A Bit About Me

When I was a kid, I got to play the part of “Baby Louise,” in the musical “Gypsy,” at sleep-away camp. The story centers around a fierce stage mom whose quest to get her girls into the spotlight inadvertently transforms one of them, Louise, into the renowned burlesque stripper, Gypsy Rose Lee (as suggested by the memoirs of Gypsy Rose Lee).

 

I don’t even remember how I got the role, because although it was generally believed in the context of the play that little Louise could not sing or dance, I suspect I must have had to do some singing and dancing well enough at the audition to prove I couldn’t do it in the show, or perhaps I did it so poorly, that I was a shoe in.

 

In any event, Louise was considered to be the untalented sister, and her sister June, was poised to become the star. It was a strange twist of events and a testament to Gypsy’s survival instincts and previously undiscovered unique talents, which led her to becoming a star in the world of burlesque as a stripper—which is a big part of what made me love her.

 

Though I only had a tiny role in the play, I hearken back to it often, because theirs was a life in the theater, pursuing it with every ounce of their souls from the time they were little and through to the end, (except for June, who found it all unbearable and got out as soon as she could.) Theirs was a life full of rejection, disappointments, and lots of transience.

 

It’s ironic to me that one of my first roles in the theater, so adeptly reflects my journey in the theater. A big distinction between their story and my own, initially, the girls were being dragged around to auditions—I would have gone to the ends of the earth to find them. Though I fought with my whole heart to become a successful actor, I didn't become famous or successful enough to quit my night job, and over time, I battled the pain of that by studying behavior and creating characters and dialogue around it, writing down thoughts, and eventually crafting stories of my own.

 

This portfolio shares a small portion of the body of work that I’ve developed over the years.

My professional life has taken me on many twists and turns, but the thing that has propelled me forward, brought me to life, and breathed new life into me, is my love of story. Story is how I make sense of the world…What's your story? I'd love to help you tell it.