Newman was born in Farmington Hills, Michigan, to parents Marsha Jo and Raphael Newman. She has one sister, Beth Nicole, a global public relations director at J Brand. Newman started performing at age eleven in the debut of Israel Horovitz\'s play A Rosen by Any Other Name. She worked consistently around Detroit, acting in many of the regional theaters. Newman received her elementary education at the Jewish Hillel Day School of Metropolitan Detroit, where she starred as Ado Annie Carnes in an eighth grade play of Oklahoma!.\n', '

After Hillel, Newman attended the private Cranbrook Kingswood School in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan, and spent her summers at the Interlochen Center for the Arts where she won the Corson Award for Outstanding Achievement in Acting. While in high school at Cranbrook, she won first place in the Michigan Interscholastic Forensic Association, a statewide dramatic competition, for three years in a row. At age 16, Newman founded Apollo Theatre Productions, serving as both a producer and director. She graduated from Cranbrook in 1996. Newman then attended Boston University College of Fine Arts\' theater conservatory for two years, before transferring to Northwestern University as an English and drama major.\n', '

At Northwestern, she founded the Ignition Festival for Women in the Arts. Through that, she produced and acted in Paula Vogel\'s Pulitzer Prize-winning play How I Learned to Drive. While living in Chicago, she performed with her own jazz quartet. Newman moved to Los Angeles in September 2000. Her cousin is actor Ben Kurland.\n', '

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