Sally Banks lives in the borough of Newham and has been a regular visitor and supporter of Stratford East for over 22 years. She has been a Board Member for 14 years and a previous Chair of the Board. Sally works in local government as a Manager in Newham Social Services and has extensive knowledge of the issues in the borough.

Clint started out at Stratford East as an actor with the Youth Theatre at 15 and worked his way up the ranks on stage and off culminating in acting for Mike Leigh and then starring in Barrie Keeffe’s Sus. Clint has acted extensively on TV, Film and in Theatre over the last 20 years including EastEnders, Prime Suspect II, Linda La Plante’s Commando, Inspector Linley Mysteries, Lock Stock, etc, and films like Shopping, The Low Down, Everyone Loves Sunshine, Mr In-between and Cherps. Clint’s directing work was born out of the Theatre Royal’s Directors Course which led him to directing two plays at the Soho Theatre Company, were he also worked as a reader. He was also part of the original Musical Theatre Workshop Committee and attended the Tisch School in New York to help build the Musical Theatre Workshop that has been going for five years. Since then he has directed three musicals for Stratford East with MTW graduates and 2 successful showings of The Big Life. Clint recently finished his first film script which he sold to Scala Films with Nick Powell to produce, who was responsible for British hits like Mona Lisa, The Crying Game and Little Voice. He is also making his Directorial film debut on a short film entitled Pukka.

Tony Hall became Chief Executive of the Royal Opera House in April 2001. He set up ROH2, a department under the former ballerina Deborah Bull, devoted to supporting new artists, and developing new audiences. He set up new initiatives to widen access to the Opera House - including big screen relays out of London, Paul Hamlyn weekends, and Travelex £10 Mondays. He has also brought new funding into the Royal Opera House – from the Arts Council, individuals and outside companies. Until 2001, he was Chief Executive BBC News; launched Radio 5 Live, Britain’s first 24 news and sport radio, BBC News 24, BBC News Online and BBC Parliament. He built the BBC news-gathering network to be a world beater. At present he is also a non-executive Director of H M Customs and Excise Board, and a non-executive Director of the Board for University for Industry. In April 2004 he was appointed Chair of the Sector Skills Council for the Creative and Cultural Industries. He has been an Honorary Visiting Fellow of Journalism at City University, a member of the Regeneration Through Heritage Steering Group, and was on the board for Race for Opportunity, and was a member of the Council for Brunel University. He is the author of King Coal (1981) – a history of the Miners Union, and Nuclear Power (1984).

Sarah Isted is the treasury of the Theatre Royal. Sarah is a chartered accountant and works as a director in the Government and Public Sector practice of PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP. She specialises in central government and health work and has a number of clients in the culture sector. She has been involved with the Theatre Royal for a year and is enjoying the experience.

Chief Executive, Grange Park Opera and Pimlico Opera. Wasfi played the violin in the National Youth Orchestra and went on to study music as St Hilda’s College, Oxford (1975-8). After 10 years in the City, programming and later designing financial computer systems for various institutions including Kuwait Investment office, Japan International Bank, Times newspapers, and British Telecom she started a small computer consultancy which gave her the flexibility to spend more time conducting. By 1993 she had made music her full-time career. In 1989 Wasfi founded the small-scale touring company Pimlico Opera, staging productions in unusual places such as banks, hospitals, country houses and, most notoriously, prisons. In 1992, whilst continuing to run Pimlico, Wasfi was made Chief Executive of Garsington Opera. In 1997 she left to create her own rural opera festival Grange Park Opera. Wasfi raised £4m to create a new theatre at The Grange and establish an Endowment Fund for the company. In 2003 Wasfi set up the Nevill Holt Opera Festival in Leicestershire at the home of David Ross, co-founder of Carphone Warehouse. The opera "portfolio" (Grange Park, Nevill Holt, Pimlico tour and prison) turns over about 2.75m. Wasfi received an OBE for services to music in the New Year’s Honour’s List 2002 and an honorary doctorate of music in 2007.

John Lock has worked in publishing and as constituency manager for a local MP. He ran his own consulting business then moved to the University of East London where he is now a development director.  At UEL, John has played a leading role in the development of its new Docklands Campus and the creation of a major knowledge transfer centre. He now also works with Thames Gateway London Partnership on higher education and strategic regeneration issues. John was a Newham councillor from 1986-1994, chairing the Leisure Committee for four years and serving on a range of external bodies such as London Arts (Deputy Chair). He has served as a member of the Theatre Royal board for eight years. John is also Vice Chair of Newham Primary Care Trust and Chair of Governors at Godwin Junior School in Forest Gate.

Jo started coming to Stratford East when she was 10 years old as part of the Youth Theatre programme. Later she had her debut as an actor, writer and director at the theatre, and has worked continuously with Stratford East on such shows as Blaggers. She has her own production company, Aarawak Moon, and is presently working in various areas such as film, theatre, radio and TV.

Murray was a student with Joan Littlewood’s Theatre Workshop. His first appearance for the Company was as the Queen’s Messenger in Macbeth. At the end of the season at Stratford East he scored a great success in A Taste of Honey as Geoffrey, a role repeated both in the West End and later in Film. He has appeared in several other productions at Stratford East as well as various theatres in the West End and elsewhere in the UK. In addition to his work as an actor, he has also directed a number of shows and has appeared in many films, most recently The Phantom of the Opera, and TV programmes.

John joined Channel 4 Television as Head of Corporate Relations in January 2000. Prior to that, John was Special Adviser to the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport Chris Smith MP, from 1997 until 1999. His previous jobs have included working as an executive for David Puttnam’s film company Enigma (1992-97), as a Policy Adviser to Neil Kinnock (1986-92) and as a journalist and youth worker..

Paul O’Leary has managed and executive produced over one hundred theatrical productions both in the UK and overseas since establishing his own company in 1992. He is currently associated with Michael Codron Plays Ltd as General Manager of Productions & Consultant for Nederlander Theatres (Aldwych) Ltd. Prior to 1992 Paul was Production Manager at Theatre Royal Stratford East for three years, having earlier worked for both the scenic construction company Kimpton Walker Ltd and the Royal Adelphi Theatre London as Technical Manager. Paul is a Member of the Society of London Theatre.

Shannen has a BA (Hons) in Drama, an MA in Arts Management as well as a PGCE. She has been a teacher of Drama for 15 years in Newham and the Head of Drama at St Angela’s School for 8 years. At present she is an Advanced Skills Teacher (AST) in Drama and supports new and experienced Drama teachers in different schools, develops arts projects and carries out training for teachers in voice, classroom presence and management and Accelerated Learning.

Mark is the longest serving Board Member of Pioneer Theatres, including a spell as acting Chair. He worked with Joan Littlewood for 10 years starting with Oh! What A Lovely War and in various capacities including Production Manager, Set and Lighting Designer. He has pursued a successful career as a Lighting Designer, lighting over 40 productions in the West End and working at most of the major regional theatres, throughout Europe, in the U.S.A., Canada and Australia. He has also worked at drama schools including RADA, LAMDA and Central, both in a designing and teaching capacity. Together with Joan Littlewood, Mark is responsible for resolving the problems of the freehold of the Theatre Royal Stratford East and forming the Theatre Workshop Trust, to hold the freehold. He is the Chair of Theatre Workshop Trust and of Stratford East Trading Ltd, the trading subsidiary of Pioneer Theatres Ltd.

DJ Excalibah started on Juice 102.5 fm, a London pirate radio station set up in early 1999. Before that, Excalibah had a brief stint on Destiny fm in South London. The radio show Tales from the Legend has a format that includes Underground / Independent and British Hip-Hop and encompasses both MC'ing and DJ’ing with freestyles, mixes and of course Excalibah's dry sense of humour. Excalibah has now been presenting TFTL for over five years and the show was nominated in the ‘Best Underground UK Hip-Hop Radio Presenter’ category at the UK Hip-Hop Awards 2001. More recently Excalibah was picked up by the BBC’s new nationwide digital Black music station 1Xtra. To date Excalibah has had his own production released on Ottomanelf Music. He has been producing for about six years now and has compiled 2 previous mix CD’s. As well as musically directing small workshops and projects with companies such as Cardboard Citizens, Excalibah has been involved with two Contemporary Musical Theatre productions with the Theatre Royal Stratford East, including the successful musical Da Boyz.