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N I C O L E T T E  G A L L A G H E R

Nicolette w/ Clint Eastwood

 

Copyright © Nicolette Gallagher. All Rights Reserved.

     “         Clint Eastwood truly inspired me at a conference in Hollywood, to utilize all of my talents

as an Actress, Filmmaker, Screenwriter, Director, & Songwriter... and to even Edit my own Director’s

first cut of my films...Clint Eastwood does it all and is such a fabulous multifaceted Actor & Filmmaker.

Clint’s process for composing his own Motion Picture Soundtrack music also inspired me to compose

my Motion Picture Soundtracks.”

     “Prior to that, I met my vocal coach, Robert Edwards, when a movie producer asked me to record

a motion picture soundtrack demo album.  I had only two weeks to learn the songs and only one take

in the recording studio.  Robert is amazing, so I’ve continued my studies.  He convinced me I can do

more than just Act, and to stop throwing away my poems & songs often written just to stop the words from

bouncing around in my head!  He convinced me to put my lyrics to music.  Robert Edwards has been a great

inspiration to me. 

     “In a TV interview Theodore Bikel (whom I met in Hollywood via his friend, legendary Agent and Author,

Walter Kohner) and Florence Henderson were discussing Theo’s multifaceted career.  Theo said “If you do

more than one thing, it rattles people because they always tell you to choose only one and then try to put you

in a box (pigeon-hole you) and tell you to say the other talents are just “a sideline”. . . (then Theodore said) “But I don’t do “sidelines!”   Florence concurred regarding her multi-faceted career.  And as I learned from legendary Acting & Directing

Coach George Shdanoff, “A True Artist has and utilizes many natural talents.”

                                                       BIO:

     Growing up (since babyhood) with an eye problem that had threatened blindness, Nicolette was often home schooled while going through eye operations and years of eye training to help save her eyesight.  Her parents encouraged her in the Arts, individualism and creativity in an effort to record & preserve “the beauty in life” in her mind’s eye.  They taught her to be a “unique individual” rather than a generic follower of the masses; and to accentuate the positive and her uniqueness.  As they traveled and camped on weekends to “show her the world through nature when blindness threatened”

(unbeknownst to her, since she was born that way) her Father wrote the book “The Ballad of Mich-o-tta-wa”, based upon the family’s search for a miracle.  Writing, poetry, historical research, singing, dancing, drawing & painting were positive creative therapy and help for Nicolette’s eyesight, coordination, and confidence.


                                  GREGORY PECK 

                                   At age five, sitting in front of the TV with a patch over one eye, doing her daily eye

                                   exercises, crying and re-writing (with her father) a “happier” ending for Gregory Peck

                                   in “Roman Holiday”, Nicolette decided she wanted to be an actress and touch

                                   people’s hearts like her favorite Actors in the old movies: Gregory Peck, Audrey             

                                   Hepburn, Katharine Hepburn.  Little did she know she would someday meet and appear in a movie with Gregory Peck (“From Russia To Hollywood: The 100-Year Odyssey of Chekhov and Shdanoff”).  Nicolette says, “Gregory Peck (best friend of George Shdanoff) was then in his 90’s as we chatted about his dear wife Veronique and his friend George Shdanoff.  And “Peck” (as George always referred to him) was still as strikingly suave, tall and handsome as he was in the movie “Roman Holiday!  A real gentleman. The most beautiful man I have ever seen!”

     Nicolette also did not know she would someday live in the same room that was Katharine Hepburn’s at The Three Arts Club, Chicago.  Nor did she know she would meet Katharine Hepburn’s Co-Star Douglas Fairbanks, Jr. (from “Morning Glory”, one of Nicolette’s favorite films) while working on the Movie: “From Russia To Hollywood”.


FAMILY OF WRITERS

   “I guess it was inevitable I’d be a Creative Artist:  My Dad, a Writer, Poet, Historian, Newspaper

Columnist, Theatre Actor, Voice-over Talent, Record Company Owner, and full time Skilled Tradesman

working several jobs while researching eyesight at University Libraries in effort to find a cure and obtain

the best medical care to help save my eyesight.  My Mom had been a Drum Majorette and part of a dance

team with my Aunt (tap, modern dance, ballet) and was a childhood model for Lilt Home Permanents

because she looked like Shirley Temple.  My Aunt became a fabulous renown Dance Instructor (Tap,

Ballet) & baton teacher.”       

     Hence, Nicolette has danced in many Hollywood Movies & TV Series.  Nicolette’s creativity has always

been “Just a way of life” . . .


WRITING, PAINTING, BOOK ILLUSTRATIONS

     “I wrote my first poem at age five trying to write the way my Dad recited his poetry to me.  Although I never wanted to be a writer because everyone told me it was in my blood.  I just wrote (and write) as an outlet to stop the words from bouncing around in my head.  Thankfully, later encouraged by my Dad and Hollywood Vocal Coach Robert Edwards, I stopped throwing away my writings, realized I had five albums of songs, a book of poetry, and a children’s book series with sample sketches.  After appearing on the original TV Series “Melrose Place”, Produced by Writer/Producer Chip Hayes, I met his wife, Deborah Adair (renown TV Series & Soap Actress).  Deborah read my Children’s Book Series and said it was just what children and parents need now days because it is so hard to find good positive Children’s Books.  She gave me one of her favorite children’s books, said my drawings were better, I should use my own drawings, and  encouraged me to do something with my writings!”

     “As a child, two record albums were illustrated with my childhood drawings.  My first painting was sold at age twelve... The school had it on display and “sold” it to someone without even asking my or my parents permission!  It was our favorite painting.  My parents demanded it be returned to us but the school claimed they couldn’t find the person they sold it to!”


RECORD ALBUMS

     My Dad had been ill and insisted I meet him in Washington D.C. for a poet & songwriters convention where he had met Willie Nelson and English songwriter Bill Kilgannon the year before.  With time of the essence, I first quickly grabbed my albums of song lyrics, flew from Los Angeles to Seattle and recorded (in one take) the spoken word album “Microwave Love:  Rock Poetry”.  It was nothing like my Dad’s or other poets’ in D.C. but I wanted to show him I cherished the writing talents he encouraged and that I would  someday do something with them.  My plan to just sit back and observe that week were

foiled when I arrived the hotel lobby where my Dad sat with a publisher who listened to my CD and insisted I perform one of the cuts that week, which I did.  To my surprise, the audience voted it a winner and people asked to buy copies of my CD, so I had some Fed-X’d from L.A.  English songwriter Bill Kilgannon sent one to famed record producer

Scott Turner in Nashville, and I began singing record demos for Scotty Turner.  


ROMANCE WRITERS OF AMERICA (RWA)  

    Encouraged by her Aunt Rita (then a Book and Magazine Ghost-Writer who had been a New York Model & Commercial Actress), Nicolette began modeling for clothing stores at age twelve after living with Aunt Rita Gallagher for awhile in Cape Cod, Massachusetts, while visiting eye surgeons in Boston and New York.  “However, before sending me to Charm School & Finishing School, Aunt Rita “made me promise” I would learn Secretarial skills and Shorthand so I would always have a respectable job while building my modeling career, and shorthand might someday help me as a writer.  Hence, later, I was a Legal Secretary in Houston and a Law Clerk in Chicago while building my modeling & acting careers. Nicolette’s Aunt Rita Gallagher later became an Author, Novel Structure Teacher, and Co-Founded RWA / Romance Writers of America along with Nicolette’s cousin, Author Rita Clay Estrada for whom RWA’s “The Rita Award” is named.” 

      . . . And coincidentally, Nicolette has often been asked to Teach, Coach and Direct Actors for Film, TV, Commercials, and Theatre in Los Angeles . . . “It all started at a Los Angeles “Chin Chin” restaurant after a daily gig on “General Hospital” . . . A group of six actors from Texas (who showed up with the friend I was meeting with) asked me to coach them . . . I didn’t have time to devote to teaching!... but one actor kept insisting!  Three of those actors ended up moving to my apartment building;  I found time to coach them, which led to high paying “special requests” from Director’s, Legendary Acting Coaches, and Producers of TV, Film and Theatre . . . And that led to Directing Commercials, Theatre, and Film !


THREE ARTS CLUB, CHICAGO

    Prior to becoming a Hollywood TV & Film Actress, and Voice-Over, Nicolette became a Chicago Fashion, Catalogue and Commercial Model via Chicago Agent Shirley Hamilton who made arrangements for her to move to “The Three Arts Club” (an historic, famous dormitory for girls pursuing The Arts . . .  Actresses, Models, Ballerinas, Classical Musicians).       Katherine Hepburn had stayed there in her early days.

     “My first night in the big city of Chicago...at the Three Arts Club...was rather scary.  The three ballerinas who shared the connecting bathroom were making scratching noises at my door which I thought must be mice or something.  Plus along with traffic noise outside my window, I heard horses hooves trotting all night!  Next night the ballerinas slipped a letter under my door apologizing for the “initiation to the dormitory”, and I found out the sound of the horses hooves were from the Beautiful Horse Drawn Carriages along Goethe and North Dearborn Streets...like the ones in New York’s Central Park!”


BACK TO  THEODORE BIKEL,  CLINT EASTWOOD,  ROBERT EDWARDS,    AND TALENTS:       

. . .Which brings Nicolette to her point :

“I can’t pinpoint just one or two God-given talents and say the others are just a ‘sideline’ !

because the variety of Creative Arts are part of who I am.  They are tools which all work together.”                       

Bio

             Nicolette & Dad

                at his Book Signing

                 in Washington D.C.

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