ZINA JASPER

JASPER--Zina. Zina Jasper, age 84, died peacefully at home on June 8, 2023. She is survived by her devoted friends and students and her dear dog, Misha. Zina was the daughter of Anna and Jack Jasper, Russian emigres and was born in the Bronx. She became an actress and studied with Stella Adler and Harold Clurman. She felt lucky and inspired for the great parts that came her way. She won an Outer Critics Circle Award in Jerome Kass's SATURDAY NIGHT at the Sheridan Square Playhouse (1968) and performed at the Arena Stage in Washington in Twelfth Night directed by Jeff Bleckner and under the direction of Adrian Hall at Trinity Rep performed in Lillian Hellman's Little Foxes and Another Part of the Forrest in repertory. In New York she performed at the WPA Theater in My Mother My Father and Me (1980) A Different Moon by Ara Watson (1983) and directed The Alto Part (1983) and Starting Monday with Ellen Green (1990). She was in the original cast of On Golden Pond with Frances Sternhagen at the Hudson Guild, Artichoke and Quail Southwest (1977) at Manhattan Theater Club, Moon Dreamers at La Mama (1969) A Dream Out of Time at the Promenade (1970) to name a few. But her true love and gift was as a teacher of acting. She started teaching in 1983, as well as developing a steady coaching career. She never trained or taught institutionally, which was in step with her independent and eccentric spirit. She read plays voraciously and brought a kindness and patience to her teaching that enabled her students to make artistic breakthroughs, develop their craft, and find employment. She was a great lover of animals, rescued 124 stray or abandoned dogs and found homes for them, fed birds in Riverside Park, who could see her silver mane from a distance and would swoop down as she walked on West End Avenue. She sponsored many children for decades and believed in charitable giving and doing good deeds. Her generosity extended in numerous directions and included the many offspring of her students. She was modest about not needing to be visible after she discovered the joys of teaching, although there were always requests for her to return to acting, she gracefully declined. It was a great delight to her to share a birthday with Anton Chekov, her favorite playwright. A treasured quote from Henry David Thoreau was framed in her home "If one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams, and endeavors to live the life he has imagined, he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours...If you have built castles in the air, your work need not be lost; that is where they should be. Now put the foundations under them." Donations can be made in her name to the following: The Humane Society, Best Friends Animal Society, ASPCA, Save The Children, St. Jude Children's Research Hospital, International Rescue Committee, Doctors Without Borders, Southern Poverty Law Center, Alzheimer's Association NYC.