Tag Archives: Juanita Jennings

Fountain actresses are now conquering television and breaking barriers

fountain-actresses

Simone Missick, Taraji P. Henson, and Tina Lifford

They are, first and foremost, talented actresses now starring in some of the most popular shows on television. They are strong women conquering an industry dominated by men. They are women of color leading a new wave of diversity now finally being demonstrated on TV screens. And they are all members of the Fountain Family, seen in acclaimed productions on our intimate Fountain stage   

Simone Missick is now taking TV by storm co-starring as Misty Knight on the new Netflix series Marvel’s Luke Cage. She plays the first black female superhero in the history of television. The new series is now being seen in 180 countries.  There is already talk of giving Simone her own series in a Misty Knight spinoff. 

luke-cage-wp

Simone Missick as Misty Knight in ‘Marvel’s Luke Cage’

Simone’s launch to TV stardom is the stuff of local LA theatre legend. She was catapulted from acting in a play at the intimate Fountain Theatre to co-starring in a new popular television series as an iconic Marvel superhero. It’s the kind of plucking from obscurity to stardom of which most actors dream. 

CITIZEN Fountain Theatre feel most colored

Simone Missick in ‘Citizen: An American Lyric’ at the Fountain Theatre

Simone got the call to audition for the series while appearing on stage at the Fountain Theatre in our 2015 hit production of Citizen: An American Lyric. Shuttling back and forth between auditioning for the TV role and performing weekends at the Fountain, she knew it was a longshot. Suffering from a head cold, she flew to New York one final time to audition and test for the part. Sworn to secrecy by TV producers, Simone couldn’t share details with her Fountain cast about the role she was up for. But we knew it was big and important. We all waited. 

Then she got word.    

“I got a call from Jeph Loeb who was the head of Marvel. He kind of just said, ‘Prepare for your life to change,’” says Simone. “And what does that even mean for an actor who’s been working, doing theatre and short films in LA for 10 years? You can just never anticipate when that call is going to come, what it will really be. It was amazing.”

tina-lifford

Tina Lifford

Tina Lifford was also on stage at the Fountain with Simone in the same production of Citizen: An American Lyric. She now co-stars as Violet Bordelon, an aunt to the three estranged Bordelon siblings on OWN’s acclaimed drama Queen Sugar. The new series was  created, directed and executive produced by Ava DuVernay. Oprah Winfrey also serves as executive producer.  

Queen Sugar is groundbreaking. It is produced by a black-owned network and overseen by two black women—one who owns the network (Winfrey) and the other (DuVernay) as showrunner, head writer and director. All of the directors guiding every episode in season one have been women.  

“It’s exciting that we get to represent the excellence that is living in people of color,” says Tina. “The excellence that hasn’t necessarily had a platform before, which is why Ava is championing the whole inclusive movement. She is saying, there’s all of these stories and talents in every face of talent-making to tell those stories, and we’re going to show you who they are. That’s exciting.”

queen-sugar

Taraji P. Henson was nominated for an Academy Award for her performance in the film The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. She now stars as Cookie Lyon on the smash hit Fox series Empire, for which she won a Golden Globe Award and has twice been nominated for an Emmy. In 2016, Time magazine named Henson one of the 100 most influential people in the world on the annual Time 100 list.

taraji-empire

Taraji P. Henson as Cookie Lyon on ‘Empire’

Taraji appeared in our Fountain west coast premiere of The Darker Face of the Earth by Rita Dove. She has maintained her connection with the Fountain Family, seeing Fountain productions and visiting with our casts and companies after performances. 

taraji-et-cast2

Taraji P. Henson and the cast of ‘The Ballad of Emmett Till’

The Los Angeles Times has dubbed Diarra Kilpatrick as “a force of nature”. She is not only a dynamic actress. She is a gifted writer and ambitious creator. Her American Koko digital series, originally produced for her YouTube channel, received the Best Web Series Award at the American Black Film Festival and was lauded as a “Web Series You Should Be Watching” by Essence Magazine. ABC’s streaming service ABCd has now acquired American Koko, with Emmy winner and Oscar nominee Viola Davis producing.

“Diarra is an exceptional talent in that she cannot be put in a category,” says Davis. “She has a unique voice that transcends her generation.”

The Race

Diarra Kilpatrick “In the Red and Brown Water”

Diarra starred in the Fountain Theatre’s acclaimed and award-winning Los Angeles Premiere of Tarell McCraney’s In the Red and Brown Water. Diarra played Oya, a lightning-fast runner, in the stunning and lyrical drama. Since that dazzling production, Diarra has been sprinting ever since.  She is now also developing The Climb for Amazon. She will write and star in the project.   

deidrie-game-of-silence

Deidrie Henry on ‘Game of Silence’

The list of Fountain actresses goes on. Deidrie Henry has mesmerized audiences in such Fountain productions as Yellowman and Coming Home. She co-starred as Detective Liz Winters on the NBC TV series Game of Silence and is the national TV commercial character Annie for Popeyes.  Monnae Michaell (Citizen: An American Lyric) plays Nina on the new TV series The Good Place. Tonya Pinkins (And Her Hair Went With Her) is Ethel Peabody on the television show Gotham. Tinashe Kajese will be seen in the upcoming TV movie The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks. Fountain veterans Tracie Thoms, Karen Malina White, Juanita Jennings, Adenrele Ojo are seen often on TV. 

“I’m always thrilled to see one of our actors, any actor, male or female, succeed in the film and TV industry,” says Co-Artistic Director Stephen Sachs. “But to see these extraordinary women achieve these accomplishments and create change, knowing that they come from our Fountain Family, makes me even more delighted and proud.” 

Fountain Theatre Earns 2 NAACP Theatre Award Nominations for its World Premiere ‘Heart Song’

Tamlyn Tomita and Juanita Jennings in 'Heart Song'

Tamlyn Tomita and Juanita Jennings in ‘Heart Song’

‘Heart Song’ Noted for Acting and Choreography

Our 2013 Fountain Theatre World Premiere production of Heart Song has been nominated for 2 NAACP Theatre Awards for excellence in acting and choreography.  Juanita Jennings has been nominated for Best Supporting Actress and Maria Bermudez for Best Choreography. The 24th Annual NAACP Awards ceremony will be held Monday, November 17, at the Saban Theatre in Beverly Hills.

Written by Stephen Sachs and directed by Shirley Jo Finney, our 2013 world premiere of Heart Song earned rave reviews and an extended run. In this funny and touching comedy/drama, Rochelle is a middle-aged Jewish woman in New York City in the middle of a life crisis. Lost and alone, her life is suddenly changed when she is convinced to take a Flamenco class with other middle-aged women. The Flamenco class and its unforgettable circle of women — all shapes, sizes and colors — lead Rochelle on a journey of sisterhood, faith and discovery of her own deep inner voice.

The NAACP Theatre Awards is presented by the Beverly Hills/Hollywood NAACP Branch. The gala is produced for the purpose of honoring artists in the field of entertainment. The branch also celebrates a three-day theatre festival, which provides a platform for theatre artists to express their craft and share their contributions with an audience of their peers, the community and other individuals who celebrate live theatre in Los Angeles.

Rochelle (Pamela Dunlap) finds release through dance in 'Heart Song'.

‘Heart Song’ featured flamenco choreography by Maria Bermudez.

This year’s Awards show will be hosted by Kym Whitley, star of the humorous and poignant docu-series “Raising Whitley” on Oprah Winfrey’s The OWN Network.  The awards show will take place on Monday, November 17, 2014 at 6PM at the historical Saban Theatre in Beverly Hills, California.

Full list of NAACP Award nominees.

 

PHOTO SLIDESHOW: ‘Heart Song’ Final Performance and Party at the Fountain Theatre

The company.

The Heart Song company.

Our wonderful 3-month run of the world premiere of Heart Song came to a glorious conclusion yesterday with its final matinee performance followed by a joyous party. The funny and powerful new play and sold-out production earned many rave reviews and deeply affected audiences. We received many emails and Facebook comments from people expressing how deeply moved they were by the play and what the production meant to them. One patron, Heidi Singh, was so taken with the play she saw it seven times.

New plays created by the Fountain Theatre often have future lives as they are produced by other theaters around the country. Heart Song will open at Florida Repertory Theatre in April.

We thank all of the extraordinary artists, crew, production team, and — most important — audience members who made the extended 3-month run of Heart Song at the Fountain Theatre such an unforgettable and meaningful experience.

Enjoy Photos From The Final Show Party! 

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New Video! Hit Comedy/Drama ‘Heart Song’ Extended to Aug 25 at the Fountain Theatre

"Heart Song" at the Fountain Theatre

“Heart Song” at the Fountain Theatre

Hailed as “superb” and “magnificent” by critics and audiences alike, the Fountain Theatre’s acclaimed hit comedy/drama Heart Song has been extended to August 25th. The Hollywood Reporter cheers Heart Song as “a genuine delight”, the LA Weekly heralds it as “beautifully performed,” and Broadway World declares Heart Song “a celebration of life you won’t want to miss.” 

Written by Stephen Sachs and directed by Shirley Jo FinneyHeart Song follows the funny and touching journey of Rochelle (Pamela Dunlap), a middle-aged Jewish woman in New York City struggling through a mid-life crisis and the recent loss of her mother. When Rochelle is convinced to take a flamenco class with other women led by a passionate Gypsy instructor (Denise Blasor), her life and world-view is changed forever.   

Enjoy The New ‘Heart Song’ Video Trailer

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‘Heart Song’ Cafe Chat: The Power of Faith, Healing and Birthday Cake

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We enjoyed a passionate and insightful chat with audience members yesterday in our cafe after the sold-out Sunday matinee of Heart Song. The hit play has been striking a deep chord with audiences since it opened to rave reviews in May. Its funny and touching dramatization of the themes of faith, grief, loss, friendship, empowerment and the mother/daughter relationship has ignited a strong need in audiences to want to talk about it after.  Yesterday, the play’s director, playwright and cast members gathered in our cafe after the matinee performance for an informal chat with audience members to share thoughts and feelings about the play they had just seen and performed.

Director Shirley Jo Finney discussed the universal chords in the play, pointing out that the intersection of cultures in the story demonstrates that “we are all one people”.  Actress Elissa Kyriacou shared her own personal story describing how, after recently losing her own mother, the play has served as an extraordinary healing process. Juanita Jennings remarked on the profound affect the play has had on all the women in the cast — and even her husband, who had a cathartic experience while seeing the play. Playwright Stephen Sachs spoke about the genesis of writing the play and how the script evolved through many drafts.  

The men and women who had just seen the play asked questions and made comments describing how deeply they were moved by the performance. Heart Song is a funny and powerful new play about a middle-aged woman named Rochelle (played by Pamela Dunlap)  struggling through a crisis of faith and the recent loss of her mother. Rochelle’s life is changed when she is convinced to take a flamenco class with other middle-aged women.

Yesterday was also an afternoon of joyous celebration as we toasted director Shirley Jo Finney on her birthday. Cake and ice cream was shared by all.  What a wonderful way to spend a Sunday: a terrific afternoon of theatre followed by a thought-provoking and heartfelt discussion topped with yummy ice cream and birthday cake! Who could ask for anything more?

Heart Song has been extended to August 25th.

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The Healing Power of Flamenco in ‘Heart Song’ at the Fountain Theatre

"Heart Song" at the Fountain Theatre

“Heart Song” at the Fountain Theatre

by Iris Mann

As her mother’s yahrzeit approaches, a middle-aged woman undergoes a crisis of the soul in the play “Heart Song,” currently at The Fountain Theatre in Hollywood. The woman, Rochelle (Pamela Dunlap), then joins a flamenco class and experiences the transformative power of that dance form. Playwright Stephen Sachs, who co-founded the theater with Deborah Lawlor, said that, due to Lawlor’s love for the dance, the Fountain has become the foremost presenter of flamenco in Los Angeles.

“The idea came to me,” Sachs explained, “that the writing of a play where a character takes a flamenco class and is changed by it would be a really good vehicle through which to tell the story, because the audience shares the experience with our lead character and enters the new world of flamenco with her.”

Sachs described the character of Rochelle as someone disconnected from her Judaism, her culture, her religion, her faith and her God.

Playwright Stephen Sachs

Playwright Stephen Sachs

“In that first scene, she talks about having forgotten the words to the Kaddish, which is something that she has known ever since she was a little girl, but now she can’t remember the words, and so she’s lost. She’s mourning the loss of her mother and struggling with some really deep philosophical questions, not only about grief and loss, but about the meaning of life and what’s our purpose.”

Rochelle’s turmoil was triggered when she went through a closet after her mother’s death and found a box with a girl’s striped dress from the concentration camp at Birkenau. At first she wasn’t sure who owned the dress.

“I think she suspected it was her mother,” Sachs said, “but, because her mother never talked about it, it was an issue that was never spoken in the home, and she never shared her true feelings.

Sachs continued, “Her mother was unable to share her pain with her own daughter.”

The challenging relationship that Rochelle had with her mother is something with which Dunlap can identify. Like Rochelle’s mother, her own mother was not very forthcoming.

Maria Bermudez and Pamela Dunlap in 'Heart Song'.

Maria Bermudez and Pamela Dunlap in ‘Heart Song’.

“Of course, my mother was not harboring the gravity of a secret like Rochelle’s mother was hiding. Actually, my mother said to me, the week of her death, ‘There is something I have never told you. I have to tell you.’ And she was not well. She was frail, and she was agitated and her breath was labored, and I got concerned. I calmed her down and said, ‘Tell me tomorrow. We can talk about it later. You don’t have to tell me now.’ She died. And I don’t know what that secret was.”

Dunlap added, “Most of us have secrets; most of us have big secrets, and we take those secrets to the grave with us, like Rochelle’s mother did.”

Rochelle’s mother also took her true name to the grave. After discovering the concentration camp uniform, Rochelle found out that her mother was born with a Polish name that she had changed. She’s now beside herself because she feels the name on the gravestone is wrong.

When she joins the flamenco group, Rochelle learns from its leader, a Gypsy named Katarina (Maria Bermudez, who is also the play’s choreographer), that there is a tradition of having two names in Gypsy culture. One name is private and known only to the Gypsy community, and the other is the name used in the outside world.

“I just thought that was a really interesting idea and metaphor to use in the play too,” Sachs remarked.

Rochelle also learns about the interconnectedness of the four cultures represented in the group; besides her Judaism and Katarina’s Gypsy roots, there is the Japanese heritage of Tina (Tamlyn Tomita), the masseuse who introduced Rochelle to flamenco, and the African-American culture of Daloris (Juanita Jennings), who befriends Rochelle.

Tamlyn Tomita, Juanita Jennings, Pamela Dunlap in "Heart Song"

Tamlyn Tomita, Juanita Jennings, Pamela Dunlap in “Heart Song”

As Katarina illuminates the mysteries of flamenco, the dance becomes the catalyst for revealing the deep-seated pain born of suffering that is shared by all the cultures. Daloris talks of the blues and its relevance to her culture; Katarina speaks of the Nazi extermination of the Gypsies, much like the extermination of the Jews; Tina expounds on the internment camps in which the Japanese-Americans were held during World War II.

“Too often what we do, and that’s a major theme, we carry other people’s stories,” director Shirley Jo Finney stated, “and part of the letting go is to create our own story.

“I think that’s one of the things each of those ladies, all of those ladies, in fact, were having to reconcile.”

According to Gypsy tradition, flamenco leads the dancer to reach into the farthest recesses of the soul to release the pain residing there, and, ultimately, Rochelle does find release in an anguished wail, the kind of outcry known to the Gypsies as the cante jondo, a primal scream that “rends the world in two” and is common to all cultures.

“Every culture has a wound,” Finney observed, “and it’s the deep need to be seen, to be nurtured, to feel safe.

“And [for] each of the tribes, when they talked about the tribes within that piece, that’s where the cry comes from. The cry comes from not being acknowledged, and the cry comes from that deep-seated place of self-expression.”

For playwright Sachs, working on this story helped him examine issues of spirituality and mortality that are part of the human experience and are very personal to him.

“The older we get,” he mused, “the more friends we seem to be losing, and it just makes one think about one’s own time, the time that we have left and how we’re spending it. I’m very much wrestling with that, and so the play allowed me to kind of swim in that water for awhile.”

Iris Mann writes for the Jewish Journal.

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Smash Hit Comedy/Drama ‘Heart Song’ Extends to August 25th at the Fountain Theatre

"Heart Song" at the Fountain Theatre

“Heart Song” at the Fountain Theatre

Hailed as “superb” and “magnificent” by critics and audiences alike, the Fountain Theatre’s acclaimed hit comedy/drama Heart Song has been extended to August 25th. The Hollywood Reporter cheers Heart Song as “a genuine delight”, the LA Weekly heralds it as “beautifully performed,” and Broadway World declares Heart Song “a celebration of life you won’t want to miss.” 

Written by Stephen Sachs and directed by Shirley Jo Finney, Heart Song follows the funny and touching journey of Rochelle (Pamela Dunlap), a middle-aged Jewish woman in New York City struggling through a mid-life crisis and the recent loss of her mother. When Rochelle is convinced to take a flamenco class with other women led by a passionate Gypsy instructor (Denise Blasor), her life and world-view is changed forever.   

The Fountain Theatre world premiere has earned rave reviews and sold-out houses since it opened  in May.

MIRACULOUS! A tender, deeply layered journey to the center of a woman’s soul.” – Stage Happenings
EXTRAORDINARY!  I wanted to jump up and shout ‘Bravo’ when the lights came up!” Los Angeles Post 
DAZZLING! A transcendent evening of theatre!”   – Explore Dance
A MUST SEE! It will make you laugh one minute and sad the next, but in the end you will be thrilled. “  – Los Angeles Post   

ELECTRIFYING! At once contagiously funny and fiercely dramatic, touching every emotion. Top-notch direction and a resplendent cast, Heart Song is a life-affirming poem that must be experienced.” – Broadway World

FLAWLESS! The acting is fabulous and the dancing spectacular!” – LASplash
VERY FUNNY! Extraordinarily moving!” On Stage Los Angeles

The play’s mesmerizing mixture of drama, comedy and flamenco music/dance has been the highlight of feature stories in the Jewish Journal and the Los Angeles Times.  

Tamlyn Tomita, Juanita Jennings, Pamela Dunlap in "Heart Song"

Tamlyn Tomita, Juanita Jennings, Pamela Dunlap in “Heart Song”

Heart Song stars Denise Blasor, Andrea Dantas, Pamela Dunlap, Juanita Jennings, Mindy Krasner, Elissa Kyriacou, Sherrie Lewandowski, and Tamlyn Tomita. Choreography by Maria Bermudez.

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Phenomenal Woman

"Heart Song" at the Fountain Theatre

“Heart Song” at the Fountain Theatre

Pretty women wonder where my secret lies.
I’m not cute or built to suit a fashion model’s size
But when I start to tell them,
They think I’m telling lies.
I say,
It’s in the reach of my arms
The span of my hips,
The stride of my step,
The curl of my lips.
I’m a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That’s me.

I walk into a room
Just as cool as you please,
And to a man,
The fellows stand or
Fall down on their knees.
Then they swarm around me,
A hive of honey bees.
I say,
It’s the fire in my eyes,
And the flash of my teeth,
The swing in my waist,
And the joy in my feet.
I’m a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That’s me.

Tamlyn Tomita and Juanita Jennings.

Tamlyn Tomita and Juanita Jennings.

Men themselves have wondered
What they see in me.
They try so much
But they can’t touch
My inner mystery.
When I try to show them
They say they still can’t see.
I say,
It’s in the arch of my back,
The sun of my smile,
The ride of my breasts,
The grace of my style.
I’m a woman

Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That’s me.

Tamlyn Tomita, Juanita Jennings, Pamela Dunlap in "Heart Song"

Tamlyn Tomita, Juanita Jennings, Pamela Dunlap in “Heart Song”

Now you understand
Just why my head’s not bowed.
I don’t shout or jump about
Or have to talk real loud.
When you see me passing
It ought to make you proud.
I say,
It’s in the click of my heels,
The bend of my hair,
the palm of my hand,
The need of my care,
‘Cause I’m a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That’s me.

Maya Angelou
Maria Bermudez and Pamela Dunlap.

Maria Bermudez and Pamela Dunlap.

photos by Ed Krieger
Heart Song   Now to July 14   (323) 663-1525   MORE

Pamela Dunlap Dances to a Flamenco Beat in ‘Heart Song’ at the Fountain Theatre

Dance in a graveyard

“Heart Song” at the Fountain Theatre

by Cynthia Citron

“I have a long history of flamenco,” Pamela Dunlap says — her tongue firmly in her cheek.  And thereby hangs the tale.

“Actually, I’m not a dancer,” she continues.  “I’m dragged kicking and screaming into flamenco class” as the lead in Stephen Sachs’ new play Heart Song, now having its premiere at the Fountain Theatre.

Playing Rochelle — a middle-aged, out-of-shape Jewish woman who’s undergoing a crisis of faith — Dunlap is persuaded to join a flamenco class for other middle-aged, out-of-shape women. The production unites two of the Fountain’s specialties — plays and the subject of flamenco (the Fountain is presenting Forever Flamenco at the Ford on June 15).

“It’s an all-female cast,” Dunlap says, “and the camaraderie is great.  It’s a wonderful journey.” Shirley Jo Finney is directing.

When I suggest that it sounds a bit like Steel Magnolias, a perennial favorite, she says, “Oh no, it’s not anything like Steel Magnolias!  In this play nobody has diabetes, nobody’s getting their hair done, and there are no cranky old women.”

Pamela Dunlap

Pamela Dunlap

She should know. She was in a Salt Lake City production of Steel Magnolias, playing the role of the former mayor’s widow, who describes the new mayor’s wife as looking, while dancing, “like two pigs fightin’ under a blanket.”

Dunlap confesses that early in her career she taught Latin dances — the cha-cha, the merengue, the samba — at a Xavier Cugat Dance Studio in New York.  “Cugat was the Arthur Murray of Latin dancing,” she says.  “He had dance studios all over.”

Dunlap is herself a New York woman from Flushing and Jackson Heights.  Currently she considers herself bicoastal, with a home in Manhattan and another in Van Nuys.  In Southern California, she has performed at the Ahmanson, South Coast Rep, and LA Theatre Works, but this is her first appearance at the Fountain.

In New York  she has been seen on Broadway in Musical Comedy Murders of 1940, Redwood Curtain, and Yerma, and in several Off-Broadway roles. Recently, she appeared at Theater Raleigh in North Carolina as Mattie Fae, the nagging sister of Violet and mother of Little Charles in August Osage County.

On TV she has been featured on How I Met Your Mother, NCIS, Law and Order SVU andCommander in Chief, but her most visible role currently is as Betty Draper’s new mother-in-law and abominable baby-sitter for Betty’s daughter Sally on AMC’s Mad Men.

About her role as “Sally’s fiendish baby sitter,” she calls her “a woman with a great sense of entitlement, exactly the opposite of the woman I’m playing in Heart Song — a woman who is struggling to find her sense of entitlement.”

In Heart Song, Rochelle is “a woman who never married, whose mother recently died, and who has very little support.  She’s in a painful place of transition, dealing with mortality and trying to find her own identity,” Dunlap explains.

Flamenco teacher Katarina (Maria Bermudez) and Rochelle (Pamela Dunlap).

Flamenco teacher Katarina (Maria Bermudez) and Rochelle (Pamela Dunlap).

Questioned about her identification with the characters she plays, she says, “acting allows us to play so many different characters, but we can always find something in ourselves that is like the character. The play mirrors the struggles we all go through, and we find a common history that we didn’t suspect we have in common.  A common history or something that connects us to that character.”

On the adventure level, though, she has had a few experiences that aren’t reflected in any play she has appeared in.  For example, when her son, Trevor Morgan Doyle, an anthropologist doing research in Finland, decided to marry a Finnish woman, she traveled to the wedding, driving a car for 10 hours above the Arctic Circle.  “The car was chugging along because the fuel was freezing in the tank,” she says.

She also reports that the bride’s family, “obviously testing my mettle,” invited her to swim with them in weather that was 70 degrees below freezing.  They dug a hole through the ice and then kept scraping the ice off the top of the hole as it froze on contact with the air.

Did she do it?  You bet she did!

“Actually, they claim it’s a cure for depression,” she says.  “You’re shocking your whole system.  I’ve never felt so alive in my life!”

On the opposite end of the spectrum, she has ties with Ethiopia.  She is an active member of the Salt Lake City-based Children of Ethiopia Education Fund, a non-governmental organization that provides schooling for girls in that country.

Tamlyn Tomita, Juanita Jennings and Pamela Dunlap.

Tamlyn Tomita, Juanita Jennings and Pamela Dunlap.

When not rolling naked in ice holes and visiting schools in Ethiopia, however, she has taken a few moments to accept awards.  She has received three Drama-Logue awards, has been an honoree of the New York Drama League, and has won an OOBR (Off-Off Broadway Review) award.

As for the future, she has very definite ideas about whom she would like to work with.  Before the question is completely posed, she answers enthusiastically, “Philip Seymour Hoffman.  He’s the real deal.”

But for the present, she is delighted to be working with director Finney, choreographer Maria “Cha Cha” Bermudez, and a cast consisting of Juanita Jennings, Tamlyn Tomita, Bermudez (through June 14), Denise Blasor (beginning June 15), Andrea Dantas, Mindy Krasner, Elissa Kyriacou and Sherrie Lewandowski.

Photos by Ed Krieger. Cynthia Citron writes for LA Stage Times.  

Heart Song Now to July 14 (323) 663-1525  MORE

PHOTO SLIDESHOW: World Premiere of New Comedy/Drama ‘Heart Song’ at the Fountain

'Heart Song' at the Fountain Theatre

‘Heart Song’ at the Fountain Theatre

Our world premiere of the new comedy/drama Heart Song opens tomorrow, May 25. Preview performances have been selling out and audience reaction has been overwhelming:

Heart Song is Fantastic! Run to see this one!
It was one of the best plays I’ve seen in years. Could see it another ten times. Didn’t want it to be over. The time just flew … really, really fantastic.” – J.P., Marina Del Rey

“This is a great play. Full of emotions, so well written, well acted and directed. I cried, I laughed. Wonderful! I can only recommend it.”
– Luzia Wolf 

  “Thank you for creating this beautiful piece, Heart Song. My heart is full and so will be many others.”  – Carol Kline

“Heart tugging and funny! The acting was superb!” – Irene  

Heart Songis the funny and touching story of a middle-aged Jewish woman in New York City in the middle of a life crisis. Her life is changed when she is convinced to take a flamenco class with other middle-aged women. A hilarious and powerful journey of faith, sisterhood and finding her inner voice.
Starring Pamela Dunlap, Tamlyn TomitaJuanita Jennings and Maria Bermudez. Directed by Shirley Jo Finney, choreography by Maria Bermudez, written by Stephen Sachs
Photos by Ed Krieger

Enjoy These Production Photos From ‘Heart Song’

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