Mariann Aalda: Becoming ‘age-full’: Snapping out of internalized ageism

0:00I am Catherine and I'm Gail and welcome to Women Over 70 Aging Reimagined the 2025 Astra Award-winning weekly podcast which is dedicated to women 70 to 110 who are rewriting the script on aging. The personal journeys you'll hear affirm that older women live vital and engaged lives full of courage, contribution and creativity. Women Over 70 is more than a podcast. Check out our monthly Aging Reimagined Circle membership program which meets monthly online. And a special thanks to our sponsor, Plymouth Place, in the Grange Park, Illinois, where senior living is redefined with options and opportunities to fit individual needs

1:02and preferences. And today we're delighted to be talking with Mary Ann Alda. She's contributing to our Advocate for Women Aging series. So welcome. Mary Ann, 78, has spent the last 20 years in old discovery about aging. After an acting career alongside Della Reese, Christie Allen, Jean Smart, just named a few. In the 1980s, she was a daytime TV trailblazer becoming one of the first and still few African-American soap opera heroines with long running roles on The Edge of Night, Guiding Light, Sunset Beach. And along the way, Mary Ann became a certified hypnotherapist and NLP practitioner that's neuro-linguistic programming, which has deepened her command of language and psychology. And today, under the banner of Aging shamelessly, Mary Ann blazes a new trail as she calls herself an ageful evangelist who prosecutes

2:04ageism, exploring the modern older women through story, through acting, speaking, and writing. And always in the process of designing her life, she declares, I am not an older version of myself. I'm the newest model. Welcome, Mary Ann. We're so happy to have you with us. Oh, I'm happy to be here. But Gail, I want to say one thing. You said the podcast is for women, 70 to 110. I think you're going to have to make it to 120. Okay, then we'll expand our age range. All right. Mary Ann, I'd really like to have you start open with sharing your ageful manifesto. Okay, I certainly well. I am quite done with my energy and appearance attributed to being youthful. Why should youth get all the good press if anything, my vibrancy and vitality is due to being ageful for filling up my years with curiosity and passion and joy,

3:04and not just using them as markers to tick off the passage of time. So what do you mean when you call yourself an ageful evangelist and this notion of prosecuting ages and those are okay, as you phrases. Well, the character that I played on edge of night was a criminal defense attorney. And when I first came on edge of night, there were very few African-American professional characters in daytime television. So I was an attorney then. And now I am prosecuting ageism in my older age. An activist is an activist and we find where things are wrong and we try to write them. And I call myself an ageful evangelist because I just got so tired of people saying to me, oh, but you don't look your age. You're so youthful. I know some pretty dull, boring,

4:13young people. So my energy and my curiosity for life have nothing to do with my age. They have to do with who I am innately as a person. And youth has nothing to do with it. So in this way, I said, why should youth get all the good press? No. And also wisdom is attributed to older people. I know some pretty dumb old people too. So we toss these words around and we use them inappropriately and we assign attributes to a certain time in our life. And it does not apply. But we get, as they hit me practicing hypnotherapist, we hear this often enough. We believe this. It's synced into our subconscious mind becomes part of our belief system. And then we start to behave accordingly. So that's why I'm on a mission to change the paradigm on women in aging,

5:17both in what we see in film and television, what we see on screen. And also in the stories we tell ourselves about ourselves. We just need to change the whole damn narrative. Well said. So what drove you into hypnotherapy? I don't know if I was driven or if I was chased. I, in my, that's early to mid fifties, I had a wonderful 30 year career, mostly on television, which is made a great living as an actor with no support jobs, just exclusive as an actress. And then suddenly the casting director stopped calling. And that's because the casting directors knew I had been around for 30 years. So they did the math. They didn't care how I looked if like, oh, she's too old. And as one of my agents said to me, well, you know, Maryanne, you're used to playing

6:17the pretty girl. What do we do with the pretty girl when she gets old? What does that mean? That is the stupidest thing I've ever heard. And he suggested it got even stupider. He suggested that I'd gain 50 pounds so I could do more character work. What? Well, needless to say, I'm not with that agent anymore. And in fact, my manager is Casey Newport. She's in her 40s. And I was working with an actor friend. And he said, I think my manager would like you. He made the introduction. And she at 40s said, she went to my IMDB page and she said, you can take down all of those reels that you have right now. She said, people don't know how you can act. She said, you have a career. They can look at your IMDB page and say, she's got credit. She can act. She said, but what I'm interested in, she said, what my generation is interested in, is in what you have to say, your authenticity, because you are who we want to be when we grow up.

7:23How has she hoped to promote yourself or represent yourself? Well, when she took my, some of my TV reels down, she's added, put some of my stand-up comedy up there. Some things for my solo show, which I'm not playing a character, I'm basically playing myself. And she, I think she made me feel braver about presenting myself and being myself. I had already taken a stand for turning down roles where I thought older people were being denigrated, where we were being made the butt of a joke. And I said, I'm not going to do that. I just, that's not funny to me. I won't do it, which meant I turned down a lot of things. Am I going to tell you? There were some things I would look at the script and I would think, no. And which is why?

8:27I became a hypnotherapist because I had a friend who was a hypnotherapist. I went to a workshop open house with her at the hypnosis motivation institute in Tarzanah, California. And I thought everything that they were saying makes sense about the subconscious mind. I had to make a living. I think actors are naturally curious about human motivation and behavior. I became a hypnotherapist and started working with women who were my age. They lived in the Encino Tarzanah area around the school when I was doing my residency there. And no matter what their ethnicity, what their socioeconomic status was, these women who were for the most part in their late 40s, early 50s, there was a through line of mid-life depression among all of them.

9:31And that's when I realized that my job wasn't to hypnotize them, but to snap them out of the trance of internalized ageism. That we as a culture have all bought into. It's starting to change. And I think it's starting to change because the baby boomers are still around. And now Gen X, my son's generation, they're now in their 50s and 60s. They're going like, wait a minute, wait a minute, there's just too many of us now. Attention must be paid. And I think that's part of the change. There's power in numbers. That's great. And then how does how does neurolinguistic programming fit into this picture of language and consciousness? Well, language is very important. The way we language things, the way we talk to ourselves, when people say, oh, I'm having a senior moment. Wait a minute,

10:33we have to become consciously aware of the words that we're using to describe ourselves, to describe our actions, our appearance. It's language is so important. I mean, that's it. And we have to be very careful about when I word with Della Reese, Della was a unity minister. So she was a little metaphysical, little woo woo. And she used to say, be careful about what you're thinking about when you're not thinking about what you're thinking about. Because these little snippets of things can come past by our consciousness. We're not paying attention and they drop down in it. Like we can be having a perfectly fine, wonderful day. And then a friend can say, oh, I'm feeling so old today. Today is so bad. And they're just, and then before you know what your day

11:34sucks because you're listening to them and you're not blocking what it is that you're saying. So we have to be conscious and aware because the subconscious mind doesn't get the joke. The subconscious mind doesn't get irony. Doesn't get sarcasm. It is very literal. And it is listening all the time. So I'm very, very careful about, and if I catch myself saying, oh, I feel so wait a minute, Marianne. Nope. And that's how I, in fact, my very first solo show I did at the hypnosis motivation institute. And it was called snap out of it. You've only been hypnotized into believing you're over the hill. Good title. Isn't that the title of a book that you're working on also? Yep. It is. It's the working title. You know, when publishers get a hold of it, it might change. I think if the

12:36damn good title, because we were, we are all in that, in that trance, I think we're starting to come out of it. But there's things are getting better, but there's still more work that needs to be done. And so in your stand-up comedy work, are you, is aging a topic? Do you talk about your, your own journey, aging, what is, how does, is aging part of the topic and what you talk about? Sometimes, yeah, it is. But I don't do it in a self-deprecating way. I celebrate getting older. You know, I celebrate some of the things I talk about. I talk about some women who were the mothers of friends of mine, for example, who when I was in my 60s and they were in their 80s, were role models for me. And these were some feisty broads. I mean,

13:37working with Delaris, she was a feisty broad and very sexy and very ageful, full of life. They didn't, you know, when, I'll go back to what you mentioned me for about the difference between ageful and ageless. Why do you want to detract your years? Ageless. Think about it, talking about NLP, ageless, no, or like anti-aging. Well, if you're not aging, you're dead. And we're not paying, you said, when we're not paying attention to these things, and we think, anti-aging, that's good. This unconscious mind doesn't get that. They say, oh, well, you want out of here? I can do that for you. No, I celebrate getting older. I talk about sex, I talk about relationships, I talk about my son who went gray before I did. As a matter of fact,

14:48when I had the new headshots done yesterday, I said, because this is relatively new for me. I started letting my, my hair go gray 18 months ago. And so I told my son yesterday, I said, well, now Christopher, I am now officially a silver fox. And he said, welcome to the club, ma. Doesn't matter your age. Doesn't matter your age. And it's really is. And you know, something I feel, just talking about authenticity, I feel more authentically me because I've stopped coloring my hair. I, I, we can forget about the fox part. I just loved the fact that this is, this is me, this is my hair. My hair is thinner than it was when I was younger, but it's, it's my hair. It's representative of who I am. And you know, when people talk about, well, you're going gray, you're letting yourself go. And I go like, going where? I'm going to the gym.

15:51I go to the, you know, I go places, but I'm not letting myself go. This is a choice. Right. If other women want to make the choice to color their hair and it makes them feel good, go ahead, do it. I mean, people go to the beauty shop. They don't go to the ugly shop. You know, right. And I always say that vanity is my friend. I'm not, do I want to look good? Absolutely. Do I want to look younger? No. So aging shamelessly is, as I understand it, so the umbrella for a lot of things that you, you do within that. So help just educate our, our listeners about what aging shamelessly is, what that covers. Okay. It all stems from the internalized ageism that I realized when I became a hypnotherapist. There is a lot of shame associated with getting older. Women tend to lie about their age.

16:54Or you'd say, you don't ask a woman her age. As if it was some dirty little secret. What's wrong with telling your age? I take pride in the fact because for one thing, not everybody gets to be old. It's a gift. Are we going to just waste that gift on feeling bad about being older? No. I think we should use the time wisely. And by wisely, I mean with curiosity, with enjoyment. I mean, for some people put off doing the things that they really wanted to do because they felt it was impractical. You know, when they were young, they listened to their parents, they followed the rules. They did what they thought they were supposed to do as opposed to following their heart. Some people, when they get to, I hate to use that word retirement. So I'll just say retirement age because I don't think there's any need to retire. But when they get to

17:56that age, they're still going to live a long life. They still have an opportunity to pursue those dreams. And they can say, oh, I'm too old to do that now. No, no, you're never too old. Try it. If you wanted to do as well, you can't probably be a major league baseball player. But for the most part, there are things that you can do and you should try it. And then again, there are people who followed their passions like me as an actress. I followed my dream. And then all of a sudden, I was aged out. No, it's like, I'm going to continue, I am continuing my dream. I started doing solo shows and sketch comedy and stand up and became a pro-age speaker on the speaker circuit. And now, interestingly enough, the culture has caught up with where I was 20 years ago as a pro-age activist. Now, there are so many of us out here, you know, carrying that banner of, yes, like you ladies. I mean, with your podcast, you know, it's, I want to ask you, what made you decide

19:03to do your podcast? Look at us. I mean, we're here. We're celebrating our life. We're trying to spread the word. You know, that's why I am an evangelist. We are all evangelists. Gayle, Catherine, you are evangelists. You might not have been calling yourself like, but you are. So do you mind if we, if we adopt that as well? Sure. It's a, it is, I have not trademarked it. It is, it is, it is a descriptor. Yes, you are a pro-age evangelist. We're going to use that. Yes, definitely. So we are stronger, more than advocate. I like the ring up. You talk about your, you're always on the process of designing your life and that you're who you are. This has made the newest model. And so what else are you involved in that we haven't talked about yet? I am, I think I've always been as an actor. I've relied on my intellect. You know,

20:04my brain works well on every light on it, even as an actor. I have operated from the top down. Now as I've gotten older, I'm operating from the inside out. I'm honoring my intuition. I'm honoring my, um, following my curiosity and creativity and my joy. And also when you get older, you realize where I devote my time and my energy, it's very limited. So I have to be much more selective about what I do. And sometimes I would do the things that I thought I should do. Ahead of the things that I would prefer to be doing somehow, maybe thinking, well, that's just too frivolous. Now I eat dessert first. Oh, literally, I metaphorically. Yep. Yep. Hey, my dessert first. For example, the, the book that I'm writing, I'm actually writing three of them. They are all in various stages on my laptop. And I'm thinking, oh, I've got to get that book out. I've got to get

21:10that. And I would make it a should. And then I forget something happened. I'm, I decided to enroll in an acting class. And it's online. The students, the teachers in Los Angeles, the students from New Zealand to Ireland all across the world. The teacher even said, well, why are you here, Marianne? Obviously, you don't need to learn how to act. I said, no, but it's like going to the gym. My spirit, the part of me that does act needs a workout. And it wanted to do that. Now that took time away from the writing. But then I did a little meditation. And my spirit said to me, but the books that you're writing, you can't write those books now because there's more of your

22:12life that you have to live to put into those books. It's too soon. They will find their time, but there's more that you have to live to put in them. So I am honoring that. And I don't know what's going to happen. I don't know what's happening, but I'm feeling, I'm feeling really good. My, my manager is excited. At the age of 74, I got my first lead role in a movie. That's great. And it premiered at the Cannes Film Festival. Oh, what's that? It's called Spons. It's all, it's on Apple Plus right now. It's on Apple Plus and Amazon Prime. But how that came about was when we had the pandemic, there was an app called, an audio app called Clubhouse. I would go on Clubhouse and I would say to these young writers and producers and directors, I took a little, my spiel for my TED, for my TEDx talk. I said,

23:14according to 2017 Federal Reserve Survey and Consumer Finances, women over the age of 50 own 70% of the wealth in this country. So when you do not include a nuanced, interesting, a fabulous, older female character in your scripts, you're leaving money on the table. A young director, producer, heard me. Her name is Tamika Brisco and she said, I heard you. She said, I'm 45 and she said, and I'm starting to face ageism now. And I want to have, I want to be, have a great life when I get to be your age. So let's work on this. And she wrote this movie specifically with me in mind. Wow, wonderful. Amazon Prime or Apple plus. Apple plus. Yeah, yeah, keep in mind. I had done lead roles in television, but I had and supporting roles in movies, but I'd never had my first leading role in a movie was at the age of 74. So the proof isn't in the

24:19pudding. I tell you that you can, that dreams never die and you can still have your wildest dream. It's at, at 74. And I'm expecting it to get wilder yet. So. So scale, do you have any other questions or? Well, I'm just listening to you, Marianne, and I'm thinking, were you like this as a child? Were you always like this? Excited and interested in life and wanting to do more and be in the limelight and express yourself? Yes. And it got me into trouble with the cash. I was always told I was too much sit down. Why do you always have to be so dramatic? So, and I went to Catholic school. I'm, you know, and so I thought,

25:25oh, what is wrong with me? Am I an exhibitionist? I tried to, for a long time, I tried to cure myself of being that the person that I am. But when I went to college, I discovered Carl Young. And I, the more I learned about Young, and I looked, I thought, well, I am genetically predisposed to be who I am, who I am. And lately, these are my gifts and talents and abilities. What do you do with that other than become an actor? You know, it's so, um, so when I discovered Young, I thought, you know what, I, I make no apologies now for who I am. And then I, I got in a theater department, I moved to New York, and then I found my tribe. I found a whole bunch of people who were just like me, and we were all actors. I thought, ah, my people. All right, Cordelia, you are a part of our tribe to Marianne. Yes, you fit us well. It took a lot of, it took some, some curiosity and balls to start

26:28your podcast. So yes, you are evangelist, and you are, we are, we are tribal sisters indeed. Right. Yes. Well, I tribe. Thank you so much, Marianne. You try. No, you do. Remember that NLP. You don't try. You do gal. Yes. Yes. We are part of the same tribe. Yes, ma'am. There you are. Right. All right. Well, Marianne, thank you so much. This has just been delightful. And look forward to seeing you in your other performances. Well, well, thank you for having me. And, oh, I should plug. I'm on this streaming soap opera called The Bay. And so let me give that a plug. And it is streaming right now on Amazon Prime, the first nine seasons. I, I don't appear until season eight, but it's,

27:32it's a great show. And, and I'm having a great time. And I'm working Diana Ross's daughter, Ronda, plays my daughter. And my very first film role was The Wiz, in which I worked with Diana Ross. So we'll circle. Right. That's exciting. Thank you so much. We'll be sure to include all of that. And our release your episode too. Thank you again, Marianne. You're just delightful. Thank you. Well, thank you for having me. And listen, Ernest, thank you for listening to Women Over 70. Your loyalty helps our community thrive. And we invite you to get more involved by joining our aging reimagined circle. And your voice is we challenge myths and create bold new narratives about women and aging. Visit womenover70.com to learn more. And we are also parked and proud to be a member of the

28:36age wise collective, a group of women podcasters who champion pro aging voices. In this week, we shine the light and award winning author Jane leader and her guests who take a deep dive into the joys and challenges of being an older woman. Older women and friends, stories of aging well is a podcast that sets the record straight. It dispels myths and explores the many contributions that older women make. And thank you for listening. We'll see you next time.