Story Slam! | Ojai Story Fest

This Year's Finalists

Miyo Yamauchi

Miyo is a mischievous storyteller and comic who finds humor in life’s cultural collisions. Born and raised in Japan, she brings a sharp, cross-cultural perspective to stages across Los Angeles and beyond. A Moth StorySLAM Champion, she also co-produces ESL Comedy, a showcase of immigrant storytellers and comedians. Her solo show, How To Be Japanese: Your Normal Is Not My Normal, has delighted audiences around the world. Whether poking fun at awkward misunderstandings or reflecting on deeper truths, Miyo’s stories leave audiences laughing, thinking, and reimagining what “normal” really means.

Zoot Velasco

Zoot Velasco was severely burned as a newborn and overcame the loss of his right foot, childhood trauma, and homelessness to work for a dozen years as a professional dancer, screen actor, internationally touring artist, arts educator, published poet, and storyteller. Since 1994, Zoot has led award-winning cultural programs throughout Southern California and in state prisons that grew exponentially during his tenure. His success led to an MBA, authoring three books, a podcast, and teaching business and leadership courses at three colleges and universities. Currently, he serves as the Interim Executive Director for Pasadena Heritage, is a member of the Altadena Rotary Club, and holds the position of Membership Chair for Rotary District 5300. Additionally, he is a leadership trainer at Cal Poly Pomona and Jericho Road Pasadena, and leads a prison art program at Avenal and SATF Corcoran prisons.

Megan Dolan

Megan Dolan is a Long Beach based writer/ actor/ storyteller who has performed at the Moth, Hollywood Fringe Festival, Expressing Motherhood, and TEDx Pasadena (to name a few). Her written work has been published in L.A. Parent Magazine and the anthology, Becoming Brave Together: heroic, extraordinary caregiving stories from mothers hidden in plain sight. She will be showcasing at the Association of Performing Arts Professionals conference January 9-13, 2026 in NYC and is currently touring her award-winning solo show, Not the Right Mom: one mother's misadventures in autism. Visit nottherightmom.com for info on upcoming shows. Follow her@megan_tells_stories.

Derrick C. Brown is the poet laureate of Los Feliz CA and is a former paratrooper based in Los Angeles, California. He writes and swims in Ojai. His books of poetry include Love Ends in a Tandem Kayak (2023) and Strange Light (2013), both published by Write Bloody. Strange Light won the Texas’s Book Award for Poetry

Derrick Brown

Alan Salazar – Puchuk Ya’ia’c (Fast Runner) – is a respected tribal elder of the Fernandeño Tataviam Band of Mission Indians and a descendant of the Ventureño Chumash and Tataviam peoples, whose ancestral villages of Ta’apu (Simi Valley) and Chaguayanga (Castaic) date back centuries. A traditional storyteller, Indigenous educator, monitor, consultant, and spiritual adviser, Alan is also a founding member of the Chumash Maritime Association, where he helped build the first working traditional Chumash plank canoe in modern times and has paddled tomols for more than 27 years. He continues to oversee new canoe projects for the Ventura Chumash community, marking the first such builds in over 180 years. A published author of four Native American storybooks, Alan is deeply dedicated to protecting ancestral sites, mentoring youth, and preserving the stories and traditions of his people for future generations.

Alan Salazar

Nick Ullett

Nick Ullett. Has been on six Ed Sullivan Shows and has done everything from “Golden Girls” to “Call Me Kat”. In the 70s, he went into advertising and ended up as Creative Director of J. Walter Thompson in LA. In the theatre he created the Hon. Gerald Bolinbroke on Broadway in the musical “Me and My Girl” and was also in “Loot” by Joe Orton. His show “The Birthday Party - a theatrical catastrophe” has garnered rave reviews in LA and also at The Edinburgh Fringe Festival.

Colleen O'Mara-Diamond

Colleen, a Writer, lives and works in beautiful and emerging Ojai, California. She manages an international communications agency, and writes short stories, essays and poetry. Colleen’s book projects include debut memoir “Raw Diamond,” short story & poetry collections “Carob Tree Blues” and “Moon of a Star.” Her work has been published in the “Los Angeles Times,” “Urban Howl,” and the “Northridge Review,” as well as short-listed by Fish Publishing for short memoir.