How I Got My Equity Card

The year I graduated college, I picked up Backstage and started auditioning for non-Equity summer stock.

I had been in the city for three months when I went to my first voice teacher – ever.

Getting my Equity card was a test in patience and perseverance. I had been offered the opportunity to earn points at several long-term regional gigs when I had finished college, but both of these jobs paid nothing and required a full-time commitment and I honestly couldn't afford to do it.

I earned my Actors' Equity card more than 40 years ago, December 1976, as the Assistant Stage Manager for a musical at the Forum Theatre in Summit, Illinois. It was an African-American retelling of a fairy tale called Cinderella Brown.

When I came to New York City from college in the late 1970s, I was fortunate enough to book a few commercials right away for soap products. I admit it did help that an aunt of mine was in the advertising business, so she was able to steer toward the right casting agents and advertisers. The helped me get an AFTRA card, and it was my first experience with being part of a union – and I was very proud.

I grew up in a small town in Texas, of about 1800 people. So when I came to NYC after college, I'll admit I knew very little about the Actors' Equity Association. All I knew was that I wanted to be on stage. 

In the fall of 1987 I had just returned from doing non-Equity summer stock in Glassboro, New Jersey and was feeling very confident.

Soon after World War II, I was at Yale Drama School as a first year student. I managed to get the part of the oldest daughter in Curt Goetz's It's A Gift – on Broadway, no less.

I was a junior at Boston University (BFA, acting) when I was one of four students picked by director Sharon Ott to appear in The Huntington Theatre Company's production of A Winter's Tale.

When I was asked to tour with an evening of my work, in which I would play the piano, sing and tell the audience anecdotes about my career as a composer/lyricist, I got my Equity card. It was an enlightening experience, after decades of being a creator and standing in the back of the theatres, to find myself in the spotlight. And, it made me appreciate how protected and cared–for a performer feels with Equity watching over him.