2006.
Ken is an alumnus of the University of Windsor and is and has been an active member of several other Not-for-profit entities in the support of education and theatre over the past 10 years, and he lives in Kingsville with his wife Diane, and their two daughters Janine and Emil.
Gordon Alistair Mackenzie, SECRETARY ATW Board of Directors
Manager E-Learning Systems, BBDO Windsor, Windsor Ontario
Gordon has helped developed one of the most largest and most comprehensive global online learning systems as a manager first at BBDO Detroit in Troy Michigan and now at BBDO Windsor. Gordon is also veteran professional actor who has appear in a wide range from children theatre to restoration productions, from Toronto to Vancouver. Gordon has appeared in every legal benefit since ATW's inception. Gordon appeared at the 2009 Windsor Fringe in the role of "James Joyce Mulligan" in ATW at the Fringe show.
Adam Folio , TREASURER, ATW Board of Directors
Business School Student, University of, Windsor, Ontario
Adam is a graduate of the School of Business of the University of Windsor, who hails from Missies, Ontario and who has settled here in Windsor. Adam first began volunteering for ATW in the summer of 2007, when he was part of a CBAR team doing research into grants for the inaugural Windsor Fringe. "I just decided I wanted to stay involved to see the first Fringe happen!"...and he has not looked back since!
Adam is now a veteran of two Windsor Fringe Festivals, working on the finance side of the event. He enjoys supporting the festival as much as he enjoys attending it. Adam works with ATW year round to ensure the ATW as a regional professional theatre company, and the International Windsor Fringe will be sustainable well into the future.
Victoria Cross, TREASURER, ATW Board of Directors
Lawyer, Cross and Lessard, Windsor, Ontario
Victoria Cross is a lawyer in general practice in Windsor. She also teaches at the University of Windsor. As a teenager, Victoria took Stanislavsky Method classes, memorized monologues and one-liners, performed roles in school and community theatre, as an avid thespian in youth. Victoria worked as a waitress, writer, union public relations staff member and a Member of Parliament’s political assistant before heading for the Bar. Victoria brings her a wide range of arts knowledge from theatre to folk music and politics to ATW. Victoria has assisted in writing, and negotiating a range of artist, vendor contracts for ATW, as well as co-production agreements and she has appeared on stage as in the 2006 & 2009 Legal Benefits for ATW.
Victoria is married and lives in Windsor with her husband Len.
Denise Ghanam, PhD (ABD), CHRP, Director, ATW Board of Directors
Principle, GCl Strategy www.gcistrategy.com , Windsor, Ontario
In her work for GCI Inc Strategic Management Consulting, drawing on more than twenty years of broad business experience, and her recent six years teaching full-time at the Odette School of Business, University of Windsor, in management studies. She has assisted a wide variety of organizations with issues related to effective human capital utilization and focused planning. She holds an Honours Commerce degree in finance from St. Mary's University in Halifax, and an M.B.A. from Windsor in strategic planning. She is currently completing her doctoral thesis at the UWE Bristol Business School in England. She has served as the first chair and founding member of the Windsor-Essex Equity Network, as chair of the Board of Governors for St Clair College, and as Vice Chair of the Association for Colleges of Applied Arts and Technology of Ontario. Her community service work also includes two terms as the chair of a school council, and ongoing service with the Windsor Fire Department Benefit Fund and as Director of her church folk choir.
Denise is married with three teenage children (and still alive to tell the tale!!). She resides in Windsor, Ontario, but has not forgotten her East Coast roots, which is also part of connection and interest in theatre, as her sister Suzanne Jacob, is a working Professional actor in Halifax.
Ex Officio
Stephen Richards, CA
Volunteer Accounting for ATW
Auditor
Kenvin Hague CA, ATW Auditor
Popp Parete Russo LLP
Past ATW Board Members
Barbara Peirce Marsahall, Director, ATW Board of Directors
Freelance Communications and Marketing Manager
Kristina Lynne Verner Past Chair
Project Officer, Connecting Windsor Essex Portal TM , Windsor, Ontario
Jennifer Pilsoon Verellen Past Treasurer
Product Engineer, Quality Safety Systems Company, Windsor, Ontario
Michael Plunkett
Plunekett's Bar& Grill, Windsor, Ontario
Rev Mary Templer
Minister University Community Church, Windsor, Ontario
Actors Theatre of Windsor Advisory Board
VALERIE BONASSO
Artistic Partner, Breathe Art Theatre Project (Director & Technical Producer)
JULIA BURGESS
Trustee for Kingsville & Essex, Greater Essex District School Board
SERGIO FOREST
Technical Production Manager, Windsor Fringe
RACHEL KAIMAN
Actor, Member Canadian Actors Equity Association
KATHERINE KASZAS
Director Music Theatre Performance, St. Clair College
DIANA MADY KELLY
Professor Emeritus, University of Windsor
PHYLLIS LEWIS
Professional Actor, Windsor Ontario
ELANOR PAINE PIOTROWSKI
Independent Theatre Director/Producer, Windsor Ontario
BRIAN RINTOUL
Professor School of Drama, University of Windsor
STEPHANIE ALLEN SANTOS
Program Coordinator, Migration Hall Kingsville.
Management Style
We regularly table ideas to see if they will stand the scrutiny of team we assemble to work with us, as we be live this will allow us to identify the best way forward at a given time. We select and value our artistic, producing and business team members for their degree of competence in their specific ares of expertise, and aim for an open, and consultative management style to encourage our internal and external customers to follow their instincts and take risks in a supportive and fun-filled environment.
Our Inspiration
" I start with the premise that the function of leadership is to produce more leaders, not more followers."
- Ralph Nader
"Be the change you want to see in the world"
- Gandhi
"It don't mean a thing (if it ain't got that swing)"
- Duke Ellington and Irving Mills