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[0:04] Kerry Butler: Once I played a penny who just couldn't stop the beat. Yes, with all their skits on her feet. Although this is recently to see a real cool mom. Use a club version of Tina. Tina. Now come with me, Emma. I am your host, Miss Kerry Butler. Together, you and I are breaking Broadway.

[0:54] Kerry Butler: Welcome to Breaking Broadway. I recently announced the launch of my signature course, Breaking Into Broadway, and I have a super special offer just for my podcast listeners. Check it out at kerrybutlercoach.com slash Broadway Podcast. As I was approaching this season of Breaking Broadway, I was thinking, our life as performers is so uncertain and unstable. And many of us, all of us probably, had to have something outside of performing in order to either fill our souls or provide money in those downtimes when we're not working on Broadway.

[1:53] Kerry Butler: And Katie has done a million shows. I feel like Katie, you are just someone who goes from show to show to show. Katie's a triple threat amazing singer, dancer, actress. And I noticed that you started this whole other career.

[2:09] Katie Webber: I did. Well, tell everyone what you're doing.

[2:11] Katie Webber: Well, so basically, you know, I have been lucky enough to have been working a lot on Broadway for the past 17 years. And the pandemic happened, obviously. And I found myself at that time I was in Tina on Broadway. And I found myself very quickly with so much time on my hands that I never had before. And as you know, you know, as performers, sure, shows open and close, and that is our life of constantly trying to get to the next thing and having a little bit of time, you know, in between gigs or whatever. But because everything shut down, it was like there was not a single opportunity to be had. And so it really was like there was nothing to kind of think about or focus on in terms of like landing the next gig, you know. So I had all this time and a lot of creative energy that wasn't getting, you know, put out from that I used to put out by performing. And so I decided to write a cookbook.

[3:15] Katie Webber: Um, I basically I I'm a I eat. Wait, did you go to school to be a nutritionist before that?

[3:20] Katie Webber: Yes, I did. So I became really I became a vegan um, I don't know, about six years ago, and shortly after that, I decided to get certified in holistic nutrition. So I'm a certified holistic nutritionist.

[3:35] Kerry Butler: And what made you do that?

[3:37] Katie Webber: Well, I just, I don't know. I was really, well, so honestly, I you know what made me do it is that I love to share the recipes on Instagram. That's kind of, you know, also a creative outlet for me. And I love to, you know, inspire people to live their best lives and eat healthy. And I really felt like I needed credibility to talk about it. I, you know, I didn't want to just be like, well, I think, you know, and it's kind of like, okay, well, now I have a little bit more credibility to lead people, you know, down a path of healthy eating. Um, and I did, you know, at the time I took on a few clients, and I'm not, you know, sometimes I'm open to that. Um, that's that's a tricky um road to go down. Um I don't know. That's I don't know if that part is for me. But but I did love creating recipes and sharing them on Instagram.

[4:33] Kerry Butler: So, well, I'm doing this series on people who sort of start another career, even though I mean you're doing amazing on Broadway, but you know, there's something about like we really never have no control over exactly our career as performers.

[5:00] Katie Webber: Absolutely. And you don't it makes you not desperate. So did you feel that by doing all of this?

[5:07] Katie Webber: I that was something that was not an impetus for me for doing this, but it was something that very much came out of it. Um because, you know, like I said at first, it was like, oh, I have so much time, let me, and I also had no income. So I was like, Well, maybe I can make a dollar, you know, maybe I'll sell a couple. I thought, you know, I thought I'd sell maybe a hundred cookbooks. Like, I thought, you know, now it's like 10,000 cookbooks later. Um my gosh, that's awesome. Um, but yeah, you know, I was like Googling like how to self-pu I self-published it, I did everything, you know, it's all off my kitchen table. I took all the pictures and did everything.

[5:47] Kerry Butler: But um you're really good even at taking the pictures.

[5:50] Katie Webber: Thank you. Well, I have a good camera that helps. Um, but yeah, you know, once I once I really poured myself into it, and it was something that I was making from the ground up, and then I was selling it, and then I was getting paid for it, and then I could do it on my terms. You know, if there was a day that I, you know, oh, I don't feel like it today, I wouldn't do it that day. If there was a day where I was like, I really want to pour myself into, you know, I want to do five recipes today, then I would take the time and I would do it, and it was just all up to me. And I was like, whoa, this is intoxicating. This is amazing having control over my life, and yes, you know, not only with being able to, you know, make some money, but also just how I was spending my time and creatively doing whatever I wanted, even though it wasn't within performing, it's still it still kind of tapped into to the creative, you know, juices.

[6:55] Kerry Butler: And yeah, this is definitely part of your um purpose and passion in life. Like we don't just have to be one thing, yeah.

[6:59] Katie Webber: We don't just have to be actors.

[7:05] Kerry Butler: No, no, and I think that, you know, when everything shut down, it kind of really like my eyes opened, like, and not in a panic way of like, I need to figure out something else to do with my life. But it was kind of like, you know, maybe this is gonna be a nice thing for me to have two lanes to drive in instead of one. You know, and I can kind of go back and forth. There are no rules, you know, it doesn't mean just because you start something new means that you're retiring or you don't perform anymore.

[7:34] Katie Webber: Yes, I love that. Yes.

[7:35] Kerry Butler: You know, because I think that maybe used to be a way of thinking like oh well if I get a job doing this or if I start doing this people are gonna think that I don't perform anymore. And that's not the case.

[7:46] Katie Webber: And it's not true.

[7:47] Kerry Butler: No.

[7:48] Katie Webber: Yeah.

[7:48] Kerry Butler: And it definitely just makes you a more well-rounded person and it ends up making you a better performer like you said. It's it's really kind of amazing. And when you go into the audition rooms you have something else to talk to about so you're even more interesting before.

[8:05] Katie Webber: Absolutely I know I remember uh so I was doing only gold recently and uh it was at MCC and Bernie Telsi who you know the amazing casting director Bernie Telsi um he is the creative director there and he's also you know they cast only gold and so he was there all the time um which was you know sometimes you're like wow I'm hanging out with the you know one of the most powerful casting directors uh all the time and you kind of want to be on your best behavior and but you know we would have some really great kind of like off the cuff you know personal conversations and I started you know talking to him about my cookbook and he just was so, you know, he just couldn't believe it.

[8:48] Katie Webber: He was so impressed, um, you know, he bought like 10 cookbooks.

[8:53] Kerry Butler: Oh my god.

[8:54] Katie Webber: I know.

[8:54] Kerry Butler: I know.

[8:55] Katie Webber: I'm like, all right, this is good for me, you know. This is gonna be good for me. Um, but yeah, you know, it exactly it just it is, you know, another layer to our humanness and our story, and you know, I think it's great.

[9:10] Kerry Butler: That's so cool. Well, thank you so much, Katie. Do you have any other, um, tips for people on starting their own business out there?

[9:17] Katie Webber: Well, you know, I think about this a lot, and even for me now after writing the cookbook, sometimes I'm like, well, I want to do another one or I want to do this. And you know, I always tell myself the only difference between, you know, somebody who's doing something and somebody who's not doing something is just the doing part. You know, if you want something to happen, you just gotta do it. And it might feel, you know, you might look at it like this big mountain to climb, but really it's just a series of small steps. And you know, Google is your friend. You can figure out how to do anything if you just how to start a X, Y, or Z. Um, and you know, it's just let go of imposter syndrome and just do it.

[10:08] Kerry Butler: I love that so much. I'm inspired to go start a business. Thank you so much for being here, Katie Webber.

[10:17] Katie Webber: Oh, and tell people how they can find you.

[10:18] Katie Webber: Oh, yeah. All right. Um, my cookbooks are on Amazon. Uh, I have two cookbooks called Fall for You and Summerset on Amazon, and then I also have The Reset, which is digital, which you can get on my website, KatieWebberNYC.com. And I'm sharing tons of food inspo and recipes on Instagram all the time, daily at KatieWebberNYC.

[10:42] Kerry Butler: And I use them and they are delicious.

[10:44] Katie Webber: Thank you.

[10:45] Kerry Butler: Thank you so much, Katie.

[10:46] Katie Webber: Thank you.

[10:47] Kerry Butler: We'll be back with Breaking Broadway right after this message.

[10:51] Kerry Butler: I'm here with David Josefsberg, my partner in crime from Beetlejuice. And I feel like one of the hardest parts of being an actor is being out of control. You know, like you can't control when the next job is coming along. You can't control what the next job is going to be. And so I've been having a lot of people come on who have started other careers and which you have recently done. It doesn't mean you're not gonna still perform. Uh, but tell us about it.

[11:22] David Josefsberg: Sure, yeah. Uh, yeah, that's what I tell a lot of my students too is like if you are going into this, you better have something else that you also love to do. Whether that's being a waiter, I did that for many, many years. I loved it, I love doing all those things, meeting people. But, uh, so I started recently when the pandemic hit. I thought, who knows when we're gonna come back to work. So I decided to, uh, I took a breath work class, which is this physical meditation that, uh, shuts off the part of your brain that says you're not good enough and smart enough unless you connect to your truth, and it's really physical and it's really great. So I took a class and I thought, wow, I'd love to do this.

And my teacher had this training program. So I took the training, spent a lot of money, took his class every week of the pandemic, and then in the class, in the breath work, there's a moment where you put your hand in the air and you think about a future moment of something you want. And I thought, okay, I want on my 50th birthday to be teaching a breathwork class online to over 50 people. And it came true.

[12:22] Kerry Butler: No way.

[12:24] David Josefsberg: And from there, I thought, you know what? I'm gonna have this as a business, whether I'm working or whether I'm not. And you know, even during backstage of Beetlejuice, I would go in early and teach breath work backstage.

[12:36] Kerry Butler: I could not believe that you were doing so much extra work while we were doing Beetlejuice and raising two kids.

[12:44] David Josefsberg: Yeah. Because in addition to your breath work, you also work for your wife's company, right?

[12:49] David Josefsberg: She has a startup as well. She has a company called Target 100, which is a health and wellness program for, you know, it's life changing for weight loss, sure, but it's also about changing your whole life. And so I would teach that class on a Sunday morning. I would teach my class on a Saturday morning, and then do two shows on Saturday, two shows on Sunday. But, you know, if open starting this own business, first of all, you have to do a lot of work. But if you love the work, it's great. And this is Broadway breath work brings me as much connection to people and to health and well. Like it, it's just as exciting to me as all right. It's a hair under as exciting as coming in and saying, you know, and doing my line for Beetlejuice. But it's still.

[13:33] Kerry Butler: Yeah.

[13:33] David Josefsberg: In our careers, like we've been around forever. There are definitely people think I work all the time. They think, and there have been years where I wasn't on Broadway where I thought, oh, I guess I'm done. I'm never gonna work again. And you know, during that time I might do like little off-Broadway shows and things like that, but certainly not enough to pay the bills.

[13:55] Kerry Butler: Yeah.

[13:55] David Josefsberg: So it's so great that you have this.

[13:57] Kerry Butler: Yes, it's and 100%, right? Like everyone else, people think, oh, David, he they I think they called me like a stalwart or something. Like I it means I'm old and have been in the business for a long time. And if you can't find something else to do, you know, people at this advanced age, a lot of people quit and do something else. But yes, for me, I don't think that, uh, you know, and for you for most, I don't think that has to happen. So this has been a gem for me be to be able to have something that I love to do on the side and during just to keep that going until until the next week. And that's what I'm people are like, oh no, you've been working for 30 years. And I'm like, I've probably been working for about six and a half of those 30, right? There's there's space and time where we have to find something else to do in this world.

[14:48] Kerry Butler: A hundred percent. Uh, tell people how they can find your breath work and how they can find your wife's company.

[14:55] David Josefsberg: Sure. Which you also work for.

[14:56] David Josefsberg: Yes. So you can find, uh, my wife's company is called Target 100. There's a book called Target 100. Uh, if you've heard about her, she used to work for Weight Watchers and helped like these celebrity people, uh, Jennifer Hudson, Charles Barkley, all these people. And so she created her own program called Target 100. You can find that at Target100.net. Um, there are always beginner courses, there's a community you can join. And then for me, you can find me at on Instagram, actually, but uh David S. Josefsberg, I think. But my website is called Broadway Breathwork. And it's not just for people on Broadway or anything about Broadway. The Broadway part is just that I sing a song at every class or bring celebrity guests. Kerry's coming this next week.

[15:38] Kerry Butler: No, I'm just kidding. I don't know when.

[15:40] David Josefsberg: Um and the breath work is, you know, it's at Broadway Breathwork, but it's all about really stress relief and connecting to your heart and the things that bring you joy.

[15:50] Kerry Butler: Yeah, I'm definitely going to join.

[15:53] Kerry Butler: I can't wait. I really need it. Uh, I've just been decompressing from, you know, the last few weeks of the show.

[15:59] David Josefsberg: So without shows.

[16:00] Kerry Butler: There's no stress.

[16:01] David Josefsberg: No, I don't want to, I don't want to give you no, you know those people who do stress, uh, all these self-care, but then they're stressed out by doing the self-care because there's so much. You come when you're ready. You don't really even have to sing. I just want you to do it because you're so connected to your heart, and I think you're gonna you just love it.

[16:19] Kerry Butler: No, I yeah, I'm excited. I definitely, definitely want to try it.

[16:22] David Josefsberg: Awesome.

[16:22] Kerry Butler: Um, thank you so much for sharing that with us, David.

[16:25] David Josefsberg: Well, thank you for having me, Kerry Butler.

[16:46] Kerry Butler: Thank you so much for listening. If you would like me to come to your school or theater group and give a masterclass or a talk back, please reach out at kerrybutlercoach.com. If you like this podcast and want more episodes, please go to bpn.fm slash breaking broadway and subscribe, like, or share. Together, you and I'm greging run away.