Chicago actress Sydney Ray brings empathy, kindness and her own brand of queenly spunk to her latest role

Every weekend Sydney Ray transforms herself from an average Chicago resident into the Queen of the Land of Contentment and then watches as the eyes of the children around her light up at getting to meet royalty. To the Uptown actress it's pure joy.

"I love performing shows for young audiences," she says. "I love the honesty that children bring to an audience."

Read more about Sydney and her work on The Princess Without Pots in the North Center Patch.

For Hendrickson engaging young minds, refuting tradition is all in a day's work

What actor Sean Hendrickson relishes most about his current production, Ghostlight Ensemble's The Princess Without Pots, is the opportunity to share stories and ideas with children.

"Many of us didn't have opportunities like this growing up," he said, "So seeing them get excited and engaged with the show is wonderful."

Read more about Sean and his work on The Princess Without Pots in the North Center Patch.

Ramos kicks imagination into overdrive for latest role

For Lakeview actress Isa Ramos, the best part about being in a show geared toward young audiences is having the freedom to think like a kid.

"I love that when performing for children, I have to kick my imagination into overdrive," Ramos said. "Childhood is the best stage of life because imagination rules our reality, and fills us with endless possibility and potential. Being an adult performing for children is the second best stage of life, because the kids challenge me to let my imagination roam big and free, the way it was intended to be."

Read more about Isa and her work on The Princess Without Pots in the Lakeview Patch.

Hogan finds humor, humanity amid horror in her latest role

Though her latest production, "Nutcracker Nightmare," is set in a world where toys talk and dolls kill, Actress Annie Hogan found it was the human realities of the play that proved the most challenging.

"The biggest challenge for me is allowing my character to have grief and sadness without losing the humor that is inherent to the play, she said. "This family has experienced an awful tragedy. The grief has to be present, but you have to remember that these people are working through it. It is active. It would be very easy, as an actor, to play one extreme or the other - extreme grief/depression versus sitcom-type sadness. It's a tricky balance."

Read more about Hogan and her work in The Chicago Tribune and the Bucktown-Wicker Park Patch.

Jacobson gives life to children's nightmares in horror-inspired 'Nutcracker'

In Victoria Jacobson's book, things that slither along the ground are scary. Dolls are not. And yet in her latest role as Zipakna, a worry doll that comes to life and terrorizes the Stahlbaum family in "Nutcracker Nightmare," she is tasked with making an audience think just that.

"The biggest challenge was trying to find the balance between doll and creepy in a movement sense, Jacobson said. "What I consider to be bump-in-the-night scary are things that slither or move lower to the floor, while a doll would not necessarily be the type of creature to do so. Exploring a spectrum of movements in that sense is something that I worked on the hardest."

Read more about Victoria and her work in The Chicago Tribune or the Lakeview Patch.