POWERHOUSE THEATRE COLLABORATIVE
Powerhouse Team
Get to know the producers and creative team.
Meet our team
Bryan Halperin
Powerhouse Producer
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Johanna Halperin
Powerhouse Producer
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Courtney Palmer
Associate Producer
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Lorraine Barrows
Power Chords Director
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Jay LaBrecque
Power Chords Assistant Director
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Amanda Wagner
Circuit Breakers Improv Troupe Co-Founder
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Alex Palmer
Circuit Breakers Improv Troupe Co-Founder
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Emma Molloy
Power Surge Cabaret Series Director
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Bryan Halperin
Powerhouse Producer/Co-Founder
Bryan Halperin is a co-founder of Powerhouse and also was a co-founder of The Winnipesaukee Playhouse where he worked there from 2004-2014. There he produced, directed, performed in, or wrote over 100 productions. He has also been the drama director at Inter-Lakes School District and a freelance director/producer. His work has been seen at the Little Church Theater, Community Players of Concord, Jean's Playhouse and the Hatbox Theatre. Bryan served as Executive Director of the New Hampshire Theatre Awards for three years, and produced and directed its annual Awards Show for five years. Bryan's play The Hairy Man won the 2019 Pestalozzi Prize at the New Works Festival of the Firehouse Center for the Arts, was a semi-finalist for Premiere Stages Play Festival, and was a finalist at the 2020 JETFest in Michigan. As a director Bryan has won 10 NH Theatre Awards and been runner up numerous other times. Bryan is grateful to the Powerhouse community for making his job so fun!
You can check out his playwriting at New Play Exchange by clicking here
Johanna Halperin
Powerhouse Producer/Co-Founder
Johanna is a co-founder and producer of Powerhouse Theatre Collaborative. In 2004, Johanna and her husband moved to New Hampshire to found, with their sister and brother-in-law, the Winnipesaukee Playhouse. In her 11 years at the Playhouse, Johanna helped build the now thriving organization from the ground up. She was struck by how impactful viewing or participating in theatre can be on the lives of individuals of all ages, so when given the opportunity to help revive the Colonial Theatre and include a resident theatre company, she was thrilled to be a part of it. She has served on the boards of Stay Work Play NH, Lakes Center for the Arts and the Friends of the Meredith Library. She also works with the Inter-Lakes Middle High School drama program in Meredith. Johanna’s specialty is in theatrical props, and over the past 20 years she has worked on numerous shows in this capacity for the Winnipesaukee Playhouse, Hatbox Theatre, Community Players of Concord, NH, Little Church Theatre, Square Peg Productions and the Inter-Lakes Schools. She is amazed by the community that Powerhouse has created and appreciates that it filled with both talent and kindness!
Courtney Palmer
Powerhouse Associate Producer
Courtney is a NH native. She holds a bachelor's degree in theatre and history as well as a minor in arts administration from Suffolk University in Boston, MA. She is dedicated to theatre arts, especially when it comes to community theatre. She has been involved with various theatre companies throughout the Northeast region both as an actor and behind the scenes. She has numerous years of experience in directing, playwriting, set design, stage management, acting, casting, and more. She has put down roots in Laconia, NH and could not be more excited to be part of Powerhouse Theatre Collaborative and its vibrant theatre community!
Lorraine Barrows
Power Chords Director/Creator
Lorraine is a retired music teacher who grew up in the backyard of a summer stock theatre. As a teacher and musical theatre director, her greatest pride has been in helping singers and performers reach their greatest potential. She has also directed award-winning adult barbershop show choruses and for 10 years was the director of education for the international women's barbershop organization. As part of her responsibilities there, she travelled North America and New Zealand conducting a cappella workshops and concerts for high school, college and adult singers. She loves any genre of popular music, but show tunes are her favorite!
Lorraine also offers private vocal lessons - reach out to info@powerhousenh.org to get in touch!
Jay LaBrecque
Power Chords Assistant Director
Jay is thrilled to be the assistant director of Powerhouse’s Power Chords! Jay has been involved with Powerhouse since 2022 and has participated in many productions in the past several years. Jay is a graduate of the University of New Hampshire where they were music director of one of UNH’s many talented a cappella groups, Off the Clef. Jay works locally as a social worker by day and enjoys spending their evenings and weekends creating, playing, and performing music. Jay looks forward to seeing the Power Chords continue to grow their presence in the community and continue to bring joy wherever they perform!
Amanda Wagner
Amanda was born and raised in St. Louis, Missouri and received her BA in Theatre Arts from Occidental College in Los Angeles California. After college, Amanda remained in LA working as an actor and stage manager, studying improv at both the Groundlings and Second City, in addition to growing her own dog-hiking business. Since moving to New Hampshire in 2022, Amanda continues to work professionally as an actor for both stage and screen, and directs youth theatre at local schools and camps. Perhaps her proudest accomplishment is bringing improv to the Lakes Region as the co-founder of the Circuit Breakers improv troupe with Alex Palmer. Together they teach improv classes for students of all experience levels. Amanda is eternally grateful to Bryan, Johanna and Courtney and the entire Powerhouse community for giving her a theatre to call home.
Circuit Breakers Co-Founder/Director
Alex Palmer
Circuit Breakers Co-Founder/Director
In 2017, Alex was serving on active-duty as a Marine in the nation's capital when he was approached by a group called the Armed Services Arts Partnership (ASAP) which focused on getting a unique and often forgotten group (namely active and veteran servicemembers) involved in the performing arts. He and his cohort were offered the opportunity to learn the art of short-form improv comedy and performed for the first time a couple of months later. Having seen the value of such an art and experienced its impact himself, Alex left Washington DC, with a new passion that he took from the service to college at Northeastern University, into another improv course through the Improv Asylum in Boston, and into the business world as a salesperson for a major energy technology company. After moving with his wife, Courtney, to her home state of New Hampshire, Alex could hardly wait to share the medium with others, and when the opportunity to partner with his colleague, Amanda, arose to teach improv on behalf of Powerhouse Theatre Collabortive, he jumped at it! Alex has since taught multiple courses and co-founded Powerhouse's first improv troupe - The Circuit Breakers. The Powerhouse team quickly inculcated Alex with the identity of a true generator for the organization, and the Marine veteran has now acted, sang, improv'd, built sets, puppeteered, and/or assisted as a stagehand in more than 16 shows with many more to come!
Emma Molloy
Power Surge Cabaret Series Director
A lifelong NH native, Emma graduated from Plymouth State University in 2023 with a BA in Musical Theatre and a concentration in Stage Management. She auditioned for Powerhouse’s In Love with Broadway in the beginning of 2024 and immediately fell in love (pun not intended) with not only the caliber of the productions but with the community, and hasn’t left since. She joined the 10 show club with A Midsummer Night’s Dream in early 2026. While she considers Powerhouse her home theatre, she occasionally works with other companies in central and southern NH. Outside of theatre, she lives a boring life involving too much mandatory overtime, shooting film (mostly backstage), and being ruled by her cat, Leia. She couldn’t be more excited to bring the Power Surge Cabaret Series to life and can’t wait to see where it goes! Big thanks to Bryan, Johanna, and Courtney for the support and trust, and for tirelessly building the community she’s so happy to call home.
Our Board
Dana Gardner
President
Sonya Misiaszek
Vice President
Susie McCann
Treasurer
Kate Haley Goldman
Secretary
Rob Hunt
Member at Large
