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Speaker 1: I'm Alec Baldwin. Then you were listening to Here's the

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Speaker 1: Thing from My Heart Radio. My guests today are two

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Speaker 1: of my all time favorite musical theater actors, Ken Paige

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Speaker 1: and Betty Buckley, and there are parallels to their stories.

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Speaker 1: Both grew up dreaming of performing on Broadway. Ken in St. Louis,

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Speaker 1: Betty and fort Worth both were cast in the original

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Speaker 1: Broadway production of Cats, Ken as Old Deuteronomy and Betty

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Speaker 1: as Guizzabella, for which she wanted Tony. Both became key

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Speaker 1: figures in the vibrant community that transformed musical theater over

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Speaker 1: the past several decades. In addition to being the voice

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Speaker 1: of Broadway, Betty Buckley's acting chops earned her roles as

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Speaker 1: the step mom on the hit TV series Eight Is

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Speaker 1: Enough and in films including Carrie, Tender Mercies, and Frantic.

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Speaker 1: But first, I'm talking with Ken Page. You may know

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Speaker 1: him as the voice of Bogie Boogie in The Night

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Speaker 1: There Before Christmas. In his breakout role on Broadway, he

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Speaker 1: played Nicely Nicely Johnson in an all black revival of

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Speaker 1: Guys and Dolls in nineteen seventy six. He went on

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Speaker 1: to perform as the Lion in the Whiz and in

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Speaker 1: the original cast of Ain't Misbehavior. Ken Paige was drawn

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Speaker 1: to musical theater early. Yeah, it was my life blood.

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Speaker 1: It was the thing that got me out of where

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Speaker 1: I was to where I went. It was the thing

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Speaker 1: that kept me going through years of up and down

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Speaker 1: childhood things. But it was always musical theater and all

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Speaker 1: of that related world that got me through. I mean,

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Speaker 1: I remember being ten and eleven, of course, watching Barbara

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Speaker 1: strei Sen's TV special going I Am Barbara Streisand and

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Speaker 1: I would go to the library in St. Louis, the

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Speaker 1: big Public Library, and in the basement they had a

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Speaker 1: section of LPs, and I would thumb through all of

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Speaker 1: these Broadway cast albums. I would read the line of notes,

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Speaker 1: and this one lady when I first couple of times

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Speaker 1: that came, she was a little triviuted, like what are

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Speaker 1: you doing in here? And she saw, you know, I'd

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Speaker 1: be sitting on the floor reading Broadway cast album liner notes,

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Speaker 1: and I'm sure she thought, is this child from Mars?

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Speaker 1: Or was was the deal? But I started to educate

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Speaker 1: myself that early about musical theater because it just fascinated me.

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Speaker 1: And of course the own two only things that I

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Speaker 1: really saw was the Tony Awards once a year, and

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Speaker 1: I would see all the shows and I was fascinated

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Speaker 1: by it. And we had this grand outdoor theater still

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Speaker 1: have in St. Louis called at that time it was

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Speaker 1: the Municipal Opera and now it's called the Muni, so

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Speaker 1: a lot of people in the business know the Muni.

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Speaker 1: And that was the first time I saw a live

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Speaker 1: production on stage. It was Oklahoma with Robert Horton as

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Speaker 1: Curly and he came out on a real horse. And

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Speaker 1: all those people in Missouri demand no less, they must

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Speaker 1: have a real horse. That's right, show me to show

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Speaker 1: me state. So he came out on a horse, and

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Speaker 1: of course when you see something like that, you fall

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Speaker 1: in love with it. And subsequently it's a lot of shows.

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Speaker 1: And it was the theater that made me really fall

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Speaker 1: in love with musical theater because I could see it.

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Speaker 1: And then it was the theater that inspired me to

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Speaker 1: move to New York. And when did you study voice acting?

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Speaker 1: I did acting school. I did. I went to two

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Speaker 1: years at Fontbonne University in St. Louis in a scholarship.

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Speaker 1: I like to say this because now I'm over fifty.

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Speaker 1: I can brag right. I received a scholarship in art

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Speaker 1: music for vocal performance and theater, and I chose theater subsequently.

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Speaker 1: At the same time those two summers, I did seasons

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Speaker 1: at the Muni in the ensemble I started when I

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Speaker 1: was eighteen, those two shows of the Muni. With those

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Speaker 1: your first two shows you did. Had you been doing

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Speaker 1: shows when you were younger? When did you start performing

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Speaker 1: in front of people? In front of people? Really sixth grade,

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Speaker 1: I was part of a thing here in Saying. It

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Speaker 1: was called the Bellerman's Speech League, which my cousin had

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Speaker 1: been in, but it was one of those competitive citywide things.

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Speaker 1: So that was really the first time I stepped in

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Speaker 1: front of people performing ring. And then of course in

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Speaker 1: high school I did your usual high school musical's Funny Girl, Oliver, Hello,

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Speaker 1: Dolly Fitler on the Route And it was that that

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Speaker 1: led me to audition for scholarship or college, which I got.

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Speaker 1: I wish at the time I'd known about Juilliard and

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Speaker 1: Goodman and schools like that, but they really didn't promote

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Speaker 1: it because the idea was stay here and go to school,

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Speaker 1: and St. Louis has a very home grown mentality that way,

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Speaker 1: and it really wasn't promoted to me to audition for

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Speaker 1: The Goodman, which was only in Chicago, and certainly not Juilliard,

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Speaker 1: which was New York. And I think, not to be egotistical,

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Speaker 1: but I think I might have really been able to

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Speaker 1: to get into those schools and for so for you,

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Speaker 1: I wonder it's it's like, and again I'm gonna say

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Speaker 1: this eleven times during the course of this interview, but

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Speaker 1: you're so talented. I mean, you are so talented. You

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Speaker 1: like the male musical theater, Annie Oakley, boom boom boom.

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Speaker 1: Anything you can do, I can you can do better than.

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Speaker 1: But if you've gone to those Nancy schools, what would

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Speaker 1: have changed everything? You think? So everything? Oh? Sure, Because

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Speaker 1: first of all, to go to any of those schools,

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Speaker 1: you're living away from home. So that's the first big change,

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Speaker 1: which means you explore your life, never mind the education,

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Speaker 1: you explore your life differently. For me, I think being

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Speaker 1: away from St. Louis would have made a big difference

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Speaker 1: in how I explored what I was doing. My mentor,

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Speaker 1: God Bless and rest him, Don Garner, when I realized

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Speaker 1: that I wanted to go to New York, I went

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Speaker 1: to him and I said, look, I think I want

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Speaker 1: to go to New York, and you shut the door

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Speaker 1: to his office. He says, all right, I didn't say this,

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Speaker 1: but I think you will learn in the next two

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Speaker 1: years in New York what you would It would take

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Speaker 1: you six years here to learn if you go and

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Speaker 1: apply yourself and really do what I think you would

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Speaker 1: do or will do. And indeed, by the two years

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Speaker 1: when my class graduated, I was in my first Broadway show,

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Speaker 1: which was an all black revival of Guys and Dolls. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: and how long did that run? Not long? Now? What

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Speaker 1: what do you attribute that too? Well, it was very

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Speaker 1: controversial because at one it was an all black version

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Speaker 1: of something, and then this is minus nineteen seventies six,

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Speaker 1: so things hadn't moved quite nearly as far as they

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Speaker 1: have come to thus hard. And also it was Guys

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Speaker 1: and Dolls, which is a sacred musical theater piece. And

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Speaker 1: there were people who were pro because you know, pro

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Speaker 1: Bailey's version of Hello Dolly had already happened, and people thought,

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Speaker 1: oh my god, that was wonderful, so dusk Guys and Dolls.

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Speaker 1: But I think because Hello Dolly is such a the

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Speaker 1: whole from Thornton Wilder on it's such an open book

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Speaker 1: of who these people are. Guys and Dolls was a

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Speaker 1: very specific New York Jewish idiom. So there were people

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Speaker 1: who thought we had no business tampering, tinkering, tooling with

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Speaker 1: guys and dolls. And then there were other people who thought,

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Speaker 1: thank god, there's some different energy on it and our production,

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Speaker 1: the the arrangements, since we couldn't change a note of

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Speaker 1: the music. But that's all another story. The arrangements had

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Speaker 1: a sort of a wa waca waca disco kind of

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Speaker 1: thing running under and when you hear the Broadway cast

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Speaker 1: album now, it's really very electric and alive. People loved it.

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Speaker 1: Those who loved I remember, may I say Rex Read

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Speaker 1: said something about saying that songs sit down, you're rocking

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Speaker 1: the boat, and he said I turned it into a

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Speaker 1: gospel stomp and it was just terrible. Oh, Rex was

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Speaker 1: unkind to you, I'd say, yeah, but he was unkind

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Speaker 1: to everybody, but he was specifically. But it was interesting

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Speaker 1: because I always remember thinking, even then, at twenty one,

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Speaker 1: I thought, what didn't Frank Lesser write a gospel number?

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Speaker 1: Isn't that what this is supposed to be? These people

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Speaker 1: in the Savus all mission and its gospel tinge and

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Speaker 1: so all we really did was took it the next

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Speaker 1: step towards what he was writing to begin with, which

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Speaker 1: I think the last eight measures of the song go

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Speaker 1: sit down, you're rocking, Sit down, sit down, sit down,

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Speaker 1: you're rocking the boat blah blah blah blah. Were they

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Speaker 1: allowed us to change that to the devil drag you under.

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Speaker 1: It was so so heavy you never bloat, sit down,

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Speaker 1: sit down? Is it down? Sit huh? Which took it

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Speaker 1: in another direction. Well that was successful in uf that

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Speaker 1: the audience would scream and carry on and they loved it.

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Speaker 1: So then they wrote an encore which is completely new,

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Speaker 1: and sometimes the encore would get two and three renditions

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Speaker 1: a night. Thank god I was twenty one, you know,

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Speaker 1: because the people dream and they'd applaud and they go

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Speaker 1: on and Joe Marshall, God Resting was our drummer. It

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Speaker 1: was really he who decided he'd listened to the crowd

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Speaker 1: and he looked at me, and he listened to the crowd,

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Speaker 1: and then he'd hit the drum field but had a dream.

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Speaker 1: And the more the people screamed, of course, we do

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Speaker 1: it again and again again. So I'm saying that to

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Speaker 1: say that was one of the things out of that

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Speaker 1: show that kept it going, frankly, because people came to

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Speaker 1: see what was new in Guys and Dolls. You weren't

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Speaker 1: in The Whiz prior to Guys and Does No. I've

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Speaker 1: seen that written a few places, and I always try

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Speaker 1: to correct it because Guys and Dolls was nineteen seventy

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Speaker 1: six and I didn't go into The Whiz until late

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Speaker 1: seventy almost seventy seven. So you go from one adaptation

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Speaker 1: of a sacred musical to another adaptation of someone. I'm

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Speaker 1: sure you also were impersonating in the bathroom with a

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Speaker 1: brush in your hand, Judy Garland, when you go do

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Speaker 1: the Whiz? Was it a different bowl of wax there?

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Speaker 1: And the way you were treated with adapting Wizard of

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Speaker 1: Us with a podcast, Oh god, because The Whiz was

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Speaker 1: unapologetically black, even though based on L. Frank Baum's in

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Speaker 1: the music and so forth. But the Whiz open and

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Speaker 1: that was a blockbuster. It wasn't at first they actually

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Speaker 1: had the closing notice up, and then Ken Harper went

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Speaker 1: to twenty Century Fox. They invested in a TV commercial

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Speaker 1: and it was so great, and then they went to

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Speaker 1: the churches in Brooklyn. Stephanie Mills belonged to the biggest church,

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Speaker 1: African American church in Brooklyn. They went to them. They

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Speaker 1: then went to Sister brother churches. All of these people

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Speaker 1: started buying tickets and came in bust loos and we

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Speaker 1: know the dollar rules. So as long as there were

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Speaker 1: people there, the show was going to keep running by

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Speaker 1: virtue of its staying where it was. The word of

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Speaker 1: mouth picked up and then other people started coming. Finished

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Speaker 1: that story to say that by the time it got

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Speaker 1: around to the Tony Awards, they were nominated for eleven

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Speaker 1: Tony Awards. I think they won six. So guys and

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Speaker 1: Dolls nicely, nicely, the Lion and the Whiz and these

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Speaker 1: are not lead roles. You're playing more supporting roles. And

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Speaker 1: the next thing is ain't misbehavior and correct and when

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Speaker 1: you do that, you get a lead role in Ain't Misbehaving? Yeah, well,

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Speaker 1: you know, I mean it's interesting because the five characters,

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Speaker 1: if you will, and amos behavior, we're all supporting people.

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Speaker 1: So the five of us really were the leads, but

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Speaker 1: we were used to being supporting people, so we supported

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Speaker 1: each other in the way that we had supported other people.

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Speaker 1: In productions, which made it a very powerful ensemble. When

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Speaker 1: did you notice that you walked in the room and

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Speaker 1: everybody sat up and they were like, it'sken, you know

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Speaker 1: what I mean? Like you really the town started to

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Speaker 1: adopt you, that you were part of a business in

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Speaker 1: an industry in New York. That was the blessing of

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Speaker 1: guys and dolls is that I did a beloved role

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Speaker 1: and by me having some sort of a personal signature

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Speaker 1: on it, it separated me from the great stu w k.

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Speaker 1: So Broadway sort of said who is this I remember

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Speaker 1: Clive Barnes. I didn't know who he was at the time,

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Speaker 1: but he wrote a sort of love letter in The

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Speaker 1: Times and saying who is this guy? Where did he

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Speaker 1: come from? People calling me up saying did you read

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Speaker 1: that thing at the Times this morning? Clive Barnes wrote

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Speaker 1: you a love letter? And I'm like, well, who is

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Speaker 1: Clive Barnes? First of all, they're like, okay, letters, he

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Speaker 1: writing me love letters. But what it did was it

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Speaker 1: opened the door to Broadway and it said this guy

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Speaker 1: is Broadway caliber. Wherever he came from, welcome dot dot dot.

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Speaker 1: So it sort of sucked me right into the center

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Speaker 1: of the Broadway community immediately and then they get to

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Speaker 1: do The Whiz behind it, which was a huge, huge,

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Speaker 1: huge hit and still very much at the top of

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Speaker 1: the list of appreciate it shows. I'll tell this story

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Speaker 1: and I think you'll know what I mean. I had

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Speaker 1: done a club act at Leemouche. You know, it was

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Speaker 1: a big disco, but it was also a big club

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Speaker 1: there too. I did a tribute it to all of

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Speaker 1: the black shows who were running abroad WITHY at the time,

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Speaker 1: and there were many at the time, and I sort

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Speaker 1: of linked them. I didn't songs from Raisin and the

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Speaker 1: Whiz and of course Guys and Dolls and a couple

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Speaker 1: of and I would link them together with He's on

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Speaker 1: down the Road, Okay, let's go on, we go, He's

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Speaker 1: on down He's on down road to raise it and blow.

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Speaker 1: And some of the people from the Whiz came to

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Speaker 1: see my show because I was in Guys and Dolls

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Speaker 1: and they heard so they called me in shortly after

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Speaker 1: Guys and Dolls closed, and I had auditioned for The

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Speaker 1: Whiz before, and I just knew I was perfect for

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Speaker 1: it because I had seen the out of town tryout

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Speaker 1: in Detroit, and I went in and I sang men

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Speaker 1: no line and they said, thank you, that's it. I

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Speaker 1: know I'm right for this put How damn you say

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Speaker 1: that like that? So when it came back around, my

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Speaker 1: agents said, well, you know, they want to see you

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Speaker 1: at the Majestic you know, And I said, hih auditioned

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Speaker 1: for the Whiz they didn't like me. He said no, no,

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Speaker 1: I don't think you understand. They saw your club act.

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Speaker 1: They want to see you at the Majestic Theater. They're

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Speaker 1: not having auditions, they're auditioning you. So I said, oh ship.

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Speaker 1: So I went in and Ken Harbor indeed was there,

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Speaker 1: and I sang the songs and he walked down to

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Speaker 1: the edge of the stage and he shook my hand

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Speaker 1: and he says, are you busy for the rest of

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Speaker 1: the afternoon? And I said no. He said good, then

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Speaker 1: go down and get your costume measurement. And it took

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Speaker 1: me a minute to understand that mean I got the part.

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Speaker 1: I was like, why, how what do you want? I wonderful? Yeah,

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Speaker 1: he said. So in answer to your question, I would say,

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Speaker 1: that's the first time people sat up when I walked

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Speaker 1: in the room. But it was still different because they

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Speaker 1: invited me into the room Broadway star Ken Paige. If

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Speaker 1: you enjoy listening to conversations with the grades of musical theater,

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Speaker 1: be sure to check out my conversation with another Broadway star,

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Speaker 1: Kelly O'Hara. Even after hos a week, I find myself

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Speaker 1: kind of dealing with all of this, all of my

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Speaker 1: innards out there. It's how I filter, it's how I process,

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Speaker 1: I think, and it's why I'm not quite tired of it.

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Speaker 1: For the most part, I find that I go inside

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Speaker 1: it as opposed to just dealing with it all out here.

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Speaker 1: You're more of my conversation with Kelly O'Hara that Here's

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Speaker 1: the Thing dot org. After the break, Ken Paige talks

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Speaker 1: about learning comedic timing from some of the best in

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Speaker 1: the business. I'm Alec Baldwin and you're listening to Here's

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Speaker 1: the Thing I dream last night. I got on the

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Speaker 1: boat to Heaven and by some chance I had brought

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Speaker 1: my das along and there are start and someone fade me.

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Speaker 1: But the acid test they do right from wrong. All

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Speaker 1: the people all sends it up. Sit down on your

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Speaker 1: rocket boat. Yes, people all sence it out. Sit down.

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Speaker 1: That's Ken Paige performing sit Down You're rocking the Boat

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Speaker 1: from the nineteen six Broadway revival of Guys and Dolls.

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Speaker 1: During his tenure on Broadway, Ken Paige would often perform

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Speaker 1: solo in smaller clubs. Oftentimes, his cast mates and other

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Speaker 1: performers were his best audience with the Broadway community, especially

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Speaker 1: back then. You were in that show at that time,

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Speaker 1: but you were still part of a larger community at large.

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Speaker 1: However long you've been around, chances are you'd worked with

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Speaker 1: just about anybody or everybody at some point. So there

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Speaker 1: was a serious sense of community, that support of people,

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Speaker 1: knew people. I can't even tell you. I remember doing

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Speaker 1: again Guys and Dolls A Burrows, who of course was

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Speaker 1: a towering figure in the musical theater him teaching me

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Speaker 1: about comedy timing. He said, look, these jokes are funny,

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Speaker 1: you know what I'm saying. I said, well, I assume him,

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Speaker 1: but you got to do a three rhythm thing for

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Speaker 1: him to work. If you break the rhythm, they're not funny.

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Speaker 1: And my example was I came out with a sandwich

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Speaker 1: and Nathan says, hey, nicely, where you've been, And I'd

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Speaker 1: say I had to get something to eat. I felt

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Speaker 1: a little faint and I would just say the line crickets.

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Speaker 1: You could hear not spart. It was that quiet, you know.

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Speaker 1: And he said to me, no, no, hey, you gotta

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Speaker 1: take two beats before you speak, take a bite of

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Speaker 1: the sandwich, and then you say the line with your mouthful.

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Speaker 1: And it's funny. Thought, well, that's very specific. I don't know,

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Speaker 1: you know, maybe I don't want to do that. Hey,

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Speaker 1: he wrote it. He ought to know, right, So I

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Speaker 1: did it. He says, hey, nicely, where have you been?

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Speaker 1: And I stopped and I took a bye to the sandwich.

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Speaker 1: I would all heard a good trouperty. I felt a

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Speaker 1: little faint roaring laughter. So you know what I mean? Right?

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Speaker 1: And I thought to myself, learn, learn, learn. Is people

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Speaker 1: were generous, not only in the production, but they were

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Speaker 1: generous to tell you things. So getting into that whole

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Speaker 1: thing of like, you start to feel more, uh, emboldened. Sure.

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Speaker 1: I think with each show successively, you become more and

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Speaker 1: more aware of what you have that's yours, that is

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Speaker 1: applicable to whatever situation you're in. But it takes. It's

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Speaker 1: a process to you get that sort of confidence that

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Speaker 1: while I'm gonna sing this song, there's something I do

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Speaker 1: with my boys, with my intention with this that that

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Speaker 1: is particular to me, that's gonna make this sing, you

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Speaker 1: know what I mean? And with a mis behaving. Of course,

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Speaker 1: the opportunity was golden because there was nothing. Hello, There

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Speaker 1: was a stack of Xerox music that Fats Roller and

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Speaker 1: other people wrote. And then that was it who shaped that?

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Speaker 1: Who was responsible for shaping that? Uh? Well, we all were.

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Speaker 1: I'm gonna say that now on record, because Richard Mulby

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Speaker 1: was a wonderful director in many ways, and he certainly

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Speaker 1: put us together. Murray Horowitz who was the jazz aficionado,

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Speaker 1: and Arthur Farria, who was our choreographer. It was really

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Speaker 1: this combined effort of everybody. Needless to say, five African

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Speaker 1: American performers brought much of what you saw from our

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Speaker 1: own selves. There was no written characters, There was no

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Speaker 1: scenario that we were following. It was just a matter

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Speaker 1: of you walk in the door and she walks over

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Speaker 1: to you and she sayings, baby, baby, what is the

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Speaker 1: matter with you? Well, you gotta know who you are,

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Speaker 1: what your intention is, what you're trying to do. All

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Speaker 1: that had to be provided by the actor who was

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Speaker 1: us right, And that was the way the show really

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Speaker 1: was created. I mean, you know it was set up

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Speaker 1: so a misbehaving and then you go into Cats. Now,

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Speaker 1: you were in the original company of Cats, the original

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Speaker 1: Broadway cast. Yes, you were in the original You were

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Speaker 1: in the original Broadway company of Cats. American Daughters in

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Speaker 1: Buckley and Harry groner Man, Terry Man amazing, Betty Buckley,

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Speaker 1: Oh my god. So how did that come together? Well,

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Speaker 1: we want to say first, it was a huge hit

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Speaker 1: in London, so it had it had already sailed the seas.

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Speaker 1: It was just coming in our direction. But that was

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Speaker 1: part of what made it such a big deal for Broadway.

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Speaker 1: It's because it was such a huge hit in London

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Speaker 1: and they were going to do the American production, and

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Speaker 1: how do you get summoned to that? Well, weirdly, because

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Speaker 1: they were seeing people for six months for this show.

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Speaker 1: Everybody who could crawl on four legs was there auditioning.

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Speaker 1: And I didn't think there was anything in the show

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Speaker 1: for me. I just thought it was a dance show

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Speaker 1: and it was about people in leotard's not me. And

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Speaker 1: I know I didn't paid any attention. And I went

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Speaker 1: to the closing performance of Ain't misbehavior on Broadway. I

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Speaker 1: wasn't in the show by that point, but I went

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Speaker 1: to the closing performance and Bernard Jacobs, Bernie Jacobs was

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Speaker 1: there and he came up to me and said, Kenny,

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Speaker 1: have you been seen for Cats? And I said, no, no,

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Speaker 1: I haven't. He says, I want you to go in.

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Speaker 1: I want you to blah blah blah, so oh Deuteronomy.

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Speaker 1: I think it's a good role for you. I didn't

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Speaker 1: know anything about it. He said, go up to Benny

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Speaker 1: Lifts office and get the music and I'm gonna have

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Speaker 1: them call you in now. Footnote. They had not called

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Speaker 1: me in, and I was certainly someone who was on

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Speaker 1: the scene well enough by that point, but I guess

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Speaker 1: they did not see me the way Bernie summy. But

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Speaker 1: he says, that's it. You're gonna go in, and that's

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Speaker 1: what it's gonna be. Right. So I am. They're learning

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Speaker 1: the addressing of Cats. I'm going over the song. I

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Speaker 1: had to audition for the show and Armelia, my late dear, dear,

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Speaker 1: dear friend of me, it was in the room next

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Speaker 1: to me, and she said, i'd hear you in the

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Speaker 1: shower page that you've heard of said kind. She said,

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Speaker 1: I would think, okay, not so good yet, but but

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Speaker 1: it'll get there. That it was great, so we come back.

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Speaker 1: I go in and by this point it's the last

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Speaker 1: week of the auditions and they were really calling a

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Speaker 1: lot of people's names and thrown them around. So I

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Speaker 1: go in on Monday. I sang and they said okay, great.

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Speaker 1: So they said come back on Friday and could you

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Speaker 1: possibly said could you possibly learn a dramatic monologue? I thought, oh,

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Speaker 1: f me from the show or from some other source,

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Speaker 1: something anything, just a monologue, And I think, or not

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Speaker 1: to be yes, I'm thinking, ain't it a musical? So

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Speaker 1: I go I learned I luckily had done this monologue

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Speaker 1: and a show I did about Louis Armstrong. I played

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Speaker 1: the character Joe Oliver, his mentor. So I had a monologue. Okay,

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Speaker 1: so I come back. I do the monologue again. Trevor

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Speaker 1: comes in the stage after monologue and he says, your

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00:22:02,840 --> 00:22:07,440
Speaker 1: talents are many fold and manifest. I thought, well, if

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Speaker 1: that wasn't a kiss of death, I think I was like,

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Speaker 1: thank you for playing the British way of saying thank you,

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Speaker 1: you know. So I go out Fire Island for the weekend.

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Speaker 1: They're announcing it on Monday, and this is Friday, and

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Speaker 1: I thought, I'm out of the city. I don't want

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Speaker 1: to be here. So I get back Monday morning. The

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Speaker 1: phone rings and it's Tyler Getchell and he says, oh,

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Speaker 1: Ken Rage is Tyler Gatchell. I said, yes, Tyler, good morning,

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Speaker 1: how are you? I was it? Tell funk around to

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Speaker 1: tell me what's up. I said, I'm good. I'm good.

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Speaker 1: He goes, well, we were wondering here in the office

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Speaker 1: if you'd like to play old Deuteronomy and cats for us,

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Speaker 1: and you know you're not feeling when your heart like

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Speaker 1: sinks and rises at the same time. And I thought, yeah,

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Speaker 1: yes I will, I would please, Yes, I'll take it.

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Speaker 1: How long did you do the show? Two years? Did

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Speaker 1: you find that? You know? Two years? I mean, my god,

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Speaker 1: two years of your life? Every night? What happens during

424
00:23:06,080 --> 00:23:11,000
Speaker 1: the ark of the two years? Many things. The beginning,

425
00:23:11,040 --> 00:23:13,240
Speaker 1: of course, is exciting because it's the opening and it's

426
00:23:13,280 --> 00:23:15,520
Speaker 1: this and the energy and that carries you almost a year.

427
00:23:15,920 --> 00:23:19,000
Speaker 1: Then it settles in like, okay, now they're coming to

428
00:23:19,080 --> 00:23:22,480
Speaker 1: see what they've heard about, which means second phase. You've

429
00:23:22,480 --> 00:23:24,880
Speaker 1: got to deliver the show. It's not just a matter

430
00:23:24,880 --> 00:23:27,200
Speaker 1: of coming out there on the energy of being fabulous

431
00:23:27,240 --> 00:23:29,440
Speaker 1: and amazing. Now you've got to deliver them to show

432
00:23:29,480 --> 00:23:31,840
Speaker 1: that they have paid this high price ticket to see

433
00:23:32,119 --> 00:23:35,800
Speaker 1: that they've heard is amazing. I like to say that's

434
00:23:35,840 --> 00:23:37,840
Speaker 1: the second phase. You've got to You've got to meet

435
00:23:37,920 --> 00:23:40,400
Speaker 1: the standard of the show, not just your own standard.

436
00:23:40,800 --> 00:23:42,720
Speaker 1: And then the third phase is where I think it

437
00:23:42,800 --> 00:23:46,399
Speaker 1: becomes a matter of being a professional, where you you

438
00:23:46,440 --> 00:23:48,680
Speaker 1: know what you're supposed to do, you know the temperature

439
00:23:48,680 --> 00:23:51,000
Speaker 1: of the show, you know what it's supposed to do.

440
00:23:51,320 --> 00:23:54,200
Speaker 1: If you know what I mean and you do it,

441
00:23:54,200 --> 00:23:57,359
Speaker 1: it isn't always inspired, because some nights you do not

442
00:23:57,560 --> 00:24:01,159
Speaker 1: feel it, but you have po road marks that you

443
00:24:01,280 --> 00:24:03,960
Speaker 1: hit that gets you through the show, and your technique

444
00:24:04,480 --> 00:24:08,320
Speaker 1: will carry you the performer. The show will carry everyone,

445
00:24:08,840 --> 00:24:12,040
Speaker 1: but your technique will carry you personally. And I think

446
00:24:12,160 --> 00:24:13,679
Speaker 1: also it has a lot to do with how you

447
00:24:13,720 --> 00:24:16,000
Speaker 1: were trained and you know how you came through the

448
00:24:16,119 --> 00:24:18,520
Speaker 1: ropes as to how you do that. I came from

449
00:24:18,560 --> 00:24:20,560
Speaker 1: the old school of you know, you give it your all,

450
00:24:20,600 --> 00:24:22,960
Speaker 1: you hit it, and if you're doing that, you're not

451
00:24:23,000 --> 00:24:26,119
Speaker 1: even conscious of it being maybe boring or a little

452
00:24:26,200 --> 00:24:31,280
Speaker 1: wrote because you always find yourself in the doing. You know,

453
00:24:31,640 --> 00:24:35,320
Speaker 1: you're considered one of the great great performers in the

454
00:24:35,400 --> 00:24:37,359
Speaker 1: musical theater, and you walk into the room. What does

455
00:24:37,400 --> 00:24:39,960
Speaker 1: the director have to offer you? Well, you know, I

456
00:24:40,000 --> 00:24:43,439
Speaker 1: will use someone as an example. It's Michael Griff, who

457
00:24:43,480 --> 00:24:46,240
Speaker 1: directed many wonderful things, but Rent was among them. And

458
00:24:46,280 --> 00:24:50,040
Speaker 1: I've worked with Michael twice. We did a production of

459
00:24:50,080 --> 00:24:55,760
Speaker 1: Brandy Newman's Faust. I love Michael Griffe because he's one

460
00:24:55,760 --> 00:24:57,320
Speaker 1: of the and I I you know, I admit I'm

461
00:24:57,400 --> 00:24:59,639
Speaker 1: not easy because I've been around a long time. So

462
00:24:59,680 --> 00:25:02,600
Speaker 1: if you don't know something, you better know something. That's

463
00:25:02,640 --> 00:25:06,000
Speaker 1: what I'm leading to. Yeah, And my feeling is if

464
00:25:06,080 --> 00:25:08,640
Speaker 1: you know something, I'm down with it. Tell me what

465
00:25:08,760 --> 00:25:11,840
Speaker 1: you know. But if you don't know anything, you cannot

466
00:25:12,040 --> 00:25:14,119
Speaker 1: fake it out with me because I see you. As

467
00:25:14,160 --> 00:25:16,000
Speaker 1: my grandmother said, I knew where you were going before

468
00:25:16,000 --> 00:25:18,359
Speaker 1: you knew where you were going. It's real, you know

469
00:25:18,400 --> 00:25:20,920
Speaker 1: what I mean. Michael Griff is one of those directors

470
00:25:20,920 --> 00:25:24,840
Speaker 1: where and he's so like open and interested in what

471
00:25:24,920 --> 00:25:27,160
Speaker 1: you think, and not in the sense of you get

472
00:25:27,160 --> 00:25:29,000
Speaker 1: to do whatever you want. That's not it at all.

473
00:25:29,040 --> 00:25:31,399
Speaker 1: It's like, well, let's talk about what is it that

474
00:25:31,480 --> 00:25:34,040
Speaker 1: you think. There's no bad ideas. There's no bad ideas,

475
00:25:34,160 --> 00:25:36,800
Speaker 1: so there's no bad idea. And I did another show

476
00:25:36,800 --> 00:25:39,800
Speaker 1: with him called Most Wanted, a musical which was Believing

477
00:25:39,880 --> 00:25:45,000
Speaker 1: or Not, a musicalization of the Kunanan murder. It was

478
00:25:45,000 --> 00:25:47,600
Speaker 1: really actually very very good and dark and so forth.

479
00:25:47,640 --> 00:25:49,359
Speaker 1: It was too dark for people. This is before the

480
00:25:49,400 --> 00:25:51,440
Speaker 1: TV movie and all that sort of stuff, and people

481
00:25:51,440 --> 00:25:57,040
Speaker 1: were freaked the funk out. You get a musical about that, Yes,

482
00:25:58,040 --> 00:26:01,400
Speaker 1: a wonderful musical. And of course Rosashi was the end

483
00:26:01,600 --> 00:26:04,560
Speaker 1: of his murdering spree. What was the name of the show,

484
00:26:04,960 --> 00:26:08,560
Speaker 1: post Wanted? Oh my God? And what year was this produced?

485
00:26:08,880 --> 00:26:12,480
Speaker 1: Oh god, about fifteen years ago at Lahoya Playhouse. And

486
00:26:12,480 --> 00:26:15,439
Speaker 1: it didn't transfer, It didn't go anywhere. They talked about it.

487
00:26:15,480 --> 00:26:18,520
Speaker 1: We did another reading thing of it in New York.

488
00:26:19,080 --> 00:26:24,920
Speaker 1: I played a drag queen named Stormy Leather. Oh God,

489
00:26:25,160 --> 00:26:28,040
Speaker 1: thank you, thank you, I'm here all week. Yeah. And

490
00:26:28,160 --> 00:26:31,520
Speaker 1: I had this great song called I Never Saw It Coming,

491
00:26:32,200 --> 00:26:34,639
Speaker 1: which was about how you do these things in life

492
00:26:34,720 --> 00:26:37,240
Speaker 1: and you never see it coming. You think you're gonna

493
00:26:37,240 --> 00:26:38,960
Speaker 1: do this, you're gonna be that, You're gonna do, and

494
00:26:38,960 --> 00:26:41,040
Speaker 1: then something else happens and you never see it coming.

495
00:26:41,800 --> 00:26:44,760
Speaker 1: And the first line of the song was I met

496
00:26:44,760 --> 00:26:47,199
Speaker 1: a bit the boy, which gives you a set up.

497
00:26:47,680 --> 00:26:51,560
Speaker 1: I knew a bit the boy had it all class, money,

498
00:26:51,600 --> 00:26:56,000
Speaker 1: everything and so and so forth. Very deep, very dark show. Anyway,

499
00:26:56,160 --> 00:26:58,080
Speaker 1: Michael says to me. And I'm doing the thing and

500
00:26:58,080 --> 00:27:00,920
Speaker 1: it's working. You know, it's doing well, I said, Michael,

501
00:27:00,960 --> 00:27:03,840
Speaker 1: I keep having this feeling. I said, would you mind

502
00:27:03,880 --> 00:27:07,199
Speaker 1: if I can I smoke? And this is the example

503
00:27:07,240 --> 00:27:09,720
Speaker 1: of Michael Grive And he looked at me as only

504
00:27:09,760 --> 00:27:16,359
Speaker 1: he kidding. I wish you would please do? I said yes, yes,

505
00:27:16,680 --> 00:27:19,359
Speaker 1: And it changed the whole feel of it, because one

506
00:27:19,880 --> 00:27:22,160
Speaker 1: the lighting and the cigarette smoke and the whole thing.

507
00:27:22,160 --> 00:27:23,919
Speaker 1: And it gave me something to start with. And I

508
00:27:24,000 --> 00:27:25,920
Speaker 1: exhaled on the first note, you know, all that kind

509
00:27:25,920 --> 00:27:28,760
Speaker 1: of should you do? And it made it a thought

510
00:27:29,119 --> 00:27:31,600
Speaker 1: rather than a delivery of a thought. It was a

511
00:27:31,720 --> 00:27:35,359
Speaker 1: Burrows in the sandwich all over again. That's right. Hey, Hello,

512
00:27:35,720 --> 00:27:38,720
Speaker 1: if I could take an inhale on this cigarette and

513
00:27:38,880 --> 00:27:44,760
Speaker 1: exhale and go, I met a boy, bitch had it all.

514
00:27:45,320 --> 00:27:47,880
Speaker 1: It's set up a whole different thing. You know now

515
00:27:48,400 --> 00:27:50,119
Speaker 1: l a New York L, A New York L A

516
00:27:50,200 --> 00:27:53,800
Speaker 1: New York St. Louis. How did the Great Ken Page

517
00:27:53,880 --> 00:27:56,560
Speaker 1: decide St. Louis is where I need to be in

518
00:27:56,680 --> 00:28:01,320
Speaker 1: this point in my life. Well, other than your mom,

519
00:28:01,400 --> 00:28:04,160
Speaker 1: Well that's kind of I mean, if it were only

520
00:28:04,240 --> 00:28:06,000
Speaker 1: you know, it was my mom, my stepdad. I have

521
00:28:06,080 --> 00:28:08,880
Speaker 1: two aunts, one of whom I'm in charge of her

522
00:28:08,920 --> 00:28:12,040
Speaker 1: care now she's in a facility. But I knew like

523
00:28:12,160 --> 00:28:15,680
Speaker 1: that they were all getting older. And the older I got,

524
00:28:15,720 --> 00:28:18,680
Speaker 1: the more I started to understand they weren't these wizard

525
00:28:18,720 --> 00:28:20,840
Speaker 1: people that I thought they were when I was young.

526
00:28:21,160 --> 00:28:23,679
Speaker 1: They were vulnerable. There were needs that they had that

527
00:28:23,760 --> 00:28:25,840
Speaker 1: they didn't even know how to be in to address,

528
00:28:26,200 --> 00:28:28,480
Speaker 1: and as they got older, they couldn't, you know, sort

529
00:28:28,480 --> 00:28:30,400
Speaker 1: of jockey their way through it. It was becoming more

530
00:28:30,400 --> 00:28:34,240
Speaker 1: of an issue how to dot dot dot and not,

531
00:28:34,440 --> 00:28:35,800
Speaker 1: you know, to put it all on them. It was

532
00:28:35,840 --> 00:28:37,680
Speaker 1: easy as easier to be here. And I did a

533
00:28:38,200 --> 00:28:43,280
Speaker 1: calculation of could I still work from here? And I

534
00:28:43,320 --> 00:28:46,040
Speaker 1: had initiated a show that I do called Page by Page,

535
00:28:46,080 --> 00:28:49,480
Speaker 1: which is a autobiographical two hour one hand and blah

536
00:28:49,480 --> 00:28:52,120
Speaker 1: blah blah, and I went all over the country with it.

537
00:28:52,320 --> 00:28:54,520
Speaker 1: That's how I kept my bills paid. I took I

538
00:28:54,560 --> 00:28:57,200
Speaker 1: got on the road like an old actor does, and

539
00:28:57,240 --> 00:28:59,440
Speaker 1: I sang my songs and I got my check and

540
00:28:59,480 --> 00:29:01,840
Speaker 1: I touched a lot of people. But I could do

541
00:29:01,920 --> 00:29:06,400
Speaker 1: that from St. Louis. Of course, show business, whether it's sports, music, entertainment,

542
00:29:06,680 --> 00:29:10,240
Speaker 1: the African American performer gets into the same limo. He's

543
00:29:10,280 --> 00:29:11,880
Speaker 1: picked up to go to the show. He's got the

544
00:29:11,920 --> 00:29:15,720
Speaker 1: star dressing room. Everything is when you're making money for them.

545
00:29:15,720 --> 00:29:19,560
Speaker 1: Everything is as fluffy and as comfortable for the white

546
00:29:19,680 --> 00:29:22,960
Speaker 1: or the black performer. But whoever roadblocks for you in

547
00:29:23,040 --> 00:29:26,960
Speaker 1: that area getting all the time. It's a constant that

548
00:29:27,120 --> 00:29:28,560
Speaker 1: I can say that, and I don't mean that to

549
00:29:28,600 --> 00:29:30,800
Speaker 1: be evasive. It's a constant from the time. I think

550
00:29:30,800 --> 00:29:33,760
Speaker 1: of when I started in seventy six with guys and dolls,

551
00:29:33,800 --> 00:29:36,400
Speaker 1: where people would say, to my face, how dare you

552
00:29:36,640 --> 00:29:40,200
Speaker 1: that'st w K's role, And I'm thinking, but I'm up

553
00:29:40,200 --> 00:29:42,680
Speaker 1: there eight times a week. I'm doing it on on on,

554
00:29:42,880 --> 00:29:45,560
Speaker 1: through many things. Cats. When I was casting Cats, there

555
00:29:45,560 --> 00:29:49,760
Speaker 1: were people black and white who just we're not having it.

556
00:29:50,160 --> 00:29:52,640
Speaker 1: The white continuency thought someone why you should of course

557
00:29:52,680 --> 00:29:55,560
Speaker 1: been cast. Why did they cast me? My brothers and

558
00:29:55,600 --> 00:29:58,320
Speaker 1: sisters were like, well, you've gone over to the enemy,

559
00:29:58,640 --> 00:30:01,640
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. But mind you, any one

560
00:30:01,640 --> 00:30:04,240
Speaker 1: of them would have certainly been happy to have the part.

561
00:30:04,960 --> 00:30:07,920
Speaker 1: So it's a constant in Hollywood. It was very difficult.

562
00:30:08,240 --> 00:30:10,400
Speaker 1: There were many auditions. I went on Alec where they

563
00:30:10,440 --> 00:30:14,760
Speaker 1: just wanted me to just be more urban, which was

564
00:30:14,840 --> 00:30:17,080
Speaker 1: a code, you know. I did one show where I

565
00:30:17,080 --> 00:30:21,000
Speaker 1: played the owner of a diet company. Okay, that's funny enough.

566
00:30:21,080 --> 00:30:23,440
Speaker 1: I'm a big guy. But as the progression of the

567
00:30:23,480 --> 00:30:25,760
Speaker 1: rehearsals went on, they said, well, you're gonna come in

568
00:30:26,480 --> 00:30:29,560
Speaker 1: eating a candy bar. I thought, come on, you know,

569
00:30:29,760 --> 00:30:31,680
Speaker 1: it's funny enough, you don't have to put a candy bar.

570
00:30:31,880 --> 00:30:33,640
Speaker 1: By the time we got to filming, they gave me

571
00:30:33,680 --> 00:30:37,440
Speaker 1: a giant, oversized hershey bar that I was to walk

572
00:30:37,520 --> 00:30:40,040
Speaker 1: in with, and those kinds of things. That's just sort

573
00:30:40,040 --> 00:30:43,000
Speaker 1: of on the one side, but it it is a constant,

574
00:30:43,040 --> 00:30:45,680
Speaker 1: and it continues, you know. And because I have been

575
00:30:45,720 --> 00:30:47,960
Speaker 1: around a long time and I am sixty seven years

576
00:30:47,960 --> 00:30:50,520
Speaker 1: old as of yesterday, you know what I'm saying. I

577
00:30:50,600 --> 00:30:53,400
Speaker 1: know what's up. And people try to bullshit you with

578
00:30:53,480 --> 00:30:56,520
Speaker 1: stuff that they're trying to veil, or you know, they're

579
00:30:56,520 --> 00:31:00,680
Speaker 1: really being racial, or they're being prejudicial. My generation, we

580
00:31:00,680 --> 00:31:03,840
Speaker 1: were the beneficiaries of the idea of we better do

581
00:31:03,920 --> 00:31:07,280
Speaker 1: the right thing because people are watching. The generation before

582
00:31:07,320 --> 00:31:09,719
Speaker 1: us was we can do anything we want because nobody's watching.

583
00:31:10,120 --> 00:31:13,880
Speaker 1: You know, my kids are obviously going through the catalog

584
00:31:13,920 --> 00:31:17,120
Speaker 1: of films and they wanted to start watching Nightmare before Christmas.

585
00:31:17,760 --> 00:31:19,800
Speaker 1: And of course there's nothing more thrilling in my life

586
00:31:19,800 --> 00:31:22,120
Speaker 1: than them being captivated by a performance of you as

587
00:31:22,160 --> 00:31:25,120
Speaker 1: Boogie Boogie and me sitting there on a couch with

588
00:31:25,120 --> 00:31:27,520
Speaker 1: my kids and going, I know him, I know him.

589
00:31:27,560 --> 00:31:29,800
Speaker 1: And then my kids are gonna be like, oh please,

590
00:31:30,040 --> 00:31:32,440
Speaker 1: I've never seen night there before Christmas, and I see

591
00:31:32,480 --> 00:31:34,160
Speaker 1: it like six months ago, and we watch it. You know,

592
00:31:34,160 --> 00:31:36,200
Speaker 1: the kids want to watch every movie twenty times, and

593
00:31:36,240 --> 00:31:39,760
Speaker 1: so we watch it. It's very inventive and inside of

594
00:31:39,800 --> 00:31:44,400
Speaker 1: that song, it defines your talent. You do so many things.

595
00:31:45,080 --> 00:31:47,959
Speaker 1: What makes you one of the greatest performers in the

596
00:31:48,080 --> 00:31:53,200
Speaker 1: history of the musical theater ever is the acting inside

597
00:31:53,240 --> 00:31:56,520
Speaker 1: the singing. How did that go down? As a child?

598
00:31:56,920 --> 00:32:01,239
Speaker 1: Like I said in my room, playing cast albums and

599
00:32:01,280 --> 00:32:03,880
Speaker 1: being everybody on the album and so forth. That was

600
00:32:03,920 --> 00:32:05,840
Speaker 1: the beginning of all that for me, because you know,

601
00:32:05,920 --> 00:32:08,360
Speaker 1: for me, I wasn't seeing anything. I was only hearing

602
00:32:08,400 --> 00:32:11,880
Speaker 1: it right. So when Nightmamber four, Christmas came around, I thought,

603
00:32:12,080 --> 00:32:14,760
Speaker 1: oh my god, I'm gonna get to do what I've

604
00:32:14,760 --> 00:32:19,000
Speaker 1: been tipping around for years. Man, do you ever, man?

605
00:32:19,040 --> 00:32:22,000
Speaker 1: Do you ever? You feel that song you've got There's

606
00:32:22,040 --> 00:32:24,040
Speaker 1: so much great acting inside that song, and the and

607
00:32:24,080 --> 00:32:26,480
Speaker 1: the and your vocalizing. I produced you in a show

608
00:32:26,480 --> 00:32:29,360
Speaker 1: one time. Yes, And I think the deepest I ever

609
00:32:29,400 --> 00:32:32,240
Speaker 1: fell in love with another man, I'm a straight guy.

610
00:32:32,360 --> 00:32:33,880
Speaker 1: But the deepest I've ever fell in love with the

611
00:32:33,960 --> 00:32:36,280
Speaker 1: man was when he sang are you with me? We're

612
00:32:36,280 --> 00:32:41,440
Speaker 1: gonna sing one phrase of this ready whispering above Tam

613
00:32:42,960 --> 00:32:49,440
Speaker 1: Tammy ties in love. You sang that song and I

614
00:32:49,680 --> 00:32:52,840
Speaker 1: melted in the I thought, this guy is the most

615
00:32:52,880 --> 00:32:56,360
Speaker 1: beautiful soul. And you are of the people I've known

616
00:32:56,360 --> 00:32:58,800
Speaker 1: in this business, one of the most beautiful souls I've

617
00:32:58,840 --> 00:33:01,440
Speaker 1: ever met. My laugh here so talented, Well, that is

618
00:33:01,480 --> 00:33:04,120
Speaker 1: beyond kind. I love you, and I love your talent.

619
00:33:04,400 --> 00:33:16,080
Speaker 1: I'll love you back. Actor and singer Ken Paige. Betty

620
00:33:16,160 --> 00:33:20,080
Speaker 1: Buckley grew up dreaming of singing her heart out and

621
00:33:20,280 --> 00:33:23,200
Speaker 1: in the stuff of legend. On her first day in

622
00:33:23,240 --> 00:33:26,200
Speaker 1: New York City, Betty Buckley landed a part in the

623
00:33:26,200 --> 00:33:31,160
Speaker 1: Broadway musical seventeen seventy six. That early success gave her

624
00:33:31,200 --> 00:33:34,160
Speaker 1: a chance to prove to herself and the folks back

625
00:33:34,200 --> 00:33:38,240
Speaker 1: home she was ready. My mom had been a singer

626
00:33:38,320 --> 00:33:41,360
Speaker 1: dancer growing up, and she was very good, very talented,

627
00:33:41,800 --> 00:33:44,000
Speaker 1: but my father, when he married her, told her she

628
00:33:44,000 --> 00:33:47,200
Speaker 1: couldn't do that anymore. My father was a lieutenant colonel

629
00:33:47,240 --> 00:33:50,000
Speaker 1: in the Air Force. When I was in the fifth grade,

630
00:33:50,000 --> 00:33:53,480
Speaker 1: he retired and he became a college professor. He was

631
00:33:53,520 --> 00:33:56,960
Speaker 1: a really brilliant guy, but he was very opposed to

632
00:33:57,000 --> 00:34:01,400
Speaker 1: show business. And my mother had this extensive cast album

633
00:34:01,480 --> 00:34:05,160
Speaker 1: collection and all the great singers and everything, and she

634
00:34:05,240 --> 00:34:07,640
Speaker 1: sang around that house all the time. So I was

635
00:34:07,680 --> 00:34:10,359
Speaker 1: exposed to all that very early on and loved it

636
00:34:10,520 --> 00:34:12,400
Speaker 1: from and she took me to see my first musical,

637
00:34:12,480 --> 00:34:16,239
Speaker 1: which was Pajama Game with the original Bob Fossey choreography,

638
00:34:16,280 --> 00:34:20,200
Speaker 1: when I was eleven, and when the number steam heat

639
00:34:20,360 --> 00:34:22,680
Speaker 1: and I remember where I was sitting in the theater,

640
00:34:22,760 --> 00:34:24,560
Speaker 1: and there was this energy that just went up to

641
00:34:24,719 --> 00:34:28,120
Speaker 1: my head. What I've learned as an adult was an epiphany.

642
00:34:28,160 --> 00:34:31,160
Speaker 1: You know, it's just like boom that that's what you're

643
00:34:31,160 --> 00:34:32,720
Speaker 1: going to be doing for the rest of your life.

644
00:34:32,800 --> 00:34:37,239
Speaker 1: So then from age eleven, I became fixated on that.

645
00:34:37,400 --> 00:34:39,640
Speaker 1: What did you do with that fixation? Well, I listened

646
00:34:39,680 --> 00:34:41,560
Speaker 1: Bye Bye Bertie all the time, and I told my mother,

647
00:34:41,600 --> 00:34:43,920
Speaker 1: you know, I could play one of the teenagers in that,

648
00:34:44,080 --> 00:34:46,600
Speaker 1: and when she was mad at me, I would run

649
00:34:46,760 --> 00:34:49,239
Speaker 1: down the hall into her room and slide in on

650
00:34:49,280 --> 00:34:51,960
Speaker 1: my knees and do the whole speech that the kid

651
00:34:52,040 --> 00:34:54,799
Speaker 1: does to Conrad Bertie, tell us a beautiful one. Tell

652
00:34:54,840 --> 00:34:59,719
Speaker 1: us how you make that glorious? Sala looked around my

653
00:34:59,760 --> 00:35:01,560
Speaker 1: house for years. My mother would go, what are you

654
00:35:01,560 --> 00:35:08,000
Speaker 1: gonna do you homework? I go, baby, really sublime. I

655
00:35:08,000 --> 00:35:11,440
Speaker 1: mean I knew that song exactly. That was his junior

656
00:35:11,520 --> 00:35:14,000
Speaker 1: high talent show that I wanted to be in. But

657
00:35:14,080 --> 00:35:16,440
Speaker 1: I was really short forever. I was like four ft

658
00:35:16,520 --> 00:35:19,040
Speaker 1: eight inches tall for m and I grew all at

659
00:35:19,080 --> 00:35:23,360
Speaker 1: once in one summer, I thought I would be short forever,

660
00:35:23,640 --> 00:35:25,279
Speaker 1: and I, you know, thought, well, maybe I'll be the

661
00:35:25,280 --> 00:35:27,839
Speaker 1: first girl jockey, you know. But anyway, there was this

662
00:35:27,880 --> 00:35:30,520
Speaker 1: talent show and I came home and I knew they

663
00:35:30,560 --> 00:35:32,920
Speaker 1: would never ask me to be in it. But I'd

664
00:35:32,960 --> 00:35:35,440
Speaker 1: studied dance with my aunts since I was three. She

665
00:35:35,560 --> 00:35:38,520
Speaker 1: was a dance teacher and my grandmother, so I had

666
00:35:38,560 --> 00:35:43,359
Speaker 1: these two very powerful female role models that were performers

667
00:35:43,760 --> 00:35:46,360
Speaker 1: and artists. And I told my mother I wanted to

668
00:35:46,400 --> 00:35:49,399
Speaker 1: do Steam Heat and the Junior High Talent Show. And

669
00:35:49,480 --> 00:35:52,120
Speaker 1: my mother was like, oh, that's interesting because the guys

670
00:35:52,160 --> 00:35:54,719
Speaker 1: who were the choreographer and the director of that just

671
00:35:54,880 --> 00:35:58,040
Speaker 1: opened a dance studio in Fort Worth. I will call them.

672
00:35:58,080 --> 00:35:59,799
Speaker 1: So she called them and said, my daughter wants to

673
00:35:59,840 --> 00:36:03,120
Speaker 1: learn and Steam Heat and they said, well, can she sings?

674
00:36:03,200 --> 00:36:05,040
Speaker 1: And I was like yeah, because I sung in the

675
00:36:05,120 --> 00:36:06,879
Speaker 1: church choir, but they always put me in the back

676
00:36:06,960 --> 00:36:08,879
Speaker 1: road and told me to blend in, you know. So

677
00:36:08,920 --> 00:36:10,719
Speaker 1: I sang and they said no, no, Betty, sing as

678
00:36:10,760 --> 00:36:13,120
Speaker 1: loud as you can. So I knew I had this

679
00:36:13,160 --> 00:36:16,120
Speaker 1: giant voice. When did you know you had a giant voice? When?

680
00:36:16,280 --> 00:36:18,879
Speaker 1: Because I was constantly singing with all the great lady

681
00:36:18,960 --> 00:36:22,959
Speaker 1: singers in my bedroom to their albums and basically imitating them,

682
00:36:23,000 --> 00:36:25,799
Speaker 1: and I knew I had this like sound, and but

683
00:36:26,120 --> 00:36:29,640
Speaker 1: I didn't know its value because our choir teacher would

684
00:36:29,640 --> 00:36:31,399
Speaker 1: always put me on the back road and really get

685
00:36:31,400 --> 00:36:35,480
Speaker 1: annoyed because my voice cuts through, you know, and and

686
00:36:35,560 --> 00:36:38,160
Speaker 1: I was trying so hard to sing soft, but it

687
00:36:38,239 --> 00:36:43,319
Speaker 1: still has this resonant edge. So so they told me

688
00:36:43,320 --> 00:36:45,080
Speaker 1: to sing as loud as I could. So I did,

689
00:36:45,120 --> 00:36:47,080
Speaker 1: and I just felt unleashed, and they were like, oh

690
00:36:47,120 --> 00:36:49,920
Speaker 1: my god. And they those guys made me realize I

691
00:36:49,920 --> 00:36:52,960
Speaker 1: had this unique voice. So they gave me the original

692
00:36:53,000 --> 00:36:55,640
Speaker 1: Fosse choreography, and I got in the Junior High Talent

693
00:36:55,680 --> 00:36:59,640
Speaker 1: show and I brought the house down. They all went nuts,

694
00:37:00,120 --> 00:37:03,040
Speaker 1: and from that time I was like little bitty Betty

695
00:37:03,080 --> 00:37:06,279
Speaker 1: Buckley with this giant voice. Then my mother became this

696
00:37:06,400 --> 00:37:09,120
Speaker 1: like huge stage mother, and she was constantly entering me

697
00:37:09,160 --> 00:37:12,520
Speaker 1: and everything, and my father was going nuts about it.

698
00:37:13,000 --> 00:37:16,200
Speaker 1: And then I got my first professional job when I

699
00:37:16,239 --> 00:37:19,360
Speaker 1: was fifteen. I played the role of Dainty June and

700
00:37:19,360 --> 00:37:22,040
Speaker 1: Gypsy at our local theater and I joined Equity and

701
00:37:22,080 --> 00:37:24,920
Speaker 1: all that stuff, and then I worked there every summer,

702
00:37:25,600 --> 00:37:27,960
Speaker 1: and so I had a lot of experience. By the

703
00:37:28,000 --> 00:37:30,239
Speaker 1: time I got to New York. What got you to

704
00:37:30,320 --> 00:37:34,800
Speaker 1: New York? Well, I I was recruited to enter the

705
00:37:34,840 --> 00:37:37,960
Speaker 1: missful Worth pageant. I hated beauty pageants. I mean, I'm

706
00:37:38,000 --> 00:37:40,200
Speaker 1: sorry to say all that, because I have friends and

707
00:37:40,239 --> 00:37:43,279
Speaker 1: beauty pageants and I won a lot of scholarships, and

708
00:37:43,840 --> 00:37:45,799
Speaker 1: it wasn't for you. Shall we say? I was this

709
00:37:45,880 --> 00:37:48,920
Speaker 1: budding young feminist. I was. I was a charter subscriber

710
00:37:48,960 --> 00:37:52,000
Speaker 1: to Miss magazine. In glorious Tina gave me words for

711
00:37:52,080 --> 00:37:57,360
Speaker 1: all these feelings of inequity that Gloria Steine. That's a

712
00:37:57,400 --> 00:38:02,200
Speaker 1: good one. I'll take that. But you didn't want that, No,

713
00:38:02,520 --> 00:38:06,000
Speaker 1: I was embarrassed by it. I remember once I won

714
00:38:06,200 --> 00:38:08,920
Speaker 1: the missfoot Worth pageant, because I was basically recruited to

715
00:38:09,080 --> 00:38:12,880
Speaker 1: do that. And then I was in the Miss Texas pageant.

716
00:38:12,960 --> 00:38:15,680
Speaker 1: I didn't win the talent competition, which was really strange.

717
00:38:16,000 --> 00:38:18,960
Speaker 1: So I was runner up to Miss Texas, I think

718
00:38:18,960 --> 00:38:21,080
Speaker 1: second runner up or something. But the producer of the

719
00:38:21,120 --> 00:38:25,360
Speaker 1: Miss America pageant was there, and I was invited the

720
00:38:25,400 --> 00:38:27,799
Speaker 1: following year to be a guest entertainer at the Miss

721
00:38:27,840 --> 00:38:32,160
Speaker 1: American pageant. And this agent saw me on television singing

722
00:38:32,280 --> 00:38:35,319
Speaker 1: dance and they asked me to fly to New York

723
00:38:35,440 --> 00:38:37,880
Speaker 1: right after the Miss American pageant audition for them. So

724
00:38:37,920 --> 00:38:41,080
Speaker 1: it was Ashley Famous Agency, which became my CM. And

725
00:38:41,080 --> 00:38:44,719
Speaker 1: there was a very famous agent named Eric Shepard who

726
00:38:44,800 --> 00:38:47,600
Speaker 1: I sang for these like eleven or twelve agents, and

727
00:38:47,640 --> 00:38:49,960
Speaker 1: he just stood up and said signer and he walked

728
00:38:49,960 --> 00:38:54,080
Speaker 1: out of the room. So this responsible agent, roder Has

729
00:38:54,160 --> 00:38:56,839
Speaker 1: who went on to become a big Broadway producer. He's

730
00:38:56,840 --> 00:39:01,160
Speaker 1: a really nice, wonderful guy, still a great friend. He said, well,

731
00:39:01,160 --> 00:39:02,360
Speaker 1: what do you want to do? And I said I

732
00:39:02,360 --> 00:39:04,359
Speaker 1: have to go back and finish college or my father

733
00:39:04,400 --> 00:39:06,960
Speaker 1: will kill me. And so he he was like, okay,

734
00:39:07,080 --> 00:39:09,440
Speaker 1: do that, and when you finished college, you'll come to

735
00:39:09,480 --> 00:39:13,160
Speaker 1: New York. And you did finish TCU for journalism. Yeah.

736
00:39:13,480 --> 00:39:16,400
Speaker 1: Why why journalism? Because my mother had been a journalist.

737
00:39:16,440 --> 00:39:19,799
Speaker 1: My dad thought that being a journalist was a complimentary

738
00:39:19,920 --> 00:39:23,279
Speaker 1: profession for a wife and mother to the husband. But

739
00:39:23,800 --> 00:39:27,680
Speaker 1: that my purpose in life, as all young women should have,

740
00:39:27,960 --> 00:39:30,400
Speaker 1: he thought, was to be married and have children. But

741
00:39:30,440 --> 00:39:32,680
Speaker 1: I didn't want to do that. I wanted to go

742
00:39:32,760 --> 00:39:36,000
Speaker 1: to New York and and I knew what my voice

743
00:39:36,000 --> 00:39:38,520
Speaker 1: would sound like, and I knew how it would affect people.

744
00:39:39,120 --> 00:39:41,560
Speaker 1: And then when I was thirty five and I was

745
00:39:41,560 --> 00:39:44,839
Speaker 1: in my dressing room at the Winter Garden, they brought

746
00:39:44,880 --> 00:39:47,800
Speaker 1: in my recording of memory after we'd made the record,

747
00:39:48,360 --> 00:39:52,080
Speaker 1: and I heard the recording and that vision flashback of

748
00:39:52,120 --> 00:39:55,640
Speaker 1: when I was thirteen, and I was like, oh, he

749
00:39:55,760 --> 00:39:58,279
Speaker 1: took from age thirteen to thirty five, but there it is.

750
00:39:58,600 --> 00:40:03,200
Speaker 1: So anyway, this agent kept calling me after college and

751
00:40:03,280 --> 00:40:05,480
Speaker 1: asking me to come to New York and I was

752
00:40:05,880 --> 00:40:08,839
Speaker 1: at that point I was really experiencing I think PTSD

753
00:40:08,960 --> 00:40:12,120
Speaker 1: because I'd been with Miss America on a USO tour

754
00:40:12,680 --> 00:40:15,520
Speaker 1: and Miss America and I and one other girl went

755
00:40:15,560 --> 00:40:18,799
Speaker 1: into all the intensive care units and all the hospitals

756
00:40:18,800 --> 00:40:21,920
Speaker 1: in Japan, and we also toured all the military bases

757
00:40:21,920 --> 00:40:26,120
Speaker 1: in Korea. I was like, my dad is wrong. War

758
00:40:26,320 --> 00:40:28,560
Speaker 1: is not noble. You know. My father was a real

759
00:40:28,600 --> 00:40:31,000
Speaker 1: hawk and he really believed in the nobility of war

760
00:40:31,040 --> 00:40:34,279
Speaker 1: and stuff. And I I came back really changed, and

761
00:40:34,360 --> 00:40:38,239
Speaker 1: we were in a consistent debate about the validity of

762
00:40:38,280 --> 00:40:41,400
Speaker 1: a show business career, which he thought was beneath me.

763
00:40:41,719 --> 00:40:44,040
Speaker 1: And I was very confused about it all. And I

764
00:40:44,080 --> 00:40:46,759
Speaker 1: was also in love. When I was in a senior

765
00:40:46,800 --> 00:40:50,640
Speaker 1: with this Dallas cowboy quarterback, and he turned out to

766
00:40:50,640 --> 00:40:53,160
Speaker 1: be he broke my heart. So when I came back,

767
00:40:53,239 --> 00:40:56,200
Speaker 1: I thought, okay, forget my show business aspirations. Because I

768
00:40:56,239 --> 00:40:59,480
Speaker 1: was a journalism major and I'd written for this newspaper

769
00:40:59,600 --> 00:41:01,840
Speaker 1: quite at I even had a team page when I

770
00:41:01,880 --> 00:41:04,839
Speaker 1: was in college for the Fourth Press, so I had

771
00:41:04,880 --> 00:41:07,520
Speaker 1: a job there and I thought, Okay, that's it. I'm

772
00:41:07,560 --> 00:41:10,720
Speaker 1: just gonna do this. And so the agent kept calling

773
00:41:10,719 --> 00:41:12,520
Speaker 1: and he got me to come see this show in

774
00:41:12,640 --> 00:41:16,239
Speaker 1: Dallas with my mother, which was an industrial show that

775
00:41:16,280 --> 00:41:19,200
Speaker 1: Flip Wilson, the comedian was doing with a band called

776
00:41:19,200 --> 00:41:22,640
Speaker 1: Your Father's Mustache. So they called me up on stage

777
00:41:22,680 --> 00:41:25,479
Speaker 1: and had me sing. And the only song I knew

778
00:41:25,560 --> 00:41:27,480
Speaker 1: my key and was You Made Me Love You. So

779
00:41:27,520 --> 00:41:30,280
Speaker 1: I sang it and the audience went nuts, which was great.

780
00:41:30,840 --> 00:41:34,080
Speaker 1: And then Rogers talks to the buyer and they offered

781
00:41:34,120 --> 00:41:36,680
Speaker 1: me a job to put me in this show but

782
00:41:36,760 --> 00:41:39,800
Speaker 1: to pretend I'm an audience member in all these different cities.

783
00:41:40,360 --> 00:41:41,920
Speaker 1: And they offered me a lot of money. It was

784
00:41:41,960 --> 00:41:44,400
Speaker 1: way more than I was being paid at the Fourth Press.

785
00:41:45,000 --> 00:41:49,400
Speaker 1: So my father couldn't deny the job the money, and

786
00:41:49,480 --> 00:41:52,759
Speaker 1: so he reluctantly. Let me do that. When I think

787
00:41:52,800 --> 00:41:55,000
Speaker 1: of you, I think of the acting and the singing,

788
00:41:55,360 --> 00:41:58,440
Speaker 1: and the acting is in the singing. Thank you. When

789
00:41:58,480 --> 00:42:01,840
Speaker 1: you teach people, you teach acting or singing. I've taught

790
00:42:01,880 --> 00:42:04,000
Speaker 1: for the Terry Schriber School for years and years and years,

791
00:42:04,040 --> 00:42:06,680
Speaker 1: and I used to teach scenes study and song interpretation.

792
00:42:07,040 --> 00:42:10,080
Speaker 1: And I was teaching these five day workshops maybe three

793
00:42:10,080 --> 00:42:12,399
Speaker 1: times a year for them whenever I was in New York.

794
00:42:12,680 --> 00:42:14,400
Speaker 1: And what do you teach them about how the acting

795
00:42:14,440 --> 00:42:19,080
Speaker 1: influences the singing? Well, that's complicated. I was really fortunate

796
00:42:19,239 --> 00:42:21,719
Speaker 1: that in seventeen seventy six I worked with all these

797
00:42:21,719 --> 00:42:24,480
Speaker 1: incredible actors. They were like thirty men and two women,

798
00:42:25,320 --> 00:42:27,719
Speaker 1: and they really mentored me, and they were like, set

799
00:42:27,719 --> 00:42:30,080
Speaker 1: me down when I was twenty one, and I've gotten

800
00:42:30,120 --> 00:42:32,280
Speaker 1: that show my first day in New York City because

801
00:42:32,320 --> 00:42:35,239
Speaker 1: of this wonderful agent, Roger Hess, who got me to

802
00:42:35,360 --> 00:42:38,799
Speaker 1: New York and shepherd me into that. And so I

803
00:42:38,840 --> 00:42:41,640
Speaker 1: got that audition, which was amazing. So they sent me

804
00:42:41,680 --> 00:42:43,839
Speaker 1: down and said, look, Betty, this is what you're good at,

805
00:42:43,920 --> 00:42:46,880
Speaker 1: this is what you've got talent wise, and this is

806
00:42:46,880 --> 00:42:50,759
Speaker 1: what you need to learn. Go here, go there, do this,

807
00:42:51,360 --> 00:42:55,000
Speaker 1: and so I did because I loved musical theater. I

808
00:42:55,040 --> 00:42:57,160
Speaker 1: love but it used to be called musical comedy, right,

809
00:42:57,239 --> 00:42:59,919
Speaker 1: So there was like a dancing chorus in a scene

810
00:43:00,080 --> 00:43:03,280
Speaker 1: in chorus, and you know, everything was separate, and everything

811
00:43:03,360 --> 00:43:07,000
Speaker 1: was like that, you know, shove is And so I

812
00:43:07,040 --> 00:43:11,279
Speaker 1: wanted I really My favorite actresses were Kim Stanley and

813
00:43:11,320 --> 00:43:14,520
Speaker 1: Geraldine Page and later on General Rowlands, and I was like,

814
00:43:14,600 --> 00:43:16,960
Speaker 1: oh my god, what it must be like to have

815
00:43:17,160 --> 00:43:20,359
Speaker 1: that skill heavy duty dramatic act to do like really

816
00:43:20,360 --> 00:43:25,560
Speaker 1: psychological portraits, to like bring raw truth to uh theater

817
00:43:25,680 --> 00:43:27,799
Speaker 1: and film. And you know, I wanted to be that

818
00:43:28,120 --> 00:43:32,279
Speaker 1: skilled and I wasn't. So I was really lucky that

819
00:43:32,360 --> 00:43:34,600
Speaker 1: in that time period I did some Broadways shows. And

820
00:43:34,600 --> 00:43:36,719
Speaker 1: then I got that TV show eight is Enough and

821
00:43:36,760 --> 00:43:39,160
Speaker 1: not eight is enough. I went to my dailies and

822
00:43:39,200 --> 00:43:42,000
Speaker 1: I was like, wait a minute, I get I see

823
00:43:42,040 --> 00:43:44,040
Speaker 1: ten seconds of good work over there when I'm in

824
00:43:44,040 --> 00:43:46,640
Speaker 1: the doorway. Why can't I bring that same quality to

825
00:43:46,719 --> 00:43:49,200
Speaker 1: the same work? Right? What's wrong with me? And I

826
00:43:49,280 --> 00:43:52,680
Speaker 1: was also studying with Stella Adler. I never put my

827
00:43:52,719 --> 00:43:54,400
Speaker 1: work in front of her. I took her acting class.

828
00:43:54,400 --> 00:43:56,759
Speaker 1: I took her script analysis class in New York, and

829
00:43:56,760 --> 00:43:59,000
Speaker 1: I took her script analysis class again in l A

830
00:43:59,080 --> 00:44:02,160
Speaker 1: while I was on eight Enough. I knew I wasn't

831
00:44:02,160 --> 00:44:06,759
Speaker 1: a good enough actress to keep my sense of self

832
00:44:06,960 --> 00:44:09,879
Speaker 1: respect or whatever, you know. If she gave me her

833
00:44:10,120 --> 00:44:13,360
Speaker 1: like Syrian critiques, I wasn't ready, So that was okay.

834
00:44:13,400 --> 00:44:16,040
Speaker 1: I learned a lot in the back road, taking copious notes.

835
00:44:16,120 --> 00:44:19,840
Speaker 1: But that TV show was great because I really was

836
00:44:19,920 --> 00:44:22,840
Speaker 1: able to see what worked and why you were on

837
00:44:22,880 --> 00:44:25,719
Speaker 1: there for two seasons, three seasons? How many? For four

838
00:44:25,760 --> 00:44:29,960
Speaker 1: seasons Dick Van Patten. Yeah. And then on the heels

839
00:44:29,960 --> 00:44:33,200
Speaker 1: of It is Enough, I got the wonderful classic American

840
00:44:33,200 --> 00:44:36,680
Speaker 1: film Tender Mercy, starring Robert Duval with a Horton foot

841
00:44:36,719 --> 00:44:39,919
Speaker 1: script directed by Bruce Beresford, and I was like, oh

842
00:44:39,960 --> 00:44:45,360
Speaker 1: my god, she's an alcoholic country western singing. It was

843
00:44:45,440 --> 00:44:49,680
Speaker 1: like written for me. It was amazing, and I learned

844
00:44:49,680 --> 00:44:53,000
Speaker 1: so much working with Duval and Wilford Brimley and Ellen Barkin.

845
00:44:53,680 --> 00:44:55,799
Speaker 1: And they wouldn't let me see my dailies until I

846
00:44:55,880 --> 00:44:58,279
Speaker 1: finished the job. And then they brought me in on

847
00:44:58,320 --> 00:45:00,920
Speaker 1: a Saturday and had me sit down and look at

848
00:45:00,920 --> 00:45:03,400
Speaker 1: my scenes. Back to back, and I sat there in

849
00:45:03,440 --> 00:45:06,960
Speaker 1: that little screening room and I was like, oh, okay,

850
00:45:06,960 --> 00:45:09,600
Speaker 1: I know how to do this. Now when you're there,

851
00:45:10,120 --> 00:45:13,360
Speaker 1: You're in Los Angeles. Is enough? Was what the late seventies,

852
00:45:13,480 --> 00:45:18,319
Speaker 1: mid seventies to eight one. So when you're out there

853
00:45:18,360 --> 00:45:21,480
Speaker 1: doing you shot out in California. And when you're out

854
00:45:21,520 --> 00:45:24,080
Speaker 1: there and you go from a show that I recall

855
00:45:24,200 --> 00:45:26,440
Speaker 1: was a successful show that was a hit show, huge,

856
00:45:26,560 --> 00:45:29,200
Speaker 1: Why don't you just stay out in California and camp

857
00:45:29,239 --> 00:45:33,560
Speaker 1: out there and pursue movies and television? Well, were you

858
00:45:33,600 --> 00:45:36,719
Speaker 1: just addicted to singing on Broadway? Well? I knew I

859
00:45:36,760 --> 00:45:38,480
Speaker 1: was going to sing on Broadway, and I had this

860
00:45:38,520 --> 00:45:40,520
Speaker 1: brilliant teacher and I was flying back to work with

861
00:45:40,600 --> 00:45:43,920
Speaker 1: him every six weeks, which the heads of eight is

862
00:45:44,040 --> 00:45:47,440
Speaker 1: enough mocked me for I remember this guy passed me

863
00:45:47,560 --> 00:45:49,400
Speaker 1: in the parking lot and I was driving a Bundy

864
00:45:49,440 --> 00:45:51,840
Speaker 1: rental wreck and he had a black Porsche and he

865
00:45:51,960 --> 00:45:55,080
Speaker 1: but sleek, black hair and wore black clothes and he's like,

866
00:45:55,320 --> 00:45:57,000
Speaker 1: where are you going? And I'm like, I'm going to

867
00:45:57,040 --> 00:45:59,320
Speaker 1: New York for my voice. Listening goes, you have such

868
00:45:59,400 --> 00:46:02,040
Speaker 1: delusion of grander Betty, you'll be lucky if you play

869
00:46:02,080 --> 00:46:04,239
Speaker 1: American Mothers the rest of your life. And I was like,

870
00:46:04,520 --> 00:46:09,319
Speaker 1: we'll see, Greg, will see. Isn't that horrible? They were

871
00:46:09,440 --> 00:46:13,160
Speaker 1: really weird guys, I mean, and they were mean, really mean.

872
00:46:13,640 --> 00:46:16,719
Speaker 1: But anyway, I survived all that, and so I got

873
00:46:16,719 --> 00:46:20,360
Speaker 1: this Tender Mercy and then I got Cats that following

874
00:46:20,400 --> 00:46:23,320
Speaker 1: on the heels of that. Tender Mercies was actually released

875
00:46:23,960 --> 00:46:27,520
Speaker 1: in the winter that Cats opened in October. But is

876
00:46:27,520 --> 00:46:30,319
Speaker 1: that what you want? To go? From Tender Mercies to

877
00:46:30,440 --> 00:46:33,040
Speaker 1: the next movie. Yeah, that would have been great. But

878
00:46:33,120 --> 00:46:37,759
Speaker 1: my dream was to bring like really that authenticity to

879
00:46:38,040 --> 00:46:41,319
Speaker 1: the musical theater to originate, right, And so those of

880
00:46:41,440 --> 00:46:44,799
Speaker 1: us who were fortunate enough to work in the musical theater,

881
00:46:45,120 --> 00:46:48,080
Speaker 1: we changed the face of the musical theater in that

882
00:46:48,120 --> 00:46:52,080
Speaker 1: time period, you know, with Sondheim, foss All that it

883
00:46:52,480 --> 00:46:58,120
Speaker 1: evolved from musical comedy to musical theater. And Grizabella in

884
00:46:58,120 --> 00:47:02,680
Speaker 1: in Cats Senior Memory was my first opportunity to bring

885
00:47:02,760 --> 00:47:07,400
Speaker 1: that level of dramatic intensity to the musical theater stage.

886
00:47:08,080 --> 00:47:10,799
Speaker 1: And I knew it was my turn, and I knew

887
00:47:10,800 --> 00:47:13,040
Speaker 1: I was ready to do that. So, had you been

888
00:47:13,080 --> 00:47:15,960
Speaker 1: offered an attractive role in a film on the heels

889
00:47:16,000 --> 00:47:18,680
Speaker 1: of tender mercies. You would have passed because Kat's was

890
00:47:18,719 --> 00:47:21,359
Speaker 1: what you wanted to do. That well, I think that's

891
00:47:21,400 --> 00:47:23,839
Speaker 1: a weird exercise. Would I have passed? I don't know

892
00:47:24,040 --> 00:47:26,799
Speaker 1: everything I'm sharing with you. I learned in retrospect and

893
00:47:26,840 --> 00:47:30,240
Speaker 1: but honestly, growing up, I didn't think I was beautiful,

894
00:47:30,360 --> 00:47:33,040
Speaker 1: and I aspired to the musical theater. That I met

895
00:47:33,080 --> 00:47:36,719
Speaker 1: Brian de Palma and auditioned for his film Phantom of

896
00:47:36,760 --> 00:47:40,399
Speaker 1: the Paradise. He didn't cast me, but several months after

897
00:47:40,480 --> 00:47:42,440
Speaker 1: that he took me to dinner and gave me the

898
00:47:42,480 --> 00:47:44,520
Speaker 1: book Carrie and said, read this book. I want you

899
00:47:44,520 --> 00:47:47,840
Speaker 1: to play the gym teacher. Awful gym teacher. She was

900
00:47:47,840 --> 00:47:50,920
Speaker 1: a great character. So that was a great film debut

901
00:47:51,000 --> 00:47:53,759
Speaker 1: that he gave me the opportunity to do. And then

902
00:47:53,800 --> 00:47:56,239
Speaker 1: from that movie I got eight is enough now? It

903
00:47:56,400 --> 00:47:59,279
Speaker 1: is enough? Was at the time I thought I'd made

904
00:47:59,320 --> 00:48:03,520
Speaker 1: a horrible miss day taking a job. Why because I

905
00:48:03,600 --> 00:48:07,480
Speaker 1: was like working in a factory and in retrospect only

906
00:48:07,600 --> 00:48:10,360
Speaker 1: it was where I needed to be to learn the

907
00:48:10,400 --> 00:48:13,680
Speaker 1: next thing. Well, no, Cats, I mean there's not much

908
00:48:13,719 --> 00:48:17,160
Speaker 1: to say about Cats. I think that hasn't been said. Obviously,

909
00:48:17,200 --> 00:48:20,520
Speaker 1: it's this iconic and your performance and there's a song

910
00:48:20,640 --> 00:48:22,919
Speaker 1: which we don't need to go into now that you're

911
00:48:22,960 --> 00:48:26,279
Speaker 1: sing that is this kind of dream state everybody goes

912
00:48:26,320 --> 00:48:29,320
Speaker 1: into when they sing this song. Good description, that's accurate,

913
00:48:29,440 --> 00:48:31,160
Speaker 1: a dream stay, and I think that a lot of

914
00:48:31,160 --> 00:48:33,239
Speaker 1: the music and Cats is a dream state. It's really

915
00:48:33,280 --> 00:48:36,960
Speaker 1: it's just you have to suspend. It's moving art. It's

916
00:48:36,960 --> 00:48:40,160
Speaker 1: like an art installation. Yeah, you can't have any preconceptions

917
00:48:40,160 --> 00:48:42,160
Speaker 1: of what, just to sit there and go with it. Yeah,

918
00:48:42,480 --> 00:48:44,880
Speaker 1: it's like it's it's like and when I think about that,

919
00:48:44,920 --> 00:48:48,960
Speaker 1: what I think about is you work hard in the theater.

920
00:48:49,080 --> 00:48:52,920
Speaker 1: People work hard. Did you have any ongoing injuries pains?

921
00:48:53,360 --> 00:48:56,000
Speaker 1: Did you suffer physically from your years of working in

922
00:48:56,040 --> 00:49:00,239
Speaker 1: the theater. Yeah, my knees were shot after two of

923
00:49:00,360 --> 00:49:03,680
Speaker 1: Sunset Boulevard, running up and downstairs twelve times a night,

924
00:49:03,800 --> 00:49:08,600
Speaker 1: and then repetitive choreography. I had a shoulder replacement in

925
00:49:08,680 --> 00:49:12,160
Speaker 1: my right shoulder was replaced in September, which I'm really grateful.

926
00:49:12,200 --> 00:49:14,040
Speaker 1: I did. It's and then the surgeon was great and

927
00:49:14,080 --> 00:49:16,960
Speaker 1: that apparatus is great. I'm really grateful. I'm gonna have

928
00:49:17,000 --> 00:49:19,640
Speaker 1: to have a knee. Probably both kneeds replaced, but I'm

929
00:49:19,640 --> 00:49:22,000
Speaker 1: gonna start with one. But you have to be in

930
00:49:22,040 --> 00:49:25,319
Speaker 1: a process either with a great osteopath or chiropractor or

931
00:49:25,600 --> 00:49:28,560
Speaker 1: the other. Thing. I found out recently that's very disturbing

932
00:49:28,600 --> 00:49:31,480
Speaker 1: to me, as I've had because of working in these

933
00:49:31,560 --> 00:49:34,840
Speaker 1: dusty old theaters that they never keep clean and mold

934
00:49:34,880 --> 00:49:37,880
Speaker 1: in the atmosphere and stuff. I've had repetitive bouts of

935
00:49:37,920 --> 00:49:42,799
Speaker 1: bronchitis for years now and it's created a kind of

936
00:49:42,880 --> 00:49:45,279
Speaker 1: asthmatic lung condition that I have to work with now,

937
00:49:45,320 --> 00:49:53,080
Speaker 1: which is not nice. Singer and actor Betty Buckley be

938
00:49:53,200 --> 00:49:55,680
Speaker 1: sure to follow Here's the Thing on the I Heart

939
00:49:55,760 --> 00:50:00,200
Speaker 1: Radio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcast

940
00:50:00,719 --> 00:50:03,799
Speaker 1: when we come back. Betty Buckley talks about the challenges

941
00:50:04,239 --> 00:50:08,480
Speaker 1: of playing Norma Desmond and Andrew Lloyd Webber's Sunset Boulevard.

942
00:50:20,080 --> 00:50:23,600
Speaker 1: I'm Alec Baldwin and this is here's the thing. Betty

943
00:50:23,719 --> 00:50:28,120
Speaker 1: Buckley worked with famed British director Trevor Nunn twice, first

944
00:50:28,160 --> 00:50:34,280
Speaker 1: in Cats In two, then again in Sunset Boulevard. In

945
00:50:34,280 --> 00:50:38,080
Speaker 1: in the intervening years, Betty Buckley's confidence in her own

946
00:50:38,239 --> 00:50:42,600
Speaker 1: vision grew. First of all, he's a genius in the

947
00:50:42,640 --> 00:50:45,160
Speaker 1: way he directed us in Cats, and the way he

948
00:50:45,760 --> 00:50:50,200
Speaker 1: put all that together was really unbelievable. I mean, no

949
00:50:50,520 --> 00:50:54,160
Speaker 1: other Cats company had that kind of amazing bond. We

950
00:50:54,239 --> 00:50:58,800
Speaker 1: did improv workshops, theater games and at least a month

951
00:50:58,960 --> 00:51:01,919
Speaker 1: of rehearsals and a couple of weeks on our hands

952
00:51:01,920 --> 00:51:05,680
Speaker 1: and kneeses Cats, but just incredible Grotowski theater games and

953
00:51:05,719 --> 00:51:07,440
Speaker 1: stuff like that. What does he have to offer you

954
00:51:07,480 --> 00:51:11,480
Speaker 1: when you do Sunset? Well, it was interesting because they

955
00:51:11,520 --> 00:51:14,680
Speaker 1: flew me to London and my audition took an hour.

956
00:51:15,000 --> 00:51:17,879
Speaker 1: I've never auditioned that long in my life. They brought

957
00:51:17,880 --> 00:51:19,640
Speaker 1: me in a week in advance and taught me all

958
00:51:19,680 --> 00:51:22,359
Speaker 1: the songs and then told me I had to sing

959
00:51:22,400 --> 00:51:25,200
Speaker 1: them in Glenn close his keys, and I was like, no,

960
00:51:25,360 --> 00:51:27,479
Speaker 1: I won't be singing them in Glenn close his keys,

961
00:51:28,600 --> 00:51:31,080
Speaker 1: And so the music director was a little in flams

962
00:51:31,160 --> 00:51:33,800
Speaker 1: about that, and then he kept coming up on stage

963
00:51:33,800 --> 00:51:37,719
Speaker 1: directing me and directing me. And I'm a meditator, so

964
00:51:37,920 --> 00:51:41,399
Speaker 1: whatever they threw at me, I just stayed in my

965
00:51:41,480 --> 00:51:44,840
Speaker 1: focus and did what they said. And then when I

966
00:51:44,880 --> 00:51:47,759
Speaker 1: got the part, I was then back in London in

967
00:51:47,840 --> 00:51:50,960
Speaker 1: this rehearsal process, and I was like, okay, So I

968
00:51:51,040 --> 00:51:56,480
Speaker 1: brought in mythological references the Greek drama Medusa media and

969
00:51:56,560 --> 00:51:58,680
Speaker 1: he was interested in that. And then he would listen

970
00:51:58,719 --> 00:52:02,239
Speaker 1: really closely and then he say, okay, show me, and

971
00:52:02,280 --> 00:52:05,520
Speaker 1: then I would show him what I meant, and gradually,

972
00:52:05,600 --> 00:52:09,640
Speaker 1: over a six week rehearsal process to eight weeks, I

973
00:52:09,680 --> 00:52:13,120
Speaker 1: saw him liking what I was doing right, and I

974
00:52:13,320 --> 00:52:17,279
Speaker 1: and then he gave me rain to interpret it that way.

975
00:52:17,400 --> 00:52:20,160
Speaker 1: You earned the right to do it your way. Yeah.

976
00:52:20,239 --> 00:52:23,879
Speaker 1: And so then we opened and it was like a

977
00:52:23,960 --> 00:52:27,400
Speaker 1: huge success, and I was just like, oh, yeah, you know.

978
00:52:27,640 --> 00:52:31,520
Speaker 1: So then I got New York and they were very

979
00:52:31,600 --> 00:52:34,840
Speaker 1: nervous because the New York Times they followed me around

980
00:52:34,960 --> 00:52:37,960
Speaker 1: to do this big feature in the Arts and Leisure section,

981
00:52:38,520 --> 00:52:41,120
Speaker 1: and it was really nice. This writer was really great,

982
00:52:41,360 --> 00:52:44,880
Speaker 1: but the angle the editor wanted was is she a

983
00:52:44,920 --> 00:52:48,399
Speaker 1: big enough star to replace Glenn Close. So they were

984
00:52:48,480 --> 00:52:51,800
Speaker 1: really nervous that my interpretation because it was so vastly

985
00:52:51,880 --> 00:52:55,760
Speaker 1: different from what Glenn Close had done. It was vastly

986
00:52:55,760 --> 00:52:59,000
Speaker 1: different from what any of them had done, and so

987
00:52:59,760 --> 00:53:05,120
Speaker 1: they got nervous. And he was very nervous Trevor None, Yeah,

988
00:53:05,160 --> 00:53:08,160
Speaker 1: and I one day in rehearsal, he was very nervous

989
00:53:08,160 --> 00:53:11,759
Speaker 1: and very upset, and I was like, what, what's going on?

990
00:53:11,920 --> 00:53:15,359
Speaker 1: And so I started crying because I couldn't understand what

991
00:53:15,400 --> 00:53:21,680
Speaker 1: he wanted. And when I was crying, he said this, this,

992
00:53:21,680 --> 00:53:25,040
Speaker 1: This is what's missing. And I was I said what what?

993
00:53:25,239 --> 00:53:28,680
Speaker 1: And he goes this and I was like wretched because

994
00:53:28,719 --> 00:53:31,960
Speaker 1: I felt wretched. He goes wretched and I said oh,

995
00:53:32,000 --> 00:53:34,239
Speaker 1: and then I just stopped crying. I said, why didn't

996
00:53:34,239 --> 00:53:36,040
Speaker 1: you just tell me that? Where do you want wretched?

997
00:53:36,920 --> 00:53:39,239
Speaker 1: And so I got really calm and he goes okay.

998
00:53:39,520 --> 00:53:43,160
Speaker 1: And then we went through the whole script and he

999
00:53:43,200 --> 00:53:47,160
Speaker 1: goes here, here, here, and here, and I'm like, okay,

1000
00:53:47,280 --> 00:53:48,839
Speaker 1: I said, I saw all you gotta do. Just tell

1001
00:53:48,840 --> 00:53:51,440
Speaker 1: me what you need now, Betty Buckley, I want to

1002
00:53:51,440 --> 00:53:54,840
Speaker 1: get to something else. The power of your voice and

1003
00:53:54,920 --> 00:53:59,239
Speaker 1: the uniqueness. Where does the power come from? Can I

1004
00:53:59,280 --> 00:54:01,239
Speaker 1: just share with you a moment I had with you

1005
00:54:01,360 --> 00:54:06,000
Speaker 1: when we were younger. We were at a big public

1006
00:54:06,080 --> 00:54:10,640
Speaker 1: theater benefit years ago and you were part of it too,

1007
00:54:10,760 --> 00:54:15,400
Speaker 1: and I sang Aquarius and it was a very powerful

1008
00:54:16,640 --> 00:54:21,279
Speaker 1: performance and you were watching me, and and you just

1009
00:54:21,360 --> 00:54:24,400
Speaker 1: like shook your head, and I was like so touched

1010
00:54:24,440 --> 00:54:28,520
Speaker 1: by that because I felt so seen and cherished and

1011
00:54:28,600 --> 00:54:31,480
Speaker 1: valued by you than you. So you ask where my

1012
00:54:31,560 --> 00:54:36,200
Speaker 1: power comes from. It comes from a spiritual connection, right,

1013
00:54:36,280 --> 00:54:40,840
Speaker 1: It's like I believe that essence, all human beings are connected.

1014
00:54:41,480 --> 00:54:43,200
Speaker 1: Like I have a heart that's beting that wants to

1015
00:54:43,239 --> 00:54:45,000
Speaker 1: love and be loved. You have a heart that's being

1016
00:54:45,120 --> 00:54:47,320
Speaker 1: that wants to love and be loved. At that essence,

1017
00:54:47,400 --> 00:54:50,799
Speaker 1: we are entirely the same. Our stories are different, but

1018
00:54:50,880 --> 00:54:53,960
Speaker 1: that I am no, that essence is the same. Since

1019
00:54:54,000 --> 00:54:58,000
Speaker 1: my since I was like twenty six years old, and

1020
00:54:58,320 --> 00:55:01,080
Speaker 1: I've been on this quest, thought there has to be

1021
00:55:01,120 --> 00:55:04,480
Speaker 1: a handbook. And I found that there's like this core

1022
00:55:04,560 --> 00:55:08,680
Speaker 1: body of truth in every religion, in every major philosophy

1023
00:55:08,719 --> 00:55:13,200
Speaker 1: on the planet. So I found meditation. While I was

1024
00:55:13,239 --> 00:55:15,880
Speaker 1: on Ati Is Enough. I went my ex husband Peter Flood,

1025
00:55:16,120 --> 00:55:19,960
Speaker 1: took me to a meditation class after my first season

1026
00:55:20,000 --> 00:55:23,040
Speaker 1: on It Is Enough. And then I learned that I

1027
00:55:23,080 --> 00:55:26,360
Speaker 1: could use meditation in my work and that there was

1028
00:55:26,400 --> 00:55:29,840
Speaker 1: this higher consciousness in me that was the creative force

1029
00:55:30,840 --> 00:55:33,799
Speaker 1: that if I made myself an instrument of that good

1030
00:55:33,840 --> 00:55:37,520
Speaker 1: things happened, and I was a witness about that as

1031
00:55:37,520 --> 00:55:40,799
Speaker 1: surely as the audience was. And I learned how to

1032
00:55:40,880 --> 00:55:44,960
Speaker 1: do that before Cats and before Tender Mercies, and then

1033
00:55:45,000 --> 00:55:48,160
Speaker 1: my work just changed and every everything opened up. And

1034
00:55:48,200 --> 00:55:52,399
Speaker 1: the power that I was able to access as an

1035
00:55:52,400 --> 00:55:56,680
Speaker 1: instrument of that consciousness, that's where it comes from. Is

1036
00:55:56,719 --> 00:55:59,759
Speaker 1: I'm meditating my way through that. And it's like being

1037
00:56:00,040 --> 00:56:03,960
Speaker 1: away on Mr. Toad's wild ride, right, because when you

1038
00:56:04,040 --> 00:56:07,680
Speaker 1: have a part like Norma Desmond that you can go

1039
00:56:07,760 --> 00:56:11,240
Speaker 1: all out, full tilt boogie to quote Janis Joplin, then

1040
00:56:11,520 --> 00:56:14,759
Speaker 1: this it's like holding to this mantra, holding to this

1041
00:56:14,920 --> 00:56:19,200
Speaker 1: like focus point and then let everything happen. That's how

1042
00:56:19,200 --> 00:56:22,359
Speaker 1: I work. You are on island of your own in

1043
00:56:22,440 --> 00:56:25,480
Speaker 1: terms of your talent and your uniqueness. It's just as unbelievable.

1044
00:56:25,520 --> 00:56:28,480
Speaker 1: It's unbelievable you, Alec. I feel humbled by your compliment.

1045
00:56:28,520 --> 00:56:30,920
Speaker 1: Thank you well. Listen, um, we interviewed Ken, my old

1046
00:56:30,920 --> 00:56:32,839
Speaker 1: friend Ken, and the thing the two of you also

1047
00:56:32,880 --> 00:56:34,839
Speaker 1: have in common other than cats, as you both went

1048
00:56:34,880 --> 00:56:38,000
Speaker 1: home can move back to St. Louis. Yeah, he moved

1049
00:56:38,000 --> 00:56:39,880
Speaker 1: back to take care of his mom, isn't he the

1050
00:56:39,960 --> 00:56:43,279
Speaker 1: greatest guy ever. He and I had addressing room right

1051
00:56:43,320 --> 00:56:46,080
Speaker 1: next to each other at the Winter Garden, so we

1052
00:56:46,080 --> 00:56:50,160
Speaker 1: were really close pals. He's a lovely, lovely man. Well,

1053
00:56:50,200 --> 00:56:51,840
Speaker 1: let me ask you this one more question, which is,

1054
00:56:51,880 --> 00:56:55,080
Speaker 1: if I'm on iTunes, which of these albums would you

1055
00:56:55,120 --> 00:56:58,120
Speaker 1: say is not your favorite? Which one you're particularly fond of?

1056
00:56:58,360 --> 00:57:02,239
Speaker 1: Ghost Like the two bum Burnett produced is a beautiful

1057
00:57:02,520 --> 00:57:04,960
Speaker 1: album that's very haunting, and the Tibon and I grew

1058
00:57:05,040 --> 00:57:07,680
Speaker 1: up together and forth and he made the first recording

1059
00:57:07,680 --> 00:57:10,520
Speaker 1: of my voice when we were both like seventeen, but

1060
00:57:10,680 --> 00:57:13,000
Speaker 1: so ghost Light. And then my recent stuff that I

1061
00:57:13,040 --> 00:57:17,920
Speaker 1: really love is story songs and hope. Thank you for

1062
00:57:18,000 --> 00:57:20,440
Speaker 1: taking the time to do this. My love to you, Aleck,

1063
00:57:20,520 --> 00:57:23,000
Speaker 1: thank you, good luck down there. I adore you and

1064
00:57:23,040 --> 00:57:26,120
Speaker 1: I'm so happy to connect with you. Thank you, My

1065
00:57:26,280 --> 00:57:30,600
Speaker 1: thanks to Broadway legends Betty Buckley and Ken Paige. I'll

1066
00:57:30,680 --> 00:57:33,200
Speaker 1: leave you with Betty singing as if we never said

1067
00:57:33,280 --> 00:57:38,640
Speaker 1: goodbye from Sunset Boulevard Live at Carnegie Hall. I'm Alec

1068
00:57:38,680 --> 00:57:42,600
Speaker 1: Baldwin and this is Here's the thing from my Heart Radio,

1069
00:57:43,640 --> 00:57:55,200
Speaker 1: The Whispered Conversations, an old cloud of so much to say,

1070
00:57:55,720 --> 00:58:12,760
Speaker 1: not just today, bottle well, wellness well, the body in

1071
00:58:12,800 --> 00:58:28,000
Speaker 1: the making. Guess everything's as if never sad boy. Everything says,

1072
00:58:28,160 --> 00:58:44,840
Speaker 1: if we never said good bye, we taught the world

1073
00:58:46,680 --> 00:59:14,800
Speaker 1: you waste too dream