Meet NY-based Actor + Director Anna Paone

ANNA PAONE is an actor, writer and director based in NYC. annapaone.com

CATHOLIC ARTIST CONNECTION: What brought you to NYC, and where did you come from?

ANNA PAONE: I've been living here since 2015. I'm from central New Jersey originally and grew up coming into the city. I was nervous about making the leap, but my day job and artistic interests were here, and I've never regretted it! You can't get Talenti at 10 p.m. in Metuchen, NJ.

What do you see as your personal mission as a Catholic working in the arts?

I'm so grateful to have been blessed with artistic interests and (hopefully) gifts. I want to use them to build a wider, more beautiful, and more equitable world; to see people and their stories in new ways; and to help others to do the same. In addition to the true, the good, and the beautiful, I've also found the arts to be a helpful way to frame sadness and tragedy, and to sublimate my own anxiety and fears into a story.

Where have you found support in the Church for your vocation as an artist?

While I'm not actively involved with any parish theatrical apostolates (though I've auditioned for them!), I love that they exist and use the beautiful spaces of NYC as their backdrop. I also love seeing from social media and everyday life that there ARE Catholic actors, filmmakers, writers, dancers, visual artists, and more, and that there are so many ways to live out one's faith in one's art.

Where have you found support among your fellow artists for your Catholic faith?

Many directors and creatives know about Catholic imagery and culture and are happy for me, as an actor, to pick up on that and access that as part of my performance. For example, in "Gormenghast" I had to raise a chalice in a certain way, which led to some discussion of Eucharistic imagery (and my own nerdiness about Mervyn Peake, the author of the "Gormenghast" novels, being the son of Protestant missionaries!). I find directors rarely mind me bringing up my faith in a sidebar way when it's helpful for me to delve into my character more.

How can the Church be more welcoming to artists?

I think it's helpful for reverts and converts, at least, to know that there's not one way of being Catholic. It took me a long time to learn this myself. Acting isn't necessarily superficial or immoral and you can be a Catholic actor! I think it's helpful for both artists and their friends and family to know this.

Pictured: Gormenghast, directed by Anna Paone

I'm also not going to say "What I do is very serious" (especially since, in my personal life, I frame it as a respite from my day job), but I still think there's an undercurrent, in the Church and society at large, that the arts are not Serious Work. Catholic art can also question and problematize the Church and still be "good," and well-made art by and for Catholics should be celebrated.

Also, not all Catholic art is explicitly Catholic!

How can the artistic world be more welcoming to artists of faith?

I think normalizing religion as a context through which to interpret a character is good--the same as any other context you'd use. Also, religious art is not necessarily bad or cheesy (although we need to promote more good religious art!).

Where in NYC do you regularly find spiritual fulfillment?

Since moving to Sunnyside, I attend St. Teresa and Queen of Angels, both of which I like a lot. Of course, I love St. Malachy's, which gave me a framework for seeing acting as a Catholic vocation, with its side altars, acting groups, and prayers for deceased actors in the bulletin. Their YouTube Masses were very helpful to me during quarantine. I was in their now-defunct women's group and met many wonderful women there.

Where in NYC do you find artistic fulfillment?

The theatre company I run, Dragonfly Multicultural Arts Center, is in New Jersey (I reverse-commute from Sunnyside on the evenings where we have rehearsal), but that's been my artistic home. I welcome anyone reading this to look us up and get in touch! I briefly co-ran a play-reading group at St. Malachy's in 2016 and met many people there with whom I'm still friends, and I have friends from other shows I've done. It's nice just to talk to other artists.

How have you found or built community as a Catholic artist living in NYC?

I could do better! Really, most of my Catholic artist friends came out of the short-lived play-reading group or hanging around St. Malachy's in general. I could stand to be more involved in parish activities, and also book more.

What is your daily spiritual practice?

I pray every morning and night and say my Universal Living Rosary Association decade every day. I love St. Philomena and sometimes say her Chaplet too. I'm trying to learn to talk more to God like a friend.

What is your daily artistic practice?

I try to get at least one thing for my art done per day, even if that's just submitting on Actors Access. I'm currently working on a super-low-budget feature I want to shoot in my small hometown (the aforementioned Metuchen) next summer and am trying to get that screenplay done.

Pictured: Gormenghast, directed by Anna Paone

Describe a recent day in which you were most completely living out your vocation as an artist.

I recently had a month where I was rehearsing both a COVID-delayed New York Theater Festival play, "Love Parade," as well as "Gormenghast," which I both directed and acted in. It was crazy and stressful, especially with my day job, but I kept thinking, "This is what I want to do" (maybe minus the day job). Probably the Saturday of our one-weekend-only "Gormenghast" run gave me the most joy: I stayed in New Jersey to forgo the commute, got to play a dream role in a unique space in an art school, and had a fun cast party after. Over the summer, I also premiered a long-gestating short film I wrote, directed, acted in, and did some editing on, "Our Lady of the '80s," alongside a premiere of my husband's sketches at Stuart Cinema in Greenpoint (which I can highly recommend). It was the perfect venue with family and friends, and we got outdoor drinks after. Greenpoint in the summer is the best!

You actually live in NYC? How!?

I work full-time at an office job, am living in Queens with my husband, and, after five years of living in NYC and applying, won the middle-income housing lottery. I'm a real-estate nerd and can recommend Listings Project (where I found my first apartment), extremely targeted StreetEasy searches, filling out your profile and applying for the housing lottery, Ghostlight Housing and other social media, and walking around your neighborhood of choice to find "for rent" signs. I'm biased toward Northwest Queens, especially Sunnyside!

But seriously, how do you make a living in NYC?

I work as a marketing associate at a company that makes dress forms and does consulting in the apparel industry. I was referred to this through a friend, but before that I worked for almost five years at an acting-industry publication, which I found via, I think, Playbill.com. LinkedIn and Playbill are usually my go-tos. I do want to work in the arts more full-time and am working on that.

That said, I don't know how people make it work without a day job, and I think there's absolutely no shame in having an unrelated day job. I've been doing this for awhile and found that people on Twitter recently got more vocal about the work/life balance that an unrelated day job allows them to have. I also did have privilege in living with my parents in central NJ and commuting in for day jobs and artistic endeavors while I saved up.

How much would you suggest artists moving to NYC budget for their first year?

Save as much as you can. I'm very anti-unpaid-internship, but if you're going to do one, try to either do it before moving here or make sure you can get a full-time job out of them. (I know people sometimes don't have a choice one way or the other, and I don't begrudge anyone taking them--I did; I just don't like the whole system.)

Make an actual spreadsheet with an actual budget which I'm always really bad at. (I shouldn't be giving anyone money advice.)

Take whatever job you need to, but also believe in your dignity and know that there are a lot of jobs in NYC if you're being mistreated. (Editor’s note: Hear, hear.)

What other practical resources would you recommend to a Catholic artist living in NYC?

Local Buy Nothing groups on Facebook are the best!

Plus secondhand furniture and other items: getting them from friends, getting them off the street, or going to places like Remix Market in LIC.

Live in New Jersey or Queens.

Shop at Trader Joe's and use Too Good to Go.

Get a library card and use it a lot.

What are your top 3 pieces of advice for Catholic artists moving to NYC?

1. There are a lot of us here and I, at least, would love to meet you!

2. Your weird or "bad" art that you rejected in the past will probably be a stepping-stone or an inspiration for something you make in the future. There are no bad ideas.

3. Your faith and your art aren't incompatible and don't listen to anyone who says they are.