The Cleveland native came to Cincinnati in 1994 to be the theater critic for the Cincinnati Enquirer, working until her position was eliminated by the paper in 2013. She had come from upstate New York, where she was entertainment editor and theater critic for the Albany Times-Union. Describing her reviewing philosophy in 1998, she wrote that she had high expectations because “people have too many choices to settle for something that’s just OK. Live performance has to bring you something that you can’t find anywhere else for it to become a priority.”