Hannah Cabell
Hometown: Tamworth, New Hampshire
Currently: Making her Broadway debut as Margaret More, the fiercely loyal daughter and confidante of Sir Thomas More Frank Langella in Roundabout Theatre Company’s Broadway revival of A Man for All Seasons.
World on a String: Cabell “it rhymes with Babel” literally grew up backstage, traveling hither and yon with her parents, who ran a professional puppet theater. “They did shows like Peter Pan and folktales from around the world,” she says, recalling yearly gigs at libraries in New York City, workshops in Alaska and an artist-in-residency trip to Russia. “My mom would teach me on the road, and then I’d come back to my small-town school and tell them what I’d seen. It was pretty cool.” Cabell later returned to Russia for an “amazing” semester studying at the Moscow Art Theatre while majoring in Russian and theater at Oberlin College.
Summer Stock Baby: Every summer, Cabell’s dad took a break from puppeteering to perform at the local Barnstormers Theatre, a classic summer-stock house in which the company did one show at night while rehearsing the following week’s offering. The budding actress made her stage debut at age five in They Knew What They Wanted and got her Equity card by the time she finished high school. “It was easier to me [to pursue acting professionally] because my parents were performers,” she explains. “I saw that it could be a real career, not just a hobby, and that you can have a life and a family. It’s lovely when I go back to the Barnstormers and share the stage with my father.”
NYC Beginnings: Before enrolling in NYU’s graduate acting program, Cabell started a sketch comedy group and sang lead vocals in the rock band Lungs of a Giant alongside her now-fiance, Paul Watling. They’re planning an August 2009 wedding back home in New Hampshire. “I’m a dabbler,” she says with a laugh. “It’s hard to make a living when you first move here, so it was fun to create my own work.” Cabell’s first big acting break came last season when she was cast as an androgynous gas station attendant in rural Ireland whose life takes a tragic turn in Manhattan Theatre Club’s production of Pumpgirl. “I loved that play, but it was scary to do every night,” she says of the monologue-based drama. “I had a lot of nightmares. But even though my character was sad and unattractive, her heart was so pure and so beautiful.”
Frankly Speaking: While in tech with her dad last summer in Toad of Toad Hall at Barnstormers, Cabell was summoned to audition with Frank Langella for A Man for All Seasons. “I drove overnight for six hours, got to the city at 4:30AM and auditioned at 9,” she recalls. “I was a little bit out of my mind, so I wasn’t that nervous.” As she performed the emotionally wrenching jail scene with the three-time Tony winner, Cabell instantly felt a familial bond. “Frank is such a generous and warm human being, and he and [director] Doug Hughes made me feel so comfortable.” So, the legendary Langella isn’t intimidating? “Not at all!” she says. “I had heard that, but he is an incredibly lovely person. He cares so deeply about this production and this ensemble. I've had the most wonderful experience working with him.”
More Please! A Man for All Seasons paints a portrait of an unusually close father-daughter bond between Sir Thomas and Margaret, who was considered the smartest and best educated woman in England at the time. According to Cabell, the play doesn’t show the half of it: “When he was beheaded, she actually took his [severed] head and kept it with her for the rest of her life, then left it to her daughter.” Yikes! “Yes!” the actress says with a laugh. “So both Frank and I felt we had to explore this relationship because he was her best, best friend.” Taking the stage in period costumes after her boyish get-up in Pumpgirl has its advantages, Cabell adds: “Once you put on the three layers of petticoats, the corset and the heavy dress, you immediately get into character. And I think everybody likes dressing up.”