Kay Williams

Kay Williams is a professional actress who has played leading roles at regional theaters around the U.S., including the San Francisco Actors Workshop and the Pittsburgh Playhouse. Among her many credits are the title role in "Miss Jairus," Cybel in "Great God Brown," and Georgette in "The Balcony," all plays that are part of the repertory of the 42nd Street Theater in "Butcher of Dreams." She has also performed in many, many new plays off-Broadway in Manhattan. She has acted in radio, television, and films. For several years, she worked behind-the-scenes as assistant producer with an award-winning independent filmmaker in New York.

Kay is a co-author of "One Last Dance: It's Never Too Late to Fall in Love," a novel started by her father, Mardo Williams, and finished by her and her sister Jerri Lawrence.

Eileen Wyman is a writer of short fiction and has edited many books and film scripts. She has had a career in radio/television and is a gifted comedy writer, crafting jokes for speech writers and comedians, humorous fillers for various magazines, and captions for cartoonists. She has written additional dialogue for films. During her long career, Eileen has held a variety of odd jobs to make ends meet--teacher, social worker, office temp.

Kay and Eileen are finishing their next book, a thriller that opens at the Leningrad Documentary Festival in 1991. Glasnost and perestroika, communism's replacements, have been around for five years. Shelves are bare. Five American dollars is a month's pay on the black market. Men who have lost their jobs are sending their wives out as hard currency hookers. Old Soviets are crying out for a return to Stalinism.

Kate Hennessey, 25, gay, aspiring filmmaker, has arrived with colleagues to show their documentary "Revolution" (about the hippies in 60's San Francisco) as part of the Festival's anti-totalitarianism program. For her NYC class in guerilla filmmaking, Kate gathers video and audio interviews from real Russian citizens, recording their criticisms of current politics and corruption and their debates about communism versus capitalism. She stumbles into an "illegal meeting" of women, where Sveta, age 17, confides to her that she is afraid she may be killed.

Kate tries to help and is swept up in a series of frightening events, nearly losing her life. She finally flees Leningrad with the help of new Russian friends, chased by a scar-faced KGB officer, the military, and the local police.

Back home in NYC, Kate, inspired by the courage of the Russian people, begins the edit of her video, "Messages from Leningrad." She vows never to take freedoms for granted--they can be eroded--and to fight for human rights. But first she must fight for her life as she slowly realizes that those who pursued her in Leningrad have followed her back to NYC.