Biography
KATHLEEN McCALL
Kathleen has had vast experience as a professional actress for more than 35 years, appearing on Broadway, Off-Broadway, National Tours and at regional theatres throughout the country, as well as on television and film. She has worked with such luminaries as Jane Powell, Shirley Knight, Rosemary Prinz, Aaron Sorkin, Robert LuPone, Bernie Telsey, Gabe Kaplan, Robert Reed, and with noted directors John Dexter (two-time Tony winner) and Morton DaCosta (Tony & Oscar nominee). A classically trained actress, Kathleen is a graduate of the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art, has been a Company Member of the Alabama Shakespeare Festival, the Utah Shakespeare Festival and the Denver Center Theatre Company.
In 1985, Kathleen was contracted by ABC television to appear on the daytime drama LOVING playing Jane Powell’s deranged daughter, Arizona Ames Beecham; Zona. She has since gone on to appear in several other daytime dramas as well as primetime television and film, most recently WELCOME TO THE FISHBOWL playing Natalie Gold’s mother, also staring Jeremy Swift. She made her Off-Broadway debut in the original company of STEEL MAGNOLIAS, and made her Broadway debut in M. BUTTERFLY. Kathleen was a member of Manhattan Class Company founded by Bernard Telsey and Robert LuPone. In 2004, Kathleen was part of the National Endowment for the Arts Shakespeare in America Series. The NEA and the U.S. Department of Defense joined together to fund a production of Macbeth which traveled to 13 military bases across the United States. Kathleen performed Lady Macbeth and in February of 2005, her journals about this experience were published in American Theatre magazine. At the request of then NEA Chair Dana Gioia, Kathleen traveled to Washington, DC to report on the tour to the National Arts Council. In 2006, Kathleen created and performed her one-woman show, “Shakespeare’s Women: Lovers, Mothers, Queens and Courtesans,” for the performing arts series of the Cherokee Ranch & Castle Foundation. With a grant from the Colorado Council on the Arts and in conjunction with the Cherokee Ranch Foundation, she brought Shakespeare to underprivileged high school students throughout the front range of Colorado.
She has taught acting in the Alabama Shakespeare Festival/University of Alabama MFA Program, University of Utah acting program, Utah Shakespeare Festival, the Denver Center’s National Theatre Conservatory MFA program as well as The Denver Center Academy’s Adult Series, as well as conducting Master Classes in Shakespeare at the University of Northern Colorado. Kathleen has been a keynote speaker for The Colorado Thespians Association and The Alliance for Colorado Theatre Association.
For her work as an actress, Kathleen is the recipient of the 2013 Lunt-Fontanne Fellowship and has been honored with a Westword Best Performance by an Actress Award for her performance of Emilia in Othello, (2010) and Kate in Taming of the Shrew (2011), The Daily Camera Award for Maggie in Plainsong, the Bessie Award for Beatrice in Much Ado About Nothing, and a Cleveland Morris Award for Elizabeth in 1918. She is an inductee of Marquis “Who’s Who of American Woman in the Arts” and in 2018 she was selected as an Albert Nelson Marquis Lifetime Achievement Award.
In addition to her acting career, Kathleen has served on the Denver Health Foundation Board, and was awarded Volunteer of the Year by the Denver Health Hospital Authority in 2012. She was a founding member of the Level One Society, an affiliate board of Denver Health, and served as its Events Chair. She was given the Encore Award as Board Member of the Year in 2012. During her service on the Level One Board, $375K was raised to outfit the newly opened in-patient facility for children and adolescents. She continues to actively fundraise for the Children and Adolescent Psychiatric Research Endowment (currently $1.5M). Kathleen has also served on the board of directors for the Center of Teaching International Relations. She has volunteered, raised money, and helped with events for New York, Los Angeles and Montgomery AIDS awareness, outreach & care organizations, Meals on Wheels, MADRE, American Diabetes Association (Alabama & Colorado), and the First Ladies Art’s Festival in Alabama.
