By Jordan Parker/Photo by Maggie West

What to do when you’re an actress who’s pregnant? Why, act pregnant, of course. “Let’s be honest, when all of a sudden you have a big belly on you, it makes acting a little bit more difficult,” says Asheville actress Lauren Fortuna, laughing and rubbing her perfectly round stomach. But Fortuna, 31, who has played such characters as the intelligent, beautiful young Ann Deever in Arthur Miller’s All My Sons and Mary Bailey, the Donna Reed character in Joe Landry’s It’s A Wonderful Life, saw her pregnancy as a chance to improvise. 

So far, it’s worked out well. Earlier this year, local director Paul Schattel cast Fortuna as the lead character in his film Alison, and luckily, Fortuna was able to play the part of a pregnant woman. In the movie, Alison leaves her husband and moves into a derelict motel, going through a wrenching personal transformation. “She was really great at inner conflict,” says Schattel, who wrapped up filming in October and will likely screen the film in 2009. “Lauren can be tormented, but very graceful at the same time. She can take on the Julianne Moore and Kate Winslet roles—beautiful, but with a lot more going on there.”

Fortuna always knew she wanted to act, signing up for acting classes in the second grade. After graduating from Greensboro’s Guilford College with a theater degree in 2000, she toured with the Repertory Theater of America for a year before settling in North Carolina. An Asheville local since age 13, she’s never felt tempted to move to bigger theater-rich cities because of her own “falling in” with the Asheville acting scene. She’s been an actor, producer and managing director at Asheville’s Immediate Theatre Project, the Partner-In-Residence company with NC Stage, since 2006, helping out on such productions as On The Verge, featuring three Victorian women, and Below The Belt, Richard Dresser’s dark take on corporate culture. “I can honestly say that I would not be in Asheville if it wasn’t for NC Stage Company,” Fortuna says. “One thing fell into place and then another…all of a sudden I was making my living as an actor. My friends in New York were not. They were waiting tables.”

Lately, Fortuna has been a producer for the play It’s A Wonderful Life: A Live Radio Play, which she often acts in. The classic Christmas tale tours in November and will be at the Diana Wortham Theater in early December. With a November 11 due date, she was happy to work behind the scenes, even though acting is her first love. “With producing, it’s nice to have something that you’re in charge of,” she says. Soon, she’ll be in charge of a baby—perhaps the toughest role she’s tackled yet.