Act One
Rebecca Versaci '09
Theatre major Rebecca Versaci knows that life after Barnard will include many twists, turns, opportunities, changes and choices. She also knows that one passion will continue to guide her-wherever she goes, and whatever she does. "I can imagine myself doing many different things," Rebecca says. "But not without the theatre. I can't imagine my life without the thing that's fulfilled me so much."
At the age of three, Rebecca discovered the joys of expressing herself through dance. By the time she was in middle school in Princeton, New Jersey, she'd performed in local productions, switched her focus from dancing to acting, and decided she wanted to attend a performing-arts high school. Her mother, Lori Versaci '79, opposed that plan.
"She said, 'Absolutely not.' She wanted me to be well-rounded,'" Rebecca recalls. Undaunted, the young actress did her own research, found a school in Massachusetts that was as rigorous academically as it was artistically, and convinced her parents to let her apply. After a successful audition and interview, she found herself living away from home in an enriching but highly competitive environment. "I struggled a lot with self-confidence," she says. "I learned that I don't do theatre to please other people but for me, and because I love it." In acting class, that meant "not to compare myself to everybody else, but to learn what I could and get to another level creatively."
Just as she'd had strong ideas about which high school would suit her best, she acted on her own when deciding on college. Instead of relying on her mother's memories of Barnard in the 1970s, Rebecca followed a counselor's recommendation and came to the campus for a weekend visit. "I left feeling this was the right place for me," she says. "And I was right." Once here, she was encouraged by her mother to audition for Theatre Department shows.
"So I did, and I was cast in Strindberg's A Dream Play, directed by Diane Paulus," she says, naming the former Barnard faculty member whose off-campus credits include the acclaimed revival of Hair that brought Central Park audiences to their feet last summer and has moved to Broadway for a 2009 run. Rebecca also took Paulus's course on the history and practice of directing, and calls her an inspirational teacher and mentor. "She has a unique artistic voice, and opens up the vision of what theatre is and how one can go about creating it," says Rebecca, who also effusively praises Rebecca Guy, Ralph Zito, and other members of the Barnard theatre faculty.
Under their tutelage, Rebecca gained experience acting in When Five Years Pass, by Federico García Lorca, and directing 365 Days/365 Plays, by Suzan-Lori Parks. She has chosen to direct Richard Greenberg's Life Under Water for her senior thesis. Meanwhile, pursuing a parallel interest in working with children, she is also completing the requirements for a minor in education.
"Which brings me to India and how I got there," Rebecca says, referring to her overseas work with an organization called Artists Striving to End Poverty (ASTEP). Interested in using theatre to help impoverished children, Rebecca volunteered in ASTEP's New York office the summer before her junior year. The following summer, she traveled to southern India's Shanti Bhavan boarding school, which provides children from the "untouchable" caste with a quality education and uncommon opportunity to escape devastating poverty.
Rebecca's teaching load there was substantial. She taught math, science and social studies to fourth graders, and English literature to 11th graders. She also taught theatre to 10th and 11th graders, and inspired them to write and produce a show about friendship and what friends can accomplish together.
"I don't believe we listen to children, and we particularly don't listen to impoverished children," she says. "There's tremendous value in what they have to say. When you give them creative tools and an audience, it's amazing what you'll hear." A lot of what she heard, she said, was the determination of those kids to grow up and make something of themselves, so that they can give back to their communities and help their families.
Rebecca sees her future in a similar light. She says that while she'd love to work in the professional theatre as a director, she is also considering drama therapy or other careers in which she could use the arts to empower abused children, traumatized veterans, the elderly, addicts, and others trying to heal emotional or physical wounds and overcome life's hurdles.
Her tentative short-term plan is to return to India after graduation next spring, and to spend a year there teaching and developing a theatre curriculum for Shanti Bhavan. "I'm keeping my options open at the moment," she says. "I'm a big believer in balance in everything. There's more to art than putting on a play on Broadway." More and more, she says, she sees herself as part of a community of artists "looking for opportunities to give back."
—Anne Schutzberger
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