Bio - ADA30 Summit 2020 Archives - Page 2 of 8

Danny Gomez

#ADA30 Summit 2020

Danny Gomez is an actor who moved to Los Angeles from New Orleans after losing his home in Hurricane Katrina. He spent years working in the service industry at night and auditioning during the day to no avail, but he never gave up. In May of 2016, he suffered a spinal cord injury that forced him to reevaluate his life and his goals. Danny is now in full pursuit of making the best of life while working with various non-profits who help people with disabilities. He credits the Easterseals Disability Film Challenge for helping to kick-start his acting career. He has starred in a number of award-winning shorts films for the annual competition which has led to job opportunities, including a modeling campaign with Zappos Adaptive and a guest appearance on NBC’s hit medical drama New Amsterdam. He hopes to continue to be a positive force advocating for the disability community in the entertainment industry.

David Caparelliotis

#ADA30 Summit 2020

David Caparelliotis/Caparelliotis Casting – Current television: “New Amsterdam” (series casting, NBC). Recent and select Broadway: Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf, The Minutes, The Waverly Gallery, The Boys in the Band, King Lear, Hillary and Clinton, Ink, Jitney, The Little Foxes, Three Tall Women, Meteor Shower, A Doll’s House Part 2, The Front Page, The Glass Menagerie, Blackbird, Fish in the Dark, Disgraced, Fences. Other theatre: Manhattan Theatre Club, Signature Theatre NYC season casting, Atlantic Theater Company Stage 2 season casting, Old Globe season casting, Ars Nova, Goodman, Berkeley Rep, McCarter, Arena Stage, Seattle Rep, among others. Additional film and television credits include “Boys in the Band” (Netflix), “American Odyssey” (series casting, NBC), NYC casting “How to Get Away with Murder” (pilot, ABC), “Ironside” (NBC), and Steel Magnolias (Sony for Lifetime). David is a proud member of the Casting Society of America, an active member of CSA’s Diversity and Inclusion Committee and a recent recipient of the Media Access Award for his work on “New Amsterdam.”

David Renaud

#ADA30 Summit 2020

David Renaud is a former medical doctor and a Producer on the Humanitas Award-winning and Golden Globe-nominated ABC series The Good Doctor. He has also written on the CBS medical drama Pure Genius (created by Jason Katims) and the ABC primetime soap Blood & Oil. He was born and raised in Canada and holds both an MFA in Screenwriting from UCLA and an MD from the University of British Columbia. At the age of 19, David was in a near fatal car accident that left him paralyzed. He is committed to challenging preconceptions about people with disabilities and was recognized for his work on The Good Doctor by the Media Access Awards in 2019 (Visionary Award) and by Variety in 2018 (2018 Inclusion Impact Report). David is also committed to expanding opportunities for disabled artists in the industry and serves as a Faculty Advisor to the Respectability Summer Lab for Entertainment Professionals with Disabilities (2019, 2020). He is a proud father of two, an aspiring musician, and a passable cook.

David Schulner

#ADA30 Summit 2020

David Schulner started his television career on Ed Zwick and Marshall Herskovitz’s beloved “Once and Again.” Other credits include the award-winning first year of “Desperate Housewives,” “Everwood,” “Kings,” “Tell Me You Love Me” on HBO, “Do No Harm” which he created and was showrunner, and “Emerald City” for which he was also showrunner. His 2008 spec script, “The Oaks” started a bidding war between CBS, ABC and FOX, ultimately being picked up straight-to-series by FOX. Then the writers strike happened. ITV in Great Britain successfully relaunched the show as the critically acclaimed series, “Marchlands” followed by season two, “Lightfields.” David is currently Executive Producer/Showrunner of NBC’s “New Amsterdam” and is developing new projects under his fourth overall deal with Universal Television. As a playwright, David’s plays have been produced off-Broadway at the Atlantic Theater, The Old Globe, Long Wharf Theater and at Sundance. David is also the creator of CLONE, a popular comic published by Image/Skybound – Robert Kirkman’s (The Walking Dead) imprint.

Debbie Fink

#ADA30 Summit 2020

Debbie Fink is Director of Community Outreach and Impact for RespectAbility, a nonprofit organization fighting stigmas and advancing opportunities for and with people with disabilities. She brings more than 15 years of diverse leadership experience in public health, education and arts programming to serve RespectAbility’s mission. [continue reading…]

Dino-Ray Ramos

#ADA30 Summit 2020

Dino-Ray Ramos is an Associate Editor at Deadline Hollywood where he reports on inclusion, diversity, and representation in film and TV. In addition, he covers genre, sci-fi and comic book film & TV. He is the co-host and creator of the New Hollywood Podcast, which champions people of color, women, members of the LGBTQ community, and other underrepresented voices in film and television. A Texas native, Dino-Ray worked as a film and TV reporter for the Oakland Tribune and San Francisco Chronicle before moving to Los Angeles. Prior to Deadline, he wrote for numerous publications including Vogue, Entertainment Tonight, Bustle, Tracking Board, Paste and Queerty. He was recently honored on Gold House’s A100 List which honors the most impactful Asians and Asian American & Pacific Islanders in culture.

Eileen Grubba

#ADA30 Summit 2020

Eileen Grubba’s memorable, edgy characters in shows like Sons of Anarchy (2008), NBC’s Game of Silence (2016), and HBO’s Hung (2009) have gained her a reputation for courageous character work. She is a lifetime member of the world renowned Actors Studio where she is known as a “force” on stage, and often compared to theatre greats Geraldine Page and Kim Stanley. [continue reading…]

Elisabeth J. Finch

#ADA30 Summit 2020

Elisabeth J. Finch is a television writer, playwright, and essayist. She is currently writer/co-executive producer of “Grey’s Anatomy.” Finch’s past television credits include “True Blood,” “The Vampire Diaries,” and “No Ordinary Family.” Her essays are published in Elle, Cosmopolitan, and The Hollywood Reporter.

Gerard Robinson

#ADA30 Summit 2020

Gerard Robinson is the Vice President for Education at the Advanced Studies in Culture Foundation. He was previously the executive director of the Center for Advancing Opportunity (CAO). Robinson was also a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), where he researched parental choice in the public and private schools, regulatory development and implementation of K–12 standards, the role of for-profit companies in education, prison education and reentry programs, and the role of community colleges and Historically Black Colleges and Universities in adult advancement. Earlier in Robinson’s career, he served as Commissioner of Education for the State of Florida and as Secretary of Education for the Commonwealth of Virginia. He is also a member of RespectAbility’s Board of Directors.

Gloria Medina

#ADA30 Summit 2020

Gloria Medina, a Trans Activist, was a Public Policy and Employment Fellow in RespectAbility’s National Leadership Program for Fall of 2019. Medina is a graduate of Montgomery College in Maryland with an associate degree in international politics and the University of Maryland (UMD) with a Bachelor of Arts degree in Government and Politics. Born in Peru, Medina moved to Virginia at the age of seven and completed her primary education there before attending UMD. What inspires her to help the disability community is her own experience as a Latin immigrant and a transgender woman. She wants to help all communities living in the margins of society, as she understands what it feels like to not get the same opportunities as others and to have stigma attached to a part of one’s identity.