Speaker 1: This is Alec Baldwin and you're listening to Here's the thing.
Speaker 1: According to the online Urban Dictionary, today's guest has become
Speaker 1: a verb. To LuPone is quote to give an outstanding
Speaker 1: theatrical performance, to make an audience revel in, open mouthed
Speaker 1: awe at your unparalleled brilliance. Unquote. Won't fry for me
Speaker 1: a gentry in a The truth is I left you
Speaker 1: all through my wild days, my mad existance, I kept
Speaker 1: my proms your distance. Paddy Lapone as twenty six Broadway
Speaker 1: credits to date and has won two Tonies, one for
Speaker 1: a Vida and one for Gypsy in London. She originated
Speaker 1: the role of Norma Desmond in Sunset Boulevard and Fantine
Speaker 1: in Le Miserabla, for which she won an Olivier Award.
Speaker 1: She's worked in film and on television, most notably as
Speaker 1: the mom on the ABC drama Life Goes On. Before
Speaker 1: all this success, Patty was in the first class of
Speaker 1: the Drama Division at Juilliard, in which seems like a
Speaker 1: reasonable place to start dreaming of a career in the theater.
Speaker 1: But Patty lapone story really begins even earlier. I knew
Speaker 1: when I was a kid that I had a Broadway voice.
Speaker 1: I wanted to be a rocker because I grew up
Speaker 1: in that era, transistor radios at the beach, The Rascals
Speaker 1: we started in the fifties, Little Anthony and the Imperials.
Speaker 1: I mean, all through the fifties and sixties and seventies,
Speaker 1: I knew I didn't have a rock voice. Though I
Speaker 1: knew I had a Broadway voice. This this is all
Speaker 1: instinctual behavior, completely instinctual behavior. And my mom listened to
Speaker 1: opera and my dad listened to jazz. He was a
Speaker 1: principle of an elementary school on Long Island and Northport,
Speaker 1: and my mom was a housewife, a homemaker. HOWI twin
Speaker 1: brothers and me, you know, typical in a ranch house
Speaker 1: on Long Island. Yeah, exactly. And I was enrolled in
Speaker 1: dance at four years old, and I fell in love
Speaker 1: with the stage. But that wasn't really the first inkling
Speaker 1: of some sort of connection to the stage. My mother
Speaker 1: used to troop me out in front of guests to
Speaker 1: do my Marilyn Monroe imitation. And I don't even know
Speaker 1: how I came up with this, but I would come out,
Speaker 1: they'd laugh, and I'd go, oh, this is cool, Like
Speaker 1: you know, I was. I was pretty astute when I
Speaker 1: was very very young and pretty. So I started dancing,
Speaker 1: and I fell in love with the audience, and so
Speaker 1: the performance aspect started very very young in dance. When
Speaker 1: Juilliard happened, it didn't happen. Well. My my brother attended
Speaker 1: the dance division of the Juilliard School and told me
Speaker 1: that they were starting a drama division. I actually had
Speaker 1: moved into New York City and was auditioning for musicals
Speaker 1: and working. And I just wanted to be in musicals
Speaker 1: and hang out in New York City and party. And
Speaker 1: I auditioned and I got in. And what happened in
Speaker 1: the four years the course of the four years of
Speaker 1: the Juilliard schools, I fell out of love with musical
Speaker 1: and in love with classical theater. And I was actually
Speaker 1: trained as a classical actress. So we did know a
Speaker 1: lot of other great classical actors. Yes, Kevin Klein, David Stires,
Speaker 1: David Schram, Mary Louisato, and then of course the classes
Speaker 1: below me have gained more recognition than my class did.
Speaker 1: We were the very first class. But that girl from
Speaker 1: Northport who's doing Marilyn Monroe impersonations in the ranch House
Speaker 1: with your family. What's that like for you, that transition
Speaker 1: to be in that very heavy, sophisticated well, it was.
Speaker 1: It was tough for me because I was not a
Speaker 1: favorite at school. My best friend, who I met in
Speaker 1: the first year, Nancy Nichols, was a favorite and I
Speaker 1: was not. But Nancy and I would always pile around
Speaker 1: together and make trouble, but Nancy would get the roles
Speaker 1: and I would not. And that went on for several years.
Speaker 1: I think it was only my third year when I
Speaker 1: realized that they were trying to throw me out of school.
Speaker 1: And what they did. They couldn't throw me up because
Speaker 1: I didn't like my personality. But what they did was
Speaker 1: that through every conceivable role in my direction to make
Speaker 1: me fail as an actor. But what happened was they
Speaker 1: why do you think that they didn't like Yeah, they
Speaker 1: didn't like me. They or that you know, I didn't
Speaker 1: get cut every year students got cut, So we started
Speaker 1: with her. Over the years, we ended up with the
Speaker 1: seventeen of the original thirty six. In the fourth year,
Speaker 1: I never got cut. So I'm confused as to why
Speaker 1: that actually happened, because why didn't they just cut me,
Speaker 1: possibly because every role I played I succeeded in. But
Speaker 1: what they did was they trained one actor in my
Speaker 1: class and versatility, and the rest of them were pigeonholed,
Speaker 1: as you know, life will pigeonhole you into exactly the
Speaker 1: supret the leading lady, the character woman. But I went
Speaker 1: back and forth, back and forth, back and forth, which
Speaker 1: taught me that I could. There were no boundaries, no,
Speaker 1: And if you look at my history, I've done more
Speaker 1: places than I've done musicals. But because I guess the
Speaker 1: voice is a powerful instrument, do you know what I mean?
Speaker 1: And it's an American cultural event. The American the brought
Speaker 1: the musical, not the broad Also the music that you've performed.
Speaker 1: When someone is as successful as you, And I've said
Speaker 1: this to people who have careers of music beyond the theater,
Speaker 1: as as leading actresses in the theater. Music distinguishes things
Speaker 1: because it's a product you can consume anywhere. You know,
Speaker 1: your career goes to another level where I can drive
Speaker 1: in my car and listen to the soundtracks anything goes.
Speaker 1: I can be on the beach and I can listen
Speaker 1: to the soundtrack from Sweeney Todd Music performers will always
Speaker 1: have the upper hand on actors. But you were saying,
Speaker 1: how you um the versatility thing? You you were almost
Speaker 1: forced to embrace this versatility to survive. And you graduate
Speaker 1: from that program the first class graduates. What year and
Speaker 1: where do you go? John Houseman? So in our third
Speaker 1: year he presented a season to um the prominent people
Speaker 1: in New York theater and critics, and mel Gussa was
Speaker 1: the one that said. Mel Gussa was a second string
Speaker 1: critic for the New York Times, and he was the
Speaker 1: one that said, why break this company up? Why not
Speaker 1: form a permanent acting company? Which was John's q And
Speaker 1: when we graduated, he handed us our equity card and
Speaker 1: four years. But we stayed for four years of touring
Speaker 1: the country performing classical plays in true revolving rep, which
Speaker 1: is a different play every single night. So we got
Speaker 1: even more training because in our first year we lost
Speaker 1: several bookings because we didn't know how to tour, We
Speaker 1: didn't know how to maintain a performance. We only did
Speaker 1: three at Juilliard and we had no idea what happened
Speaker 1: on the fourth And that sounds crazy, but it's we lost.
Speaker 1: Do you think this acting company idea, and the worry
Speaker 1: was what Housman had up a sleeve the whole time
Speaker 1: when he instigated the Juilliard program. No, I don't think so.
Speaker 1: You know, the training was intense and emotionally intense, psychologically intense,
Speaker 1: physically intense. But there was one production where the company
Speaker 1: formed an invisible circle of support around each other, and
Speaker 1: that was his. He saw the ensemble and I remember,
Speaker 1: I mean, I know it was. It bores Tomorrow's production
Speaker 1: of of You from the Bridge, and oh, I could
Speaker 1: cry now thinking of it. It was an extraordinarily powerful
Speaker 1: experience to be a student actor but in a professional mindset.
Speaker 1: And I remember our curtain call and the pride and
Speaker 1: the power, and it was an amazing moment that changed
Speaker 1: the course of all of us. And we understood what
Speaker 1: ensemble mean, and we understood what support meant, and we
Speaker 1: understood the power we had as individuals and as actors.
Speaker 1: And John saw that in his actors. There's been a
Speaker 1: couple of experiences that I've had that it's that same
Speaker 1: ensemble mentality. So that's the other thing I have to interject.
Speaker 1: When I left Juilliard and left the acting company, and
Speaker 1: then of course landed musicals. We all did, by the
Speaker 1: way David Stys did, Kevin did, um many did. We
Speaker 1: all ended musicals. But there's only a couple of times
Speaker 1: where I felt I had that kind of ensemble. And
Speaker 1: one was Limas in London because it was a Royal
Speaker 1: Shakespeare Company actors, and the other was Gypsy, where every
Speaker 1: actor owned their part, big or small, and gave themselves
Speaker 1: to the play every single night. The other one was
Speaker 1: Sweeney Too, because and our stage manager said in Sweeney
Speaker 1: that we acted more like a band than a bunch
Speaker 1: of actors. So the acting company thing less for how
Speaker 1: long you didn't have I did it for four years.
Speaker 1: Nobody goes in for four years anymore. We all did
Speaker 1: it for four years, and you know, I thought about
Speaker 1: the I don't know why we stayed, except we thought,
Speaker 1: I'm sure we all went we are not going to
Speaker 1: be able to play these parts in real life. And
Speaker 1: that was back in a time when they were the
Speaker 1: very last vapors in the air here in New York
Speaker 1: of the Old Way, and the old way was you
Speaker 1: went downtown and you carried a spear for Joe, where
Speaker 1: you carried a spear in the park, and there was
Speaker 1: an apprenticeship in the theater, and if you didn't have
Speaker 1: credit in the theater, Raoul and Chris Walking and Sigourney
Speaker 1: and you and Kevin and everybody, everybody who were the
Speaker 1: princes and princesses and Mandy of the theater in New York,
Speaker 1: that's where you headed. So when you finished the acting
Speaker 1: company and you've decided, you know, you've done enough, it's
Speaker 1: four years, which was a typical of people, Then where
Speaker 1: do you go? Then? Um, we came home, Kevin and
Speaker 1: I came home. And so you you're with Kevin Kevin
Speaker 1: and you're Kevin and you were a couple for seven years.
Speaker 1: We broke up, we got back together, we broke up,
Speaker 1: we got back together, we broke up, we got backing.
Speaker 1: Can you imagine the children you would have had for him?
Speaker 1: Could God in Heaven, good God, would have a theater
Speaker 1: big enough to house that person's ego and talent. So
Speaker 1: we both came home and Kevin went off and did
Speaker 1: a play. And I had auditioned for and didn't get
Speaker 1: The Baker's Wife Steven Schwartz musical The Baker's Wife based
Speaker 1: on Marcel But I got a telephone call from David
Speaker 1: Merrick's general manager, Helen Nickerson, and to ask if I
Speaker 1: was free, because they wanted me to come out to
Speaker 1: LA to replace the leading lady. And I wanted to
Speaker 1: do this musical so badly. So I went out and
Speaker 1: I did my first big, gut wrenching rip out of
Speaker 1: your body, squished heart, the most horrible, vulnerable experience of
Speaker 1: my life. The baker's wife, Who does he think he is?
Speaker 1: Who could be as handsome, who could be as smart
Speaker 1: as he thinks he is? He just had to snap
Speaker 1: his face. Good women fall uppart? What does he think
Speaker 1: that a single way with them rise? And it was
Speaker 1: an unbelievable disaster and we were on the road for
Speaker 1: six months. That is that's the big question. It is
Speaker 1: a great idea, it's a great film, and had Stephen
Speaker 1: Schwartz music, It had John Milzino's last sets, Jennifer tipped
Speaker 1: into the lights and theonyologist did the costumes. David Merrick
Speaker 1: was producing. It had all the potential to be a
Speaker 1: smash hit, and it got progressive. I joined two days
Speaker 1: after they opened in l A. And it got progressively worse.
Speaker 1: For you while you were doing no I thought it
Speaker 1: was gonna be okay, but I didn't realize that nobody
Speaker 1: realized what was really going to happen to us and
Speaker 1: it and what did happen, Well, six people were fired.
Speaker 1: The show never got better. David Merrick came out. One
Speaker 1: of the most theatrical moments I've ever had in my
Speaker 1: career was David Merrick showing up in San Francisco. We
Speaker 1: were performing in San Francisco with no director. We were
Speaker 1: told to stay after the show. They assembled us on
Speaker 1: the stage and there was it was not lit except
Speaker 1: for the ghost light. David Merrick shut up and stood
Speaker 1: in front of the ghost light, so he was totally
Speaker 1: back lit. Couldn't see his face, only saw the outline
Speaker 1: of a long coat and a bowler hat, and proceeded
Speaker 1: to ask us to go into rehearsal for nothing, so
Speaker 1: that we could save this wonderful show. And it was
Speaker 1: so dramatic, because he's incredibly dramatic, and so in the
Speaker 1: light of day, everybody went, what we had just gotten
Speaker 1: out of rehearsal for nothing. We were in rehearsal every
Speaker 1: single day, performing at night for six months, and what
Speaker 1: we rehearsed that day when in that night only to
Speaker 1: rehearse the next day, and that stuff would come out,
Speaker 1: some new stuff would go in that was not better
Speaker 1: than what we had just taken. A little laboratory. We
Speaker 1: were not but people were dying. The rats were dying.
Speaker 1: That's losing air. Oh my god. It was so horrible.
Speaker 1: And you know, there's an expression, Larry Gilbert's expression, if
Speaker 1: Hitler were alive today, his punishment should be to send
Speaker 1: him out on the road with a musical in trouble.
Speaker 1: I did a movie once in the movie was going
Speaker 1: really badly and said, this is as if the government
Speaker 1: made movies. You know you, I've always said there's a
Speaker 1: fine line between a hit and a flop, and it's
Speaker 1: you don't know what it is. You don't know why
Speaker 1: it is a hit, and you don't know why it
Speaker 1: is a fun. You know, if it's really terrible, you
Speaker 1: know right off the bat and you're not going to
Speaker 1: take the job. But if it has the potential to
Speaker 1: be a hit and ends up being a flop, you
Speaker 1: can't figure it out. So you do this show and
Speaker 1: when you come out of that, like, what's the lesson
Speaker 1: for you? Was there something you said to yourself? Never
Speaker 1: again am I going to know? I went into a
Speaker 1: depression for nine months. I was on valium to sleep
Speaker 1: for the six months and I went into a valium
Speaker 1: depression for nine months, gained forty pounds, woke up, went
Speaker 1: what the hell just happened? And I couldn't say. You
Speaker 1: think like you? You care a lot. There's nothing casual
Speaker 1: about you, there's nothing amateurish about you. You know, you're
Speaker 1: very serious and you're very dedicated. You're very hard working
Speaker 1: along with being very talented, and you feel these wounds.
Speaker 1: Why do you think that is why? Well, our business
Speaker 1: is subjective. It's all subjective, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: You talk to anybody from the baker's wife and they
Speaker 1: can remember it as if it was yesterday, and there's
Speaker 1: blood spilled and we became blood, a blood family. I
Speaker 1: just ad to me Jerome, who's in phantom now and
Speaker 1: we see each other, and that what we recall is
Speaker 1: that bonding in that horrible experience and we can talk
Speaker 1: about it as if it was yesterday. I think it's
Speaker 1: because you know it happened to us. Of course it
Speaker 1: happened to the creators, but they're not on stage. We're
Speaker 1: on stage, succeeding or failing in front of an audience.
Speaker 1: We're on stage being judged by the audience. Were the messengers,
Speaker 1: We're the ones who take the hit. We take the
Speaker 1: hit all the time. This was really abusive. It was
Speaker 1: just horrible. I woke up one morning and my face
Speaker 1: was filled with what looked like white heads. The entire
Speaker 1: face had raised bumps on it. I didn't know what
Speaker 1: it was. I went to sleep, woke up and the
Speaker 1: entire face. Maybe it was from the value. I have
Speaker 1: no idea what I was. Things were happening to us,
Speaker 1: physically happening to us. And when does the sun come
Speaker 1: out for you? When does the sun come out for
Speaker 1: Patti Lapone? Career wise, I think when I go back
Speaker 1: to work with David Mammitt, I go back and work
Speaker 1: with David, I go into and go back. David and
Speaker 1: I did a play in Chicago. Wh was that? After
Speaker 1: Baker's wife? Was that? I see, I'm trying to keep
Speaker 1: I'm trying to keep it straight. What play does you
Speaker 1: do with him? First? The very first play I did
Speaker 1: with him was a thing called All Men or hors
Speaker 1: Kevin Sam Chiefs and I did it at Yale rep
Speaker 1: for one night. I said, Hey, Dave, we opened it
Speaker 1: closed in new Haven, and new Haven used to be
Speaker 1: one of the circuit. Uh. You know, when you took
Speaker 1: a show out of town, your first stop was new
Speaker 1: Haven and it was a big deciding factor. So we
Speaker 1: opened and closed, we bombed well and him there. He
Speaker 1: gave me a play called The Woods. And what happens
Speaker 1: when you do the Woods, Well, I go back to
Speaker 1: what I was trained for, and I go back to
Speaker 1: an honest environment pretty much, and you're back to the
Speaker 1: circle of trust, having feels right. This is more like it.
Speaker 1: And it's a risk. It's a big risk. And when
Speaker 1: every time I work with David, I learned so much
Speaker 1: as a human being, approximate And I think nineteen late
Speaker 1: nineteen seventy seventy seven, you had a relationship with him, Yes,
Speaker 1: well we met him five years Yes, yes, and I will.
Speaker 1: I will drop everything to do a play by David everything.
Speaker 1: I don't care how risky it is. I learned so
Speaker 1: much from David and I instinctually have the mam At speak.
Speaker 1: That's something that I know how to do. His his
Speaker 1: rhythms um and I think it's because, as someone said,
Speaker 1: I cut my teeth on David. David's words when you
Speaker 1: know starting with Allmen or Horse and the Woods and
Speaker 1: the Water Engine and Edmund. I had finished Evita and
Speaker 1: I went down to the must play us at the
Speaker 1: opening of Um Edmund, and I said, why couldn't I
Speaker 1: have been in this in the back of my head?
Speaker 1: And not two weeks later I got a call from
Speaker 1: Gregory Mosher and David saying, would you replace Linda. Linda's
Speaker 1: a Chicago actress and she wanted to go back to Chicago.
Speaker 1: She was playing the wife. She came on and she
Speaker 1: was at the beginnings and broke the dish or whatever
Speaker 1: it is exactly. I'm leaving you. She's what do you
Speaker 1: mean you're leaving? Of course we'relieving, We're really geting dressed.
Speaker 1: We're thinking, No, I'm leaving you. What do you know this?
Speaker 1: You know? I begged Mama to give me the right
Speaker 1: to do the movie, but he gave it to Bill
Speaker 1: Macy and so I um joined the company and my
Speaker 1: agent was so furious with me. He said, this will
Speaker 1: hurt your negotiational you know ability, And I went for
Speaker 1: what you know, If anybody in the business knows who
Speaker 1: I am, they know that this is where I came
Speaker 1: from before I did Evita, and they did not want
Speaker 1: me to go backwards. They didn't want me to go
Speaker 1: to the Gut three to do Rosalind and As You
Speaker 1: Like It. But I was able to work with leave
Speaker 1: you Chule, a great Romanian director, or just passed outrest
Speaker 1: to sell in his internationally famous production of As You
Speaker 1: Like It At the Gunman. I was raped over the
Speaker 1: calls by the critics. One critics said, you know, basically,
Speaker 1: what was Evita doing here? And it was It was difficult,
Speaker 1: as you say, to straddle that, but I kept doing
Speaker 1: it because I was given the opportunity to do it.
Speaker 1: And I wasn't going to say no, I have to
Speaker 1: wait for the next VI to part to come along.
Speaker 1: If I waited for the next part to come along,
Speaker 1: I'd still be waiting. Is Evita the next big thing
Speaker 1: for you? Is the big thing that was? But how
Speaker 1: does that happen? I auditioned um Joanna Merlin is how
Speaker 1: princess casting director and of course how directed, how directed?
Speaker 1: And as I said earlier, all of those people had
Speaker 1: come to see this acting company at Juilliard were aware.
Speaker 1: They were aware, yes, And so I was brought in
Speaker 1: for a preliminary audition and then I was told to
Speaker 1: make myself free, make sure that I made myself free
Speaker 1: for the final callback. And as I understand that how
Speaker 1: wanted to cast actors in the role the roles as
Speaker 1: opposed to just musical theater people. So I think that's
Speaker 1: one of the reasons why I got in there, because
Speaker 1: I knew they knew I was an actor. In between,
Speaker 1: there were several plays. There was stage directions by Israel Horovitz,
Speaker 1: John Glover, Ellen Green and Night Down at the Public.
Speaker 1: While Merrill is doing, um, you're doing everything you can
Speaker 1: to scratch that inch of yours and not become a star.
Speaker 1: Now I get it. No, no, it was it was
Speaker 1: It was the available work. We're about to talk about
Speaker 1: the moment when perhaps one of the greatest musical stars
Speaker 1: of the last fifty years is born on Broadway. So
Speaker 1: let's talk about how that the moment this happens, How
Speaker 1: Prince wants people who can act and sing, and you
Speaker 1: go to the make yourself available to the final cullback
Speaker 1: and what happened. How do you feel when you're in
Speaker 1: that room. Well, I was very mad because I was
Speaker 1: actually shooting and there was a little issue about yes,
Speaker 1: about letting me go and the producer said, if you're
Speaker 1: not back tomorrow or the next day, you're you'll never
Speaker 1: work in Hollywood again. So I left Hollywood with those
Speaker 1: words ringing in my ear, and I woke up in
Speaker 1: New York to the nineteen seventy eight blizzard where they're
Speaker 1: like two ft of snow on the ground. I couldn't
Speaker 1: get back to l are you no? Um. Christopher Reeve
Speaker 1: got me on the plane. I only missed three hours
Speaker 1: of shooting. When they said howd you get here? I said, Superman.
Speaker 1: I did. It's exactly. So I went to the final callback,
Speaker 1: but I was really mad because I didn't want to
Speaker 1: do this musical. I didn't like the music. I thought, Evita,
Speaker 1: you didn't like it? What specifically? You're a smart woman,
Speaker 1: what specifically didn't you like? Well, I didn't like I
Speaker 1: heard the White album the Julie Covington David Essex called
Speaker 1: Wilkinson very rocky, weird music, but right it rocked out
Speaker 1: a lot, and I thought, what's rock? I want to
Speaker 1: be a rocker. It was really really high. Didn't grab me.
Speaker 1: I mean, I grew up on Rogers and Hammerstein. I
Speaker 1: grew up on Julie Stein, Mereth Wilson, Stephen Sondheim. This
Speaker 1: was not a musical to me, This was noise from Britain.
Speaker 1: Do you know what I mean? It wasn't. It just didn't.
Speaker 1: It did. So how did you go out there and
Speaker 1: do it? I went out and and the final audition,
Speaker 1: I was wet from my knees down. I was wearing
Speaker 1: sneakers and jeans, not knowing it was going to snow.
Speaker 1: Who you know, I did so stupid. I didn't look
Speaker 1: at the weather report. I went out there and I blasted,
Speaker 1: literally blasted through rainbow high Buenos Aires and don't cry
Speaker 1: for me, Argentina. And there were tears in my eyes apparently,
Speaker 1: and there were there were tears of rage, necessarily not
Speaker 1: tears of And I left, and um, I got I
Speaker 1: got a call on the set. I made it back
Speaker 1: and I got a call on the set and the
Speaker 1: makeup trailer and they said you've got the part. And
Speaker 1: I started to cry again because I had promised David
Speaker 1: that I would reprise The Woods at the Public Theater
Speaker 1: with Hulu gross bar directing. What I love is that
Speaker 1: you're gonna blow your Hollywood film career to go do
Speaker 1: a musical. You don't even like, and then that when
Speaker 1: they are for too, you don't sure you're gonna because
Speaker 1: you gotta go do another little man play well. I
Speaker 1: had been trained to be an actor, and I thought
Speaker 1: my responsibility was to act at every possible opportunity, and
Speaker 1: especially good opportunity. It put, you know, apply your craft
Speaker 1: and if it's good material. And I David and I
Speaker 1: forged a friendship and a bond, and I didn't want
Speaker 1: to let him down. David and I became really really
Speaker 1: good friends. David lived on twentieth Kevin and I lived
Speaker 1: on twenty first Tree. He'd come over all the time
Speaker 1: for breakfast. We'd walk around, we'dn't do anty. I'm gonna
Speaker 1: start calling you out, by the way, because you keep
Speaker 1: changing the subject. What happy with? How? How did the
Speaker 1: hell get you to do that material? And and it
Speaker 1: became what it became? Well, No, I knew I had
Speaker 1: to do it. I cried because I knew that I
Speaker 1: would have to. I couldn't do the woods and I
Speaker 1: had to do with the tip because I knew I
Speaker 1: wanted to work with how and I knew that it
Speaker 1: would change the course of my career. You knew going
Speaker 1: in that was going to be a hit. There was
Speaker 1: so much hype before had they done it in London? Yeah?
Speaker 1: What is it? Big hit in London? And you were
Speaker 1: in the American cast. It was huge in London, so
Speaker 1: you knew this was a big opportunity and there was hype.
Speaker 1: You can't That was my first indication that this was
Speaker 1: going to be a tough experience because it was I went,
Speaker 1: how am I going to get around the hype? It
Speaker 1: was the first musical that I was aware of that
Speaker 1: had so much pre opening the Modern Way, not even buzz,
Speaker 1: you know, not word of mouth, hype, media hype. And
Speaker 1: it was created, of course by really isful, by Andrews company,
Speaker 1: do you know what I mean? That's how he operates.
Speaker 1: And it was frightening and I had no vocal time.
Speaker 1: So now this thing is all hyped up. You've been
Speaker 1: through everything you've been through. You've had some good times
Speaker 1: and some tough times, and you've worked hard, god knows
Speaker 1: four years in the road with Holisman in that company,
Speaker 1: and you stepped out for the Broadway opening, the opening
Speaker 1: of Avida. What was it like for you? How do
Speaker 1: that evening? Perfect? Of course you did? And I threw
Speaker 1: up in the sink before I sank. Don't cry from Argentina.
Speaker 1: I'm sure it was a combination of I got, I
Speaker 1: got extremely bad notices opening in l a and extremely
Speaker 1: bad notices opening in San Francisco. And Al came to
Speaker 1: me and said, we're going to laugh about this in
Speaker 1: twenty years, Patty. They pulled the entire company together, and
Speaker 1: he said. There was an article coming out in Susie
Speaker 1: Nicko Parker's column the next day that I was going
Speaker 1: to be fired and that actor's equity was waiting to
Speaker 1: clear Elaine Page to take my place, and this was
Speaker 1: in the newspapers. Yeah, she's the one that originated in London.
Speaker 1: I'm dealing with all of this press of me being
Speaker 1: fired and me not being able to sing the part
Speaker 1: and still going on from well that was that was
Speaker 1: opening night, and so so you go out and do
Speaker 1: the opening of What Happens? Bad reviews again? Actually they
Speaker 1: weren't bad. Were They dismissed how and this is this
Speaker 1: was an innovative This was an innovative concept and innovative production.
Speaker 1: They dismissed how and they barely touched on Mandy and me.
Speaker 1: And that's worse when you're ignored It's one thing if
Speaker 1: they're passionate and you're back and passionate when you're good,
Speaker 1: but when you're ignored. And Mandy and I at one point,
Speaker 1: I said, you want to go out for a drink?
Speaker 1: He said yeah, and we we were in fifty second
Speaker 1: I think that's where the the Broadway theaters, and we
Speaker 1: walked down Eighth Avenue and simultaneously we burst into tears.
Speaker 1: I mean, we worked hard in those parts and then
Speaker 1: to be ignored is tough. And then, of course nine
Speaker 1: months later they give us the Tony's. When you win
Speaker 1: the Tony did? Was it any vindication for you at all?
Speaker 1: Or was it just anything? You felt good? Such a relief.
Speaker 1: It was such a relief, because really have you? Because
Speaker 1: I was still performing and still scared out of my
Speaker 1: mind every night. I envied Mandy because Mandy was just
Speaker 1: all over the place. He didn't have a problem singing it.
Speaker 1: So he literally he told me. He told me something
Speaker 1: the other day we were talking about it beat in.
Speaker 1: He said, well, how teld me to go? He wanted
Speaker 1: me over there? And I said to how how do
Speaker 1: I get there? He said, I don't know, just get there,
Speaker 1: And so that's where he does a jatte across the stage,
Speaker 1: and I went. I would see it every night, going
Speaker 1: Whites Mandy doing that. And it was because How told
Speaker 1: him to get there, getting there, and he didn't care
Speaker 1: how so many put it in and it became part
Speaker 1: of his performance and and so. And I suppose in
Speaker 1: that respect How gives the actor freedom. But I didn't
Speaker 1: have that freedom because I was so tied up and
Speaker 1: a not because I didn't think I could sing it.
Speaker 1: I wanna be when that who what I did? If
Speaker 1: I haven't thought, if I hadn't known that, we would
Speaker 1: stay to get really and you know when you in
Speaker 1: a rehearsal period, you know this, you have to do
Speaker 1: it over and over and over again. So you're not
Speaker 1: hitting that d in. Screw the middle classes once you're
Speaker 1: not hitting that g in. Screw the middle classes once
Speaker 1: you're doing it over and over again. I didn't have
Speaker 1: vocal technique to know that. I didn't have to hit
Speaker 1: those notes every day. I didn't have vocal technique. I
Speaker 1: got it during the run by from a kid the chorus, Oh,
Speaker 1: David Vosberg. I came off stage in Tis I they
Speaker 1: got him a piano that put a piano in my
Speaker 1: dressing room, and he worked with me an hour every
Speaker 1: single day before the show. He would come to me
Speaker 1: and um work out of the goodness of his heart.
Speaker 1: David Vosper David vosperg he's in Ohio, he's a director
Speaker 1: of opera. But he would um give me a vocal technique.
Speaker 1: He would warm me up. And the difficult thing was
Speaker 1: to be to apply what he had just taught me
Speaker 1: that night. Because I would do one thing right, something
Speaker 1: else would go disastrously wrong. But at least I was
Speaker 1: getting a technique to sing that part. He saved my
Speaker 1: job and they knew that, and they paid him. Now,
Speaker 1: you say, when you talk about this, you talk about
Speaker 1: the tension and the anxiety and the fear, and you
Speaker 1: don't really want to necessarily be doing a vide because
Speaker 1: you got another David play and this and this and
Speaker 1: that didn't start to become fun for you. Oh, anything
Speaker 1: goes with a ball because of the material and because
Speaker 1: of the cast, and and it was hysterical, I mean
Speaker 1: Jerry's acts. And Jerry did a great job of direct
Speaker 1: Yes he is. And but however, these were the way
Speaker 1: musicals used to be written. You'd have a joke coming
Speaker 1: and then a gorgeous song. The material was so ripe
Speaker 1: and so beautiful. If I was in a bad mood,
Speaker 1: all I had to do was hear that. Okay, I
Speaker 1: know where I am tonight, just looking at the audience
Speaker 1: and seeing tears of joy from laughter. The only thing
Speaker 1: we are as actors are messengers. That's all we are. Correct.
Speaker 1: We are delivering the playwright's intentions through the concept of
Speaker 1: the director. And I come on stage if I feel
Speaker 1: confident in the role, then I give it away. I
Speaker 1: give it away anyway. But it's all about them, So
Speaker 1: I have to go out there and love them, and
Speaker 1: I do. And I think they see that they can
Speaker 1: relax with me because they know I'm giving it to them.
Speaker 1: I'm not. You know, there are some actors that don't
Speaker 1: want to be on stage because you just nailed it.
Speaker 1: Because because Patty the pone to me as a woman
Speaker 1: who comes out there when the first thing does she
Speaker 1: stopped here and she's like, you know, how's everybody doing it?
Speaker 1: It's like a little moment like a nightclub singer, like
Speaker 1: you know how you all doing tonight? Without saying how
Speaker 1: you all doing to it? Like just connect to them
Speaker 1: and let them feel like there's no place else we'd
Speaker 1: rather be. Is there than here right now? Well, I
Speaker 1: think our responsibility is to relax them. You've been in
Speaker 1: an audience. I've been in an audience where we're worried
Speaker 1: for the performer and then we're not having experience. They're
Speaker 1: paying a lot. And if I'm worried for the performer
Speaker 1: and they and they should be worried for then I'm
Speaker 1: worried for me because I want to get the f
Speaker 1: out of there. Yeah. Hello, Our responsibility is a minute
Speaker 1: we hit the deck, is to relax the audience. And
Speaker 1: that is what is called command of the top. You're
Speaker 1: the col You're the top, You're the lou Museum, You're melody.
Speaker 1: From how long did you do anything? Goes fifteen months?
Speaker 1: I think, Oh I laughed my ass off, and that's
Speaker 1: we had such a ball. And then and the same
Speaker 1: thing is, is this this idea that the someone said
Speaker 1: to me, why do you like doing the theater? I mean,
Speaker 1: even now, did you get it? A lot of actors
Speaker 1: do it for a period and you get it out
Speaker 1: of your system. I said, you know, the one thing
Speaker 1: I've never gotten out of my system is if the
Speaker 1: play is the right play. I said, I go to
Speaker 1: work at six o'clock. I like to get to the
Speaker 1: theater early, kind of drain the day out of me.
Speaker 1: And then I go out on stage and I said,
Speaker 1: you know what I love. I said, I know exactly
Speaker 1: what I'm gonna say. I know exactly what the other
Speaker 1: guy is going to say for the next two and
Speaker 1: a half hours. I don't know exactly how people are
Speaker 1: likely going to react. I said, how often can you
Speaker 1: say that in your life, that you know exactly what's
Speaker 1: going to happen and it's a good thing for the
Speaker 1: next two and a half hours of your life. I
Speaker 1: never get tired of that. No, and I it's magical.
Speaker 1: It's magical. And you taught you said, draining the day
Speaker 1: out during the day out to have a magical night.
Speaker 1: Do you know what I mean? Really, to have experience
Speaker 1: with a group of people. Do you know I mean
Speaker 1: not just your your fellow actors on the stage, but
Speaker 1: people that want that leave the theater going oh my.
Speaker 1: I mean I've done that. I've walked out of a
Speaker 1: production going oh my, oh what street we on? You know,
Speaker 1: we've been transported, we've been taken away, We've drained the
Speaker 1: day out of our life and we've experienced something that
Speaker 1: has changed us. It's another thing I love about our
Speaker 1: profession at the arts. I mean you can do that
Speaker 1: in the in the movies too, as a woman, as
Speaker 1: an actress who was known for a raft. Now of
Speaker 1: these heavy duty, you know, uh, powerful musical roles. Was
Speaker 1: there another one that I'm missing? Between uh Evida and
Speaker 1: uh No? We did all? I did? Oliver? I did Oliver?
Speaker 1: I did know Oliver? Here Lim is in London who
Speaker 1: Oliver Ron Moody and Graham amble Guard rescissal. Ron Moody
Speaker 1: was reprising his Royal Spagan. Yeah. He was great, beautiful
Speaker 1: song as long as he needs me, one of the
Speaker 1: most beautiful songs in all of Yeah, he wrote a
Speaker 1: great score. Um. And then I went to London and
Speaker 1: did Ley, miss Soley, miss you did only in London? Yes?
Speaker 1: Why well? And this because I didn't want to do well?
Speaker 1: And it's a it's a it's a reason that I
Speaker 1: have questioned my entire career. When I was at the
Speaker 1: Barbicane rehearsaling the Barbicane was then the Royal Shakespeare Company's
Speaker 1: London home, it felt so much like being in the
Speaker 1: hallways of Juilliard. It was amazed the rehearsal rooms. I
Speaker 1: just felt like I was at Juilliard. And Trevor actually
Speaker 1: said to me, if anybody belongs in this production or
Speaker 1: with the Royal Shakespeare Company, it's you, Patty, because Michelle
Speaker 1: sun Denis was an artistic director of the Royal Shakespeare Company.
Speaker 1: Michelle Sundni was one of the co founders and an
Speaker 1: artistic director of the Drama division of the Juilliard School.
Speaker 1: So I came full circle two different countries. But I
Speaker 1: had come full circle in training. The notice for you
Speaker 1: when you did they miss in London. I don't even remember,
Speaker 1: but I wanted Olivier Award for Fantine. So I have
Speaker 1: no idea. Everybody that I know that so you do
Speaker 1: it said to you were breathtaking in that role, so
Speaker 1: there was no desire you had. Well, this is what happened.
Speaker 1: Two weeks after we opened at the Barbercan. I came
Speaker 1: off stage in my barricade uniform because I was in
Speaker 1: the barricade scene and I I can't do this in
Speaker 1: New York. It was an instinct, I can't do this
Speaker 1: in New York. And I went to the stage door
Speaker 1: to drop off a name to the stage doorman at
Speaker 1: Cameron McIntosh, the producer you know besides the r SC,
Speaker 1: was standing there and I said, Cameron, I can't do
Speaker 1: this in New York. I was the only American in
Speaker 1: the company. He said, I know, the parts too small
Speaker 1: and said, no, that's not it. I said, this is
Speaker 1: my company. I realized when I came off the stage
Speaker 1: that I was in the perfect theatrical environment, in the
Speaker 1: perfect play, with the perfect cast, and I didn't want
Speaker 1: anything to touch that memory. And I made it It It
Speaker 1: would be different in New York totally. It would be
Speaker 1: a reproduction of this production. And I didn't think that
Speaker 1: I would seeing And you know, I've never known whether
Speaker 1: I made the right decision or not. But what did
Speaker 1: you do after that? Lb J? I came back to
Speaker 1: do lb J, and we've been didn't talk about film
Speaker 1: in your life now because in and around all of
Speaker 1: your historic career in the theater, what is going on
Speaker 1: for you? Film was nothing. I wish it did nothing,
Speaker 1: I mean but minor. But I don't know why I
Speaker 1: don't get cast or I don't know why that you know.
Speaker 1: And now it's probably too light because I'm one of
Speaker 1: those women that are too old for Hollywood, or maybe
Speaker 1: maybe I'm coming into my film career now. I don't
Speaker 1: know why it didn't happen, but it didn't. Um. I
Speaker 1: did Driving Miss Daisy, and Alfred Jury was responsible for
Speaker 1: my casting in that. I did UM And that's the
Speaker 1: best experience you had making a film, all of them working,
Speaker 1: especially working with the Australian directors Perspiras for it and
Speaker 1: Peter Weir. What did you do with them? We did
Speaker 1: Witness Peter Weir and I did Driving Miss Daisy with Perspiracy.
Speaker 1: Ever worked with Lamette very little. I had a tiny,
Speaker 1: tiny little part in something. I can't remember what it was,
Speaker 1: but I thought, oh my god, it would love to
Speaker 1: have worked with him. I don't remember the whole experience.
Speaker 1: I was literally I had one tiny scene and I
Speaker 1: can't remember if it was a movie or I can't
Speaker 1: remember television series. Could have been a television. But remember,
Speaker 1: life goes on for four years and then you know
Speaker 1: guest spots here and there. But it was it's odd
Speaker 1: that that that I haven't had that opportunity. Probably did
Speaker 1: have that opportunity, but you passed on it. Correct. No,
Speaker 1: I don't think I've diden the chance to do a
Speaker 1: television series. Come your way. No, it's interesting. I'm a
Speaker 1: hard sell, Alec. I've been cut at the studio level
Speaker 1: on auditions in California because I didn't believe I was
Speaker 1: I could do this or that. And you know, it's like,
Speaker 1: it's I'm a hard sell in California. I'm a hard
Speaker 1: sell in movies. I'm a hard selling TV. You know,
Speaker 1: I'm always a hard sell. I could tell you a
Speaker 1: story right now, but I can't. I've been asked to
Speaker 1: audition for a musical, and it's twenty five years since
Speaker 1: I'm auditioned for musical. When does it stop coming up?
Speaker 1: Patti Lapone talks about the most painful loss of her career,
Speaker 1: her subsequent illness, and how she recovered from both. This
Speaker 1: is Alec Baldwin, and you're listening to Here's the Thing,
Speaker 1: but the time is gone. The voice as soft as londer,
Speaker 1: as they tell your whole as the time you dream
Speaker 1: to shape. This is Alec Baldwin, and you were listening
Speaker 1: to Here's the Thing. Patty Lapone originated the role of
Speaker 1: Norma Desmond in Andrew Lloyd Weber's Sunset Boulevard in London.
Speaker 1: She was set to move with the show to Broadway
Speaker 1: until she found out she was being replaced by Glenn Close.
Speaker 1: To say she was devastated is an understatement. You know,
Speaker 1: there's always going to be some kind of stuff going
Speaker 1: on in a musical. That's just the nature of a musical.
Speaker 1: But it was a great company, We had a great time.
Speaker 1: It was the exterior information that was coming to me
Speaker 1: that was very painful. I mean, clearly, when I didn't
Speaker 1: get the reviews Andrew wanted me to get, I was
Speaker 1: on the chopping block. But I didn't find that out
Speaker 1: until after Glenn Close opened in New York and Vincent
Speaker 1: Canby gave her this review against my ad review. Meantime,
Speaker 1: I'm getting standing ovations in in London and there's nothing
Speaker 1: about me in the press in London because I show
Speaker 1: up every night. I'm turning in my working Yeah, but
Speaker 1: Andrew wanted something else, and the way they got me
Speaker 1: out was the way they were going to get me
Speaker 1: out was to have me quit because of the the
Speaker 1: barrage of negative publicity, and my agents and the lawyers
Speaker 1: said stay on stage. And I don't know if it
Speaker 1: was worth it, because it was really painful, and months
Speaker 1: before I closed, I got a telephone call from my agent.
Speaker 1: I'm in the dressing room getting ready for the show.
Speaker 1: I called my my agent called. He said he's sitting
Speaker 1: down and said yeah. He said, you've been fired. Glenn
Speaker 1: Close was replacing you in New York and he went.
Speaker 1: And I got up and had batting practice in my
Speaker 1: dressing room with a you know, a floor lamp, and left.
Speaker 1: Did They could hear me crying and screaming, and the
Speaker 1: company came up and uh, company manager, I said, I've
Speaker 1: been fired. I said, I'm leaving. I'm going by. I
Speaker 1: can't take this anymore. And if people say, what would
Speaker 1: you do for you saw Andrew again, I said, it's
Speaker 1: not what I would do, It's what my husband would do.
Speaker 1: Because whatever I had to absorb, I then took out
Speaker 1: on my husband when I came home. And that was
Speaker 1: like I went into therapy. I was on prozac. It
Speaker 1: was like it was like a long healing process because
Speaker 1: I had to absorb it and I couldn't. There was
Speaker 1: no place I could release it because I had to
Speaker 1: perform every night and um that But that company was
Speaker 1: extraordinary and we had a great time. We had a
Speaker 1: great time. So after that you do Sweeney. Then the
Speaker 1: next musical I do is Sweeney John Doe. Well, then
Speaker 1: it's two thousand. This is interesting. I come home beat
Speaker 1: up emotionally and also physically. I find out through a
Speaker 1: routine eye examination that I am in the middle of
Speaker 1: detached retinas in both eyes. There's like four hundred shots
Speaker 1: of laser and one eye two fifty in the other eye.
Speaker 1: Kevin Anderson gets into a life threatening motorcycle accident, and
Speaker 1: Bob Baby and the choreographer comes down with a really
Speaker 1: really severe case of I don't shingles or something. So
Speaker 1: three of us are manifesting illness at the end of
Speaker 1: this experience, which was so bad. So I take time
Speaker 1: to heal and I do a movie. I do bits
Speaker 1: and pieces. But the next big thing that comes comes
Speaker 1: on the heels of breast cancer. They say, do you
Speaker 1: want to play Nelly love It and Sweeney Todd with
Speaker 1: the New York film Brent Turvill playing Sweeney. I went
Speaker 1: first thing, I said to Steve no, because I've never
Speaker 1: been cast in Asantei musical. They said, yes, he gives
Speaker 1: the privileg said, of course I do. But this is
Speaker 1: a year earlier. Within that year, I find out that
Speaker 1: I have breast cancer. And what happens as I deal
Speaker 1: with it. There's nothing else I can do but deal
Speaker 1: with it and go through radiation. On my last day
Speaker 1: of radiation, start rehearsal for Sweeney Todd in the New
Speaker 1: York Film. And it's yes, the quintessential New York moment
Speaker 1: the New York Philharmonic on a New York stage in
Speaker 1: a New Yorker's production. And that was an unbelievable experience
Speaker 1: from the oven. What is that? It's priest, have a
Speaker 1: little priest? Is it really good? It's too good at least,
Speaker 1: then again, they don't calm it since all on the flesh.
Speaker 1: That was pretty fresh. Now, let's talk about Mami's last play.
Speaker 1: So here, your last venture in New York is you
Speaker 1: with your old buddy. So he calls you. He's got
Speaker 1: the play, and he called you. I called him. I
Speaker 1: saw November, and I saw after the play. I saw
Speaker 1: as his wife, Rebecca Pigeon. I said, Rebecca, I'm hitting
Speaker 1: David up for a play. It's too long. It's too
Speaker 1: long that we've worked together. And I wrote him a
Speaker 1: letter and I said, I don't want a relationship to
Speaker 1: end with the old neighborhood. I said, let's do something.
Speaker 1: And then he called me and he said, do you
Speaker 1: know who Cathy Bodin is? And I did, but he didn't,
Speaker 1: and and then he started to tell me about he
Speaker 1: was right. He was thinking about writing a play about
Speaker 1: the weatherman or the an anarchist. And I went, oh cool.
Speaker 1: And then then I found out this was last year.
Speaker 1: And then I found out that the play was being
Speaker 1: done in London, and I went, no, no, no, man,
Speaker 1: I said, I have to play this part. And I
Speaker 1: wrote to him and I said, is this the we
Speaker 1: were talking about? It? Said they don't want me in
Speaker 1: London because they don't want me in London? But can
Speaker 1: I do it in New York? And you call me
Speaker 1: said screw London, let's do it now. So that's how
Speaker 1: that happened. I knew it was a risk, but that
Speaker 1: you know you, I always take a risk with David,
Speaker 1: and I had You've been directed by David before a
Speaker 1: lot more often than you, more comfortable with him in
Speaker 1: both the aspects. And we talked about because I came
Speaker 1: and saw you that last performance, and we talked about
Speaker 1: how the financing and the financiers themselves have changed a lot,
Speaker 1: which is if they don't get those results very very quickly,
Speaker 1: they jump, They put the parachute. This is a risky play.
Speaker 1: And you know what Broadway should be, what Broadway is
Speaker 1: supposed to be, which is a vehicle for every idea.
Speaker 1: And I also am frustrated with the producers that have
Speaker 1: made gobs of money. They should have a Levy text
Speaker 1: attacks Levy against them. They should open a black box theater.
Speaker 1: They should support all the new play rights and composers.
Speaker 1: There should be a great deal of support. Art is
Speaker 1: the soul of a nation, and our art is not
Speaker 1: being supported. They developed, yes, and it's very, very very depressing.
Speaker 1: It's very depressing. If I go back on the stage
Speaker 1: in New York, I'm going to find out who the
Speaker 1: producers are and who their partners are, and I'm going
Speaker 1: to sit down and talk to them. And I want
Speaker 1: to find out what their marketing campaign is, what their
Speaker 1: marketing you know, yes, you definitely, And I want to
Speaker 1: pay and play, which you don't have pair play on Broadway.
Speaker 1: You don't have that. But you know they don't think
Speaker 1: we take the risk with them. We most certainly do.
Speaker 1: Actually we book out the pair play concept is in
Speaker 1: films is important because we book out and sometimes you
Speaker 1: gotta take it deeper. I think maybe I shouldn't care
Speaker 1: so much. I don't know whether that's true, Alec would
Speaker 1: it would not, It would reflect in your performance, do
Speaker 1: you know what I mean? I think that you can
Speaker 1: see when people care and when you an audiences can
Speaker 1: see when they don't care, because you see, because you
Speaker 1: see like someone in the years I've bumped into you,
Speaker 1: run into you, known you, known you better. You seem
Speaker 1: to care of the exact same amount as you used to.
Speaker 1: I love what I do, and I love the audience,
Speaker 1: and I love the fact that I get to do it,
Speaker 1: and I love I love our craft very very much,
Speaker 1: and it's it's a noble craft. We have a responsibility
Speaker 1: to it and to the audience and to the playwright
Speaker 1: into the message. I won't ever care less if the
Speaker 1: sky you should fall into those and the storms all
Speaker 1: laurron me the we have known. I will sing him
Speaker 1: to Love. Next month, Patti Lapone will go on a
Speaker 1: national tour with her concert entitled Far Away Places. This
Speaker 1: is Him to Love from the c D of the
Speaker 1: same name. Her book, Patti Lapone a memoir is now
Speaker 1: available both in hardcover and as an e book. So
Speaker 1: the last thing I want to say to you is
Speaker 1: a content and a question embedded in a content, and
Speaker 1: that is and I want to say this as carefully
Speaker 1: as I can, because I don't want to give myself
Speaker 1: in trouble. Watching you perform, Patty, sometimes it's like having
Speaker 1: sex with you, and it's like a sexual It's like sex.
Speaker 1: When you do what you do, it's like it's like
Speaker 1: and when you're done, I almost get this feeling like
Speaker 1: you're looking at me personally, look at me, going you
Speaker 1: really enjoyed that, dude? That was good for you, wasn't it?
Speaker 1: Do you realize? My question is do you realize the
Speaker 1: effect you have on people? Do you know when you
Speaker 1: come out there? Can you feel how much they're digging
Speaker 1: what you do? You must be able to feel it. Well,
Speaker 1: I don't know. If I don't go out there going
Speaker 1: they're gonna dig me. I go out there, and I
Speaker 1: do know that the people that have come to see
Speaker 1: me know that I have them in mind and that
Speaker 1: they already have them on my side. They know that
Speaker 1: I'm doing it for them. They It just it could
Speaker 1: be a persona could be a body language thing, but
Speaker 1: they know that I know they're there. And the differences
Speaker 1: when when actors don't acknowledge the audience, the audience can't come.
Speaker 1: When an actor acknowledges the audience, then you can have
Speaker 1: a moment of ecstasy and I'm doing something talking and
Speaker 1: a gipsy gips. This is Alec Baldwin and you're listening
Speaker 1: to here's the thing.