BOB ADER – has been a professional actor and performer for over 65 years. Broadway Credits

include All the Way Home. Regional Theatre: Shlemiel the First (TFANA), Laughter on the 23rd Floor (Flatrock Playhouse), Tin Pan Alley Rag (Cleveland Playhouse), and many others. Off Broadway: Jayson, Coulda Woulda Shoulda and two Drama Desk nominated musicals for the Folksbiene Yiddish Theater, The Golden Land & The Golden Bride. TV: Law & Order, Criminal Intent, Unsolved Mysteries, David Letterman, Saturday Night Live, One Bad Choice (MTV), Red Oaks (Amazon Prime) Billions (Showtime), Goosebumps (Disney +). Film: It’s Complicated. Bob has also created and performed in two successful cabarets shows, Harry Who? (The Songs of Harry Warren) & One Degree of Judy Garland (who Bob worked with).

ASHLEY ADLER is thrilled to be back with NYTF after years! She was recently heard in Pixar’s smash Hoppers, and is the voice of the Disneyworld Annual Pass, the Make-A-Wish Foundation, & the Narrator of Disney Dreamlight Valley. Other credits include The Witch on Hulu’s Solar Opposites, Marvel’s What If…?, Final Fantasy VII: Rebirth, Cartoon Network’s We Bare Bears, Eliza in Final Fantasy Brave Exvius, and the star of two of Netflix’s top 10 projects- Glitter & Brick. Ashley’s voice matched over 25 actresses in films such as Vice, Captain Marvel & Inside Out. She’s been a vocalist at the Hollywood Bowl, Greek Theatre, Wolftrap Opera, and was lead singer in the only Klezmer band to perform at Disneyland, Mostly Kosher. She’s also performed at NY City Center, The Town Hall & The Signature Theatre. She is an Adjunct Professor at SUNY Purchase’s prestigious Acting Conservatory and a Guest Lecturer at Emerson College. 

KIRK GERITANO (Mendl) is grateful to be aboard for Di Yam Gazlonim! Kirk is honored to have appeared in many Folksbiene productions since 2017, the most notable being their Drama Desk award-winning production of Fiddler on the Roof in Yiddish, directed by Joel Grey. He was an original cast member, playing Avrom for the entire New York run, and played Motl in the 2025 West Coast premiere at the Soraya in Los Angeles. Kirk also performs in English from time to time, having recently played John Wesley Harvey in a new musical, Silent Strength, which premiered at the New York Theater Festival last winter and earned him a nomination in the festival’s “Best Singer” category. Offstage, Kirk is an Acting & Improv teacher at Rockstar! Studios in Middlesex, NJ, and is a published youth playwright with Pioneer Drama Service. Much love to the cast, crew, and entire Folksbiene team!

HANNAH MADELEINE GOODMAN, hailed for her “adept coloratura,” “exquisite dynamics,” and “riotous physical comedy,” is thrilled to be making her National Yiddish Theatre Folksbiene debut. Originally from Oregon, her credits span opera, musical theater, concert work, and television. Opera highlights: Fort Worth Opera, Portland Opera, Los Angeles Opera, Opera Vermont. Musical theater: La Mirada, New Musicals Inc. Concert: Philadelphia Orchestra, Bangor Symphony Orchestra, Suzhou Symphony Orchestra. TV: Glee. She has toured internationally with Echoes of Ancient Tang Poems and the iSING! International Festival, performing the work in London, Beijing, Philadelphia, and NYC since 2023. An active performer of Jewish music, she has also served as guest cantorial soloist for Congregation Shma Koleinu in Houston since 2018. Young Artist: 2024-25 Fort Worth Opera, 2019 iSING! International Festival. Awards: 2023 Camille Coloratura Awards semifinalist, 2024 American Traditions Competition quarterfinalist, 2025 Anna Sosenko Assist Trust grant recipient. Love to Logan. www.hannahsopranah.com 

JACKIE HOFFMAN is best known for her Emmy-nominated performance as ‘Mamacita’ in FX’s Feud: Bette and Joan. Her selected television credits include And Just Like That…, Best Medicine, Only Murders in the Building, andThe Marvelous Mrs. Maisel. Film credits include Netflix’s Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery. On Broadway, Jackie has co-starred in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, On the Town, The Addams Family, Xanadu, and Hairspray. Off-Broadway, she starred as ‘Yente’ in the critically acclaimed Yiddish production of Fiddler on the Roof and as ‘Princess Winifred’ in Transport Group’s Once Upon a Mattress, earning a Drama League Award nomination. Her solo album, Live at Joe’s Pub, is available for streaming. jackiehoffman.com | @jackiehoffman16

STEPHANIE LYNNE MASON (Ensemble) is thrilled to hop aboard this ship. NYTF credits include Fiddler on the Roof in Yiddish (Hodl) directed by Joel Grey. Amerike, the Golden Land (Gussie) and Di Kishefmakherin (Mirele) in 2017. She was also seen in the 2016 Broadway revival of Fiddler on the Roof, where she covered the principal daughters. She toured the country as Dyanne in Million Dollar Quartet and was recently featured in the U.S. premiere of Mythic, directed by Tony Award winner Kathleen Marshall. Favorite roles regionally include Carole King in Beautiful, Trina in Falsettos, Guenevere in Camelot, and Louise in Gypsy. Special thanks to Zalmen, Motl, Joe and Allen. @stephanielynnemason 

ELI MAYER – Eli is ecstatic to be singing with his Yiddishe Mishpokhe once more. Previously with the Folksbiene: Tsvishn Falndike Vent/Amid Falling Walls, 2024 Gala performer. Other credits include: Fiddler on the Roof (Atlanta Opera/Alliance Theatre), King James (Pioneer Theater), Willard in Footloose (The Muny, MSMT); Mischa in Ride the Cyclone (Arena Stage, McCarter Theater); Reuven in The Chosen (Milwaukee Rep, Cincinnati Playhouse); Rob in The Book Club Play (Cincinnati Playhouse); Jeremy in Indian Summer (Bay Street Theatre); TV: Power Book II: Ghost on STARZ; CCM MT. @elimayermaynot; much love to family and friends! 

ANNABEL PARKER is thrilled to make her mainstage debut at the Folksbiene. She has long dreamed of performing with the NYTF— the only company in the world where being an opera-singing Yid is totally normal. In 2025, Annabel and Zalmen performed a program of Yiddish Operetta and Theater Music in Israel, and the TES Fest in Bucharest, Romania. Other recent credits include Lauretta in Giacomo Puccini’s Gianni Schicchi (NYU), and Almirena in G. F. Handel’s Rinaldo (Jerusalem Lyric Opera Studio). Annabel’s visual art can be seen in NYTF’s “Pearls of Yiddish Song” Episodes 4 and 12, in the scenic backdrops for NYTF’s 2026 production of The Megile of Itzik Manger, and on her website, allthingsannabel.com. She would like to thank her parents, voice teachers, Zalmen, and Hashem.

JOHN REED Born in Houston, Texas and raised in Melbourne, Australia, John Reed is a New York City based actor, dancer, singer and choreographer. Australian theater credits: Funny Girl, Merrily We Roll Along, Jesus Christ Superstar, Songs for Swingin’ Lovers, Action/Riff understudy in West Side Story on Sydney Harbour, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Much Ado About Nothing, Romeo and Juliet and King Lear. John made his Off-Broadway debut in Amid Falling Walls for the National Yiddish Theatre Folksbiene. Regional credits: Guys and Dolls, Something Rotten, Fiddler On The Roof, A Chorus Line, Tootsie, 42nd Street, Fiddler On The Roof In Yiddish directed by Joel Grey, and most recently, Charley Kringas in Merrily We Roll Along and Billy Flynn in Chicago. For Dad and Sluggo.

ALLEN LEWIS RICKMAN (Director/Co-adapter/Supertitles/“Der Groyser General”) For Folksbiene he adapted, directed and wrote supertitles for The Lady Next Door, for A Novel Romance, and for the Drama Desk-nominated Yiddish Pirates of Penzance (from Al Grand’s original). Other directing credits include The Big Bupkis (New Yiddish Rep), the online Dybbuk (Congress For Jewish Culture), his translation of the Yiddish melodrama Money, Love, and Shame (Target Margin), and his co-written musical Christmas at the Small Empire (Centenary Stage Co.). He also directed and co-produced Tevye Served Raw, which played to rapturous reviews and sold-out houses Off-Broadway. 

Acting credits include the Coen brothers’ Oscar-nominated A Serious Man (for which he also translated the Yiddish dialogue), John Turturro’s Fading Gigolo (with Woody Allen), Boardwalk Empire (recurring role), Tom McCarthy’s The Cobbler (with Dustin Hoffman), Barry Levinson’s You Don’t Know Jack (with Al Pacino), The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel (as Red Skelton), Steven Spielberg’s Public Morals (recurring role), etc.  On Broadway: Relatively Speaking (with Marlo Thomas). Off-Broadway: Mack and Mabel (Encores!), Schnitzler’s Far and Wide (Mint), So Help Me God! (Lortel), Theda Bara and the Frontier Rabbi (JRT and York), etc.  Regionals: Cleveland Playhouse, Paper Mill, Two River, et al.  He has also performed at the Royal National Theater in Stockholm, the International Samuel Beckett Festival in Ireland, the Dresden Staatsschauspiel, the State Jewish Theater of Romania, and at Carnegie Hall.

He is also an internationally-produced playwright and translator. His co-written farce Off the Hook has been produced in Paris, Copenhagen, Luxembourg, Madrid, and Iceland, has been optioned for further European productions, has had three regional productions stateside, and was published in French in L’Avant-Scene Theatre; and his revue The Essence: A Yiddish Theater Dim Sum has toured widely and was published in the anthology “Yiddishkeit”. His translation of Paula Prilutski’s One of Those was published in the anthology “Yiddish Plays By Women”, and he wrote subtitle translations, an essay, and did commentary tracks for The Jewish Soul, Kino/Lorber’s box set of restored Yiddish movies.

DREW SEIGLA Richmond, VA native Drew Seigla is a standout among theatre and opera audiences, recognized for his “stunning tenor voice” by BroadwayWorld.com.  Off-Broadway:  Matt; The Mute in The Fantasticks; Anthony/Tobias/Beadle Standby in Sweeney Todd at Barrow St. Theatre, & Pertshik in Fiddler on the Roof in Yiddish at Stage 42 & New World Stages where he can be heard on the Original Cast Album.  Opera:  Gastone in La Traviata & Le Remendado in Carmen at Lyric Opera Virginia; Bruno in the world premiere of Ricky Ian Gordon’s The Garden of The Finzi-Continis with NYC Opera.  Last Spring Drew made his Carnegie Hall debut as a solo vocalist in “Few Words,” composed and conducted by Bryan Perri.  Education:  The Juilliard School B.A. in Music from the Vocal Arts Division & Elon University majoring in Music Theatre.  Special thanks to Dad, Mom, God, his teachers, and his wife, Steph.  IG:  @drewseigla

ADAM B. SHAPIRO has been seen Off-Broadway in Death of a Salesman, The Mikado, Bastard Jones, Wikimusical, and since 2008, he has been a fixture of the National Yiddish Theatre Folksbiene, in The Golden Bride, The Megile of Itzik Manger, Gimpel the Fool, and most especially, the Drama-Desk and Outer Critics Award winning Fiddler On The Roof in Yiddish, in which he played The Rabbi and understudied Tevye and Lazer Wolf. Other theatre credits include The Producers (Max), The Prom (Barry), Ragtime (Tateh), Titanic (Strauss), Young Frankenstein (Hermit), and She Loves Me (Head Waiter). Film/TV credits include The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, 30 Rock, Master of None, FBI Most Wanted, and HBO’s Emmy-winning film The Normal Heart, among others. Adam is also a MAC Award winning solo performer and released his debut EP “Let Love In” in 2021. www.adambshapiro.com

YELENA SHMULENSON grew up in Ukraine and emigrated with her family in the 1990s. Instead of getting a real job, she decided to become an actress, and now spends her life making silly faces. She fought a dybbuk in the Coen brothers’ A Serious Man, she was a gangster’s wife on Boardwalk Empire, a doctor on Chicago Med, a spy in Madam Secretary and Robert DeNiro’s The Good Shepherd, Juliet’s mom in Romeo & Juliet in Yiddish, and she’s been in and out of prison on Orange is the New Black. Stage credits include The Golem of Havana (Miami New Drama), The Essence: A Yiddish Theatre Dim Sum, Tevye Serve Raw, etc. Yelena is also a dialect coach/translator for numerous projects and an audiobook narrator. She did five shows with the Folksbiene, including the original Di Yam Gazlonim — and is very excited to return to shpringen tsvishn berg un shteyner. 

STEVE STERNER appeared on Broadway in Oh, Brother! and Yiddle With a Fiddle, Off-

Broadway in That’s Life!, Kuni Leml and Vagabond Stars, and in a plethora of plays and

musicals for Soho Rep, Jewish Repertory Theatre, National Yiddish Theatre Folksbiene, Penguin Rep, and other theaters around the country. He succeeded Julius La Rosa as the star of The Spectacular Days Of Radio at Trump Plaza in Atlantic City, and for years was the voice of the singing fire hydrant on ABC-TV. Steve is also the house pianist for silent films at the Film Forum, where he has written music for and accompanied over 300 films. As a puzzle maker, his crosswords and acrostics have appeared in the NY Times and other publications.

Zalmen Mlotek is a pre-eminent authority on Yiddish folk and theater music and an internationally-acclaimed expert on contemporary Yiddish culture. As Artistic Director of the National Yiddish Theatre Folksbiene (NYTF), his visionary leadership brought the award-winning and critically acclaimed Fidler Afn Dakh (Fiddler on the Roof in Yiddish), directed by Joel Grey, to New York City and beyond.

Under his direction, the city’s annual New York Sings Yiddish, presented at Central Park’s SummerStage, has become a highlight of the city’s cultural calendar, drawing a diverse and engaged audience. 

Mlotek is the co-creator of Those Were The Days, the first bilingual musical on Broadway, which earned two Tony Award nominations. His other acclaimed works include On Second Avenue and The Golden Land, both nominated for Drama Desk Awards. The Golden Land toured internationally under the sponsorship of one of Mlotek’s most influential mentors, Leonard Bernstein.

Mlotek has played a key role in reviving and preserving the richness of Yiddish theater, overseeing groundbreaking productions such as the world premiere of Isaac Bashevis Singer’s Yentl in Yiddish, Di Yam Gazlonim (a Yiddish adaptation of Gilbert and Sullivan’sThe Pirates of Penzance) , and a revival of the 1923 Joseph Rumshinsky operetta The Golden Bride.

An active performer in Europe and Israel, Mlotek is also a highly sought-after musical collaborator for recordings, concerts, television, and film. His credits include consulting for PBS programs such as The Thomashefskys, produced by Michael Tilson Thomas, and Itzhak Perlman: In The Fiddler’s House.

His recent musical Amid Falling Walls (Tsvishn Falndike Vent), created in collaboration with his son Avram, features songs composed in ghettos, camps, and cabarets during World War II. Many of these songs were drawn from his mother’s landmark collection, We Are Here—the first-ever English-language anthology of Yiddish Holocaust songs. This past June, an adapted documentary version of Amid Falling Walls became available for streaming on WNET All-Arts.

Under Mlotek’s leadership, NYTF received a special Drama Desk Award for its contributions to New York City theater. The company has earned over ten Drama Desk Award nominations and four Lucille Lortel Award nominations during his tenure and last year’s sold-out production of Hannah Senesh at Manhattan’s Theatre Row, (presented in English) garnered stellar reviews. The company is now in its 111th season, with a rich array of productions and performances. For more information about NYTF’s upcoming season, please visit NYTF.org.