In this final episode of Season 2 (delayed again due to my recent surgery ... apologies, and THANK YOU for all of your encouragement and support!), you'll meet my special, "mystery guest", an actor whose professional career in TV and film didn't START until after he "retired". He's also, in more ways than one, THE reason that this podcast EXISTS. Enjoy! And stay tuned until the end for details on Season 3!

In this "better late than never" edition of New Trier Performing Arts Stories, TV and film actress Rusty Schwimmer and I talk about why she eventually returned to Chicago while still maintaining a successful Hollywood career. We also talk about her involvement in the Guardians of the Galaxy Christmas special, and then go back to New Trier for her favorite performing arts memory. Finally, we finish with a funny story about something her Mom didn’t know about one of New Trier’s great contributions to popular culture. Enjoy!

In this episode, Rusty talks about her rocky start in the industry (including a near death experience at a Superbowl celebration), how a chance lunch serving The Fonz changed her career, our mutual obsession with The Carol Burnett Show, and how New Trier prepared her for her career as an actress.

Laura Deutsch's life was transformed by, and then later dedicated to the dance division at New Trier. In this episode, she talks about how dance changed her life, and how she eventually ended up back at New Trier, where she then taught dance for more than 30 years. We also talk about how the program has changed, and how it hasn't over the last 40 years. Enjoy!

Welcome to the first Bonus feature from Season 2 of New Trier Performing Arts Stories! OK, technically it’s not the first bonus feature, because I have several others from earlier interviews that I need to edit and post for you, but this is the first one I’m posting and it’s a lot of fun. As many of you know, after the official interview is over, my guests and I often stick around and talk for a while, and when Jim True-Frost and I did that, I told him about an important role that he had rather inadvertently played in my life, and then he told me an even funnier story about how I wasn’t the first person to tell him that. Enjoy!

In part 2 of my interview with stage, film and TV star Jim True-Frost, Jim and I continue our conversation about the challenges of being a working actor. We also talk about some of his favorite experiences in film and television, but then we return to New Trier and talk about the only time that we got to work on stage together. Enjoy!

In part 1 of my interview with stage, film and TV star Jim True-Frost, we talk about how his experiences in music, dance and theater helped prepare him for his career as a professional actor, and then we talk about films like The Accidental Tourist, Fat Man and Little Boy, and Singles, before moving on to the BIG role of his career (5 seasons on HBO's The Wire). It's another great and candid interview with another great NT PAD alum! Enjoy!

In part 2 of my interview with Suzanne, we talk more about casting and play selection, but we do that while talking about one of my very favorite parts of the Performing Arts Department, The Forensics Team. Enjoy!

When the legendary Suzanne Adams would hand out scene assignments, her students called those days "Christmas", so it's only fitting that, once again, she is our guest at this special time of year. In this episode, Suzanne talks about how she designed the curriculum for the Performing Arts Department at New Trier, and how her aim produced not just better performers, but better people. Enjoy!

In part 2 of my very special interview with Oscar nominee Virginia Madsen, which is again being presented without commercial interruption, Virginia and I discuss the various stages of her career in TV and film. From Electric Dreams to the Astronaut Farmer, from Frasier to Star Trek Voyager, we go forwards and backwards through her career, and finally, of course, we also go … Sideways. And it is once again a remarkably candid and thoughtful look at a remarkable career. Enjoy!