Arun’s love of acting goes way back to when he would perform William Wallace narration pieces from Age of Empires II to amuse his family at parties. It took two decades and a detour into studying neuroscience at the University of Toronto before those little spores of performance mania truly took hold, but he now counts himself firmly in the clutches of the dramatic arts. He has had the enormous privilege of performing on historic Toronto stages like Theatre Passe Muraille and Alumnae Theatre, the gateway of indie Montreal theatre at the Mainline, the Conservatory, the Segal Centre, and most recently the Centaur Theatre. Over the past five years, he has diversified his performance media, gaining the opportunity to be a part of three TV shows (Future Man, The Bold Type, About Sex). Most recently, he has dived deep into the exciting world of voice performance in animation and video games, and he hopes that in the next five years he might have the opportunity to wade deeper into this rich and exciting field. He hopes you enjoy the show!

Shaharah Gaznabbi (They/Them) is an Indo-Guyanese-Canadian ACTRA actor, writer, & comedian. They are currently pursuing a BFA in Playwriting & Devised Theatre in York University’s Theatre program. Shaharah is part of this year's cohort for Nightwood Theatre’s Innovators Program, as well as Tarragon Theatre’s Young Playwrights Unit. They’ve also graduated from Second City Training Centre’s Conservatory Program. Shaharah performs Stand-up and Sketch comedy around Toronto, performing with Asian-Infused Sketch group “Crunchy Tigers Comedy”. Shaharah recently finished a full run of their solo-show “What Can Indian Look Like? Can It Look Caribbean?” at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, and received The Neurodiverse Review’s Birds of Paradise Theatre Emerging Artist Award. They have also made their television debut playing the character of Noor in season 3 of CBC’s Run the Burbs!
If you wish to connect with Shaharah or find more of their work, you can check them out on Instagram @huckkingfilarious …ROAAAAAAR!!!

Matt is so excited to jump back into the jungle! Matt is an Indo-Canadian actor and director hailing from Tiohtià:ke/Montreal currently working and living in Tkaronto/Toronto. Matt is a graduate of both Dawson College in Montreal and Randolph College for the Performing Arts in Toronto. Selected Credits: Twelfth Night, Alice In Wonderland (Shakespeare By The Sea), New Canadian Curling Club, Robin Hood: The Great Escape, Brimful of Asha, Ben Hur (Festival Antigonish), Fabulous Lipitones (Miracle Theatre), Les Moutons (Corpus), Hydrofoil Mystery (Theatre Baddeck). Matt has had the pleasure of being with the JB team since it's inception in 2018, playing houses like Cleveland Playhouse, Asolo Rep., Pasadena Playhouse, Symphony Space and so many more. IG @IS_That_MattLacas 

Navtej Sandhu is a Toronto-based actor, born in the United States; she is also an emerging screenwriter and singer. Her most recent acting credits include Karna/Satyavati in Mahabharata directed by Ravi Jain at the Barbican Centre in London England, after a successful run at the Shaw Festival earlier in 2023. Navtej is also an intermediate actor combatant and is now in the process of getting her advanced actor combatant at Rapier Wit. She hopes to be able to tell her story and amplify the voices of communities that have had their voices constantly stifled. Navtej’s goal is to continue to create and be a part of projects that she believes in, and that speak to those communities. “Any form of art is a form of power; it has impact, it can affect change – it can not only move us, it makes us move.”- Ossie Davis

Craig Francis (he/him) is a writer, director, illustrator, and multidisciplinary creator. His shows have toured Canada and the US, including Off-Broadway in 2016 and 2019. A founding member of The 20K Collective, Craig co-created Twenty Thousand Leagues Under The Sea, Game of Clones, Jungle Book, and HANS: My Life In Fairy Tales with Rick Miller; and FRANKENSTEIN: A Living Comic Book with Miller and Paul Van Dyck. He's a producer, dramaturg, and stage manager for Miller's solo trilogy (BOOM, BOOM X, and BOOM YZ) in Canada, the US, France, and Taiwan. Craig co-directed a workshop of the musical Blocked (TheaterWorksUSA), and is a mentor of emerging artists, including co-authoring Redwood Avenue with Andrea Friesen. New projects include CYNIC, and The Time Machine. Craig is a speaker on LGBTQA2S+ issues. He performed improv comedy with Just For Laughs, CBC, CTV and Showtime. His videos with Kidoons and not-for-profits are installed in museums in six provinces. Craig lives in Montréal, has illustrated several books, and voiced animated series.

Rick Miller (he/him) is a Dora and Gemini award-winning writer / director / actor / musician / educator who has performed in five languages on five continents, and who Entertainment Weekly called “one of the 100 most creative people alive today”. He has created and toured solo shows such as the BOOM Trilogy (BOOM, BOOM X, and BOOM YZ), MacHomer, Bigger Than Jesus and HARDSELL; and family shows with Craig Francis and Kidoons, such as Twenty Thousand Leagues Under The Sea, Jungle Book, and FRANKENSTEIN: A Living Comic Book. With Robert Lepage, he has collaborated on Geometry of Miracles, Zulu Time, Lipsynch, and on the film Possible Worlds. Current projects in development include MONEY, HANS: My Life in Fairy Tales, and The Time Machine. Rick hosts an intergenerational podcast called Xing The Gap, and sometimes teaches an interdisciplinary class at the University of Toronto called The Architecture of Creativity. He lives in Toronto with his partner Stephanie Baptist. www.rickmiller.ca

Jeff has a lifelong passion and vision for combining art and technology to develop original works. His projects are inspired by a love of storytelling and innovation. Through Kidoons theatrical productions and digital works on the Kidoons Network, Jeff's artist collaborators help organizations to tell their stories onstage and online. He works with Not-for-Profits and corporate clients across Canada and the United States with a vision to inspire and empower all generations. He dedicates his work on this play to his mother, Evelyn Lord.

Melanie is a Toronto-based set, costume, and puppet designer who has worked extensively with Eldritch Theatre, Videocabaret, and Théâtre français de Toronto. Other companies include Second City, Soulpepper Theatre, Theatre Gargantua, YPT, Obsidian Theatre, Mirvish Productions, Theatre 20, ProArte Danza, Driftwood Theatre, and many more. She also works in TV, mostly in French, including Production Designer for Échappe-toi si tu peux. Melanie has received two Dora Awards, three other Dora nominations, a Prix Rideau, and a nomination for the 2015 Prix d’Excellence artistique (Arrière-Scène). Melanie is a graduate of Ryerson Theatre School, and a member of ADC.

Irina is a creative artist, graphic designer for print and web, and video production artist. She has worked on multimedia campaigns for Performing Arts Centers across Canada and the U.S. and managed event marketing campaigns ranging from The Joy of Dance Studio Toronto to TELUS Skins. Irina has been a longstanding multimedia collaborator with Rick Miller and Craig Francis, including assisting on onscreen media projections for MacHomer, Twenty Thousand Leagues Under The Sea, and Game of Clones. Recent work includes branding and projections media design for BOOM X and BOOM YZ, for which she was nominated alongside Rick Miller and Nicolas Dostie for the Betty Mitchell Award for Outstanding Projection or Video Design. Irina is the multimedia designer for Jungle Book, Frankenstein, and upcoming projects Andersen Fairy Tales and The Time Machine. As a web and video production artist, Irina is the designer and production editor of the Kidoons Network animated series.

Rebecca is a Toronto based lighting designer. Theatres and Dance companies include: Adelheid (Heidi Strauss), The Blyth Theatre, Buddies in Bad Times, Canadian Rep, Factory Theatre, GCTC, Tarragon Theatre, RMTC, National Arts Centre, Mammalian Diving Reflex, Volcano, Theatre Passe Muraille, Mirvish, HUM (Susanna Hood), Zata Omm (William Yong), Nightwood, nightswimming. She has received 3 Dora awards and many nominations for outstanding lighting design.
 

A stalwart and consistent presence in the Canadian sound world, Debashis Sinha has realized projects in radiophonic art, sound art, theatre, dance, and music across Canada and internationally. A winner of 2 Dora Awards for Best Original Sound Design, his credits include productions with: The Stratford Festival, Soulpepper Theatre, The Shaw Festival, Why Not Theatre, Peggy Baker Dance Projects, The Theatre Centre, Nightwood Theatre, Young People’s Theatre, Theatre Passe Muraille, Tribal Crackling Wind, Project Humanity, Volcano Theatre and Necessary Angel, among others. His live sound practice on the concert stage has led to appearances at MUTEK, the Guelph Jazz Festival, the Banff Centre, The Sound Symposium, ISEA, Madrid Abierto, and other venues. Sinha releases The White Dog on Berlin record label Establishment in early June, 2018. www.debsinha.com
 

DORA award-winning, JUNO-nominated world/fusion vocalist Suba Sankaran has effortlessly combined musical worlds, performing in over 20 countries across 6 continents with Autorickshaw, master drummer Trichy Sankaran, FreePlay (a cappella/live-looping) and Retrocity (80s a cappella revue). Performance highlights include performing for Peter Gabriel, Nelson Mandela and Archbishop Desmond Tutu, and performing with Jane Siberry, Lorraine Segato, Bobby McFerrin and The Swingles. Suba is in demand as a vocalist, choral director, arranger, educator, composer and sound designer. She has composed and produced music for theatre, film, radio and dance. Highlights include collaborations with Deepa Mehta, the CBC and working for two seasons at the Stratford Festival. Theatre composer/sound design credits include Stratford Festival, (Komagata Maru Incident; The Aeneid), Soulpepper (For Coloured  Girls…;Tiger Bamboo Festival), Cahoots Theatre (The Enchanted Loom), Tarragon Theatre (Much Ado About Nothing); Nightswimming Theatre (Same Same, But Different); Nightwood Theatre (The  Penelopiad), Nightswimming/Cahoots Theatres (Bombay Black).
 

Siobhan Richardson is a certified Fight Director (Fight Directors Canada) and an internationally-respected instructor, and has taught stage combat across Canada, USA and Europe. In all her work, Siobhan is dedicated to the growth and development of the art form, the artists and our workplaces in order to support a vibrant and healthy artistic community. She’s also an intimacy director, a pioneer voice in this specialty across Canada, and an award-winning performer. Recent Credits include:

• Fight Director:  Knives in Hens (Coal Mine Theater), Getting Married (Shaw Festival), The House of Martin Guerre (Canadian Musical Theatre Projects), The Penelopiad (The Grand Theatre), The Model Apartment (Harold Green Jewish Theatre Company), A Christmas Story (The Grand Theatre), Frankenstein’s Boy (Eldritch Theatre)
• Intimacy and Fight Director: The Unnatural and Accidental Women (NAC Indigenous Theatre and NAC English Theatre), Sex and The Russian Play (Shaw Festival), Guarded Girls (Tarragon Theatre), Four Chords and a Gun (Starvox Entertainment), The House of Martin Guerre (Canadian Musical Theatre Projects)

www.SiobhanRichardson.com
instagram: @fighteractress
youtube: www.youtube.com/actorsr
 

Levin is thrilled to be reprising his role as Mowgli after playing runs at Asolo Repertory and Pasadena Playhouse. Levin was brought up in Sugar Land, TX and is now working and living out of New York City. Most recently Levin also originated the role of ‘Gobind’ in the new musical Bhangin’ It with the La Jolla Playhouse, ‘Dharun Ravi’ in the new musical Poster Boy with the Public Theater and with Williamstown Theater Festival and also the role of ‘Lottery’ in Monsoon Wedding at Berkeley Repertory Theater. Levin has also played Man 1/Monty in Gentleman’s Guide to Love and Murder at Florida Studio Theater. Levin has also played ‘Bob’ in the musical The Fabulous Lipitones at the New Theatre, Virginia Repertory Theater, and at The Florida Studio Theater. Film credits include the short film Thoughtless. He is trained at the Steppenwolf Theater School, Boston Conservatory, and Berklee College of Music. He wants to thank his mom, dad and brother for their endless support and love! “For the strength of the pack is the wolf, and the strength of the wolf is the pack!”

Mina James is an actor, improviser, and writer. Select credits include, Puppeteer in 1991 (Theatre Center/RISER Festival), Ensemble in the 2018 Diversity Fellowship Showcase (Second City), Helena in All’s Well That Ends Well (Canadian Stage/Shakespeare in High Park), Kristyna in Paul Dunn’s Outside (Roseneath Theatre), Ensemble in Blood Wedding (Aluna Theatre/Modern Times Stage Company), Ensemble in Antigonick (SummerWorks Festival). Film: Auroras (Dir. Atom Egoyan). Mina trained at the International Actor’s Fellowship at The Globe in London, England in 2013. Mina would like to thank her partner Jake and her doggo, Annie for always supporting her.

Tahirih Vejdani is a Toronto based actor, singer, composer, music educator and conductor originally from Regina, Saskatchewan. She graduated from the University of Regina with a Bachelor of Music double majoring in Vocal Performance and Music History. Select theatre credits include: HMS Pinafore, Treasure Island, The Pirates of Penzance, Elektra (Stratford Shakespeare Festival); Portia’s Julius Caesar (Shakespeare in the Ruff); The Men in White (Factory Theatre); Taming of the Shrew (Driftwood Theatre); Much Ado About Nothing (Tarragon Theatre); The Hobbit, Shrek The Musical, Honk! A Musical Tale of the Ugly Duckling (Globe Theatre); Paradise Lost (Summerworks Festival); Shakespeare Meets Hip Hop (Shakespeare in Action). Select film/TV credits: Kim’s Convenience, Let it Snow, InSecurity. As an educator, Tahirih teaches for the Center for Indigenous Theatre, Shakespeare in Action and the Regent Park School of Music. Follow her on Instagram to keep up to date on various projects! @tahirihvejdani

Anita is an award-winning actress, playwright and dancer. She attended the National Theatre School of Canada and has over 20 years of dance experience with formal training in kathak, bharatanatyam and odissi dance forms. Her acting debut in the film Murder Unveiled won her the Best Actress award at the Asian Festival of First Films in Singapore. She also appeared in Deepa Mehta’s adaptation of Salman Rushdie's Midnight's Children, which premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival. In playwriting, Anita holds Canada’s Governor General's Protégé Prize in playwriting and was nominated for the Betty Mitchell Award for Outstanding New Play and Outstanding Performance for her play Same Same But Different. Her Fish Eyes Trilogy was published with graphic illustrations by Playwrights Canada Press, and her play Boys With Cars received Dora Mavor Moore Awards for Outstanding New Play and Outstanding Performance. In 2017 she completed her Masters of Arts in Theatre and Performance Studies and began developing a solo YouTube/Instagram series called "YesWeCandice".
 

Miriam Fernandes is an international actor, director, and theatre-maker. Acting credits includeAnimal Farm (Soulpepper Theatre), Prince Hamlet (Why Not Theatre), Dinner with the Gods (Wolf and Wallflower, Sydney AU), the World Premieres of The Snow Queen and A Sunday Affair (Theatre New Brunswick),  The Living (Summerworks Performance Festival), Soliciting Temptation (Tarragon Theatre), and The Biographer (Tango Co.).  She has trained with the SITI Company, and is a graduate of Ecole Internationale de Théâtre Jacques Lecoq in Paris. Miriam is the co-artistic director of YVA Theatre, an international company of artists from France, Norway and Canada. In 2017 she directed their inaugural production, Nesen, in the MiniMidiMaxi Festival in Bergen, Norway, and is currently in development for their new show, The First Time I Saw the Sea.  Miriam is the recipient of the Canada Council’s JPC Watkins award, the Imasco Performing Arts Award, and a Chalmers Professional Development Grant.  
 

Natalia is a Dora Mavor Moore nominated actress and a graduate of Sheridan Institute’s Musical Theatre - Performance program. Past credits include Fatima Al-Sayed in The New Canadian Curling Club (Victoria Playhouse Petrolia), Pandora in Lysistrata and the Temple of Gaia (Odyssey Theatre), Mary Lennox in The Secret Garden (Young People’s Theatre – Dora nomination for outstanding performance), Anjali in Beneath the Banyan Tree (Theatre Direct), Marcy Park in The 25th Annual…Spelling Bee (The Grand Theatre),  Pepper in Annie (YPT) and Sister Mary Leo in Nunsense (Harbourfront Theatre).

James Kendal is a freelance technician, carpenter and artist currently working in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. His long and varied career in performance began as a youngster with classical training in voice, violin, and 10 years as a classical ballet dancer. James has expanded his skillset into the realms of lighting, audio and video design, and carpentry along with stage and production management throughout the past decade. James has worked on many acclaimed and award-winning productions including - Really Big World, Sousatzka, Comfort by the Red Snow Collective, Legends of Horror at Cast Loma with Hit & Run Productions, The perfect word In/Future festival with Peggy Baker Dance Projects, Messiah Against the Grain Theatre, Steer Zata Omm Dance Projects amongst others. James looks forward to bringing Kidoons/WYRD Productions Jungle Book to the world with this wonderful cast and crew.

Much of Andrew’s recent work as been with Video Cabaret on their productions of “To Good To Be True”, “Confederation parts 1 and 2”, “The Great War”, “Trudeau and Levesque”.  Other recent credits include:” Cliff Cardinal’s CBC Special”, “The Second City Guide to the Symphony”, “Krapp’s Last Tape” with Theatre Passe Muraille, “Stellavision”  With Stella Walker in Keno City, Yukon.