Caissie Levy - Biography

Caissie Shira Reiser (born April 15, 1981 in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada), known professionally as Caissie Levy, is a Canadian stage actress and singer.

Early Life

Levy was born Caissie Shira Levy to parents Mark, a general practitioner, and Lisa Levy, an administrator at her husband's practice. She has two elder brothers, Robi and Josh, who are film directors known as The Levy Brothers. Levy and her brothers were raised as Jews and she is understood to have joined Camp Ramah, a Jewish summer camp, at the age of eleven. It was at Camp Ramah that Caissie got her love for the stage, enjoying performing in the camp's all-Hebrew musicals. Levy graduated from Westdale Secondary School in 1999. Set to study Shakespeare in Canada, Caissie was given the suggestion to audition for New York's American Musical and Dramatic Academy (AMDA); on a whim she did and got in. Caissie has also taught several audition workshops for students in the NYC area.

Career

Levy's big break came when she played the role of Penny Pingleton in both the Broadway and U.S. national tour companies of Hairspray after understudying the role in the Toronto company. During this time, she also covered the role of Amber Von Tussle. Levy graduated from AMDA in 2004; a week later she made a name for herself by playing the role of Maureen Johnson in the U.S. national tour of Rent.

In 2008, Levy starred as Elphaba in the Los Angeles sit-down production of Wicked. She had previously understudied the role on Broadway and briefly served as standby in Los Angeles. Her first performance took place on January 1, 2008, replacing Eden Espinosa. She left the show on May 11 of the same year, and was replaced by her standby Teal Wicks.

Levy recently starred as Sheila in the Broadway revival of Hair, which began previews on March 6, 2009 and opened March 31, 2009 at the Al Hirschfeld Theatre. She left the Broadway cast on March 7, 2010, where she was succeeded by Diana DeGarmo, to open the West End revival which began performances April 1, 2010 at the Gielgud Theatre. The show recently closed September 4, 2010.

Levy is currently originating the role of Molly Jensen in Ghost: The Musical. The musical opened at Manchester Opera House in March 2011 for a seven week run before transferring to London's West End at The Piccadilly Theatre from June 22, 2011.

She can be heard on the cast recording for Hair and Ghost as well as singing, "Please Don't Let Me Go" on the re-release of composer Scott Alan's "Keys". Caissie can also be heard singing "Dear Daddy" on composer Bobby Cronin's album and "I Am Yours" on composer Jonathan Reid Gealt's album "Thirteen Stories Down". All of them are available on iTunes.

Personal Life

On 30th October 2011, Caissie Levy married actor David Reiser in an evening ceremony on Miami Beach, after five years of dating.

External links

• Caissie Levy - Official site
• An interview with Caissie Levy talking about her work in HAIR - todoMUSICALES.com
• Caissie Levy Reflects on Camp Ramah - "Nearly all of my childhood memories revolve around Ramah. It was an amazing, magical place where kids could just be kids, explore their Judaism, make life-long friends, and be free."