Caris Corfman, 51; Actress Created Memory Loss Show

Caris Corfman, 51, a stage and film actress whose one-woman show illuminated her personal struggle with short-term memory loss and other disabilities, died Jan. 13 at her apartment in Rockville after a stroke.

Ms. Corfman, a Yale-trained actress, compiled a respectable list of acting credits while living in New York in the 1980s and early 1990s.

She appeared in the original Broadway production of "Amadeus" as the character Katherina Cavalieri, pupil to composer Antonio Salieri. There were numerous off-Broadway plays as well as speaking parts in the 1983 movie "Something in Between," set in Belgrade, and the 1988 comedy "Funny Farm" starring Chevy Chase.

Her acting career then appeared to come to an abrupt end. She began to experience severe headaches and once fainted on the subway, said her father, Philip A. Corfman.

His daughter soon discovered that she had a benign brain tumor. Philip Corfman, a gynecologist and former reproductive health specialist with the National Institutes of Health, said his daughter underwent surgery to remove part of the tumor in 1993. During the operation, the section of her brain used for short-term memory was damaged, as was her pituitary gland, he said.

So although she could recall lines from plays she had memorized years earlier, she couldn't remember from one hour to the next whether she had taken her medication, Corfman said.

By then medication and cosyntropin injections had become a major part of her daily routine. At one point, she was prescribed 12 different kinds of medication, some of which were to be taken twice a day.

She underwent more surgeries, lived for a time in a rehabilitation facility in Manassas and eventually moved to Rockville to be closer to her father.

About two years ago, eager to return to theater, Ms. Corfman worked on creating a stage show about her life since her surgeries.

Drawing upon material from her daily journal, she co-created the one-woman performance show with playwright Mark Bowman and director Brad Watkins, a former classmate of hers at Walter Johnson High School in Bethesda.

The result was a 45-minute show, "Caris's Peace," featuring Ms. Corfman on stage, at times reciting long soliloquies she had memorized nearly 30 years earlier. She read the new lines, however, from index cards.

She performed the show at the Olney Theatre and in New York and Philadelphia.

"No memory, no life; no memory, no career; no memory," Ms. Corfman was quoted as saying in a New York Times review of her show in 2005. "No, it's not that tragic; I do have a life and at times it's quite a wondrous one, but damn it, it would be such a treat to remember it."

Ms. Corfman was born in Boston and raised in upstate New York and Bethesda.

As a child, her father said, she had a pronounced theatrical streak.

She graduated from Florida State University and received a master's degree in fine arts from Yale University School of Drama.

In addition to her father, survivors include three brothers, Stanley Corfman of New York, Timothy Corfman of Walnut Creek, Calif., and Mark Corfman of Poolesville.