Arts & Entertainment
ON THE COVER
Pho to by Tim Fu ller
A Spiritua Connection
Actress-singer
Kelly McCormick
grew up in
Metro Detroit
celebrating
Christmas.
But she found what
she was looking
for in Judaism.
Kelly McCormick and her husband, Rabbi Jonathan Blake
Danielle Freni
Special to the Jewish News
W
hen Kelly McCormick's name appears in a
playbill, readers learn about her path from
Detroit to theaters across America. But they
won't learn about her journey to Judaism.
A rising star in musical theater, McCormick received
rave reviews earlier this year for her performance in the
Off-Broadway production of Her Song, a four-person
revue created and written by Brenda and Barry Levitt that
celebrates the contribution of female composers to popu-
lar music. She has starred in numerous repertory produc-
tions, including revivals of 1776 and Pal Joey, in New
York and around the country. In the last national touring
production of Les Miserables, she played the Factory Girl
and understudied the role of Fantine.
Currently, she is playing the lead role of Babe Williams
in the Arizona Theatre Co. production of Pajama Game.
The show wraps its Tucson performances on Dec. 22 and
moves to Phoenix Dec. 31-Jan. 20.
The daughter of Christian parents — a Hungarian-
Protestant-born mother and an Irish-Catholic-born father
— McCormick grew up in Bloomfield Hills and spent her
childhood attending a Presbyterian church, Kirk in the
Hills. "When I was 6, I told my mother that I didn't under-
stand why I had to pray to a man (Jesus) when I already
spoke to God all the time says McCormick.
Though her neighborhood was ethnically diverse,
McCormick, a graduate of Bloomfield Hills Lahser High
School, was never formally introduced to Judaism. "My
best friend growing up was Orthodox," she recalls. "Her
house had two refrigerators and two dishwashers. I just
assumed they were wealthy and threw a lot of parties."
After earning a bachelor's degree in vocal music from
Michigan State University, McCormick headed to gradu-
ate school at Cincinnati Conservatory of Music, where
she went on to earn two degrees: a master of fine arts in
drama and a master of music in voice.
It was during her studies in Cincinnati that McCormick
met composer Bonia Shur, a professor emeritus of music
and liturgical arts at the Reform movement's Hebrew
Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion's Cincinnati
campus. McCormick had been recruited by a fellow voice
major to sing in Shur's choir at HUC-Cincinnati's ordina-
tion service in 1997.
"The program for the service was full of quotes from
the Torah and Talmud that resonated with everything
I believed;' says McCormick. "That, coupled with sing-
ing Bonia's music, was what made me weep for almost
the entirety of the four-hour service. Bonia hired me as
a regular singer for weekly Shabbat morning services at
the college, and the professors and students welcomed
me warmly into their community. They were a huge part
of my Jewish education and my [eventual] decision to
convert.
"I'd found what I was looking for:' says McCormick, of
her decision to pursue her exploration of Judaism. And
Kelly McCormick as Babe Williams and Kevyn
Morrow as Sid Sorokin in the Arizona Theatre Co.
production of Pajama Game
while she didn't know it at the time, she also would find
her husband in the very same sanctuary.
As McCormick continued to sing at HUC over the
next two years, her friendship with rabbinical student
Jonathan Blake turned romantic, and she began to
explore Judaism through his rabbinic mentor, Rabbi Mark
Goldman. Prior to her experience at HUC, "I never knew
one could convert to Judaism:' says McCormick.
In 2000, after serious study, a meeting with a beit din
(religious court) and a trip to the mikvah (ritual bath),
McCormick became a Jew. A few months later, Blake was
ordained a rabbi, and two years later, the couple married.
But, unlike most newlyweds, McCormick and Blake
spent their first year of married life living in different
cities. McCormick pursued an acting career in New York
while temping on Wall Street, and Blake accepted a full-
time position in Providence, R.I. He is now associate
rabbi at Westchester Reform Temple in Scarsdale, near the
couple's Bronxville, N.Y., home.
As McCormick's acting career continues to carry her
all over the country, some people are surprised when they
see her last name and find out she is Jewish. "I just tell
them, 'It's Sephardic," she laughs. I I
Arts Editor Gail Zimmerman contributed to this story.
For tickets to Pajama Game in Arizona, starring
Kelly McCormick, go to www.aztheatreco.org or
call (602) 256-6995.
December 20 2007
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