Meet The Team
Nora Neo-Crothers
Founder & Director
Nora Neo-Crothers is the founder of inwardBOUND, a uniquely positioned company that uses drama to inspire confidence and empower creative change. Having received First Class Honours in Drama and Performance from the National Technological University of Singapore, she became a prolific writer, trainer and director.
She is a recipient of numerous Outstanding Contribution Awards for her efforts at developing drama in schools. She was the 1st runner-up for Woman of Asia - Rising Star Award (RBS - Coutts and Financial Times) and was nominated for the Outstanding Youth in Education Award.
She believes in the transformative power of drama which has, over the years, evolved into the core of her work with youth at inwardBOUND. In the long term, her vision is to see her drama programs making a difference, especially to people who may not otherwise have the opportunity to be empowered through such a medium.
Isaiah Christopher Lee is a multilingual Singaporean theatre practitioner, art historian, researcher, cultural diplomat, educator and entrepreneur with 15 years of experience in performance making and 5 years in education.
A recipient of the prestigious Indonesian Arts and Culture Scholarship 2023 (Beasiswa Seni dan Budaya Indonesia) from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Indonesia, Isaiah represented the Republic of Singapore on the international stage. He studied Indonesian dance and music in DKI Jakarta and has worked with Indonesian maestro Eko Supriyanto on Indonesia Channel 2023 at Lapangan Banteng, Central Jakarta. He continues to practise Balinese dance with Eka Suwara Santhi, Singapore.
Isaiah is an Associate Artist at inwardBOUND – Transformation through Drama. Previously, he served as the Artistic Curator and Stage Director at New Opera Singapore, teaching acting and stagecraft. He is also the Co-Founder of In The Round: Network of Emerging Theatre Directors, and a guest lecturer at the Nanyang Academy of Fine Arts, Singapore (NAFA) and teaches Contemporary Southeast Asian Theatre for MU4631: Music & Sound Design for Theatre under the School of Music. Isaiah was an Artist-in-Residence with Centre 42 under the The Vault: Lite 2021 with a research specialisation on reimagining Singapore theatre classics, in particular Chong Tze Chien’s Poop!. He has also worked with pioneer Singapore artist Tang Da Wu on 'The Big Rehearsal: What Question' at The Substation, Singapore (2021) and ‘Walk Darkness Walk’ at the National Gallery Singapore (2021).
Among his wide repertoire of works, he was the playwright for the interdisciplinary performance《空》Reflections for Esplanade’s HuaYi 2021. His poems have been published in The Kindling Journal, and SingPoWriMo 2018: The Anthology, and he was shortlisted for the 2018 Editorial Consultations by Arts House, Singapore for poetry.
Apart from writing, he is active in performance and is particularly interested in movement and physical theatre. His latest solo performances include The Concubine (2021), and The Visit (2022) part of a community theatre project with Bored Whale Theatre's 'FourPlay' series. As part of his directorial work, Isaiah directed Single Mothers (2019) at the Playden at the Arts House, Singapore and Anamnesis (2021) at Aliwal Arts Centre. As a theatre practitioner, he has worked with New Opera Singapore and MUSA: The Collective. He has worked on various arts projects supported and funded by the National Arts Council Singapore (NAC), the Arts Fund, and the National Youth Council (NYC), Young ChangeMakers (YCM).
Isaiah graduated with a BA(Hons) Double Major in English Literature and Art History (Highest Distinction) at Nanyang Technological University, Singapore (NTU-SG) with a Minor in Modern Languages (German). He is also the recipient of the Lee Kwan Yew Gold Medal (English) and the Koh Boon Hwee Scholars Award from NTU-SG. In parallel with theoretical research within and beyond the disciplines of Art History and English Literature, he explores performance and storytelling through interdisciplinary theatre and education.
Isaiah Christopher Lee
Associate Artist
Mitchell Fang
Associate Artist
Mitchell Fang is a theatre director, performer and teacher. His previous works include the M1 Fringe's '1000 Millennials Crying', Toy Factory's 'Permanence', and 20-Something Festival's 'Long Weekend'. He has performed for productions such as Toy Factory’s 'GRIND', Red Pill Production’s 'Let’s Get Back Together', One Man Riot's 'Pull Up', and Artivate's 'Bus Stop'. Mitchell has taught in various secondary schools and junior colleges in Singapore over the last 10 years, running drama-in-curriculum programmes, in-house school productions, and directing drama clubs in the bi-annual Singapore Youth Festival.
Sonia Kwek
Associate Artist
Sonia is an artist, performer, and educator/facilitator who works primarily through performance and body expression to create multidisciplinary experiences. Sonia works with children, youths and communities as she believes in using art and drama as a way to empower people and open up conversations.
As an educator, Sonia strives to cultivate the next generation’s imagination, confidence and resilience in creative expression. Sonia trained in acting at the Intercultural Theatre Institute and holds a Bachelor of Creative Industries (Drama) with Distinction from Queensland University of Technology.
Umi Kalthum
Associate Artist
Since Umi graduated from LASALLE, she has acted for theatre and television. Her theatre credits include MERDEKA / 獨立 / சுதந்திரம் and Supervision (W!LDRICE). Internationally, she has toured France with The Reunification of the Two Koreas (T:>Works).
While she profoundly enjoys performing, teaching has always been Umi’s first love – she has spent the last decade educating young theatre-makers in the disciplines of writing, directing and acting.
Nina Chabra
Associate Artist
Storytelling has been an artery of Nina Chabra’s practice for the last 18 years, employing various mediums to communicate her projects, with video being her oft-used tool. Her projects have been in competition and also screened locally and internationally at numerous independent film festivals, including Singapore International Film Festival and Salamindanaw Asian Film Festival.
She is trained in film production and worked as a freelancer in the corporate video sector for close to a decade before pivoting to drama education in recent years. Visual - storytelling has taken on many new forms; as the media landscape shifts and incorporates new elements for stage, she believes the merging of both her loves, brings new perspectives to tired methodologies.
Nina continually pushes her technical creative skills by working with intra-disciplinary art practitioners, in hopes of visually presenting lesser-known truths. True collaborations are a driving force for her to coalesce and present her current works.
Benjin Chua
Associate Artist
Benjin has been teaching for more than 10 years, spanning between the ages of 2 – 18 years old. He has a special interest and passion in education, believing in the power of theatre and the benefits it can give in
nurturing the next generation.
Benjin is someone who focuses more on the growth of the student as compared to the end product that they can bring, because he believes that the life skills they impart can impact and change their life.
Rebecca Louise Burch
Associate Artist
Rebecca Burch has been a drama trainer with Inward Bound since completing her studies at Lasalle in 2007.
Balance is very important to Rebecca. She loves singing and performs regularly at events, weddings as well as on collaborations on music tracks with DJ’s around the world. So the perfect life for Rebecca is to work with students in the day/week, and perform and immerse herself in music during the evenings and weekends. Working with and guiding students keeps her young hearted, energetic and motivated.
Dwayne Ng
Associate Artist
Dwayne Ng is a local theatre-maker and drama educator. He believes that theatre, more than a tool for storytelling, has the power to affect and change lives. He has acted in, written for, and directed both professional and independent productions, in various forms—traditional, promenade, playback, forum, digital; in diverse styles—realist, absurdist, physical, immersive; and in different languages—English, Mandarin, and Baba Malay. He was trained at young&W!LD in 2016-2017. Over the years, he worked with various theatre companies such as the Second Breakfast Company, Patch and Punnet, Toy Factory Productions, Peranakan Siblings, Images of Singapore LIVE, Shoes Theatre, and BOUND Theatre.