Jessica Vosk: Welcome back to She Pivots. I'm Jessica Vosk.
Emily Tisch Sussman: Welcome back to She Pivots, the podcast where we talk
Emily Tisch Sussman: with women who dare to pivot out of one career
Emily Tisch Sussman: and into something new and explore how their personal lives
Emily Tisch Sussman: impacts these decisions. I'm your host Emily Tish Sussman and
Emily Tisch Sussman: honor the Tony Awards this year. I'm beyond excited to
Emily Tisch Sussman: have on an icon in the Broadway world, Jessica Vosk.
Emily Tisch Sussman: She's graced Broadway stages with performances as Alphaba and Wicked, Jenna,
Emily Tisch Sussman: and Waitress, and currently stars in Hell's Kitchen. Her quick
Emily Tisch Sussman: wit and crystal voice captured the hearts of theater lovers.
Emily Tisch Sussman: A sharp and witty woman who loves Broadway my kind
Emily Tisch Sussman: of girl, so as you can imagine, we bonded instantly
Emily Tisch Sussman: when we met. I remember thinking, how have we not
Emily Tisch Sussman: known each other forever? Jessica is truly one of those
Emily Tisch Sussman: people who lights up every room she walks into, and
Emily Tisch Sussman: maybe unexpected of artists, She's practical and logical to her core,
Emily Tisch Sussman: so much so that she dropped her pursuit of musical
Emily Tisch Sussman: theater in college and instead went into finance, fully believing
Emily Tisch Sussman: she was closing the musical chapter of her life. She
Emily Tisch Sussman: worked her way up on Wall Street, but something was
Emily Tisch Sussman: always gnawing at her, an itch that just wouldn't go away.
Emily Tisch Sussman: In this episode, Jessica shares how she made the terrifying
Emily Tisch Sussman: leap from a stable career in finance to chasing her
Emily Tisch Sussman: dream on stage. But and this is the part we
Emily Tisch Sussman: don't talk about enough, it didn't all click into place
Emily Tisch Sussman: right away. Jessica didn't leave the finance job and land
Emily Tisch Sussman: a Broadway roll the next week. In fact, there were
Emily Tisch Sussman: years of struggle she had to build from the ground up.
Emily Tisch Sussman: She babysat, did odd jobs, and went to every audition
Emily Tisch Sussman: and networking opportunity she could. And it wasn't just the
Emily Tisch Sussman: career challenges. There were personal ones too. In fact, Jessica
Emily Tisch Sussman: shared something she's never talked about publicly before, a low
Emily Tisch Sussman: point that now, in hindsight, has allowed her to blossom
Emily Tisch Sussman: into the person and to the career she has now.
Emily Tisch Sussman: Jessica opened up about her experience dealing with alcohol and
Emily Tisch Sussman: ultimately her decision to go to rehab. This conversation is
Emily Tisch Sussman: real and raw, but also full of laughter, because that's
Emily Tisch Sussman: who Jessica is. She's honest, she's brave, and she's wildly talented,
Emily Tisch Sussman: and I'm so lucky to call her a friend. Enjoy.
Jessica Vosk: I'm Jessica Vosk and I am a Broadway performer. But
Jessica Vosk: I would also say that I'm kind of a jack
Jessica Vosk: tress of all trades. Which trades, oh gosh, business, marketing, singing, acting.
Jessica Vosk: If you want me to dance, I will, but you
Jessica Vosk: shouldn't pay me. Teaching just entrepreneurialism, I would say. But
Jessica Vosk: let's go back to a little jess Yeah, so, like,
Jessica Vosk: what did you think you were going to be when
Jessica Vosk: you grow up? Oh? Man, A lawyer? A lawyer. I
Jessica Vosk: was pretty heavy from grade school on into criminal justice.
Jessica Vosk: Any class, any ap class that I could possibly take
Jessica Vosk: that had to do with debate, or again crime and
Jessica Vosk: justice where we got to visit prisons or have you know,
Jessica Vosk: very in depth conversations and debates about current trials happening
Jessica Vosk: at the time was my bread and butter.
Emily Tisch Sussman: Did you have a performer? You clearly have a performer gene,
Emily Tisch Sussman: but liked were you one of those little kids who
Emily Tisch Sussman: is like just looking to perform all the time? Yeah?
Jessica Vosk: I was. I got bitten by the singing bug maybe
Jessica Vosk: at like three years old. My dad had a band
Jessica Vosk: when he was young, before he left that life and
Jessica Vosk: went into pharmaceuticals. He was a singer, had like a
Jessica Vosk: Crosby Stills, Nash Young kind of band, very harmonic, and
Jessica Vosk: so I used to sing with him in the living
Jessica Vosk: room when I was three, And so from that point on,
Jessica Vosk: I did as many community theater things as I could.
Jessica Vosk: I auditioned for all the school shows. I loved it all.
Jessica Vosk: I would sit in my room for hours just singing
Jessica Vosk: along to the cassette tips of my favorite Broadway shows
Jessica Vosk: and my favorite singers. I mean it was I think
Jessica Vosk: I was trying and tell people I feel music so
Jessica Vosk: physically in my body that it's hard to explain.
Emily Tisch Sussman: If you had this performer bug in you and you
Emily Tisch Sussman: were doing the community theaters and the shows, why didn't
Emily Tisch Sussman: you think of that as your future as your career?
Emily Tisch Sussman: You know what I At first?
Jessica Vosk: I did. At first, I did after the lawyer thing.
Jessica Vosk: I mean, I remember my mom got a call from
Jessica Vosk: one of my grade school teachers and they were like,
Jessica Vosk: Jess is really phenomenal with law and considered really pushing
Jessica Vosk: her to do something like that. And then I got
Jessica Vosk: really into high school plays and musicals and choir and
Jessica Vosk: all that stuff, and I did think at that point, Okay,
Jessica Vosk: is this possible? Can I do this for a living?
Jessica Vosk: You know, Broadway is such a feels so very far off.
Jessica Vosk: It feels i'd go see Broadway shows. I you know,
Jessica Vosk: was the kid that stayed at the stage door fingers
Jessica Vosk: crossed Kodak camera. Am I going to meet the Broadway stars?
Jessica Vosk: What is it like? Oh my god, wigs, makeup?
Emily Tisch Sussman: You know.
Jessica Vosk: It seemed so otherworldly and not attainable. And yet by
Jessica Vosk: the time I became a senior in high school, I
Jessica Vosk: thought that I would eventually become a Broadway performer. And
Jessica Vosk: I did get into a school for musical theater, and
Jessica Vosk: so I did go for a semester to a musical
Jessica Vosk: theater program. But while I was there, I just was
Jessica Vosk: kind of disenchanted, I guess, and it wasn't for me.
Jessica Vosk: So I quickly was like, well, shit, if this isn't
Jessica Vosk: for me, then maybe am I not supposed to be
Jessica Vosk: doing this thing? So then I pivoted and disenchanted by what.
Jessica Vosk: You know, it was one of the It was a
Jessica Vosk: private program, and I kind of had this mentality of
Jessica Vosk: why am I not just going in auditioning?
Speaker 3: Right?
Jessica Vosk: Now in New York for stuff. Not that I thought
Jessica Vosk: I was better than anybody else, That's not at all
Jessica Vosk: what I thought. But I also knew that it was
Jessica Vosk: a lot of money to go there, and you know,
Jessica Vosk: I also knew that not everybody in the program was
Jessica Vosk: going to make it, and I didn't know why the
Jessica Vosk: teachers were acting like everybody was going to just immediately
Jessica Vosk: get to Broadway once those four years were done. And
Jessica Vosk: then after those four years, if you don't get to Broadway,
Jessica Vosk: you're saddled with what the tons of debt? And then
Jessica Vosk: what right you're in a program where you're singing, acting,
Jessica Vosk: and dancing all day long, But then what's the other
Jessica Vosk: You're not getting any other skill that is being presented
Jessica Vosk: in these programs. So I left, and you know, my
Jessica Vosk: parents said, Okay, well you aren't not going to school,
Jessica Vosk: so pick another school in state so it's nice and
Jessica Vosk: financially sound, and I chowed a different major. And that
Jessica Vosk: was really that I didn't I kind of didn't look
Jessica Vosk: back as far as musical theater was concerned.
Emily Tisch Sussman: Jessica moved on and started a communications investor relations program.
Emily Tisch Sussman: But the nail in the coffin was really when she
Emily Tisch Sussman: auditioned for American Idol.
Jessica Vosk: I decided, I believe you know I again, I have
Jessica Vosk: to think about it was early, very early on. I
Jessica Vosk: think it must have been really right after I left
Jessica Vosk: music theater school and I was in college, because I
Jessica Vosk: think about the boyfriend that I was with, So it
Jessica Vosk: was early on. Iimatt and I auditioned for America. I
Jessica Vosk: had very early on in the season and it was
Jessica Vosk: a held at Giant Stadium in New Jersey and thousands
Jessica Vosk: of people showed up. It was like maybe two the
Jessica Vosk: season after Kelly Clarkson, or two seasons after Kelly Clarkson,
Jessica Vosk: so it's like the Jam and no social media, nothing
Jessica Vosk: like that, nothing, nothing existed. Yet you show up, you
Jessica Vosk: get a number the audition for the executive producers. I
Jessica Vosk: made it through. I have to go back into a
Jessica Vosk: holding room. I have to sign a stack of papers
Jessica Vosk: of course, giving your entire life away should you make
Jessica Vosk: it onto the show, but you don't care at the
Jessica Vosk: time because it's American Idol. And I then made it
Jessica Vosk: through to the producers. After the producers, I made it
Jessica Vosk: through again to the judges. So now we're like the
Jessica Vosk: amount of time that passes in between these auditions is
Jessica Vosk: about a year. So they take a polaroid of view
Jessica Vosk: in the outfit that you're in on the first time
Jessica Vosk: for content annuity, to make sure that you have it
Jessica Vosk: for the judges because it looks like they're filming everything
Jessica Vosk: at the same time. So then I showed up at
Jessica Vosk: Chelsea Pears, which is where the third and final audition
Jessica Vosk: was for Simon, Paula and Randy and Ryan Seacrest was
Jessica Vosk: there and you were allowed to bite your family. So
Jessica Vosk: my family drove all the way out from Pennsylvania. My
Jessica Vosk: boyfriend came and they all wait on one side of
Jessica Vosk: the room and you and everybody else, all the other
Jessica Vosk: contestants are on the other side of the room, and
Jessica Vosk: it was wild. The celebrity judges did not show up
Jessica Vosk: for twelve hours. We were stuck in there for twelve hours.
Jessica Vosk: They did the thing where they came around and sort
Jessica Vosk: of interview you on camera. The producers come around and
Jessica Vosk: one producer who took a liking to me and said,
Jessica Vosk: you know, is there anything in your life like have
Jessica Vosk: you ever been a meth addict? Have you ever been homeless?
Jessica Vosk: Have you ever gotten pregnant? Do you have a kid somewhere?
Jessica Vosk: And I just I was pretty boring, and I went in.
Jessica Vosk: Finally the judge showed up. They asked all of us
Jessica Vosk: to come back. Actually, they said, the judges are really tired.
Jessica Vosk: They just got here. They don't want to do this
Jessica Vosk: and be on camera, but we're leaving it up to
Jessica Vosk: you if you want to audition or not. And all
Jessica Vosk: of us were like, our families are here, we've been
Jessica Vosk: here for twelve hours, we're auditioning. Well, none of us
Jessica Vosk: made it through, and they were they were in shitty moods.
Jessica Vosk: Let's not let's not lie. But I got in. I
Jessica Vosk: sank alone by heart, and Simon said I was desperate,
Jessica Vosk: and I was like, just don't do anything on camera
Jessica Vosk: because it's going to make it on TV if you
Jessica Vosk: do something crazy on camera. Don't do anything on camera.
Jessica Vosk: And Ryan Seacrest has an earpiece in and they all
Jessica Vosk: have earpieces, and so you leave the room and the
Jessica Vosk: camera follows you all the way out to the car,
Jessica Vosk: and I just was tunnel vision again, very eyes to
Jessica Vosk: the floor, don't say anything. And I remember we got
Jessica Vosk: on the train, my boyfriend and I back to Montclair,
Jessica Vosk: New Jersey, where I was living at the time, because
Jessica Vosk: that's where I was going to college and I was
Jessica Vosk: a mess. I was so embarrassed. I ad a hamburger
Jessica Vosk: at the local pub and it was mostly just embarrassment
Jessica Vosk: and probably a little bit of anger, but that was
Jessica Vosk: a core memory. And yes, for me, it was like, Okay,
Jessica Vosk: I'm done. I am yeah, Nail and Coffin. I don't
Jessica Vosk: need to do this. I shouldn't be doing this. I
Jessica Vosk: don't know why I thought I could do this. I'm done.
Emily Tisch Sussman: So is that what took you in that direction? Like,
Emily Tisch Sussman: is that you know why finance? Why corporate America in
Emily Tisch Sussman: the first place that you were like, this feels this
Emily Tisch Sussman: feels secure, this feels safe, and that was what you
Emily Tisch Sussman: were aiming for at that point, Yeah.
Jessica Vosk: It was, it was it was how to Honestly, it
Jessica Vosk: was mostly me thinking about what would make my parents proud.
Jessica Vosk: I guess I was also really embarrassed that they had
Jessica Vosk: to be there for the American Idol thing. And you know,
Jessica Vosk: a career path. My parents did practical things. You know,
Jessica Vosk: my parents both have artistic qualities. My mom actually was
Jessica Vosk: an artist, a graphic designer. She sketched and painted. But
Jessica Vosk: then when in real estate, my father had a fantastic band,
Jessica Vosk: he could sing, he went into pharmaceuticals, like it was
Jessica Vosk: the typical boomer trajectory. And so I think there was
Jessica Vosk: a part of me too that was like, I can't
Jessica Vosk: believe that I went through something like that in front
Jessica Vosk: of my parents, and I'm never going to I'm never
Jessica Vosk: going to allow them to see something like that again.
Jessica Vosk: And that's the first time I'm saying this out loud.
Jessica Vosk: That's interesting, But it sounds like that was like what
Jessica Vosk: you saw, like you were following the path of what
Jessica Vosk: you saw, Like, yes, you can love art, but it's
Jessica Vosk: not what you do. What you do is practical, exactly.
Emily Tisch Sussman: And practical she was. She left any dreams of theater behind,
Emily Tisch Sussman: putting one hundred percent into this new corporate path. Jessica
Emily Tisch Sussman: finished early, graduated with honors, and found a job in finance.
Jessica Vosk: I rose the ranks pretty fast at that job. So
Jessica Vosk: for me, I worked a lot with clean energy clients.
Jessica Vosk: So I had, you know, an area of clean energy,
Jessica Vosk: wind energy. I had an area of corporate real estate,
Jessica Vosk: and then I had a personal finance area. So I
Jessica Vosk: sort of like worked in these three areas with clients,
Jessica Vosk: and I would travel most of the day to day
Jessica Vosk: was like in the office. A lot of earnings calls,
Jessica Vosk: a lot of hopping on calls with executives talking about
Jessica Vosk: damage control, if something stock wise happened that we had
Jessica Vosk: to talk to the press about. There was a lot
Jessica Vosk: of liaising between press and sea level suite, and then
Jessica Vosk: there was a ton of like three days of the week,
Jessica Vosk: I'd be in Texas doing something for this wind energy client,
Jessica Vosk: or I would have to fly out to San Francisco
Jessica Vosk: and do something for this personal finance company and be
Jessica Vosk: with them. So it was a lot of back and
Jessica Vosk: forth and taught me a lot about if I'm going
Jessica Vosk: to a lunch, it's either going to be with a client,
Jessica Vosk: or it's going to be with one of the head
Jessica Vosk: requorters of the FT or the Wall Street Journal and
Jessica Vosk: sitting with them to place a story or to make
Jessica Vosk: sure a story doesn't get placed store to you know,
Jessica Vosk: it's that kind of again, jack of all trades, ability
Jessica Vosk: to be that chameleon within the job. So I rose
Jessica Vosk: Arin's pretty fast at that job. It was it was
Jessica Vosk: the type of thing where we were working with enough
Jessica Vosk: sea level executives and doing enough pitches where it felt
Jessica Vosk: like I was the person to be in the room
Jessica Vosk: because I was really good at volleying and improving and
Jessica Vosk: kind of now I would call it auditioning or walking
Jessica Vosk: into a room or being you know that type of
Jessica Vosk: person where you can throw me anything and I'll be
Jessica Vosk: able to come back with something. So it was kind
Jessica Vosk: of fun for me at the time. But nobody, nobody
Jessica Vosk: there knew that I could sing, or that I was
Jessica Vosk: a theater girly under wraps.
Emily Tisch Sussman: But really you were pulling from your theater background to
Emily Tisch Sussman: be successful in investor relations and in business. Yes, yes,
Emily Tisch Sussman: so I didn't know that, right, but I love that,
Emily Tisch Sussman: Like already the seeds are planted. It's like a little foreshadowing.
Emily Tisch Sussman: It totally was Oh I love that. Okay, So I
Emily Tisch Sussman: think a lot about what success looks like at different
Emily Tisch Sussman: points in our lives. What do you think success was
Emily Tisch Sussman: for you at that point?
Jessica Vosk: Money, health, insurance, the ability to say, like, I have
Jessica Vosk: a job that I'm locked into, I work with all
Jessica Vosk: of these great large companies that are you know, foreign
Jessica Vosk: companies going public on the US market. Look at all
Jessica Vosk: of my jargon. I'm very very smart. I think that
Jessica Vosk: was success to me at the time. It wasn't necessarily happiness.
Jessica Vosk: So it was a really interesting thing because it became
Jessica Vosk: you know, how do I become the best at this
Jessica Vosk: at this but I also didn't love it, so at
Jessica Vosk: the time, I didn't realize that what I thought of
Jessica Vosk: as success was actually hindering me.
Emily Tisch Sussman: Well, you've shared that when you were working in finance
Emily Tisch Sussman: you started having panic attacks. What do you think drove
Emily Tisch Sussman: those and did those change how you were thinking about
Emily Tisch Sussman: your career? Yeah?
Jessica Vosk: I mean when I was in this place of giving
Jessica Vosk: pits every day or doing client pitches in a boardroom,
Jessica Vosk: or I would be so stressed out and I couldn't
Jessica Vosk: understand why. And I was on all these different time
Jessica Vosk: zones because when the market opens in Portugal, it's the
Jessica Vosk: middle of the night here, but then you know, I
Jessica Vosk: still have to keep up with San Francisco and that's
Jessica Vosk: three hours behind. It was not I didn't have a
Jessica Vosk: body clock, and I didn't again, I was in my twenties.
Jessica Vosk: I was burning the candle at both ends with this job.
Jessica Vosk: And then I think what happened with my subconscious knowing
Jessica Vosk: that I wasn't doing the thing that I loved, and
Jessica Vosk: I wasn't experiencing any art, and I wasn't going to
Jessica Vosk: any therapy or talking to anybody or confiding in anybody.
Jessica Vosk: Is that stress is a silent killer. It really does kill.
Jessica Vosk: In my experience, it manifested itself through sweating and my
Jessica Vosk: heart rate going through the roof and feeling like I
Jessica Vosk: was going to die. But I couldn't understand what that was.
Jessica Vosk: I didn't know what anxiety was. I didn't know what
Jessica Vosk: panic attacks were. I sort of just thought, like, gosh,
Jessica Vosk: am I getting nervous for these meetings. I don't understand
Jessica Vosk: why I would be so every single day too, You're
Jessica Vosk: going out to lunches, and in order to quell the anxiety,
Jessica Vosk: you're having like three glasses of wine with lunch, and
Jessica Vosk: then you're doing the same thing at dinner. So that
Jessica Vosk: became a whole other you know, well, in order to
Jessica Vosk: get rid of my anxiety, I've got to have a drink.
Jessica Vosk: And so it kind of was this hand in hand thing.
Jessica Vosk: It was very very slippery slope at that point in
Jessica Vosk: my life. Did that make you think that you were
Jessica Vosk: eventually going to leave?
Jessica Vosk: Like?
Emily Tisch Sussman: Was that a pivot point?
Emily Tisch Sussman: Where is that what we call sort of like the
Emily Tisch Sussman: intervening life event where we start to think about what's
Emily Tisch Sussman: making us happy at that point or not making us
Emily Tisch Sussman: happy and precipitates the change.
Jessica Vosk: Yeah, I mean, I think there was. It was a
Jessica Vosk: very night light sprinkling of what's going on here, but
Jessica Vosk: not really understanding how to figure that out. And I
Jessica Vosk: mean my pivot moment, my true pivot moment, was when
Jessica Vosk: kind of the universe stepped in and I was sitting
Jessica Vosk: in my office. At this point, I was promoted to
Jessica Vosk: my own office, so I had people underneath me, and
Jessica Vosk: I had been sitting in my office and I again
Jessica Vosk: totally sort of checked out, disassociating, knocked something over, saw
Jessica Vosk: a note that fell out of a folder. I don't
Jessica Vosk: know where or how this happened from my grandmother that
Jessica Vosk: said I wish you all the luck in the world
Jessica Vosk: that she wrote to me, like after a theater show
Jessica Vosk: or something. And that's when I was like, I gotta go.
Jessica Vosk: I have to go. I don't know how. I don't
Jessica Vosk: literally know how to go. But that kicked off the
Jessica Vosk: pivot of the next six months of how to make
Jessica Vosk: the transition.
Emily Tisch Sussman: When we come back, Jessica walks us through the mechanics
Emily Tisch Sussman: of her calculated but nevertheless scary pivot out of her
Emily Tisch Sussman: stable job in finance.
Jessica Vosk: I have to go. I don't know how. I don't
Jessica Vosk: literally know how to go. But that kicked off the
Jessica Vosk: pivot of the next six months of how to make
Jessica Vosk: the transition. I had concepts of like, Okay, I need
Jessica Vosk: to leave this job. So what I want to do
Jessica Vosk: is I want to sing. I want to be back
Jessica Vosk: in that life. Okay, how am I going to do that?
Emily Tisch Sussman: Well?
Jessica Vosk: I had kind of met a couple of people within
Jessica Vosk: the business. I had been going to this open mic
Jessica Vosk: night every Monday night after work was over. I'd have
Jessica Vosk: to wait till eleven pm every Monday night to try
Jessica Vosk: and get hurt on this open mic night. And I
Jessica Vosk: met people through that, and I thought, Okay, I've got
Jessica Vosk: a network here and figure out how to get in
Jessica Vosk: like the right room. How am I supposed to audition?
Jessica Vosk: I don't have an agent. I called my parents. I
Jessica Vosk: was like, okay, I'm leaving this job, and they were
Jessica Vosk: like no, no, no, reverse. So they were pretty scared nervous. Again,
Jessica Vosk: like my father in an interview a couple of years
Jessica Vosk: ago said to ABC or something like I thought this
Jessica Vosk: was like the worst decision she's ever made. So no,
Jessica Vosk: I didn't have a plan. I just knew I had
Jessica Vosk: to get laid off because that was the only way
Jessica Vosk: I can collect unemployment. I knew that that if I quit,
Jessica Vosk: I couldn't collect unemployment. If I quit, I wouldn't get severance,
Jessica Vosk: you know, all of that kind of like stuff about
Jessica Vosk: how to. And in the interim I decided to put
Jessica Vosk: together a concert and do a concert and invite all
Jessica Vosk: the finance people to come see it at the Lori
Jessica Vosk: beachmanth Theater on forty second Street between nine and ten
Jessica Vosk: in the basement, and make everybody come see it. As
Jessica Vosk: am I like, this is what I want to do
Jessica Vosk: than while I was still at the job. I don't
Jessica Vosk: know what I was thinking, but I did it. And
Jessica Vosk: subsequently the market crashed in O eight and I skillfully
Jessica Vosk: got laid off. So what happened is the chirp, chirp
Jessica Vosk: chatter of the real estate crash happening, the big banks
Jessica Vosk: going under, etc. Was around the office. I knew we
Jessica Vosk: would either get acquired by a London company or you know,
Jessica Vosk: in order for us to stay afloat with our clientele.
Jessica Vosk: So I was like, Okay, how do I do this.
Jessica Vosk: I go into the HR office and I was like, hey, guys,
Jessica Vosk: pleasure listen. I was just wondering if you were looking
Jessica Vosk: for anybody to volunteer to be laid off because I
Jessica Vosk: will do that. And they were like, you just got promoted,
Jessica Vosk: and I said, oh, well, I'm just saying that if
Jessica Vosk: you were looking for it, and they were like, this
Jessica Vosk: conversation never happened. I think one of the girls who
Jessica Vosk: I was close with had a chat with my boss
Jessica Vosk: and I got an email from him saying a couple
Jessica Vosk: of weeks later saying, hey, can I see you in
Jessica Vosk: my office? And I think anybody else who got this
Jessica Vosk: email in life would probably be like fuck no no.
Jessica Vosk: I was like, yes, this is it, God like it was.
Jessica Vosk: It was that moment for me. I remember going in there,
Jessica Vosk: sitting down, you know, totally faking the O you know,
Jessica Vosk: I can't believe and get it laid off, and of
Jessica Vosk: course he probably faked it too, and everybody thought I
Jessica Vosk: was nuts. Everyone thought I was nuts, said I would
Jessica Vosk: get a certain amount of severance, YadA, YadA, YadA. I left.
Jessica Vosk: I don't remember how soon after I left, but you know,
Jessica Vosk: made sure everybody with kids knew that I could babysit
Jessica Vosk: their kids and kept in touch with them and kind
Jessica Vosk: of supplemented as much as I could. And that was that.
Emily Tisch Sussman: Yeah, how did you once you left the stability, the
Emily Tisch Sussman: thing that you had, that thing that you had been
Emily Tisch Sussman: organizing your life around. How did you make it work
Emily Tisch Sussman: once you started? Was it auditioning?
Jessica Vosk: Because you were.
Emily Tisch Sussman: Also probably you know, a number of years behind everyone
Emily Tisch Sussman: else in experience that had been Yeah.
Jessica Vosk: Way behind, way behind. I mean, I'm at this point
Jessica Vosk: mid to late twenties. Kids are on Broadway now at
Jessica Vosk: twenty two, twenty one, nineteen. So I was so late
Jessica Vosk: to the party. I would show up every day at
Jessica Vosk: six am at the Equity building. I was not an
Jessica Vosk: equity performer. This is back in the day where you
Jessica Vosk: had to sign up in person, not online. Rarely would
Jessica Vosk: you get seen if you were not equity. So it
Jessica Vosk: was it was so hard, man, it was. It was
Jessica Vosk: really hellish. My supplemental income was babysitting. You know, you
Jessica Vosk: can only collect unemployment for so long. And I just
Jessica Vosk: kept doing the same thing over and over and it
Jessica Vosk: is really exhausting. And I know people who do it
Jessica Vosk: for you know, a living day in and day out,
Jessica Vosk: and it is That's so I respect performers so much
Jessica Vosk: because you have to keep putting yourself out there for
Jessica Vosk: people who don't really give a shit. At the end
Jessica Vosk: of the day. A lot of these are required calls.
Jessica Vosk: They have to do these calls. You're never going to
Jessica Vosk: get a phone call about it. And that's what I did.
Jessica Vosk: And it was it's a bit soul sucking. Didn't make
Jessica Vosk: your question your decision. Oh sure, I questioned that. I
Jessica Vosk: questioned my decision every day. I was like, and now
Jessica Vosk: I don't have health insurance. Now I don't have a
Jessica Vosk: four oh one k. Now I don't have a salary
Jessica Vosk: coming at every single week. And I wasn't good with
Jessica Vosk: my money back then. I spent all of my money
Jessica Vosk: when I was at that job. I spent it on clothes.
Jessica Vosk: I spent it on booze, I spent it on dinner,
Jessica Vosk: I spent it on travel. I did you know, It's
Jessica Vosk: not like I sat and saved a bunch of money.
Jessica Vosk: So it's a bit of a wake up call.
Emily Tisch Sussman: The difficulty of making it all work started to wear
Emily Tisch Sussman: on her audition after audition, she was hustling to make
Emily Tisch Sussman: her dreams come true, and what started as a casual
Emily Tisch Sussman: drink here and there turned into a way to cope.
Jessica Vosk: I mean, this is probably the first time ever on
Jessica Vosk: an interview where I'm going to say that I relied
Jessica Vosk: so much on alcohol to get me through the latter
Jessica Vosk: couple of years of that that I wound up with
Jessica Vosk: such a problem with alcohol that I had to, at
Jessica Vosk: the age twenty nine, go to a rehab for twenty days.
Jessica Vosk: And I've never publicly talked about that before. First of all,
Jessica Vosk: for the first time in my life, I can say
Jessica Vosk: that I told everybody I would never go into a
Jessica Vosk: program of rehab. No, no, no, I am way better
Jessica Vosk: than these people. I am not as bad as these people.
Jessica Vosk: And then it was one of those things where I
Jessica Vosk: had to actually talk to my parents about it, and
Jessica Vosk: they said, no, you're going, and I was like, I'm not,
Jessica Vosk: and they won. And then when I got there, I
Jessica Vosk: remember being very taken aback because I was there with lawyers,
Jessica Vosk: and I was there with doctors, and I was there
Jessica Vosk: with pharmacists, and I was there with nurses, and I
Jessica Vosk: was there with all of these people who I held
Jessica Vosk: in high regard in life circumstances, who all had the
Jessica Vosk: same problems that I did. And those twenty days of
Jessica Vosk: my life was the first time that I ever had
Jessica Vosk: tools put into a toolbox of how to handle emotion
Jessica Vosk: and how to handle mental health and how to handle
Jessica Vosk: anxiety and possible depression and how to handle the fact
Jessica Vosk: that we're all addicted to something. So I didn't have
Jessica Vosk: the use of my phone at that time, which is
Jessica Vosk: another addiction. I didn't have the ability to talk to
Jessica Vosk: really the outside world. I had therapy. I had therapy,
Jessica Vosk: really for the first time in my life, to have
Jessica Vosk: to sit and really do therapy, and then you learn
Jessica Vosk: who you are. By the time I had left again
Jessica Vosk: only like thirty days, but I had turned thirty, and
Jessica Vosk: I remember feeling so different and at the time that
Jessica Vosk: I had gotten into those first thirty days, it was
Jessica Vosk: I'm so much better than all of you. I don't
Jessica Vosk: need to be here. And by the time I left,
Jessica Vosk: I was like, you know what, none of us are different.
Jessica Vosk: What a wild thing for me to have such an
Jessica Vosk: ego ego about this. But I think it's important to
Jessica Vosk: my story because that kind of year of my life,
Jessica Vosk: at the end of my twenties, not having I had
Jessica Vosk: done a couple of like really amazing things. I had
Jessica Vosk: done Carnegie Hall, a concert at Carnegie Hall with Abba,
Jessica Vosk: and I had done a show with the San Francisco Symphony,
Jessica Vosk: And I think it's important for people to know that
Jessica Vosk: I worked really hard to even be seen for those
Jessica Vosk: to like word of mouth, have somebody be like, Jessica
Jessica Vosk: has a good voice, you should bring her in for
Jessica Vosk: this thing. That my brain got ahead of myself and
Jessica Vosk: I thought, these are going to be my big break.
Jessica Vosk: This is going to be like it for me when
Jessica Vosk: I play Carnegie Hall for the first time, and then
Jessica Vosk: when I do the San Francisco Symphony, this is going
Jessica Vosk: to be everybody's going to want to hire me. And
Jessica Vosk: it was not that. So after that is when I
Jessica Vosk: just like it was a downward spiral for a year
Jessica Vosk: where it or I hit a rock bottom that I
Jessica Vosk: believe was necessary and another impetus for a massive pivot
Jessica Vosk: point in my life to get where I am now.
Jessica Vosk: And all of it ties together because by the time
Jessica Vosk: I left is when I booked Broadway show. So I
Jessica Vosk: had been sober only for a few months, maybe three
Jessica Vosk: or four, and I had gotten called in to audition
Jessica Vosk: for a Broadway show and I didn't again. I don't
Jessica Vosk: know how that happened, but back when I had been
Jessica Vosk: sort of like auditioning all the time, a casting company
Jessica Vosk: kept my headshot and resume. I wasn't right for the thing,
Jessica Vosk: but they decided to keep it and bring me in
Jessica Vosk: for this other thing, and it turns out I booked it.
Jessica Vosk: And I just remember saying like, this would have never
Jessica Vosk: happened if I didn't just go get sober booze, I,
Jessica Vosk: this never would have happened.
Emily Tisch Sussman: Do you think that the rehab gave you access to
Emily Tisch Sussman: the both the emotional tools to be able to book,
Emily Tisch Sussman: but also the fortitude to get through it.
Jessica Vosk: Yeah, I mean I think it gives you vulnerability, right,
Jessica Vosk: I really stand very firmly on the fact that I
Jessica Vosk: think being vulnerable is a superpower that not a lot
Jessica Vosk: of people are willing to access. Is a scary and
Jessica Vosk: you have to be vulnerable if you're in a situation
Jessica Vosk: where you're talking about the thing that took you to
Jessica Vosk: the worst, most low part of your life, where you've
Jessica Vosk: had to you've had to crawl out of that hole
Jessica Vosk: by yourself, without help. And so yeah, I learned a
Jessica Vosk: lot about emotional capability. I was way more open. I
Jessica Vosk: was willing to show a lot more of myself. Was
Jessica Vosk: I ever willing, really until this moment with you publicly
Jessica Vosk: to say I was in a rehab?
Emily Tisch Sussman: No.
Jessica Vosk: I was very embarrassed about it for years, for years,
Jessica Vosk: So that again, I have not ever publicly said it.
Jessica Vosk: People know I don't drink, but nobody knows that I
Jessica Vosk: got help. So again, in that American idol sense, there
Jessica Vosk: was this kind of embarrassment again where I felt like
Jessica Vosk: I embarrassed my family and I felt like I had
Jessica Vosk: put people through this awful thing on my behalf. And
Jessica Vosk: so for a long time it was a very dark,
Jessica Vosk: dark thing for me to talk about. And now I'm
Jessica Vosk: ten years into my Broadway career or I just celebrated
Jessica Vosk: ten years, and I would never be here had I
Jessica Vosk: not gone through that, I never would be here because
Jessica Vosk: I never would have had the tools.
Emily Tisch Sussman: Those tools finally landed her her first role on Broadway.
Emily Tisch Sussman: She made her debut in Bridges of Madison County as
Emily Tisch Sussman: a swing. We dive into what it entails to be
Emily Tisch Sussman: a swing and what came next for Jessica after the break,
Emily Tisch Sussman: And can you just explain because our podcast audience is
Emily Tisch Sussman: not on the theater lovers, although I imagine we were
Emily Tisch Sussman: probably over index for this episode, but just explain what
Emily Tisch Sussman: a swing is.
Jessica Vosk: I think it's pretty critical to understanding for your role here.
Jessica Vosk: So a swing is typically hired on a Broadway show.
Jessica Vosk: There are a number of swings hired on Broadway shows
Jessica Vosk: to cover various tracks who are on stage. So in
Jessica Vosk: particular for the Verges of Madison County, I was hired
Jessica Vosk: as the female swing to cover six different female roles,
Jessica Vosk: so if one of them was out, I would have
Jessica Vosk: to be able to go on. There are people who
Jessica Vosk: make a career out of this who have done twelve
Jessica Vosk: Broadway shows because they hop from show to show to
Jessica Vosk: show because they have the again brain to sort of
Jessica Vosk: play tetris and say, okay, I can go on for
Jessica Vosk: this role right now, and then I'll go on for that.
Jessica Vosk: I am satanically bad at being swing. I mean truly
Jessica Vosk: had to be handheld, walked around the stage, somebody telling
Jessica Vosk: me where to go, what to do, how to act,
Jessica Vosk: what line to say. I mean, it was it was
Jessica Vosk: really I was a terrorist at it, so uh and
Jessica Vosk: it was my own one and done. I never was
Jessica Vosk: a swing on a show again, and so yes it is.
Jessica Vosk: It is actually the hardest role on Broadway.
Emily Tisch Sussman: Though, because you had to know six different roles, and
Emily Tisch Sussman: it can happen at the drop of a half, driving
Emily Tisch Sussman: you like you won't know that day which role you're
Emily Tisch Sussman: going to do.
Jessica Vosk: That's right, which is Wild. It's disgusting. I'm not good
Jessica Vosk: at it. I really like I got I got my
Jessica Vosk: way in to Broadway by being a swing and saying
Jessica Vosk: yes to being a swing.
Emily Tisch Sussman: Never even though you were bad at it, you were
Emily Tisch Sussman: still able to book jumb after. I'm presuming you were
Emily Tisch Sussman: pretty good once you were on the stage.
Jessica Vosk: Yes, and I and I you know again, I'm a
Jessica Vosk: big believer in the universe. And I happened to have
Jessica Vosk: one show scheduled where I went on for a principal
Jessica Vosk: track in Virgis of Medicine, and the composer lyricist Jason
Jessica Vosk: mar Brown, who wrote the show, happened to be conducting
Jessica Vosk: that night, so we had this moment where he got
Jessica Vosk: to see me sing and do my thing on stage.
Jessica Vosk: And after that we really started working together a lot
Jessica Vosk: more outside of the theater. So that led to again
Jessica Vosk: casting seeing me for the next show, which was Finding Neverland.
Jessica Vosk: And then after Finding Neverland, I went into Fiddler on
Jessica Vosk: the Roof on Broadway with Danny Burstein, and after Fiddler
Jessica Vosk: on the Roof came Wicked. So it was all very fast.
Jessica Vosk: It was maybe within the span of three years.
Emily Tisch Sussman: Fifteenth Anniversary Company of Wicked, Please welcome Jessica boss.
Speaker 4: Was sweet Summer, chaphire, scot Feasting, York Billy feasting or
Speaker 4: gush to apologize it.
Emily Tisch Sussman: You want. And then when you booked Wicked, is that
Emily Tisch Sussman: when you felt like, was that like your I made
Emily Tisch Sussman: it moment? Did you have one? Yeah?
Jessica Vosk: That was it. That was my like, I'm leading a
Jessica Vosk: company on Broadway. My parents are able to come see this.
Jessica Vosk: They had seen me on tour, yes, but it was
Jessica Vosk: that like, I'm here on Broadway as a leading lady,
Jessica Vosk: you know, booking Broadway for the first time. I've baby
Jessica Vosk: made it moment for me. It's a very large I've
Jessica Vosk: made it moment for everybody, But for me, I still
Jessica Vosk: wanted I still needed to do other things. I still
Jessica Vosk: had other places to go for Jessica. So by the
Jessica Vosk: time Alphaba came around and it was Broadway and then
Jessica Vosk: I hired a press team and ABC did a profile,
Jessica Vosk: Dateline did a profile and my parents were involved and
Jessica Vosk: they got interviewed. So now I have that footage. It
Jessica Vosk: was this very very wild, book ended thing because within
Jessica Vosk: that ABC interview, all the finance people got interviewed. So
Jessica Vosk: to have my life laid out like that with all
Jessica Vosk: of those people was very very full circle for me.
Jessica Vosk: That's the very full circle thing that I will always remember.
Jessica Vosk: Just really impressed everybody with her energy level. She worked
Jessica Vosk: incredibly hard.
Jessica Vosk: And nothing seemed to face her. It's definitely the emotion
Jessica Vosk: of she's founded and she's so happy, and I think
Jessica Vosk: as a mom, he says, I can't even.
Emily Tisch Sussman: That's why.
Jessica Vosk: It's wild to kind of see these people who hired
Jessica Vosk: me when I was this kid out of college being
Jessica Vosk: interviewed and going like, well, we thought, what are you doing?
Jessica Vosk: You know, I mean, And that's also kind of it's
Jessica Vosk: just helpful. My feet have always very been firmly planted
Jessica Vosk: on the ground because I had these massive setbacks of like, okay,
Jessica Vosk: I worked in finance, and then I got laid off,
Jessica Vosk: and then I was able to babysit everybody, and then
Jessica Vosk: I had a couple of cool little moments of big
Jessica Vosk: things happened to me that I thought were going to
Jessica Vosk: be huge. Then everything came crashing down and I had
Jessica Vosk: to build everything back up again. So it gives you
Jessica Vosk: a lot of humbling energy because I don't walk around
Jessica Vosk: like I'm owed any of this. I don't walk around
Jessica Vosk: with the attitude of a diva or I'm so good
Jessica Vosk: or you owe me. I know exactly what it's like
Jessica Vosk: to lose and to fall and to have to get
Jessica Vosk: back up again.
Emily Tisch Sussman: Once you got the role, did it meet your expectations
Emily Tisch Sussman: of what it would be like to do it for
Emily Tisch Sussman: a year on Broadway?
Jessica Vosk: Oh god no. I mean the show itself is phenomenal,
Jessica Vosk: but it's a really hard it's a hard track. I mean,
Jessica Vosk: you're you're leading a Broadway company. There's a lot of expectation.
Jessica Vosk: You know. I had done the fifteenth anniversary, so that
Jessica Vosk: was a whole other, you know, huge amount of press
Jessica Vosk: added to an already big show, and that's when the
Jessica Vosk: talks of the movie had started happening. And that's you know,
Jessica Vosk: Mark Platt, who is the producer of the film. He's
Jessica Vosk: mostly based in la with with NBC Universal, but he
Jessica Vosk: came by and we had a lovely chat and he
Jessica Vosk: was very very kind with you know, the energy that
Jessica Vosk: I had brought into the show for the fifteenth anniversary.
Jessica Vosk: So there were a lot of amazing parts of that
Jessica Vosk: really put me on the map. So there's there's this
Jessica Vosk: double edged sort of how hard it is and how
Jessica Vosk: much you learn about your strength, especially as a woman,
Jessica Vosk: because we just are treated differently. I don't care if
Jessica Vosk: anybody argues with me. It's just a fact. So there's
Jessica Vosk: there's that, and then there's this beauty of being able
Jessica Vosk: to play this this role that so many people respond to.
Emily Tisch Sussman: Look, I think both things can be true. Like you
Emily Tisch Sussman: can go through something that is incredibly difficult and it's
Emily Tisch Sussman: worth it. Yes, Yes, I don't have to say I
Emily Tisch Sussman: regret it. You know the place that it got you
Emily Tisch Sussman: it was worth it, Yes, it really was. And I
Emily Tisch Sussman: don't There's there are a few things that I'll ever say,
Emily Tisch Sussman: like I really regret I don't even regret going to read.
Emily Tisch Sussman: I don't regret drinking, none of that. There's really few
Emily Tisch Sussman: things I will say I regret. I never will regret Wicked.
Jessica Vosk: Wicked was one of the best things that's ever happened
Jessica Vosk: to me and my career, But because of how difficult
Jessica Vosk: it was, it taught me a ton about self love
Jessica Vosk: and resilience.
Emily Tisch Sussman: What is something that at the time you saw as
Emily Tisch Sussman: a negative or low point, but now in hindsight you
Emily Tisch Sussman: really see it as a positive that put you on
Emily Tisch Sussman: this path.
Jessica Vosk: The negative low point was probably rehab. Yeah, outside of
Jessica Vosk: leaving finance, thinking I made the worst decision in the
Jessica Vosk: world auditioning for a couple months, nobody calling, thinking that
Jessica Vosk: I'd become fams and not becoming famous. I mean, I
Jessica Vosk: had to learn that expectation is really the enemy of
Jessica Vosk: success in my opinion. That's just my opinion. The more
Jessica Vosk: I expect, the less I get. You can only expect
Jessica Vosk: things from yourself. You can't expect it from anybody else
Jessica Vosk: or anything else. So I can expect perfection from myself.
Jessica Vosk: I'll never deliver on perfection. I can deliver on you know,
Jessica Vosk: practice and progress. I can't expect it from anybody else.
Jessica Vosk: I can't expect to be called with the job. I
Jessica Vosk: can expect to ready myself for the job. But any
Jessica Vosk: of these other things that I thought were going to happen, right,
Jessica Vosk: I did this thing, people heard me saying, I expect
Jessica Vosk: to be a leading lady. Doesn't work that way. So
Jessica Vosk: that's the stuff that I learned in that I'm the
Jessica Vosk: only one that can actually do anything about my life
Jessica Vosk: without expecting anybody else to follow suit.
Emily Tisch Sussman: Do you think you'll pivot again?
Jessica Vosk: Oh? Yeah, girl, I love a pivot. I love a pivot.
Jessica Vosk: I don't know what it'll be, but just keeping the
Jessica Vosk: options open. Yeah, I mean that's I think my happy
Jessica Vosk: place is. You know, my happy place is challenge. I'm
Jessica Vosk: going into Hell's Kitchen. It's an Alicia Keyes musical. I'm
Jessica Vosk: known for Broadway. This is pop and I'm massively challenged
Jessica Vosk: every day at this show and question myself every day
Jessica Vosk: and have to remind myself that I asked for these challenges,
Jessica Vosk: and so who knows what the next challenge will be,
Jessica Vosk: But I focused on this one right now because even
Jessica Vosk: this is a tiny pivot from what Broadway is. So
Jessica Vosk: what the next thing will be, I don't know, but
Jessica Vosk: but I will. As I like to say, I do
Jessica Vosk: not like to half asked. I like to use my
Jessica Vosk: whole ass.
Emily Tisch Sussman: Okay, wait, before I let you go, I have to
Emily Tisch Sussman: ask your thoughts on the Wicked movie because I know
Emily Tisch Sussman: you and Arianna are friends.
Jessica Vosk: I mean, Ariana Grande and I became quite close when
Jessica Vosk: I did fifteenth Anniversary of Broadway because we did an
Jessica Vosk: NBC special together, so we stayed in touch, and she
Jessica Vosk: called me when she booked it, and I was so
Jessica Vosk: thrilled for her because we had been talking about it
Jessica Vosk: for so many months. And then I flew to London
Jessica Vosk: and we had like a nice little dinner together and
Jessica Vosk: chatted about the experience when she was filming, and I
Jessica Vosk: remember at the time she was so focused on getting
Jessica Vosk: it right and paying a really beautiful tribute to Kristin
Jessica Vosk: Chenow with an homage to the show itself. And I
Jessica Vosk: think she did all of those things. I think they
Jessica Vosk: both did. I think again, Mark Platt is a genius
Jessica Vosk: and really assembled a team of avengers together to put
Jessica Vosk: the best film version of this show out. And I'm
Jessica Vosk: very proud of Ariana, which she knows, and her capability
Jessica Vosk: to sort of step out of her comfort zone of
Jessica Vosk: I'm a pop singer, I go on tour, YadA yadeah,
Jessica Vosk: and to go back to her roots of but I
Jessica Vosk: can also do this other thing. And I think she
Jessica Vosk: knocked it out of the park. I loved it. I
Jessica Vosk: had a great time at the screening.
Emily Tisch Sussman: I was at well. Jessica, thank you so much for
Emily Tisch Sussman: coming on. Thanks guys, so great to have you on.
Jessica Vosk: I'm so happy that we did this. Thank you so
Jessica Vosk: much for making it happen. Oh my god, I'm so happy.
Emily Tisch Sussman: Jessica is still gracing us with her performance in Hell's Kitchen.
Emily Tisch Sussman: So if you're in New York, be sure to grab
Emily Tisch Sussman: tickets Plus, Jessica is hosting the Tony Awards Red Carpet
Emily Tisch Sussman: this Sunday. Tune into New York One to see her,
Emily Tisch Sussman: and finally, be sure to following her on Instagram at
Emily Tisch Sussman: Jessica Voss for more. Thanks for listening. Thanks for listening
Emily Tisch Sussman: to this episode of she Pivots. I hope you enjoyed it,
Emily Tisch Sussman: and if you did, leave us a rating and tell
Emily Tisch Sussman: your friends about us. To learn more about our guests,
Emily Tisch Sussman: follow us on Instagram at she pivots the Podcast, or
Emily Tisch Sussman: sign up for our newsletter, where you can get exclusive
Emily Tisch Sussman: behind the scenes content on our website at she pivots
Emily Tisch Sussman: thepodcast dot com. Special thanks to the she pivots team,
Emily Tisch Sussman: Executive producer Emily At, Associate producer and social media connoisseur
Emily Tisch Sussman: Hannah Cousins, Research director Christine Dickinson, Events and Logistics coordinator
Emily Tisch Sussman: Madeleine Sonoviak, and audio editor and mixer Nina Pollock.
Speaker 3: I endorse t pivos