It’s not hard to spot up-and-coming actress Ryan Cahill sitting outside a Washington Street Starbuck’s in Hoboken on a steel-gray October afternoon. The 21-year-old Weehawken resident, who starred in a production of “The Cradle Will Rock” in the East Village in Manhattan, wore each of the Greek drama masks – comedy and tragedy – as earrings on each ear.
She had a ring to match.
The home-schooled and self-described “strange brainiac” has found recent success playing Sadie in the Downtown Music Productions rendition of the play, which wrapped in early September. Part of the month-long Howl Festival, an event founded in 2002 in the spirit of Allen Ginsberg’s beat-era poem of the same name, the play tackles big money, labor corruption, and even union strikes.
“I felt like I was having withdrawals on the final night,” Cahill said. “We worked for six months to put on a musical. It was amazing.”
“I was always a bit of a strange brainiac.” – Ryan Cahill
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“It’s by far the most operatic piece in the whole show,” she said. “It’s very traditional opera and very short and to the point.”
She recently landed a role in the Gilbert and Sullivan opera “Patience,” being performed by the Ridgewood Gilbert and Sullivan Opera Company through Nov. 13.
For more information about “Patience,” which will be performed almost every weekend in nearby northern New Jersey towns, visit: www.dancaster.com/ridgewoodgands.
Childhood dreams
Unlike the average actress who would tell you she wanted to perform on stage since she was a little girl, Cahill is far from the norm. For this vibrant young lady, who prides herself on her intellect, it was more a matter of meandering her way onto the theater stage.
“Every little girl wants to be a ballerina,” she said. “I wanted to be a scientist.”
With an intense curiosity, Cahill landed her “dream job” working in cryogenics as an intern at the Museum of Natural History. But Cahill soon found out that she wasn’t suited for work behind a desk.
“I had such a passion for science, but couldn’t find a practical application for me.”
As a home-schooled girl, Cahill doesn’t have a formal education, and found the job market can be tough without a “piece of paper saying that I’m smart.”
Even so, Cahill is notably well-spoken and harbors a wealth of information that is usually ignored by young adults her age.
“I’ve always been a bit of a strange brainiac,” she said. According to her, she could read at age 2, and was polishing off Madeleine L’Engle novels, like “A Wrinkle in Time,” before age 8.
“My grandmother – to her great dismay – found out that I couldn’t pronounce the word grandmother, but knew the scientific names for dinosaurs, like Tyrannosaurus rex.”
After a fruitless effort to secure a position in a scientific field, she decided to turn to the stage.
“I’ve been singing my entire life and have always loved theater and Broadway shows,” she said. “It was like someone was kicking me in the head, telling me to act.”
Township girl
Although Cahill was never brought up through the Weehawken school system, she loves her home atop the Palisades.
“There’s a good sense of community,” Cahill said, “but, enough excitement to keep you on your toes.”
She grew up with Humphrey Bogart and noir films, and said she loves Dean Martin and especially Hoboken’s own, Frank Sinatra.
“If a song was written for him, he might look at the sheet music and start changing the melody around,” she said. “But he was a genius. And hey, he was Frank Sinatra.”
Sean Allocca can be reached at editorial@hudsonreporter.com