By Ann Harada

"In the fall of 1987, I had just returned from doing non-Equity summer stock in Glassboro, NJ and was feeling very confident. I don't know why, exactly, because my best reviews all summer came playing Nana the Dog and the Crocodile in PETER PAN. A friend from college, Karen Sonet, was working as a casting intern at Manhattan Theatre Club and got me into an audition for the first workshop of Maury Yeston and Larry Gelbart's 1,2,3,4,5. She's never admitted it, but I think that's how it happened. I was hired to be in the ensemble and play the extremely tiny role of Jonathan Hadary and Mary Gordon Murray's daughter. I was thrilled to be in the rehearsal room with such pros including Liz Callaway, Alice Playten, Louis J. Stadlen, Davis Gaines, Vicki Lewis, William Youmans and the late Beatrice Winde. I believe it was Jerry Mitchell's first job as a choreographer. I was incredibly naive and the entire company was very kind to me. I couldn't believe they would let me eat lunch with them. I remember going to the AEA office to pay my dues. The cost of joining was 2 weeks worth of MTC pay but I knew the Equity card meant I was a "real actor" at last!"

Ann Harada originated the role of Christmas Eve in AVENUE Q, for which she received an Outer Critics Circle Award for Best Ensemble and Artistry in Puppetry and the Broadway.com Audience Favorite Awards for Best Featured Actress in a Musical and Best Ensemble Performance. Other Broadway: SEUSSICAL, M. BUTTERFLY. She is a member of the Vineyard Theatre's Community of Artists and appeared in four original musicals there. Other NYC: FALSETTOLAND (National Asian American Theatre Co.), THE MOMENT WHEN (Playwrites Horizons), 1,2,3,4,5 (MTC Stage 2), Lincoln Center Theatre Directors Lab. Regional credits include: WORKING (Long Wharf), GOLDEN CHILD (Kennedy Center), SCAPIN, DAS BARBECU (both at Portland Stage), PAJAMA GAME (Center Stage). Film: Happiness, Hudson River Blues, Transamerica. Concerts: HAIR, CHESS, SNOOPY, CHILDREN OF EDEN.