Rachael Quinn is a modern-day Renaissance woman.

The versatile graduate of Hempfield High School, where she was a pitcher on the softball team, is an actor, author, podcast host, screenplay writer, director, producer, and editor - and she even once "accidentally" joined a band.

"I think in general (the entertainment) industry requires you to be multifaceted in a lot of ways, but also I think it's just in my personality," said Quinn, who resides in Los Angeles. "I love learning new skills, and I also love being able to have ownership and take control of things and get them moving."

Her most recent project is a role in the movie "Christmas in Amish Country," which is airing on UPtv's streaming platform and broadcast channel.

"It's pretty classic," said Quinn. "It's about a chef in the big city who's been trying out a bunch of new-age modern technology with cooking, and her opening doesn't go well. With all their bad reviews and everything else, she decides to take a break and goes out to the countryside to visit her family. A reporter by happenstance ends up being the one to drive her out there and realizes that she's actually from an Amish community. They both end up spending time there, and he kind of sees the Amish side of life, and she kind of gets back in touch with the cooking that originally brought her to cooking."

Quinn portrays the sister-in-law of Claire, the protagonist. "It's a pretty big ensemble movie for being a Christmas movie," she said. "They have a lot of really fun side plots and characters that are all kind of interweaving together. My character's big struggle is that she is pregnant, but she's afraid to tell her husband because she doesn't want to get his hopes up because they've been having fertility issues. ... It's very wholesome with a happy ending."

"Christmas in Amish Country" was filmed in Missouri. "It was really cool when I actually saw the listing, because the character's name is Rachel and then me growing up around here. I was obviously not in the Amish community, but I feel like I understand it better than the average Joe," Quinn said. "It was really cool to get to be a part of that. A lot of the other actors ended up asking me questions because they weren't as sure about the community. It definitely felt like a kind of a homecoming, but in Missouri."

In May 2026, Quinn and her writing partner Abigail Reed will publish their debut novel, "Hollow's Bend." "It's a world that we've been building out for a long time," Quinn said. "We pitched it for TV, and then with the pandemic we switched over and did a podcast radio play version of it. That cast was really fun, because we were able to get some staple names from the genres. We've been working on a book series to bring that world to fruition since we've already fleshed so much of it out. We love the characters, and we love the meaning behind all of it."

Preorders for the book will be accepted in the spring. Go to http://www.rachaelquinn.com for updates.

Quinn stated that the book is a young adult thriller that will appeal to teenagers as well as people in their 20s and 30s. " 'Hollow's Bend' is about a group of high school students in 1985 who accidentally unlock a world of supernatural spirits in their small mining town," she said, adding that a "Hollow's Bend" podcast is available on all major podcast providers.

Quinn also has some shorts and commercials in the works with her fiance, Filup Molina, who is enjoying a stellar career on the YouTube platform. The couple recently visited her hometown of Landisville so Quinn could spend time with her parents and her grandmother Joan Adams, who is a big supporter of Quinn's career.

Molina is so enamored with the area that he and his betrothed plan to shoot a movie in the county next year.

Quinn realized her love of the performing arts at a young age, and she credits Cookie Bonsall, the director of church productions at Hempfield United Methodist Church, with being an early influence. "I had a pretty good memory when I was little, so I could memorize large chunks of text before I could read," said Quinn.

Landisville Intermediate Center fourth-grade teacher Peg Longenecker provided encouragement. "She was the one that really, really, really pushed me on the writing side and pulled my parents aside and said, 'You need to foster this,'" Quinn said.

Quinn noted that Hempfield High School teachers Pat Kautter and Matt Binder also had a big impact on her career. "(Kautter) was instrumental in the theater program and really affected a lot of people," she said. "She was lovely. She used to let me ... sit in on her acting classes."

During a dance class with Kautter, Quinn spent approximately 100 hours to make a 19-minute dance music video with iMovie, and it was entered into the student film festival.

Binder wanted Quinn to take his classes to learn proper editing. "That was a really big turning point for me because I took as many of his classes as I could cram in, and I started learning the editing side on the correct editing software," she said.

Her parents, Mark and Nancy Herman, have always been nurturing. "My parents have just been incredible support systems," said Quinn. "It's funny because they're both engineers, but my favorite thing about them as parents that I definitely want to carry on when I become a parent is they've always been so big about truly finding what my sisters and I were passionate about and fostering that rather than putting their own emphasis (on us)."

At Franklin & Marshall, Quinn directed two shows, "Bye Bye Birdie" and "Aida." She graduated with a double major in film and theater and a focus on writing.

Following graduation, Quinn worked at Triode for a year, and she was invited back to F&M to direct a senior thesis. "That was probably one of my favorite productions I've done because it's such a limited cast and it's a limited set," Quinn said. "You got to be so experimental with every aspect of it."

After a year at Triode, Quinn and Reed, who were college roommates, moved to California. Quinn joined a band after tagging along with Reed to an audition, and she got the opportunity to perform at major L.A. venues such as the Hotel Cafe.

The journey west has been everything Quinn had hoped. "I love L.A.," she said. "It's one of those amazing places where every time you go to a coffee shop, you're probably going to run into 20 other creatives. I was so inspired by it."

The motivation generated imagination. "Abigail and I just started ... noticing especially when you're a new actor, you're seeing the things that are getting greenlit, but they're not necessarily studio quality," said Quinn. "We started thinking, 'We can write stuff at this level' because we both had been writers beforehand. 'Hollow's Bend' was our first foray."

The book is another example of Quinn fulfilling her dreams. "I want to be able to tell stories that impact people," she said. "I think at the end of the day the running thread is I want to tell meaningful stories that impact people the way that stories impacted me growing up."