We were lucky to catch up with Sofia Tosches recently and have shared our conversation below.
Sofia, appreciate you joining us today. Can you open up about a risk you’ve taken – what it was like taking that risk, why you took the risk and how it turned out?
It was March 2018, my senior year of college, when I auditioned at the Southeast Theatre Conference in Mobile, Alabama. I don’t remember what my audition number was, but I know it was pretty early on in the weekend. You have to wear your number pinned to you, much like a runner in a marathon, when you stand on stage to audition. It was a cold morning so I was all dressed up in my audition dress, but had a pullover sweater over it. As I walked into the conference center I pulled my sweater off and realized I didn’t have my number pinned to me anymore. I ran up and down the stairs and the sidewalk outside of the building thinking it had fallen off, but it was also an extremely windy day. That number could have been anywhere. I remember running around the conference center as the clock ticked closer and closer to when I was supposed to be in the holding room and I just figured “Screw it. I won’t audition. It’s not like anything is going to come from this anyway.”
After I threw myself a pity party, my logic pushed aside my fear and anxiety and I ventured off to find April Marshall (or as my friends and I lovingly refer to her, The Queen of SETC.) She was the HBOC and I knew she’d be able to help. When I told her I lost my number, she said “not a problem”, looked up my name and very neatly wrote it on a blank card and gave me a new one. She smiled, told me to “break a leg,” and showed me the way to the audition holding room. I had less than 15 minutes to pull myself together before it was my turn. Within the course of the next 24 hours my life changed and I didn’t even know it was happening.
After my audition I received a few callbacks, one of which was for Riverside Theatre in Vero Beach, FL. I went to the callback, which was more of an interview. The open position was as a Performance Apprentice for the Riverside Theatre for Kids! I had an incredible interview with the director of the children’s theatre and when I walked out of the room, I can’t really explain it, but I knew something was different.
Less than a month later I was driving home to Memphis for Easter break when I received an email from the HR department at Riverside. I pulled off some random exit between Nashville and Memphis, into the parking lot of some random McDonald’s, and read the email. They were offering me a year-long contract beginning May 21, 2018 (just 16 days after graduation.) I sobbed, called my mom, and spent the rest of the three-hour drive home doing math in my head.
The contract was paying $200 a week, but housing was provided. Still, that’s $10,400 for the whole year…BEFORE TAXES. I still was responsible for gas, food, car insurance, spending money, etc. My parents were understandably nervous about this venture. But I wanted the night to think about it.
That night my mom, sister, and I went to see Leslie Odom Jr. at The Orpheum Theatre in downtown Memphis. He was reading excerpts from his book “Falling Up” and performing some music. About halfway through the show he started to tell a story about how he was working on a movie making cushy cinema money when he got a call from a friend asking him to come to New York and be a part of a table read for a new musical he was working on. It was a rap musical about the Founding Fathers of the United States. It was Hamilton; and that friend was none other than Lin Manuel Miranda. Odom left the movie and moved to New York to be a part of this project. Everyone told him he was crazy. They said “why would you give up a sure thing to go be a part of a reading for a show that may never amount to anything and agree to get paid only $200 a week.” Odom said he did it because he knew in his gut it was going to be something special.
As tears filled my eyes I slapped my mom on the arm. She rolled her eyes as if to say, “I know. I heard him.” And the next morning, I signed my contract for Riverside Theatre.
Mine and Odom’s gut were both right. “Hamilton” went on to be record breaking, and my life was absolutely never the same after that contract. I met people who changed my life in a matter of seconds, I found hope and healing inside my own skin, and I created art that has continued to change my life to this very day. But that’s a different story.
Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.
My name is Sofia Tosches and I was born in Prospect, Connecticut. I now live in Nashville, Tennessee. In between both of these places I have also lived in Florida, New Jersey, and Memphis, TN. I attended Belmont University right here in Nashville and graduated in 2018 with a BFA in Theatre Performance. I am an actress/playwright here in town and can also moonlight as a director. When I am not making art I am a part-time nanny to the best kids in the world, a server at a local steakhouse, and spend as much time as possible doing things that set my soul on fire.
I have always loved performing and have been seriously engaging in theatre since 2010. In highschool I was the president of my school’s Thespian Honor Society and our Speech and Debate Team. In college I was president of our chapter of Alpha Psi Omega (a national theatre honor society) as well as incredibly involved in the admissions office and new student orientation. I have always been a person who wants to be involved in many different things and that’s not changing anytime soon.
Since being in Nashville I have had the honor to get to know so many professionals from many different companies and am so grateful for all of the guidance they have given me over the years both pre and post grad. As I continue to grow as a professional in my field I am becoming more and more aware of who I want to be for my community.
This past fall I directed and produced my original play “White Elephant: A Comedy Until It’s Not” at the Darkhorse Theatre in Sylvan Park. This was one of the most exhilarating and complicated things I have done to date. It taught me so much about myself as a leader and about what it takes to fully mount a production in this industry. A few things I walked out of that experience knowing are:
1) Leadership is an extremely healthy mix of being open for feedback and knowing when to put your foot down and move on with the process.
2) There will be bumps in the road, breathe and know that you have it within yourself to figure out a solution.
3) Your tribe will show your their true colors during this time. There will be non-theatre friends who offer to help decorate 100 gingerbread cookies that you need as props. Those are lifers.
4) Don’t blink. You will miss it. Feel everything. Every triumph, every ache, every burn, every kind word; it all contributes to the beautiful mosaic of how you will remember this experience forever.
5) Remind yourself that you’re human. Everyone is looking at you to give them what they need. Breathe. Take it one thing at a time and give yourself grace when you fall short.
I will spend the rest of my career searching for projects and people that make my heart full. Communication and care for others will always be at the top of my list. It is a priority for me to surround myself with artists who are actively seeking opportunities to grow as people through the stories we tell.
We often hear about learning lessons – but just as important is unlearning lessons. Have you ever had to unlearn a lesson?
“Daring greatly means the courage to be vulnerable. It means to show up and be seen. To ask for what you need. To talk about how you’re feeling. To have the hard conversations.” -Brené Brown.
All through college theatre training we were taught to “be vulnerable.” We began Meisner training with repetition and provocative questions. My first semester freshman year a classmate and I were paired up to do this exercise in front of my Acting 1 class where she had to ask me a “provocative question” and I had to react genuinely.
She looked at me and asked, “If a director told you that in order to land a role you had to get a nose job, would you?” This question was in direct relation to the fact that I have one of those Italian noses that are just well, prominent. It is not even something I think about often unless it’s brought up. But in this instance lit a fire in my belly. I laughed, but that wasn’t my truthful reaction. Truth is, I wanted to cry. Being a freshman in any major is a difficult state of being, but I was in a particularly vulnerable one. I was the only freshman theatre major who got cast in a mainstage production my first semester. I couldn’t tell you how I did it…I think I blacked out during the audition, but somehow my name landed on the cast list.
I remember reading the cast list, gasping, and basically running back to my dorm because I didn’t want to encounter anyone who may be upset with me. That’s a horrible way to celebrate being cast in your first college production. Over the next few months I had a very difficult relationship with my class of peers. It seemed that I was being quite isolated and wasn’t being invited to a lot of events. I had to believe this was because I had been cast over them. However, I was in rehearsals so I had the beautiful opportunity to grow close to many upperclassmen. Some of those people stuck around for a few months. Some of those people stuck around until graduation. And one of those people remains, to this day, a rock in my life. A reason, a season, or a lifetime. That’s how I categorize the people who have crossed my path. No matter their purpose, I tend to wear my heart on my sleeve immediately upon meeting someone new. I always thought the best way to get someone to trust me was to tell them about every scar up front. It’s not the best way.
Being vulnerable is important, but not everyone deserves our vulnerability. The closer you are to someone, the easier it is for them to hurt you. This is a lesson I learn and unlearn every single day. In my personal and professional life I tend to believe people are innocent until proven guilty which I know is morally the right thing to do, but as I get older it gets harder to do that. When you start to make art and professionally engage with people who already have a piece of your heart, it can become difficult. Lines can get blurred, judgement can be skewed, and feelings can be hurt. I am not saying don’t create with your friends, but I am saying identify boundaries. Guard your heart and remember what you are working towards. Don’t give your creative property away for free because not everyone deserves the pieces of you that you have worked so hard to heal.
Is there mission driving your creative journey?
It is pretty apparent that everything I write as a playwright can somehow be related back to the conversation on “mental health.” This is something I do not take lightly and I want everyone to know that healing through art is real.
I wrote my first play “White Elephant” during a time that was very overwhelming for me. I was struggling in so many aspects of my life but still found a way to find light and laughter through my writing. This play has been quite the phoenix. It has burned down and been reborn in so many different ways, but each time it comes back beautiful and better than ever.
What that has done for my mental healing is indescribable.
My next few plays in the cannon follow the same suit. I want to write about things I know. I want to write about things that are relatable. If just one person in the audience can see themselves in a story I’ve written, well, then I have done my job. Theatre is meant to be universal. It is for everyone. I want people to find love and truth in the seats of a theatre space. Art imitates life and life imitates art. 
Contact Info:
- Website: sofiatosches.com
- Instagram: @sofia96ann
- Facebook: Sofia Ann
- Linkedin: www.linkedin.com/in/sofia-tosches
- TikTok: @sofia.tosches
Image Credits
Shanna Snow Kristen Fields Rachel Redbird Heather Leroy