Kathy Baird Westfall is from South Dakota but has been in the DC area for over three decades. She's recently married and the mother of a 22-year old daughter, Peaches. When she's not working at Ogilvy, she's teaching classes at Georgetown University, telling true stories on stage and in church basements, attending improv shows, and hanging out with other "Burners."

Sam Kean gets called Sean constantly. He grew up in South Dakota, where he collected mercury from broken thermometers, and he now lives and writes in DC.​ He’s the New York Times–bestselling author of three books, including The Disappearing Spoon and The Dueling Neurosurgeons, and he has been featured on NPR’s “Radiolab” and “Fresh Air.”

Jose Magana-Salgado is a sarcastic gardener with a propensity for social justice, cooking, and board games. A former slam poet, his day job now involves saving the world by suing everyone. He spends most Friday nights drinking Two​-​Buck ​C​huck and watching Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist on repeat. He is a virgin to the SpeakeasyDC stage; please be gentle with him.

Brad Podliska knows how NOT to do things – he believed Washington Post’s Date Lab would deliver true love and he enjoys breaking out the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) at family dinners as a conversation starter.  Fortunately, his girlfriend and two Iraqi rescue dogs keep him off the streets at night.

Jenny Splitter is a storyteller (SpeakeasyDC, Risk!, Story League) and the creator and producer of two Capital Fringe shows – H Street Housewives and The Dish. She spends her glamorous days trying to write whatever and whenever she can, counting 1-2-3 in a slow-yet-threatening manner to her children and working to eradicate dog hair from the planet, or at least from her home.

Valentina Stackl told her first story at age 6 on a train platform, to everyone waiting on a train.  To her parents' chagrin, she was hooked.  Currently, Valentina works at an international human rights and environmental justice organization where she does Human Rights Storytelling.  Valentina has performed for SpeakeasyDC, she’s a Storyleague Tournament winner, and she recently rocked the Kennedy Center's Millennium Stage.

Meredith Whipple is a recent graduate of SpeakeasyDC’s Storytelling 101 class and a second-time performer on the SpeakeasyDC stage.
​She loves the Internet so much that she’s made a career out of it, fighting for an open Internet, universal access to memes, and cat videos for everyone. Meredith is​ also​ involved in improv and comedy in DC​. ​

Michael Zhuang is financial advisor by day and a storyteller, improver and standup comedian by night. ​Once a month, you can find him in hosting Storyfest Short Slam in Silver Spring, MD and he's always looking for new storytellers like you to join the competition. Find posts about his show by joining the DC Storytelling Facebook page.

Stephanie Garibaldi has always been a sucker for love and for storytelling.  She started directing​​SpeakeasyDC's ​Sucker for Love back in 2008, because she was tired of having nothing to do on Valentine’s Day.  Seven years later, she’s come to adore the SFL show itself plus all of its cast members.  She’s happily married now for the third and hopefully last time.

Assistant Director and Host Mike Baireuther was born in the subways of New York City, where he was exposed to a mutagenic chemical known as "The Ooze." There his sensei Hamato Yoshi trained him in the art of storytelling. He has dedicated his life to fighting crime alongside his brothers Leonardo, Donatello, and Raphael, but considers himself a full-time party dude.