I was born and raised in the suburbs of Sacramento, CA. The middle child of a Californian and a Minnesotan, I grew up a quiet kid with an insatiable curiosity for the world and everyone in it. Always sensitive, I discovered the theater as a place that welcomed my big feelings, desire for connection, and natural proclivity for performing.

I attended Jesuit High School, an all-boys Catholic high school in Sacramento, where I was cast in a devised piece called Achilles in America. Our director, Ed Trafton, led us teenagers through an intensely collaborative and eye-opening creative process that culminated in a documentary play that explored the history of soldiers suffering from PTSD in the ancient times of Homer all the way up to the present. This experience was a major turning point for me. From then on, I have always been immensely drawn to and inspired by stories of those experiencing the extremes of life.

Seeking a new experience out of my comfort zone, I was set on going to college on the East Coast. I was accepted to and enrolled at Boston College. Despite having fully fallen in love with performing, I also had a deep interest in psychology, which I shared with my mother, a family therapist. I decided to pursue degrees in both fields. While attending BC, I experienced the tragedy of losing my parents in a sudden accident. I put my studies on hold while I went home, grieved with my siblings and family, and started to try and figure out what the rest of my life would look like without my two greatest role models, supporters, and champions.

The following year, I went back to school and finished my studies, earning degrees in both Psychology and Theater Arts at BC. After graduating, I bounced around the country working on devised projects with dear friends and eventually settled in New York to pursue acting professionally. Since then, I’ve performed all over New York City as well as studied and trained at Upright Citizens Brigade and Atlantic Acting School. I am a founding member of Clementine Players, a performance collective formed with Atlantic classmates, and was its first artistic director.

It has been through the great tribulations of my life that I have felt the greatest connections to other people and to stories of getting through loss and life after. Art heals, and I am so grateful to be an artist. Hopes of skating through life totally unscathed are unrealistic. Nevertheless, we don’t need to fear the deep downs of life when we are reminded we are never totally alone. Plus, the downs make the ups all the more amazing.