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Interviews
Classic Rocker Tommy James Celebrates his Life
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- Parent Category: Film and the Arts
- Category: Interviews
- Published on Monday, 19 July 2010 16:42
- Written by Bruce Alexander
Classic pop-rock star Tommy James writes his own music, has a great voice, stills sells records and tours regularly. Lots of musicians have covered his songs from such stars as Joan Jett to Billy Idol. I love 
all his songs from his early classic “Hanky Panky” to the great “Mony Mony.”
Now 63 years-old, this Dayton, Ohio-born singer/songwriter recently wrote his autobiography with Martin Fitzpatrick, Me, the Mob, and the Music (2010). Accommodating to his fans, he makes sure he meets and greets everyone and enjoy signing for the fans.
When he came to NYC for a book signing at Barnes & Noble, I had a chance to interview him for a few minutes. He’s a real pro, answered everything I asked and gave me great information about his past.
BA: What made you write this book?
TJ: Basically this book was in the works for almost 10 years. Martin Fitzpatrick and I started out writing an autobiography that was to be about music, which we were going to call it “Crimson & Clover,” but we soon realized that we weren’t telling the whole story.
It had to be the Roulette Records story. The book was incomplete without that part of the story, but it was not in our best interests to tell the whole story at the time because most of the Roulette people were still alive. I was just uncomfortable about it.
A few years went by and the remaining Roulette regulars passed away in December 2005. We felt it was time that we finished the book and felt okay about doing it then.
So, we did it and told the whole story and got a deal immediately through Simon & Schuster which we were surprised about because they do more literary works and very few pop culture kinds of projects. We were very honored and flattered when they took the book. Now it’s going be a movie and a Broadway play. So, we are very happy, feeling lucky and also very blessed.
BA: I heard that director Martin Scorsese might be doing a movie based on it.
TJ: We are talking right now with three different directors and he is one of them. He actually contacted us first and we are going to make an announcement over the next few weeks on the film project.
BA: Martin Fitzpatrick is not only your co-writer of the book but also your road manager.
TJ: He wears many hats for us, and also does merchandising for us.
BA: It must have been weird not getting paid for a lot of things back then.
TJ: Roulette was the best and the worst of all worlds. It was great from a creative standpoint because they left us alone and let us be whatever we could become, but getting paid was very difficult. I don’t have a lot of regrets and a lot of anger or bitterness because we were able to make a great deal of it back over the years. But it is true that getting paid was like taking a bone from a rottweiler
BA: A lot of people thought that you were born in Niles, Michigan when in fact you were born in Ohio.
TJ: That’s true, I was born in Dayton, Ohio and moved to South Bend, Indiana and then to Niles, Michigan. My dad was in the hotel business so we moved around a lot.
BA: How did you find the transition when you moved to New York in the ’60s and that whole period coming here?
TJ: It was a culture shock because I was a kid from the Midwest, graduated from high school and all of a sudden within a year lived in the middle of New York. So, I consider myself the first year a spectator. I felt like I was in a movie in New York. I said in the book that I never felt so important and insignificant at the same time.
BA: What was it like playing music in and being part of the ’60s scene? Was that a groovy time?
TJ: The 1960s were the best time ever to make it because all the ducks were in a row. All the planets were lined up. Radio and television and the record business were all on the same page and were not competing with each other much.
They were all looking to break the next big act. Of course, 60 million baby boomer kids with money in their pockets fueled everything and radio was so much bigger and covered so much more ground then than it does today.
The Average Top 20 hit from that period sold more records than 10 #1 records combined today. Really, the rules have changed. I consider that period of time the very best to have made it in because of then amazing numbers of people back then.
BA: Also, the music was very positive back then.
TJ – Absolutely, anything could happen that you could think of
BA: What was it like being away from your family and having this other life in New York?
TJ: You end up spreading yourself very thin when doing this business. One of my great regrets is that I wasn’t able to be more of a family man as so much of my life was was devoted to self promotion and making music. On one hand you get to stay a kid a long time but on the other hand you really do miss those important years with your family. But, you can be at only one place at a time.
BA: What it was like traveling on those package tours. Was it fun, tiring, or both?
TJ: I basically stopped the really serious touring back in 1968 .We had done the big one night tours with 40 dates back to back and I was so tired having to live like that it’s as if I became a zombie. I decided from that point on we would do one-nighters or two nights a week was all I wanted to do
In the end it worked out well because I was able to save my voice. I can’t imagine doing the touring that like Rod Stewart does. I don’t know how they do it; they would find me under a bridge or somewhere out in the field. I couldn’t live like that.
BA: What was it like working in a record store in that period?
TJ: I got a great education working in a little record store in Niles. Things that I use to this day I like learning to read the trade papers I learned back then. It was called the Spin-It Record shop.
BA: Anything about notorious record company owner Morris Levy that you want to add?
TJ: Morris ended up being the star of our book. He was one of the most dynamic people I have ever met. It was a real love/hate relationship, kind of like an abusive father I guess. I learned more being at Roulette than any place in the world.
BA: And any final thoughts?
TJ: I just want to say thank you to the fans for 44 years of fun and music. This is a business that maybe gives you two or three years if you are lucky, and we have had it for four decades. Thanks to the fans and the good Lord!
Brazilian Babe Alice Braga Hunts Predators, Repo Men
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- Parent Category: Film and the Arts
- Category: Interviews
- Published on Monday, 12 July 2010 20:17
- Written by Brad Balfour
Maybe it's because of her Brazilian genes that Alice Braga looks good even when sweaty after a jungle trek. Braga has become the go-to girl for sci-fi action thrillers, what with this year's Repo Men and the recently released Predators. This time, as the bust-ass female lead, IDF sniper Isabelle takes charge, with co-star Adrien Brody, of a pack of errant mercs, paramilitary types, rebels and hardcore criminals forced to band together in order to survive after they are mysteriously chute-dropped into an unknown tropical forest on a distant world. 
Chosen because they can kill without conscience, these warriors, some trained, some not, battle a pack of 10-foot-tall Predators who are hunting them as prey. In this vast jungle, these human predators must learn whom, or what, they're up against, and test the limits of their abilities, knowledge and wits in a battle of kill or be killed.
Having appeared in several films, most notably as Angélica in 2002's acclaimed Cidade de Deus, Braga landed her first US blockbuster with 2007's I Am Legend. Who else has starred in two apocalyptic films about the world's end within a year -- that Will Smith film and Blindness (2008) -- and survived?
Coming from a cinematic family -- her aunt is the great Brazilian actress Sônia Braga -- 27-year-old Alice Braga Moraes got started at eight being in a yogurt commercial. Besides her native Portuguese, this daughter of São Paulo, Brazil also speaks English and Spanish, and shows a sort of pluck that propels her career.
Braga has learned to endure all kinds of abuse whether it's rolling around in slimy traps, or having a hand rammed into her gaping wounds. Maybe because she neither has the tough-as-nail glare of Angelina Jolie or the towering power of Uma Thurman, she suggests both intelligence and vulnerability. That's something so noticeable when we talked for a few minutes after the Repo Men interviews.
Q: You've done a lot of futuristic movies lately; do you have an affinity for them? Do you look for science-fiction scripts or do they happen to find you?
AB: It was a happy coincidence. It was something that my mom always loved, so I grew up watching those types of films, but it wasn't something that I focused on. These scripts came to me; I read them, had fun with them and liked them. I really had fun because this type of film really opens a door for your imagination. It was a happy coincidence.
Q: When did you finish Predators?
AB: We wrapped the second week of January [2010].
Q: How was that experience?
AB: It was great, really nice, a lot of running around, running for my life as fast as I can. A great cast and crew. The photographer, Gyula Pados, was amazing. It looks really nice and the Predators are dark, and really, really, scary.
I think the fans are really going to be happy with it, at least I hope so. The director, Nimród Antal, is a fan of the films, so it was like a fan directing us. He was like a kid on set, and having that energy was really special.
Q: It was R rated; was it ever going to be a PG-13?
AB: I don't think they could have because there are some [really] dark scenes in it, like any other of this type of film. So I think it’s going to be hard. We never know what's going to happen or what the studio’s going to do in the editing. But it looks really dark, and I had fun doing it.
Q: Meeting you here, it's hard to believe they cast you as a tough "guy."
AB: Everyone tells me, "You look so much taller in the movies."
Q: Will you get your own action figure for Predators?
AB: I hope so. We did the scanning. I don't know if it was for action scenes or post-production things, but I really hope I have an action figure. I would love that.
Q: Your character is Israeli military?
AB: She is a sniper. She’s a Special Forces lady.
Q: So are you chasing the Predators?
AB: I’m being chased.
Q: Was Predators a hard shoot?
AB: It was a fun shoot. It was hard because of the weather conditions -- really cold and working outdoors. But it was a blast, and I think it’s going to be interesting.
Q: What’s it like acting next to some guy in a suit?
AB: Awesome. Truly, I had so much fun because in I Am Legend they were wearing suits with dots, so it's like Teletubbies.
I remember I took a picture when I met the guys because one of the guys who played the Predator -- he also played Jason -- Derek Mears, so he's big, and I was next to him barefoot. He's great. So having someone that tall, that big, with me -- and I’m like 5'3" -- that kind of vibe was great because it gives you [a sense of] that desperation.
Q: What was it like working with such different people on Predators? It has such an interesting collection of actors, like Topher Grace and Adrien Brody.
AB: It was great because I think they wanted to do something different. Having Adrien as the hero was not the obvious choice, but he did great. I thought it was a great choice just to play around with acting in an action film.
Q: Do you think it one-up the old movies?
AB: I don't know if it will one-up [the original]. I hope it adds up more than anything else. I don't know if it ones-up the other ones. I think to become successful as the others I think it needs to add up. You cannot try to make something different because then you lose the fans. The best thing is to make a film for the fans. That’s why we’re making it.
Q: Is there a possibility to get your own franchise out of the Predators movie?
AB: I don't know. I would love to, but I have no idea. I'm totally open for anything. People ask me, "What type of films do you want to make?" I want to make films. I have a blast when I’m on set. Seriously, I’m a kid, ask anyone that worked with me or saw me on set.
Actually, what [director] Fernando Meirelles used to do with me on Blindness is he would keep me for last so that he could keep me on set. He knew that I wouldn’t leave. So if it comes up, definitely I would love to do more action and more stuff. I’m open for any type of acting.
Q: Have you talked to Fernando recently? Do you have any idea what he’s going to do next? Are you going to work with him again?
AB: I heard that he was going to do something with a Janis Joplin story or something, but I’m not sure. I heard that at a party at midnight in São Paulo, so that’s not a trustful source.
He was doing a really wonderful TV series in Brazil about Shakespeare. He’s been writing, and I think he’s probably in pre-production or something. As I was shooting Predators I was away for the past few months so I’m not sure.
Q: If you could work on any action film franchise or remake, do you have that ideal role in your head where you could be another kick-ass character?
AB: I never thought about it. I’ve always been a small, short girl so I never thought about myself running around and kicking ass and punching and shooting. In Predators, I’m a sniper and truly, my gun was the heaviest gun on set. It’s 14 pounds and everyone is with a knife, a pistol, and I’m with a [huge] rifle.
I totally love the challenge to portray someone like that character. It would be great if something comes up as another action figure. It’s a nice challenge physically and emotionally.
Q: Your career seems to be moving not only in a sci-fi direction but in an action film mold. The world needs a really big Latina action star. They’re looking to cast Wonder Woman right now.
AB: That’s great! But Wonder Woman is not going to be Latin for sure. With my accent?
Q: Linda Carter is half Mexican.
AB: Oh yeah but she didn’t have an accent like I do. That would be great though; Wonder Woman Latina. But I did City of God and Lower City and independent projects, and then I did some dramas. It was nice to face a film like Repo Men that has some drama, is a character that has some hard background stories but at the same time is running and training and firing. It’s cool.
Q: When did you do Repo Men?
AB: Right after, actually. I was shooting Blindness in Toronto and went to LA to audition with Jude [Law, co-star of Repo Men with Forest Whitaker] on a Saturday and then went straight back to Toronto to finish Blindness. Then I ended up shooting Repo Men in Toronto again.
My mom always asking me, “When are you going to do a romantic-comedy without monsters?” and I’m like, “Okay, that’s coming one day. Let’s work for it.” But this is a happy coincidence.
Q: Do you think your character, Beth, in Repo Men was plagued by a love for the surgery? Do you think she was addicted to the surgery or she was just going along trying to fix things?
AB: Miguel [Rosenberg-Sapochnik, the director,] and I spoke a lot about her past, about what she’s been through, what happened in her life, what was her background, why was she in that situation when we first see her in the film, just because I love doing that and Miguel also was really involved in the story.
We wanted to understand what kind of emotional state she would show up in. It’s just life; we created a little background, like some disease, some problem, some lack of health, addictions maybe. As soon as she started getting new ones then it became an addiction I think, because it’s kind of hard to say she had all those problems. It was mainly an addiction, but it’s hard to say that it was only that.
There was a line that ended up not in the film but is really fun. I looked at him and was like, “Did you get upgraded? Come on!” And that kind of line shows that she was always trying to keep up. It’s like us; you guys don’t have tape anymore.
We’re always upgrading, always doing something new. Everyone has the iPhone; in a week everyone’s going to have the iPad. We’re always upgrading all the time, so I feel that’s what Beth did. And it’s nice. If someone’s boring talking to you, just turn it down.
Q: How do you find the right level of empathy for a character that has so much of her body turned over to science and is a drug addict and does all those deals? How far do you go to make that character empathetic, and where do you stop?
AB: Empathetic in what sense?
Q: You want people to feel sorry for her so that you worry about her, but where do you stop? Because you also want her to be tough.
AB: I don’t know if I want people to feel sorry for her. I never felt sorry for her. I always try to not judge the characters that I portray. I try to just understand, and get meaning and belief in the characters. But I always tried to make her as human as possible.
All of us endure pain, sadness, loss. Life is not only happiness. But on the other hand, you can find love or happiness, or you can find anything else, so that’s the change she goes through her life. She’s giving up on herself when he finds her and that’s why I punch him in the face and am like, “Why? Why did you do that? You’re not going to save me right now. You’re going to go away.”
Who knows, maybe 10 guys did with her, or her family did with her, we don’t know. I just tried to create a character that was human more than anything. I think feeling pity is a really strong thing to feel for someone.
Q: Apparently, in the book version, your character had cancer which ravaged most of her body? Her husband at the time had been a doctor, so she got a discount, which is why she got so many body part upgrades -- he was just trying to keep her alive. By that time she was 74% artificial, and he couldn’t be with her anymore.
AB: [Miguel] didn’t say anything. No but I wish he did. The script was so different in a sense, so we tried to build the story and background. There were a lot of different versions of Beth and Remy’s love story in the beginning, and then it changed through the course of the film until we started shooting.
Q: Miguel said your character started out in a different relationship with Remy. What’s your reaction as an actress? You play a part a certain way, and then it’s edited and somehow it works in a completely other way that you hadn’t intended. What did you think when you see that?
AB: My mom’s an editor, so I totally understand editors, which is great -- It helps. I’m kidding. I grew up in this world. My father’s a journalist, but he directed a lot of TV shows in Brazil. I never think too much about what they’re going to do. I always try to grab the script and learn it by heart and focus on that, and whatever they want to do later they can do it. I don’t mind.
I’m passionate for the story and being part of something. That’s the most important thing. Funnily enough, in Repo Men, I prefer what I saw on the screen than what we shot. It works really nice. I don’t know how, because we had such a background in our minds – me and Jude, Beth and Remy – all the time that drove us through the journey towards the end of the film, and once we cut the part before they meet, where we meet them in the film, it could have gone wrong.
What is great is that it was done perfectly, and it was even better. I’m glad he took it off because the story is even sharper. I think more important than you as an actor is the storytelling. Of course as an actor you want to show your work, you want to be on screen, but being part of a nice story, it’s really special. So I do think as an actress you need to know how to understand and how to put yourself into it. Everything matters; don’t take anything for granted. Be present in the moment. That’s the best thing to do.
Q: At the end you’re still alive. Is there hope for a sequel that would include you?
AB: Maybe. I'll give you Universal’s number so you can ask them. Then I’ll give you mine, and you call me. I have no idea what they think of it. I don’t think so. I think the story’s done.
Q: Did you think of yourself as a female Terminator?
AB: The way Beth’s going, she probably can be a Terminator because the only thing’s real are the lips.
Q: One of those scenes near the end where he's taking the parts out of you is really sick but also sexy in its own way. It recalls the movie Crash. In filming that scene, how did you play it so that it was both passionate but kind of sick and crazy at the same time?
AB: When Miguel told me that he wanted to do that scene as a love scene I couldn't picture it. Once we started doing it I was just trying to figure out how to play it, not to be overly painful or only love and forget the pain. I tried to stay in the middle and to just bring truth.
It's interesting that both characters are so in love and they’re fighting for their lives, yet they’re so connected at that moment in the film. I think pain and love go together. If you're in love, you're going to feel pain and the passion increases the pain.
It's hard to explain with a logical answer, but mainly I do think that's what Miguel wanted, and I tried to put my heart into it and just bring it alive. It was fun to do it because it was so free to create anything. We are in sexual positions actually; it's like we're making love. It was a great idea.
For more by Brad Balfour: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/brad-balfour
Staying Human in The Twilight Saga Challenges Actress Christian Serratos
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- Parent Category: Film and the Arts
- Category: Interviews
- Published on Saturday, 03 July 2010 19:08
- Written by Brad Balfour
And then there's actress Christian Serratos's bespectacled Angela Webber, who kind of reflects the film's own core girl-geek squad.
After the 20-year-old Serratos made it into The Twilight Saga, she started to tour the con circuit making sure that the humans other than Bella weren't forgotten. So she made it to New York last October after The Twilight Saga: New Moon was released, then to Anaheim this April, and also found time to bare all for PETA. And her few moments of screen time in the installments reveals real flashes of talent -- part of what she discusses in this exclusive interview conducted during one of those con excursions.
It's not like she's a total novice. Though she has limited screen time again in the third installment, she occupies an incredible ringside seat to see this Virgin-Vamp saga emerge and track how everyone has evolved in doing it. As close-up to the media circus as anyone, Serratos has not only witnessed the Twilight phenomenon from the inside out, she has felt the glare of that white-hot spotlight that Kris Stewart and Rob Pattinson have been subjected to throughout.
Q: Now that you know the characters, do you just go with it or do you rehearse?
CS: We definitely go over our stuff, our lines and work together, even off-set when we want to. The only real rehearsals are to get the stunts down. So the Cullens and the vampires have to deal with that.
Q: Did the mood on set change over time since everyone was already like a family, or was there more pressure because of the success?
CS: If anything, it went the other way. Once everyone realized how intense it was, everyone calmed down and relaxed. "Let's not think about it. Let's just do what we're here to do, make the fans happy and go home."
Q: Are the scripts tight or are there some things you make up while you're shooting?
CS: A lot of the improv was literally us trying to make each other mess up. It ended up working. It's really cool. It's funny to see what scenes they end up taking.
Q: It seems like all the actors have built a real sense of family.
CS: They have.
Q: Your character lasts throughout the series, so you're there for the long haul.
CS: Yeah. It's been great. Everyone is definitely close-knit. Everyone is family -- we all take care of each other. We all pick on each other and so it's great. I love everyone.
Q: Do you feel you learned anything from the more experienced actors on Twilight?
CS: Peter [Facinelli], who plays the dad, Dr. Carlisle -- he's pretty fatherly on set. But we all learn from each other.
Q: Do you guys crack each other up on the set?
CS: Yes. They're not specifically planned. We just mess with each other in general. I'm usually picked on the most. I'm not kidding. I'm an easy target. They like to mess with me.
Q: What did you do to immerse yourself in the whole vampire universe?
CS: What was really cool about this particular project is that we didn't have to. I mean, we did and we could, but we had the book.
Q: So you read the book beforehand?
CS: Oh, yeah.
Q: Some people advise that you shouldn't read the book before the role, and others go the other way.
CS: I couldn't help it. I remember being on the third one, and the fourth wasn't going to come out for another week or so. I could not possibly read just one page a day. I would go through a hundred pages a day. So I would force myself to just do one page a day, because I had to have my daily dose, but I didn't want to finish because I didn't want to have to wait.
Q: Have you met Stephanie Meyer?
CS: Yeah, she comes to the set a lot. She's really hands-on. She's really cool. I got a chance to meet her kids and talk to her about the movie and how she came up with it. She's really nice.
Q: Have you ever discussed your character with her?
CS: Yeah. She gave me solid little tips and stuff and told us little tidbits about our characters. I think that a lot of what she told us is now in the public and so everyone really knows the inside stuff.
Q: What is your favorite Twilight character?
CS: It would probably be Edward -- Edward and Alice. He's like the perfect guy ever, and [she] is pretty, sassy and cool. She's got a lot of great one-liners.
Q: Have you seen other vampire movies?
CS: Yeah, I've seen other vampire things, but not necessarily for research.
Q: There’s one, Daybreakers, where all the vampires are going to die because they're losing their blood supply.
CS: That sounds cool. I definitely want to go watch some of the other vampire flicks. I guess I have to go see that.
Q: What do you think of the vampire TV shows?
CS: I think it's cool, a vampire phenomenon. I have not watched any of them. I really want to get into True Blood because that's the one that everyone talks about.
Q: Do you have any dream projects you'd like to do?
CS: Sure. I'm very open to anything. I'd love to play someone who's insane or something, just so I can go flake out. I like a superhero. I know that's ironic. That's where we are, but seriously, it'd be really cool to play a superhero.
Q: Are you an anime fan?
CS: I'm really not. I'm not a really big comic book person. I know the typical Spider Man and Wonder Woman and Storm and that stuff. Don't quiz me, because I'm not good at things like that.
Q: Are you a fan of specific characters?
CS: I guess if anything, it would be [I Love] Lucy. I do have a lot of Lucy stuff.
Q: What about being in a Lucy biopic?
CS: That would be so cool. I know every single episode. The newer stuff would be Friends. I've seen every episode one too many times. I watch them for like the fifth time, each episode, and I still think they're funny.
Q: You seem to have your share of one-liners. Do you have a comic side to you?
CS: Yeah. That's how I started.
Q: When you think about your next project, do you want to look for a comedy, coming off of Twilight?
CS: I really like comedy. I'm into doing comedy. It'd be fun. [And] I would definitely like to do something a little more dramatic.
Q: Do you also sing?
CS: I do. I took a break from that when I got Twilight because it took up a big chunk of time. I'm going to get back at that, though.
Q: What are your influences?
CS: I listen to the Mars Volta and Fiona Apple every day. I feel if you do write music, you write what you listen to and you couldn't possibly write in another genre. So those are the two that I usually use.
Q: Have you thought of bridging the two interests and doing musicals?
CS: That would be really cool. It would have to be a really bomb musical.
Q: A vampire musical.
CS: A vampire musical. That would be really cool. I'd be down for something like that. It would have to be something really creepy, like Repo. I feel if it's going to be a musical, it has to be really edgy.
Q: Can you imagine a Twilight musical?
CS: Imagine Robert [Pattinson] singing as Edward Cullen? That would be cool.
Q: The emotions in the film would [work] for breaking out into song.
CS: I feel that, too. It's actually funnier when you really think about it.
Q: Whom else do you admire?
CS: I love Sandra Bullock. I think she's really cute. Chelsea Handler, although she's more of a comedian, but I still really love her. Ian McGregor—love him. Parker Posey. So many.
Q: Do you have actors you want to work with that you especially admire? I can see you doing something like Parker Posey, who does all kinds of interesting roles.
CS: Right, and that's why I love her. There's nothing ordinary about the things that she picks. I think that you have to have guts to do some of things that she's done.
Q: Are there directors you want to work with?
CS: Gus Van Sant would be really awesome. I like Gus Van Sant. I like Steven Soderbergh. The guy that did Pan's Labyrinth — Guillermo del Toro. And Steven Spielberg, naturally, just because he's Steven Spielberg. But there's a whole list of people. I wanted to work with Catherine Hardwicke before I got to work with Catherine Hardwicke. So I got to check that off my list and that was really cool.
Q: Would you work with her again?
CS: Oh God, yeah. I love Catherine.
Q: Whom do you get excited about meeting in the business?
CS: The J's from America's Next Top Model. I saw them at this US Weekly party and they were fabulous. I couldn't even go up to them. I just wanted to watch them, how they work, so that I can imitate it. They're so cool. Love that show,
Q: Do you get recognized a lot for Twilight or even for Ned's Declassified School Survival Guide?
CS: Yeah. It's usually when I'm in a Twilight-oriented environment. I do a lot of the Twi-Cons and I get recognized a lot. But I don't wear my glasses on a daily basis. Those are the ones that I wore in the film. So it's pretty easy. I just take off my glasses.
Q: You haven't had to suffer too badly from the press, right?
CS: Not too bad. There have been a couple of incidents. You think that you can ease into it. Not with this project. It's going to be hardcore.
Q: Do you keep the fans in mind while making the film?
CS: Absolutely. When we first started working on it, we all did our research. We went online and saw what the fans had to say because this is definitely a fan movie. We love the fans.
Q: Has there been something that a fan did that made you nervous?
CS: There was one guy in Vancouver. I don't even think he was fan. I didn't get close enough to ask. He sat outside our place. We had a Starbucks across the street, so we'd go over there every day. He would follow me.
My friend came into town and I told her about it. We were having fun with it and trying to get away from him. We went behind the Starbucks into the alley, to go home because it connected. So we were strolling along, cracking up because we lost him. All of a sudden, he comes up the alley.
Q: Do you ever think about not taking parts that give you a high profile?
CS: You're definitely right, yeah.
Q: You were on Hannah Montana?
CS: I was on one episode and in one scene. Alexa—that was the character's name. I was having a party and I wanted to invite everyone, and that was it.
Q: Was it a big adjustment living in Vancouver?
CS: No, I love traveling. I love going to other places. It may be hard when I get there, like it was in Germany. I don't care. I like seeing a new place.
Sometimes we're only there for a millisecond and all you get to see is things on a taxi ride to the airport. I still think it's cool. You walk away with souvenirs, like different currencies and stuff. That's fun.
Q: What's the farthest you've traveled so far?
CS: Germany. It's so cool. They have amazing architecture. That place is beautiful.
Q: Do you ever get jet lag traveling all over the world?
CS: I don't anymore. I think I've gotten used to forcing myself to fall asleep at a certain time because I have to wake up early.
There are definitely days where I feel too tired and I feel my body can't take it and I feel like I'm going to pass out. Other days I'm just stoked.
You have to wake up around 4:00 in the morning because we have 4:00 A.M. pick-ups. So sometimes we're like, "No, we're not getting up." That's why it's really cool to have everyone living next door to you in this big house. They just bang on your door. I don't know how many times we've woken up each other banging on the door, half asleep, saying, "Get up."
Q: How much time do you have in between to do other projects, and what opportunities has this opened up for you?
CS: It's opened up a lot of doors. There are a lot of opportunities that get shot our way, which is great. But they've been doing these so quickly that no one really has time to do anything else. When they do, it's very planned out and very coordinated. So there's really no time for random things.
Q: You started out pretty much as a kid. How does it feel maturing through this whole process? Do you take it less seriously because you see it for what it is?
CS: I don't think I take it less seriously...
Q: Will you do more risky roles, ones with more sexuality or nudity in them?
CS: I don't know about that. But I don't mind risqué or edgy. Nudity? I feel it's super-important when it comes to some projects, and I feel it's completely ridiculous and stupid when it comes to others. So it would definitely depend.
Sherie Rene Scott Gives Audiences "Everyday Rapture"
- Details
- Parent Category: Film and the Arts
- Category: Interviews
- Published on Wednesday, 30 June 2010 21:41
- Written by Frank Lovece
She earned a Tony Award nomination for Dirty Rotten Scoundrels and originated the role of the sea witch Ursula in Broadway's The Little Mermaid. Yet Sherie Rene Scott still calls herself "a semi, semi semi-star" in her Tony- and Drama Desk-nominated semi, semi semi-autobiographical Broadway show Everyday Rapture, which runs throug
h July 11, 2010, at the American Airlines Theatre.
Scott's not-quite one-woman-show, which earned equally rave reviews Off-Broadway last year, was a quickly slotted replacement for the Roundabout Theater Company's Lips Together, Teeth Apart, shuttered during rehearsals after co-star Megan Mullally pulled out.
For Scott, 43, that became the kind of now-go-out-there-and-come-back-a-star break of which showbiz legends are made. After many theater roles including Amneris in Broadway's Aida and the title role in the Off-Broadway musical Debbie Does Dallas, she seems happily overwhelmed by all the attention she's getting for her show about, well, getting out there and trying to be a star -- even when you come from a Mennonite family.
Scott, who with husband Kurt Deutsch co-founded the Grammy Award-winning cast-recording label Sh-K-Boom Records (pronounced "shik-a-boom"), spoke in her backstage dressing room shortly before earning Tony Award nominations for Best Performance by a Leading Actress in a Musical and, as co-writer with Dick Scanlan, Best Book of a Musical.
Q: One reviewer, writing about the show's original Off-Broadway run, compared you favorably to Bette Midler as a "diva-as-trash-goddess." How does one take that?
SRS: One doesn't. (laughs) The word "diva," I don't even know what that means; I'm so not a diva. But I love that I've created this character who is a diva, and it's fun to play this character who happens to have my name, this character who I think is much less insightful than I like to think I am, and this character who is wrong in all the right ways -- that kind of foul, sexy, grungy [persona] that I am more interested in [playing] than some kind of, I don't know, ingénue part, I guess. Old ingénue!
Q: People call Everyday Rapture semi-autobiographical, but as you say, the show's Sherie is just a character. How much should we take as genuine? Are you really half-Mennonite --referring to the generally Amish-like religious group -- for instance?
SRS: In a way. A funny thing happened when [co-writer Dick Scanlan and I] were writing. When I would write completely factual stories, everyone thought I was making them up. So what we were able to do is write stories that are really genuinely true, but are not necessarily factual.
Q: So about the half-Mennonite thing…?
SRS: That's true. My dad wasn't -- my mother married a non-Mennonite.
Q: So when she married a non-Mennonite, your mom was shunned?
SRS: Her whole family was almost shunned. [Her church] stopped shunning with my mother. Most Mennonites don't shun.
Q: Have any Mennonites complained about the show?
SRS: No; Mennonites love it.
Q: Mennonites come see Broadway shows?!
SRS: Oh, yeah. There are different levels. None of my family's been to see the show, though. They're not interested in theater; never were. But now my mom says she really wants to see me on The View; that's her dream. Barbara Walters did love the show, I have to say.
Q: This theater used to be the Selwyn back in the good ol' days of Times Square B-movies and peep shows. Do you remember that 42nd Street?
SRS: I would try not to walk down it. When I was in [the rock opera] Tommy [beginning in 1993], we used to trade stories about what heinous things were said or done to us on the way from the subway to the St. James Theatre. I remember we'd see baby carriages and think it was tantamount to child abuse! It was usually a crazy person carrying around a voodoo doll or something.
A friend's mother came from Canada, and in-between shows she was going to go see a movie. And she wanted to go see that new Kevin Costner movie that was playing on 42nd Street: Dances with Foxes!
Q: (laughs) How long did it take her to find out it wasn't Dances with Wolves?
SRS: Not too long. At first she thought, "This is New York -- maybe all movie theaters have people in raincoats with odd smells." I think it was very soon into the previews [that she caught on].
Q: In your show, one conceit is that Idina Menzel had actually replaced you in Wicked. That really happen?
SRS: No, I wasn't in Wicked.
Q: Was she okay with being a presence in your play?
SRS: She came to see it at [Off-Broadway's] Second Stage; she and [husband] Taye [Diggs], and they got a real big kick out of it.
Q: The whole Idina Menzel riff was a very funny bit. That and the one about strangling the cat.
SRS: Yes. Any kind of cat strangulation usually goes over well.
Everyday Rapture
American Airlines Theater
227 W. 42nd St
New York, New York 10036
(212) 719-1300
Runs through July 11, 2010
For more by Frank Lovece: FrankLovece.com
