Riverdale actress wins BRIO, three NY Emmys

It was April of 1996, and Diana Henry had just left Manhattan’s 30th Street Theatre after that night’s performance of Reckless, a play by Craig Lucas, in which she played Rachel, Mia Farrow’s character in the film version of the show. 

As she walked home to her apartment in Chelsea, snow fell, covering the city streets.   

“I felt really good about the show and I remember thinking, I’m acting in New York, and it’s snowing in April. It felt like one of those unique moments — ‘I like where I am right now,’” she said.

Since that April evening, Ms. Henry, a 2014 Bronx Recognizes Its Own (BRIO) winner for acting, has not lost her passion for the performing arts.

The actress, a regular on the ABC show “Primetime: What Would You Do?” recently won three New York Emmy Awards for her role as the presenting host on an eight-part panel discussion series called “The Line Up: Best Sports Movies.”  

“If you’re fundamentally creative… if you have that in you, you kind of have no choice. If that’s a part of you, you have to make room for it in your life,” said the actress and voiceover artist.

Ms. Henry, who met her husband Matt Salzberg while acting on the set of a film he wrote, called Fortunes, has lived in Riverdale with Mr. Salzberg and their two children, Elena, 10, and Benton, 8, for the past 11 years. 

A native of Indiana who grew up acting in local community theater and high school productions, Ms. Henry received her  acting degree at Miami University of Ohio, after which she completed an MFA at Rutgers University’s Mason Gross School of the Arts.

Soon after, she moved to Manhattan to pursue theater, TV and film roles. She received her Screen Actors Guild (SAG) card for a role on Law & Order — a rite of passage for New York actors, she says — in which she played a woman kissing a co-worker in an elevator, who hears gunshots in the office as the elevator doors open. 

“It was really exciting; it was my first TV role,” said Ms. Henry.