Episodes

  • Cringe

    Cringe

    · I Survived Theatre School



  • LeRoy McClain

    LeRoy McClain

    · I Survived Theatre School

    We talk to star of The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel and Yale School of Drama alum LeRoy McClain!
    Intro: Aaron survived a heart attack! Marriage is hard.
    Let Me Run This By You: Love Has Won and the tale of Mother God, Matthew Perry
    Interview: We talk to star of The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel and Yale School of Drama alum LeRoy McClain about being born in England, being a biracial boy with a British accent in Hawaii, studying at Loyola, seeing community in and discovering a passion for theatre, and the sometimes difficult path of getting an advanced degree at Yale.

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  • Cynthia Darlow

    Cynthia Darlow

    · I Survived Theatre School

    Intro: Boz loves LinkedIn. Will she emcee the next Beastie Boys event?
    Interview: We talk to star of The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel Cynthia Darlow about North Carolina School of the Arts, performing for Tennessee Williams, the historic theatrical residence for young women called the Rehearsal Club, Volunteer Lawyers for the Arts, the Webster Apartments, getting the word out about their story through New York Times article, spending the entire day in line to audition at the cattle call for the touring company of Grease, Pat Birch, Vinnie Liff, having the same agent for 55 years, Tony Shaloub, American Repertory Theatre, Cherry Jones, getting furniture for her home made by Patrick Swayze, working with Michael Zegen, the play that got away, and whether or not people should go to theatre school.

  • Stefano Carannante

    Stefano Carannante

    · I Survived Theatre School

    Intro: headshots, turning off my self-view, Emotional Brain Training,
    Let Me Run This By You: Is Flakiness always hostile?
    Interview: We talk to Season 2 of Severance's Stefano Carannante about going to theatre school in Italy

  • Sydney Cole Alexander

    Sydney Cole Alexander

    · I Survived Theatre School

    Intro: Titan(ic), Botox, Wegovy
    Interview: We talk to star of Severance Sydney Cole Alexander about LaGuardia High School, SUNY Purchase, and Severance.

  • Lennon Parham

    Lennon Parham

    · I Survived Theatre School

    Intro: NASA needs a producer, Copernicus, Don Knotts, Barney Fife, Monsters, Quentin Tarantino, Django Unchained, Shaft,
    Interview: We talk to Lennon Parham about growing up in Georgia, playing quirky characters, getting a taste for theater, soaking up all the non-performance aspects of theatre, improv, Upright Citizens Brigade, Pete Holmes, applying to Juilliard, doing Teach for America in Greenville Mississippi, auditioning for Veep with Julia Louis-Dreyfus and Armando Iannucci, callbacks, Playing House, Jack McBrayer, Jason Mantzoukas, Betsy Capes, the 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee, Jessica St. Clair, Best Friends Forever, the undeniable draw of having fun.

  • Kristoffer Diaz

    Kristoffer Diaz

    · I Survived Theatre School

    Intro: smush-faced dogs, sleep procrastination, Meyers-Briggs, Eneagram, Amazon, Oujia board conspiracies, the mystery of parenting.
    Let Me Run This By You: Boz gets rained out of Disney and entered the Land of Forgotten Teslas.
    Interview: We talk to playwright and professor Kristoffer Diaz about NYU, Gallatin, Tisch, John Leguizamo, growing up Nuyorican, being addicted to theatre, ambition, and the future of American Theatre.

  • Desmin Borges

    Desmin Borges

    · I Survived Theatre School

    Interview: We talk to star of stage and screen Desmin Borges about The Theatre School, Minneapolis Children's Theatre Company, Peter Brosius, improvising and workshopping new works at Teatro Vista, Dennis Začek Sandy Shinner, Victory Gardens, phonetic pillows, Arthur Lessac's work, speaking creatively through rhythm instead of words, Ann Wakefield, Ric Murphy, John Leguizamo aka Johnny Legs, winning a preschool talent show televised on Telemundo with his rendition of La Bamba, growing up in a barber shop, losing his dad to cancer at age 15, Elaborate Entrance of Chad Deity by Kristoffer Diaz, The Buddy Holly Story musical with Janey Lauer, Barry Brunetti, Dominic and Eugene, The Room Upstaris, Stephen Belber's Tape, Tokoloshe, stereotyping of Latine actors, Brian Cox, Boleros for the Disenchanted, being #1 on the call sheet.

  • Nick Reynolds

    Nick Reynolds

    · I Survived Theatre School

    Intro:
    Let Me Run This By You: 12 Strange Questions (TM) version 2.0
    Interview: We talk to television star Nick Reynolds about West Virginia, Marshall University, Penn State, MFAs, waiting for 10 years to star on , Search Party, Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, being an only child, and almost offending every single cast member of Law and Order SVU, and being a character actor.

  • Kelley Curran

    Kelley Curran

    · I Survived Theatre School

    Intro: Boz didn't win Powerball
    Let Me Run This By You: 10 Strange Questions
    Interview: We talk to Kelley Curran about The Gilded Age, having career faith, Fordham at Lincoln Center, The Acting Company, 4.48 Psychosis, Heather Lind, Michaela McManus, Taylor Schilling, Betty Gilpin, Kate Burton, Lawrence Sacharow, Marian Seldes, Roger Reese, Cherry Jones, Fiona Shaw, Oregon Shakespeare, Shakespeare in the Park, Lady Percy in Henry IV, Davis McCallum, Carrie Coon, playing a villain, Telsey and Co., Angels in America, Downton Abbey, Julian Fellowes, Michael Engler, Tim Kubart, and doing a nude scene for millions.

  • Rodney To

    Rodney To

    · I Survived Theatre School

    Intro: Sometimes the little guy just doesn't cut it.
    Let Me Run This By You: Time's a wastin' - giddyup, beggars and choosers.
    Interview: We talk to star of Parks and Recreation, Easter Sunday, and Barry - Rodney To about Chicago, Marquette University, Lane Tech, getting discovered while pursuing a Chemistry degree, The Blues Brothers, Dürrenmatt's The Physicists, playing children well into adulthood, interning at Milwaukee Rep, Lifeline Theatre, Steppenwolf, doing live industrials for Arthur Anderson, Asian American actors and their representation in the media, IAMA Theatre Company, Kate Burton, and faking a Singaporean accent.
    FULL TRANSCRIPT (UNEDITED):
    1 (8s):
    I'm Jen Bosworth RAMIREZ

    2 (10s):
    And I'm Gina Pulice.

    1 (11s):
    We went to theater school together. We survived it, but we didn't quite understand

    2 (15s):
    It. 20 years later, we're digging deep talking to our guests about their experiences and trying to make sense of it all.

    1 (21s):
    We survived theater school and you will too. Are we famous yet?

    2 (30s):
    How's your, how's your eighties decor going for your

    1 (35s):
    New house? Okay, well we closed yesterday. Well,

    2 (39s):
    Congratulations.

    1 (40s):
    Thank you. House buying is so weird. Like we close, we funded yesterday, but we can't record till today because my lender like totally dropped the ball. So like, here's the thing. Sometimes when you wanna support like a small, I mean small, I don't know, like a small bank, like I really liked the guy who is the mortgage guy and he has his own bank and all these things. I don't even, how know how this shit works. It's like, but anyway, they were so like, it was a real debacle. It was a real, real Shannon situation about how they, anyway, my money was in the bank in escrow on Friday.

    1 (1m 20s):
    Their money that they're lending us, which we're paying in fucking fuck load of interest on is they couldn't get it together. And I was like, Oh no.

    2 (1m 29s):
    They're like, We have to look through the couch cushions,

    1 (1m 31s):
    Right? That's what it felt like, Gina. It felt like these motherfuckers were like, Oh shit, we didn't actually think this was gonna happen or something. And so I talked to escrow, my friend Fran and escrow, you know, I make friends with the, with the older ladies and, and she was like, I don't wanna talk bad about your lender, but like, whoa. And I was like, Fran, Fran, I had to really lay down the law yesterday and I needed my office mate, Eileen to be witness to when I did because I didn't really wanna get too crazy, but I also needed to get a little crazy. And I was like, Listen, what you're asking for, and it was true, does not exist. They needed one. It was, it was like being in the, in the show severance mixed with the show succession, mixed with, it was like all the shows where you're just like, No, no, what you're asking for doesn't exist and you wanna document to look a certain way.

    1 (2m 25s):
    And Chase Bank doesn't do a document that way. And she's like, Well she said, I don't CH bank at Chase, so I don't know. And I said, Listen, I don't care where you bank ma'am, I don't care. But this is Chase Bank. It happens to be a very popular bank. So I'm assuming other people have checking accounts that you deal with at Chase. What I'm telling, she wanted me to get up and go to Chase Bank in person and get a printout of a certain statement period with an http on the bottom. She didn't know what she was talking about. She didn't know what she was talking about. And she was like, 18, 18. And I said, Oh ma'am, if you could get this loan funded in the next, cuz we have to do it by 11, that would be really, really dope.

    1 (3m 6s):
    I'm gonna hang up now before I say something very bad. And then I hung up.

    2 (3m 10s):
    Right, Right. Yeah. Oh my God, I know. It's the worst kind of help. And regarding like wanting to support smaller businesses, I what, that is such a horrible sadness. There's, there's no sadness. Like the sadness of really investing in the little guy and having it. That was my experience. My big experience with that was going, having a midwife, you know, with my first child. And I really, I was in that whole thing of that, that time was like, oh, birth is too medicalized. And you know, even though my husband was a doctor, like fuck the fuck the medical establishment we're just, but but didn't wanna, like, I didn't wanna go, as my daughter would say, I didn't wanna be one of those people who, what did she say?

    2 (3m 52s):
    You know, one of those people who carry rocks to make them feel better.

    1 (3m 57s):
    That's amazing. Super.

    2 (4m 0s):
    So I didn't wanna go so far as to be one of those rock carrying people to have the birth at my house, but at the same time I really wanted to have this midwife and then there was a problem and she wasn't equipped to deal with it. And it was,

    1 (4m 11s):
    I was there,

    2 (4m 13s):
    Fyi. Yes, you were

    1 (4m 15s):
    The first one, right? For your first one.

    2 (4m 16s):
    The first one.

    1 (4m 18s):
    Here's the thing you're talking about this, I don't even remember her ass. What I, she, I don't remember nothing about her. If you had told me you didn't have one, I'd be like, Yeah, you didn't have one. I remember the problem and I remember them having to get the big, the big doctor and I remember a lot of blood and I remember thinking, Oh thank God there's this doctor they got from down the hall to come or wherever the hell they were and take care of this problem because this gene is gonna bleed out right here. And none of us know what to do.

    2 (4m 50s):
    Yes. I will never forget the look on your face. You and Erin looking at each other trying to do that thing where you're like, It's fine, it's fine. But you're such a bad liar that, that I could, I just took one look at you. I'm like, Oh my God, I'm gonna fucking bleed out right here. And Aaron's going, No, no, no, it's cool, it's cool, it's cool. And then of course he was born on July 25th and all residents start their residency on July 1st. So you know, you really don't wanna have a baby or have surgery in July cuz you're getting at a teaching hospital cuz you're getting a lot of residents. And this woman comes in as I'm bleeding and everything is going crazy and I haven't even had a chance to hold my baby yet. And she comes up to me and she says, Oh cuz the, the midwife ran out of lidocaine. There was no lidocaine.

    2 (5m 30s):
    That's right. They were trying to sew me up without lidocaine. And so this nurse comes in, she puts her hand on my shoulder, she says, Hi, I'm Dr. Woo and I'm, and I said, Dr. W do you have any lidocaine? I need some lidocaine stat right up in there. Gimme some lidocaine baby. A...

  • Damian Thompson

    Damian Thompson

    · I Survived Theatre School

    Intro: swiping left on the poor man's John Travolta, wilderness therapy for the 1%, Ashton Kutcher.
    Let Me Run This By You: the thing that you're most afraid of is probably not what's gonna getcha.
    Interview: We talk to actor Damian Thompson about immigrating from Jamaica, the University of Evansville, the Florida Theatre Conference, stuttering, PAVAC, North Carolina School of the Arts, asking for what you want, how letters of recommendation aren't always what they seem, gatekeeping, theatre school with no acting classes, Pericles, zoom theatre.
    FULL TRANSCRIPT (UNEDITED):
    1 (8s):
    I'm Jen Bosworth Ramirez,

    2 (10s):
    And I'm Gina Pulice.

    1 (11s):
    We went to theater school together. We survived it, but we didn't quite understand it.

    2 (15s):
    20

    3 (16s):
    Years later, we're digging deep talking to our guests about their experiences and trying to make sense of

    1 (20s):
    It all. We survive theater school and you will too. Are we famous yet In Chicago or New York? You can just get crazy, but anyway, go ahead. Go ahead, go ahead.

    2 (38s):
    No, no, no. So now that the poor man's John Travolta has purchased Twitter for $44 billion, will you be deleting your account?

    1 (52s):
    Yes. I'm getting off only because I, I, I actually, I just, I mean, I think that he is a, he's in many ways a genius. I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna fault him on that. There's, there's, but I don't trust what's gonna happen. Like I just don't wanna be a part of the great unraveling in that way. I don't know. It'll probably unravel then come back together and unravel before it finally goes in one direction or the other. Yeah. I'm gonna also, let's be honest, I'm gonna probably use this as an excuse to get off because nobody fucking retweets my shit anyway, so I'm just gonna use it as an excuse.

    2 (1m 30s):
    Yeah, yeah.

    1 (1m 31s):
    It just not working for me. I'm not Twitter famous. Nobody gives a fuck. So I'm gonna just shut it down and then maybe TikTok will be our new thing. Right?

    2 (1m 40s):
    There you go. By the way, 44 billion, I was like trying to, you know how humans really can't conceive of big numbers, and so I'm always trying to find these ways of like making it, you know, somewhat understandable. And it turns out this, a lot of people do this and, and I read an article about how, Oh, by the way, I used to, I realized apropo of this, I was relying on Twitter 100% for my news. Like I had stopped, I, I used to start with the New York Times and then go to Twitter, and then I stopped starting with the New York Times. I would, I would only go to it if there was a link to it in Twitter.

    2 (2m 20s):
    And so today I start, I did the times again. And, you know, there's a lot of bad things going on that I really didn't know about because I hadn't been, you know, I really hadn't been paying attention to the news, but, okay, so he, for ostensibly speaking, you could end world hunger with 6 billion. You could end United States houselessness with 20 billion and this is 44 billion. Now, when they say these things, like you could end it, I always think like, yeah, but really how? Right. That doesn't seem right because

    1 (2m 59s):
    They're, they're still, well, there's like, Right, And also you need, you need, you need systems put in place. It's not, but what, with the resources, I think it is important to know like that's how much resources financially it would cost, and it then it would take a whole fuck ton of work. But I do think it's interesting to, and also who comes up with these figures, That's hilarious to me. There's some person being like, You could end Jen, Jen Bosworth Ramirez as problems with, you know, $150. You know, like that kind of a thing. But, Well,

    2 (3m 27s):
    I think, I think in the case of the thing I was reading, it was like organization, non-governmental organizations who, their mission is to end world hunger or their

    1 (3m 38s):
    Mission. So they do. Yeah. My guess is the New York Times is really checking their shit out. So Yeah, of course. And they're talking to nonprofits that, that this is their mission, so they know these numbers. Okay. That is crazy as fuck. And he spent 44 billion,

    2 (3m 53s):
    He spent 44 billion. And that's the other thing about it, it is starting to seem like these, you know, mega billionaires are just kind of bored and looking for something novel. I mean, you know, him and Bezos are trying, trying to outspace each other and, and it's just like, there's no, you know, it's, it's the thing of like, there's no, there's nothing left to vanquish, so let's just, you know, come up with new things. And I think, you know, I wonder if any of them would be interested in like, having a perspective change. Like what if they had to live without a house for some period of time? What if they had to, you know, like, is there a way that we could mandate just sort of the experience of not being them?

    1 (4m 43s):
    What, Okay, what you're, what you're talking about is like a mix of like outward Bound meets tough love and like prisoner for a day, like reality show for billionaires. And I am also wilderness therapy. They need

    2 (4m 57s):
    Wilderness therapy.

    1 (4m 58s):
    Yeah. Well, I'm convinced that like, if you trapped me in an elevator with them for an hour, they might have a perspective change. Only because, or anyone, anyone that's not in their circle. It could be any, Well, it couldn't really be anyone. Cause like, can you imagine them getting trapped with like, I don't, I don't know my weird neighbor, that would not be good. But like, someone who is psychologically minded like that actually cares about the universe and stuff. If they were, if we, I always think of this, I don't know why, but like, let's say Osama Bin Laden was still alive and then he got trapped in an elevator with me and neither of us had weapons, right?

    1 (5m 38s):
    We just have our minds and our mouths and our hearts and all our bodies. Could we come to, could we change, Could anyone change anyone being trapped in the elevator for a couple hours? I don't know. But it would be interesting to find out. So this is along those same lines, like you put Elon Musk in the woods, but they have to have either a therapist or some kind of guide because left to their own devices, they're gonna fucking try to colonize the woods, right? They're gonna be like, ah, we could, you know, So they need a guide. Who would be their guide? Gina?

    2 (6m 12s):
    I think it should be you, frankly. No, I think the woods

    1 (6m 15s):
    Like, I'd be like's,

    2 (6m 17s):
    Maybe not in the woods. By the way, how long do you think it would take Osama Bin Laden to acknowledge your presence since you are

    1 (6m 24s):
    A woman? Oh, that's great. Together in an elevator. That is a really good, that is a really good question. Would he just pretend I wasn't there? And I would dance around? I mean,

    2 (6m 36s):
    I kind of think he would just pretend that you weren't there. Like, like

    1 (6m 39s):
    Well, that would even give more impetus to get in his space. I would be like, Oh, this is a game now. So then I would try to be like, you know what I would do? Cause I'm a people pleaser. I'd be like, I love your hair. Like, I would be like, Tell me how you got your hair to look. So whatever

    2 (6m 56s):
    Matter. Matter,

    1 (6m 57s):
    Right? Or like, I think you have great bone structure. Like I would just come up with the most because that's who I am. So it would either or he would just strangle me that that could be, he could just strike me.

    2 (7m 11s):
    That's possibility too. ...

  • Tina Parker

    Tina Parker

    · I Survived Theatre School

    Intro: Emceeing a memorial service
    Let Me Run This By You: Fear and the paranormal
    Interview: We talk to Tina Parker aka Francesca Liddy about SMU, Blake Hackler, Andre DeShields, Maria Irene Fornes' Mud, Kitchen Dog Theatre, Breaking Bad, Better Call Saul, Robert Altman's Dr. T & the Women, Birdbath play, Perpetual Grace.
    FULL TRANSCRIPT (unedited):
    1 (8s):
    I'm Jen Bosworth Ramirez

    2 (10s):
    This, and I'm Gina Pulice

    1 (11s):
    We went to theater

    3 (12s):
    School together. We survived it, but we didn't quite understand it.

    4 (15s):
    20 years later, we're digging deep talking to our guests about their experiences and trying to make sense of

    3 (20s):
    It all. We survive theater school and you will too. Are we famous yet?

    2 (34s):
    So what does mean, What does it mean to mc a memorial?

    1 (40s):
    Yeah. I mean, I don't know what to call it. I I people keep it host. I'm not hosting cuz the family's hosting. So what it means is that I'm trusted, I think to not, Well one, I've done this twice, you know, I've lost both my parents. So I like know the drill about how memorials go, but also I think I'm kind of a safe person in that I will step in if someone goes kaka cuckoo at the memorial and I also have some, you know, able like, presenting skills. Yes. Right. And I'm entrusted to like guide the ship if it, and if it goes off kilter, I will say to somebody, Hey, why don't you have a seat?

    1 (1m 23s):
    This is like, we'll have time for this later if you really wanna get crazy or whatever. But that's, and I think it's just sort of steering, steering the grief ship maybe. I don't know. Yeah, look, I don't know. I like that. It's gonna be

    2 (1m 34s):
    Interesting, dude, people, Oh, honestly, they should have that for, you know, in other cultures where they have like professional grievers and professional mourners, it, it sounds a little silly, but at the same time it's like, no, this is right. Because no, we don't, we never know how to do it. Unless you've lived in a really communal environment where you, you, you, you know, you attend the rights, the ceremonies or rituals of everybody in your village, then you really don't know until, usually until it's thrust upon you. And then it's like, well, you're supposed to be grieving and then like hosting a memorial service. It's such a weird thing. So this could be another career path for you. You could be a professional, you know, funeral mc, I actually, honestly, I hate, I don't hate it.

    2 (2m 21s):
    I love it. Well,

    1 (2m 22s):
    And also could be my thank you, my rap name funeral Mc instead of like young mc funeral mc, but no. Yeah, I, I have no, and it's so interesting when it's not my own family, right? Like these are family friends, but they're not, it's not my mother who died. I don't have the attachment to I people doing and saying certain things. I don't feel triggered. Like being, I grew up a lot in this house that I'm sitting in right now, but it's not my, it was not my house. So I don't have any attachment emotionally like appendages to the items in the house where the girls do.

    1 (3m 2s):
    So I'm able to be here and, and, and be like, this is, this is, I'm okay here. I don't feel overwhelmed. And I think that is a sign that I'm doing the right thing in terms of helping out in this way if I got here and I was like, Oh my God, it's too much. But I don't feel that. And I also think that like, one of the things that I did with Nancy and Dave over the last couple years is like, they were literally the only adults. Well, I'm an adult, only older adults my parents age who are like, Yes, go to California, you need to get out of here, get away from this. They were the, so I that made me trust them. And then we stayed, we had like weekly phone conversations, just like they would each be on a line.

    1 (3m 46s):
    It was hilarious. And we would talk for hours like maybe once every two weeks, a couple hours. And it was really like a parenting experience. So I feel very close to them and I, what I'm learning is that like, even if other people have different relationships with people, you can have your own. So I know that no one's perfect, but these were allowed, like, you're allowed Gina to have your own relationship with your mom and with your even dead people than other people have.

    2 (4m 17s):
    Yeah. Yeah. I agree with that. Back to the plane for a minute. In these situations, what do the flight attendants do, if anything?

    1 (4m 28s):
    Oh, well I always talked to them before because I, so what I say, I always like to, because Dave, who's, who's a hypnotherapist and a psychologist, he said, Listen, you know, he used to be afraid. And he said his thing was talking to the flight attendants before and just saying like, Hey, I have a phobia. I'm a therapist. I'm working through it. Like just to make contact, right. I don't, I didn't say that exactly, but what I said was, Listen, I say, Hi, how are you? We struck up a strike up, a teeny conversation in that moment where I'm going to my seat and I say, Listen, I'm going to Chicago to like mc a memorial for like someone who's like my mom. So if you see me, so if you see me crying like it's normal. And they're like, Oh, thanks for telling me. And they're, they usually don't get freaked out.

    1 (5m 11s):
    I'm also not like intense about it. They do nothing. And you know what they, I think and, and she said, Thanks for telling me. I really appreciate it. Because I think they'd rather know what the fuck is going on with someone than thinking someone's about to hijack the goddamn plane.

    2 (5m 29s):
    Exactly. I was thinking that exact same thing. I was thinking like, especially right now, all they know is it's heightened emotion or it's not, you know, like they, they, they have no, they would have no way of differentiating, you know, what's, what's safe and what's dangerous. So I can't believe nobody's ever done this before. But we, another project that we could do is like airplane stories. I mean there is such, this is one of the few points of connection that humanity still has people that is who can afford to you fly a plane anywhere. But this thing of like, it sucks and it's dirty and it's growth and people, people's, you know, hygiene comes into question and if they're sitting next to you and it's uncomfortable and it's not the glamorous thing that it used to be even when we were kids.

    2 (6m 21s):
    So it's, it's one of those moments unless you have a private plane where you're sort of forced to reckon with like the same thing that everybody else in humanity has to reckon with. But even on a private plane, and I would argue even especially on a private plane, there is the fear of your imminent death. Like the, the, it doesn't matter if you're afraid of flying or not, it crosses your mind.

    1 (6m 42s):
    Well, yeah. And I, ...

  • Tina Huang

    Tina Huang

    · I Survived Theatre School

    Intro: Nasty neighbors in the Great Unraveling, The Rest Movement
    Let Me Run This By You: Rejection
    Interview: We talk to Tina Huang about soap opera acting, LaGuardia High School, the Playwrights Horizon program at Tisch, breaking down barriers for Asian actors, Ammunition Theatre Company, Revenge Porn or the Story of a Body by Carla Ching, Bay Area Theatre, Pig Hunt, starting a fake management company, Word for Word Performing Arts Company, Intersection for the Arts, Campo Santo, Amy Tan, 1:1 Productions, Karla Mosley, Jeanne Sakata.
    FULL TRANSCRIPT (unedited):
    1 (8s):
    I'm Jen Bosworth Ramirez this, and I'm Gina Pulice.

    2 (11s):
    We went to theater school together. We survived it, but we didn't quite understand it.

    3 (15s):
    20 years later, we're digging deep talking to our guests about their experiences and trying to make sense of

    2 (20s):
    It all. We survive theater school and you will too. Are we famous yet?

    0 (34s):
    You

    2 (35s):
    Part of the building.

    1 (36s):
    Okay,

    2 (37s):
    Great. I don't know how it's gonna go.

    1 (41s):
    I mean, nobody knows how it's gonna go. It's unknowable until we know it.

    2 (45s):
    That is true. Good morning.

    1 (48s):
    Good. Margie,

    2 (50s):
    Your makeup looks amazing.

    1 (53s):
    Thank you. I'm not doing well, so I'm acting opposite. You know that skill?

    2 (59s):
    Oh, I know. Oh, that's like, I would say like 90% of adulthood. Anyway. What's happening? What, what is, if you wanna get into it, like what's the overall arching shittiness,

    1 (1m 10s):
    The overarching thing is just, Well, my neighbor I told you about.

    2 (1m 15s):
    Okay. And I just wanna put it out there and we'll get into the story, but I wanna put it out there that I, we are in, and we've said this before on the podcast in what I would call, and others like Gina would call probably similar, the great unraveling of our society. So it's like Rome is falling and I, I don't even say it, it sounds so cavalier the way I'm saying it, but I literally every day see evidence of the great unraveling of the American sweater. You know what I mean? Like it's coming out. Yes. Yeah. And we, it's okay. And I think one of those things is terrible neighbors, right? Like, people who are terrible are just getting more terrible.

    2 (1m 58s):
    So Gina has a neighbor that is very terrible.

    1 (2m 0s):
    Yeah. People just over the last several years do seem to feel way more comfortable just being extremely hor. Horrible. Horrible. So what, So this is the same neighbor that I've talked about before. And basically the deal with her is it's like she's obsessed with us. And, and like, what she doesn't understand is that we just work very hard to avoid her, you know, avoid interacting with her at any cause. I realized yesterday after she screamed at me that she has screamed at three fifths of my family members.

    1 (2m 40s):
    She only hasn't screamed at the nine year old and the, and the 14 year old. It's so insane. She's the one who Aaron was walking the dog and he had a flashlight and the dog was really young and he was trying to train him. So he kept like stopping and starting screens out. It's very disconcerting to be sitting in my living room and seeing a flashing light in front of my house, house. Like, he's like, I'm walking the dog. And the same one who when she was walking her dogs and he was walking our dog, she's like, It's not a great time to be walking your dog because her dogs are out of control. And she's yelled at my son a few times. Anyway, so what happened was, I walked the dog, I picked up the poop, I had the little baggy. If it's anybody else's house, I feel comfortable putting it in their trash

    2 (3m 23s):
    Can. Yeah. Here's the deal. Here's the deal. I hate to tell you people, but poop is trash. There's like nowhere else to put it. So if you, if you are like not okay with pooping in your trash in a bag tied up, then you don't need to live in a society where there are dogs or where there are trash. Cause that's what it

    1 (3m 44s):
    Is, Honestly. Honestly. And it's like, I feel like a big part of what's driving all this bad behavior is just like, so much entitlement. Like, I'm entitled to have only my trash in my trash can. And it's like, okay, you've never lived in New York City, right? Cause you don't understand anything about cooperative living. And anybody, whether they live in my neighborhood or not, is welcome to put their poop

    2 (4m 6s):
    Back. Yeah, dude.

    1 (4m 7s):
    So I'm walking by and I'm talking on the phone stuff, somewhat distracted, and I see this trash can, and I go, I like reach out ever So tentatively, not tentatively, but like, I had barely started to reach out, realized it was their house didn't. And within milliseconds, she is out of her house screaming at me. And I hadn't even, you know, put the poop in there. And I, I'm talking about misbehavior. I mean, I've, I don't think I've ever done this except for like having road rage in the car where the other person really can't hear me. Like I just screamed every obscenity Yes.

    1 (4m 48s):
    In the book. I, I hope nobody else, I'm sure somebody else heard, but nobody, nobody's contacted me. And, you know, I'll say this, I'm much better about taking a beat. Like, I really wanted to blast her. I really wanted to like write a horrible message to her. I really want, and I, and I don't, I'm not refined enough, well enough evolved enough to like get right to like, what's, what's the need of the matter? But I have figured out that I should probably just not say anything until, until I've thought about it. I had a good long think she messaged me on social

    2 (5m 22s):
    Media. What

    1 (5m 23s):
    She said, I'm sorry, I accused you of throwing trash in our trash can. And I just blocked her. I'm just like, you know, I, I, I wanted, what I wanted to say is like, you have no idea how much time we spend trying to avoid you. You are unwell. You have yelled at three fifths of my family, like, never speak to me or my children ever again. Forget I exist. Forget I live right across the street from you because that's what I'm trying to do about you. So

    2 (5m 50s):
    Instead you just blocked her. Well listen that, that, because when you told me this story yesterday that she, the the reach out on social media hadn't happened. So now I'm like, I think what, before you said that part, I was gonna say like, I think our only recourse is what people do, which is start videotaping the insanity. And I'm not sure that's a really a good solution. Like, I think that like, oh sure, people put it on social media and then there's a laugh, but then we're really laughing at sort of the horribleness and the, and the mental illness of others. And it's their person and who knows how that's gonna negatively affect them or their job or their family. So I don't, like, I understand the, the urge to videotape everything, but I'm not sure that's really the answer with, with non-criminal behavior.

    2 (6m 40s):
    If it's a crime, then i...

  • Paul Oakley Stovall

    Paul Oakley Stovall

    · I Survived Theatre School

    Intro: We are in the Great Unraveling - let's knit a new sweater

    Let Me Run This By You: Thin is In, ETHS Drama teacher Bruce Siewerth's abuse of students, iCarly's creator Dan Schneider's abuse of actors

    Interview: We talk to Hamilton's own George Washington - Paul Oakley Stovall about family, touring with Hamilton, being fearless, the magic of solving problems behind the scenes, early-age professionalism, quick changes, University of Illinois Urbana- Champaign, almost being a Chemical Engineer, Gary Mills, Don Ilko's quiet championship, Ric Murphy's vocal championship, when Jim Ostholthoff called Paul a supernova, Dr. Bella Itkin's career advice, playing John Proctor in The Crucible and Starbuck in 110 in the Shade, Working by Studs Terkel, Betsy Hamilton, being in Caryl Churchill's Serious Money with Gillian Anderson, Yolanda Androzzo, Minneapolis, playing Jason in Steven Carter's adaptation of Medea called Pecong, the X Files, getting shot in both legs, Matt Scharf, Amy Pietz, Monica Trombetta, performing in Frank Galati's Goodman Theatre's production of Good Person of Setzuan with Cherry Jones, Mary Zimmerman's The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci, Journey to the West, working for the Obama Administration, when Phylicia Rashad directed Paul's play Immediate Family at the Goodman and then Mark Taper Forum, KernoForto Productions, Wolf in Waiting with Danilo Carrera, Frederick Douglass, and finding a second home in Ireland.

    Full transcript (unedited):
    1 (8s):
    I'm Jen Bosworth Ramirez.

    2 (10s):
    And

    3 (10s):
    I'm Gina Pulice.

    1 (11s):
    We went to theater school together. We survived it, but we didn't quite understand

    3 (15s):
    It. 20 years later, we're digging deep talking to our guests about their experiences and trying to make sense of it all.

    1 (21s):
    We survived theater school and you will too. Are we famous yet?

    0 (32s):
    Podcast situation.

    1 (34s):
    Cause I was talking to someone else that had the same thing where they were trying to use video and it's like not working. So it's like tech, it's like nothing ever works. Like that's the other name of my solo show. It's like just nothing ever really works. Like we're always like, well, all this to say too that I have come to the conclusion that we are in the time period of in history that I am now calling the great unraveling. Okay, so we've got the great unraveling going on. Now listen, I, I think it's sad, but also the good news is at the end of the unraveling, if humankind has still made it, we can build a new sweater.

    1 (1m 15s):
    Do you know what I mean? Like, we're gonna have to create a

    2 (1m 17s):
    Gonna say, yeah, you get, you go, you keep going on that sweater and you know that there's problems, but you're like, maybe it won't look that bad.

    1 (1m 27s):
    And no, you have to unravel the thing at,

    2 (1m 29s):
    At some point you say, and there's that term, the myth of invested co.

    1 (1m 37s):
    Yeah, I know what you mean

    2 (1m 38s):
    Is, but it's like when you build, when you buy into this idea, Well I've come this far, I might as well keep going and

    1 (1m 45s):
    Don't keep going. So

    2 (1m 46s):
    Time investment. Yeah, no, sometimes

    1 (1m 48s):
    There's like no, there's no telling like how good it can be to just call it, just call something and be like, I'm calling it, you know, like I'm calling it and, and, and there is a tipping point of like, and I think I've told this story about my drywall holes in my apartment. The first apartment I ever had. Did I tell this story? I don't think so. Okay. This is where we are in history. We are at this point where I was, after my dad died, I lived by myself for the first time ever and I got this little apartment and I decided I was gonna put up a quote floating shelf, right? So you need to put holes in the wall and then you put Molly bolts in, they expand.

    1 (2m 32s):
    Okay. So, but you, but thing number one, it was like a thousand degrees. No, call it. Okay. Could have called it there. Didn't, in my apartment, no air conditioning thousand degrees. Summer, call it, I did not call it. I proceeded two investigate what your motherfucking walls are made of before you do this. Because plaster does not, it does not work out. So I started to drill holes with my molly with my drill. And I'm like, Oh, oh, that's interesting. The holes just kind of gets bigger and bigger and bigger. And I'm like, Yeah, but I just have to keep going. So I kept going and by the end, and then I had holes about the size of a tennis ball in each, and I was like, Okay, but maybe it'll still work.

    1 (3m 16s):
    Okay, dude, I looked around and then I moved to the shelf around. So I had multiple holes thinking it was the spot in the wall that was the pr. Oh my God, I'm alone. I don't know what's happening. I have a drill. My dad, dad left me like, I don't know what's happening. So I look around and there are chi, I'm sweating. I'm on the verge of tears and there are literally tennis ball holes all over the walls of my studio apartment. And I just think, and I, I then I stopped and I was like, okay, this is, I don't know what made me stop, but I was like, okay, this is insanity. This is the definition of insanity. Because now, yeah, the whole thing is screwed and I have to patch it all.

    1 (4m 0s):
    It was the biggest lesson of my life of like, wait a second, investigate before you start a project. And it reminds me of your family's project about the trains. Like how one of your kids is really good about planning and out and stuff. I am not that way and I'm learning to be more that way. So anyway,

    2 (4m 20s):
    Yeah, that's a part that that is I think a big part of maturing. Like I, I have the same thing. I do a lot of little crafty things, sewing and stuff like that. And the, they always tell you, measure twice and cut once. And I've ne...

  • Ryan Wagner

    Ryan Wagner

    · I Survived Theatre School

    Intro: Boz is buying a house!
    Let Me Run This By You: 47 year old Gina saw 19 year old Gina doing accent work and Mark Rannin owes me an apology.
    Interview: We talk to playwright, director, and USC alum Ryan Wagner about self-diagnosing as a bad actor, protecting your joy, Miguel Arteta, filmmaking, his short film Every Other Week, Growing Up Hip Hop, being a PA, and keeping a cohort of friends to make films with.
    FULL TRANSCRIPT (UNEDITED):
    1 (8s):
    I'm Jen Bosworth Ruez.

    2 (10s):
    And I'm Gina Paci.

    1 (11s):
    We went to theater school together. We survived it, but we didn't quite understand it.

    2 (15s):
    20 years later, we're digging deep talking to our guests about their experiences and trying to make sense of

    1 (20s):
    It all. We survived theater school and you will too. Are we famous yet? I'll be

    2 (31s):
    Recording this whole time by the way, if I just realized that

    1 (40s):
    La Tova motherfuckers. That's what I have to say. Okay.

    2 (44s):
    Universe, what is it that you're trying to tell us about why we can't do this

    1 (47s):
    Today? Okay, so what we will say is humans of the world, we had started, we thought we recorded 20 minutes ago and really we were just having a great conversation. So

    2 (59s):
    I guess you missed, you missed a great time. We'll, we'll do our best to recap, but honestly there's nothing like the energy in the moment and I'm not certain I can duplicate it.

    1 (1m 10s):
    Yes, let's not do that. So let's just, let's just say that I'm in the house buying process, but I also wanna say like, that was good to to to get out and just that, you know, it is really interesting, you know, mercurys and retrograde, all the things that people talk about. But what I'm noticing right this second in the, well, not right this second, like, you know, throughout the day, the last couple days, is that I keep tripping over my own feet. Like literally. And I keep thinking like in any shoes, any kind of, I'm tripping over myself and it's like, okay, what is the message there? And I think one of them is like slow down, but also it's okay if you stumble also.

    1 (1m 55s):
    Oh yeah. Things are kind of wonky right now. Also, you're buying a house, trying to buy a house, trying to close on the house and moving potentially. So there's a lot going on. But tripping if you find yourself, And the other thing is, I had, yeah, that really mean roommate I had here used to say like she would get super, super clumsy before like her period or during,

    2 (2m 19s):
    That's how I get. Yep.

    1 (2m 21s):
    And I'm in this weird menopause situation. So like, or prairie menopause I guess. So all the things are happening. So I'm just saying, and everyone's like, well you don't wanna buy a house during mercury and retrograde. And I'm also thinking, I know and I also think that, yeah, like the whole planet's dying and in retrograde so like, you know what I mean? Like are we really gonna pinpoint the blame Mercury for

    2 (2m 44s):
    Yeah, let's don't split hairs. The girl needs a house, she needs more space. Space. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well I'm excited for you. I think that's gonna be great. I can't wait to buy you a housewarming present. You'll have to send me your Pinterest mood board about how you're gonna Oh,

    1 (2m 59s):
    The part about this, the best part about this, well, not the best, but one of the parts, and my cousin hates it when I say this, but I have, I'm gonna have a, she shed

    2 (3m 8s):
    Nice. Your cousin hates it. Yeah. Cuz it's like, is it not PC or something?

    1 (3m 12s):
    I don't know, it just, she, No, I, she said it sounds like something peeing going on, like there's some bodily function involved, but I think it may be because it's, maybe because it's gendered too. I don't know. But I love saying she she, because of that commercial Yeah, with the lady goes Richard, some, someone burned down a she shed or whatever that for the insurance company Anyway, so I, I am going to keep everyone updated on what's going on there. The other thing I wanted to ask you was, is it fall there? The most important question.

    2 (3m 45s):
    Yeah, it's great. I mean it's like the weather is getting, you know, cool but not cold and it's still sunny mostly and yeah, no, this is what listen intellectually, I understand exactly what people mean when they say when they live in California and they say, Oh, I missed the seasons. Like if they grew up on the East coast, I, I do really understand that and it is kind of nice to have a change, but I still think I'd be fine without that too. Yeah, I'd be fine if it was just summer, I'll, I'll all year long. Well

    1 (4m 19s):
    I think because, because for me it's actually not about the weather, it's the nostalgia, right? It's like, oh with the, the things that are conjured up to me Gilmore Girl's style when I think of the fall. Right. And it is, and a lot of that has to do for me with family and like it's around my birthday and I remember walking home from like elementary school and having, being excited that I could hear the leaves crunching and I knew at my house was waiting my grandma and all the amazing

    2 (4m 50s):
    Oh,

    1 (4m 50s):
    That's nice. Yeah. But she's dead and the whole thing went to shit and my parents, So I, when I, and it is beautiful, but I also know that for me a lot of the seasons is about memories, right? It's not actually

    2 (5m 2s):
    Yeah. And I don't have that, I don't have any nostalgia about fall and winter and, you know. Right. Yeah. So that makes, it

    1 (5m 7s):
    Totally depends on the divide. Hey, by,

    2 (5m 20s):
    I mean we, we as women have so many mountains to climb and as podcasters. Okay. So Bo and I have talked several times on the show about wishing we could have a camera to record or something that would've captured any of our time in the theater school, whether it was on stage or, or or otherwise. And I don't know about you, but I resigned myself to, It's never gonna happen and we're just always gonna wonder about it. Well, don't count out Ms. Allison Zel, who recorded all of her performance. She was a director, MFA director. So it makes sense to me that she would wanna make sure she had her performances on camera.

    2 (6m 1s):
    Now I wanna reach out to the other directors of my other workshops cuz you know, I did all the workshops. So Sean Plan again and David Mold, if you are listening and you have video of any of your shows from theater school, please let me know. Okay. So, okay.

    1 (6m 19s):
    Wait, wait, wait. I just have to say one thing. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then I'll mute again. This is fantastic. Also, of course Azel of course because she was like, she was so much more to in my mind, like more sophisticated and grown up and like New York City and all the things. Yeah. So it doesn't shock me, but it does shock me. So proceed.

    2 (6m 37s):
    Yeah. Yeah. She's the kind of person who probably started doing to-do list when she was like six years old, which is what my daughters like, and those people are forces to be reckoned with. But yeah, so I did, there's a Paula Vogel play called Des Doona, a play about a Hankerchief. And so it's a feminist take on Othello because it's from the right, The fellow is that? Yeah, Okay. I just, I just flashed on Wait, that's not the right place. Yeah. And so my, and I remembered it of course as soon as I saw it I had to do this crazy accent, this crazy dialect. It was like, o...

  • Cullen Douglas

    Cullen Douglas

    · I Survived Theatre School

    Intro: Even our lungs need a sense of purpose.
    Let Me Run This By You: Boz is buying a house!
    Interview: We talk to actor and documentary filmmaker Cullen Douglas about AMDA, Florida School of the Arts, Southeastern Theatre Conference, Tyne Daly, character actors, Jason Priestly, Patricia Crotty, Our Town, Lenny Bruce, Dick Van Dyke, investigative journalism, reusing caskets, David Carr, Deadwood, playing Bilbo Baggins, being pen pals with Andrea McCardle, singing If I Were A Rich Man, The Pirates of Penzance, Bye Bye Birdie, Robert Sean Leonard, Billy Flanigan: The Happiest Man on Earth, Shonda Rhimes, Twin Peaks, Grey's Anatomy , Barry, Bill Hader, documentary filmmaking, The Humanitas Prize, Private Practice.
    FULL TRANSCRIPT (Unedited): 1 (8s):
    I'm Jen Bosworth Ruez.

    2 (10s):
    And I'm Gina Paci.

    1 (11s):
    We went to theater school together. We survived it, but we didn't quite understand it.

    2 (15s):
    20 years later, we're digging deep talking to our guests about their experiences and trying to make sense of

    1 (20s):
    It all. We survived theater school and you will too. Are we famous yet?

    3 (33s):
    TikTok and I started looking at the videos and I was like, Ooh, I don't know about this. I think I need to start wearing wake up. So thank you. You

    1 (43s):
    Look gorgeous. How are

    3 (43s):
    You doing?

    1 (44s):
    Yeah, hi. I'm finally, Many things are happening. Many things are happening. So I finally, even though I'm coughing still little, I finally feel like I am, I like kicked the pneumonia bronchitis situation and little mostly thank you. I, yeah, I, we went away and then to Ventura and I slash Ojai and I really rested and I really, there was one day I worked, but I really mostly rested and I just really was like, okay, I need actual ass downtime. And yeah.

    1 (1m 25s):
    And then I started to heal and I was also on praise God for antibiotics. And then the thing that really helped me really kick it was I hadn't exercised my lungs in a really long time at all because I was so sick that I just was like, Who wants to like walk or, and, and it was 107 degrees, so it's like, who wants to exercise in that? So my cousin, my sister came in town, I, that's like a big eyebrow raise for, to drop my niece off to college. And we went on a hike to Griffith, but like a sloping hike, not a crazy hike. And I was like, I don't think I'm gonna be able to do it.

    1 (2m 5s):
    And it actually helped my lungs to like feel like they were contributing to fucking something and me like Forgot I

    3 (2m 16s):
    Like a sense of purpose. Right,

    1 (2m 17s):
    Right. And also like to, yeah, to have a job. And they were like, like to be exercised and I was like, Oh, I forgot that. Like the lungs. And, and it's interesting in this whole covid situation, like the lungs need to work too. And I never understood in hospitals, cuz I spent quite a long time in them, why they have those breathing like tube things that you blow the ball and the ball floats up. You have to, I thought that was so dumb until I had bronchitis and pneumonia and I was like, Oh, they have to work. Like they have to be expanded. If you don't use them and work them, they get, it's not good when,

    3 (2m 58s):
    When my dad, you know, my dad had this really bad car accident when I was like nine years old and yeah, he rolled 40 times and he wasn't wearing a seatbelt, which saved his life because he was in a convertible. But of course the reason he got into the accident was because he was drinking anyway. He broke everything. Like he broke six ribs and he had one of, he had to spend one year lying on an egg crate mattress on the floor one year. And for the rest of his life, every time he sneezed or coughed it hurt his ribs. But he,

    1 (3m 34s):
    Oh, and he

    3 (3m 36s):
    Had one of of those things like you're talking about. And as a child I could not get it to the height that I was supposed to go. I shuder to think what it would be like right now. Yes. So you're, that was a good reminder to exercise our lungs. I make sure my breathing capacity is good

    1 (3m 54s):
    And, and, and even wait and, and it's like, I always literally thought, oh, you exercise to be skinny. That is the only, only reason no other, like, if you had asked me, I'd say, Oh, there's no other reason. What are you talking about? But now I'm like, oh, these parts of us need actual exercising. Literally lie. I just, it blew my mind.

    3 (4m 19s):
    I was lies

    1 (4m 21s):
    The lies.

    3 (4m 22s):
    It's endless. Yes.

    1 (4m 27s):
    Hey, let me run this by you. Oh, I think we're buying a house. What? This is the craziest Oh my not in, Yeah. Okay. This is what went down. So this is so crazy. Miles' job stuff has evened out in terms of like, there's just so much going on that I can't talk about, but which is makes for terrible radio, but podcasting. But anyway, the point is we're we're a little stable, so we went to Ventura and I was like, I fucking love this town. I love Ventura. It's an hour away. It's a weird like, think lost boys, right? Like Lost Boys. The movie is, is really Santa Cruzi, but like, that's what this town reminded of.

    1 (5m 9s):
    It's not, so it's Adventurer county, so it's like an hour northwest. It's on the beach. And I was like, I love this town. I I I love it here. There's so many brown folk. It's heavily, heavily you Latina. And it's like, so anyway, I was like, I love it, but I bet I can't afford it like anywhere in California. Well it turns out that Ventura is about 500,000 less on a house than la. So I was like, wait, what? So we saw this darling house that was, that is was small but like beautiful craftsman and you know, I'll just say I'll be totally transparent with $729,000, which is still a shit ton of money.

    1 (5m 49s):
    But I looked at the same exact property almost in, in, in Pasadena for 1.3 million for two bedroom, one bath. Yeah. Two bedroom, one bath got preapproved. I've never been preapproved for anything in my goddamn light. We got preapproved for a mortgage. I couldn't, Gina, I couldn't. But when we got the preapproval letter, like I literally, speaking of lies, I was like, oka...

  • Jackie Burns

    Jackie Burns

    · I Survived Theatre School

    We talk to Wicked's own Elphaba, Jackie Burns!
    FULL TRANSCRIPT (unedited):
    0 (2s):
    Hello? Hello. Hello survivors. How I've missed you. I've missed talking to you boss. And I took quite a number of weeks off. Well, I did. She, she actually continued to record for at least one week while I was gone. And she's got a great interview. We've got a great interview coming up. She talked to Jackie burns, little Jackie burns on Broadway, wicked playing Elphaba. No big deal. Actually. She has a big deal and she's great. And so were all of you. I am heartened because even though we've taken all this time off, we've continued to grow our listenership.

    0 (47s):
    So thank you to you for listening, for continuing to listen for being a first-time listener. If you are thank you for being here, it's a privilege actually, to be able to have a platform to speak one's mind is truly a privilege. And one, I hope we do right by. We're going to be right back into the swing of things with interviews, regular weekly interviews in the fall. So stay tuned for that. And in the meantime, please enjoy this interview with Jackie burns and I'm Gina Kalichi

    3 (1m 34s):
    To theater school together. We survived it, but we didn't quite understand.

    0 (1m 38s):
    20 years later, we're digging deep talking to our guests about their experiences and trying to make sense of it all.

    3 (1m 43s):
    We survived theater school and you will too. Are we famous yet?

    2 (1m 56s):
    Here's the thing. Jackie burns. Congratulations. You survived theater school and you also survived this hellish trying to get you on. So squad quest squad cast, which we usually use is totally wonky this morning. And I was like, no, I, because I'm obsessed with you because I'd been researching you. I'm not a musical theater person, but I am one of these musical theater lovers that has so much reverie. And I think it is a sacred thing to sing and I don't really do it. And so I'm obsessed and you and I have the same birthday, October 4, 10, 4, buddy, ten four. So You're a little younger than me, five years, but that's okay.

    2 (2m 41s):
    I'm still, I'm super obsessed. And I also like I, when I watch, so I'm known for like going to high schools and middle schools and watching musical theater of people I'd have no connection to in what I was at when I was in Chicago, because I adore the art form and I don't do it, but I'm obsessed. So anyway, start, start from the beginning. You grew up in Connecticut. How, and then obviously you're a Broadway star. Are you back working in on Broadway? What's happening with you right now?

    5 (3m 13s):
    Oh my God. What is happening?

    2 (3m 15s):
    Yeah. I looked at your, I looked at all your profiles, but I want to hear it from you. Where are you post sort of pandemic. What is happening with your career? Tell us,

    5 (3m 27s):
    Oh God. Well like every musical theater theater,

    2 (3m 31s):
    Just say star, just say star, you are a star. You're a musical theater star. Like I understand for someone like I write for TV and I act sometimes, but like I musical theater people when I see them on stage, I'm like, I, the, the, the amount of brilliance it takes and dedication to, I have trouble on set, just moving my body and say, and you sing and move and dance and all the things. Okay. Okay. So what's happening with your career?

    5 (4m 2s):
    Oh my God. Well, first of all, Jen, I'm obsessed with you because I wish the rest of the world felt the same way about musical theater people because all of I'm most TV and film people are like, oh, you're not a real actor because you,

    2 (4m 13s):
    No, I would love to cast, listen, listen, what I mean? I would love to catch you and all your cohort when I do, because here's the thing. The body spatial awareness of musical theater folks, to know where they are in space translates onto set. So everyone listening, the 10,000 people that have downloaded this podcast that will continue to hire musical theater folks on television and film because they know bodies and bodies. It's not just a head people. So anyway, okay, go ahead. Sorry. I keep interrupting. I'm just like,

    5 (4m 46s):
    Nope. I love you. You're like making me feel so good about myself. But as every theater person, all we want to do is get on TV and film.

    2 (4m 55s):
    Oh, right. It's that's holds true for musical theater folks too. I assume that's where the dough is. Is that

    5 (5m 1s):
    That's where that money is. Because if you think about it, like once the theater show closes, we don't get a back end of it. So like, that's it. Your paycheck's done.

    2 (5m 9s):
    There's no residuals.

    5 (5m 10s):
    There's no residual.

    2 (5m 12s):
    Yeah. Okay. So, okay. So tell me what is happening now? You said you got your insurance back, which is

    5 (5m 17s):
    Paula that's hope. It's always helpful. I just did a new musical called a walk on the moon. That was based off the movie. No,

    2 (5m 27s):
    No,

    5 (5m 29s):
    No. I'll walk in the cloud. Like very similar. No,

    2 (5m 33s):
    She's dope. I like to

    5 (5m 34s):
    Have her with like Viggo, Mortensen, Schreiber. And when it was like back in the day, it's a good movie. Tony, Tony Goldwyn, like directed it and stuff. And he actually came and saw the musical. Did

    2 (5m 47s):
    He give you a compliment?

    5 (5m 49s):
    Yes, he was very nice. It was also like super handsome. You're like, hi,

    2 (5m 52s):
    I have heard. Yes.

    5 (5m 54s):
    You're just like, hello? Oh, you're married Ella and there's no, no, no, no, no. And my boyfriend's gonna listen to be like,

    2 (6m 6s):
    No, no, no. That's okay. That's okay.

    5 (6m 8s):
    No, he knows. He knows that I'm just joking. I'm just stroking on there. No. And then Pam gray wrote it. Who wrote the, who wrote the script as well? Yeah. And it's really good. And we just closed and they're hoping to bring it to Broadway. So fingers crossed. But the problem is, is that Broadway because it was closed for two years. All these shows have been trying to get theater. So that were like low man on the total whole cause it's like two years worth of shows trying to get to Broadway.

    2 (6m 37s):
    Correct.

    5 (6m 37s):
    So it's, and we're just like a little show rather than like a big show, so

    2 (6m 43s):
    Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. But still worked. You have worked post pandemic, which is a huge thing. Okay. So tell me, were you a kid? Who did you grow up? You grew up in Connecticut. I'm assuming, were you a kid? Like you were five and you were like, just ho like you knew you could sing or what, how did that go? How does that, how do you discover that you can freaking sing?

    5 (7m 6s):
    You're so cute. I'm going to like put your pocket. Your energy is like seven. I'm going to be a best friend now.

    2 (7m 13s):
    And we'll together. We'll try to, we'll try to have a television show. That's like, I know they did it kind of with glee, but like Glebe, like less sassy and more earnest.

    5 (7m 23s):
    Yes. I am interested Jen, get

    2 (7m 26s):
    And throwing some murders because I, I write a lot of murder. Yeah.

    5 (7m 29s):
    Oh, I love that. That's what

    2 (7m 31s):
    Musical murders. Great. Okay. So you, you were a kid and how did this happen? That you were like, dude, I can be on stage and sing.

    5 (7m 38s):
    I just like always was obsessed with it. Like, so I started dancing when I was three and then, but like I used to get on like the little like Hutch, you know, like the fireplace such as my stage and sing, sing to like Michael Jackson's thriller. And I just like, yeah. And I used to, when I used to go to dance, like as I got older, we drove like 45 minutes. My mom drove me very sweet to dance class. And I used to sin...

  • Let's All Tend Our Own Victory Gardens

    Let's All Tend Our Own Victory Gardens

    · I Survived Theatre School

    Toxic showrunners, giving feedback, halitosis, The Taking of Pelham 123, Victory Gardens Theatre, Autism Spectrum Disorder.

    FULL TRANSCRIPT (unedited):
    2 (10s):
    And I'm Gina Kalichi.

    3 (11s):
    We went to theater school together. We survived it, but we didn't quite understand it.

    4 (15s):
    20 years later, we're digging deep talking to our guests about their experiences and trying to make sense of it all.

    3 (21s):
    We survived theater school and you will too. Are we famous yet?

    2 (34s):
    You're committed to that, Joe, how you doing pal

    1 (41s):
    For your big adventure?

    2 (42s):
    Getting ready for my Pee-wee's big adventure, by the way, I watched that movie again, not too long ago and I liked it even more. I

    1 (53s):
    Was so thrilled to hear.

    2 (54s):
    Yeah. I really, really liked that movie. I think it's so funny. The other thing I, oh, so you had texted me earlier about into the woods.

    1 (1m 3s):
    Oh yeah. I actually genuinely wanted to know cause is this w two in this episode, are we going to hear from C? Like, is this the,

    2 (1m 12s):
    He didn't make the cut. I'm sorry.

    1 (1m 16s):
    Are you kidding?

    2 (1m 17s):
    I'm not kidding. It just, it did. Well, it was,

    1 (1m 21s):
    Oh gee. I feel sad in my heart. What?

    2 (1m 25s):
    I'm sorry. It was just boring. It was just boring. You know, there's an age that kids reach. There's just a line. They go past a line. It's like, okay, you're not as

    1 (1m 35s):
    Sweet a minute. Wait a minute because it's

    2 (1m 37s):
    When they're not. So it's it's because she's no, she's self-aware

    1 (1m 41s):
    I like had the bus time.

    2 (1m 43s):
    I'm so glad and I'll forever treasure it in my heart as this beautiful, lovely conversation that I, and, and my family and you will love, but it was not giving me it was not giving me. Okay,

    1 (1m 57s):
    Great. Well, that's important. Like maybe it was a good, like,

    2 (2m 2s):
    It was a good experience. It was a good experience for her and, you know, and we had wanted to do it. And so when, when, when I did crew for, into the woods, you know, we had to listen

    1 (2m 15s):
    To that.

    2 (2m 18s):
    We had to listen to that song or that, that music constantly. And actually, I think that when you, when we were in crew, like we didn't get to see the show

    1 (2m 29s):
    Ever. Never, never knew

    2 (2m 31s):
    Listen to something only, and you don't get to take in the whole thing. It's just not the same. And so I had it in my mind that I really hated that show. And when the movie came out, my kids were really interested in seeing it. I kind of liked it. I at least understood the story. I was at least like, oh, this is what this is about. But seeing it on Broadway, I was like, okay, now I get it. I get it. I totally get why. And it's not just that it was on Broadway. Is that I understand what it's about now, because,

    1 (3m 10s):
    Well, I think, I also think it's so interesting about the theater school aspect, right? So when we were in theater school, we, I didn't have any capacity to understand about loss and love. Yeah,

    2 (3m 28s):
    Yeah, yeah. So it was great. So I loved to NPV. I loved so I've, I'm actually, I had wanted a lump for a long time to ask you, you told me about a few things that you've watched rewatch haven't hold held up, which we all have those things. It's like, oh, this is not nearly as good as I thought it was, or it's funny, but what has, have, has anything gotten better? Like you didn't appreciate it at the time. And then

    1 (3m 55s):
    Yeah. So all the like old political movies or movies that have a bent with social justice stuff like, so the taking of Pelham 1, 2, 3 is my favorite movie of all time.

    2 (4m 11s):
    I don't even know what that is.

    1 (4m 13s):
    You have to, they made a remake with Denzel Washington and John Travolta that's horrific, but the original is Walter Matthau and a bunch of other dope actors. And it's about, it's a train heist movie. It's about New York city and the train thunder, obviously the subway being taken over brilliant acting, brilliant writing, great social commentary about the haves and haves nots anyway. So that has held up and gotten better. But all of John Hughes movies should be burned in a heap,

    2 (4m 53s):
    Just trash.

    1 (4m 54s):
    What, what the fuck? What are we doing?

    2 (4m 57s):
    God, there's so much, we didn't know. There's just so much. We didn't know. And actually that's been kind of, my theme recently is like, you know how we always say, oh man, think about how many people before there was this acceptance around LGBTQ, think about how many people just died and you know, for him, for all of history up until that point, it was just horrible for those people. And I, so I've been wondering recently, well, okay, well, so what's our version of that. What's our thing that we don't know. We, we ascribe something to something that it's not, and that we'll understand later or, or not at all. And one example is autism.

    2 (5m 42s):
    I have recently learned that somebody I love is on the spectrum and it has really positively changed my perception. It's literally like a person does a behavior and you interpret it this one way and then you learn something. And then that same behavior no longer is interpreted that way.

    1 (6m 13s):
    Absolutely

    2 (6m 14s):
    Behavior that drove me crazy made me angry, riled me up. Now I'm like, oh, you have autism. Got it, got it. I'm so sorry. I didn't get it. And actually I'm looking back through my family tree and I'm going, oh, I bet my mom's mom had autism. And actually she had a therapist who said that to her at once. And when my mom told me that I'm like, what? She didn't have autism, but she was on the spectrum. Right. When rain man came out, it taught us that it made us think that all autism was that right.

    1 (6m 49s):
    Right. Was like savant or like, so on the other end of the spectrum, right? Oh my gosh. Yeah. So autism. Yeah. That's so interesting. Well, you know, I, I think I've mentioned on the podcast that like, I use the word lame and my cousin called me on it and I called someone else on it recently. And that's how change is made. Like literally. And so there is, I'm like obsessed with the idea of how does real change get made? Like not in, just in words, but like, what is the alchemy that happens with change?

    1 (7m 32s):
    And I know the answer, but I'm doing a lot of research.

    2 (7m 36s):
    Well, the thing that you just mentioned about using that word reminds me of in medical school or medical training, it's they say, see one, do one, teach one. So when you're learning procedures, you watch it once you do it once and then you teach it, like, that's, that's the, that's the rate at which you're expected to absorb information, but actually that's exactly what you did with that word. You heard that you heard or saw that, that wasn't okay. You started to do the right thing yourself and then you taught somebody else. But that's how change happens.

    1 (8m 18s):
    Let me run this by you. <inaudible> with this highlight

    2 (8m 32s):
    Beachy wave, actually, that's funny because earlier today I was like, should I get my hair cut before

    1 (8m 38s):
    I love that? See what you want? So it change the way change gets made. Okay. I have a little story about a show about show running. Okay. I was talking to it. What I want to ask you. I was talking to a friend and she's dope and she's a new friend and she's fancy. Or, and then I am in terms of where she's at in her career as a writer. Okay, fine. Has this great idea for a series has a lit agent, lit agent says, Hey, every production company read this dope script and th...

  • Playboy

    Playboy

    · I Survived Theatre School

    Intro: Image management, Glenn Davis, King James, Odd Mom Out, Hamilton, Abbott Elementary, The Method
    Let Me Run This By You: Dads and pornography, Secrets of Playboy, The Girls Next Door, Stranger Things.
    FULL TRANSCRIPT (UNEDITED):
    2 (10s):
    And I'm Gina <inaudible>.

    1 (11s):
    We went to theater school together. We survived it, but we didn't quite understand it.

    3 (15s):
    20 years later, we're digging deep talking to our guests about their experiences and trying to make sense of it all.

    1 (21s):
    We survived theater school and you will too. Are we famous yet?

    2 (32s):
    Yeah, it's it's it's up for debate. So you got to both interview and then see Glenn Davis in a play. So tell us about,

    1 (43s):
    So I will say that I haven't seen a play. I saw Hamilton in LA, which isn't a play to me. It's a musical and it's also a spectacle and like, I don't know.

    2 (54s):
    And a cultural and that like, did you ever see, wait, I'm sorry to give a little time out, but there used to be this show on Bravo called odd mom out. And I loved it because it was about a upper east side woman who like, just didn't relate and like clock in that well with mommy culture, which I can really relate

    1 (1m 15s):
    Over there.

    2 (1m 16s):
    And there's this scene where she's talking to some other moms or I don't know, just other women. And they were like, have you seen Hamilton? And she says, no. And it precipitates is like very, you know, heightened dramatic thing where like people's jobs are under hinges. Let's say like,

    1 (1m 39s):
    That's hilarious.

    2 (1m 41s):
    Yeah. So it's an event you have to, you have to have seen how.

    1 (1m 44s):
    And so I thought in life, right in pop culture and in, you know, whatever. So, yeah, exactly. So I saw that, but this was the first play I've seen now to be fair. It's also a spectacle in that the mark taper, like the center theater group situation downtown LA has like six theaters or seven theaters. I had not been to the mark taper theater since literally 2000 and I don't know, two and it's gorgeous and quite a deal. And wow, just the facilities. I mean, I'm so used to shithole storefront theater that I was like, oh, this is like, oh, this is fancy. Okay.

    1 (2m 24s):
    So I saw king James, which is a play. It was a two hander. I didn't know that it's two people on stage the whole time. And it's Glenn Davis and this other character. Who's one of the stars on a show that I love called Abbott elementary, which is hilarious about

    2 (2m 39s):
    Brunson. I have seen that show, but I heard it.

    1 (2m 41s):
    Yes. Oh, you would love it. It's high Lariat. And just so, so, so well-written okay. So this guy, Chris Paul, something I'm going to butcher his name. So I won't try is the other character plays the other character in the play and I didn't know what to expect. I love basketball if by basketball, you mean the bulls in the nineties basketball. That's where I stop. So

    2 (3m 8s):
    I'll do basketball.

    1 (3m 10s):
    Yeah. I'm into nostalgia. Exactly. That specifically relates to a very niche time in history. Okay. In Chicago. So, okay. So this is a play about LeBron James and it's set in Cleveland and it is set like in the, I want to say the arts and then it spans the time I believe of like 10 years, maybe a little more. And it's just these two characters. I didn't know what to expect. I didn't know shit about the play, which is how I like to go in. But Glen gave me was kind enough to give me comps. And I went with two friends and I loved it. I loved it. I at first. Okay. It was so interesting.

    1 (3m 50s):
    Like I've been spending so much time doing writing and reading television that like, I was like, oh, this is a play. Oh, oh, this is a different thing. It's like super presentational on purpose.

    2 (4m 5s):
    Right.

    1 (4m 6s):
    So it's not a, it's not television. And these are like

    2 (4m 10s):
    Mumble core.

    1 (4m 11s):
    It's not mumble core. It's not, it's not, they they're they're they can hear us. If we say noises and things make noises and things. So I was like, oh, right, right. The seats were great. And you know, it was a lot of white people in the audience, but like that's who sees theater, right? Like that's who sees this kind of theater. I think, you know, tickets were probably very expensive anyways. So I loved, okay. So you could tell that they, they had to get warm. First of all, I was closing day. We didn't see the closing show. There's there like to show a day kind of people. And so we saw the first show at one and of the last day. And the first scene you could tell, like they had, they were like, just getting warmed up because that's how live theater is by the second scene.

    1 (4m 56s):
    I was like, oh, these are pros. Oh, these are pros. Meaning the language moves. Now, look, they've done two runs of the show, one in Chicago at Steppenwolf and one here. So they've been the same cast. So they've been working with this material. Right. So they, they know what's going on here, but they're just both like seamlessly like a basketball game or like any sporting event. Like the physicality was brilliant. I just was like, oh, these are pros. Oh, okay. There's no, this is not a stiff cause I'm also used to teaching students. Right. So these are not students of a young students. These are oppressed. And I was like, oh shit, okay.

    1 (5m 38s):
    This is some real top level acting here. You know,

    2 (5m 42s):
    I really appreciated when in his interview with you, he said that doing the play expanded his ideas about theater goer, since you mentioned, yes. Typically all theater goers are white and older because they have the time and the money. And because it's, for all of history it's been made for them, it's been made for that demographic. But he was saying, doing this play brought a bunch of people who were not theater people, but who were basketball, people who enjoyed it. And, and that gave me a thrill like, yes, that's what we need because the re the whole perpetuation of the cycle of like, why people don't appreciate or go into theater is because if they don't get exposed to it, you know, at, at a young age.

    2 (6m 27s):
    And so that just keeps perpetuating itself. And in order for that to change, you have to, you have to sell people on wanting to have more of it. You know what I'm saying?

    1 (6m 38s):
    Yes. And so I totally know what you're saying. And I, that leads me to this thing of I, so there is this position that opened up for 15 hours a week, being an artist in residence at San Diego state, in the theater department to create art with the theater department there, but also with the community at large. And I have to say to you, if I get it, I applied. And my idea is to do, because I love monologues. Like, that's my jam. So like, what if I want to create some kind of show? That's like a community-based show where people get to write and perform their own monologues in the community in San Diego, not just students, but like the store ...

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