Amanda Brugel

Pointe Claire, a quiet community situated in the West Island of Montreal is what you might call a "sleepy" area. The West Island has a lot of diverse communities. People who have never been aware of it frequently think it is a separate island facing west. Amanda Brugel is said to have been born on the West Island, although this isn't the truth. Brugel lived in Courtice near Oshawa, Ontario. The first goal she had was to dance but an increase in her height led to her growing beyond her dance partners. According to an article in the Toronto Star, she revealed her height in heels as 6 foot 1 inches tall. When I outgrew my male companions, I quit. Many dancers make the transition to acting. In the case of Brugel, it was her drama teacher who nudged her into this path. She was a teacher at the time who advised her to take on a part in the annual school production. The student tried it out, and was eventually cast as the lead of Anne of Green Gables. It was the Fine Arts Talent Scholarship led her to York University, where she was a theatre student and earned the Bachelors in Fine Arts in 2000. Her career spans twenty years, and she's appeared in 60 different productions, both on big screens and smaller ones. Her most notable role was as Rita (pictured beneath) on The Handmaid's Tale. Brugel appeared only on rare instances in the initial season of the show The Handmaid's Tale. She was the only Canadian member.