Lewis Carroll’s Alice of “Wonderland” fame was a proper English girl. But Carroll (1832-1898) would probably gyre and gimble in the wabe if he knew that a nice Jewish girl from Mill Valley would someday portray Alice on stage.
Hannah Rose Kornfeld, 12, is the young Jewish actress who won the part of Alice in a new outdoor production from Marin Shakespeare Company. “Alice in Wonderland” opens a five-week run at Dominican University’s Forest Meadows Amphitheater on July 14.
Originally, the show’s producers and director expected to cast an adult in the challenging title role. But after her first audition (which consisted of a monologue from Shakespeare’s “The Tempest”), Kornfeld won their hearts and, eventually, the part.
“I worked hard for the audition and the call-back,” says the Mill Valley Middle School seventh-grader. And like any serious actor, she has put a lot of thought into the nature of her character.
“Alice,” she adds, “is stubborn, smart, polite, respectful and very curious.”
In this case, she’s melodic, too. The new “Alice in Wonderland” production sets some of Carroll’s witty verse to music. Kornfeld sings in the show, as do assorted rabbits, caterpillars, Cheshire cats and mean queens. “There’s a lot of comedy,” she says, “and over-the-top funny magical things that wouldn’t happen in other shows.”
Kornfeld has appeared in several professional theater productions in the Bay Area, including “Secret Garden” in San Anselmo and two consecutive years with the popular new musical “White Christmas” at the Curran Theater in San Francisco. She portrayed cute little girls in those plays, but Kornfeld warns against anyone typecasting her.
“I also did a play called ‘Ruthless,’ about a little girl who kills people in a comic way,” she says. “I end up killing the lead by hanging her with a jump rope.”
While she may occasionally play the bad seed on stage, Kornfeld is one of those kids who is actually happy with her family, her friends, her work and her Judaism.
“Judaism is a big part of my life,” says the former Brandeis Hillel Jewish Day School student. “It’s important to me that I take part in what I believe in. Being in the temple connects me to Jewish people.”
The actress is preparing for her bat mitzvah at San Raphael’s Congregation Rodef Sholom. and she has nothing but good things to say about the process.
“I’m really enjoying it,” she says. “I love understanding my Haftarah. Last year, Cantor David [Margules] and I did a musical thing during one of the services. We sang harmony on a Hebrew song. I want to add a lot of that into the [bat mitzvah] service.”
Standing ovations are generally frowned upon during bar- and bat mitzvah services. Otherwise, Kornfeld likely would get one when she reads from the Torah. Last December, she co-starred in a production of “Simply Sondheim” at the Jewish Community Center of San Francisco. According to local theater legend, she was the only one to take a prolonged ovation and curtain call in the middle of the show.
That sort of thing could go to a kid’s head, but Kornfeld seems unaffected. She’s dedicated to her academics as much as to acting. “It’s hard to do both,” she says, “but it teaches me how to manage my time, to make sure when I get home I get my homework done before rehearsal.”
The hard work should pay off once “Alice in Wonderland” opens. And even if Kornfeld seems utterly at ease on stage performing in front of hundreds of people every night, her self-confidence doesn’t just fall out of the rabbit hole.
“On stage or on the bimah I never get stage fright,” she says. “But off stage I’m always nervous. It helps me to be prepared.”
“Alice in Wonderland” plays 8 p.m. Fridays-Sundays, 4 p.m. Sunday matinees,
July 14-Aug. 20 at Dominican University’s Forest Meadows Amphitheater in San Rafael. Tickets: $15-$27.50. Information: (415) 499-4488
or online at marinshakespeare.org.