Russell Faillaci

Russ’s acting career began at Colorado State University where he learned that he did much better in acting classes then he did in business classes. After graduation he went to Los Angeles to study at the American Academy of Dramatic arts and discovered his love for improv comedy in small theaters around Hollywood. Upon moving back to Colorado, he joined Impulse Theater and gained 750 shows of improv experience. He is now proud to be co-owner of Madcap Theater and is now wishing he did better in those college business classes.

Brian Harper

Brian would like to think he is a Denver native, or at least an honorary one. He was born in Hollywood, FL. and moved to Denver with his mom when he was three. (He wasn’t old enough to move here by himself.) He used to tell people he was going to go from Hollywood, FL. to Hollywood, CA. Well, he figured he was close enough when he went to school at California Lutheran University in Thousand Oaks, CA. After returning to Denver, Brian fulfilled his acting bug by working in Kaiser Permanente’s Educational Theatre since ’96, and was a part of Impulse Theater for five years. He not only performed there, but performed well enough to meet his wife, Renee, there as well. Brian is thrilled to fulfill this life dream of owning a theater by being one of the co-owners of Madcap. Please be careful though, if Brian gets too excited, he has a tendency to get sick.

Renee Ashe

Renee Ashe has been involved in the Performing Arts as long as she can remember. As a girl, she used to dress up her kitty cats and made them perform Shakespeare. She graduated from the University of Northern Colorado with a BA in Theater Arts. It was then she began her improv training at Denver's Impulse Theater. In addition to being a core cast member of Madcap, Renee is a dancer, choreographer, director and wellness educator. Renee discovered that she truly is a hippie when she tried to grow her own sprouts and roots and forced her family and friends to eat flax seed chips. Along with her husband Brian Harper, they are proud parents of their sons, Ashe Patrick and Aiden O'Brian.

Nicole Costello-Faillaci

Nicole began acting with a two year run as Dorothy at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas. As Dorothy, she had many pictures taken of her with many people, her favorite one being with David Hasselhoff. He’s dreamy. She then moved to Los Angeles to study at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts. It was in LA that she discovered her love for improv. Locally she has been in various productions at the Country Dinner Playhouse and the Boulder Dinner Theater and she is known for her outstanding performances at karaoke bars all across the country. She is very excited to be co-owner of Madcap Theater.

Garrett Gilhooly

Garrett graduated from the University of Northern Colorado with a Bachelor of Arts in Theater, with an emphasis in Costume Design and Acting. Improv became her passion in college when a group of her friends got together to give it a whirl, once realizing that improv was a type of theater that did not require any line memorization, she was sold. She has since performed in over 850 improv shows with Impulse Theater, and other improv troupes. Garrett is a part owner of Madcap Theater and is thrilled to bring some improv to the Northside!

Eric Mather

Eric Mather began his professional acting career alongside celebrities such as Tom Cruise and Val Kilmer. After repeated requests by movie theater security to "move away from and stop touching the movie screen" during midnight showings of 'Top Gun', Eric turned to comedy. He has performed improv, sketch, and stand-up comedy for the past ten years in and around Denver. Last year he was selected as a finalist in both the Comedy Works New Talent Search and Wit's End 'The Survival of the Wittiest' contests. Eric, however, chooses to point to his role as a giant green pile of vomit (actually a flu bug) playing basketball opposite the Nuggets' Marcus Camby as his big break into show business.

Leanne Jewell

Leanne is currently taking time off as a voice double for Jennifer Tilly so that she can pursue her true love; performing improvisational comedy. She has been performing improv and sketch comedy for the past 4 years and was honored recently with an invite to perform at the Chicago Improv Festival with her all female improv troupe "The Box Fans". Leanne studied music education and performance at Ohio University, a perennial top 5 of 'The Biggest Party Schools in America', which is why she can only sing songs by Michael Bolton. She has a classically trained voice, which she utilizes as a soprano in the professional choral group 'Ars Nova Singers'. Leanne can be seen in local and national TV commercials as well as a few films.

Nabih Saliba

Back when he used to have hair, Nabih spent quite a bit of his time yearning to be bald. Having fulfilled that dream, he set out to make a name for himself with Improv comedy. While pursing this lofty goal, Nabih encountered a few obstacles: a career in the "dot com" industry, getting married and, of course, kids. It was during this "growing up" time that Nabih rediscovered his love of acting when trying to convince his friends and family that the "dot com" bubble would never burst. Now, when he's not on stage, Nabih spends his time doing design work for Madcap Theater which we lovingly refer to as, "drawing pretty pictures."

Brad Umbaugh

Brad first acted in a community theater Christmas production in sleepy Hudson, Ohio; never before had a first-grader portrayed the role of "Background Pine Tree #2" with such raw emotion. After that tour-de-force performance, which included the legendary "wave to mom in the middle of the show," the demands of the theater became too overwhelming, and Brad slipped quietly into anonymity. His next stage appearances came years later, on high school's "awkward teenager stage" and college's "confused about life stage," on which he performed the timeless classic, "Studying Computer Science At Ohio State University." He eventually moved to Denver and caught the improv bug while taking a few workshops at Rattlebrain Theater. He's super excited to be a cast member at Madcap Improv, and he hopes you (and his wife Kate) will forgive a few bad puns.

Matt Meyers

Matt Meyers enjoys talking. In fact he loves it so much that his theatrical experience has come by way of competitive public speaking. Being a member of the Denver chapter of Toast Masters, Matt has won about 12 speech contests in the last 4 years. That's a lot of blue ribbon talking. When he's not wowing crowds with his speaking prowess his time is spent working as a Leadership Skills trainer for T-Mobile (where he does more talking). Matt is ecstatic to be bringing his gift of gab to the stage of Madcap and if you ask him, he may recite one of his award winning speeches in the lobby after the show.

Haley M. Driscoll

Haley's acting career started ever since she felt comfortable enough to leave the womb. Since then she has been performing in local theatre and has achieved two State and District Championships in the National Forensics League for Poetry and Humor. Haley is absolutely thrilled to be a cast member at MaDcap. She also enjoys speaking in the 3rd person like she has been doing the entirety of this bio, and does a chillingly accurate Christopher Walken impression.

JT Wakefield

JT graduated from Colorado Christian University with a CIS degree. Officially, this meant “Computer Information Systems”, but to JT it meant “Computers Is Stupid.” After discovering his disdain for his chosen field, JT decided to take a job as a cart attendant at Target. There he discovered that, somehow, working on the bottom of the Target food chain wasn’t quite the life he was looking for either. He then decided to take a job selling legal addictive stimulants to people for exorbitant prices. JT found that working for “the green monster” was enjoyable, but not the career he’d always dreamed of growing old with. Finally, JT decided to try chasing his, self-dubbed, “silly dream” of acting and stumbled into a cast spot here at Madcap theater.

Zach Silver

Zach is attending Metropolitan State College of Denver for Business Management. We have encouraged him to make better life goals than pursuing an education, but he has assured us that he will keep time for Madcap. Zach started off working in Madcap's kitchen. When we realized he could not operate a knife properly, we looked for other means of employment. He liked pushing buttons so we threw him into our tech booth to run wild. To our surprise, Zach mastered the "press button, move fader, make sound effect" sequence. To be fair, we moved him to the stage, gave him a red shirt, and called him an actor. We like Zach... a little.