Homegrown in Southern California, Marina began performing with the
Ramona Town Hall Players in "Mark of the Masked Man" and "Oklahoma"
before she was five. After her first taste of applause (rumored to have
occurred while butterfly-costumed at a ballet recital at age three)
Marina felt right at home on the stage. In a sixth-grade gender-bending
turn as the evil "Doctor X" at Ramona Elementary (nowhere did it ASSERT
that the doctor HAD to be played by a boy), Marina enjoyed the fruits of
playing: a) the villain, b) against type, and c) a role no one else had
auditioned for. She studied dance with Sue Hamilton in North Park
(while becoming an advanced Mad-Libs writer during those long car-trips)
and in seventh grade, made her big move to the suburbs of San Diego.
There she began her arts magnet school experience, deepening her
appreciation of local radio stations Jammin' Z90 and the now-defunct
Q106.
Finishing her high school career at the newly-minted academic superschool just across the freeway from home, Marina catapulted herself three thousand miles away to a small, private East Coast liberal arts college where she refined her thrift store style and purchased her first Duke Ellington CD in Greenwich Village. Cold weather, study abroad, discursive theory, etc. and Marina returned to her home coast for turns as an improv comedian, costume character and mystery dinner theater maven. Could an MFA in acting be far behind?
Post-graduate-school roles include several of Shakespeare's heroines and, the most satisfying yet: acting teacher. Marina's enthusiastic teaching has inspired undergraduates, first-time outreach students and those in pursuit of refined coaching. Recently, through a magnificent home-run of fate, she has been working with three-year-olds, creating splendid first-performance experiences like the one that sparked her own life-long love of theater.
Finishing her high school career at the newly-minted academic superschool just across the freeway from home, Marina catapulted herself three thousand miles away to a small, private East Coast liberal arts college where she refined her thrift store style and purchased her first Duke Ellington CD in Greenwich Village. Cold weather, study abroad, discursive theory, etc. and Marina returned to her home coast for turns as an improv comedian, costume character and mystery dinner theater maven. Could an MFA in acting be far behind?
Post-graduate-school roles include several of Shakespeare's heroines and, the most satisfying yet: acting teacher. Marina's enthusiastic teaching has inspired undergraduates, first-time outreach students and those in pursuit of refined coaching. Recently, through a magnificent home-run of fate, she has been working with three-year-olds, creating splendid first-performance experiences like the one that sparked her own life-long love of theater.