A Wellness Handbook for the Performing Artist

Appearing Healthy vs. Being Well
There is no question that your lifestyle affects your health. As a performing artist, whether your art is in the movement arts, acting, vocal or instrumental performance, your health is of the utmost importance as the slightest ache, injury or even a common cold can have an impact on your career. While the state of each individual’s health depends on many risk factors, including genetics, environment, and information, there is no doubt that choosing to become a performing artist as a vocation can, in and of itself, become an additional risk factor.
But it does not have to be that way.
The atypical demands placed on a performer’s health as compared to the typical demands placed on lay people call for a parallel system of wellness in order for you to nourish yourself and flourish in your career. Many people use their voices to sing lullabies, sing in the shower, or go out dancing on the weekend. This is far different from the needs you have to keep your body, mind, and spirit in top shape in order to compete for roles and jobs and feel well in the conscious use of your body and voice to make a living.
This book is your plan of action to meet the unique demands and challenges faced by a performer on the body, mind, and spirit. I write from personal experience to share with you what I have learned, for I was not always a healthy performer.
As a professional performing artist for over a decade, I was energetic and ambitious. Armed with a degree in psychology, I felt ready to take on the fierce New York City musical theatre scene with extensive dance training, classical singing and acting training. Just “off the boat” from a little college town in the southwest, it took some time to get my bearings and start booking jobs, but my career spanned from my 20s through my 30s. I made a name for myself as a triple threat, and as I grew into the leading lady roles I dreamed of, I felt I was finally getting somewhere.
While I projected an image of the “picture of health,” in hindsight I can now see that I was not necessarily well. I pushed my body to its limits, balancing my survival job (waiting tables and teaching dance) with dance classes, auditions, voice lessons, and during the really good times, eight shows per week belting, tumbling, tap dancing and changing costume after costume in a flurry of adrenaline and excitement.
Looking back on those years, it is a wonder I lasted as long as I did with so little attention to wellness. My emotions, too, rode the roller coaster of the highs and lows of a performer’s life, both in the shows and around them, and as the years wore on, my spirit slowly depleted.
Shortly after my wedding, I was scheduled to do a run of Anything Goes out of town, playing the role of Reno made famous by Ethel Merman, and famous again by Patti Lupone. I was honored to follow in these amazing performing artists’ footsteps, but in my heart, I wanted to stay in New York City with my new husband and our little dog, Ned. Finally after spending years on the road doing show after show and hopping from one regional theatre to the next, I was creating a home and I never dreamed I could feel so comfortable. So when my agent got me a last minute audition for a hit musical on Broadway, I was thrilled because that would mean I would not be leaving town again and everything would work out.
I scheduled an emergency lesson with my voice coach to learn the music for the audition. I knew the dance captain of the Broadway production so I met with her early the day of the dance call and she taught me the whole routine ahead of time. Surely this job would be mine!
I did not even make the first cut. They called back all blondes. It did not matter how good or how prepared I was. I went home and cried my eyes out. I realized this was a pivotal moment for me. I had to accept the fact that it was no longer enough for me to be just "working,” ready to take any role in any town for any length of time, as I used to. Even as I was climbing the ladder of the business, the demands and the stakes were getting higher while my desires and needs for my body and in my life were changing.
In spite of feeling exhausted from the festivities of our wedding, I took the role in Anything Goes on the road because, while I knew I was changing, I still needed work. And I needed the money and even more, the employment weeks towards my health insurance. Not surprisingly, my body, mind, and spirit broke down during the run of that show. Yes, an Actors Equity Association representative came to town and confirmed obscene levels of black mold in my housing. There were environmental toxins causing several cast members to get sick, but the effect on me was profound. I knew the mold made me sick, but I also realized, in hindsight, the deeper truth: I was not well coming into that show, spiritually, emotionally or physically.
It was time to get well.
I have spent many years since that experience making health and wellness my priority, and while I did recover fully from the mold and come back to my career as a performer, being well became my passion and, eventually, my life's work.

You Are Not Alone
According to the National Association of Schools of Theatre (NAST), the national accrediting agency for schools of theatre, music, and dance, enrollment in performing arts training institutions was close to 150,000 students, and this is only accounting for those schools which are accredited (177 schools for theatre, 636 schools of music, and 66 schools of dance). A complete tally of training institutions for performing artists in the United States has never been collected, but it is safe to assume the number of training organizations for aspiring and professional performing artists far exceeds those accredited by NAST.
Actors Equity Association, the union for stage actors represents roughly 50,000 professional performers. Screen Actors Guild (SAG) and the American Federation for Television and Radio Artists (AFTRA) report upwards of 160,000 members in their ranks.
American Guild of Musical Artists (AGMA), a labor organization for operatic, choral, and dance performers has approximately 7000 members. The American Guild of Variety Artists, representing theme park performers, skaters, circus artists, comedians, spokespersons and performers for private parties and special events, reports about 3000 active members. This is not even taking into account the scores of professionals who have not yet joined a professional labor union, but for now we’re talking about roughly 220,000 professional performing artists in the United States.
So, you are not alone.
In A Wellness Handbook for the Performing Artist, I hope to promote health, wellness, longevity, and hopefully ever-expanding pockets of peace of mind. I use this information daily in my work in New York City hospitals, as well as in my private psychotherapy and therapeutic yoga practice. I hope to impart to you what I have learned in my quest for wellness and glowing health. In short, it is information I wish I had as an aspiring and working performing artist. I have interviewed and consulted with performers, directors, producers, agents and coaches, and culled information from physicians, health professionals and experts specializing in holistic wellness, and interpreted how health information relates to the risks and rigors of being a performing artist.
It is my hope that with this information, you may enjoy a fruitful, healthy, happy and fulfilling career.