Nicole Kempskie (Nicole Kempskie with Ken Davenport in No, No Nanette)Nicole Kempskie (Nicole Kempskie with Ken Davenport in No, No Nanette)
Nicole Kempskie’s mother was shocked when her shy, 9 year old little girl came home from a Campfire Girls trip to the Peter Pan Players in Worcester and declared “that’s what I want to do!” Thus began Nicole’s journey into the exciting world of theatre. Nicole couldn’t get enough time on the stage and performed regularly with Peter Pan Players, Westboro Players, Worcester County Light Opera and the Holy Name Summer Theatre.
She graduated from Auburn High School in 1991 and took to the stage at Theatre at the Mount in the title role of No, No Nanette that summer. It was off to Providence College in the Fall where she majored in theatre and acted in, directed or choreographed virtually every production during her college years and received the John Leonard Award for excellence in theatre.
While New York was calling to her, Nicole was cast in a TV commercial for Entertainment Weekly and decided to start her career in Boston after graduation. Her first professional stage experience came as the understudy to 2 leads in Huntington Theatre Company’s production of Company. She had so much work locally that she put off her plans for the “Big Apple” for six years. During that time she appeared in 12 Equity shows at the Lyric Stage, Huntington Theatre, Trinity Rep and other regional theatres, obtaining both her Equity Card and her Screen Actors Guild Card. One of the highlights of her Boston career was landing the role of Squeaky Fromme in the world premier of Stephen Sondheim’s controversial musical Assassins at the Lyric Stage. After appearing in Trinity Rep’s My Fair Lady, Nicole felt that the only way to continue to grow was to take that leap and move to New York City.
Nicole’s first year in NY was spent auditioning, teaching, directing, choreographing and performing at every opportunity that came her way. She then decided to continue her formal education and enrolled full time at New York University’s Gallatin School of Independent Study where she designed her own Master’s Degree program with emphasis on performance and theatre education. Together with some of her classmates, she began an after school theatre program in Harlem and other inner city schools and developed a passion for theatre education which continues to influence her career.
For several years, her summer months were spent as director of Children’s Theatre at North Shore Music Theatre in Beverly where she directed two of Music Theatre International’s premier productions, Dear Edwina and Rapunzel. Her talent was noted by MTI who quickly snatched her up to be part of the staff for their “Disney Junior” workshop performances last spring where she served as choreographer for The Aristocats. She hopes to continue her association with MTI and is working with them on developing training programs for elementary and middle school teachers who would like to learn more about directing “Broadway Junior” productions.
Nicole’s love of teaching is also evident in her most recent position. Theatre Direct, producers of most of Broadway’s big hits, including Beauty and the Beast and All Shook Up employ her in their “Broadway Classroom” program where she conducts pre-show lectures and post-show Question and Answer sessions for groups of theatre goers. Her interest in teaching has not kept Nicole from performing and she has been featured in several episodes of the hit TV show Law and Order and in the Julia Robert’s film Mona Lisa Smiles. When asked about her future goals, Nicole states that she would like to continue to act, direct, choreograph and teach but that she would also like to do scholarly writing and perhaps even teach theatre at the college level.
Nicole has remained friends with her No, No Nanette co-star Ken Davenport (his profile was also featured in this series) and they often reminisce about their experiences at the Mount. They both claim that Theatre at the Mount is the “best community theatre they ever performed in!” We humbly agree and are proud to call Nicole Kempskie one of our own.