The first time I was on stage, it was to walk a sign from stage left to right. Literally. Me, a sign, one side of the stage to the other. I was in absolute heaven. I was four. There are pictures. I loved it so much it was a problem. When I was nine, I played a willow tree in the Met’s production of Hansel and Gretel. We walked on stage as a group, in relevé, in green face paint with matching hooded onesies, waving our tree branch arms. There are pictures. It was my job to tip toe around the stage to get to my place on the other side, but one night I accidentally tripped on the witch’s cane. HEAVEN. 3,000 eyes, watching me get up. Yes, I thought. Yes. Years later, after being in every show ever made in a 20-mile radius of my hometown, I did a summer stock production of Cabaret. It’s my favorite play, my favorite movie, there are hookers and Nazis and queer people and pervy dancing. I was so thrilled to be on that stage, in that play, that on the very first dance where we dragged the chairs to their cabaret performance places – I smiled so much the director yelled at me. I was way too happy a hooker. But I couldn’t contain my glee! A corset, stockings, a chair, high heels, and messed up make-up??? Absolute heaven for my teenage self. I got it together, though, I started to learn to use all that energy in the performance and not just bounce around with it. But it’s still a wild ride. It’s unpredictable, sometimes even unreliable, but it’s in that unknowing that makes theater a place where the most interesting and wonderful things can happen. And it’s radical. People are affected differently when you put yourself out there in front of them. And when you do that because you actually have something to say, which for me was when I did my show, Positive Me, at La Mama during the height of the AIDS crisis, you feel like you are moving the world. Maybe you only moved it a micro-inch, but you did something, you pushed, and you felt other people change, at least for that moment.
Following her co-starring role for 7 seasons on the world-wide hit Fox medical drama “House,” Lisa Edelstein starred for five seasons in Bravo’s first scripted series “Girlfriends’ Guide to Divorce.” That show also gave her the opportunity to write, produce and direct and she has since written and directed two short films (“Unzipping”, “Lulu”), written a pilot and is adapting a book for her feature directorial debut. She recently appeared opposite Rob Lowe in the hit Ryan Murphy series “9-1-1: Lone Star” and reprises her recurring role in season 3 of the award-winning Netflix comedy series “The Kominsky Method” (May 28th Season Premiere). Lisa is reunited with Jason Alexander in The Sisters Rosensweig as part of the Spotlight on Plays series benefitting The Actors Fund. They last worked together in 1993 in the notable ‘Risotto’ episode of “Seinfeld”.