Scarlet Sheppard

Scarlet is a long-time member of the AMAW community, having completed her foundations class all the way back in 2015! She holds a BA (honors) in Theatre from the School of Performing Arts at Columbia College Chicago. She also completed the Comedy Studies program at The Second City which immersed her in the rich worlds of improv, sketch and clown. An insatiable storyteller, Scarlet has dabbled in almost every behind-the-scenes role imaginable: writing, producing, showrunning, directing, editing, sound mixing, casting and even dialect coaching. Her screen credits include The Brothers Sun on Netflix, upcoming sci-fi series Shatter Belt starring Patton Oswalt, and so many viral internet projects (Buzzfeed, Smile Squad, The Warp Zone) that she's beginning to feel like the Judy Greer of Youtube. Stage credits include the west coast premiere of Antigone: Presented by the Girls of St. Catherine's at Sacred Fools (LA Times Critics Choice) The Rise and Fall of Little Voice at Theater Wit, and Hair with Altadena Music Theatre, for which she was nominated for a Broadway World Award. What inspired you to become an actor? I have always thought actors were the coolest people on the planet, but I didn't really consider this kind of path for myself until I was a teenager. All it took was one middle school drama teacher who saw something in me and gave me a chance with a challenging role. As a painfully anxious kid, being told "I want you to tell this story, you have what it needs inside of you" was the most magical and affirming moment of my life thus far. I'd found my North Star in performing and never looked back! I believe that acting connects us to each other like nothing else. When someone volunteers to take on the spiritual burden of another person, it reminds us of something long forgotten: we have so much more in common than not. And so, to become a freer actor, we have to do a lot of primal remembering. Doing this kind of work at AMAW and assisting other actors to do the same is endlessly inspiring to me!