“Characters on Call” founder spreads joy of make-believe

For Characters on Call founder Kathryn Gonzalez, being a princess is not just about playing dress up. While Gonzalez founded her character entertainment business in 2016, the seasoned actor has been donning princess and mascot costumes for the delight of children since her own youth.

“My sister passed away from leukemia just before I was born,” Gonzalez explained. “In memory of her, my parents somehow acquired bootleg mascot costumes like the ones you see in Times Square. Then they got some pretty nice ones. It was strictly volunteer. We got those costumes so we could do annual Christmas gift-giving events for Hackensack Medical Center, where she was treated mostly…I guess that was cathartic (for my parents).”

It wasn’t until after college that Gonzalez realized she could turn the idea into a business. When a classmate revealed that she worked as a professional princess on summer breaks, Gonzalez began freelancing for other character companies using her parents’ costumes. When those gigs didn’t work out, Gonzalez’s parents encouraged her to set up an enterprise on her own.

“My parents were just like, ‘Look, you’ve been with these costumes for years, you know how this stuff goes, you’ve been doing it your whole life—just go on your own,’” Gonzalez recalled. “And I said, ‘But I don’t have a business head, I know nothing about business!” And they said, ‘You know the product, so just go from there.’ So that’s what I did.”

In the past decade, Characters on Call has grown into an established entity in Rockland County, sending princesses and characters of all kinds to entertain crowds at both public and private events. With a client list that includes businesses from the Rockland Boulders to the Palisades Center, as well as personal character-grams and parties, Gonzalez has a busy schedule spreading character magic wherever she and her castmates go.

“It feels really nice, it gives me something positive to come from such a tragic event…It was a lot of negativity. And for this to be something positive that came from it—I don’t know if I would have gotten into this world any other way.”