Speaker 1: Hey, it's Alec Baldwin here. Before we launch our next
Speaker 1: season of Here's the Thing at iHeartRadio in January, I
Speaker 1: thought I'd play some of my favorite shows from the archives.
Speaker 1: Audra McDonald occupies a unique place in the American theater.
Speaker 1: With six Tony Awards, she has the most of any
Speaker 1: actress in history. She is renowned for her work in
Speaker 1: opera as well as in films and on television. Here
Speaker 1: is my conversation with Audra McDonald.
Speaker 2: Svens fesh hoatch money.
Speaker 1: Much like the staggering beauty of her singing, Audra McDonald
Speaker 1: is impossible to ignore. The only person to sweep all
Speaker 1: four acting categories at the Tonys, she's one of the
Speaker 1: most decorated Broadway stars of all time. Reviews of her
Speaker 1: award winning performances overflow with accolades. She's spellbinding, radiant, and
Speaker 1: wrenchingly human. This year, the Juilliard graduate took on her
Speaker 1: first voice over role, playing Madame Gardrobe in Disney's Beauty
Speaker 1: and the Beast. The performance was so great one critic
Speaker 1: wrote that her name and the credits prompted theatergoers to
Speaker 1: erupt in cheers. I sat down with Audre before her
Speaker 1: debut this summer in London's West End, where she takes
Speaker 1: on Billy Holliday, whose life as a black female performer
Speaker 1: hits close to home.
Speaker 3: Specifically for me, I would say that there was an
Speaker 3: expectation on my part that things would get easier as
Speaker 3: a result of being successful. You know, well, what do
Speaker 3: you mean, they're going to make more money than I am.
Speaker 3: And yeah, we're doing the same thing, we're playing. We're
Speaker 3: basically equal as far as the roles are concerned.
Speaker 1: Or what did you do to address that? If anything?
Speaker 3: I didn't. For I didn't do anything for a while
Speaker 3: I should have, and I didn't.
Speaker 1: I just went along well.
Speaker 3: And especially you know, when you're an actor, it's like
Speaker 3: you're always being told you should be grateful you've got
Speaker 3: the job, you know.
Speaker 1: So being told that if you if you push too much,
Speaker 1: you're going to get a bad reputation for being Yes, yes,
Speaker 1: and I those actors that are infinitely less talented than
Speaker 1: you who all the time they're.
Speaker 3: Just easy to easier to work with, and they don't
Speaker 3: they don't cause in terms.
Speaker 1: Of being an African American performer, did that change?
Speaker 3: Well, I tell you, I mean, let me give you
Speaker 3: an example of how in some ways it changed and
Speaker 3: didn't change. I have to I have to acknowledge the
Speaker 3: fact that I am someone who has had uh an
Speaker 3: incredible opportunity in terms of sort of breaking down barriers
Speaker 3: as far as like color blind casting, being color blind
Speaker 3: cast as Carrie Pepperridge in Carousel, you know, or the
Speaker 3: fact that I played Mother Abbess and the Sound of
Speaker 3: Music Live, you know, and you know a lot of
Speaker 3: people have issues with that, but you know, I was
Speaker 3: the one that got the opportunity to do that. You know,
Speaker 3: when I was doing Annie for ABC, they did a
Speaker 3: version of that with Kathy Bates and Victor Garber and
Speaker 3: Alan Comming and Kristin Chenowith, and they cast me as
Speaker 3: Grace Ferrell and there was a scene at the end
Speaker 3: where Grace Ferrell and Daddy Warbooks proposes to Grace Ferrell
Speaker 3: at the end, the happy endings happening. You know. Warbocks, Yes,
Speaker 3: he was my daddy. I love him too. And actually
Speaker 3: you'll appreciate this. We were sitting around one day on
Speaker 3: the set and you know, in the big gorgeous mansion
Speaker 3: that Daddy war Books has, and we were sitting between
Speaker 3: takes and I was sitting next to Victor, and I
Speaker 3: just got a little emotionally. I said, Victor, what if
Speaker 3: this was really our house and we were really getting
Speaker 3: married and we had all this money in this life?
Speaker 3: And he said, in the just true Victor fashion, Darling,
Speaker 3: get a hold of yourself. You can total Victors saying
Speaker 3: that right. But anyway, so we were filming Brier, Yeah,
Speaker 3: we're we were filming Annie, and so we shot the
Speaker 3: scene where you know, Daddy Warbucks gives Grace Ferrell the
Speaker 3: ring and it's lovely. And then we get word that
Speaker 3: we have to come in on a Saturday to do
Speaker 3: some reshoots. And Rob Marshall was directing, and Neil Maren
Speaker 3: and Craig Zayden, who were wonderful, wonderful producers and have
Speaker 3: been very kind to me over the years and give
Speaker 3: me a lot of work. They cast me in Sound
Speaker 3: of Music as mother Abbess, and they said we have
Speaker 3: to do some reshoots, and then they took me aside
Speaker 3: and said, it turns out that Disney might be a
Speaker 3: little uncomfortable or the powers that be. I don't know
Speaker 3: if it was Disney abcre, I don't know. We are comfortable.
Speaker 3: There might be some issues with Daddy Warbucks actually marrying Grace,
Speaker 3: So what year was this? Nineteen ninety nine? So we
Speaker 3: need to reshoot the scene and do it without.
Speaker 1: You're hooking up with Daddy Warbucks.
Speaker 3: Giving Yeah, And I was devastated. I was I was devastated.
Speaker 3: It's one of those things where you know you're starting
Speaker 3: to feel good, You're starting to feel like, oh, there's
Speaker 3: really change coming. Things are happening here. I am playing
Speaker 3: this role and it's it's Annie, but nobody cares.
Speaker 1: And it's what did everybody else feel? Including Victor?
Speaker 3: I think everybody and Rob I think they were all
Speaker 3: kind of horrified, and you.
Speaker 1: Know, and also did they use in the product in
Speaker 1: the film?
Speaker 3: Rob said, Okay, so we're all going to come in
Speaker 3: on a Saturday, and you know how expensive that is
Speaker 3: when you're only shooting Monday through Friday. Come in on
Speaker 3: a Saturday just to reshoot the scene. So everybody comes
Speaker 3: in and we get dressed up in that moment for
Speaker 3: that scene, and Rob does one big master take of
Speaker 3: Daddy Warbucks just sort of going, hey, and bit buddy, buddy,
Speaker 3: it's great in this great this happened? Okay, kid, exactly?
Speaker 3: You over there, you person, you and he got one shot,
Speaker 3: one master take one shot, and then Rob said, okay,
Speaker 3: got that, so while we're here, and then he proceeded
Speaker 3: to reshoot other things that he thought he could make.
Speaker 1: It, so he tanked it to it. He did tank it,
Speaker 1: and so they couldn't use it.
Speaker 3: So they ended up using where So you look in
Speaker 3: the film and Daddy Warbucks proposes to Grace Ferrell in
Speaker 3: that and that's because that's because of Rob, you know.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and his courage.
Speaker 3: His courage. Absolutely. And then at the end of the
Speaker 3: year when the film came out, Time magazine said something,
Speaker 3: or maybe it was a newsweek any of the said
Speaker 3: that in Things that Happened this Year, Daddy Warbucks Mary
Speaker 3: is a black Grace Ferrell and nobody cares. So I
Speaker 3: don't know what that's the answer to, but it's just
Speaker 3: an issue of things that you know, you think, you
Speaker 3: get to a certain point where you know things are changing,
Speaker 3: and then boom, you're sort of slammed back into that reality.
Speaker 1: What are you in the middle of doing now?
Speaker 3: I can't remember you're doing?
Speaker 1: You rehearsing some show?
Speaker 3: Yes, yes, I say so, I've got a lady day.
Speaker 3: It was on the West End.
Speaker 1: You're going to go to London.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I've never been. No, I've never performed on the
Speaker 3: West End.
Speaker 1: That's what I mean. You've never performed over there.
Speaker 3: Not I performed, but never on the West End. I've
Speaker 3: never I've done like concerts and stuff that I've never
Speaker 3: done a show.
Speaker 1: You never did a legit show?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1: What of the places outside of New York have you performed?
Speaker 1: That's an interesting thing to think about.
Speaker 3: Well, in terms of like concert work everywhere, but actual shows,
Speaker 3: I've only done, Well, that's not true. I did the
Speaker 3: Secret Garden Tour million years ago, so you do kind
Speaker 3: of a national tour, you go all over the place. No, La, Yeah,
Speaker 3: I did it, but as you know, ensemble member, you know.
Speaker 3: And then I did Masterclass. It is the only other
Speaker 3: one that I did. I did that in LA and
Speaker 3: at the Kennedy Center. We did the taper at the
Speaker 3: Kennedy Center and Plays and Players in Philadelphia before we
Speaker 3: came into New York. But that's been the nineties.
Speaker 1: Do you find that you stay in New York and
Speaker 1: try to stay in New York if that's home and
Speaker 1: that's easier for you, and well, yeah, I mean it
Speaker 1: is Broadway.
Speaker 3: It's Broadway and that's where I want to be. Yeah,
Speaker 3: but especially since since having kids, you know, I mean,
Speaker 3: do you have no Well, I have a six month old,
Speaker 3: and I have a sixteen year old, and I have
Speaker 3: two step sons who are sixteen and thirteen.
Speaker 1: So it's you have a sixteen year old and that's yours,
Speaker 1: that's mine, and you have a six month old that's mine,
Speaker 1: that's yours.
Speaker 3: Yes, yes, you know what that's like, having a bit
Speaker 3: of a spread in between.
Speaker 1: You had a kid when you were very young, the sixteen.
Speaker 3: Year old, Well, that's very kind of you to say. No,
Speaker 3: I was thirty when I had my first and now
Speaker 3: I'm forty six and.
Speaker 1: You want to have another baby?
Speaker 3: I you know, I or you were drunk on a
Speaker 3: sailboat with your husband?
Speaker 1: What happened? Which is it?
Speaker 3: Which is it? It's it's it's somewhere in between. It's
Speaker 3: really that the Broncos won the Super Bowl. Seriously, my god,
Speaker 3: and my husband is a big Broncos fan, and nine
Speaker 3: months later history the rest is Sally James McDonald's Winson. No, yeah,
Speaker 3: what are you gonna dow?
Speaker 1: Was that for you? Because I mean, I don't always
Speaker 1: want to ask. I was saying, how I want to
Speaker 1: do another show, but I don't want to be away
Speaker 1: at dinner time every night. Yeah, for four to six months,
Speaker 1: That's what's that like? Do you bring the kids to
Speaker 1: the theater?
Speaker 3: I did, well, I certainly did with my sixteen year old.
Speaker 3: When she was little, she was at the theater all
Speaker 3: the time with me. That was kind of the only way.
Speaker 3: And I imagine, well, I know for a fact, when
Speaker 3: I'm in London, I'm staying very close to the theater,
Speaker 3: and she'll be at the theater. And and if I
Speaker 3: were to get another Broadway show, I would just bring
Speaker 3: her there because you don't want to you don't want
Speaker 3: to miss anything, and you don't you don't want to
Speaker 3: make them feel like.
Speaker 1: What about the baby?
Speaker 3: But yeah, the baby will come. Absolutely, she has.
Speaker 1: To just be with you right up till the half hour.
Speaker 3: That's what I've been doing now this year, you know,
Speaker 3: since i've had her, I've started back concertizing and literally
Speaker 3: I've had her backstage with either my husband when he
Speaker 3: can join me, or my babysitter, and I will sing
Speaker 3: and then run off stage and nurse her and then
Speaker 3: you know, go do your meet and greet or whatever.
Speaker 3: And actually during one concert she was really fussy, and
Speaker 3: so my husband went on and performed, and I ran
Speaker 3: off stage and nursed her and called her down and
Speaker 3: they went back on stage. Crazy crazy.
Speaker 1: Where did you meet him? Your husband?
Speaker 3: We met doing one hundred and ten in the Shade,
Speaker 3: the show on Broadway back in two thousand and seven. Yeah,
Speaker 3: it was a long time ago, really, Yeah. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 3: it was a crazy time too. I met him and
Speaker 3: then my dad was killed in the plane crash like
Speaker 3: a couple of weeks, like about six weeks later. Your dad,
Speaker 3: he was a high school principal that you grew.
Speaker 1: Up in California. Yeah, but you were born in Germany.
Speaker 3: I was born in Germany.
Speaker 1: What was he doing over there?
Speaker 3: He was in the he was in the army. Yeah,
Speaker 3: and then yeah, I was raised in Fresno, California, and
Speaker 3: my dad was a high school principal and then he
Speaker 3: went on to become an associated superintendent of schools there.
Speaker 3: But his passion was flying and he flew small planes
Speaker 3: and he had his own and he was he had
Speaker 3: just recently retired and he had his own plane that
Speaker 3: he was flying, and yeah, he had Where were you
Speaker 3: that I was actually walking. I just finished the matinee
Speaker 3: of one hundred and in the shape. We were still
Speaker 3: in previews and I was walking with my husband. He
Speaker 3: wasn't my husband at the time, he was just a
Speaker 3: friend at the time. A bunch of us were walking
Speaker 3: to meet the rest of the cast to have you know,
Speaker 3: a post you know, Sunday matinee drink with the entire cast,
Speaker 3: and my stepmom called.
Speaker 1: And said, my dad was remarried.
Speaker 3: Yes, he was remarried. And you yes, my mom was
Speaker 3: She lives next door to me in the city. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 3: or yeah, in Westchester. When she retired she left town breath, yes, yes,
Speaker 3: but yeah. My stepmom called me and said, and I
Speaker 3: was just I was on fifty third Street between eighth
Speaker 3: and ninth Avenues, and it was it was It's interesting,
Speaker 3: you know in those moments, you know, you see what
Speaker 3: happens in film and you think it'll be similar, you know,
Speaker 3: in real life, and it's it seldom is you know,
Speaker 3: as an act Well, I didn't. I didn't compute what
Speaker 3: she was saying. You know, she said, your dad, dad
Speaker 3: had an accident while he was flying the plane and
Speaker 3: he didn't make it. And I kept saying, oh, I
Speaker 3: said okay, so where is he now? And she said, Audra,
Speaker 3: he didn't make it. I was like, okay, well where
Speaker 3: it is? Yeah, but I wasn't. It wasn't computing either,
Speaker 3: you know, and I was just really stunned. And it
Speaker 3: took it took a day for me to really start
Speaker 3: to cry, you know, because it just it ver close
Speaker 3: to him, yeah, yeah, very close, and it just wasn't
Speaker 3: making sense, you know. So it's interesting. I mean, it's
Speaker 3: been ten years on it'll be ten years actually next
Speaker 3: week that he's since his passing, and but it's just interesting.
Speaker 3: As an actor, this sounds so cold and callous and
Speaker 3: it's not. It's not meant to be. But as an actor,
Speaker 3: there was a part of me that was sort of
Speaker 3: floating away from my body watching the scene, going, I
Speaker 3: don't think you're having the right.
Speaker 1: Reaction, right, you know, I don't process.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, that's not you know, if this were a scene,
Speaker 3: you'd fall to the ground and you know, break into
Speaker 3: a million pieces, and you're not doing that. You're you're
Speaker 3: playing the scene. It's so strange. But actually I know
Speaker 3: exactly when I really started to cry about my dad's passing,
Speaker 3: and it was I found out. We were getting ready
Speaker 3: to open one hundred and ten in the Shade, and
Speaker 3: so we were getting ready to go into critics Week
Speaker 3: where critics are coming and they're saying, I'm saying I
Speaker 3: have to go, and they're saying, you're the star of
Speaker 3: the show. You can't leave as I have to. And
Speaker 3: so they canceled a couple of shows so I could
Speaker 3: fly home to California.
Speaker 1: This is for their father's funeral. Yeah, they said, you
Speaker 1: can't leave.
Speaker 3: Well, they were just they were like, how do we
Speaker 3: do this? You know? And actually it was at the
Speaker 3: end of it was like right at Tony, what's it
Speaker 3: called it? When it's the cutoff time? Had qualification time,
Speaker 3: So everybody was like, what do we do? So they
Speaker 3: were kind enough to cancel enough shows for me to
Speaker 3: run home for the funeral and trying to work that
Speaker 3: out with my stepmom who was devastated and you know,
Speaker 3: really broken, and trying to keep her together and keep
Speaker 3: the family together and figure it all out. And it
Speaker 3: wasn't until after the funeral you're saying hello to everybody.
Speaker 3: And I just kind of kept it together the whole time.
Speaker 3: And then as soon as I agreed it, like the
Speaker 3: thirtieth person or something here, like a thousand people at
Speaker 3: his funeral. He was very very well known and very
Speaker 3: loved in Fresno, California. And his older sister came and said,
Speaker 3: how are you doing?
Speaker 1: And that's when I lost it, when you emptied out.
Speaker 3: I emptied out. But it was you know. But once again,
Speaker 3: that's not how I mean. Maybe maybe a good director,
Speaker 3: but that's not how I just imagine the film.
Speaker 1: It was an actress. You're always controlling and managing your feelings. Anyway,
Speaker 1: there was the lovers and knobs and dials inside of us.
Speaker 1: They were in there playing with all them. Yes, of
Speaker 1: course we get paid for you know. So you moved
Speaker 1: to Fresno when you grew up in Fresno beginning at
Speaker 1: what age?
Speaker 3: I was nine months old?
Speaker 1: To me, you're your little baby. So you're a child.
Speaker 1: And so there's the Order McDonald who grows up in California. Yeah,
Speaker 1: there's the Order of McDonald, who now is one of
Speaker 1: the princesses of the Broadway Theater. There's like a Mount Rushmore.
Speaker 1: It's you and burned Itad and all these chicks. Now,
Speaker 1: who are these the greatest singers in the world? And
Speaker 1: I want to talk about the audre in between. So
Speaker 1: the order in between when you first started into the business,
Speaker 1: when people are hiring you and as you're building your
Speaker 1: career in New York and singing, what were they hiring
Speaker 1: you for?
Speaker 3: Well, I think it had more to do with if
Speaker 3: I look back on it now, and no one's ever
Speaker 3: asked me this, So kudos to you.
Speaker 1: Well, I do try.
Speaker 3: You've got the talent, But I think it had more
Speaker 3: to do with I wasn't what people were expecting, you know,
Speaker 3: back in those days. Can I say back in those days, Yeah,
Speaker 3: the early nineties. You know, you'd go an audition for
Speaker 3: something and they'd see an African American girl in her
Speaker 3: twenties walk in, and I think they'd expect some big
Speaker 3: gospel voice, or you know, they're like, can you be
Speaker 3: street smart? You know all those code words and whatnot,
Speaker 3: And I would sort of break out with the pseudo
Speaker 3: operatic voice that had Broadway qualities and was a bit goofy,
Speaker 3: and so I think it just intrigued people and anything.
Speaker 3: I think that's even how I got into Juilliard. When
Speaker 3: I auditioned for Juilliard and I wasn't, you know, I
Speaker 3: wasn't really wanting to pursue classical music, but I thought,
Speaker 3: I'll audition on the strength of my voice. That's that's
Speaker 3: my strength.
Speaker 1: Was that a goal to go to Juilliard?
Speaker 3: Well, I wanted to go to New York. I wanted
Speaker 3: to live in New York Juilliard was it Lincoln Center,
Speaker 3: you know, you know the good beginning, Yeah, And I
Speaker 3: thought I'd be able to get like my acting classes
Speaker 3: in nancing class as well. I was there. I didn't
Speaker 3: realize that once you're in a program, once you're in
Speaker 3: a department, you know you shall not stray, you stay
Speaker 3: in that department, and you know, so I just went
Speaker 3: in there an audition, didn't really know what I was doing,
Speaker 3: and kind of riffed at the end of a Mozart area.
Speaker 3: You're not supposed to riff with Mozart, and I did.
Speaker 3: And I said, I was a meto soprano and I'm
Speaker 3: singing subrette, you know, roles for them, showing them. I
Speaker 3: sang a subrette aria from the note to figure out
Speaker 3: maryaifigure out.
Speaker 1: And so for people who don't know what subrette is,
Speaker 1: what is that? I'm one of those people, by the
Speaker 1: way you do surete.
Speaker 3: Well, Subrette is sort of like a really high light soprano,
Speaker 3: not necessarily coloratura, but she's like a young, sweet heroine,
Speaker 3: lighter sound, not like a full lyric soprano. And so
Speaker 3: it's a lot of people say the ena roles despina
Speaker 3: or it's their lina, the little cute roles. So anyway,
Speaker 3: that's what I sang. I sang one of those arias.
Speaker 3: But then I said I'm a mezzo soprano, which I
Speaker 3: just was just that just showed how much I didn't know,
Speaker 3: how little I do. And they laughed at me and
Speaker 3: they said how old are you and I said I'm
Speaker 3: seventeen and they just said okay, And I thought, well,
Speaker 3: I blew that. And then two weeks later they called
Speaker 3: me and said, we want you to come to Juilliard.
Speaker 3: But I don't think I think it was just intrigue
Speaker 3: on their part.
Speaker 1: Are you there for four years? Well, would you start working?
Speaker 3: No? I was there for five years.
Speaker 1: But you finished there, you graduated from there.
Speaker 3: Yeah. I took a leave of absence because I had
Speaker 3: a suicide attempt actually while I was there, So I
Speaker 3: took a leave of absence. There's a lot that happened
Speaker 3: between the Order and Presner, California and the Order who's
Speaker 3: on Broadway.
Speaker 1: Now, okay, we're going to cover as much of that
Speaker 1: as you care to time.
Speaker 3: I'm completely open about it.
Speaker 1: So you're in Juilliard, Yeah, what years was that? That
Speaker 1: five years was from when to when?
Speaker 3: It was from nineteen eighty eight to nineteen ninety three.
Speaker 1: Right, So when you're there, was it trouble for you
Speaker 1: fitting in? Did you feel uncomfortable and out of place?
Speaker 4: There?
Speaker 1: Absolutely was that a part of what led you to
Speaker 1: do what you did.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I felt out of place artistically. I felt all
Speaker 3: my life growing up in Preston, California, all I ever
Speaker 3: wanted to do was beyond Broadway. And then I thought,
Speaker 3: you know, let me audition for Juilliard. Just didn't think
Speaker 3: it through audition, got in. So everybody back at home
Speaker 3: is like, wow, Udra got into Juilliard in New York.
Speaker 3: She's you know, she's gonna make it. And then I
Speaker 3: get to Juilliard and I'm studying classical music. I'm like,
Speaker 3: this isn't what I want to do. I don't want
Speaker 3: to be an apt for singer. Why surely they're going
Speaker 3: to let me go take some acting classes. Surely it
Speaker 3: go do some dance less and surely didn't go an
Speaker 3: audition for Broadway shows. No, you have to just study,
Speaker 3: you know.
Speaker 1: You are enjoying it.
Speaker 3: No, And I felt lost. I felt completely lost. I
Speaker 3: felt like I was offering about that.
Speaker 1: But that alone, I'm assuming me if I'm wrong, didn't
Speaker 1: lead you to do something drastic. What else?
Speaker 5: No?
Speaker 3: I mean, well, you know, to an extent you can
Speaker 3: say yeah, well, you know, like I said, I'm open
Speaker 3: about it because you know, I think I'm a case
Speaker 3: of it gets better, you know. But I so I
Speaker 3: was lost in terms of that, and then feeling like
Speaker 3: I couldn't just quit and go back home because I
Speaker 3: would look like a failure back at home. And you know,
Speaker 3: I had boy trouble while I was there. And so
Speaker 3: the culmination of being where I wanted to be in
Speaker 3: New York City, thinking I'm finally going to realize my dreams,
Speaker 3: stuck and failing miserably at Juilliard, not being able to
Speaker 3: admit to anybody at home what was going on, Not
Speaker 3: being able to go home because I would have looked
Speaker 3: like a failure, living literally on Broadway, on Broadway, my apartment,
Speaker 3: my address was Broadway twenty five oh eight Broadway third.
Speaker 3: I lived with the residential of the old Broadway like well,
Speaker 3: the wild wild West.
Speaker 1: Anything north of Baby sixth Street, forget.
Speaker 3: It, you not in those days, shield and a sword
Speaker 3: to go to the grocery store, right and crazy to
Speaker 3: look at it now, Oh my goodness.
Speaker 1: But what I'm curious about is that the woman, the
Speaker 1: young woman from Fresno, who goes to New York. And again,
Speaker 1: let me put a fine point of this before you answer,
Speaker 1: which is, and you say you have boy troubles? Are
Speaker 1: you dating a different kind of boy now with Juliet? No,
Speaker 1: but the boys were hard for you to understand.
Speaker 3: No, I was, you know, I was.
Speaker 1: Was that all the same?
Speaker 3: Well? I was just not being treated well by a boy. Yeah,
Speaker 3: boys are the same.
Speaker 1: All boys in the same where you go? Yeah, Ok,
Speaker 1: thank you. My guest has been ugum McDonald everyone, good night, everybody. No,
Speaker 1: but but but but the reason I asked is I
Speaker 1: want to Are you a fish out of water in
Speaker 1: every way?
Speaker 3: Yes? I was a fish out of water in every
Speaker 3: way except for the fact that I was in New York,
Speaker 3: which is what I knew I wanted. I knew that
Speaker 3: much was right, but everything else I kept you grounded, yes,
Speaker 3: but everything else was wrong. And so you know, in
Speaker 3: those days I was, you know, twenty twenty one. I
Speaker 3: couldn't see past the fact that I had gotten here
Speaker 3: and everything up up to now had gone swimmingly, and
Speaker 3: all of a sudden it was all falling apart.
Speaker 1: And if you don't know my asking what what were
Speaker 1: the the ramp up the time and what you were
Speaker 1: thinking and feeling? And the only reason I asked this
Speaker 1: for people who listen to this, who might be young
Speaker 1: people and artists who experience a certain kind of pain
Speaker 1: that you experience in this business that I think is
Speaker 1: very unique, because you exude in your work. You seem
Speaker 1: so confident and so powerful.
Speaker 3: Well, I think it's because I'm now, I'm I'm where
Speaker 3: I'm supposed to be. I'm doing what I'm supposed to
Speaker 3: be doing. I'm doing what I think if you want
Speaker 3: to get I don't know.
Speaker 1: You're not playing the e Ina roles anymore.
Speaker 3: No, no, no, But I it's more about I'm artistically fulfilled.
Speaker 3: I think my artistic soul is fulfilled. It's doing what
Speaker 3: it's supposed to do.
Speaker 4: You agree, look copy to me.
Speaker 1: Not that she doesn't still find challenges coming up. Audra
Speaker 1: McDonald talks about a song that's been rather hard to sing.
Speaker 1: Audra McDonald isn't the only star who struggled to find
Speaker 1: her voice.
Speaker 5: I mean when I tell people I was extremely shy
Speaker 5: and nobody believes me.
Speaker 1: Now that's the thing that people have to overcome.
Speaker 3: Yes, exactly.
Speaker 5: You know, I've found a lot of comedians to be
Speaker 5: extraordinarily serious and draws withdrawn sometimes, So yeah, I think
Speaker 5: sometimes we overcome things by going after the very thing
Speaker 5: that really eludes us.
Speaker 1: To hear more about Renee Fleming's story, go to Hear's
Speaker 1: Thething dot org. This is Alec Baldwin and you're listening
Speaker 1: to Here's the Thing. If ever there was a track
Speaker 1: record that warranted dividum, it is Audra McDonald's. But despite
Speaker 1: her unparalleled fame, the Queen of Broadway is disarmingly humble,
Speaker 1: perhaps the mark of a person who's endured great pain
Speaker 1: in her case. While studying at Juilliard, this.
Speaker 3: Was my third year and it had been just yet
Speaker 3: another year of floundering and doing poorly in all my classes,
Speaker 3: and teachers just saying you know, you've got to give
Speaker 3: over to your operatic sound and me not wanting to,
Speaker 3: not knowing what that was. And when I would get
Speaker 3: close to an operatic sound, I'd say, I don't want
Speaker 3: to sound like that. So I felt like I was
Speaker 3: just being pushed and they were doing their job rightfully.
Speaker 3: So this is like, this is your Juilliard to study.
Speaker 3: This is what you're going to do to push me
Speaker 3: into a place that just wasn't me artistically. So that
Speaker 3: coupled with being you know, twenty twenty one by yourself
Speaker 3: in New York and being treated poorly by whatever his
Speaker 3: name was, what's his name? We're going to say that no, no, no, no, no,
Speaker 3: he's he's fine. He's a great guy now, but at
Speaker 3: any rate, So all of that combined with me being
Speaker 3: sort of like the great hope from my hometown too.
Speaker 3: You know, Order's gonna make it. If anybody's gonna make
Speaker 3: it on Broadway, it's going to be Order. I I
Speaker 3: the boy was the catalyst that sort of like sort
Speaker 3: of broke that. It was the star that broke the
Speaker 3: camel's back. But it was three years of I'm in
Speaker 3: the wrong place, doing the wrong thing. I'm failing miserably,
Speaker 3: but I'm here in Disneyland, where I'm supposed to be,
Speaker 3: where I said I wanted to be, so I sored
Speaker 3: you do I I slit my wrists one night?
Speaker 1: What happened? And written about this?
Speaker 3: I haven't, I guess I should. I speak about it
Speaker 3: all the time, but maybe one day I'll write about it.
Speaker 3: Found you I I I slipped my wrists and then
Speaker 3: realized what I had done and called the affairs director
Speaker 3: who I had become close with, and said, I helped me,
Speaker 3: and someone came and helped you, and they helped me,
Speaker 3: and they took me to a mental hospital. It's interesting
Speaker 3: this mental hospital still there, Gracie Square Hospital. It's next
Speaker 3: door to my ob gyn who delivered my six month
Speaker 3: old's what a circuit that is.
Speaker 1: So I almost didn't make it, and now I made
Speaker 1: it and I'm in this.
Speaker 3: I had to pass it, you know, every week to
Speaker 3: go to my obgyn appointment, I had to pass Gracie
Speaker 3: Square Hospital. And every time I passed it, there was
Speaker 3: a part of me just, you know, waddling down the
Speaker 3: street pregnant as can be. Some twenty nine years later,
Speaker 3: I would I would. I felt such relief and joy,
Speaker 3: and you know, a sense of yes, I get the
Speaker 3: big picture.
Speaker 1: Now, what month in the school year was that that
Speaker 1: that happened. It was January or February, So it was
Speaker 1: at the midpoint. Let's say, and you take off obviously
Speaker 1: when you come back, when you come back the following fall,
Speaker 1: you don't.
Speaker 3: I came back the following fall for a little bit,
Speaker 3: and then I got an opportunity to audition for something
Speaker 3: that ended up that I ended up being the Secret
Speaker 3: Garden actually, and I asked the you know, administration office
Speaker 3: and my the dean, what I should do, and they said,
Speaker 3: you know, go do that. It's okay, take the time
Speaker 3: off to go do that. It seems like that's where
Speaker 3: you want to be, so and.
Speaker 1: They probably didn't want to disappoint.
Speaker 3: You at that point.
Speaker 1: At that point that point they were like, sure, go
Speaker 1: go you want to go sing on and go, go
Speaker 1: do it. Yeah, we don't ever want to get your way.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 3: The thing is there was actually a lot, not a lot,
Speaker 3: but they had a special arrangement with Gracie Square Hospital.
Speaker 3: There were a couple of other Juilliard students there that
Speaker 3: I had wondered what had happened to I was there.
Speaker 3: I was at the hospital for me. But Grace's Square,
Speaker 3: I think is private hospital. I was there for a month.
Speaker 3: They evaluated me and said, you you're not going anytime soon?
Speaker 1: And did that change you?
Speaker 3: I was so heavily medicated. I was heavily medicated.
Speaker 1: When you say that, it's so compelling to me because
Speaker 1: when I see you, I think of you. I think
Speaker 1: of you like you know, you're so strong your personality
Speaker 1: and perform. I view you as a person that's going
Speaker 1: to go. I'm going back into the burning building to
Speaker 1: save the baby.
Speaker 3: Well that is me now, yeah, but I think maybe
Speaker 3: that experience helped make me that now. I mean, look,
Speaker 3: I'm still a mess. I mean everybody's a mess, always
Speaker 3: a mess. I you know, and I what, I understood
Speaker 3: a lot going on. Yeah, and I realized, you know,
Speaker 3: I'm someone who suffers from depression. But I learned in
Speaker 3: the years A how to deal with it. B to
Speaker 3: find you know, find my joy and see to realize that,
Speaker 3: like alcoholism, it's something that you wake up every day
Speaker 3: and you say, yeah, that's still something that I have
Speaker 3: to deal with, as opposed to saying, oh, I'm just
Speaker 3: not depressed anymore. Just but to learn how to cope
Speaker 3: with that, and my art gives me a lot of
Speaker 3: joy and keeps me, keeps me strong.
Speaker 1: So what's the first job you do? This is a
Speaker 1: tired question, but I can't help back ask you, especially
Speaker 1: with somebody like you, what's the first job when you do?
Speaker 1: When you sit there and go, I got this. I
Speaker 1: think I got this, like I'm over the no no
Speaker 1: meaning you know that the sky is the limit for you.
Speaker 1: You're out there and you're doing it, and you're connecting
Speaker 1: to that material you know, and you go, I think
Speaker 1: I really really have a shot at my dream coming true.
Speaker 3: Here it was Sally Murphy and she was she was
Speaker 3: Julie Jordan, and I played Carry Pippridge and it was
Speaker 3: the guy Michael Hayden was with Hayden, Yes, yes, yes,
Speaker 3: Nick Heitner at Lincoln Center, which is also crazy for
Speaker 3: me to then open, you know, in Carousel at Lincoln Center,
Speaker 3: where at Vivian Momont Theater where you can look up
Speaker 3: and I can see the school that I, you know,
Speaker 3: had a hard time in and and I remember standing
Speaker 3: in those in those windows at Juilliard looking at Vivian Beaumont,
Speaker 3: seeing Patty Lapone performing there and going why am I
Speaker 3: not doing that.
Speaker 1: And then how'd you feel.
Speaker 3: Like the luckiest survivor in the world. I mean, and
Speaker 3: I felt a sense of gratitude, a sense of relief,
Speaker 3: and a sense of Okay, I get it. I now
Speaker 3: get that I was on my path.
Speaker 1: Out the window of one place is your future. Out
Speaker 1: the window of Juilliard, where you try to snuff yourself
Speaker 1: is the Vivian Beaumont, where you're going to do carousel
Speaker 1: across the streets, always a vista for you. What might
Speaker 1: have been was, which was something not bad and wonderful? Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean babies and Tony Awards and all that stuff.
Speaker 3: I think I think what I realized is there's a
Speaker 3: bigger picture. And I think, you know, it's very easy
Speaker 3: to you know, just get into tunnel vision, especially when
Speaker 3: you're young and you know it's only you that you're
Speaker 3: having to think about and not but that's a bad thing.
Speaker 3: But it's just easy to get buried very quickly under
Speaker 3: emotion and fear and disappointment and all that. And I
Speaker 3: just think that I learned to have a bigger picture
Speaker 3: about life.
Speaker 1: We're taking a break, so stay with us. Once you
Speaker 1: become extraordinarily successful in the busines. You won your first
Speaker 1: Tony Award for what show? For Carousel? And you're how old?
Speaker 3: Twenty three?
Speaker 1: Your child and you when you you were fresh out
Speaker 1: of that situation, you weren't far that far we move
Speaker 1: from that situation.
Speaker 3: Was two and a half years away from that situation
Speaker 3: and a half years.
Speaker 1: Later, which is nothing. Yeah, you win a Tony Award
Speaker 1: and you've won six Tony Awards. Yes, you won the
Speaker 1: most Tony Awards of anybody. Are you tied with somebody
Speaker 1: you're tied with?
Speaker 4: No?
Speaker 5: Not with that.
Speaker 2: No.
Speaker 3: I love.
Speaker 1: I love when people sit there and they go, oh,
Speaker 1: I don't know. I don't keep track of that. I go, you, liar,
Speaker 1: you got all your Tonies lined up?
Speaker 3: They do.
Speaker 1: No, I'm not you, I'm saying, but people in general,
Speaker 1: I doubt you do. To actually but to embarrass you
Speaker 1: even more than I already have. Good God, you are
Speaker 1: enormously talented and everything clicks, and you're very, very successful,
Speaker 1: and you're a gorgeous woman. Well you're a gorgeous woman.
Speaker 1: And what did that do in terms of your career,
Speaker 1: meaning that you could have gone and made films and
Speaker 1: then a television series. Did you have a lot of
Speaker 1: offers you swept aside.
Speaker 3: No, I've never had those offers. I mean, I did
Speaker 3: one television series once where I played the best friend
Speaker 3: in Private Practice to the main character show Private Practice,
Speaker 3: Kate Walsh played Addison Montgomery and I played her best friend.
Speaker 1: Did you do that?
Speaker 3: I did it for five six years. The show ran
Speaker 3: for seven years, and I did it for five or
Speaker 3: six years. But No, Hollywood has never really banged down
Speaker 3: on my doors. And I think that's because you're very
Speaker 3: kind to say I'm gorgeous, but I don't think I'm
Speaker 3: the typical sort of look. I'm also a big girl,
Speaker 3: and I'm proud of that, and I'm fine with that.
Speaker 3: But you know, it's interesting when you go to Hollywood
Speaker 3: and you see these people on the movie screens your
Speaker 3: entire life, and then you see them in person and
Speaker 3: they're all like one fourth of that taper airplay.
Speaker 1: What the hell didn't look well?
Speaker 3: Do you want a cheeseburger?
Speaker 1: Yeah?
Speaker 3: No, no, no, I mean, it's say, look terrible, but
Speaker 3: it's just for me. It's just like I I you know,
Speaker 3: I think size wise that has something to do with it,
Speaker 3: and I and I don't know that that's where I'm
Speaker 3: at my strongest, right, you know, And I think it works.
Speaker 1: So hard to develop this perch you're in.
Speaker 5: Now.
Speaker 1: What's that like for you to have to go out
Speaker 1: and wring yourself.
Speaker 3: Out again and again every night. Well, the process for me,
Speaker 3: I go really inside. I get really quiet. People around
Speaker 3: me think that I'm angry with them before I do
Speaker 3: a show because I just get very quiet and I
Speaker 3: go inside and stay still. And I'm not. I'm not
Speaker 3: one to kind of jump around and go visit other
Speaker 3: dressing rooms. I just I have to kind of go
Speaker 3: in and be super super super quiet and still because focus. Yeah,
Speaker 3: because in a minute, you're going to have to turn
Speaker 3: all of your insides out, and so if I'm giving
Speaker 3: all that out beforehand, I will have nothing to get.
Speaker 1: What was one of the hardest ones for you, Lady Day.
Speaker 3: Absolutely that was by myself on stage for an hour
Speaker 3: and forty five minutes, just having to give it and
Speaker 3: especially living that life that she led. I have to
Speaker 3: have to live that on stage every night. That I
Speaker 3: was no fun to be around before the show. After
Speaker 3: the show, I was a ball because.
Speaker 1: That's very common.
Speaker 3: Yes, because I was thrilled it was over until the
Speaker 3: next you know, it's interesting.
Speaker 2: I know.
Speaker 3: I can't remember who. Oh, maybe it was Kathy Bates.
Speaker 3: I can't remember who said this to me, but I said, well,
Speaker 3: why don't you ever come back to Broadway or do
Speaker 3: a show on Broadway? And I think it was Kathy Bage.
Speaker 3: She said, oh, honey, oh that's hard. It's hard, and
Speaker 3: she's right, you know it is, because especially when you think, Okay,
Speaker 3: I've done it, I've given a good performance. I got
Speaker 3: through that. You know, when you're doing a film, you're like, great,
Speaker 3: it's in the can and now I'm off the cab
Speaker 3: or whatever, you know. But Broadway it's like, and now
Speaker 3: I have to do that again tomorrow night, and then
Speaker 3: the next night after that and the next and it's
Speaker 3: a blessing.
Speaker 1: At the end of every day. I got to go
Speaker 1: to work exactly, you have that whole day and what
Speaker 1: happens in that in the world. The worst thing for
Speaker 1: me when I was acting was when I'd have a wonderful,
Speaker 1: fun day and then I had to go to work
Speaker 1: and wring myself out and some drive to go do
Speaker 1: the Scottish play.
Speaker 3: Yes, for me, it was always on Sunday matinee when
Speaker 3: you're headed to your Sunday matinee. You're walking down ninth
Speaker 3: Fablue and you're seeing everybody outside, either out of street
Speaker 3: fair or having wine and runch. And I can't tell
Speaker 3: you how many in the sun. I can't hedly tell
Speaker 3: you how many times you're walking down ninth Faber you
Speaker 3: just want to take your hand and wipe all the
Speaker 3: food off of those sidewalk tables. It's like, that's not fair,
Speaker 3: of course not. I mean, it's I'm doing what I
Speaker 3: wanted to do my entire life.
Speaker 1: But there is that people are counting on you. Yes, amazing.
Speaker 1: When I did Street Car, I got really sick and
Speaker 1: I missed the show. I was out for it for
Speaker 1: a weekend, the two Saturdays and the Sunday, and I
Speaker 1: missed the show. But I go downstairs. I lived on
Speaker 1: Central Park West. I go downstairs. I cross over to Broadway.
Speaker 1: I'm on eighty six then Broadway on the northeast corner.
Speaker 1: I'm going to cross over to William's Chicken Yes, and
Speaker 1: get my soup.
Speaker 3: Yes.
Speaker 1: And I'm there and this little woman looks up to me.
Speaker 1: It's like seven o'clock at night. It's a it's a
Speaker 1: Friday night or a Saturday night rather, and she looks
Speaker 1: up to me, this little owlish woman. She goes, aren't
Speaker 1: you supposed to be on Broadway right now? And I thought,
Speaker 1: it's town, flip the town.
Speaker 3: I have a story like that too. I mean, we
Speaker 3: were it was New Year's Eve and Ethan Hawk had
Speaker 3: been able to we were doing Henry the Fourth at
Speaker 3: Lincoln Center, and he'd been able to get the entire
Speaker 3: cast invited to the Plays and Players Club or a
Speaker 3: what's the club over on the Players Club? Yes, for
Speaker 3: New Year's Eve. So we're all there and we're all
Speaker 3: celebrating and it's wonderful, but we're, you know, in and
Speaker 3: amongst you know, the actual members of this club. And
Speaker 3: it's New Year's Eve and I'm doing a play. And
Speaker 3: I was still young, and I thought, I'm gonna have
Speaker 3: a cigarette. You know, why not, I'm gonna have a cigarette.
Speaker 3: And I don't smoke as a rule, but I just
Speaker 3: decided it's New Year's Eve, I'm gonna have wine and
Speaker 3: cigarettes and it'll be fun. So I was smoking out
Speaker 3: on the little terrorists they have out there. I'm smoking
Speaker 3: my cigarette. I'm chatting with some of my cast members
Speaker 3: and an older woman who's a member of the play's club.
Speaker 3: She comes up to me and she said, I'd say
Speaker 3: you're Audra McDonald, but it couldn't possibly be her because
Speaker 3: she wouldn't be smoking.
Speaker 1: Never destroying her instrument.
Speaker 3: She wouldn't be smoking. And then she just sort of march, Now.
Speaker 1: Who are people who in your life? In your career?
Speaker 1: One might assume you've sung the song, sang the songs
Speaker 1: of pretty much everyone you want to sing. Where is
Speaker 1: there one that's gotten by you? Is there some composer
Speaker 1: whose music you want to sing that you haven't sang.
Speaker 3: No, I wouldn't say that. I mean there's always young
Speaker 3: com I am always championed the work of new, young
Speaker 3: musical theater composers, so I'm always looking for new work
Speaker 3: to do. There are certain songs that I stay away
Speaker 3: from because I don't feel that I can do them properly.
Speaker 3: For example, one that I have not been able to
Speaker 3: conquer that I have tried a couple of times and
Speaker 3: never done in public because I can't conquer it is
Speaker 3: being Alive by Son Tim. I cannot. As much as
Speaker 3: that song moves me and as much as it means
Speaker 3: to me, every time I try and sing it, I
Speaker 3: fail so I have not done it in public and
Speaker 3: I and I won't until I figure it out. And
Speaker 3: that is that strange?
Speaker 1: It is No, No, I mean, I'm sure there's people.
Speaker 1: It's like in plays. I mean, I'm trying to roles.
Speaker 1: I'm trying to think of.
Speaker 6: Right.
Speaker 3: Do you have writers whose work you steer clear of
Speaker 3: as a performer because you don't get it so you
Speaker 3: don't know how to bring it to life. Not that
Speaker 3: you don't enjoy watching.
Speaker 1: I might enjoy watching, you know, whatever. I want to
Speaker 1: have in the theater. Life itself is so filled with
Speaker 1: oddities now and surreal crap going on with the government
Speaker 1: and everything. I want to see something which is really
Speaker 1: I want some honesty. No, I need to have a
Speaker 1: like oxygen. I need a big hit of honesty.
Speaker 3: I you know, that's interesting. I was listening to a
Speaker 3: performer on the way down here who i'd absolutely admire,
Speaker 3: whose work I admire, and they were singing a song
Speaker 3: that didn't, in my mind, seem quite right for them.
Speaker 3: Not that they weren't singing it beautifully, but I thought,
Speaker 3: I don't think they believe this. I don't. I think
Speaker 3: they're trying something and they don't believe it, and there's
Speaker 3: a part of me that thought, why am I thinking
Speaker 3: that about them? I do that stuff all the time.
Speaker 3: But I think you're right. There is something going on
Speaker 3: right now in the zeitgeist that is sort of like
Speaker 3: everybody is needing truth and needing needing something to ground
Speaker 3: them and where is reality?
Speaker 1: Any sat tire? And my last question for you is, well,
Speaker 1: first of all, describe for me, if you would, as
Speaker 1: I try to, always think about people in your profession
Speaker 1: and who do what you do as well as you
Speaker 1: do a moment when you're on stage and you used
Speaker 1: to go out there at night and you'd sing a
Speaker 1: song and you knew you were going to kill these people,
Speaker 1: you know, the minute that you sang that song, the
Speaker 1: way you said that you could almost feel the people
Speaker 1: just getting destroyed by that song. Is that in a
Speaker 1: Lady Day as well?
Speaker 2: Well?
Speaker 3: I think in the beginning with Lady Day, because I
Speaker 3: think no one thought that I could find her voice,
Speaker 3: you know, because I'm a soprano, so it's like, what
Speaker 3: are you doing? What's this soprano doing Lady Day? You know,
Speaker 3: trying to be Billie Holiday. She doesn't have it in
Speaker 3: her And I didn't think I had it in me.
Speaker 3: And so some nights, you know, the show opens and
Speaker 3: the first thing I do is sing before I even
Speaker 3: start speaking, and so the audience and you can tell
Speaker 3: that the audience is waiting to hear is she going
Speaker 3: to get it? And on nights that I really felt
Speaker 3: that I was really lined up, really lined up with Billy.
Speaker 3: I had I had enough, you know, of her perfume on,
Speaker 3: and I had the makeup right, and I had the
Speaker 3: gin behind my ears so I could smell like what
Speaker 3: she must have smelled like in those days. And I
Speaker 3: would open my mouth and sing the first all I
Speaker 3: know is I'm in love with you, and you'd hear
Speaker 3: sometimes i'd hear the audience gasp, and that's when I'd
Speaker 3: be like, Okay, I got that right now. Sustain it
Speaker 3: for the next hour and forty five minutes, you know,
Speaker 3: and I'd feel that. I'd think, Okay, they're they're taking
Speaker 3: the journey with me. And there were nights where that
Speaker 3: wouldn't happen. I'd think, Okay, I got a drag them
Speaker 3: on this journey too, you know. But every once in
Speaker 3: a while there'd be that moment of and every once
Speaker 3: in a while to hear people go, oh my god.
Speaker 2: Ah, and no.
Speaker 3: Is jam In Low ye in there.
Speaker 6: You said that we are through. I know that should
Speaker 6: laugh A yes, care go I Wonderalah.
Speaker 2: Has gone.
Speaker 1: The final line of a review from The Evening Standard
Speaker 1: for her recent West End debut as Billie Holiday doubles
Speaker 1: as a review of Audra herself. Quote yet still she
Speaker 1: stands broken but indomitable to the last unquote. I'm Alec Baldwin.
Speaker 1: Here's the thing. Is brought to you by iHeart Radio.