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The role of the violinist in The Christmas Bow on Hallmark, Kate, was played by real-life violinist Lucia Micarelli, the Bubbly Sesh podcast told Heavy. But what you may not realize is that Micarelli can relate to the plot of the movie all too well. She once suffered an injury in real-life that left her wondering if she would be able to play again.
Violinist Lucia Micarelli Suffered an Injury in Real-Life That Almost Ended Her Career
Lucia Micarelli is a talented, professional violinist in real life and portrays one in the new Hallmark Movies & Mysteries film. She has collaborated with Josh Groban, Jethro Tull, and others — but she didn’t turn to acting until after an injury that almost ended her career.
She’s trained classically and began playing the violin when she was just three, Esquire reported. She was born in Queens, New York, and was classically trained at Juilliard. She was in HBO’s series Treme, was a concertmaster with the Trans-Siberian Orchestra in 2003, and was a featured soloist with Ian Anderson and the Vienna Radio Orchestra.
The synopsis for The Christmas Bow reads: “Kate is a promising musician whose lifelong dream of playing in the Rocky Mountain Philharmonic is put on hold by an accident.”
Much like her character in The Christmas Bow, Micarelli told Esquire that she injured herself in real-life once too. She said that on the Fourth of July one year, she tripped and cut her left hand open after landing on a wine glass. She said that she severed some nerves and wasn’t sure if she would be able to play professionally again. As of the time of publication (2010), she still didn’t have full feeling in three of her fingers.
Micarelli told The Smith Center that the accident happened when she was backstage, during a performance with Chris Botti. She said she got very emotional and was scared that she wouldn’t be able to play again. She needed surgery and months of rehabilitation.
She explained to The Smith Center: “My muscles are fine, it’s just the sense of touch that’s gone. I notice it most when I’m folding laundry or drying my hands, that ‘Oh yeah, this feels different.'”
Micarelli told Esquire about her role on Treme: “I can play again, because I got lucky and rehabbed really quickly. Then I got lucky again and got this job.”
She told The Smith Center that her injury gave her a new sense of gratitude about playing.
In an interview, Micarelli said she got goosebumps reading the script because the injuries were so similar to what she experienced in real life, AfterBuzzTV reported. She said the doctor’s office scene gave her flashback to her real life experience.
“I don’t know if it was written based off of me but certainly the parallel was uncanny,” she said.
She Said She Was More Certain of Her Musical Abilities than Her Acting Abilities at First
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In an interview with HuffPost when she was starring in HBO’s Treme, she said that she was more certain of her musical abilities than her acting abilities at first.
But in Season 1, she said she often questioned where the script was going. She said: “I had numerous conversations with David and Eric and Nina where I would just be like, ‘What are you doing? How did you even think I could do this? You guys are crazy. I don’t know what I’m. And finally they would just get mad at me. And David would be just like, ‘Lucia, I know what I’m doing. I’ve been doing this a long time.”
By Season 2, she said she was less intimidated and more secure in herself, but was still “very hesitant to call myself an actress.”
Today she has quite a few acting credits to her name, including Manhattan, The Christmas Bow, and Treme (38 episodes). She’s also contributed as a violinist to TV and film productions too, including multiple episodes of The Mandalorian, and The Call of the Wild, Da 5 Bloods, Terminator: Dark Fate, Frozen II, Spider-Man: Far from Home, Incredibles 2, Spider-Man: Homecoming, Cars 3, and much more.
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