Broadway legend Patti LuPone on InnerVIEWS with Ernie Manouse

from Broadway to the West End from Evita to Norma Desmond Patti LuPone has created some of the most memorable characters on the musical stage hi i'm ernie manouse coming up on interviews our conversation with Tony award-winning actress Patti LuPone [Music] ten actors switch between mediums anymore um well yes I should be able to I think they should be able to if they are trained actors I personally resent - oh my god this is how we start the interview I personally resent the film and TV actor coming to Broadway messing with the economics of the stage actor and bombing yeah and bombing abroad because they don't have the chops they don't have the technique stage acting is considerably different the discipline is different than television and film acting and you need you need to train for it even if it's just going to the gym to work up some sort of stamina for a chose a week and I think that if you're trained at stage actor is easy for easier for you to adapt to television and film it's a question of larger or smaller but I also think it's it's not the way it used to be where everything was in one city the way it is in London for instance you can go you can be on stage at night and shoot something during the day at Pinewood or was the other one tweaking them or something like that here you have to unless it's shooting in New York you have to fly to Los Angeles gives your life basically do you ever feel pigeon holed do you still think people look at you and say she's Broadway no no no enough time has passed in my career but there I was never tagged cast anyway because I kept moving between a musical and a play or a TV movie and a musical and a play and I remember you know at first my agents this is a crafter a villain well you can't do it you know you can't I went to the Guthrie to work with Libby Chula the gutter in Minneapolis which is regional theatre because he asked me to because I've admired his work and he asked me to play Rosalind and his internationally famous production of as you like it and I went of course this is how I was trained at Juilliard of course I'll go and my agent said you can't do that you were Evita and I went yeah but if I waited for another role like Evita I'd still be waiting so I went off to do regional theater and was ripped apart in the newspapers because Evita was doing regional theater but it so it took a while for what my history was before if he took to catch up with the girl to play Evita right in this in the same sort of question when you're doing a TV series life goes on did that then cos grow that's now she's a TV actress can she come back to the theater no I don't think that ever plays into can you come back to the theater because the bulk of my work has been on stage no but there was an article in The New York Times about stage actors on TV and how they adjusted to the television medium and I wasn't um I didn't like the hours on life goes on it was 16 hours a day really sobbing I'm getting I'm just getting ill thinking of it yeah between 14 and 16 hours a day and you had no life no life and the our lungs are incredibly difficult the easiest child in show business is situation comedy it's a nine-to-five job and I love the stage because at 8 o'clock you know the curtains gonna go the curtains got to come down goes up at 8 it's got to come down two hours later at the Maxima tour well not always you know for it let's say three hours later the curtains going to come down you know what you're planning your day to that you know forth at 8 o'clock curtain when it goes up spout and come down you never know when they're gonna stop shooting yeah you really don't know when they're gonna pull the plug and say it's a wrap it's just like very difficult take me all the way back then always wanted to do this always I was bit when I was 4 years old I was my dad was principal of the only elementary school in my hometown of Northport Long Island and he started this extracurricular activities program and my mother enrolled me in dancing and and I was in a black Capezio leotard black physio chair skirt black Capezio tap shoes tapping downstage right which you will hear tomorrow night and I I looked out the eye and someone hey I can't get in trouble okay they're smiling at me but I've gotten in a lot of trouble with the pre-roll anyway geez that can't get jog do whatever I want and they'll still smile at me so while I was on stage I fell in love with the ions and never looked back a quote you made that your favorite audience is the one that's not asleep hahahaha that true yeah well you know you you wonder why this is on Broadway and I see this I still see it you would have why to spend that money to go into a darkened theater to fall asleep I'm in the were talking we're talking in the hundreds of dollars for an app um I actually as Maria Callas and master class could wake them up but because I the fourth wall was broken but in other place you can't exactly wake them up yeah unless you just sort of talk louder which is then you're breaking character but I my bag of my eye in the audience and I'm in character but I'll actually peek before I'm very unprofessional and but I don't think it's unprofessional I want to see who the the audiences before I plate them I'm going to command the stage I want to see who I'm playing to while the lights are up and you know they had a dinner they go into a darkened theater I suppose I I don't want to go to the theater I don't water policy I think there's some people who probably want to go to the food well I don't know is it different if you're doing a concert as opposed to a show do you find a difference well audience I don't I don't hear I don't see people falling asleep in in concerts as much as I do on the on the Broadway stage because I think a lot of times people come to hear a symphonic orchestra or a singer whereas at the theater on Broadway their wives are dragging them and it may be an obligation okay tonight's Tuesday night is Broadway tonight's do Wednesday night is the belly there isn't that kind of well there I am an experienced in a long time but there used to be a Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday audience Monday night people ran from work with their bag lunch they eat it because I want to go to the theater they wanted to see the new play too the same thing Wednesday meant now you'd get the Bridge and Tunnel grout Wednesday night you get a little bit of the Bridge and Tunnel car but you know still Thursday Friday Saturday Sunday it was a bridge no huh people that theater parties or people that felt an obligation to go to the theater especially Saturday night like the worst night why Saturday night State night us day hey I got ticket to me via ha ha ha you mentioned a Vita the fame that came the success that came with that show were you prepared for it is anyone ever prepared know um what I wasn't prepared for was the difficulty of the role and I don't the fame was infamy it was no I was it wasn't a joyous experience it was one of the most difficult life lessons that I had to learn because I couldn't handle the role and I was put in a situation where I understood understood the vulnerability of the singer because I could pick I could be perfectly fine but the vocal chords said you're not going onstage tonight you may not go on stage all week long I was not singing the world correctly I was getting no help from the producer the director the writers because they didn't know what to tell me and then I was thrown to the Lions because it was a tremendous success and it had this juggernaut of of hype behind it and then I was the unknown cast yeah and I got a lot of bad press and had to figure out how to filter the bad press go out on the stage and not be afraid of the role while I was trying to figure out how to play the role and sing it so every night I went out across myself and prayed to God that I could get by the first day in the first 10 minutes it's just a series of DS and FS and I and I was not happy well I left the play after Mandy left which broke my heart because he was my ballast and I left it and I said we have nothing to go and I lost my sense of humor I have got to get out of here so I never got any better didn't got better in Australia I left and I got you know I had learned this the art of patience I could not vocalize without running every faucet in my apartment on so that I didn't have to hear the first couple of notes because it would inevitably be this ragged hoarse horrible sound I would kick my kickstart my voice I would have the answering machine on the phones turned off and the volume off so I didn't hear who it was calling me so I didn't speak for like between 12 and 14 hours a day I live like a monk just to get through a performance six times a week for nine months so another shows ever I've left and I get a telephone call and I picked it up on the first ring and it was Robert Stigwood said do you want saying do you want to go to Australia and I went you know nobody's ever going to ask me to go to Australia and work account yes I'll go and that was when I found the joy in the role I was in love and I got the reviews I thought I should have gotten for the part and I could sing it after nine ten months I could finally sing it so that each night I came off the stage I went okay I can go have a drink Maddie - yeah and so and I only played it for three months and but I at one point during Evita in San Francisco after I blew the opening night yet again and got terrible notices I was having a staring are they rented me the specific mansion of Pacific Heights and it was infested with mice but it's not bad enough that I can't play the role but I turn off the lights but put my hair on the pillow and they dive into the rat poison in the master bedroom and it was like and then one night it came home and I saw a mouse in the kitchen floor and I had a 45-minute conversation with a friend of mine in New York and the mouse was still there and I got down the floor and actually looked a mouse in the I went oh I'm sorry I don't live here I didn't do it and he lunged at me you and I went I broke I went this is insane this is absurd and it sort of was the turning point for me in a Vita where I wasn't like so depressed and I just had to laugh I'd had to laugh at the whole thing and it turned around I started to relax into the role I had course David Vosburg somebody the course teach me how seeing the world every night we worked on the show an hour and a half before I sang two hours of a show I get the head the tail would fall off I get the head in the tail and a leg and another link would follow so all through the 16 weeks on the road he worked with me every day in my dressing room Wow it wasn't it was something that teaches you to be strong but I don't know why I knew I was strong it just made me stronger and I don't know why cuz they never had a role like that it made me suffer childbirth yeah what did you think when you saw the film I didn't see the film and I'll tell you why I'm I think that they changed the keys and it's like an opera you can't like me me me a mezzo-soprano it changes the whole tenor of the piece and I did see a couple of numbers when the tempest with deadly and with this is Cynthia vida that had the audiences wrapped in the Broadway theatre yeah this is something else there's no need to see it and it wasn't that I was you know envious of Madonna I was already too old to play the part as a matter of fact before Madonna got the role Hollywood Pictures was was was going to do it and I was offered the role of Vitas mother she really brightened up you're out of town and game it cut that's a wrap on patty thank you very much anyone is Mauro think something good ten years before Adana Madonna Madonna Madonna played Evita um it didn't look as though it rose to the occasion what Tim Rice and Andrew Lloyd Webber and Halperin's had created it looked like it didn't it wasn't as good as Chicago it didn't have that Broadway gut in Evita you play a living person or one that had been alive in LBJ once again you do somebody's been alive a lot of talks been going on right now about trying to tell the story of people historical stories and yet be accurate to it but you can't necessarily be a hundred percent accurate when you're putting a life story down into two or four hours what do you think about all that well what do you what are you talking about you mean I mean even recently in in a script well even as recently as the Regan oh that is ridiculous I'm sorry that is since that is total censorship that is somebody going you know you're gonna have the studio taken away from me if you put that on I am appalled at that so what their public figures excuse me if they chose not to be in the public life he wouldn't have been president he wouldn't been an actress she would she would have been an actress he wouldn't have been an actress I'm sorry that pisses me off what do I think it's a play it's a movie I mean somebody wasn't Maria I did Maria Callas I did what was you know based on the the master classes at the Juilliard School I listened to the master classes I was at school we never went well some some of the kids in school did the actors were not encouraged necessarily to go to these and I was too busy partying whatever you know anything other than going listen to an opera singer even though I knew who she was and the tremendous excitement in the building I had more important things to do at 20 years old um but they are not this was not Maria Callas uh LBJ they tried to follow it as accurately as possible but there is still theatrical license and Judy Davis is a brilliant actress and I think what doesn't James Brolin I mean I haven't seen that much of his work but I'm sure that's a woman I thought should have played Evita Judy Davis rollin Marni Nixon who I understand is still alive have her sing the world but they don't got some depth in that part you got a real actress in the park and you know like an incredible voice I could hit those notes but I think that's outrageous but they pulled it it looks like okay let me take you back to the stage then Linda zurab mm-hmm what disappointed me about it was so little of you in there Oh in the role of Fantine yes it's a wonderful room but I was expecting after the success of the Vita we would see a big Patti role again why did you choose to take that role Oh incredible well like I said now if I waited I'd still be waiting for a role like Evita there isn't a role like Evita yeah there isn't there was nobody like Evita what are they gonna you know sure um I was going to London to do the cradle will rock and Cameron Mackintosh whom I had worked for in Oliver saw my picture in an English newspaper and they had could not cast Fantine and so he came to my apartment and he played me two bars he's a piece of wood you be enjoyed not having to love London and he said he played to two to four bars and I heard this is the French production - this was not even ours anyone and the idea of working with the Royal Shakespeare Company being the first American to work with the Royal Shakespeare Company in the Royal Shakespeare Company's home London home the Barbican theatre to be in London for a year the sandwiches apart by the side i dream'd think I heard Fantine song excuse me did here fronting son it was the idea of that memory that experience working with Alan Armstrong and working with Roger Allen and working with RSC actors and I went and had the time of my life and chose in the second week not to do in New York and I knew I was going to get asked to do it in New York and with the camera I was my barricade uniform and I went to it was I went to the stage door there was Karen I said Karen I can't do this in New York he said I know the Costas moment no I said it's any and he wouldn't get and I said this is perfect production it was the perfect production it was a perfect cast in the perfect environment in a perfect play the only thing that stage actor has are their performances of the memory of them so I didn't want I didn't want to compromise this event in my life it's the hardest decision that I made I was offered the role I said no my husband and I are flying home from England and somebody tapped me on the shoulders were descending and he said we're going to miss you tonight I'm calm Wilkinsons agent Lima is opening and I burst into tears and I cried you know I saw the reviews I cried I want what I do what I do then i saw john caird he said let's go pick up you know Frances her film I said okay I hadn't seen it and we would second I couldn't know it that's why what I saw was a copy of the British cast yeah it's what they do know they don't let you the new cat that they don't want to mess with a hit that gave them a CD you you you do you imitate your ginardi a he's got to be like it Alun Armstrong you gotta sound like that you got and so what I saw was a cast that was not unique and it would have been a step down and that's why I went you made the right decision because I still have the memory of the cast that I was part of yeah it's very important for my I don't know what might I don't know what my life might the honor in my life the the integrity in my my the choices that I make I don't know because it's the cheap world it's a cheap business it's a cheap and vulgar business unless I make it different unless the the performer makes it the different yeah you talk about larger-than-life characters and I know we're skipping over things as we go along but otherwise we'd never have time to fill it all in Sunset Boulevard right well what a huge yeah I know I wanna talk about a devastating experience ah yeah what do you want - what do you want - tell me about it well it was horrible it was a horrible experience and it was mine was the most public but everybody went through it you know down to the farm and that's sleep in the theaters at night Kevin Anderson and I delivered the show that was written under the direction of Trevor Nunn eye care center kevin was fired - aye Kevin left the show in January I would worry going cuz it wasn't really with a battlefield he said I said why are you leaving he said because I can so Kevin what do I came back he went up to dinner I said they had announced Glenn Close and of course all the while in America I'm being fired all the while in London my my name is not in the newspaper at all because I'm turning in a performance every night great there's no problem in London it's all germinating from the state and of course it really is good no no we don't know what it is coming from I said well you better stop it you know yeah I don't know how well a lot of people said they were whatever it's a long and complicated site um but Kevin a city going to do it Kevin he said I don't know whether I'm and I in my heart of hearts knew that he had been fired because when they announced Glenn Close they would have said Kevin Anderson would have been reprising his role they were there's it he didn't find out he was fired they'd never told him they never told him he would not be reprising his role it was that kind of treatment right down the line in the negotiations for me all right and then the show whatever problems the show had could have been fixed had we had a better director and a better well a composer who was not so obsessed with having the largest hit of his you know career and you can't collaborate you can make and Trevor's a wonderful director don't get me wrong I love working with Trevor but I don't find the English the answer to Broadway musicals I think that their answer to Shakespeare and restoration but I do not find them to be the and third laborious at best they do not know how to disguise any flaw they just want to expose him to the world and Broadway musicals by the very nature are flawed joke song or you know part of a scene or you know maybe a scene of a song you know but they want to investigate him and like invest them with I don't know what so and I was invited to the closing night it was rehearsing masterclass and I didn't know and I got a message from my stage manager from my old stage management saying we want you to come to closing night know - oh my god I went home to my husband in London I said Matt I got a phone call I want me to go to the clothes they wanted he said yeah let's go I was holy Wow you gotta be kidding let's bar let's go when I got to lose so I walked right into Anthony Powell John Kerr Trevor no no John Napier Anthony Powell the suits creative staff there was they've turned ashen when they saw my bachelor Clark was finishing other one we took our seats I ended the first act I got up and I went to the musical director were we this boring oh it was not a good show but it was my fault you bought a pool with your settlement honey I got a lot of things jump ahead now talking once again a lot of these roles you create you stepped it or didn't step in you you read you brought back remounted restaged Sweeney Todd Oh everyone's going to look that's Angela Lansbury - there's no way anyone else can do it you did what did you do that you were able to make that character so your own and I am a huge fan of Angela Lansbury I think first of all you go into it one an actor should I go into it without the fear of the other actors performance and I'm only responsible for the text I am only responsible for what's written it I did not see her the way Angela did I saw her as something else and had a director who didn't go no no no no didn't do it I work with this guy Lonnie price who does these were doing another one we're doing what we've done Wells Kaufman is responsible for these when he was a artistic administrator at the New York philony moved to the Chicago Symphony we've done two others we just did passion Audra McDonald play Clara I played Fosca we did a little night music the year before and Link Inc I believe is going to now bring passion the same way the Phil did I don't know if we're doing it with me I feel I'm not sure but we're going to continue this and are going to be filmed and it's also in concert version but it's it might as well be staged I mean it might as well you might as well it that the only thing that's missing is the orchestra's not the pit that's the only thing that's missing we will continue to do these and I just think that if you don't have the fear but go in there with Lonnie price as the director you can't lose I didn't see it that way okay favorite thing you stole costume wise Oh for people though you love to take something from it I do yeah yeah I'm selling it all anybody know because I'm good monsters a lot of stuff the most favorite thing we turn there Adelaide Adelaide Louie no god rest her soul she just passed was a legendary wardrobe supervisor on Broadway and she came to me while the show was going on and I was about to make an entrance and she had a black velvet jewelry tray and on there were these was choker and earrings and this braces she was leading them funny when she went these were Ethel mermans Apple manage don't call me madam it's all war than the charity concert when I left the show everybody looked the other way and I took him because nobody will remember they would have gotten broken and thrown out I have them Ethel going to a museum they we don't have that same tradition I went for somewhere to California to do Hollywood movie I was at Western costumes and I put I swore I put on June Allyson stress I swore it was June Allison's dress and there was no label in the back of it they used to put labels in I had on Julie Christie's corset from uncle vanya when I did this school for scandal I went holy it carries a tradition you know it carries it it's the same thing I talked about earlier you know I don't know what the correct word is it gives dignity and a kind of integrity I kind of an you know can to know that you're in part of a tradition those were Ethel mermans Aurora stone tonight the guy Donald stand and who did a lot of her drooling knew the designer he said you hold on to those patty because it's get lost so that was my favorite thing that I took yeah well we are out of time but I want to thank you for taking us down that went quickly I know I talked of a blue dress and there's so much more thank you so much owning this pleasure are you kidding my pleasure Patti LuPone [Music] [Music] to order a transcript call eight six six six five two three three seven eight or sudden $6.95 to the address on your screen please include the name of the guests [Music]

Channel: HoustonPBS

Views: 72,331

Rating: 4.9042554 out of 5

Keywords: KUHT, HoustonPBS, InnerVIEWS, with, Ernie, Manouse, Patti, LuPone, actress, singer, performer, Broadway, 'Evita', Eva, Perone, 'Sweeney, Todd', 'Sunset, Boulevard', 'Master, Class', 'Life, Goes, On', 'Witness', 'Driving, Miss, Daisy', 'Les, Miserables', Fantine, Tony, Award, Drama, Desk, 'Oz'

Id: 1asS7GdEO5I

Length: 28min 58sec (1738 seconds)

Published: Wed Jan 27 2010