Eliza Schneider

Schneider spent her formative years on a Chippewa reservation in Bemidji, Minnesota with her two older brothers in a mostly Jewish family.{{cite web |url=http://sdjewishjournal.com/site/5375/the-sound-of-america/ |title=The Sound of America |publisher=San Diego Jewish Journal |first=Pat |last=Launer |work=San Diego Jewish Journal |date=August 2013 |access-date= December 26, 2014}} She moved to New York at the age of 8. Her father became a math and drama teacher at the School of Arts High School in Rochester, New York,{{cite web |url=http://www.westernfrontonline.net/features/article_94124b82-e4b5-5bef-84a7-21699c1fa836.html |archive-url=https://archive.today/20141206062540/http://www.westernfrontonline.net/features/article_94124b82-e4b5-5bef-84a7-21699c1fa836.html |url-status=dead |archive-date=December 6, 2014 |title=In Her Own Voices |publisher=Western Washington University |first=Jaynie |last=Hancock |access-date=December 5, 2014 }} where she graduated as salutatorian. Her mother was an attorney for the reservation. She started playing violin, which she learned from her grandfather, learning the Suzuki method, after seeing L Shenkar. When she was sixteen, she was in her first musical group,{{cite web |url=http://www.sonicbids.com/band/elizajane/ |title=About, Eliza Jane & the Barnyard Gypsies |publisher=SonicBids |access-date= December 5, 2014}} IT'S MY PARTY!{{cite web| url=http://www.discogs.com/ITS-MY-PARTY-Debut-Cassette-Release/release/6919355| title=IT'S MY PARTY Debut Cassette Release| date=1988| publisher=DiscOgs| access-date=July 15, 2015}} From ages 7–20, she went to Jewish summer camp, becoming a counselor, and started performing on stage. By the time she was in the fourth grade she began writing and performing her own plays, because the teacher told her that she would only be allowed to stage a play if she "wrote, produced, directed." Four years later she was chosen for a part in Annie; Schneider's parents would not let her tour with the troupe after being cast. She participated in a theater program at Northwestern University's National High School Institute and graduated from UCLA in 1994 as a world arts and cultures major.{{cite web | url=https://www.sandiegoreader.com/news/2013/oct/16/cover-eliza-jane-schneider/ | title=The first time I see Eliza Jane Schneider onstage, I want to be her friend | San Diego Reader }}

While in college she continued going to auditions and got the role of Sheila Brentwood in the television series The Amazing Live Sea Monkeys. For the show she was allowed to cast the actors who played her parents. After the show got canceled, she replaced Alanna Ubach as the assistant and co-host for the second and third seasons of Beakman's World.{{cite interview| interviewer1 = Jimmy Falcon| interviewer2 = Gremlina|subject= Eliza Jane Schneider| title = Cloverleaf Radio Presents: Actress Eliza Schneider "South Park"!| type = Interview

| url = http://hosts.blogtalkradio.com/cloverleafradio/2014/03/22/cloverleaf-radio-presents-actress-eliza-schneider-south-park | format = Audio podcast | work = Cloverleaf Radio |date=March 29, 2011| access-date = October 25, 2014 | quote = 5:09 [I got to] "be the best friend of these three life size sea-monkeys..." 6:58 "They showed me a bunch of headshots and were like 'Pick your parents'. 7:15 "Luckily I got to do a audition for the replacement show which was Beakman's World. 13:42 "He brought me in his room, and locked the door behind me, and said 'I don't want South Park to go off the air. I know you can do those voices. Don't you have an agent?'" 14:23 "He forced me to call my agent at ICM, from his room. And so I called, if they need anybody I can do that.}}

For her college senior thesis, Schneider made a cross-country road tour in a former ambulance studying regional dialects.{{cite web |url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YBmzR8WRgvA |archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/varchive/youtube/20211221/YBmzR8WRgvA |archive-date=2021-12-21 |url-status=live|title=Eliza Jane Schneider talks about traveling the country in an ambulance |date=October 16, 2013 |publisher=San Diego Reader |access-date= December 5, 2014}}{{cbignore}} During her research into accents, she "visited all the English-speaking countries in the world, conducting more than 7,000 interviews over all." From the interviews she created a one-woman show called Freedom of Speech in which she tells the stories of 34 people in their voices.{{cite web |url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YKfa4ijUQgk |archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/varchive/youtube/20211221/YKfa4ijUQgk |archive-date=2021-12-21 |url-status=live|title=Woman of 1,000 voices – Eliza Jane stops by Night & Day on U-T TV |date=June 25, 2013 |publisher=U-T San Diego |access-date= December 5, 2014}}{{cbignore}} The various quotes are combined into a story.{{cite news |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2003/08/25/theater/critic-s-notebook-a-spiritual-search-and-a-noir-comedy.html |first= Bruce |last= Weber |title=Critic's Notebook; A Spiritual Search And a Noir Comedy |newspaper=The New York Times |date= August 25, 2003 |access-date= December 5, 2014}} When interviewed about the shows by Western Washington University newspaper The Western Front, she explained that "People in America today are scared to speak up and tell their perspective on what our nation is or where it is going... I wanted to repeat the peoples' words verbatim so the audience could develop their own perspective." Using a semi-autobiographical approach, Schneider links the quotes and stories together, saying "it’s really a love story about a petulant girl who starts out hating America for perpetuating hate. She begins collecting sounds and winds up falling in love with her country." The show won the 2003 New York International Fringe Festival award for "Best Solo Show".

Her ensuing solo show, Words of the Prophets, is composed partially of quotes from "homeless people all over the world."

In 2008, Schneider wrote a play called "Sounds of Silence: A Documentary Puppet Musical Farce" about the 2004 United States election voting controversies in Ohio.

When explaining about her dialect and musical interest she said: "You know how they talk about a photographic memory? That’s not actually how my mind works. It’s aural. I remember what I hear...when I try to do a piece onstage, I hear the next words [they actually said]. I hear the rest of the monologue. It takes every bit of strength and intellect that I have to control that."{{cite web |url=http://www.sandiegoreader.com/news/2013/oct/16/cover-eliza-jane-schneider/ |title=The First Time I See Eliza Jane Schneider Onstage, I Want To Be Her Friend: Who is This Multimedia Bombsells |publisher=San Diego Reader |first=Elizabeth |last=Salaam |date=October 16, 2013 |access-date= December 26, 2014}} In a 2013 interview, she explained that "to me, music, voice, voices of the people, play writing, dialect, language, violin – it all springs from the same well of fascination with sound."

Schneider also provided voice acting on the popular animated comedy South Park. Alongside Mona Marshall, she replaced Mary Kay Bergman in many roles following her death by suicide. In 2003, while Marshall continued to provide voices, Schneider left over the show's producers' refusal to extend her a union contract. She was replaced by April Stewart in 2004. During this time, Schneider was part of Honey Pig, an all-female country music trio.

Schneider and her partner, Roger Ray, have a son named Raiden Daniel. Schneider is working as a violin instructor for her son and other children.

In 2012, Schneider joined the cast of Spider Baby the Musical for a San Diego performance, playing the role of Emily Howe.{{cite web |url=http://www.sdcitybeat.com/sandiego/article-10717-spider-baby-the-musical-unmasked-comic-art-in-san-diego-revealed-and-sabrosura-sundays.html |title=Spider Baby the Musical, Unmasked: Comic Art in San Diego Revealed, and Sabrosura Sundays |publisher=San Diego City Beat |first=Alex |last=Zaragoza |date=October 16, 2013 |access-date=December 31, 2014 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131219150832/http://www.sdcitybeat.com/sandiego/article-10717-spider-baby-the-musical-unmasked-comic-art-in-san-diego-revealed-and-sabrosura-sundays.html |archive-date=December 19, 2013 }}

{{reflist}}

• {{official website|http://www.elizaschneider.com/}}
• {{IMDb name|773791}}
• [https://web.archive.org/web/20061107140620/http://archive.salon.com/sex/feature/2000/07/05/bluegirl/index.html Salon.com's article on Blue Girl]

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Schneider, Eliza}}

Category:Living people

Category:20th-century American actresses

Category:21st-century American actresses

Category:Place of birth missing (living people)

Category:American child actresses

Category:American film actresses

Category:American video game actresses

Category:American voice actresses

Category:Dialectologists

Category:Actresses from Rochester, New York

Category:Voice coaches

Category:21st-century American singers

Category:21st-century American women singers

Category:Year of birth missing (living people)

Category:Jewish American actresses