One of Lake Mary’s own recently made her debut in a Broadway-style show with award-winning stage and screen stars Nathan Lane and Brian Dennehy. A member of Chicago’s legendary Goodman Theatre, Lake Mary Preparatory School graduate Tara Sissom portrayed Pearl in The Iceman Cometh.
“The play was written by Eugene O’Neill in 1939, and is a metaphorical piece on man’s
After falling in love with acting at the tender age of six, Tara began her thespian training at Lake Mary Prep.
“Lake Mary Prep has an exceptional theater department, and my experience there really led me to decide to pursue acting as a career,” says the 2003 graduate.
Since graduation, Tara has stayed busy working at regional theaters in North Carolina, Nebraska, and California. In North Carolina, she earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree from Elon University in Music Theater and Digital Art. Later, Tara to Chicago, where she focused in comedic acting.
Upon entering the cast of the The Iceman Cometh, Tara says that she initially felt intimidated by the others actors. The play has a cast of 18 people, only three of whom are women. The group includes an illustrious lineup of TV, film, and Broadway actors like Messrs, Lane, and Dennehy.
“Everyone in this cast has been in the business for a very long time,” Tara says. “They brought in people from literally all over the globe to be in the production, and I was the oddball in the group.”
Tara’s modesty belies the fact that, aside from acting and playwriting, she is also a composer, designer, and art director for The New Colony Theater Company, In 2011 Tara received a Jeff Award for “Best Original Incidental Music” for her work in That Sordid Little Story. Some of Tara’s many other accomplished credits include Frat, 11:11 (twice); Tupperware: An American Musical Fable; Literally Sexy II, III and IV; Walk of Shame at Victory Gardens Theater; and the Freshly Squeezed TV series.
Tara’s select regional credits include Jack Goes Boating, Gulf View Drive, Make Someone Happy, and Cinderella at B Street Theatre in Sacramento, where she is a company member. Her other regional credits include Children of Eden, Beaty and the Beast, and The Man Who Came to Dinner at Flat Rock Playhouse (in North Carolina), and Lucky Stiff at Post Playhouse (in Nebraska).
“This is as far as I’ve gone, but certainly not as far as I will go,” she predicts, with a broad smile.
–Ashley Cisneros
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Ashley Cisneros is a co-founder of Chatter Buzz Media, an Orlando Internet marketing firm that helps companies and organizations engage with their target markets through inbound marketing via the Internet. Chatter Buzz Media, which won the Social Madness competition for the Orlando small business market, is a full-service digital marketing firm specializing in website design, search engine optimization (SEO), social media marketing and content creation. Prior to founding Chatter Buzz, Ashley worked as a newspaper reporter, magazine editor, technical writer, marketing manager, public relations practitioner and freelance journalist. To see Ashley’s content writing, visit www.ashleycisneros.com. You can also reach Ashley on her Google profile.
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