Penny Safranek LA Stage Insider

Here’s a great feature on PRT’s Penny Safranek in Julio Martinez’s STAGE WATCH in the LA Stage Times blog!

THE THING IS…“I am from Spokane, Washington. I started performing at a very early age, I think since seeing the film, Singin’ in the Rain. I decided right then I wanted to sing that song. I began taking drama lessons quite early. I actually went to University of Washingon in poli sci with the idea of going into law but instead went to grad school in drama. I decided I could become a lawyer any time, but I better try to be an actor first. I have been a member of this [Pacific Resident Theatre] company since Orpheus Descending [2003]. I first became involved with the J.M. Barrie play a couple of years ago in [artistic director] Marilyn Fox’s acting class because she loved the play and was looking to explore the possibility of producing it. I worked on it with Joe (McGovern) in class. I play a char woman during the time of World War I. It wasn’t too much of a stretch. We still have char women today, people who clean apartments, mop floors and things like that. I lived in New York for many years and that’s what I did. I cleaned apartments. But back in Barrie’s time, it was difficult to move beyond your station in life, especially in wartime. So, as in this play, it would be natural for char women to form their own social groups. And within her group, she is so intimidated by the other char women talking so much about their sons who are serving in the British military, she pretends to have a son, whose name she copies from a newspaper. Of course, the drama begins when the real soldier confronts her.” — Penny Safranek is featured in the title role of The Old Lady Shows Her Medals, opposite Joe McGovern, one of two short plays by J.M. Barrie that make up Barrie: Back to Back, running at Pacific Resident Theatre in Venice.