Debra De Liso
Adjunct Faculty

Debra De Liso has been a theatre artist for over twenty-five years working as an actor, choreographer/dancer, director, playwright, and teacher. Highlights from Debra’s acting career range from playing the title role in a critically acclaimed production of Agnes of God at the Edinburgh Festival, Scotland, to the physically demanding performance as a Siamese twin in Air For One at the Center Stage Theatre, to sparkling Los Angeles reviews of her portrayal of Blanche Dubois in A Streetcar Named Desire and Lorraine from Lie of the Mind. She has also enjoyed working in film and television. Debra is a member of the Classical Theatre Lab in Los Angeles, where she keeps in shape working with great artists like Alan Rickman, Lynn Redgrave, and Alfred Molina.

From the age of 12 to 20 Debra was a competitive gymnast and ballet student. She went on to perform in several dance concerts and choreograph over 30 theatre productions. She has delighted many audiences performing her original comedy solo piece Music That Makes Me Dance. She was the Chair of the Physical Education Department at the Los Angeles County High School for the Arts for eight years. She has taught methodology from her Master’s Thesis The Physicalization of A Role at several institutions. Also as a certificated Hatha Yoga instructor, Debra and utilizes focus of the mind field, physical flexibility and stamina, and sustained breath work in training her actors.

Debra has guided the writing and directed over 250 One-Person Shows at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts, USC, and in professional theatres. She thoroughly enjoys the challenging and personal work of taking actors through the autobiographical writing process into performance. She has written two of her own solo performance pieces, one about her disabled but inspirational mother, one about the visionary dance artist Isadora Duncan. Debra also wrote a musical comedy about the making of a low budget horror film with the talented music arranger Jonathan Sacks. She also conceived the play “Cock Tales,” an evening of wickedly original male monologues about sex from some of L.A.’s best playwrights which ran for 10 months in Hollywood. The original solo play “The Most Mediocre Story Never Told,” dramaturged and directed by Debra is nominated for Best Solo Play 2008 by L.A. Weekly.

Debra received a three year California Arts Council Grant to teach acting and playwriting at a woman’s prison, which was some of the most difficult and rewarding work she has done to date. In the Femme Fatales Magazine Debra is featured in an article about her Hollywood journey from early film work in low budget horror films to finding her niche in theatre, dance and helping others share their gifts.

She received a Graduate Fellowship to UCLA, earning an MFA and the Jack Nicholson Prize for Acting. She also graduated Phi Kappa Phi with a Masters Degree in Theatre from California State University, Los Angeles, where she won the Best Actress award during her undergraduate years. She was accepted at the Royal National Theatre Summer Training Programme and studied with several talented teachers including Sir Ian McKellan, Prunella Scales, and John Castle. She counts herself very fortunate to have been a student of Jose Quintero and Jim Kirkwood. She is now delighted to share her extensive training with her own theatre students as a faculty member at the USC School of Theatre, the American Academy of Dramatic Arts, and Cal State L.A.