T H E S TAT E | I N S I D E R
WHO’S THE BOSSA? Multi-talented Tulsan Ana Berry has several TV shows, webcasts and a host of acting credits, along with fronting a popular band.
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Ana Berry works as a podcast host, singer and actor in and around Tulsa. Photos by Lana Thomas, Voulez Vous Photography
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OKLAHOMA MAGAZINE | MARCH 2020
first met Ana Berry a little more than two decades ago, when my filmmaking partner Leo Evans and I cast our feature Café Purgatory. She came to our attention by her father, Milton Berry, who had a leading role in the picture – and she turned out to be absolutely perfect as the young teenager who takes up with Elvis (Darwin Warner) in an afterlife eatery. Café Purgatory ended up winning a few film festival awards and getting some good regional and national press, which led to a limited video release. But it wasn’t until a couple of years ago that Ana Berry’s path crossed mine again as she became the new co-host of Film Noir Theatre, my RSU TV series now in its fifth season. In getting reacquainted, I found that Berry had worked diligently and successfully in TV, movies and other media on both coasts before returning home to Tulsa, where she’s continued as a creative force. Most recently, she’s been seen and heard to good advantage as the lead vocalist for a band called Bossa, which, she notes, “plays classical bossa nova from the [Antonio Carlos] Jobim family; a lot of beautiful Latin jazz from the ’40s, ’50s and ’60s; cha-chacha; mambo; salsa; and some really classic jazz-standard songs that we put to that sexy bossa nova beat.” Only a few months old at this writing, Bossa has emerged as a top act on the local scene.