We were lucky to catch up with Hannah Mary Simpson recently and have shared our conversation below.
Hannah, appreciate you joining us today. We’d love to hear about the things you feel your parents did right and how those things have impacted your career and life.
My parents took my brother and me to the theatre growing up! When I was a middle schooler, my mom took us to see Camelot at a local theatre– once the knights started belting out the sky-high notes of “Fie On Goodness,” I was done for… then I played Sir Dinadan sixteen years later. I have a vivid memory of seeing a children’s theatre production of Snow White with my family– one of the Seven Dwarves insisted that my mom wear a horned helmet. She kept taking it off, only for Mr. Dwarf to slam the thing on her noggin again a few minutes later. We borrowed a taped version of Macbeth from the library, and Banquo’s ghost scared me so badly I couldn’t sleep that night. Now I’m a Shakespeare Coach, and two of my three cats have Shakespearean names. I took theatre camps and drama classes and voice lessons and ballet, and I even spent a summer at Interlochen Center for the Performing Arts. Shakespeare was quoted on the regular around the dinner table or in the car, and all four of us could quote the entirety of The Producers from top to bottom. My parents raised us on the theatre, and I’d say that was “right!”
Hannah, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?
On a snowy morning in mid-December in the year Don’t Worry About It, I declared, “Yes, my due date is Christmas Day, but I’m arriving two weeks early. I will also arrive 20 minutes early to every single one of my appointments for the rest of my life. Huzzah!” I’ve been surrounded by show tunes, Shakespeare, wordplay, and a love for making people laugh since that snowy December day, so it only makes sense that I decided to pursue a career in the performing arts. My first experience with Shakespeare was cowering in fear over Banquo’s ghost in a videotaped production of Macbeth, and my first experience with Ethel Merman was witnessing the majesty of her cameo in the classic 1980 film, Airplane! While the child terrified of bloody specters and enamored with Ethel Merman is still very much who I am as a person, I’m now a working Actor, Singer, Improviser, Shakespeare Coach, and Teaching Artist based in the great city of Chicago. I’m drawn to quirky, silly, sensitive, cheerful characters, and the lion’s share of my professional work has been in Shakespeare and musical theatre (I’ve done my fair share of new works, as well– it’s Chicago, after all!) As a Shakespeare Coach and Teaching Artist, I aim to foster a warm, collaborative, fun environment with my students. We all have different levels of comfort and experience with Shakespeare, and I hope to help my students feel empowered and excited about their craft. Whether I’m performing or teaching, I approach my work from a place of joy, empathy, and wonder, and I feel extraordinarily lucky to have theatre in my life.
What’s a lesson you had to unlearn and what’s the backstory?
I used to think that if I wasn’t constantly booked on a creative project, I wasn’t a “real” actor. Then, a pandemic shut down the show I had just opened, and I didn’t step on stage again until 27 months later. Miraculously, I remained an actor for all of those stageless months. I studied and read and worked and rested and cried because I missed hugging friends in audition waiting rooms and sang to my cat, and I was still an actor. Separating the need for external validation from my identity as an artist is an ongoing process, and I’m better off because of it.
What’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative in your experience?
Nothing makes me feel more alive than performing onstage– it’s an indescribable feeling. As an artist, you are inevitably going to have slow, doubt-ridden, and frustrating periods. Or, to put it in the words of my good friend, Billy Shakespeare, “When to the sessions of sweet silent thought/I summon up remembrance of things past/I sigh the lack of many a thing I sought/And with old woes new wail my dear time’s waste.” I’ll admit that I’ve fallen prey to the dreaded, “Should I even be doing this?” or “What if I’m not good enough?” questions that plague so many actors and creatives. After banging my head against the wall a few times and new wailing over old woes once or twice, I remember how deeply I love my work and how deeply I believe that the theatre is necessary for human survival. We need the arts. We need poetry. We need puns. We need rhyming couplets. We need to project ourselves onto the Unlikely Hero and live vicariously through them on their Hero’s Journey. We need to cry. We need catharsis. We need to be reminded, “Oh yeah, we’re humans with heart beats and vocal cords and feelings.” What a goddamn gift it is to dedicate my life to this art. To end with another Billy quote, “But when I think on thee, dear friend/All losses are restored and sorrows end.”
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.hannahmarysimpson.com/
- Instagram: @hannahmary32
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCT2EFYFAhSRW9U072U7j44A
Image Credits
Nancy Vela Photography; Steven Townshend | Distant Era; Oomphotography; Sara Shifflet Photography