James Wallert

James Wallert is a New York City-based actor, playwright, director, and producer. He is co-founder and Associate Artistic Director of Epic Theatre Ensemble, an Off-Broadway theatre company in its seventeenth season that creates bold new work with and for diverse communities to promote vital discourse and social change. As an actor, James has recently appeared in Richard III, Dispatches from (A)mended America, and Macbeth Off-Broadway, as well as the upcoming feature film Ambition’s Debt. In 2015, James received a Smithsonian Fellowship at the National Air and Space Museum to research his play Ad Astra which will receive its world premiere in 2018. He directs the Epic Next touring shows Laundry City (an exploration of educational segregation) and Building Blocks: Colorful Minds (an analysis of current science education and diversity in STEM fields). Since Co-Founding Epic Theatre Ensemble in 2001, James has curated and administered Epic’s Forum Series (funded by the New York Council for the Humanities), serving over 25,000 audience members. He is currently the lead teaching artist and site manager at Chelsea Career and Technical Education High School, where he oversees Epic’s sequential learning program.