Our Actors

Sirena Abalian, a young actress from Lexington, was recognized for her performance as Jojo in Wheelock Family Theatre’s Seussical by the Independent Reviewers of New England (IRNE) for most Promising Performance by a Child actor. Sirena has several credits at Wheelock Family Theatre, including Grammy in Lilly’s Purple Plastic Purse, Roo in Winnie-the-Pooh, an Oompa Loompa in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, and the Commercial Girl in Ramona Quimby. She has performed with Stoneham Theatre as young Eponine / young Cosette in Les Miserables and in the musical 13. Other theater experience includes the Lexington Players, as the princess in The Princess and the Pea, the Boston Children’s Theatre as Fern in Charlotte’s Web, and the Boston Children’s Opera in Cinderella. Sirena has taken classes and workshops at Wheelock Family Theatre and the Arlington Children’s Theater. Sirena has also done a radio promotional ad for the Department of Health. Sirena enjoys acting, singing, and dancing.

Andrew appeared as Peter in Peter Pan, the Cat in Seussical, and Jack in Lord of the Flies at Wheelock Family Theatre. Last summer, he founded Cellar Door Productions, a new and exciting theatre company geared toward social change and community outreach, and recently directed Alice there. Andrew thanks Wheelock Family Theatre for shaping him into the passionate individual he is today. Without this wonderful theatre, he would have never dared to dream big. As the Cat in the Hat says, "Oh the thinks you can think, if you're willing to try."

Grace, appearing as Annie, was last seen as Fern in Charlotte's Web. Favorite credits include Scout in To Kill a Mockingbird (WFT), Piglet in Winnie-the-Pooh (WFT), and Rumpleteaser in CATS! (Dana Hall School). Grace has also performed at the Huntington, Lyric, and College Light Opera. By day, Grace is an 8th grader at Dana Hall. She enjoyed trapezing, dancing, acting, and singing at French Wood's Festival of the Arts Camp this past summer.

Peter appeared in Seussical as General Schmitz and in Honk!, both at Wheelock Family Theatre. Recent credits include Mr. Fezziwig in A Christmas Carol (Worcester), Buddy in Follies (Lyric Stage), and Bertie Sutton in Dessa Rose (New Rep). He has also performed with American Classics in Rodgers and Hart's Peggy Ann and Cole Porter's 50 Million Frenchmen. Peter won the Connecticut Critics Award for Best Actor in a Musical in Goodspeed Opera House's 1776 as John Adams, and an IRNE Award for Best Actor in a Musical for the Lyric Stage's 1776, again as John Adams. Directing credits include Much Ado About Nothing (Wellesley Summer); The New Moon and The Merry Widow (NE Light Opera); Arsenic and Old Lace and Dirty Blonde (Company), and Nine (Publick). Peter is the director of the Lyric First Stage, an intensive summer program for young artists ages 14 to 20.

Sarah appeared as Lowbutt in Wheelock Family Theatre’s Honk!. She is a daughter of English missionaries, born in India and raised in England, and is a graduate of the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in London. Locally she has appeared at the Huntington, Wilbur, North Shore Music Theatre, ART, Lyric Stage, SpeakEasy, Publick Theatre, and Company, and in the nationally renowned Christmas Revels. A fellow of the Cabaret Symposium in Waterford, CT, Sarah has enjoyed diverse cabaret experience, and recently appeared in her own cabaret show, Sarahndipity, directed by Scott Edmiston. She is a founding member of the Village Theatre Project. Sarah has lived in Cohasset on the South Shore for 35 years, and is now a proud US citizen. *

Aimee appears as Grace in Annie and as Ida in Honk! at Wheelock Family Theatre. She has been in several IRNE Best Ensemble-winning productions, including The Women at SpeakEasy and New Rep’s The Wild Party and Ragtime. Other regional credits include: Speed-the-Plow (Karen), Cabaret (Sally Bowles), tick, tick…BOOM! (Susan), and Into the Woods (Cinderella) with New Rep; Grey Gardens (Young Edie), Follies (Young Phyllis), See What I Wanna See (Kesa/the wife/an actress), and Adrift in Macao (Lureena) with the Lyric;The Pain and the Itch (Kelly) with Company One; and Bubbly Black Girl... (Scarlet) and Company (Kathy) with SpeakEasy. Aimee is the president and senior scientist of Doherty Environmental Consulting. *

Katherine appeared with Wheelock Family Theatre in Lilly’s Purple Plastic Purse as Lilly, in The Sound of Music as Gretl, and in A Little Princess as Lottie. On Broadway, she originated the role of Jane Banks in the Tony Award-winning musical, Mary Poppins, and recently appeared with Angela Lansbury and Catherine Zeta-Jones in A Little Night Music. Other stage credits include Susan Waverly in the White Christmas debut at the Wang; the title role in Annie (Open Fields); Mary Lennox in The Secret Garden (SLOC and Stagedoor Manor); Iris in A Still Life with Iris (Regis College); the Narrator in Joseph...Dreamcoat (Stagedoor Manor); and Tootie in Meet Me in St. Louis (Weston Friendly). *

Ricardo has performed in several Wheelock Family Theatre productions including Winnie-the-Pooh (Rabbit), The Phantom Tollbooth (Tock), and Lilly’s Purple Plastic Purse (Wilson). Other credits include SpeakEasy’s Take Me Out (Davey Battle) and Our Lady of 121st St. (Balthazar); Boston Theatre Works’ Hamlet (Horatio); Commonwealth Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing (Borachio); Stoneham Theatre’s As Bees In Honey Drown (Photographer, et al); the Lyric’s Lobby Hero (William), Old Settler (Husband Witherspoon), and The Liar (Philiste); and Gloucester Stage’s 50 Years of Caddying (Chip Eastern) and One Under (Xavier).

Jennifer appears as Martha in The Secret Garden, and has appeared many times in the past with Wheelock Family Theatre, including as Gertrude in Seussical, as Wendy in Peter Pan, as Sara Crewe in A Little Princess, and as Mary Lennox in Wheelock Family Theatre’s 1993 production of The Secret Garden. As a Harvard undergraduate, she sang with The Radcliffe Pitches and performed in several college productions including Ruthless! (Tina) and The Secret Garden (Martha). Following college, Jennifer played the roles of Bielke and Grandma Tzeitel in the national touring production of Fiddler on the Roof starring Theodore Bikel. Regionally, she has been seen as Ado Annie in Oklahoma! (Company), Edna Arkins in The Good Times Are Killing Me (SpeakEasy and Wheelock Family Theatre), Little Red Ridinghood in Into the Woods (Worcester Forum), and June in Gypsy (Publick). Most recently, Jennifer appeared as Young Solange/Margie in Follies at the Lyric Stage and Kim in Company’s Miss Saigon. A graduate of the University of VA School of Law, by day Jennifer is an estate planning attorney and teaching fellow at Harvard Law School. *

De’Lon appeared with Wheelock Family Theatre as William in The Little Mermaid and as Dunois in Saint Joan, for which he received an IRNE Award nomination. Most recently, De'Lon was blessed with the role of Samuel Sawyer in Lydia R. Diamond's critically acclaimed play Harriet Jacobs, based on the first female slave narrative. Some of his favorite roles include Kaine in Dessa Rose at the New Repertory Theatre in Boston, and Brick in Tennessee Williams' Cat on a Hot Tin Roof. He earned a BFA in Acting from the University of Michigan and his Master's degree in Musical Theatre performance at The Boston Conservatory.

Neil appeared with Wheelock Family Theatre as The Inquisitor in Saint Joan, one of Captain Hook's Pirates in Peter Pan, Mr. Sir in Holes, Squire Greene in Beanstalk, Henry Drummond in Inherit the Wind, Gideon in The Witch of Blackbird Pond, King Henry VIII and The Ruffler in The Prince and the Pauper, King Alonso in The Tempest, and Teddy Lloyd in The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie. For eight years, Neil traveled the highways and byways of New England to perform a one-man show, Isaiah Thomas—Patriot Printer, produced by the American Antiquarian Society. Internationally, he has appeared in works by Shakespeare and Chekhov. On TV, he has played roles on The Practice; Spenser: For Hire; A Midwife's Tale; and Black Bellamy's Treasure. On the big screen, Neil played Yuri Spinov in Next Stop, Wonderland. *

Gamalia appears in Wheelock Family Theatre’s Annie; she was last seen as the Sour Kangaroo in Seussical, and in Broadway on the Riverway. Some of her favorite Wheelock Family Theatre shows include Beauty and the Beast, Sound of Music, Hello Dolly, Ol’ Sis Goose, A Little Princess, and Cinderella. Gamalia has performed in regional theatres up and down the East Coast, and has a BFA from the Boston Conservatory of Music. She has sung with the Joyful Voices of Inspiration gospel choir and the Colleges of the Fenway Jazz Band.

Ilyse appeared in Lilly’s Purple Plastic Purse and Seussical at Wheelock Family Theatre. Other favorite roles include Little Becky Two-Shoes in Urinetown and Puck in Shakespeare in Hollywood with Lyric Stage; Lala Levy (Last Night of Ballyhoo) at Jewish Theatre of NE; and Mae (Wild Party) at New Rep. Ilyse is the voice of the narrator in Eve Bunting’s book My Teacher Is Having a Baby and can be seen as your local neighborhood pharmacist in CVS stores across the country. She teaches creative drama through Wheelock Family Theatre at Lee Academy in Dorchester and creative drama education at Brandeis. She holds a BS in Theatre from Northwestern and an EdM from Harvard.

Andrea’s Wheelock Family Theatre credits include Joan of Arc in Saint Joan, Sara Crewe in A Little Princess, Liesl in The Sound of Music, Ramona in Ramona Quimby, and Winnie Foster in Tuck Everlasting. In 2007, Andrea played Swallow in the national tour of Andrew Lloyd Webber's Whistle Down the Wind. Her regional credits include Fredrika in A Little Night Music (Lyric Stage), Young Lizzie in Lizzie Borden (Stoneham), and the title role in Annie (Trinity Rep). She received the 2005 Elliot Norton Outstanding Actress Award. Andrea recorded the solo album “Moon River”, which was produced by Andrew Lloyd Webber; she is also featured on the Webber CD compilation “60”. *

Jenna appears in Wheelock Family Theatre’s Annie, and also appeared in Honk! in 2010. She studied Musical Theatre at the American Musical and Dramatic Academy in New York and completed an acting apprenticeship at the Walnut Street Theatre in Philadelphia. Jenna received an IRNE for Best Ensemble in a Play (G.R. Point) for the Hovey Players in Waltham.

Scott appeared as Greylag in Honk! and as Captain Hook in Peter Pan at Wheelock Family Theatre, and has over 300 other professional productions to his credit as actor or director, including critically acclaimed turns as Oscar Madison, Pseudolus, Benjamin Franklin, Falstaff, Nathan Detroit, Don Quixote, and the Cowardly Lion. He has played Tevye in Fiddler on the Roof on six different occasions, winning Best Actor honors for the role at the NH Spotlight Awards in 2007. Most recently, Scott appeared at UMass Lowell in the title role of Brecht's Galileo, and was Herbie in Gypsy at Stoneham Theatre. He has been named Best Director twice at the NH Theatre Awards, for productions of Les Miserables in 2003 and Into the Woods in 2004, and was featured in the film Fever Pitch.

Jane is a co-founder of Wheelock Family Theatre and is the theatre’s resident actor and casting director. Recent directing credits include Honk!, Charlotte’s Web, Peter Pan, Beauty and the Beast, and The Sound of Music. Her most recent acting roles include the Great Mother in The Little Mermaid , Madame Defarge in A Tale of Two Cities, the Grinch and Yertl in Seussical, Mrs. Dubose in To Kill a Mockingbird, and Willie Wonka in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. *