Mary Jane Wells Bio

Mary Jane was born in a dust storm
during the Great Depression
in a little town on the South Dakota Prairie
She grew on that Great Prairie
with wide open skies and land so flat
you could see for miles
moving from little town to little town

Then the war came and her parents moved to a
small industrial city in Wisconsin
where her father built airplanes
and her mother made shells for tanks

Sidewalks and paved streets replaced
woodsy paths and rutted roads
and instead of dressing up her dog
in her old baby clothes
she played dressup like the movie stars
with her girlfriends
and got her share of skinned knees
from roller skates and bicycles

Puberty made her serious and rebellious
absent from school more days than she was present
her senior year requiring her high school principal
to tell her she'd never get married
if she became an actress

He turned out to be a false prophet
she got married twice
after graduating from a theatre school in Chicago
marriage being safer than the scary thought of
moving to New York City alone

Her travels with her husbands took her from Michigan
to Florida to North Carolina to Massachusetts to Ohio
and finally to New York City

Along the way she had a baby boy
and joined the actors unions and played in
various theaters from community to dinner to regional

Never one to say 'no' she helped start a theatre or two
and served on a city council
in one of the small college cities she was
plopped into by her husband's work

Finally New York City came into focus
and she has been able to ply her profession of
acting more or less successfully
while still having a family life

Now that her childhood dream of living in Manhattan
and being a famous actress has been partly fulfilled
she is working at fulfilling the rest of it
and has branched out
into National Television and Major Movies

Mary Jane Wells now

Site design by TheaterLoop