PCPA (since 1989): Director: Million Dollar Quartet, A Little Night Music; The (curious case of the) Watson Intelligence, Trying; Actor: More than 85 productions including Ursula, The Little Mermaid; Lady Bracknell,The Importance of Being Earnest; Kate Jerome, Brighton Beach Memoirs; Nurse, Shakespeare in Love; Soccer Mom, The Wolves; Rosie, Mamma Mia!; Mrs. Potts, Beauty and the Beast; Medda Larkin, Newsies; Mrs. Jennings, Sense and Sensibility; Madame, Cinderella; Amanda Wingfield, The Glass Menagerie; Queen Margaret, Richard III; Silda, Other Desert Cities; Mrs. Higgins, My Fair Lady; Aunt Eller, Oklahoma!; Gertrude, Hamlet; Patsy Cline, Always… Patsy Cline (2013, 1998, 1997); Miss Andrew, Mary Poppins; Golde, Fiddler on the Roof; Mrs. Malaprop, The Rivals; Kate Keller, All My Sons; Carmen Bernstein, Curtains; Martha, White Christmas; Mama Rose, Gypsy; Dolly Levi, Hello, Dolly and The Matchmaker; Lady Macduff, Macbeth; Mrs. Paroo, The Music Man; Maria, Twelfth Night; Penny, You Can’t Take It With You; Maria, Lend Me A Tenor; Molly Brown, The Unsinkable Molly Brown
Other Theatres: Actor: South Coast Rep, Utah Shakespeare Festival, Sacramento Theatre Company
Teaches: Voice & Speech 1
Training: BA, Brown University; MFA, UC Irvine
Awards: Lunt-Fontanne Fellow – 2019; Santa Barbara Independent Award – 2017, Amanda, The Glass Menagerie
Board Member: Santa Barbara Arts Fund
Member: *Actors’ Equity Association
Teaching Philosophy
I love teaching. I love teaching acting and music literature. I love uncovering sweeping through-lines and small, intimate beats. I love theater and stories and people.
I have been teaching primarily 1st year acting for PCPA’s Actor Training Program for a good part of the last 20 years. I give the students structure for their work. I give them tools that they can use over and over again to build their characters. No matter the play, no matter the director; I give students a method to approach the work. I expect actors to arrive filled with creativity. I teach them that they must also be smart, responsible, and diligent. They must be courageous and flexible and have open and available hearts. They must be more than they thought was possible in order to find room for these characters in themselves. My goal is to help them live truthfully within the given circumstances of the play… over and over again … eight shows a week.
Acting is a mysterious thing. It’s identifying human relationships and interactions and then weaving them into a framework with words and actions. If done correctly, it takes our breath away. What joy we feel when an actor discovers a truthful moment of vulnerability, or triumph, or love. In my class I aspire to create a positive working environment where actors feel free to try and fail…and, ultimately, to succeed.
Teaching Voice and Speech is working on the acting process through the filter of breath, sound, and language. I strive to help students find their authentic, natural voice, and connection to impulse through breath. It’s through that circular connection of impulse, breath and intention that words and characters can actually come to life with ease and truthfulness.
I chose a life in the theater because I like to work collaboratively on a common goal. I prefer the energy and momentum a group creates versus working in isolation. I value the generosity of spirit and creativity that my colleagues bring to their work. My goal is to pass that tradition on to the students in my care.