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THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS

"Every holiday we'd go to New
York. All my relatives live there,
and my father went on a lot of buy-
ing trips. My parents were avid
theatergoers and I'd go with them to
the theater. So, when I was little, I
was watching people like Mary Mar-
tin and Ethel Merman on the stage."
By the time she was 10, she was
taking dance, speech, and acting
classes, studying at Will-O-Way
Playhouse and the Detroit Conser-
vatory of Music. In junior high
school and at 'Oak Park High School
she starred in school productions
and, by the time she graduated, had
made up her mind to apply for ad-
mission to the prestigious Neighbor-
hood Playhouse in New York.
"To get in, you had to go for an
interview, and then audition," she
recalls, adding that all auditions
were held in New York. "In the
audition, I had to do a comedic read-
ing and something serious. So, I did
Saroyan's Hello, Out There as my
serious piece and something, I think,
from Guys and Dolls as comedy.
"During my audition, I must
have conveyed to Helen Morgenthau
(who was then president of the
Neighborhood Playhouse) somehow
that I really wanted to be there. I
can remember her saying, 'I think
you really want to be an actress.'
"Out of about 500 applicants,
they chose 50. And, when I got back
home and got the letter that I had
been accepted, I absolutely couldn't
believe it!"
Life in New York on her own,
however, was definitely something
different for the 17-year-old who had
been brought up in what she calls a
"very, very protective" household. At
her parents' insistence, she lived at
the Barbizon Hotel for Women and,
though she found the Neighborhood
Playhouse "exciting" and especially
enjoyed being able to study dance
under Martha Graham, one of the
words she uses today to describe her
two-year stay there is "overwhelm-
ing."
"When you're 17, it's frightening
because, as talented as you think
you are, it seems that there's always
somebody (in New York) who is
prettier and better than you are.
"I think that was one of the
things I've done that I regret," she
says, referring US her leaving home
'just out of high school. "when people
call me and say, 'Whit do .I .do? I've
got this kid who wants to be in The
theater,' I tell them, 'Have your
child go to college first. Then, when
they graduate college, if they still
really want to do this thing, they'll
do it — when they're a little older.' "
One day, near the end of her
stay in the Neighborhood Playhouse,

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she received a call to come in for "an
audition" (even now, she says, she's
not sure exactly what it was she was
auditioning for). Her "judged' were
to be Broadway singer-actreSs Mary
Martin, and Helen Menken, then
president of the American Theater
Wing and a founder of the Tony
awards. The 19-year-old Playhouse
student was expected to sing a
couple of songs and to deliver a
monologue for the two women in
their offices in New York.
"It' was to be very informal,"
Gurwin recalls. "I was all prepared.
I had all the material with me."
But, when she went in for the
audition, she found herself unable to
sing, or to deliver the monologue.
"I don't know what it was," she
says. "It had never happened to me
before. I suppose it was the insecu-
rity of maybe not being good enough,
and I was so frightened to perform
in front of those women. But I froze.
As I look back on it, I wish I had
halihe confidence I have now. But
that's one of the things age gives
you, of course — more confidence."
A short time later, she returned
home — having completed the
course of study at the Playhouse —
and enrolled at Olivet College,
where she performed in several
shows, and met Don Gurwin.
"After Olivet College, I was liv-
ing at home and trying to decide
whether to go back to New York to
pursue a career," says Gurwin.
"Then, I married, and decided that
was it — I was going to become a
mother, raise kids, and forget the
career. I really had no idea about all
the options available here. I never
even knew -about the Jewish Com-
munity Center theater, for instance."
But; by the time daughter,
Joanna (now 18), and son, Matt, had
arrived, she did know about the
Center theater. One afternoon, after
hearing, a television ad to audition
for parts in a Center production, she
did just that, and landed the role of
Adelaide in Guys and Dolls.
She insists nowadays that, at
the time, she regarded it all as "just
a hobby."
Soon, she did another show at
the Center, and then another, and
was eventually asked to work with a
dinner theater group, doing Last of
the Red Hot Lovers at the Botsford
Inn in Farmington.
Working with the dinner theater
group, Gurwin began to develop an
interest in lighting, scenic design,
and other behind-the-scences produc-
tion work. Encouraged by good re-
views of the show and of her _work in
it, and the growing popularity of
dinner theater in Detroit, she began

Continued

on. Page 62

Friday, January 24, 1986 49

The curtain is
always rising for
Nancy Gurvvin,
e First Lady of
Detroit dinner

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