Helene in Sweet Charity
The Porter in Macbeth
Miss Poppenguhl in Moonlight & Magnolias
Prince Malcolm in Macbeth
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Disappearing Woman Click here for the article's link on the Bohemian's website. I like stepping all the way into whatever I'm presented with," pronounces actress Denise Elia, spearing a shrimp over lunch last weekend in Santa Rosa. "I like disappearing into my roles. I want every one of my characters to be a really full, rich, deeply developed character, so I always try to find that character somewhere inside me, and then I start hauling it up and out into the open until I see the image of that character in front of me—and then I just step in." Though Elia has been performing frequently in the North Bay for the past three years, first appearing on the stage of the Sixth Street Playhouse as Pageen Ryan in Mame , it is only recently that audiences and critics have begun noticing her as one of the best young actresses to be working in the area. The problem—which, upon examination, is really anything but a problem—is that Elia, 29, has a way of disappearing into her roles so completely that she seems like an entirely different actress from role to role. Whether singing and dancing in musicals like Mame, Sweet Charity and Oklahoma , smoldering as an emotionally conflicted cop in Actors Theater's Lobby Hero , or flattening audiences with her comic timing, spot-on New York accent and scalpel-sharp comedy precision in the Sonoma County Rep's currently running Moonlight and Magnolias , Elia immerses herself so completely that all one remembers later is the character seen onstage. But that kind of invisibility can only last so long, and it was as the lead in last year's Wait Until Dark , presented by Healdsburg's Raven Players, and in last fall's Macbeth , staged at the Loading Zone theater in Santa Rosa, that it suddenly became impossible not to notice Denise Elia. In Macbeth , playing the multiple roles of Malcolm and Hecate, Elia gave one of the most physically committed performances of the year, prowling, slinking, screaming, fighting, pleading, threatening and terrifying her way through a three-hour production that ranks as the scariest, most imaginative Macbeth I've ever seen, with Elia delivering one of the most memorable performances of the year. "Of everything I've done in theater, ever, I think Macbeth was the first time I was able to utilize nearly everything I know, all the skills I learned in college and everything I've learned along the way," Elia says. Born in Long Island, Elia studied theater and Italian at the Center for the Arts in Buffalo, N.Y., and founded her own company devoted to performances of Italian theater. After graduation, she moved to Whitney, Ontario, where she was briefly married, and where she found a niche doing stage managing and assistant directing. After the dissolution of the marriage and a brief return to New York, she visited some friends in Santa Rosa, and over the course of that summer, fell in love with Northern California. With its vast number of theater companies and devoted theater audience, the North Bay has turned out to be a great place for Elia to develop her acting career. She's been auditioning for several major roles in local shows this summer, and expects to not be idle long once Magnolia ends its run next weekend. Eventually, she says, she plans to test the film and television waters of Los Angeles. "I think Santa Rosa is a really great place for an actor to cultivate and nurture themselves," she says. "There's really quite a lot of work here, and I've been soaking up as much as I can."
Moonlight and Magnolias 1939 Hollywood is abuzz. Legendary producer David O. Selznick has shut down production of his new epic, Gone with the Wind. The screenplay, you see, just doesn’t work. So what’s an all-powerful movie mogul to do? Summoning famed screenwriter Ben Hecht and formidable director Victor Fleming from the set of The Wizard of Oz, the three men labor over five days to fashion a screenplay that will become the blueprint for one of the most successful and beloved films of all time. "A nice additional surprise is Denise Elia (hot off a sensational run in the Loading Zone's seething Macbeth) as Selznick's shell-shocked secretary Miss Poppenghul. With little to do through most of the play beyond uttering "Yes, Mr. Selznick" and "No, Mr. Selznick," Elia still manages to incite huge gusts of laughter, sometimes with little more than a gesture with a pencil and the raising of an eyebrow." ------ David Templeton, Bohemian 1/23/08 Click here to read the full review of Moonlight and Magnolias. Macbeth "...as Malcolm, the son of the murdered king, and especially as Hecate, the queen of the witches (an invention specific to this production), Elia is the standout, giving a performance of mesmerizing intensity that is as brave and assured as it is detailed and riveting." - David Templeton, Bohemian 11/07/07 Click here to read the full review of Macbeth. Click here for more photos! Denise played multiple roles in this extraordinary adaptation including Hecate, Malcolm, and the Porter. MACBETH played at the Loading Zone black box studio theater in downtown Santa Rosa.
Over the River & Through the Woods Nick, a single Italian-American guy from New Jersey sees both sets of his grandparents every Sunday for dinner. This is routine until he's offered his dream job, which would take him away from his beloved, but annoying, grandparents. Thus begins a series of schemes to keep Nick around including bringing to dinner the lovely -and single - Caitlin O'Hare as bait . . . We won't give the ending away. Click here to read the review and click here for more photos! Denise as Caitlin O'Hare and Jeff Cote as Nick |
