All about me
Hey hey!
I was born in Saint Paul, Minnesota and spent my life growing up there. From the minute I popped out, performing was something I knew I had to do. Some pivotal moments in my youth were the following: memorizing all of "Climb Every Mountain" by age five, painting my entire body green and lip synching to "Defying Gravity," watching Donald O' Conners "Make Em' Laugh" performance fifty seven times and creating my very own Dancing with the Stars routines with my sister.
As I made it through the horrors of middle school, I was fortunate enough to make it through numerous theater camps and allow my pre-pubescent self the room to truly let herself go. A role that is a personal favorite is playing an ancestor in "Mulan Jr." I was passed over for the title role for obvious reasons. It was around this time my love for comedy really started to take root. Television shows like, The Office, Saturday Night Live, and Parks and Recreation filled my evenings as I struggled studying for math tests. Honestly who needs a pre-teen boyfriend when you have Jim Carrey, Mike Myers, and Will Ferrel?
When the choice of high school came, I knew I needed to attend a school with an amazing theater. When I first walked into Cretin Derham Hall in Saint Paul, I knew I had found the place I needed to be. From that first day of freshman year to my last day four years later, that theater was my home away from home. I spent countless hours performing and being apart of almost every production in some way. I only attended two football games and three dances in my entire high school career- wait, maybe I should be embarrassed by that? What can I say? I was a devoted little theater kid.
College was something I was thinking about since the moment I entered high school. I was constantly searching for the next phase that was going to make me the professional performer I wanted to be. I remember spending homerooms and lunches in my high school theater going over audition material hundreds of times. After the most stressful audition process and countless rejections, my hard work payed off. I was accepted to attend the Chicago College of the Performing Arts and gain a BFA in Musical Theater. Your girly did it. She was going to move forward in accomplishing her dreams. I apologize for the cliche of that last sentence.
In the fall of 2015, I moved to Chicago with two bucks, one bag, and me. I did not- that was a pun. I had to do it. I mean I did move to Chicago- just with more stuff.
The four years I spent at CCPA held some of the most amazing, fulfilling, and special moments of my life. Walking out of its doors I felt like the professional performer that I wanted to be when I walked in years prior.
Comedy has become an even larger part of my life. I have begun to write standup and begun to work on my material. I have performed stand up at Zanies, The Laugh Factory and iO. I also completed The Annoyance training program as well as many classes at iO. Through my training I met an amazing group of comedians and together we formed the sketch group Motorcycle Rocketship. We have had runs at The Second City (as Late Night Sketch Binge), The Annoyance and The Bughouse.
I created my own one woman show called Halfway to Fifty. It incorporated stand up comedy about the past 25 years of my life with music of all genres. It sold out for both performances and was met with much acclaim. Due to the success, I created Halfway to Fifty 2 (because I turned 26) and Halfway to Fifty 3 (because I turned 27- the math doesn't math but whatever it's comedy). I also created a show to be performed during the holidays called A Very Dellis Holiday. It celebrates every holiday of the year in one night through stand up comedy and music. These shows are everything to me and also the bane of my existence. I love them. It's pretty cool that the thing that has gotten me the most attention is one I created.
Now? I am going after what I always wanted. If you made it through this entire story, thank you! You're awesome. I'm pretty proud of it and I am excited (and scared) to see where it goes.
That's it.
