Meet the Directors

Jed Hancock-Brainerd and Rebecca Noon are theater-makers who live in Newport. They have performed, directed, produced and taught in theaters big and small from Providence, RI to Juneau, Alaska for the last 20 years. Center Aquidneck is their latest theatrical idea: To infuse daily life with the play, surprise and curation of live performance through annual events and community happenings. After spending decades living in Newport and creating work everywhere else, they are excited to dedicate their practice to their hometown.

Jed & Rebecca’s most prolific collaborations derived from ten years of running the tri-coastal devising company, Strange Attractor from 2009-2019. From an Ibsen-inspired haunted house to a meditation on museum security guards, Strange Attractor taught Jed & Rebecca to create not only in theaters, but also for houses, on beaches, and with community centers; with trained actors and people who never considered acting; for urban and rural audiences; for entertainment and for ritual.

Teaching and community engagement are central to Jed and Rebecca’s practice. They’ve taught devising and physical theater to middle, high school, college-aged, and adult students around the country at theaters, camps, and universities. They share their evolving training with people of most ages and all abilities who seek to expand creatively, ground physically, and grow generously. Jed was the movement instructor at Rhode Island College and is now a practicing Alexander Teacher. Rebecca was the Artistic Associate for Community at Trinity Rep, the Director of Community Engagement at the Guthrie Theater and is now the Director of Special Projects for Providence’s Department of Art, Culture and Tourism.

As designers, Jed and Rebecca created the School House Long House for the RISD Museum's 2013 show Locally Made with Jeremy Radtke and a multi-sensory installation with the Lippitt House Museum in Providence called Back to the Work. They also collaborated on Carolyn Gennari’s 2016 film/installation thesis project, Searching for What Isn’t There. 

They have won awards from RISCA, RICH, NEFA, the Network of Ensemble Theaters, two playwriting fellowships, a handful of Motif Awards and an award of excellence from the American Association for State and Local History (AASLH). Jed holds a BFA in Acting from the University of Rhode Island, Rebecca holds a BFA in Acting from the College of Santa Fe, and both hold MFAs from the London International School of Performing Arts in Lecoq Based Actor Created Physical Theatre.