Where is that intersection between theatre, education and engagement? 

How important are community and learning environments? 

Please join me in this amazing and raw conversation with Crystal Mercado, Artistic Director and Founder of Bocón Arts and Karen Ann Daniels, Director of Mobile Unit at The Public Theater in NYC. 

Links to what we talked about: 

Café Dionisio in Tijuana. 

Bocón Arts 

Onstage Playhouse 

More about our guests: 

Karen Ann Daniels is the Director of Mobile Unit at The Public Theater in NYC.  A native San Diegan, she is an accomplished actor, director, vocalist, and musician. In her prior role as the Associate Director of The Old Globe’s Arts Engagement, she program managed community partnerships and piloting and implementing key programs: Globe for All (the biannual tour of free plays across San Diego,) coLAB (devising original performances with community,) Community Voices (playwriting for new writers) and Reflecting Shakespeare (teaching Shakespeare in corrections facilities) across communities. She joined the Globe in 2013 after working in the technology sector and as a teaching artist and director with Studio East’s ArtsReach! program in Seattle. Karen Ann created marketing and event programs including large-scale trade shows, networking, and national recruiting events for Xbox, Halo, Windows Phone, Hardware, Server and other Microsoft Entertainment clients as well as for private entities, non-profits, and advertising clients. In 2019, her new musical, The Ruby in Us premiered as part of The Old Globe’s coLAB project, which was co-created with the Fourth District Seniors Resource Center in San Diego. Ms. Daniels served as a chair for the City of Chula Vista’s Cultural Arts Commission, held a seat on the Leadership Committee and was co-chair of Learning for the New California Arts Fund representing the future of community engagement for a cross-section of California arts organizations, via the James Irvine Foundation. She holds a B.A. in Art History from UCLA, an M.F.A in Musical Theatre from San Diego State, and a certificate in Shakespeare from the British American Drama Academy.  

Crystal Mercado is a proud native of San Diego California and the Artistic Director of Bocón, dedicated to empowering artists of all ages to create collaborative works of art that voice social perspectives on community stages. She is a theatre artist, director, facilitator, and educator passionate about the intersections of theatre and her community of San Diego. Crystal’s unswerving dedication and devotion to education has earned her a Master of Fine Arts in Theatre for Youth from Arizona State University and a BA in Children’s Theatre from San Diego State University. As the Co- Founder of TuYo Theatre, she served as the Co- Artistic Director. She co-wrote and co-directed Self-Conchas a new bilingual play for middle school. She directed Bodyguard: Protector of Anatomy (Creede Repertory Theatre), a bilingual play that toured to hundreds of schools across the American Southwest. She has worked as an artist in residence teaching theatre, creative drama, puppetry and theatre for social change in classrooms K-12 all over San Diego. Mrs. Mercado’s actions to create a dialogue and take actions around her community set a new precedent for how to engage community audiences through the many forms of storytelling and personal narrative is at the center of her artistic work and pedagogy. 

Photos of the Artwork by Reanne Acasio and Rich Soublet.