Laura Bonarrigo | |
---|---|
Born |
Brookline, Massachusetts, United States |
October 29, 1964
Occupation | Actress |
Spouse(s) | Marty Koffman |
Children | 2 |
Website | http://www.laurabonarrigo.com |
Laura Bonarrigo-Koffman (born Laura Bonarrigo; October 29, 1964) is an American actress.
Laura Bonarrigo was born in Brookline, Massachusetts. She became a member of The Shoestring Players, a professional children’s theater group, while still in grade school. While in high school, her family moved from Massachusetts to a large farm in Thomaston, Maine. She became involved in community theater and in 1981, decided to compete in the Miss Maine National Teenager Pageant. The first year she competed, she came in second and won the congeniality award. She ran again in 1982 and won the overall title in addition to winning the awards for most photogenic, citizenship and again, congeniality. She competed in the Miss National Teenagers Pageant in 1982.
In 1986, she graduated from the Mason Gross School of the Arts at Rutgers University, after studying acting, voice and movement. She returned to Maine to continue her acting studies at both the International Film and Television Workshops in Rockport, Maine and the School for Performance Studies. She moved to New York and after doing some modeling, she got an early acting role as the Mother in the independent film The Passing with Marian Seldes and Garrison Keillor.
Koffman is best known for her role as the fourth Cassie Callison on the ABC soap opera One Life to Live. Before landing the role of Cassie, Koffman played the short-term role of Lindsay on the NBC soap opera Another World in 1991.
On One Life to Live, she succeeded Ava Haddad, who portrayed Cassie from 1983–1986, with a brief reprise in 1990. Koffman portrayed the role from March 1991 to January 1999, winning a Soap Opera Digest Award nomination in 1993 for Outstanding Younger Leading Actress. She left the show in 1999 when she was controversially fired while on maternity leave, something that was widely blamed on then-executive producer Jill Farren Phelps. She made several brief appearances on the series in 2001, 2002, 2003, and 2004. She returned once again on February 15, 18 and 26 and March 1 of 2010, when Cassie's family was being terrorized. After leaving One Life to Live in 1999 and giving birth to her son, Laura performed as Trish in Five Women Wearing the Same Dress by Alan Ball. Her daughter was born in 2001 at which time she took a break from acting to raise her children in Manhattan.