SOMA Living December 2021

MEET THE FAMILY

Photography by Jamie Meier

“We met as dance partners at the Goodspeed Opera House in Connecti cut 21 years ago and have been together since. The director of the show noticed our chemistry and jokingly asked for an invitation to our wed ding,” Marc Kessler warmly recalled on meeting his wife Casey Hushion. The talented couple were both living in mid-town Manhattan and working on and off Broadway as actors at the time. Casey added, “I started dancing at age 2, did my first musical at age five and I’ve been doing shows ever since. After graduating from NYU, I transitioned into directing and I started working on Broadway in 2005. I have so many favorite shows that I’ve worked on but Mean Girls, The Prom, Aladdin, In the Heights and The Drowsy Chaperone rank at the top. Coming up next, I am looking forward to directing two shows at Paper Mill Playhouse this season, Jolly Holiday: Celebrating Disney’s Broadway Hits and Clue. I am thrilled to be back at Paper Mill, it is truly one of the best theatres in the country and I love that it’s right in our backyard! Jolly Holiday opens in early December and it will be a fun, festive concert, full of incredible talent and all of your favorite Disney songs. And following that, we open the new hit play Clue, a hilarious murder mystery based on the cult classic film, in late January.” When asked the favorite part of her career, Casey quickly answered that it is the collaboration and the strong bonds with other artists. “The connections you make, the moments you share when you are creating shows, the families that you form during the process, it’s a very special thing. I also love the leadership aspect of my job and being able to create a safe, inclusive and joyful space for artists to do their best work.” After twenty years in theater, Marc made a career shift to segue into teaching middle school math and is currently at Maplewood Middle School. After both performing on Broadway and conceiving the hit Off-Broadway musical Altar Boyz, he was ready for a career transition that would help balance the freelance artist lifestyle for his family and would challenge him in new ways.

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