Gina Gallego, Book

Gina, a second-generation Angeleno, has appeared in over one hundred feature films and television shows, recently completing four seasons as Mrs. Hernandez on the CW Channel’s groundbreaking musical comedy, Crazy Ex Girlfriend. América Tropical is her first musical theatre writing project with her husband of forty years, Joel S. Bailey.  América Tropical was a semi-finalist at the O’Neil Theatre Center’s prestigious NAMT Conference, and was selected by McCoy Rigby Entertainment as winner of the Raise Your Voice new works competition sponsored by Inclusion Media Group. Gina has been honored with the prestigious Golden Eagle Award from Nosotros’ the oldest Latino arts advocacy organization in the United States founded by Hollywood legend Ricardo Montalbán. IMDb > Gina Gallego (I)

Jan Roper, Music

Jan is a composer, music director, keyboardist, singer and native Southern California girl. Her first new work, Jerusalem A.D., an immersive rock musical about Christ’s last week of life is licensed by CMI Shows. City of Light came next, which was part of the ASCAP Workshop of 2016 and the sheNYC Festival of 2017 where it won Best Score. Her new work, The Path to Catherine, was produced by Write Act Repertory in 2022 at LA’s Brick House Theater and received a regional Best Musical nomination for Broadway World. The Path to Catherine concept album will be released this year on Center Stage Records. Another current new work in development, América Tropical, was the winner of the Raise Your Voice Award for Diversity and Inclusion in 2020. In 2021 it was a finalist in the Eugene O’Neill National Music Theater Conference and in 2022 for the Jonathan Larson Grant. In 2022, América Tropical had 2 staged readings produced by 2 highly respected SoCal theater companies: McCoy-Rigby Entertainment and Musical Theatre West, as well as the featured musical for the Latiné Musical Theatre Lab’s Table Read Series, 2023, with support from the Lin Manuel Miranda Family Fund. In addition, América Tropical just received a live-streamed reading in NYC in February 2025, produced by Jamila Ponton-Bragg of JamRock Productions and TRU. Jan also won the L.A. Scenie Award in the 2019-20 & 2022-23 season for Best Music Director and was nominated by Los Angeles Drama Critics Circle for Best Musical Direction in 2024. She stays busy as a faculty teacher at AMDA College of the Performing Arts.

Joel S. Bailey, Book & Lyrics

Joel works as a writer, producer, director, and actor in the entertainment industry. América Tropical is his second collaboration with composer Jan Roper. Their first musical, Photo Finish (Eve Weston lyrics), was produced on Theatre Row in Hollywood by Studio C Artists. His full-length musical, New York Society for the Suppression of Vice (book, with music by Jake Anthony, lyrics Patricia Zehentmayr), was awarded a series of concert readings at NMI. Big Noise (book & lyrics) co-written with composer Ron Barnett was also awarded a concert reading at NMI. His latest (book & lyrics), with Jan Roper and Gina Gallego, is América Tropical, which was winner of Theatre Resources Unlimited TRU Voices Musicals Reading Series for 2025, and a semi-finalist at the O’Neil Theatre Center’s prestigious NAMT Conference, a Jonathan Larson Grant Finalist (American Theatre Wing) for 2022, and was selected by McCoy Rigby Entertainment as winner of the Raise Your Voice new works competition for inclusion and diversity sponsored by Inclusion Media Group. América Tropical was honored to be selected and featured in Musical Theatre West’s New Works New Voices festival in November of 2022. Joel was awarded the Center for Cultural Innovation Arts Quick Grant in 2022 and 2018 for Musical Theatre. Joel is a member of the Writers Guild of America, SAG-AFTRA, a graduate of Florida State University, and a Lifetime Member of The Actors Studio. Joel is married to actor Gina Gallego co-book writer of América Tropical.Film & TV credits: IMDb > Joel Bailey (I)