Actor (Bosch, White Oleander, Working Girl)

Written by Nicole Torres AB '11

Amy Aquino’s love for acting began in junior high and high school. When it came time to choose a career path, she was passionate about acting, but feared it was no way to make a living. Amy also loved science and medicine, having interned in the emergency room growing up in Philadelphia, and decided that might be a more practical career path. With this pragmatism, she chose to attend Harvard, although it did not have a theater department and offered only one theater class. But her love for acting was ever present.

As she recalls, “Actually, the essay that I wrote for my [Harvard] application was all about acting and what it meant to me.”

By Nicole Torres AB '11

Born in New York, Shirley Rumierk is an actress known for Rise, Collateral Beauty, and 11:55. You can watch her most recent work on the NBC show Rise, in which she stars as single mom Vanessa Suarez.

Q. What inspired you to pursue an acting career? Tell us about your acting journey.

A. Acting started out as a hobby for me. Starting when I was 10 years old and all throughout high school, I was involved in a children’s theater program called The 52^nd Street Project in Hell’s Kitchen, New York. This was before Hell’s Kitchen became known as Clinton and there weren’t many extracurricular opportunities available. It became my second home. The after-school program’s mission wasn’t (and still isn’t) about cranking out future actors. It was through exposure to different art forms and working side by side with theater professionals that The 52^nd Street Project not only became my outlet for artistic expression; it was where I improved my writing skills and learned that my words really matter.

Soloist Dancer, Los Angeles Ballet

By Nicole Torres AB '11

Elizabeth C. Walker AB '11 was first exposed to ballet in the way many young girls are—she took ballet classes as one of the various activities her parents had her explore growing up. Her older sister was taking ballet, and like any younger sibling, she too begged to be placed in a ballet class. She recalls, “I started creative movement at three; it's what they put preschool-age kids in. You'll do some ballet, but it's not formal ballet class. It's skipping in a circle and pretending you're a fairy. So it was one of my activities that I did once or twice a week growing up.”

Although Elizabeth connected with and enjoyed ballet early on, it was not until she was thirteen that she really began to take the possibility of a professional career more seriously. The turning point was an experience she had with her mom.

“I remember going to see a New York City Ballet performance with my mom; that was the company she always took us to. We would [usually] go to The Nutcracker, but we went to see something that wasn't The Nutcracker—it was much more modern pieces. I had never seen dancers moving that way, and I really loved it and wondered, so how do you become one of those people?"

Director & Producer (The Breach, Nashville, If I Stay)

By Nicole Torres AB '11

R.J. Cutler AB '83 has had a long and varied career spanning the worlds of theater, television, and film. He spent his early years after college in the theater, first at the American Repertory Theatre in Cambridge, and later in New York working with the likes of Steven Sondheim, Bernadette Peters, and Kevin Spacey. His passion since the first grade and throughout college was theater, and initially he had no intention of transitioning to Hollywood.

The film that would ultimately spark his Hollywood career, the award-winning The War Room based on Bill Clinton’s presidential campaign, emerged from his own personal interest in politics. Cutler recalls, “In 1992, I got very caught up in the presidential election, really just as a citizen, and later that year had the idea to make a documentary about Clinton’s presidential campaign. That film became The War Room, which was directed by D.A. Pennebaker and Chris Hegedus and produced by myself, Wendy Ettinger and Frazer Pennebaker, and it was through that experience that I was exposed to the whole world of independent film and documentary filmmaking.”  

Novelist (The Lockpicker, Triplines) & Writer (Snowfall, Justified, Awake)

By Nicole Torres AB '11

Born in New York City and raised in Long Island, Leonard Chang largely credits his love of literature to his mother. Growing up, Chang read a majority of her English and American novel collections which she had brought with her from Seoul to America.

While his amateur writing career began at the age of seven writing long letters to camp friends, his ‘aha’ moment, the moment he knew he wanted to be a writer, came in high school during a memorable interaction with his best friend Joe. Perhaps during a conversation about their futures, Joe remarked that he wanted to be a writer and a lightbulb went off in Leonard’s head. He thought, “You can do that?” and from that point on the seed of desire to become a writer was planted in his brain. During high school, the two of them embarked on a mission to co-write a novel together, and while Leonard remembers it as “youthful, ambitious, and terrible,” he also remembers it as “damn fun to write.”

Actor (The Book of Henry, Breaking Bad)

By Nicole Torres AB '11

Dean Norris AB '85 humorously recalls his earliest experience with acting as a young boy in Indiana: “I think my very first play was Richard III. I played the young prince, so I had to learn Shakespeare at age 7 or 8.”

At Harvard, Norris was heavily involved in theater, participating in at least two plays per semester, and often more. He comments, “I did so many productions I can’t even remember them all.” At that time, the American Repertory Theater (ART), now one of the country’s great regional theaters, had just moved to Cambridge. The ART served as a fantastic resource, where he could watch and learn from the professional actors there. He spent a lot of time as an understudy, and would also play small parts in the professional plays.

He recalls his time at Harvard and the ART fondly, where he was surrounded by a great group of people, some of whom also incidentally found success in Hollywood, such as Bill Rauch AB '84 and RJ Cutler AB '83.

By Nicole Torres AB '11

New York Times best-selling author and comedian Andy Borowitz AB '80 has written for The New Yorker since 1998. He is the creator of satirical news column The Borowitz Report, for which he won the inaugural National Press Club award for humor. His books include The 50 Funniest American Writers and a memoir, An Unexpected Twist.

Q. It’s hard to believe it’s been 10 years since we last profiled you for Harvardwood! Throughout your career you have worked in an impressive number of mediums spanning television, journalism, political satire, social media, stand up comedy, teacher, musician, radio host, and author.  How have you managed to transition between and work in so many different arenas?

A. It's all been one long happy accident. Opportunities to do different things, like radio or standup, have presented themselves and I've said yes to them. It's the classic improv lesson of saying "yes, and..." to every proposition. Not everything you try will work out, but it's always interesting to try.

Q. Of all the different mediums and work you’ve done over the years, do you have a favorite?

A. Not really. They've all been fun at the time. I'm really enjoying the mix I have now—writing for The New Yorker, some live shows, some radio—but that mix will no doubt change in the years ahead.

By Nicole Torres AB '11

In the #HWire blog's "Where Are They Now?" series, we check in with Harvardwood program alums to find out what they've been up to and to showcase their accomplishments since participating with Harvardwood! 

Ava Tramer AB '09 was a participant in the Harvardwood Writers Program - TV Modules, and her credits include TROPHY WIFE and ANGIE TRIBECA. Most recently, she developed her single-cam spec comedy MY FRIEND 50 at Fox with executive producers Will Packer (Truth Be Told, Uncle Buck) and Curtis "50 Cent" Jackson (Power), and is currently staffed on an upcoming Netflix comedy.

Q. Can you tell us how you got started in writing? Was it something you always knew you wanted to do or was it something you gradually fell into?

A. When I was young, I was interested in historical costume design and the hotel industry, like most kids.  Which was a good thing, because growing up in LA my parents discouraged me and my brother from careers in Hollywood.  They’re extremely supportive of us, but they also knew how unstable and stressful it can be and wanted us to avoid that heartache. 

The summer after my sophomore year of college, I didn’t have a job lined up.  I got Greg Daniels’ email address from a family friend and wrote him the most embarrassing email ever explaining why I’d be the perfect intern on The Office, listing every random skill I had that might possibly come in handy.  A highlight (and very desperate) sentence includes “I used to work at Angelina’s Frozen Yogurt, so if you need someone to serve you frozen yogurt in a beautifully swirled way, I’m your girl!”  Miraculously it worked, and I spent my summer there as an intern with the writers.  Everyone was so welcoming and I loved every single second of it.  I returned the following summer as a PA in the production office.