BatSheva Raissa Spills Her Guts

As a kid, I was a prolific actress, a singer and writer. 

I didn’t dance, 1) because I had zero coordination and 2) because my older sister Tara danced professionally with the Washington, DC School of the Ballet and I was UBER competitive. 

I wasn’t willing to be less talented or less of a star than my sister.

So instead, I acted and sang in local theater groups and even with a professional children’s group CUE: Children’s Urban Arts Ensemble, in which I was the only White person in an all-Black group. It was cool - we performed at the Kennedy Center with the late Malcolm Jamal Warner, at National Theater, Gallaudet and Howard University, and we sang and acted scenes from esteemed musicals such as Purlie, Raisin, Dreamgirls, the Whiz, Annie (in which I played Miss Hannigan, teetering on 6-inch platform heels and nearly keeling into the audience), and ye olde favorite, Christmas in Cabbage Patch Land.

What? You haven’t heard of that last one? 

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