EPISODE 11: TONY NOMINEE JENNIFER SIMARD & ANDREW BRIEDIS (AKA ANNOYING ACTOR FRIEND)

PATRICK HINDS: Hey Podcast listeners, Patrick here. Just a reminder that

Tickets for BroadwayCon 2017, presented by Mischief Management and

Playbill, are now on sale. You can find information and tickets at

broadwaycon.com. And you guys, we’ve just announced a whole slate of

original programming for this years con and I’m gonna tell you about some of

it right now. First up is BroadwayCon Start to Be which is a fan-based talent

show with Broadway judges for which our fans perform and compete for

prizes. There’s also I’m Just a Broadway Baby which is video clips of

Broadway stars performing when they were kids and recreating the

performances live. There’s also the BroadwayCon Feud which is hosted by

Jenn Colella and it’s out version of the Family Feud staring both Broadway

fans and Broadway stars. The last one I want to tell you about now is called

BroadwayCon Jukebox and with this, the audience gets one minute to vote

for one of our four selected songs on our official BroadwayCon App, so don’t

forget to download the app and after voting ends, our Broadway singers take

center stage and sing the winning song with our live band. You guys, there’s

so many things to know about for BroadwayCon 2017. Be sure to check it out

at broadwaycon.com.

ANTHONY RAPP [singing]: I know a place where you belong. Come follow

me and join the song.

ANTHONY RAPP [shouts]: Welcome to BroadwayCon…

PATRICK HINDS: …The Podcast. The show for the theatre kid in all of us. I’m

your host, Patrick Hinds.

[SONG BIT FROM DISASTER!]

PATRICK: This week we’re bringing you a tale of friendship, overnight

stardom that was two-decades in the making, the power of social media, and

two theatre nerds’ love of Jurassic Park or something like that. You all know

my friend Andrew Briedis as his twitter alter-ego Annoying Actor Friend. Well

Andrew is really good friends with Jennifer Simard, the Tony nominated

actress from last year’s Disaster! and up coming Hello, Dolly! So Andrew and I

had this idea of just putting the three of us in a recording studio and seeing

what happened. We all knew that I would totally geek out over Jennifer,

Andrew would speak in a very low, barely audible tone, and Jennifer would

just be her charming self, but we also wanted to tell this great story of how

Andrew and Jennifer met and how Andrew used his social media prowess to

almost Simard on the Tony’s and if you have no idea what I’m talking about,

you’re about to find out. I love these two. Here’s our conversation.

[SONG BIT FROM DISASTER!]

PATRICK: Hi guys!

ANDREW BRIEDIS: Hey hey.

PATRICK: Andrew! Jennifer!

JENNIFER SIMARD: Hi!

PATRICK: Welcome to BroadwayCon the Podcast!

JENNIFER: Thank you. It’s so good to be here.

PATRICK: Andrew and I schemed about making this happen like months ago

and then all of sudden, I got a text like ‘Simards in town tomorrow. This block

of time.’

ANDREW: We’re doing it.

JENNIFER: Let’s do it. I appreciate I got it together so quickly.

PATRICK: Well I’m just thrilled to meet you.

JENNIFER: Aw. I’m thrilled to meet you.

PATRICK: I’m such a big fan.

JENNIFER: I wanted—we’ve been trying to get this together for months now.

PATRICK: Yeah.

JENNIFER: Thank you for saying that. That’s so nice.

PATRICK: It’s funny. You have the voice of the nun. You just have the voice of

—

JENNIFER: I do?

PATRICK: Yeah. Just like—

JENNIFER: Well maybe it’s my high—no I can kind of do my—sometimes it’s

just nasal and awful though.

PATRICK: Yeah I love it.

JENNIFER: I just—I don’t have those dulcet tones all the time.

ANDREW: I think it’s sometimes—it’s like a podcast voice too when you get

the microphone.

JENNIFER: Yeah, I think I might of put it on a little bit just so I sound nice—

ANDREW: I love it.

JENNIFER: But believe me, sometimes it’s just like this. [extra nasal-y] Hey.

How are you?

ANDREW: I get the microphone, I’m just like [deeper] Hi, uhm, I’m just gonna

try and sound low and then it’s just quiet. [normal voice] It’s a podcast voice.

JENNIFER: It’s a podcast voice.

ANDREW: Yeah.

JENNIFER: You just turn it on. But I did the witch in uhm, Shrek, the Musical

and I thought to myself I think one of the reasons I got it was I do have that

just resting bitch face. Like my neutral face just looks angry. And I was like

‘how—how are you doing?’ I look witchy.

PATRICK: It’s funny—

JENNIFER: And I’m like no no I’m really happy. God damn my face, you know?

And my voice. This nasal voice. I mean I can say the gentlest, I hope kind

thing, but I think it can come out so controlling and awful because I have this

—just this this.

PATRICK: But but I had this total—

JENNIFER: Damn my voice and damn my face.

PATRICK: I had a totally different experience with you face when you walked

in I was like ‘She’s so pretty’ ‘Cause you know, as you were the nun, you can’t

really see your face.

JENNIFER: We camouflaged it. Seth was a little obsessed with that. He’s like

‘look at her. Here she is on stage and then the transformation!’ You know,

she’s really not a horror. Uhm, but you know.

PATRICK: I wanted—before we get to the two of you, can we talk just to you a

minute? Because we’ve never met you before.

JENNIFER: Yeah sure. Do you mind, my friend?

ANDREW: I would mind greatly, actually, but sure.

JENNIFER: Sorry.

PATRICK: Well you have this incredible career. There’s so many incredible

things to talk about. Maybe we won’t get to all of it today, but one of the

things I mentioned to you when you first came in, and this has been on my

mind since really since the off-broadway production of Disaster! because you

were such—I mean everyone in the show was amazing and that cast was so

wonderful in addition to the Broadway cast being wonderful.

JENNIFER: 100% wonderful.

PATRICK: Yeah.

JENNIFER: Love each of them.

PATRICK: You were the only one to go on. Is that right?

JENNIFER: Uh, Seth and myself, mhm.

PATRICK: Seth, of course, right. So you knw, you have this incredible body of

work behind you, but Disaster! hit. You got this incredible review, you got a

Tony nomination. And it just seemed like, all of a sudden, overnight you were

a star, so it’s like this overnight success despite the fact you’ve been working

for, you know, two decades.

JENNIFER: Right.

PATRICK: How—first question. When you got Disaster!, off-broadway, could

you have ever foreseen what would happen?

JENNIFER: Oh gosh. No, you you—I, you know, you just want to work and

hopefully extend the time that you’re able to do the thing that you love to do,

you know?

PATRICK: Yeah.

JENNIFER: And when you’re art is also the way you pay your bills, it can be

challenging, can’t it? You know. And so I uhm, I felt very connected to the role

and I was really excited to sink my teeth into her. But it’s interesting what you

say this overnight star. I think—my husband and I laughed, one of the reviews

or two of them actually, in the broadway or articles anyway since the

broadway show, uhm, and then I think off-broadway as well, dating back over

my career, it’s the fourth time I’m newcomer Jennifer Simard. In print. You

know. I think I Love You, You’re Perfect, Now Change, The Thing About Men,

which was at the Promenade off-broadway. Gosh, it was such a beautiful

theatre. I’m still sad that it’s not there.

PATRICK: Where was that?

JENNIFER: It’s 76th and Broadway.

PATRICK: Oh. Oh!

JENNIFER: 76th Street. It was exquisite.

PATRICK: Of course. I remember that theatre.

JENNIFER: Uh huh. W’ve lost a lot of our gems off-broadway unfortunately.

But yeah, it was the fourth time I was a newcomer. Fresh face!

ANDREW: And it’s like 5th Drama Desk nomination. Newcomer Jennifer

Simard.

JENNIFER: Well four. I don’t—not five.

PATRICK: Twelve?

JENNIFER: I don’t want to say—no but yeah.

PATRICK: How was it when you like found you—the Tony nominations came

out. Be honest. Were you expecting it?

JENNIFER: Was I expecting it? No. Because look at the—look at the women

that were in my category.

PATRICK: It was a great year.

JENNIFER: It was a great season. Uhm, I mean, I think—you’d be lying if you

say you don’t hope that happens, right? Like it would be—I mean, I’m sure

there’s some people that would be ‘I don’t like awards.’ Uhm but not me. I

think it’s lovely. Uhm, you can’t make it about that, right? So you just

concentrate on other things. Uhm, I had a blue and white dress altered, I’ll say,

that I wore to the nomination lunch-in.

PATRICK: Yes!

JENNIFER: But I wasn’t expecting to wear it to that. I was altering it for the

drama-desk lunch in which was coming up in a couple weeks and I had just

altered it and I—when it came out, what you don’t know is that the next

morning, it’s like full court press or at least—that’s never happened to me

before, so I didn’t know that was the kick. So it happened and I’m like uh uh,

and you have to be at this, you know, early press event and you get your pin,

and they take your photos and you have to do interviews and I’m like ‘what

am I going to wear?’ This blue and white dress! So, you know it was uhm, it

was great. So no, I didn’t expect it. One of our good friends Keala Settle, she

was so great in Waitress, uhm luckily, she’s already had a Tony nomination,

but she and Andrea Burns in On Your Feet! Just brilliant. And there’s many

other women that I’m leaving out, but the point is, there could have been I

think ten slots wouldn’t have been enough this year.

PATRICK: Totally. And that category is usually tough because that’s where so

many of our great actresses are—is in that fabulous supporting role.

JENNIFER: And some years are weaker than others, but this year was. I—it

was a salad. It was so much in there and—

ANDREW: Yeah, I felt like I even just personally knew five people that were in

that category.

PATRICK: Totally.

ANDREW: Like you had like Krista Rodriguez in Spring Awakening.

PATRICK: Oh!

JENNIFER: Thank you! Excuse me—thank you. I’m glad you said Krista

because she was brilliant.

PATRICK: Incredible. Incredible.

ANDREW: And so I meant like just to make this about me. When I was at the

gym and I wasn’t watching the nominations. I was just trying to refresh

Twitter which is very confusing to do when the nominations are like—

[breathing deeply like a workout] who—who—oh Megan Hilty— Thank God.

And then I couldn’t—all a sudden it just sort of happened where I saw your

name, but I needed to see it on the Tony website and I actually just myself

started crying at the gym and I don’t do that. I’m not emotional like that. But I

started crying because it felt like we all got nominated in that nomination.

JENNIFER: Aww, Andrew.

ANDREW: Because it was such a singular performance.

PATRICK: But it was really just Jennifer. It was just Jennifer.

JENNIFER: And—

ANDREW: I have it on my resume.

JENNIFER: Let me tell you something. I’m gonna give a shoutout to uh, Keala

and Andrea Burns especially because I know them personally. They couldn’t

have been lovelier and that’s—it—I mean, and genuine. Like so so supportive.

So lovely. And I just—it really the fellowship of it was one of the nicest parts.

PATRICK: Did you think it was one of those things too where it was like ‘finally

people understand how good I am.’

JENNIFER: Oh gosh no. I think if you believe your own hype, it’s the fastest

ticket to the unemployment line, you know what I mean? I mean I—look—on

social I would unfollow me now if I were my friends. If you’re my Facebook

friend, I apologize. Uhm, but you know, I had a lot of people give me some

advice like ‘you have to ride that line of you’re self promotion’ Like, this is

what I’m doing, you guys. And I apologize and just, you hope you’re not a

douche and that you’re, you know, you hope that you’re nice to your friends

when nice things happen to them.

PATRICK: Well one of the really interesting things that came out of that whole

experience was with our friend Andrew was the whole Put Simard On hashtag

thing that happened that I think lead to Playbill coming and playing and

showing your number live when you did it. I want to go back to the beginning

of that if we can. ‘Cause I’m fascinated by this. First of all, how did you guys

even meet?

JENNIFER: We have a mutual friend. The fabulous brilliant actress Jackie Piro

Donovan.

ANDREW: Incredible. Known uhm as the first woman to play Cosette and

Fantine in the original Les Miserables before it was revived nine times, so she

was in the original company over the course of those years, she played those

roles.

JENNIFER: Mhmm. And her husband Peter Donovan is a local stagehand and

house head and my husband, Brad, is a local stagehand, so they became

friends and so we all, sort of, would meet and I think Jackie and Pete were

sort of the apex of social gatherings, so we met—

ANDREW: Yeah, we met at one of their—they have a birthday that’s close

together and we met at a Greek restaurant and you had just gotten Sister Act.

I believe that’s when we met.

JENNIFER: I guess so. And then we met at like her house in Maplewood or

something.

ANDREW: Yeah like Fourth of July parties or something like that.

JENNIFER: So sort of just periphery. Like ‘Hi it’s that couple again, right?

That’s really good friends with our other friends.’ You know? And then last

year, Pete and Jackie were planning a trip to Hawaii to honor some very

special events in their lives and they invited all of their twenty-five favorite

people in the world to this get together in Hawaii and Andrew and his wife

Sarah were there and so were—

ANDREW: Keale is was there.

JENNIFER: And Keale was there.

ANDREW: And the fabulous Patti Colombo choreography was there. It was

just like this, you know, hodge podge of wonderful people all out in Hawaii.

PATRICK: Uh huh.

JENNIFER: So we—so that was uhm, we probably got to know each other a

little more then.

ANDREW: You came up to me—it might have been when—I don’t remember if

it was the boat or Kawaii is where they filmed Jurassic Park and—

JENNIFER: That’s where we started to fall in love.

ANDREW: She goes—Jenn goes ‘we share a mutual uhm sort of like reverence

or obsession with Jurassic Park.’ I did not know that she had this same love.

JENNIFER: And I didn’t know that he did.

ANDREW: And we just like had come together where they filmed it over this

film that evidentially is very symbolic in both of our lives for various reasons.

JENNIFER: Right and I was like ‘until this moment, I didn’t really like you.’ And

now—

ANDREW: But now…

JENNIFER: I’m going to give you a chance.

ANDREW: Yeah, I guess it’s like well we’ll try it ‘cause like you—for me,

Jurassic Park was like to talk about the ring of keys moment on this podcast

and my ring of keys moment for just acting in general was Jurassic Park

because I was nine when it came out and I was very very angry that I was not

in the film and Joseph Mazzello was. I didn’t realize Spielberg had already

written D.H the character, so he could play it. I was never going to be on the,

you know, up for this role, but I was mad at my mom about it and was like

‘why was I?’ I was not an actor. I just assumed you could just be in movies.

And and she said ‘Well, if you want it so badly, ask Steven Spielberg to be in

the next one and she found his address and I wrote him a letter and uhm, we

talked about this on Theatre People, and so I wrote Steven Spielberg a letter.

PATRICK: Did he write you back? I don’t remember.

ANDREW: His people did. His head of PR did and explained like what—how

agents work and how casting directors work. And that’s when I went to my

mom and was like ‘I would like to start acting.’ So it was this very definitive

moment for me to get into this—what lead me down—there’s like this first real

adult decision I made at nine to just ask somebody and it’s something I kind of

carry with me like what’s the worst they can say? No. Well the worst anybody

can say is not respond, so I figure if Steven Spielberg’s people responded,

then anybody can, you know, respond to you if you just ask them to do it. Uh,

so it’s kind of like—I learned a lot from that moment and I kind of carry that

moment with me in my career now as far as being open and asking people,

you know, so that’s why Jurassic Park was important to me and also I just love

the movie.

PATRICK: Yeah!

ANDREW: Uhm, and—

PATRICK: Jennifer, what’s your story with it?

JENNIFER: I—well, I think you win, first of all, how special it is.

ANDREW: Yours is symbolic for another reason.

JENNIFER: Mine was symbolic because it came out the summer of ’93 and

that was my first summer in New York City. I moved to New York December

7th, 1992.

PATRICK: Wow.

JENNIFER: And uhm, that summer was my first summer in New York and it

was playing down at 62nd Street and Broadway and I it’s where I first really

got comfortable taking myself to the movies, you know, and I love, to this day,

I love going to the movies by myself, you know? I remember—it was a

blockbuster and I took myself several times. And it sounds incredibly nerdy,

which I am, and I sort of loved ‘I live in New York. And I’m going to walk down

the street and take myself to the movies.’

PATRICK: I love it!

JENNIFER: ‘Here I am. And I’m seeing this big summer blockbuster. And I

didn’t drive in my car where I grew up.’

PATRICK: Where did you grow up?

JENNIFER: New Hampshire.

PATRICK: Oh cool!

JENNIFER: And it was a great place to grow up, but it was just sort of

symbolic for I am an adult and I’ve gone forward and here I am in New York

and I’m trying to make it as an actor and this movie was sort of the start of

my ‘I’m here!’ You know?

PATRICK: Yeah, yeah. Totally.

JENNIFER: So that’s my head. That’s why it means something.

PATRICK: So you guys become friend on this trip. Then Miss. Simard gets

nominated for a Tony Award.

JENNIFER: Yeah and I will say, you asked me before was I surprised that I got

nominated. Of course, yes. The hashtag Put Simard On and everything that

followed was even more of a surprise. When I say people had to tell me ‘Do

you know what’s going on?’ I’m not kidding. And Andrew and I. I think we’ve

become close since the hashtag because it was so like ‘what have you done?’ I

mean I’m like—

PATRICK: So tell us, what happened?

ANDREW: What happened was it was—it was Mother’s Day weekend and

uhm, uh, we knew they were going to do the live stream. Playbill was gonna

do this livestream which I thought was so brilliant, and so forward thinking. I

know there’s a lot of—

PATRICK: Why were they doing that?

ANDREW: They were doing it because it—

JENNIFER: I don’t even know. Asked me if I minded and I—

PATRICK: Hey everyone. Patrick here. This is a great story, but I was very

confused in the chronology of things, so I’m just going to spell it out here. So

Jennifer got amazing reviews for her performance in Disaster! and was

nominated for a Tony award for her work. Unfortunately, the day that the

Tony nominations were announced, Disaster! announced that it was closing

and quickly. So likely, many of the Tony voters wouldn’t get to see Jennifer’s

performance which would hurt her chances of winning. So the Disaster! press

department called Playbill and asked if they’d be interested in live streaming

Jennifer’s big number in the show, Playbill said yes, and they came and did it.

We picked the conversation back up with Jennifer talking about the few

things that gave her pause about the idea of the livestream.

JENNIFER: So they did ask and I remember my first thing was ‘as long as it

follows the rules’ because I’m a big union gal.

PATRICK: Yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah. No laughing matter.

JENNIFER: And again, it’s my favorite word—the word of the day is douche.

You don’t want to be a douche. You know? You gotta follow the rules, so I

remember going ‘Well, if it’s okay with the union, I guess I’m fine with it.’ But I

was also—I laughed. You think of anything that could possible go wrong

because it’s live, right? The last thing I’ll say is, the only thing I was—made me

hesitate was that uhm, just out of context, I wondered its it would work

because the thing to me, the mania that occurs in the song, is more—is uhm,

means more when you’ve seen the repression that comes up before it, you

know what I mean? And why people are so excited about the song. The thing,

if I can use the word proud, the thing I’m most proud of with the show has

nothing to do with the song. It’s the quiet moments, you know what I mean?

And just the I love how little can I do to achieve this result. So I liked that stuff

the most, so I was hoping that it didn’t just look bad like out of context. And I

guess people liked it. It’s hard for me to watch. I think I watched it once just

because someone said you should watch it. But it’s just like uhh, like hearing

your voice when you listen to yourself. I don’t sound like that, you know?

ANDREW: Totally. Totally. That’s why I’m here. So I can brag about you.

[SONG BIT FROM DISASTER!]

ANDREW: When I saw Disaster! I was like ‘she is giving the finest comedic

performance I have ever seen on a Broadway stage.’ Uhm, and—

JENNIFER: Aw, thank you.

ANDREW: And then uhm, and so I was like I—I—you know, you have those

things where you just feel so passionate about somebody you want to do

everything you can to—

PATRICK: Totally.

ANDREW: to get it out there. And I think that when they aired it, I was just so

excited that everybody—people were going to see it and then I could sort of

see like the traction ‘cause it was like 2 o’clock or something like that that—

that the views were ticking up. And I talk a lot about social media timing and

how some stuff, you know, you can put out there and it’s just gonna—it’s just

gonna hit the wall and nothing’s going to click and sometimes you just hit the

right time with the right person and the right thing and the right subject

matter and also kind of like, as douchey as it sounds, the right hashtag and I

remember, I was walking down the street going to go see your first live

summer series with Lesli Margherita.

PATRICK: Oh no way.

ANDREW: And I was—I was walking and I was walking with my wife and I was

like—I kept playing hashtags in my head and—and I stopped on the street

when Put Simard On came into my head and I was like—because we call her

Simard.

PATRICK: Yeah.

ANDREW: ‘Cause it’s what we call her and so I was like—that’s it. And then I

just wrote that—this tweet about like if you think she should perform on the

Tonys. I know how the Tonys work. I know that there was the—like the shows

have to pay for it. I know that like—

JENNIFER: I didn’t know this. He knew more than me.

PATRICK: Oh really?

JENNIFER: I really didn’t.

ANDREW: Yeah, the shows have to pay x-amount because it’s like a

commercial. We learned that with the Spring Awakening kickstarter, and or

that put it out there a little more, and people really see—so like we knew that

like they would have to raise a bunch of money. They [Disaster!]would be

closing just to perform and I was hoping—the best case scenario would be like

CBS would be like we need a comedic bit, let’s just put it on. Uhm, but it really

was just like this thing that I threw out there and then you could sort of see

the community just jumped on it because it’s like it was like what a wonderful

thing to celebrate because it’s such a great performance and everyone got to

see it and got to see why she got the nomination over these fantastic women

that were also in the season and I think that everyone—I mean to just watch

how trickle down to just these big names using it and just being like you can

click on that hashtag and you can see just love letters to her and it’s always

on Twitter that way. But we never asked her. Sarah, my wife, Sarah and I did

not ask her if she wanted this.

PATRICK: Are you on Twitter, Jennifer?

JENNIFER: I am, but it’s funny. I actually was on as an egg for four years. I

think I had been a member since 2011, but honestly, just before Disaster! I

decided to be a grown up.

PATRICK: Yup.

JENNIFER: Because I knew that this was—

PATRICK: The gig.

JENNIFER: The gig, yeah. So I—I —I was afraid of people tagging me. Maybe

saying things that are inappropriate or—you know what I mean?

PATRICK: Totally.

ANDREW: Trolls.

JENNIFER: Yeah. Yeah. But uhm, I’m getting better. I can do Snapchat. Uhm,

but I uh—so it was a—literally, a day or two went by and people were like ‘so—

huh?’ And I’m like ‘what are you talking about?’ I had no idea.

ANDREW: We texted you like ‘Hey I don’t know if you’ve been on Twitter,

sorry girl.’ Because, by then, it was just a thing.

JENNIFER: A thing. It was—

ANDREW: It became a thing and

PATRICK: Wow!

JENNIFER: It was trending! I was trending!

ANDREW: You were trending. And I was like ‘I don’t know if—if she even

wants—I mean maybe she—you might just want to like wear a nice pretty

gown and not have to worry about it.’ It’s a big—

JENNIFER: Oh!

ANDREW: It’s a big Tonys. It’s Hamilton’s everything. You might not want the

pressure. We’re like ‘sorry.’

JENNIFER: No and that’s the truth. That is the beauty when you’re not

performing. You can just sort of—

ANDREW: Hang out.

JENNIFER: Get ready and enjoy the show.

PATRICK: Yeah.

JENNIFER: You know? But uh, going back and forth, it’s absolutely a privilege

and you would do it and you would do it happily, but the price it makes the

day even crazier. But uh, so I just said ‘whatever is meant to be will be.’ And I

—I don’t meant to sound frankly, I really do believe that and I think it played

out exactly the way it was supposed to.

PATRICK: How did it play out?

JENNIFER: Well I did not perform.

PATRICK: Right.

JENNIFER: I was—well I was in the opening number which made me cry. We

didn’t know until we got there that they were going to have little children

representing—oh God.

PATRICK: They made everyone in America weep.

JENNIFER: Representing us and my gal who was even wearing a green dress

and my dress was green and oh my God.

PATRICK: Oh my goodness.

JENNIFER: And we didn’t know ‘cause, of course, it was very top secret so I

was so honored and grateful to be a part of that opening number and uhm,

uh, the truth is, my opinion is, I was sitting there that night. I don’t—I’m my

own worst salesman, but I just don’t know that it had a place—that my

number needed to be there.

PATRICK: Yeah.

JENNIFER: I just didn’t feel that way and I really feel like the best part about it

was the love and support that came around it and the whole campaign and

the sweatshirts and I had to sign some for the flee market and just uhm,

people appreciating the art form and the comedic performance and having

comedy be celebrated. Uhm, is really wonderful and uhm, so I feel like I won

something that you can’t even explain.

PATRICK: Of course.

JENNIFER: I’d—I harbor on ill will that I wasn’t—that I didn’t perform my

number on the awards show at all.

PATRICK: Was there any talk about it in the wake of?

JENNIFER: I don’t—to be honest with you, that’s above my pay grade. I don’t

know. I think there was. I think there was, but I don’t know what those

conversations were or were not and that’s okay.

PATRICK: Yeah. Totally.

JENNIFER: Because I—I’m real good. I’m real good.

ANDREW: What—what like became my focus for the rest of, say, the week,

that this pretty much was on big—this was a thing for about a week and a half

was that it really went from so much of social media outcry is often negative

even when—or it’s charged with a sort of like anger fight. With this it was just

—it was like let’s just talk about how great this one performer is.

PATRICK: Yeah.

ANDREW: And it really just became about a celebration more than like a big

like call to action. It stopped being about wanting you to be on as much as it

was, you know, everyone seeing people who didn’t know Disaster! across the

country who didn’t get to see it, or who didn’t know what you role was or

what your role did and—and got to learn that, you know?

PATRICK: Yeah. Uhm, what was I going to ask you? One of the things I like to

ask people who go through the Tony—the Tony time, that craziness, who did

you get to meet during that time that you were a big fan of or really excited

to meet?

JENNIFER: Well uhm, I have a couple of answers to this question. Now I didn’t

talk to him this year, but last year at the Drama League Awards, I got to meet

Bryan Cranston.

PATRICK: Oh my!

JENNIFER: So when I was then off-broadway and he was at the nominees

luncheon and I shied away from going up to him again. Just like ‘Hi it’s your

friend, Jen. How are you? You remember me?’ Uhm, but let me tell you

something. Uh, Lin Manuel-Miranda came up to me at the nominees luncheon.

Now I had not had a chance to thank him, but I’d like to and maybe this is my

moment to do so. Publicly. So here he is and he would probably never accept

this crown I’m about to give him, but inarguably, he was the—he was the king

—the reining king of this season and he wore that crown, you know, so

humbly and so thoughtfully and all that responsibility that comes with that

and part of that is, I think, having to just accept this mantle of leadership, I

guess. And he went out of his way to come up to me. He had seen one of the

interviews, I think I had mentioned my mom and how she passed away, but

he’s like ‘Oh you know, I saw the interview. I read the article.’ He just reached

out his hands and he was like ‘Ohhh,’ and he came up to hug me like he was

so moved and just to be happy for me and congratulate me. And there was a

sea of people there and everyone wanted a piece of him.

PATRICK: Of course.

JENNIFER: Of course. But he found a moment, he saw me, he recognized me,

and he brought up this—a moment where, I guess what I’d said touched him

and he gave me a moment of his time. And I just thought ‘That’s a leader.’ You

know, he has this big responsibility of being the odds long favor to win this

year in a way we’d not seen before and I, and he took a moment to share that

with me. And it was genuine. I don’t think he—maybe—he probably not even

thinking of it in the terms that I’m painting it, but for me, it felt like ‘wow. Look

at this person who’s the leader of this year taking a moment to, uh, give me

some love.’ And I really appreciated it.

PATRICK: That is so amazing. What a—that’s so amazing.

ANDREW: He did a similar thing with me in April and I had not met him, but

we had like—he had a knew what Annoying Actor Friend was—I assume, but

uhm, I had this joke tweet that I had been doing well before I had ever seen

Hamilton which was like ‘I wonder if Lin Manuel-Mirada’s mom introduces

herself as the womb where it happened.’ And I used to tag him in it

incessantly over holidays like ‘did you ask her? Did you ask her?’ And it wasn’t

until, it ended up coincidently being the day that I outed my anonymous

identity. Three hours before I had it planned, his mom tweeted “No, but I

might start.” Like so she tweeted it back and like answered my question and

uhm, that sort of became a little bit of a thing, and so four months later, I was

doing Easter Bonnet and I was backstage at the Minskoff and uhm, I kind of—

you know when you end up in a conversation with three people and you’re

the third person. You’re not like really in the conversation and that’s what I

was kind of in and he just turned to me and he put his hand out and said

“Thank you for making my mother very happy.” And shook my hand. And I

was like ‘This guy just one the Pulitzer yesterday.’

PATRICK [laughs]: Yeah.

ANDREW: They had just announced that day that he’s doing Mary Poppins

too. He’s having a global moment. It’s so beyond this community and he took

the time to just genuinely—like you said about leadership—turn and say and

talk about like some lame 140-character thing that I wrote.

JENNIFER: But just a down to Earth, real guy. A real person.

PATRICK: Can I share a story?

JENNIFER: Yeah!

PATRICK: Uhm, so when I first moved to New York, and I moved in 2000. And

in 2002, I was trying to be a writer in the LGBT press. I wanted to write in like

you know, the advocate now, and whatever. And I worked in a restaurant with

a girl who had a friend that had gone to college with these guys that had this

uhm, production company that were doing a show in the basement of the

Drama Book Shop and so she’s like ‘my friend is going to call you because he

knows you write about gay stuff and he’s doing this hip-hop musical about

this guy who has a prominent gay character.’ So like great. I get a call from

this guy named Tommy Kale. He’s like ‘hey I think you should spend a day

with this kid. He’s so smart. We’re doing this new show. You should write

about it.’ I was like ‘okay.’ I went and spent a day with this guy, Lin Manuel-

Miranda 2003, I write this whole piece for this—this little newspaper called

Gay City News, about Lin and about In the Heights and this gay character.

JENNIFER: I love Gay City News. It was very good to me.

PATRICK: Yeah. Have—well I’m sure. That makes perfect sense. Uhm, and it

was the first piece ever published about Lin, about In the Heights, about

whatever and Lin has never forgotten me. He’s never forgotten it. Every time I

see him, he asks—he knows me by name and gives me a hug. I saw him at the

Drama Leagues. I was covering the red carpet like an idiot with my iPhone

tweeting. It was so stupid, but he came over to me and gave me a hug and

asked me how my kid was like—this is a guy who just never forgets anything.

JENNIFER: Right. Right. ‘Cause he’s just like a nice person. I guess that’s the

best way to put it. I don’t think he’d ever go ‘I’m going to be a great leader

today.’ No. He’s just a nice person.

PATRICK: Yeah.

JENNIFER: And hasn’t lost sight of who he is and where he comes from. And I

just think the world of him.

PATRICK: I wanted to just sort of end talking about what sort of doors this

has opened for you. How did your—how did like your professional life change

after all that?

JENNIFER: Well initially, you know, you have to give these things time, so I

I’ve had both sides of the coin, you know. I’ve had one experience where I

auditioned for something and I thought ‘oh.’ I realized only when I got there,

oh my gosh, I’m being screened. I’m not even going to the final—you know?

So in that sense, you’re like, ‘oh it never changes, does it? Okay. Well that’s

good to know. Now I know.’

PATRICK: Wait, this is since the Tony nominations?

JENNIFER: Yeah. Oh yeah. Yeah yeah. That’s alright. It’s all good. Gonna need

something stronger than that lemon-lime water you just gave me though. No.

But that’s, and that’s okay. I’m not above auditioning. I’m happy to do it, you

know. You just sort of—I wondered like you, what happens now, you know?

And then, just the opposite happened where I, you know, I got to have a really

nice job offer that I didn’t have to audition for. I had another experience—and I

don’t think that would have happened.

PATRICK: Yeah.

JENNIFER: Without that. And then uhm, I had another audition experience

which was just wonderful and I was given real personal attention and I had a

work session just me. You know what I mean?

PATRICK: Oh wow.

JENNIFER: So I don’t think that would have maybe happened. And I got to go

on the Playbill cruise as a celebrity ambassador.

PATRICK: Oh really?

JENNIFER: And you know, that’s something I’ve always wanted to do and I

used to look at those people and go ‘Ah! I want to be one of those.’ Christine

Ebersole.

PATRICK: Marin Mazzie.

JENNIFER: You know? I’ll turn down your bed. Leave chocolate on your

pillow. But I’d love to be there at the party. And so I’m not sure that would

have happened. Maybe it would have, but it hadn’t happened prior, so I’m

really grateful for Phill Birsh and everyone at Playbill for helping me—really,

these are little dreams—little checks in the boxes in the bucket list of stuff in

terms of my career that I wanted to do, and so I’m really lucky.

PATRICK: And you got a big thing coming up.

JENNIFER: Yeah. I’m so lucky to be in Hello, Dolly! with this amazing company

and under Jerry Zaks. It’s the second show I’ve been fortunate enough to

work for him. Scott Rudin will be the producer and he’s such great taste. Have

you seen everything he’s produced from movies and beyond? I mean it’s

incredible so I really feel happy. Oh! This is interesting. I uhm, you know, my

scene in Act II is opposite David Hyde Pierce.

PATRICK: Yes!

JENNIFER: Well David Hyde Pierce came to see Disaster! and could not have

been lovelier and I got to relay this story to him. That in 2005, uh, I was lucky

enough to be nominated for a Drama Desk award. He was also there for

Curtains.

PATRICK: Uh huh.

JENNIFER: And my mother, my late mother, uh, loved him. And he was her

favorite comedic actor.

PATRICK: Wow!

JENNIFER: And she ran up to him, and, of course, before I could stop her like

‘don’t go to the celebrities, please!’ But she did. She ran right up to him, asked

him for a photo, and you know, I’m dying a thousand deaths inside going ‘oh

God. Don’t bother him.’ And he could not have been nicer because he’s a nice

nice man. Like ‘Of course! Of course.’ So he took the photograph and she blew

it up to an 8x10 and she kept it in a frame on her dresser until she died. So

2014.

PATRICK: That’s incredible.

JENNIFER: Uhm, two years ago this month. So he comes to see the show and

uh, like I said, I relay the story and I asked him, ‘so would you mind if I had a

photo because I’d love the mirror image of this with my mother.’ And he was

hilarious. He went ‘Oh no.’ He’s like ‘Are you kidding! Come here! Come on!’ So

he was hilarious. Like I just gave him my heart and he did not disappoint me

by being absolutely hilarious and uhm, and absolutely lovely. And, of course,

we took this photograph, and so I don’t even know if he remembers me or

knows I’m doing it with him. He will when we speak about it.

PATRICK: Yeah of course.

JENNIFER: Of course, but I uhm, I’m so excited that my scene is opposite this

man. And it’s a way to, you know, for me to feel close to my mother.

PATRICK: Totally.

JENNIFER: You know what I mean?

PATRICK: Yes!

JENNIFER: It’s just the gift that keeps on giving. I’m so lucky.

PATRICK: I love you guys.

JENNIFER: I love you back, times two, plus one, I love you more, haha!

PATRICK: Andrew Briedis, you get handsomer and handsomer every time I

see you.

ANDREW: Oh thank you.

PATRICK: You’re welcome.

ANDREW: You too.

PATRICK: Thank—well, that’s true. Bye!

JENNIFER: Okay, bye!

[SONG BIT FROM DISASTER!]

PATRICK: BroadwayCon The Podcast is a partnership between BroadwayCon

media and Theatre Podcast Productions. Episodes are produced, mixed, and

edited by me, Patrick Hinds. Just a reminder that tickets for BroadwayCon

2017 are now on sale. You can purchase them at broadwaycon.com. If you just

can’t wait until next week to get your theatre podcast fix, you can check out

my other podcast. It’s called Theatre People. We do long form interviews with

Tony winners, Broadway legends, and today’s brightest theatre stars. You can

find us wherever you get your podcasts. We’re taking next week off for

Thanksgiving, but we’ll be back in two weeks with one of my favorite people

Nikka Graff Lanzarone who’s currently staring in New Group’s production of

Sweet Charity. Until then, we ask you to remember this:

[SONG BIT FROM THE OPENING OF BROADWAYCON 2016]

If you get really pissed and won't cut someone slack

When they call a cast album a frickin' soundtrack

You're a fan, you're fantastic, you're part of our crew

BroadwayCon's the place---

BroadwayCon's the place

BroadwayCon's the place

BroadwayCon's the place for you!

Welcome to BroadwayCon!