Emma Kikue is thrilled to be a part of Selected Shorts, reading such a beautiful story. Onscreen, she has appeared in Love Life, The Sinner, Bull, Instinct, Elementary, Madam Secretary, The Code, Braindead, and Josie and Jack. Her stage credits include God Said This at Primary Stages, Song of the Northwoods at Audible Theater Audio Play, what you are now at Ensemble Studio Theatre, and Fruiting Bodies at Ma-Yi. Kikuke will appear in the forthcoming film The Adults.

Iranian-born, award-winning actor Arian Moayed is the co-founder of Waterwell, a civic-minded and socially conscious non-profit art and education company. Moayed is the creator of the Emmy-nominated thriller The Accidental Wolf and the film adaptation of Waterwell’s The Courtroom, premiering at the Tribeca Film Festival this spring. He is currently at work on an autobiography about his family’s immigration journey. Notable acting credits: Broadway's The Humans (Drama Desk Award), Bengal Tiger at the Baghdad Zoo (Tony nomination), Guards at the Taj (Obie Award), Emmy-winning Succession (HBO), and Shonda Rhimes’ series, Inventing Anna (Netflix).

Jennifer Mudge most recently appeared in Molière in the Park’s Tartuffe (NYT Critic’s Pick), the indie horror feature The Requin with Alicia Silverstone, the world premiere of Will Eno’s The Plot at Yale Rep, and Actors Theatre of Louisville’s remote-capture Romeo and Juliet: Louisville 2020. On stage, she has appeared in Rocky, The Philanthropist, Reckless, The End of Longing, Into the Woods (Lucille Lortel Award nomination), Dutchman (Drama Desk nomination), and more. Film and television credits include The Irishman, The Surrogate, Twelve, Nostalgia, The Drummer, Beautiful Dreamer, My America, Shades of Blue, Boss, and Elementary. Producing credits include Broadway for Biden’s A Concert for the Soul of the Nation and NYCLU’s Sing Out for Freedom.

James Naughton has won Tony Awards as Best Actor in a Musical for City of Angels and Chicago. On Broadway, he directed the Tony-nominated productions of Arthur Miller’s The Price and Thornton Wilder’s Our Town, starring Paul Newman. He also directed the television production of Our Town for Showtime and Masterpiece Theatre. He has appeared in numerous films and television shows, including The Devil Wears Prada, Damages, The Paper Chase, Gossip Girl, Ally McBeal, Planet of the Apes, Hostages, Turks & Caicos, The Affair, The Tap, The Independents, The Romanoffs, The Accidental Wolf, and And Just Like That….

Denis O’Hare is known for his versatility and multiple roles on the series American Horror Story. His screen credits include Garden State, A Mighty Heart, Michael Clayton, Milk, The Comedians, Duplicity, The Good Wife, True Blood, The Normal Heart, Dallas Buyers Club, This Is Us, Big Little Lies, Lizzie, The Goldfinch, American Gods, Dr. Seuss' the Grinch Musical, The Postcard Killings, The Nevers, The Accidental Wolf, and Infinite Storm. He won a Tony Award for his performance in Take Me Out and a Drama Desk Award for his role in Sweet Charity. He is the co-writer and star of An Iliad, and co-author of The Good Book. O’Hare’s upcoming projects include The Nevers and American Horror Story.

Jenny Allen is a writer and performer whose works include the fable collection The Long Chalkboard and, most recently, Would Everybody Please Stop?, a finalist for the Thurber Prize for American Humor. She wrote and starred in the award-winning one-woman show I Got Sick Then I Got Better. Allen’s writing has been featured in several anthologies, including Disquiet, Please!: More Humor Writing from the New Yorker and The 50 Funniest American Writers, edited by Andy Borowitz.

Richard Bausch is the author of thirteen novels, including Hello to the Cannibals; Before, During, After; Peace; and the forthcoming Playhouse. He has published eight volumes of short stories, including The Selected Stories of Richard Bausch (The Modern Library); The Stories of Richard Bausch; Wives & Lovers: 3 Short Novels; Living in the Weather of the World; and, forthcoming, The Fate of Others. He has won a Guggenheim Fellowship, the Award of the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the PEN/Malamud Award for Excellence in the Short Story, and the REA Award, among others. Bausch teaches in the Writing Program at Chapman University.

Percival Everett is the author of more than 30 books, including Wounded, which won the 2006 PEN USA Literary Award; Erasure, winner of the Academy Award for Literature of the American Academy of Arts and Letters and the Hurston/Wright Legacy Award; Big Picture, winner of the PEN/Oakland-Josephine Miles Award for Excellence in Literature; Zulus, winner of the New American Writing Award; and the story collection Damned if I Do. His latest books are The Trees and Telephone, which was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. He is a Distinguished Professor of English at the University of Southern California.

Born and raised in Malaysia, Grace Shuyi Liew is a lesbian poet and fiction writer currently living in Brooklyn, New York. Her work has appeared in Kenyon Review, West Branch, Black Warrior Review, Best of the Net, and elsewhere. She has received awards from the Center for Fiction in New York, Squaw Valley Community of Writers, Atlantic Center for the Arts, and more. She is the author of the poetry collection Careen (Noemi Press, 2019), which has been named in Electric Literature’s 14 Unmissable Poetry Books of 2019 and Entropy magazine’s Best Poetry Books of 2019. Liew is writing a novel set in a gambling resort city in Malaysia.

Simon Rich is a frequent contributor to The New Yorker. He has written for Saturday Night Live, Pixar, and The Simpsons and is the creator of the TV shows Man Seeking Woman and Miracle Workers, which he based on his books. His other collections include Ant Farm, Spoiled Brats, and Hits and Misses, which won the 2019 Thurber Prize for American Humor. His latest book, New Teeth, was published in 2021.