I have a deep, scratchy voice. Boys would call me Froggy, and my father would often tell me to shut my 'big bazoo.' I remember standing in line for confession. After I walked out, the other kids were like, 'You punched your sister in the face?' Because of my voice, my confession was like speaking into a loudspeaker.
I don't really say, 'Is this script Catholic or not?'. But if I find it to be immoral, or it doesn't sit right with me, which happens a lot these days because there's a lot of garbage being written... I'm like, 'I'm not doing this.'
My faith has cost me a lot of money. Because I do creative roles, and I guess someone could think of me as, I could play bawdy, I could play rough around the edges. And so they think, 'Oh, she'll do this. It'll be so funny.' And I'm like, 'I'm not doing that.'
I'm always praying for a part that would be something that I could be really proud of, in which I could use the gifts God gave me in a positive way.
Being that I was raised in the Catholic faith, I am very careful about what I choose. I've turned down a lot of projects that... could have helped me a lot financially, and I've quit shows because of where they were going and because I feel like I have to be a role model for my kids.
I grew up in Cazenovia, N.Y. I'm the second of five children, with three sisters and a brother.
My father was one of 11. He was an attorney. My mother worked for the Syracuse newspaper as a columnist before she became a stay-at-home mother.
During my senior year, I was supposed to spend a semester student teaching, but decided I couldn't be a teacher. My aunt Beth's friend was Jackie Gleason's daughter, Linda Miller. She encouraged me to talk to her. After doing that, she recommended Catholic University's M.F.A. acting program. So that's what I did.
