Read more about them. Study their history. Then approach them after a live show and pretend you know them. This will freak them out and make them uncomfortable. They love that.

COURTENAY HAMEISTER, Associate Producer/Head Writer/Host
Courtenay’s theater career began in high school, in the worst-ever staged version of “Fame.” After three years of classical acting training at NYU, she spent two years working behind-the-scenes with the comedy group “The State" - her version of Comedy Camp. When she is not writing or performing for Live Wire!, she sings in the Portland band The Ditty Twisters, and works as an advertising copywriter for behemoth clients like Xerox, Microsoft, and Fox Television. Courtenay recently wrote the copy on the back of the American Idol DVD, for which she would like to apologize. A lot.

RALPH HUNTLEY, Writer/Performer/Co-Musical Director
Pianist, composer and co-founder of Klezmocracy, Ralph Huntley has been playing music in Portland for nearly 20 years. He has toured nationally with many Portland acts, including Tony Starlight (as musical director), Fernando, Pepe and the Bottle Blondes, and Do Jump! Extremely Physical Theater. He has composed music for Do Jump, written jingles for the Oregon Lottery, and has scored a number of independent film and theater projects. A true Renaissance Man, Ralph also writes a sketches, performs them, and provides musical accompaniment, sometimes all at once. We're fairly certain he's a creative robot of some kind. We'll let you know.

PAT JANOWSKI, Writer/Performer/Science Nerd
Pat has spent decades honing her craft as comedy writer and performer. She started out as editor of her college humor magazine, but took a detour and ended up writing for national magazines including Discover, OMNI, and Scientific American—all known for being very, very funny. For the past several years, Pat has performed as a singer with the Oregon Symphony Orchestra and also as a backup singer for The Ditty Twisters, a band deemed both rockin' and hilarious by area music critics. Pat is also a mother of two, a job that she finds alternately riotously funny and deeply vexing.

TYLER HUGHS, Writer/Performer/Recovering Plushy
A native of Deer Lodge, MT., Tyler has been performing and improvising on Portland stages for 15 years. He is a grizzled veteran of nearly every children’s theater in town, but adults may also recognize him from several Shakespearean productions or as a member of Brainwaves Improvisational Comedy. Tyler spent a few years with USO/DOD Overseas Entertainment, performing audience interactive shows in Iceland, Western Europe, The Balkans, Asia, Micronesia and Alaska. As a part of FFRT he is having the most fun he’s had on the radio since his 1976 on-air request of John Denver’s “Sunshine on My Shoulders.”

SEAN MCGRATH – Writer/Performer/Man With One Healthy Head of Hair
Sean was raised in Manhattan yet spent his adolescence in Minnesota, forever dooming him to a normal childhood. A Portlander for the last three years, Sean jockeys between high-profile European assassination-contracts and organizing junior high school bake sales. He now performs stand-up comedy around Portland and writes for online and print publications. His film "Burning Heart" won the Audience Award at some high-falutin’, la-di-da short film festival in Minneapolis. His allegiance to Live Wire runs deep, made evident by the tattoos covering most of his chest, his back, and…other areas.

PATRICIA FERGUSON, Performer/Mother/Cute as a Damn Button
Born in Augusta GA, home of Masters Golf and James Brown, Patricia relocated to the Northwest a decade ago after finishing her MFA in Acting at the Universtiy of Texas at Austin, where the library is Texas-shaped. Next up: Seattle and the Children's Theatre, Wooden O, and the Fringe Festival. She’s now relocated to Oregon to raise her children and fully embrace fleece. Thank you, Live Wire, for giving this mother of two a chance to venture out from her den and play among the polysyllabic people of Portland.

JONPAUL MCLELLAN – Performer/Improv Actor/Voice of Angus McBeef
Performing for over 25 years, Jonpaul has been involved in thousands of shows worldwide but always finds his way back to Portland, no matter how hard the city tries to lose him. His most important work happened here, when he played covered, dead body #3 in the movie "Dr. Giggles,” and a crazed devil worshiper in the (oddly) hard-to-find "Bloody Mary.” He is currently involved in three improv troupes, including Brainwaves Improv. You can also see him from time to time doing stand-up comedy or baking scones, naked.