In 2025, Marissa Mulder celebrated her birthday with the candid, iconoclastic show, This is 40! I can think of no other artist to have done so at her age. She’s come a long way. Femininity masks maturity, shrewd instinct, authenticity and daily resolve. Marissa is five and a half years sober and has a day job helping people who struggle with drug addiction.
The Mulders recall their toddler singing when four. At six, she performed Annie in a revue produced by her grandmother at local church theater. Neither stage fright nor learning lyrics diminished the experience. “Glo” (short for Gloria) “…was a lot; very encouraging, fiercely protective, nosy; …She’d plunk out tunes and I’d sing along.” Rodgers and Hammerstein ruled. Her grandfather introduced Marissa to the American Songbook.
Left: Marissa and her cousin, Katie, with grandparents, the Irvings; Right: Marissa as Annie
The vocalist’s mother – “she has a beautiful voice” – sang around the house. Her dad played records of singer/songwriters. Marissa took piano and voice starting at 11, but admits no particular skill in the former.
Auditioning for high school musicals, Glo coached her granddaughter in presence, projection, and enunciation, invaluable early lessons. Family cheered her on. She ambivalently auditioned for community theater. “But I got it in my head I was a singer, not an actress. When it came to dialogue, I shrank back.” Today, nothing could be further from the truth.
Marissa was raised in Syracuse, New York. Catholic schools she attended were sports oriented. Few kids shared her interests. The Mulders had a lot on their plate with an autistic son. Physically larger then, she had serious body issues wreaking havoc with adolescent confidence. At SUNY Geneseo near Rochester, Marissa finally took acting class. “I had a very tough teacher. She was just what I needed.” The performer responds to tough.
Marissa’s thesis show (Friends called her Maris)
Vocal coach Alan Case suggested she create a cabaret show for her Final, rather than offering a recital. Friends and family gathered at a club. “He emphasized the importance of being myself and telling stories,” she says. “I was nervous and didn’t make as much eye contact as I do now. Still, my good friend Leah cried as I looked at her and sang.”
Marissa had yet to attend a professional cabaret show. She listened to recordings of material to which she was drawn. The vocalist still does that kind of research, interested in other interpretations. Sometimes she probes the life of an artist to further increase understanding. Unlike peers, her first choice was cabaret.
After college, the young woman moved to Brooklyn with three aspiring actors and got a job at Barnes and Noble. (There’s a sitcom here.)Through her parents, she met vocalist Karen Oberlin and her writer/teacher husband David Hadju. Marissa went to Oberlin’s shows and then with her to cabaret around the city, meeting musical directors and artists. Karen directed Marissa’s early efforts. “She said, `Stand up straight, shoulders back, open heart. The audience is on your side,’” Marissa recalls.
Early Coverage
Tracy Stark was her first music director. “Even in those early years, Marissa’s beautiful voice and natural ability to tell a story was evident,” Stark says. “She also has the facility for making the audience feel like they are hanging out with a funny, sweet friend, while a minute later, she can break your heart…She’s unaffected…”
Marissa left the bookstore and for many years acted as a nanny. A contestant in two Metrostar competitions at the defunct Metropolitan Room, the vocalist got close the first year but lost. She had to go directly from the event to Don’t Tell Mama and her show Illusions. “I was devastated.”
Ritt Henn, Marissa Mulder – Illusions
Cabaret legend Sidney Myer approached her at the bar. “You’ve got a job to do, a show to do. You’ve got to pull yourself together,” he gently but firmly said. “We had a huge talk about talented people who’ve been told ‘no’ or failed,” she recalls. “I learned a lot about myself.” The next year, 2011, she won.
“Bill Zeffiro encouraged me to come see him at the now closed La Mediteranee,” she says. “He MD’d my Jimmy Van Heusen Show and Illusions. Bill also taught me the importance of gigging as much as I could, getting up in front of an audience no matter how small as the only way to develop craft and grow comfortable in your skin.”
Julie Wilson and Rick Meadows give Marissa the Julie Wilson Award at the 2013 New York Cabaret Convention (Photo by Richard Termine)
Lauren Fox, and her now husband, Andy Powers, came to see the show and in conversation discovered Marissa was drawn to darker material. Andy suggested Tom Waits. Unfamiliar with the artist, she did some research and found affinity. The book Tom Waits on Tom Waits provided spoken word. Lauren directed. Marissa’s show might’ve been the first to break tradition, offering an eclectic “rock” singer/songwriter as inspiration. She’s always had the courage of her instincts. These days many singers mix genres.
“Working with Marissa was endlessly inspiring,” says Fox. “She was always open to taking enormous risks outside of her comfort zone committing to all of it fully and completely. I was in awe of her dedication to her craft…”
Another unconventional presentation was Marilyn in Fragments. Stacy Sullivan recommended acting class with Sondra Lee. “I signed up and oh, my gosh,” she says. “Sondra is such an amazing acting teacher, but she can be tough.” Here again is disposition towards tough mentors.
“I’d always been a [Marilyn] Monroe fan,” she says, quoting the star: “Fear is stupid. So are regrets,” and “If you can make a girl laugh, you can make her do anything..” According to Mulder, Sondra knew Monroe from Actors Studio. “She said the actress was `f*cking nuts…’,” she says. “We decided to do something about her together. I’d bring in quotes and stories. Sondra shaped it…”
“Marilyn in Fragments does not aim to please,” Stephen Holden wrote in his New York Times review. “This downbeat psychological portrait is uncomfortable to watch because the rawness of the performance is so believable. Mulder portrays the creature hiding behind the glamour that Monroe wielded with such confidence as a frightened, defenseless animal.”
Ninety-seven year-old Sondra and Marissa are currently working on reviving another piece they did together. The performer swears being pushed is productive. “I remember rehearsing at KT’s (KT Sullivan),” she says. “We were talking about the brokenness and the sickness. It was scary and exposing to play Marilyn…”
Did you understand that part of her life? I ask her. “Having a brother with special needs as a young person – nobody really knew what autism was in my world,” she says. “I was left to my own devices. My parents were wonderful people but over their heads. Not having someone there when I really needed it…I was always trying to keep everybody happy. I put a lot of pressure on myself starting young to be perfect, to be a helper, to calm my brother, to help my parents, to cheer them up, to diffuse situations when he acted out or misbehaved…”
Marissa and Kevin Mulder taken after a fundraiser for the Front Row Players, Kevin’s theater group.
“My brother calmed down as he grew up,” she says. “We’re extremely close. As challenging as it is having a sibling with special needs, Kevin makes a profound impact on me and my parents. He challenges our way of thinking and seeing the world and has made us more patient, compassionate, accepting people.”
“I made the decision to get sober in 2019,” she volunteers. Marissa began drinking too much in a college sorority. “I took my musical endeavors seriously but partied a lot.” She was sometimes hung-over, admits it affected her voice, and occasionally woke not knowing where she was. “It was terrifying.” What was the click moment? I ask. “Nothing catastrophic.” she responds. “I was just so sick of self loathing. My good friends and parents knew. I would get very sad.”
Therapy hadn’t helped. “My dad’s sister is a recovering alcoholic,” she says. “He always said I could call her and I did. The next day I went to a meeting in Astoria wondering how I’d quell feelings of shame and misplaced anger without alcohol.”
“It’s the best thing I’ve ever done for my shows, my relationships, my family,” she says. “I’ve been very vocal about it. Now sometimes people come to me for help… Because of my newfound sobriety, I tried to think what else I could do to pay the rent…” At her father’s suggestion, she signed up for a ZOOM course to become a wellness advocate.
Marissa Mulder Sings Jimmy Van Heusen: Jon Weber, Marissa Mulder, Ahmad Johnson, Phil Ambuel, Lance Conrad (Photo by Alix Cohen)
Marissa now has a job with the New York City Health Department. “We’re on call when someone ODs,” she explains. “The patient has been given NARCAN and is in bed. We ask if he or she wants to participate in our initiative and go over ways to prevent incidents happening again, not force them to go into treatment.”
“I cover hospitals five days a week following up with counsel, peer support, connecting to treatment, encouraging patients to identify and celebrate their strengths,” she continues. “Some live in shelters. We use the buddy system for safety when visiting. It’s very rewarding…I have a young man who OD’d at 27. He’s been on a methadone program since two days after the event. I admit that’s kind of unique, though…”
“I’m learning in this job that people really just want to be seen, heard and treated like a human being,” she says. “Some of my clients have disappeared, relapsed or just stopped answering my calls. I worry about them. But the great thing is I usually hear from them again when they are ready to talk. And I’ll always take the call.”
This is Forty! (Photos by Alix Cohen)
What advice would you give someone starting out in cabaret? I ask. “See as much as you can, get in front of people, network to make your voice and presence known,” she offers. “Really trust your instincts when it comes to material. Maybe take class. Remember cabaret is storytelling.”
Do you consider yourself a professional success? I ask. “I do. I’m an artist on my own terms,” she says. “I feel like I have been and continue to be true to myself. My work as a wellness advocate feels like it goes hand in hand with my life as an artist. Being exposed in this job, to people of all different races, backgrounds, situations has made me a better person and a deeper performer… I’m proud and grateful for the life I have.”
Jon Weber, Marissa Mulder
“Marissa Mulder has a rare and natural gift for authenticity,” says Jon Weber, who has been musical director for five of Marissa’s shows. “She is as real on stage as anyone I’ve ever accompanied. I often find myself … stunned by the beauty and compelling nature of her storytelling… tone and emotionality are quite unique. She is a quick learner and extremely versatile interpreter of a tremendous variety of songs and idioms. Marissa can take any song and make it sound like her. She knows exactly who she is and what she needs to say…”
Marissa Mulder is on a journey. She approaches life with the anticipation of a pilgrim.
Her website: Marissa Mulder
Opening Photo: Bill Westmoreland
All other unattributed photos courtesy of the artist
