In the spring of 1978, I was taking three courses at the Borough of Manhattan Community College. The course credits were to be transferred back to the Goodman School of Drama at the Art Institute of Chicago [now the Theatre School at DePaul University], where I had earned a certificate in a three-year acting program two years earlier, and needed the remaining nine credit hours to satisfy the academic requirements to combine with my certificate to complete my B.F.A.
Vinnette Carroll had been a guest artist my last year at Goodman. “Come to New York when you graduate,” she told me. And I did. Within two weeks of my arrival in the fall of ’76, I became a fulltime, unsalaried company member of Carroll’s Urban Arts Corps, where I would rehearse and perform solely for almost two years. I was among the last batch of “Corps Kids,” as we were affectionately called. Under Carroll’s direction, we birthed dynamic and inspiring performances out of blood, sweat and tears; one of our productions was Alice, with music and lyrics by Micki Grant and choreography by Talley Beatty.
In the spring of 1978, Alice was picked up by Mike Nichols and Lewis Allen. While some original cast members and dancers maintained their roles, I and other original cast understudied the roles we had created (the Duchess, in my case), and sang background offstage in a makeshift sound booth.
We rehearsed in the then new Minskoff Studios and headed for the Forrest Theatre in Philadelphia for our out-of-town tryout. I was a tiny cog in a big Broadway-bound musical machine. The show closed before coming to Broadway, but I got my Equity card. I also got my B.F.A., and even went on for the final three performances in the role I had originated.
