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As a little girl, Elizabeth Jenkins ’07 (Greenwich, Conn.) loved accompanying her mother to New York’s Metropolitan Opera and Broadway. She then discovered a passion for stage performance after her high school guidance counselor enrolled her in a musical theater class.
It was there she met the group of students with whom she would found Take A Bow Theater Company after high school graduation. Now in its third year, Take A Bow stages a production each summer. The company recently finished its run of Wendy McLeod’s The House of Yes.
“The beginning of May is when we start narrowing down the shows we really want to do and seeing how many people we have to cast, etc.,” explains Jenkins, a psychology major. “This summer was especially hard because the entire company had grown significantly, both in size and acting ability, so we had many more plays on the table that we knew we could handle.
“Our company is unique to our area for many reasons, and maybe one of the most important is that we focus on modern American dramas. In the summer, it is very difficult to find companies that produce anything other than Shakespeare or musicals. We give the community the opportunity to see things that are rarely, if ever, produced. We tend to choose things that allow us to grow as actors and as a company. Once the show is chosen, we start right away on blocking and memorizing and keep pushing through until the night the show opens.”
For Take A Bow’s production of The House of Yes, Jenkins played the role of Jackie-O and was co-director along with founding member Rocco Natale, who recently received his B.A. in dramatic studies from New YorkUniversity. The third founding member is Allison Fulgieri, who is an art history major at SarahLawrenceCollege.
Jackie-O has been one of Jenkins’ favorite roles to date. A homage to Jackie Kennedy, the character is a young woman growing up next door to the Kennedy estate in Washington. Jackie-O lives in an atmosphere where people never hear the word no, as the play’s title suggests.
“The character appealed to me greatly, not necessarily as a person, but as an actor,” says Jenkins. “It was such a struggle for me not to go overboard with her because the lines and ideas surrounding the character would have one believe she is just nuts and has no control of herself. But I felt that she maybe was not as crazy as the others believed her to be. Much of her craziness comes from her upbringing and the kind of society she was living in. I felt she is actually someone to feel sorry for and to pity, as she desperately tries to be someone or something that it becomes painfully obvious she is not. Trying to balance on the fence of just playing Jackie as if she were nuts and playing Jackie as a character with which the audience should be sympathetic was such a challenge and allowed me to push my abilities as an actress.”
As co-director, Jenkins put in hours of work outside rehearsals to take notes on the script and develop themes and motifs for the play. As a founding member, she also plays an instrumental role in choosing the show each summer and recruiting new members.
Jenkins notes that the productions Take A Bow brings to the community offer audiences a change of pace from normal summer theater fare.
“During the summer, our community theater consists of Shakespeare and musicals, which are fabulous, but people need change,” she says. “Shows like The House of Yes are the kinds of shows that would be produced in lower Manhattan. Having the freedom of our own company allows us to bring fresh material to the community. Performing is just another aspect of theater production that fascinates me. I learn something new every time I perform – about the piece of theater, about others, and about myself.”
Jenkins was the stage/production manager for Take A Bow’s inaugural production of Richard Greenberg’s Three Days of Rain and played the part of Alma in Tennessee Williams’ Summer and Smoke the following year.
She is a member of Lafayette Choir and musical chair of Delta Delta Delta sorority. She also serves as a tour guide for the admissions office, SAT tutor, and writing associate. She is a graduate of Greenwich High School Bella.