Double Threat

So she can't sing. Robyn Allen can do most everything else on stage — and has. When she's not performing (most recently in Phoenix Theatre's The Women; currently in The Beauty Queen of Leenane), she's often directing; the rest of the time she's running the West Valley's Algonquin Theater Company and, she says, reading about dogs and wishing she was one.

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• Bob Sorenson
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I knew I wanted to be in show business when I was 5 and I put up a lemonade stand. For 10 cents you got lemonade, but for 25 cents you got lemonade and a show. I made a fortune that day — something like eight bucks!

The worst thing about being an actor is the pay.

My worst audition ever was when I tried to sing with a piano accompanist. Bob Sorenson was directing the remount of Six Women With Brain Death and said, "Oh, give it a shot, you never know. You'll be fine." He was wrong.

The happiest day in my life was the day my children were born. Pure, uncomplicated joy. The next day the worrying began. It drives my children crazy.

If I could be anyone other than myself, it would be nobody. I like me . . . I really like me. Or maybe I'd be a dog. Dogs are cool.

It's not entirely true, but I sometimes tell people that really, I can sing, I just don't want to.

The character I am most like is Pocahontas. I proudly boast of my 1/24th Cherokee Indian heritage.

I am utterly terrified of drunken clowns. It's a long story.

I laugh uncontrollably at bad acting on television and in movies — some of which includes my own stuff. At a screening of one movie I was in, I required my guests to drink two shots of tequila before they were allowed to view it. It helped ease the pain.

The one thing I absolutely refuse to do on stage is stand in front of an audience completely nude. That ship has sailed.

Something I have never admitted to anyone before is I am terrified of auditions and completely suck at them! Auditions are cruel, and I am currently working on having them banned from our art form. I haven't figured out how we'll get hired yet, but it'll come to me. See, the truth is, when they sit behind that desk and stare at us, they aren't laughing with us, they're laughing at us! (Perhaps I should seek counseling about this.)

Currently I am reading Marley and Me by John Grogan. It's about this dog that is a pain in the ass, messes up a lot, but loves and is loved unconditionally. My husband and I live that story on a daily basis.

The first time I got drunk, I threw up all over my bedroom floor. The next morning my mom said, "You look tired, go back to bed." She truly is the original Sandra Dee. I absolutely love her. She's a saint.

Like my mother used to say, "Be a lady in public and a whore in bed." My husband loves this. (Or is it, "Be a whore in public and a lady in bed?" I guess it depends on what character I'm playing. It's not easy being married to an actress.)