Stephanie D'Abruzzo

Stephanie Ann D'Abruzzo, born December 7, 1971, in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, is an American actress and puppeteer whose work spans Broadway, television, and children's media. She grew up in McMurray, a Pittsburgh suburb, and graduated from Peters Township High School in 1989. She attended the Pennsylvania Governor's School for the Arts, a summer program for gifted high school students, before enrolling at Northwestern University, where she earned a degree in Radio/Television/Film in 1993. During her time at Northwestern, she performed with a campus improvisational comedy troupe and produced a puppet television program called Freeform, which won a National College Emmy Award for comedy. She also appeared as Mildred in the short film The Ballad of Hank and Mildred and as herself in The Glance.

D'Abruzzo is best known for originating the dual roles of Kate Monster and Lucy the Slut in the 2003 Broadway production of Avenue Q. Her performance earned a nomination for the Tony Award for Best Actress in a Musical, a Drama Desk nomination, the Theatre World Award in 2004, and the 2003–2004 Outer Critics Circle Special Ensemble Award. She appears on the original cast recording of the show. Her Broadway activity between 2003 and 2005 also included participation in Chess for the Actors' Fund in 2003 and Children and Art: Stephen Sondheim's 75th Birthday Gala in 2005.

Beyond Broadway, D'Abruzzo accumulated a range of stage credits. She performed in Carnival for City Center Encores! in 2002 and appeared Off-Broadway in I Love You Because in 2006, a production whose cast recording also features her. That same year she performed in If You Give a Mouse a Cookie for TheaterworksUSA Off-Broadway. Additional stage work includes Kiss and Makeup at the New York City Fringe Festival in 2007 and Austentatious at the New York Musical Theatre Festival in 2007. She has also participated in developmental readings of several works, among them Oh, What a Lovely War! in 2005, The $trip, The Medium at Large, and The Green Room. Concert appearances include Skitch Henderson's New Faces of 2004 at Carnegie Hall, the Encores! 10th Anniversary Bash, and Stephen Sondheim's 75th: The Concert at the Hollywood Bowl in 2005. In May 2005, she made her solo cabaret debut at Birdland in New York City.

D'Abruzzo has maintained a long and active career in children's television, primarily as a puppeteer. She began performing various Muppets on Sesame Street in 1993, a role that has continued for decades and has included Prairie Dawn since 2016, following the retirement of that character's original performer, Fran Brill, in 2015. Among her notable Sesame Street appearances was a performance alongside R.E.M. in a version of their song "Shiny Happy People" retitled "Furry Happy Monsters." From 2000 to 2005, she played Uma and Inka on the Noggin series Oobi, working alongside her husband, Craig Shemin, who was part of the show's writing staff. Her other puppeteering and voice credits include The Wubbulous World of Dr. Seuss, The Book of Pooh, Sheep in the Big City, Jack's Big Music Show, Abby's Flying Fairy School, Helpsters, Donkey Hodie, and Julie's Greenroom, among others. She also voiced characters in the studio recording of Finding Nemo – The Musical, performing the parts of Sheldon and Deb for the production staged at Disney's Animal Kingdom.

In live-action television, D'Abruzzo guest starred in the musical episode of Scrubs titled "My Musical," playing a patient whose condition caused her to perceive speech as Broadway-style song and dance. She sang in five of the episode's nine songs, four of which were co-written by Avenue Q composers Robert Lopez and Jeff Marx. She later made a cameo appearance in the Scrubs finale episode "My Finale." She voiced Jan S. Port in Season 4, Episode 6 of Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt and reprised the role in the show's interactive film, Kimmy vs the Reverend. D'Abruzzo is also one of the performers documented in ShowBusiness: The Road to Broadway, a 2007 film chronicling the 2003–2004 Broadway season.

D'Abruzzo married Craig Shemin, a writer, producer, and board member of the Jim Henson Legacy, on September 17, 1995. The couple lives in New York City.