My Story

(skip ahead if you want my professional bio)

At age seven I took my first acting class with Mrs. King, a bouffant-haired, menthol-smoking, goddess. We’d just moved to Cincinnati, I was lonely, and a bit sad. I had a lisp and had to go sit with the speech pathologist during recess: “thoup,” “thwing,” “thathafrath.”

In the Mini Mummers, Mrs. King taught us that actors are never bored; there is always some fascinating person around to study. Grocery stores were my favorite place to practice my noticing skills. I watched how people stood, mimicked their gait, made up stories about their lives based on the contents of their carts, gleaned their inner lives by listening to the music of their voices.

My father taught me that if I find someone boring, it’s because I’m not asking the right questions.

My mother taught me to love the beauty of human imperfection.

And no one ever tried to talk me out of being an actor.

In my early 30s, I was sitting at the light-rimmed dressing table, applying a spray of freckles over my cheeks and nose with an eye pencil, and missing my step-sister’s wedding. I saw the red-ringleted wig, the corset pulled tight, and the eyes of a person who was missing out on having a real life.

Within a couple of months I had applied and been accepted to a graduate program in clinical social work. And I never lived in my tiny West Village apartment again.

One week before graduation I got a call to audition for The Sopranos. This was 2000 and The Sopranos was just it. At any other time in my life I would have tossed my lip-gloss and headshots into a bag and hit the road, leaving behind all hair appointments, rendezvous, parties, friends, lovers, day-jobs, and dirty dishes without a moment’s hesitation.

I didn’t even call them back. I cannot describe the sense of buoyant freedom I felt.

Besides, I was directing and acting in the Senior Skits!

My first job out of grad school was to begin and run social work programs in two inner-city Catholic schools. I’d been hired to deal with the ravages of the Catholic Church sexual abuse scandal.

Sister Paula and Sister Carol gave me a small, sunny closet with a thick wooden desk, and never, ever doubted my process even though I was brand-new and kind of making it up as I went along. I just hoped I was doing more good than harm. From these women I learned to hold the truth and do your best. Sister Paula also offered to give me handwriting lessons, though I never took her up on this much to my family’s chagrin.

Around the same time, I found that many of the theater people I’d worked with as an actor in Boston had started having families and had to get “real jobs.” A couple of them had started The Ariel Group, a company made up of professional performers who teach leadership presence using the skills and techniques of the theater. I jumped right in!

From then on, my work, my passion, my talents, my experience, my skills, my purpose, seemed to align with what the world needed. I worked at Ariel in many capacities from facilitator to running their fledgeling non-profit wing. And when we moved to Virginia (I couldn’t find a parking space in Massachusetts), I started my own practice.

And here I am. Grateful for the many teachers who shone the light a few steps ahead so I had a path to follow.