Antoinette Peragine
I grew up in Brooklyn, in a household of Italian immigrants who believed a kitchen was a strategy. My first stage was our dining-room table. My second was a Broadway theater. Everything after — the studios, the Comedy Store, the weddings, the interviews — was practice for the same thing: how to be a human being while other people are watching.
This book is the argument I've been trying to make my whole adult life. The research finally caught up.
One Woman. Many Rooms.
Born to Italian immigrants in Brooklyn; competitive gymnast; co-founded a New York theater company.
Studio soundstage with Jeff Bridges and Isabella Rossellini — a first film credit in Peter Weir's Fearless.
Junior (Reitman/Schwarzenegger), Angie (Geena Davis), and premium-cable work across ER, NYPD Blue, Six Feet Under.
Discovered by Mitzi Shore; paid-regular status granted on the spot. Photo on the Wall of Fame.
Fifteen years producing weddings and celebrations in Los Angeles — a nickname bestowed by Bravo.
A cultural archive, filmed by Norman Seeff. Interviews that read like portraits.
Put Emotion Back in Business …where it belongs — nine peer-reviewed studies and thirty years in the room.
The only real qualification I've ever had for any of it is that I paid attention to what people were actually feeling.