Katherine Renee "Kate" Shindle (born January 31, 1977), Miss America 1998 and Miss Illinois 1997, is an American actress, singer, dancer, and AIDS activist. She is the author of the 2014 memoir, Being Miss America: Behind the Rhinestone Curtain, published by the University of Texas Press.

Biography

Shindle was born in Toledo, Ohio, grew up in Brigantine, New Jersey and attended high school at Bishop Eustace Preparatory School. She was a double major in sociology and theater (with a minor in musical theater) at Northwestern University. She has worked as an actress in New York since 1999. Shindle is also a licensed real estate agent.

She is the president of the Actors' Equity Association, elected in 2015.

Shindle appeared (as a replacement) in the Broadway production of Jekyll & Hyde as "Lucy" understudy and several other roles. She played the role of Sally Bowles in the 1998 Broadway revival of Cabaret from June 19, 2001 to July 1, 2001. She played this role again in the Maltz Jupiter Theatre (Florida) production, starting in January 2012. In 2007 she appeared in the Broadway musical Legally Blonde as "Vivienne Kensington." She played the "Mad Hatter" in the Broadway production of Wonderland in 2011.

She appeared in a concert verson of Jeykll & Hyde in September 2004 at the Mohegan Sun Casino's Cabaret Theatre in Uncasville, Connecticut, playing "Lucy." She then toured in the U. S. with the concert version, starting in September 2005.

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