About Laurel
I feel very privileged that musicians I work with don’t refer to me as a “female vocalist.” These guys are among the finest jazz pianists in the country.
In Providence I was the darling of the Federal Hill crowd, including the infamous Mayor Vincent “Buddy” Cianci. The Biltmore Hotel was my center stage and I became a “Cause Celeb” -mostly for myself. Film Maker Xaque Gruber produced a film about me (Laurel Casey: The Hurting Truth) which won Best Documentary at the 2001 Provincetown Film Festival. I thought that film would act as a leveraging tool, a career booster, but it didn’t and I still don’t understand why. I think I need a manager although my irreverence is misinterpreted by authority figures as disrespectful.
I seem to get along famously with Old Money – and spent a good number of years becoming infamous at Newport Soiree performances, such as Doris Duke’s birthday party. My performance installations at such diverse locations as Dick Cheney’s country club, Sleepy Hollow, in Nyack, New York, and The Empty Gallery in New York are hard to forget. I have performed in the No Shame Series at the Joseph Papp Public Theatre, most of the Cabarets of New York, such as Steve’s McGraws, Don’t Tell Mama, The Duplex.
More about Laurel Casey
Laurel Casey was born in Middlebury, Vermont, to a phone repairman who sang to her in the living room, old swing tunes by Duke Ellington and Glenn Miller.
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After getting degrees in acting in Vermont and at Florida State University, Casey moved to New York. She worked off-Broadway and did regional theater in a number of cities, but the money never flowed the way she needed it to. She took side jobs, working as a reporter for a radio station, a columnist for the New York Press, a nude model, a bathroom attendant, and, of course, a waitress. She did her cabaret shows to make money on the side, but there was rarely enough money.
EDUCATION
M.F.A. Program, Asolo Conservatory of Acting, Florida State University 1984
M.A. Program, Drama Therapy, Hunter College, NYC 1993
B.A. Theater/Journalism University of Vermont 1974
Acting- Sanford Meisner, Tim Philips, NYC
Breadloaf Writers Conference- Fellowship for Fiction 1996 Middlebury College
