Meet the Cast of Richard II: Julia Steudle

Julia Steudle

(Bushy, Scroop, Surrey, Murd 2) is making her debut with Pigeon Creek. Julia has also performed with Heritage Theatre Group as Elma Duckworth in Bus Stop, the Stark Turn Players as Suze in Draw Me Out and Carly-Anne Freeman in The Poltergeist: A Musical Parody, and Muskegon Civic Theatre as Shelley in Hairspray. Julia also works for The Murder Mystery Company as various characters, as well as maintains her own business called Enchanted Princess Parties by Julia where she dresses up as various princesses for special events. Julia has her Associate’s Degree in Liberal Arts from Ferris State University, where she was a member of Alpha Psi Omega, the national theatre honorary.

1) Where are you from originally? How did you end up in MI or why did you stay?

I was born and raised in Michigan, and though I was originally from the east side, I moved to West Michigan in 2001. I don’t have plans to stay in Michigan forever, there is too much in the world to see for me to justify never leaving, but I’ve also just moved to Grand Rapids, and moving is a nightmare for a procrastinating, lazy person with no time, so it may be a little while before I pack everything up and do it again.

2) Where did you study acting?

Other than taking acting courses and workshops while in college, I have also done theatre for about 10 years now, and there are just things that I’ve picked up from each production.

3) What other theatres have you worked with? Describe your favorite role/production.

I have worked with Heritage Theatre Group, The Stark Turn Players, Muskegon Civic Theatre, and then shows in college and gradeschool. I think my favorite out of all of them though would be a show I did in college called The Best Man by Gore Vidal. It’s a political satire and maybe a little dry, however my character, Mabel Cantwell, was definitely not. She was a southern belle that absolutely loved her liquor and manipulating the other candidate’s wife. So, obviously, that would make it my favorite…Or maybe not so obviously if you don’t know me too well—which is the point of this blog. Anyway, I enjoyed the dynamics of the characters and the show, and being the malicious one was extremely satisfying because I’m generally not a malicious person.

4) What do you do in your free time?

What do I do in my free time… I like to go to see shows when I can, and I absolutely LOVE reading. Mostly fantasy and magic-type books. I also obsess over princess things because being a princess is one of the perks of my life, and I need to know my stuff about them since children ask the craziest questions. Overall though, I generally hermit away when I don’t have to be anywhere.

5) Share three “fun facts” about yourself.

My go-to fun fact is that I have my own company that allows me to be hired to dress up as a princess and entertain children at birthdays

and special events, but you’ve asked for three fun facts, so here’s another: I am very into holistic healing and medicine. I know how to perfom La Ho Chi on people, which is similar to Reiki for those of you who know what that is, and for those who don’t, La Ho Chi is a type of energy work. It deals with the frequencies and vibrations around you, and when you are out of sync with yourself having someone work with the frequencies or working on them yourself really helps right everything again. And my last fun fact is that I love glitter.