Who We Are
Kind Strangers Collective is a creative home for theatre artists across disciplines — actors, playwrights, directors, designers, and technicians — who want to tell meaningful stories, challenge conventions, and build community.
What We Do
We create spirited theatre that invites all of us to slow down and engage with the social issues shaping our world, onstage and off.
We also host events for artists to expand their craft, practice together, and cultivate creative partnership.
Our pillar productions are curated scene cycles: collections of scenes from different plays that explore a timely issue from multiple perspectives.
We feature plays at every stage — from early drafts to celebrated works — supporting both emerging and established artists while inviting audiences into the development process.
Alongside each production, we highlight a New York City nonprofit whose work directly addresses the issue we explore, connecting the emotional power of the work on stage to tangible change happening across our city.
By bridging artists, audiences, and community action, Kind Strangers Collective creates theatre that reflects the complex world we live in — and inspires us to navigate it together with compassion, curiosity, and hope.
Our Story
Kind Strangers Collective was founded in 2024 by Marjie Shrimpton and Jamie Gore Pawlik after meeting at The Freeman Studio, where we found a group of deeply skilled actors doing powerful work with limited chances to share it.
We formed Kind Strangers with those artists to create more opportunities to develop and perform moving work together.
After selling out our first two scene-cycle productions, we continued to develop Jamie Gore Pawlik's I EAT BOYS, a new play featured in our second production that centers on a group of women in recovery.
In light of the important themes explored in this play and our previous shows, we realized we wanted to create greater impact: Beginning in 2026, on each show we would partner with a local nonprofit whose work directly addresses the central theme.
Creating impact together is really at the heart of Kind Strangers. We are committed to nurturing a vibrant and supportive environment for artists while strengthening the larger New York City community at the same time.
Ultimately, we believe that bringing people together through theatre can inspire understanding and activate change.
After all, we have all depended on the kindness of strangers...
Our Team
Marjie is an actor, producer, and movement director based in Brooklyn. Her work has been seen at Berkshire Theatre Group, Theaterlab, Greenbrier Valley Theatre, Sounds of the City, Museum of the City of New York, Baruch Performing Arts Center, New York Musical Festival, Columbia University School of the Arts, the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, and elsewhere.
Marjie has produced works in multiple forms—from plays to evening-length dance pieces, to short film projects. In 2018 and 2019, she took her solo cabaret honoring Judy Garland, What Would Judy Do?, to stages across NYC and Minnesota.
She has a BA in Dance and Human Rights from Barnard College of Columbia University, where she studied acting under Juilliard's Rebecca Guy and Rob Bundy, and worked with celebrated choreographers Twyla Tharp, Larry Keigwin, Sidra Bell, and Colleen Thomas.
Outside of her theatrical life, Marjie has a career as a ghostwriter. Whether writing, performing, or producing, tying all of her work together is a deep curiosity about people, a commitment to understanding others' perspectives, and the determination to have a positive impact.
Jamie Gore Pawlik is a New York–based writer, producer, and performer. She holds a B.S. from Barnard College, Columbia University, where she studied Film with a concentration in Screenwriting through Columbia’s Film & Media Studies Department, and an MFA from the Actors Studio Drama School at Pace University. She has also trained in London through the British American Drama Academy and the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art.
Her debut play, I EAT BOYS, has been developed through readings at TheaterLab (produced by Kind Strangers), Royal Family Productions, and The Ephemeral Players. As a producer, Jamie has helped develop new work across musical comedies, plays, scene cycles, and short films, with a focus on bold, character-driven storytelling.
Outside of her producing and writing, Jamie works at the Freeman Studio, where she leads digital marketing, crafting the studio’s online voice and expanding its audience through strategic content, branding, and outreach initiatives. She has also helped shape a clear artistic vision for the space while coordinating free seminars and events featuring guest artists such as Paul Giamatti, Amy Ryan, Martyna Majok, Adam Rapp, and Hank Azaria.