Most pretty young actresses these days are relegated to playing bubbly and uncomplicated ingenues — all winsome smiles and vapid platitudes. Not so Annie Parisse, who stars in “Prelude to a Kiss,” opening tonight at the American Airlines Theatre. For the better part of the two-hour production, Parisse plays Rita, a newlywed who swaps souls with an unidentified elderly man (John Mahoney), allowing her to clomp around stage with the devil-may-care wisdom that comes with age.
“I thought, ‘I’m going to have to sit in a retirement home and observe people,'” the doe-eyed brunette says of her research for the part, which is the same one Meg Ryan played in the film version that also starred Alec Baldwin. “But I ended up watching a lot of Burt Lancaster movies instead, like ‘From Here to Eternity,’ because the body he’s in is Rita’s young body.”
But if given the chance herself to undergo the “Freaky Friday”-like switch, Parisse would likely pass. “I don’t have an immediate answer. It’s not, ‘I wish I could be Marlene Dietrich. Or Jesus Christ, for just one day,'” she deadpans.
Parisse is perhaps best known for her four-year run as assistant D.A. Alexandra Borgia on “Law & Order,” but she has been acting for more than two decades. Born in Anchorage, she moved with her family to Seattle at age 11. There she became interested in acting — or, rather, her mother became interested in her taking up acting as a way for Parisse to overcome her intense shyness. Her first two roles were non-speaking ones, but eventually she branched out enough to study drama at Fordham University at Lincoln Center. From there, she took parts with now-defunct New York stage troupes like La MaMA and Nada until landing small roles in the Hollywood films “How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days,” “Prime” and “Monster-in-Law.” She next will appear in the upcoming comedy “Definitely/Maybe” starring Isla Fisher, Rachel Weisz and Ryan Reynolds.
“Graduating from college, I would have said I’ll probably end up doing a lot of regional theater and classical theater,” she says. “And then it turned out I got a lot of film and television work. I think it’s funny when I hear actors talking about the ‘choices’ they’ve made because at the beginning, you’re just like, ‘Yes, I’ll do the job. Somebody please pick me.'”