The 9/11 Story You Haven’t Heard: Anthoula Katsimatides on Loss, Healing & Purpose

Anthoula Katsimatides shares the 9/11 story you haven’t heard — loss, healing, purpose, the Memorial, and rebuilding NYC. In this Glorious Broads conversation, Anthoula Katsimatides sits down to talk about losing her brother John on September 11th, working with grieving families, helping rebuild Lower Manhattan, and finding a life of color, purpose, and performance after unimaginable loss. Anthoula Katsimatides is an actor, writer, producer, and voice-over artist. She has worked on screen with directors Ang Lee, Barry Levinson, Luc Besson, and Ritesh Batra, and with actors including Robert De Niro, Michelle Pfeiffer, Jane Fonda, Rose Byrne, Jane Seymour, and many other talented artists. Passionate about theatre, Anthoula has performed in many plays around New York City. She is also developing a solo show that was awarded best autobiographical script by the United Solo Festival. After earning a Bachelor’s degree in Business Administration at Baruch College and a Master’s degree in Secondary Education at Queens College, Anthoula worked across different fields before becoming an actor. Those experiences gave her the skill set of a producer, which she now brings to her passion project: the official documentary film about Oscar-winning actress Olympia Dukakis. Anthoula is a proud New Yorker and deeply involved in charitable work. After September 11th, 2001, she worked at the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation on the massive rebuilding effort. She is also a member of the board of directors of The National September 11th Memorial & Museum, serving voluntarily in memory of her brother John Katsimatides. In this honest, no-BS one-on-one, Anthoula talks about the morning of September 11th, the weeks of searching and waiting, the family liaison work that connected grieving families with the rebuilding process, and why the Memorial still matters for future generations. She also opens up about becoming an actress at 32, using performance as a place to put down grief, wearing color again, carrying her brother John’s spirit forward, and the September 12th Effect — the compassion, kindness, and community that appeared the day after the towers fell. If this stirred something in you, you're our people. Glorious Broads is for women who refuse to disappear and the younger broads who refuse to be invisible in their own time. Subscribe for honest, intergenerational conversations every week. "Age Against the Machine." Glorious Broads is a movement and a media platform celebrating women over 50 who refuse to fade. Through candid, no-BS interviews, we dismantle ageism and reframe what aging really looks like — sensual, sharp, courageous, and gloriously alive. Every video is a conversation. Every Broad is a permission slip. Every viewer is welcome. STAY CONNECTED WITH GLORIOUS BROADS: Website gloriousbroads.com Meet the Broads, read the manifesto, join the movement. Instagram @gloriousbroads Daily doses of broad wisdom and unfiltered glory. Facebook /gloriousbroads Where the conversations keep going. TikTok @gloriousbroads The unfiltered, no-apologies moments. CHAPTERS: 00:00 - The Morning of September 11th 01:24 - Watching the Second Plane Hit From Her Mother's Living Room 02:41 - Six Weeks of Searching, Hoping, Waiting 04:00 - Forty Percent Were Never Recovered 04:50 - Comforting Family While Mourning Was on Hold 05:48 - Returning to Work for Governor Pataki 07:00 - The Family Liaison Role at the LMDC 07:48 - The Family Room: Photos, Flowers, Spirits 08:54 - Sitting on the Memorial Board 10:20 - Three Years Later: Time to Mourn 10:34 - Becoming an Actress at 32 11:18 - Acting as a Place to Put Down the Grief 11:54 - Why She Wears Color Now 13:11 - Carrying John's Personality Forward 14:34 - On Bittersweet Joy & Missing Him 22 Years Later 15:18 - The Family Foundation: Jam For Life 16:00 - Building the National 9/11 Memorial 17:01 - Why the Museum Matters Now 17:55 - For New Yorkers Who Still Cannot Visit 19:18 - The September 12th Effect 20:24 - What She Learned About Herself 21:46 - John's Full Name #GloriousBroads #AnthoulaKatsimatides #September11Memorial #LivingAfterLoss #WomenOver50