DA'VINE JOY RANDOLPH 'I Set a High Bar for Myself

THE AWARD-WINNING STAR OF THE HOLDOVERS NEVER PLANNED FOR HER BIG BREAKOUT-BUT SHE SURE IS READY FOR IT 

-  JACK SMART

Da'Vine Joy Randolph is the first to say that acting is "crazy."

"Imagine I'm just meeting you now," she exclaims, her hands fluttering. "We go on-set, and we're supposed to play long-lost lovers. I now have to be in love with you and make everyone believe it, and I just met you five minutes ago." She pauses with the impeccable comedic timing of a pro. "That's insane, right?" Maybe it's because the 37-year-old Pennsylvania native spent her childhood playing the piano and becoming a classically trained opera singer that she can approach acting by embracing its inherent absurdity. Her parents, both educators, worked around the clock to put her in private school and arts camps. "Early on I was made aware that my gift was singing-never, ever crossed over into that other department, the other room down the hall," she says. Then, when Randolph was midway through her undergraduate studies, her mother, Joyce, sensed her acting talent and insisted she switch majors from vocal performance to musical theater.