Class Year: 2019
Major/Minor: Neuroscience/Theater
Hometown: Andover, MA
Her Campus: What is most challenging for you as an actor?
Emily Cross: I think that I get really involved in the characters that I’m playing. Last year at this time I was a warlord in Hecuba. By the end of the play I was dripping in sweat. I screamed and I yelled in 8-inch heels. It was fun. I think, “I’m not a 45-year-old warlord, but if I had to be 45-year-old a warlord how would I do that?”
HC: I hear you have a really cool idea for your neuro thesis.
EC: I want to use Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation…this device that alters brain strates. It looks like a giant magnet. Basically, I want to figure out what parts of the brain correspond to art. I want to have different artists from all the artistic communities at Skidmore come together. I want to do this with actors, musicians, painters and the World Languages department. I would have a painter paint something like a flower and then see how they paint it again with a part of their brain altered. I would do the same with actors, musicians, etc. Arts and sciences aren’t really meshed right now and I want to show that there doesn’t have to be a divide between arts and science.
HC: Do you know of any other people in neuro and theater?
EC: I do know one, his name is Joe. We were in neuropsychology class together and then we would go to rehearsal together. It was really nice to find Joe. But he’s in Australia right now.
HC: If you could have dinner with any deceased famous person, who would it be?
EC: Gene Wilder, because I feel like it would be the most outrageous dinner ever. I would just want to drink wine with him and talk about everything he’s ever done. I think I would die from laughter.
HC: What’s your favorite song at the moment?
EC: “If You Want to Sing Out” by Yusef Islam (formerly Cat Stephens). My mom’s partner sat me down one night and had me watch Harold and Maude, the movie that the song comes from. It’s such a beautiful movie…at the end Harold is on this cliff and is dancing to it. I have a record player and I listen to the song whenever I’m studying.
HC: What’s your favorite hobby that’s not related to theater or science?
EC: Scuba diving! I’ve only gone a few times but I’ve loved it every single time. I’m hoping to get a certification to do underwater photography, and I have a list of places I want to go, Maldives, Brazil, obviously the Great Barrier Reef. The last place I went was Turks and Caicos, that was amazing.
HC: What is your favorite animal?
EC: Sloth. Always sloth. Forever sloth. I don’t care if it’s a 3-toed sloth or a 2-toed sloth. When I was in high school my mom showed me a picture of a sloth and said “Sloths don’t get stressed.” I just love them so much.