©2019 Match: Lit

We are Match: Lit

 

Who We Are

The Company

 

Kristin Sgarro

Founding Artistic Director, Producer

Kristin is a New York City teaching and performing artist and musical director. With Match: Lit: Romeo (Romeo & Juliet), Emilia (Othello), Second Witch (Macbeth), Bianca (The Taming of the Shrew), Viola (BC: Twelfth Night), and Margaret (ISC: Henry VI, Part One). A graduate of Muhlenberg College in Allentown, PA, Kristin went on to New York City and pursued Shakespeare almost exclusively. She blames her teachers for this; their adoration for the work was too infectious. Selected New York credits: Mistress Page in The Merry Wives of Windsor, Viola in Twelfth Night, Helena in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Hermia in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Celia in As You Like It, and Queen Margaret in Richard III (Stag & Lion); several credits in AMIOS' SHOTZ! series; Macbeth: The Shakespeare/Beckett Axis (HB Studios/Christopher Martin); Love/Drunk (courtesy david h. rosen); Stella May in Come Back to the Five & Dime… and the poetry readings of Tennessee Williams (Regeneration Theater). Selected NY/PA Musical Director credits: Othello (Match: Lit); Iphegenia Among the Taurians (Everyday Inferno); At The Edge (NY Fringe); Captain Louie (Upper Darby Summer Stage - Philadelphia, PA); The Last Five Years, Assassins, A Year With Frog & Toad, Schoolhouse Rock: Live!, Alexander and the…Very Bad Day (Muhlenberg College). As a Teaching Artist: ASTEP (Artists Striving To End Poverty), RYSA (Refugee Youth Summer Academy, their joint program with the International Rescue Committee); Hunter College Elementary; After-School Programming at the Y (Upper West Side); and Wingspan Performing Arts. Her goal is that one day her students will blame her for spreading her own infectious enthusiasm.

Victoria M. Fragnito

Publicity Manager

Victoria is an actor, director, teaching artist, and playwright. With Match: Lit: Capulet (Romeo & Juliet), Maria (BC: Twelfth Night), Joan La Pucelle (ISC: Henry VI, Part One), and the Creative Ensemble (Nightcap). Victoria attended DeSales University and worked very closely with the Pennsylvania Shakespeare Festival, assistant directing many of their critically acclaimed productions (Midsummer, The Playboy of the Western World, South Pacific, Sweeney Todd, Romeo and Juliet with Rick Sordelet, and more), and touring with their WillPower program as Ophelia (Hamlet) and Hermia (Midsummer). Her debut play, Scar Tissue, was the first play selected for Match: Lit's New Words in a New Light reading series and has since had a successful workshop at Dixon Place's Works in Progress program. Scar Tissue was performed at The Old Joint Stock theatre in Birmingham, England as part of their Women’s History Month in March 2019. Victoria wouldn't be doing her job if she didn't tell you to follow Match: Lit on social media RIGHT NOW!

Nick Ritacco

Development Manager

Nick is a Chicago-born actor, artist, and athlete, and an avid White-Sox fan. He received his BFA from NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts where he studied at the Stella Adler School of Acting. Back in October of 2015, Match: Lit put out a casting call for roles in the company’s premiere production, Macbeth…and Nick answered. He appeared as an amalgamation of Ross, Lennox, Angus, and Donalbain, more commonly referred to as “Rolangus.” Thus, Nick and the company’s artistic paths became permanently intertwined, clubs could not part them. His other mainstage credits with the company include Petruchio in (Taming of the Shrew), Cassio (Othello), and Prince Escalus (Romeo and Juliet); along with Claudio (BC: Much Ado About Nothing) and, more recently, Orlando (BC: As You Like It). Some of Nick’s other favorite New York credits include Deployed (Pvt. Michael Dunalley), Devil and the Deep (Alan, Theatre East at Theater 3), Strictly Dishonorable (Giovanni, Attic Theater Co.), The Notebook of Trigorin (Yakov, Attic Theater Co.), Blue Balls (Jack, NY Rep/Dixon Place), and Scar Tissue (as Luke; original play written by fellow company member Victoria Fragnito). Nick can also be seen in co-star roles in recent seasons of Homeland and Law and Order: SVU. When he is not acting, Nick can be found reading a history book, playing sports, writing his own material, playing sports, listening to a good podcast, or playing sports.

Rudi Utter

Director of Education

Rudi is an actor and educator who originally hails from Minnesota. With Match: Lit: Friar Laurence (Romeo & Juliet), Macbeth (Macbeth), Director (BC: Twelfth Night, ISC Henry VI, Part One), Text Coach (The Taming of the Shrew, Othello). Over the past twenty years Rudi has become a bit of a Shakespeare specialist, working on dozens of productions as an actor, director, and text coach at venues such as the Guthrie Theater, the Shakespeare Festival of St. Louis, Trinity Repertory Company, and the Great River Shakespeare Festival. While working as a company member at GRSF, he developed a series of workshops to help audiences and actors alike to unlock and better appreciate Shakespeare's language. He continues to lead workshops and provide individual coaching for actors in Shakespeare performance, text analysis, and physical and vocal technique. He holds an MFA in Acting from Brown University/Trinity Rep.