Evan Jackson (Director) serves as the Artistic Director of Idle Muse Theatre Company, a position he has had the honor of holding since the company’s inception. He has directed 12 previous productions for Idle Muse, including The Lion in Winter and Sherlock Holmes: The Final Adventure (both Jeff-Recommended). In past seasons, he directed Idle Muse’s production of The Hound of the Baskervilles. Recently with Idle Muse, he directed The Talking Cure and Rites and Sacrifices, a world premiere by Chicago playwright Jennifer L. Mickelson. Other directing credits include Enchanted April, The Scullery Maid, and The Veil. He was also director and co-adaptor of Shotgun Shakespeare: What the Weird Sisters Saw with Idle Muse Literary Director Tristan Brandon. Outside projects include several short plays as a participating the Martin de Maat New Works Festival at Boxer Rebellion Theatre, and two summers serving as Assistant Director for Shakespeare on the Green in Lake Forest. Evan is a graduate of The Theatre School at DePaul University, where he received his MFA in Directing.

Bill Cain is an American playwright and author of How to Write a New Book for the Bible, which premiered in the 2011-2012 season at Berkeley Repertory Theatre and Seattle Repertory Theatre. His play 9 Circles was awarded the Sky/Cooper Prize by Marin Theatre Company where it received its world premiere production. It has been produced around the country including theaters in Boston, Denver and Los Angeles. His playEquivocation received its world premiere production at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival and its New York premiere at Manhattan Theatre Club, as well as being produced at the Geffen Playhouse (Ovation Award for Best Play), Seattle Rep, Marin Theatre, and Arena Stage.

Other works include Stand-Up Tragedy, which earned six LA Critics Awards (including best production and distinguished writing) for its premiere at the Mark Taper Forum before moving around the country and eventually to Broadway, four Helen Hayes Awards, (including Production of the Year), a Writers Guild nomination for the screenplay and the Joe A. Callaway Playwriting Award for the Broadway production. Screen credits include the series “Nothing Sacred” (co-creator/writer/producer) which aired on ABC, an adaptation of “Clover” for the Hallmark channel and HBO, “Nightjohn,” which was named best American film of the year by “The New Yorker,” “Thicker Than Blood” (TNT), which was an adaptation of Stand-Up Tragedy, “Everything That Rises” (starring Mandy Patinkin), “Papa’s Angels” (starring Scott Bukula, Cynthia Nixon, and Eva Marie Saint), and “Sounder.”

Additional Awards include: Steinberg New Play Award (first ever recipient two years in a row), multiple Edgerton grants, a Peabody, the WGA Award for Episodic Drama and a Christopher Award. “Nothing Sacred”: the George Foster Peabody Award for Outstanding Achievement as co-creator, writer and producer of the ABC-TV series. His work for television has won Writers Guild, Humanitas, Christopher and Alma awards, among others.

He is the founder of the Boston Shakespeare Company, where he was Artistic Director for seven seasons, directing most of the Shakespeare canon.