Area Actress Deals with Personal Loss by Performing for Home Made Theater
Provided By Home Made Theater
It is no surprise that Toni Anderson-Sommo, of Cunningham Avenue in Glens Falls, took to performing in area theater.
A recent retiree from the Hudson Falls School District who now teaches English Literature and Creative Writing at the State University of New York – Adirondack in Queensbury, Anderson-Sommo says teaching and performing come naturally to her.
“You’d be amazed at how many teachers are actually actors and actresses,” she says in advance of the opening of the new show she’s going to appear in, Home Made Theater’s production of Almost, Maine, a play which explores love and loss in a mythical New England town. “I think that’s because we’re used to standing in front of a large group and performing to keep their attention.”
Often cast in the role of a snobby socialite – one reviewer said of her performance as Claire Ganz in the company’s 2012 version of Rumors that she brought “a delicious drollness to Claire’s comments, delivered like a Greek chorus of one, drink constantly in hand” – Anderson-Sommo has also played Kate Jerome in Brighton Beach Memoirs and Lorraine Sheldon in Home Made Theater’s 2015 revival of The Man Who Came to Dinner.
Anderson-Sommo has a long and proven record working with the well regarded, award-winning company. She’s also directed Home Made Theater’s The Jungle Book and The Wizard of Oz, which won an Albany Times Union readers poll in 2013 for being the best local musical in the Capitol Region.
Besides her performances in local theater, area patrons of the arts may have also seen her in Forget Me Nots, a poignant, independent film about caregivers, as well as her debut play, U R Here, which was produced at the Charles R. Wood Theater in Glens Falls in February 2018.
A lighthearted comedy filled with puns, double entendres and assorted word play, Anderson-Sommo explains that she wrote U R Here “because I was acutely aware of how much society was becoming dependent on interpersonal relationships being conducted almost totally through social media.
“The sad thing,” continues Anderson-Sommo, “was that we had stopped depending on those people we knew and loved for answers to our life questions and had begun to rely on the virtual strangers that we found on social media.”
But the results, she’s quick to add, were well worth it, since the show played to sold out audiences. “Other than my two wonderful boys, this was the crowning achievement of my life, and everything and more than I’d hoped it would be.”
Up next for Anderson-Sommo is her portrayal of Glory in Almost, Maine, a role in which she plays against type. “It allows me to be a little New Age and hippie-ish,” she says. A woman whose heart broke when her husband, Wes, ran away with someone else, Glory spends most of her scene time carrying a paper bag that she claims contains an artificial heart.
But portraying the character also resonates with the local thespian on a tremendously personal level. That is because Anderson-Sommo says she and her husband went through the unthinkable and unbearable tragedy of losing their youngest son when he was diagnosed with a very rare disease at the age of eight-years-old.
“Theater became an escape for me, a chance to put aside my grief and become someone else for a short time,” she reflects.
The actress and her family suffered more grief only this past month, when their Cunningham Avenue home was damaged by a catastrophic fire. Though she briefly thought about quitting Almost, Maine to deal with her loss, Anderson-Sommo says she decided to stay with the production because the cast and company rallied around her.
“They provided not only financial support, but reminded me that home is where the heart is,” she explains. “And at Home Made Theater, I’ll always be home.”
Written by playwright and Tony-Award nominated actor John Cariani, and directed by Michael McDermott, Almost, Maine will have a limited, seven performance engagement at Saratoga Arts, 320 Broadway, Saratoga Springs, NY 12866. Performances will be September 24, 25, October 1, 2 at 8:00pm and September 26, October 2 and 3 at 2:00pm.
Single tickets, plus information and subscriptions to Home Made Theater’s entire 2021-2022 season are available on their website, www.HomeMadeTheater.org, or by calling (518) 587-4427 during regular business hours.
For more information about Home Made Theater, you can visit the group’s website, www.HomeMadeTheater.org, the company’s Facebook page, or contact the General Manager, Eric Rudy, at eric@homemadetheater.org.