She’s Left College to Become a Queen Tessa Rose Ferrer Arrives for Festival Reign By Jessica Sabbath , The Winchester Star, Thursday, April 28, 2005 Tessa Rose Ferrer’s New York University drama professor told her she would fail if she missed the last few days of her acting classes. But Tessa had made up her mind: She was going to accept an invitation to reign over the 78th Shenandoah Apple Blossom Festival. Luckily, her teacher relented and allowed Tessa to pass her class and come to Winchester and serve as Queen Shenandoah LXXVIII. (Her official Coronation will take place on Friday.) “It was really, really tough to get out of my acting studio,” she said on Wednesday at the Merrimans Lane home where she will reside during the festival. Tessa, a 19-year-old freshman studying acting at NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts, arrived in Winchester on Wednesday afternoon, smiling and looking forward to what will come. “I’m open to all that’s going to happen this weekend,” she said. “Rain or shine.” Tessa is the daughter of singer/actress Debby Boone and Episcopal minister Gabrielle Ferrer. Both of her grandfathers, pop singer Pat Boone and the late Academy Award-winning actor Jose Ferrer, attended Apple Blossom Festivals as special guests in 1999 and 1979, respectively. Two of Ferrer’s aunts have served as festival queens: Laury Boone in 1977 and Maria Ferrer Murdock in 1979. This year, Maria will crown Ferrer during the Coronation ceremony at Handley High School. For a woman with such strong family ties to the festival, Tessa said she knew little about the event before agreeing to accept her royal duties. “I didn’t even know until six months ago, when I started finding out about this,” she said. “Then I started to realize that this is a town that’s filled with so much history. This is a festival with so much weaved through it.” Tessa said her aunts told her that the festival was an experience they couldn’t explain until she had gone through it. Maria Murdock gave her only a little preview. “She kind of wanted it to be a surprise,” Tessa said. “She kept saying if I didn’t go, I would be missing something very big.” After accepting the invitation to be queen, Tessa said she had an image of how she wanted her white dress to look for the Coronation. She never quite found what she was looking for, but settled on one after conferring with her mother. Two days ago, she found a better match to what she envisioned at a New York thrift store, Angel Thrift. “It was the closest to what I wanted,” she said of the dress she will wear to the ceremony. Tessa, who comes from a long line of successful performers, said she wants to pursue work in theater, but feels little pressure. “There’s something that I get out of theater that I want to have a strong ground in before I do anything else,” she said. She seems ready for the next three event-filled days: “I’ve looked over most of [the schedule]. It’s just packed. They’re like 10-minute intervals.” And what is the queen-to-be most looking forward to during the celebration? Tasting her favorite dessert at the Apple Pie Baking Contest today at the Marker-Miller Orchards. Queen Has Festival Family Ties Two of Tessa Rose Ferrer’s Aunts Were Also Royalty By Kelly Cupp, The Winchester Star, Wednesday, March 30, 2005 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The 78th Shenandoah Apple Blossom Festival hopes to reconnect with the past in its selection of this year’s queen-designate. Tessa Rose Ferrer, 19, is bringing her family’s history with the festival full circle. She will be the third festival queen from her family, and both of her grandfathers have been guests at the festival, said Kay Bollinger, chairman of the Celebrities Committee. Tessa is the daughter of actress/singer Debby Boone and Episcopal minister Gabrielle Ferrer, and the granddaughter of maternal grandparents Pat and Shirley Boone and paternal grandparents Rosemary Clooney and Jose Ferrer. Jose Ferrer and Pat Boone attended the festival in 1979 and 1999, respectively. Two of Tessa’s aunts have served as festival queens: Maria Ferrer in 1979 and Laury Boone in 1977, according to festival officials. Both aunts are proud that another family member gets to take part in the festival, said Tessa, a student at New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts. The honor is exciting because being queen enables her to be a part of something ingrained in a community, she said, adding that the event is drenched in history. Tessa, 5 feet, 8 inches tall with blond hair, said her excitement about the festival has been distracting her from school work, and noted that she occasionally sets aside a paper to study her wardrobe to decide which items to bring to Winchester. But she hasn’t selected a Coronation dress yet. Tessa said she has a couple of dresses in sight, but is still looking for her ideal. So far, the best advice Maria Ferrer — who plans to accompany her to the festival — has offered for clothing choices is comfortable shoes, Tessa said. Tessa’s chance to reign in front of thousands should come naturally because of her showbusiness lineage. It doesn’t hurt that she’s studying acting in college, too. Right now, she said she is absorbing all she can, but can’t predict what an acting future might hold. She described it as a roll of the dice. Some of Tessa’s cousins are also in show business — including actors George Clooney and Miguel Ferrer. Of course, music is also a large of part of Tessa’s life, she said. Her mother, Debby Boone, has just completed a new album, after putting her career on hold to raise Tessa and her three siblings, Jordan, 24, Gabrielle, 21, and Dustin, 21. “I absolutely love to sing. Music is a big part of my life,” she said. Tessa said she’ll often sing some of her grandmother Rosemary Clooney’s songs to herself and her grandfather Pat Boone’s remake of Little Richard’s “Tutti-Frutti” makes her smile. No announcement has been made about who will crown Tessa, Bollinger said. (The Coronation will take place at 2 PM on Friday, April 29th.)