Current Board of Directors and Officers, 2025
Directors are elected for 2-year or 1-year terms and Officers for a 1-year term.
Steven Jensen
President for 2025; Director since 2022
A member of the Society for 15+ years, his involvement with Shakespeare includes more than 40 years of reading, attending dozens of performances, acting in play productions, and participating in other public performances. He previously served on the board of the Bay Theatre Collective, a Berkeley-based theater troupe that produced classical plays in the SF Bay Area. Steven is a retired high school science teacher from Sweetwater UHSD.
Thomas Haine
Vice President for 2025; Director since 2023
Tom is one of the founders of the San Diego Shakespeare Society and an attorney. His prior directing and acting credits include Hamlet, Julius Caesar, Tartuffe, Romeo and Juliet, King Lear, Macbeth, Hedda Gabler, You Can’t Take It With You, Bury the Dead, Rumors. Tom has received formal training in directing from the Berkeley Rep and from Cambridge University in the UK. He is a graduate of the British American Drama Academy Mid-Summer Oxford Program (BADA).
Gordon L. Gidlund
Secretary for 2025 Playwright of Mock Trials; Director since 2016
A tax attorney, Gordon is naturally concerned with the intersection of the Bard and the law. Inspired by the efforts of Justice Anthony Kennedy, he has written five mock trial scripts subjecting Shakespearean characters to forensic examination. He is an Oxfordian and a signatory of the Declaration of Reasonable Doubt. In his youth, he taught English as a Peace Corps Volunteer in South Korea. He has a B.A. from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, and a J.D. from the University of Minnesota.
Laura Ganz-Holtan
Treasurer for 2025; Director since 2020
Laura has a BA in Drama from UCSD and has acted locally in San Diego and New York City. She has worked as a paralegal in Family Law. She is a docent at The Timken Museum of Art in Balboa Park and has been teaching yoga for 17 years. She assisted the San Diego Actors Theatre with their 30th Anniversary Celebration and has acted in their theatrical productions and staged readings. Through the Fine Artists program, Laura taught art at Vista Grande Elementary School in San Diego for 8 years and coordinated the annual students’ art exhibition. Laura also created the “King Lear” program for the Society’s staged reading in 2019 and has participated in the monthly open readings. Laura is currently cataloguing her late father’s original paintings and sculptures for future exhibitions.
John Tessmer
Artistic Director; Director since 2016
John is a professional actor and director, who holds a B.A. from Yale and an M.F.A. in Acting from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. He spent six seasons with the Colorado Shakespeare Festival between graduate school and moving back to his home town of San Diego in 2001. John co-founded the La Jolla Theatre Ensemble in 2010 and is the company’s Producing Artistic Director. Regionally and locally, he has performed on many stages. John is an Associate Artist of New Fortune Theatre Company. He has taught for the University of Colorado and the Old Globe Theatre and acted in two-thirds of the Shakespearean canon.
Milena (Sellers) Phillips
Director since 2024
An actress for over 35 years on film, television, and stage, Milena is a member of SAG-AFTRA and Actors Equity. She is the executive director of the Jonathan Sellers and Charlie Keever Foundation, a nonprofit organization that focuses on the safety and well-being of children. Milena is also currently a member of the board of directors at New Village Arts, an advisory member of the San Diego Black Artist Collective, and a Community Advisory Council Member for the Old Globe.
John T. Williams
Director since 2024
John and his wife Jane live in San Diego but own and operate an architectural firm in Milwaukee, American Design, Inc., which they founded 30 years ago. He is a banker by trade but spent years making loans to developers and worked for a Milwaukee-based General Contractor. He has assisted the Inner-City Redevelopment Corporation in Milwaukee in developing affordable housing. He has served as a judge in the Milwaukee Public Schools’ STEM program and is a past member of the Psychology Examining Board of the State of Wisconsin, Governor appointed.
Additional Supporters
Kevin G. Manley
Open Readings Coordinator; since 2020
Kevin has acted in dozens of San Diego stage and film productions over the past several years. He is a full time math teacher who developed a love of theatre by going to his high school’s productions. This eventually led to becoming the theatre program’s assistant director. He also teachers film production. Kevin is a graduate of Larry Silverberg’s True Acting Institute. His current passions are reading with SDSS, performing live true story-telling with So Say We All and The New Narrative, and working on short films with his daughters.
Genevieve Foster
Social Media Coordinator; since 2020
Genevieve is pursuing an English major and an Education minor at UC Berkeley after graduating from Patrick Henry High School in 2022. As a student, she worked onstage and backstage with San Diego Junior Theatre, Theatre for Young Professionals, JCompany Youth Theatre, the Broadway San Diego Awards, and the Coronado Playhouse. She is currently a Quartermaster and Instructor for UC Berkeley’s Historical Fencing Club studying Medieval and Renaissance combat. She still absolutely adores Shakespeare’s works and hopes to introduce students to Shakespeare in the future.
Prior Board Members:
- Nathan Agin
- Michael Auer
- Cassidy Bartolomei
- John Bolger
- Connie Boyd
- Natasha Busick
- Vanessa Dinning
- Patricia Elmore Costa
- Pauline Green
- Laurie L. Hill
- Leslie Murrell Holt
- Sidney Jacobsen
- Kim Keeline
- Steven Lipinsky
- Wendy Lucas-Meyer
- Paul Majkut
- Terry Miller
- Charles Riendeau
- Alex Sandie (founder)
- Marvin Spira
- Patricia Spira
- William Virchis
- Amanda Walter
- Carol Whaley
- Claire White
- Jack Winans
- Darryl Woodson
- Marilyn Zeljeznjak