Red Herring Puppet Staff
Lisa Aimee Sturz is the Owner and Artistic Director of Red Herring Puppets. She has an MFA in puppetry from UCLA and 50 years of experience building, performing, and directing puppetry for film & television, theatre, museums, educational institutions, and special events. She has worked with Jim Henson Productions, Walt Disney Imagineering, Lucasfilm and the Lyric Opera of Chicago. Film credits include Howard the Duck, Muppets in Space, Elmo in Grouchland, RoboCop II, Ninja Turtles III, the Flintstones and many more.
Click below to download Lisa's résumé. 
Noa Moquin is an accomplished gothic artist, musician, and budding puppeteer born and raised in Tucson, Arizona. Their involvement with Red Herring Puppets began in early 2025. Noa collaborated with Lisa to design and perform a unique shadowplay adaptation of Ray Bradbury's "Soft Rain" for the Biosphere 2. Since then, they have been learning the many puppet styles and performing Red Herring Productions.
Luis Castillo Silva began working with Red Herring Puppets in early 2025. He is a Chicano creator from Tucson with a lifelong passion for storytelling! Luis’s experience includes writing, crowdfunding, editing, and producing books, zines, and comics. His writing embodies his desire to use pop culture as a vessel to explore the joys and terrors of life. He is a member of the Fae Ring Webcomic Collective and the Cartoonist Cooperative.
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Maria Hays started performing with Red Herring Puppets in 2021. She is our Spanish language translator and uses her sewing and crafting skills to help build puppets and scenery. She is the Chief Event Coordinator with the educational non-profit, ABC Guidance and home-schools her two young puppeteers, Caleb & Gabriel.
Caleb Hays is the youngest member of the Red Herring Puppet family. Since 2021, he has attended Red Herring’s After School programs and Puppet Camp. Impressed with his talent, Lisa recruited him as a bilingual voice actor and assistant puppeteer for the 2022 production of the Barking Mouse and the Blue Frog. During the Summer of 2025, Caleb performed the lead role in The Friendly Chupacabra. Caleb also participates in the Joyful Music Youth Choir, youth acting classes at Scoundrel and Scamp theater, and has been a finalist in multiple art competitions including the Pima County Library card design, and Fiesta Sahuarita art contests.
Amelie Allen is finishing up a degree in journalism at the University of Arizona. She performs in several of Red Herring's touring productions and has been part of the Adult Puppetry Slams.
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