This transcript was automatically generated and might contain errors.

[0:01] Ben Rimalower: Broken records. The albums you wouldn't shut up about. Broken records. The music our guests can't live without. Like Judy, Barbara, Liza, Bette, Patty, Audra, Bernadette. We broadcast this podcast with hopes that someday we might get Patti LuPone.

[0:14] Daniel Nolen: Broken wreck, broken wreck, broken wreck, broken wreck.

[0:40] Daniel Nolen: Hey y'all.

[0:41] Ben Rimalower: Today's guest is Broadway star Telly Leung here to talk about Patti LuPone Live. Telly recently concluded a 21-month run in Aladdin on Broadway.

[0:49] Daniel Nolen: As Aladdin on Broadway.

[0:51] Ben Rimalower: Excuse me. Shaka Khan. His other Broadway credits include Allegiance, In Transit, Godspell, Pacific Overtures, Flower Drum Song, and Rent.

[1:01] Daniel Nolen: As Rent. Stop. Telly's gonna talk to us about Patti LuPone Live.

[1:06] Ben Rimalower: The greatest night in show business history. When I once made a playlist or a mixed CD, if you will, of—well, no, it was a mixed CD at the time. The original playlist was just like a couple of years. I was calling it a playlist, but it wasn't. It was, well, it was in a sense, because actually I literally made a playlist on iTunes and then burned it on a CD.

[1:30] Daniel Nolen: You copy?

[1:31] Ben Rimalower: We've all done that, yeah.

[1:33] Daniel Nolen: I know.

[1:33] Ben Rimalower: But I'm saying it's not wrong to call it a playlist, because it actually was a playlist. But it was—

[1:37] Daniel Nolen: But you didn't listen to it as a playlist.

[1:40] Ben Rimalower: I listened to it as a CD. Anyway, it was songs I wanted Patti to possibly do as like a club hit.

[1:47] Daniel Nolen: Like a sentence.

[1:49] Ben Rimalower: Oh, I see. You know, um, Tina Turner's song that I'd put on was "River Deep Mountain High."

[1:54] Daniel Nolen: Oh.

[1:55] Ben Rimalower: Well, that's before I heard every piano bar waitress in America sing it. I don't think Patti would—that'll be a good song with Patti, though. I just imagined her being like, "When I was a little girl, I had a rag doll."

[2:09] Daniel Nolen: Oh, it die.

[2:16] Ben Rimalower: I love that rag doll.

[2:18] Daniel Nolen: You just want to hear her say "doll."

[2:21] Ben Rimalower: Doll.

[2:21] Daniel Nolen: She's the doll.

[2:22] Ben Rimalower: She is doll, yeah. Um, what are some other songs that you want to hear Patti sing?

[2:28] Daniel Nolen: From that playlist or just from my life?

[2:31] Ben Rimalower: In general, top three.

[2:32] Daniel Nolen: Top three. Oh my god, I'm gonna have to do that all night.

[2:34] Ben Rimalower: Okay.

[2:35] Daniel Nolen: Um, well, this is so basic, and I've resisted it for years, but it's been occurring to me lately that I really do want her to sing "The Man That Got Away."

[2:43] Ben Rimalower: Do you like that song?

[2:44] Daniel Nolen: For some reason, I thought you hated it.

[2:46] Ben Rimalower: Because I don't want people to do it because I think they fuck it up.

[2:50] Daniel Nolen: Is it one of those songs?

[2:54] Ben Rimalower: Well, we don't get it out. But this is what "The Man That Got Away" is about first. She never had a song. That's crazy to me.

[3:00] Daniel Nolen: That's crazy.

[3:01] Ben Rimalower: Yeah. It'd be a wonderful song. You know what? Because here's the thing. What that song is about, and this is of course what Judy did better than anybody, is that like you have to be—it's not just that there's the build of the song from the beginning to the end.

[3:15] Daniel Nolen: For sure.

[3:15] Ben Rimalower: But each of the three sections has its own build. And you do need to get very big, but you don't want to get too big. You have to say something to do. And also, Judy understood that vowel thing of like, um, that, you know, um, "fools will be fools." And "where's he gone to?" And like you want to be like, too. But Judy kept that "ooh" so pure.

[3:40] Daniel Nolen: Yeah.

[3:41] Ben Rimalower: And then she still—and she went from that big "ooh." She does that thing where it's like—yeah, when he de Crescendo is like, well, yeah, and then she eases into the road.

[3:50] Daniel Nolen: CX whereas I want Patti to be like, "Who's where's it fools?" And "where's he gone to the road?" Like in "Being Alive," like the—like, you know, a lot is a lot, uh, a lot of love with no breath.

[4:07] Daniel Nolen: Same with "As If We Never Said That."

[4:09] Ben Rimalower: Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. Uh, uh. Uh, I've come home at last and this time of bega!

[4:18] Daniel Nolen: She doesn't do big uh.

[4:20] Ben Rimalower: Thank you, through to the end.

[4:21] Daniel Nolen: Yeah.

[4:22] Ben Rimalower: And then "Bright Other," and just when you think the belting climax is over, she's—

[4:22] Daniel Nolen: Why I sound like Bernadette.

[4:34] Ben Rimalower: Too soon.

[4:34] Daniel Nolen: Too soon.

[4:34] Ben Rimalower: Fog, bro. Broken wreck, broken wreck.

[4:40] Daniel Nolen: Well, we are so fucking thrilled today to have as our guest the most amazing Telly Leung.

[4:47] Ben Rimalower: You give you a proper intro when you're not here, so that's what you're getting in face-to-face.

[4:51] Telly Leung: I'm so excited to be here.

[4:52] Ben Rimalower: We're so excited to have you, and I am so excited that the album you wanted to talk about was Patti LuPone Live.

[4:59] Telly Leung: Well, Ben, I figured if you were like, is there an album that's been very influential? And I don't—because it's you that asked, I was like, oh, I have to pick a Patti album. Yeah, I have to.

[5:07] Ben Rimalower: That's—that was a great answer. You're already getting brownie points. Um, so, uh, uh, well, talk to us about that. But also, I also feel like now, since this album—early 90s, right?

[5:17] Telly Leung: What do we say this came out in '93?

[5:20] Ben Rimalower: So I also feel like there's a whole generation of people that don't know this album.

[5:25] Telly Leung: Right. Uh, so, uh, this was—I remember this was one of those, you know, double disc CDs back when people had CDs. And there was a separate highlights version available.

[5:32] Ben Rimalower: Right.

[5:35] Telly Leung: Which I can't tell you how many friendships have ended for me because they lost a real one. But also by them. I mean, like when you're a young teenager, you know, growing up in New York City, you're like, one day I too shall do enough Broadway shows and be a big—a big enough Broadway diva that I will merit an entire second disc of one 11 o'clock number after the next. I mean, she goes—it's insane what she's doing.

[6:23] Ben Rimalower: But now that—now that I'm actually a Broadway singer and a pro, I listen to that and I go, how did she—how does she do that? How does she go from one killer belt song to the next?

[6:23] Telly Leung: She actually did have vocal trouble during the run. It was a two-week run at the Westwood Playhouse.

[6:23] Ben Rimalower: Uh-huh.

[6:23] Telly Leung: Which is the Geffen now. Um, and I remember I had seen like one of the first shows, and then several were cancelled because she lost her voice.

[6:22] Ben Rimalower: It's hard.

[6:22] Telly Leung: It's hard. This was—I mean, I now that—now that I'm an actual performer and I know how difficult eight times a week is, and you know, you have—you get one good 11 o'clock in a show, right? And so to have them all in a row like that, I was like, all right, but you're kind of like a beast, aren't you?

[6:36] Ben Rimalower: I don't think of you as one of these.

[6:37] Telly Leung: Oh gosh, well I—you know, I too, I too had my fair share of vocal troubles too, you know. And actually, like I—I don't know, it was back in 2016. Um, I had vocal surgery too.

[6:45] Ben Rimalower: You did?

[6:47] Telly Leung: I did, and so you know, actually that kind—yeah, I had a—well, I didn't have the same thing Patti did. Um, Patti was always hemorrhaging, I guess, because she had like a—I believe what she had was like an exposed blood vessel. And I actually had what they called a pseudo-cyst, which is basically—the easy way to describe it is it's like when you wear shoes that don't fit, you get a blister on your feet. I basically had a blister, but it was on my vocal cords. So like you still have to like get put under a—a surgeon has to go in and like pop the blister, and so it's scary.

[7:15] Ben Rimalower: It is still sharp objects.

[7:17] Telly Leung: Absolutely. Because it's—it's always like sharp objects coming at your vocal cords. So it's—it's scary. Vocal surgery is scary because these two tiny little things in your throat are your entire career. So I remember when I was being very quiet and recovering and, you know, being afraid of surgery, I read Patti's book because she talks about it extensively about that time in her life, and that actually she's the—I feel like she's the success story, right? Because I feel like now that—now that people—when people listen to Patti, she sounds better than ever.

[7:44] Ben Rimalower: Oh, yeah.

[7:44] Telly Leung: You know, she just turned 70 and she's singing better than ever.

[7:48] Ben Rimalower: You were at the—

[7:50] Telly Leung: And healthy harmonics.

[7:51] Ben Rimalower: I know. I wish I was. I wish I was able to be there with the city. So many of these songs she's still singing.

[7:54] Telly Leung: I know totally and in the same keys. So you go, all right, well, you know, she's doing something right.

[7:58] Ben Rimalower: Yeah. The key thing, it's a little out of control nowadays, though, I have to say. People are so hyperconscious about the keys.

[8:05] Telly Leung: And it's like, I mean, like, you know, I do the show with the Countess, and we have all these guest stars, you know, and they talk about like—I have like these, I won't say the name, but a guy who like wants to sing this song in this high key, and I have to like keep convincing him to take it down a step, and it's—he sounds better, yeah, and he nails it when it's down. And nobody's sitting in the audience with a pitch pipe.

[8:25] Ben Rimalower: Right.

[8:25] Telly Leung: It's—it's not like saying this is—this is an A and not. It's not like you're in some Sondheim show and he wrote this key because it's the brighter tone of the character's angst. I mean, you know.

[8:36] Ben Rimalower: But you know what? I'll say this. So having worked with Stephen Sondheim, I did Pacific Overtures, and I remembered we were doing— we were doing some number. I think it was—I think it was "Chrysanthemum Tea" or something, and I remembered, you know, Paul Gemignani was like, "So do we like this key?" You know, he's there doing music rehearsals. And we're like, "What do you mean, do we like this key? This is Sondheim. Isn't this like the Bible? Isn't this like written in stone? We're not allowed to change it." Paul Gemignani literally picked up his cell phone, called Stephen Sondheim, and said, "Uh, we're gonna do this half a step up. Is that all right?" And like he was like, "Yeah, sure." You know, because it's a living, breathing thing.

[9:08] Telly Leung: And Steve's songs—maybe he had a reason for that original key that was important, or maybe that was situational too.

[9:14] Ben Rimalower: It was situ—probably situational. He wrote it for a specific actor and basically said, "Oh, is this key comfortable for you?"

[9:19] Telly Leung: Yeah, and you know, even somebody like Stephen Sondheim's like, "Yeah, change the key."

[9:22] Ben Rimalower: Yeah, it's—it's so crazy. I mean, it's the wicked and alpha, but I think that's like where it's become, and in a way, Patti kind of started that whole thing, and you know, Patti and Betty and the whole hypothetical.

[9:31] Telly Leung: Oh, yeah, absolutely.

[9:33] Ben Rimalower: Right. But it's so—I mean, like now they're telling you—I know so many people want Patti and Mandy to do a reunion concert of Evita.

[9:39] Telly Leung: Oh wow.

[9:39] Ben Rimalower: And Mandy says he can't sing it. And I'm like, first of all, he can.

[9:44] Telly Leung: I think he can.

[9:45] Ben Rimalower: I mean, I saw when they did their concert together. He was better than she was.

[9:50] Telly Leung: Yeah, he like, when he did "Oh What a Circus," I was blown away. It was even better than "Don't Correct Me Argentina." It was, and for me to think that she—that's how great it was.

[9:59] Ben Rimalower: And so maybe he's right, maybe he needs to change some of the keys. Obviously, he's referring to some fact that he has about his voice, but clearly he can sing it in a way that we will all be very happy with.

[10:11] Telly Leung: I think it's also interesting, you know, Mandy isn't somebody that's singing eight times a week. So there is a certain element of like you're a little bit like a little bit out of shape or nervous that you're not gonna be able to do something. Like when you're doing—somebody who sings all the time, you're doing eight shows a week. Even my ENT says, um, all of you guys that do eight shows a week, you're a little Broadway swollen. Like even when he looks at our chords, he goes, "There's normal people's vocal cords that are like, you know, not red and not swollen." He's like, "And then I look at normal Broadway chords, and there is a baseline of normal where everybody who's working on Broadway, your chords are slightly swollen, they're slightly red, but it's almost a good thing. That's your baseline. That's normal. You use your voices for a living."

[10:50] Ben Rimalower: I mean, that—but that's really what it is. When you're warming up, you're doing scales to warm up. You're basically pumping blood into your vocal cords so that they're warm. So our vocal cords tend—because we use them all the time—tend to be just a little more swollen.

[11:02] Telly Leung: So I would say some—even somebody like Mandy probably, you know, uh has incredible. Like I remember hearing him sing "Move On" at that concert with Bernadette Peters and the both of them.

[11:14] Ben Rimalower: Oh yeah.

[11:14] Telly Leung: How many years later still singing that "Move On" in that case? She even gave you a little like, "Let others make that," you know.

[11:20] Ben Rimalower: Yeah.

[11:20] Telly Leung: I mean that night she delivered. It's just in their—it's in their muscles. It's just in there.

[11:23] Ben Rimalower: But it's—it's scary when you don't use it often. And you know, okay, going back to you discovering 11 o'clock numbers, discussion and the whole thing. Now, I mean, so I think you're younger than me. So where—where were you in the moment?

[11:37] Telly Leung: I don't know. I don't know if I'm younger than you. I'm 39.

[11:39] Ben Rimalower: So you know.

[11:40] Telly Leung: Yeah.

[11:40] Ben Rimalower: But I remember—I remember getting the double disc. This was back in the day when there were like used CD stores.

[11:47] Telly Leung: Right, yeah.

[11:47] Ben Rimalower: And so I don't know how many of your listeners remember that, but like the used CD thing.

[11:51] Telly Leung: I remember the deal.

[11:52] Ben Rimalower: And I got the double—it was a used—it was in like a used CD thing. So it was a deal.

[11:56] Telly Leung: Right, because it could have been twenty-five dollars new.

[12:00] Ben Rimalower: Right. But you're not going to be able to do that. I think this was like nine bucks or ten dollars. And this was in New York, where you become a big thing.

[12:04] Telly Leung: This was—I can't remember where it was, but I do remember probably New York because you grew up in the next one.

[12:07] Ben Rimalower: I grew up in New York.

[12:08] Telly Leung: So it was probably, you know, it was probably, yeah, some used CD shop. You know, one of the—they used to have like Disco Rama, or was that what it used to be called? It like the $10 CDs, right?

[12:17] Ben Rimalower: Yeah, yeah.

[12:17] Telly Leung: And this probably cost a little more because it was a double disc. It was probably like thirteen bucks or something.

[12:21] Ben Rimalower: Right. But you know, that was the cheap way to get CDs. And maybe the case was a little cracked, or do you mean—and that's usually what it was, but the CDs were fine.

[12:30] Telly Leung: Um, and I remember getting that there.

[12:32] Ben Rimalower: You were already like a fan of the stuff.

[12:33] Telly Leung: I was a theater fan.

[12:35] Ben Rimalower: Yes.

[12:35] Telly Leung: So I was a theater fan, and I'm trying to think if I had seen Patty live by then, and I'm not sure if I had.

[12:43] Telly Leung: I remember very vividly seeing Patty in a play.

[12:47] Telly Leung: I remember vividly growing up and seeing Patty in that Noises Off revival.

[12:52] Telly Leung: And I right with like Faith Prince was in that too.

[12:54] Telly Leung: That was um, ten years later after the album.

[12:56] Ben Rimalower: That was after the album, but I remember vividly seeing her in that, and I'm trying to think if I'd seen Patty live in something.

[13:02] Telly Leung: I definitely saw this concert at the current on Broadway.

[13:06] Telly Leung: When she did this at the car.

[13:07] Ben Rimalower: Oh, wow.

[13:08] Telly Leung: So I went to high school in the city and um, as an after school job to save money for voice lessons and stuff, I worked as a file clerk at some insurance company.

[13:16] Telly Leung: My high school was Stuyvesant High School, which was downtown by Battery Park City near all these office buildings.

[13:21] Telly Leung: And so when I went to interview for an after school job at this insurance firm, they were like, "Oh, you like theater. Why don't you go to the entertainment insurance place, like golf insurance downtown?"

[13:31] Telly Leung: And so it was golf insurance that was insuring a lot of Broadway shows.

[13:34] Telly Leung: And one of the shows they insured was this concert.

[13:37] Telly Leung: So I remember they were like, "We just got comps, you know, to this. The office got comps, would you want to go?"

[13:43] Telly Leung: And I remember seeing this for free, this concert.

[13:44] Telly Leung: Wow, sitting in the current watching this concert.

[13:47] Ben Rimalower: Had you already listened, well, I guess the CD probably wouldn't have...

[13:49] Telly Leung: I think I had listened to this already.

[13:51] Telly Leung: Because I knew the years and I remember seeing it and knowing it in order.

[13:56] Ben Rimalower: Yeah.

[13:56] Telly Leung: Um, I, before this album, though, I had gotten the Patty Sunset.

[14:02] Telly Leung: I feel like...

[14:02] Ben Rimalower: No, after.

[14:03] Telly Leung: Well, you might have to.

[14:04] Telly Leung: After, but my, I don't think I bought this in '93.

[14:06] Telly Leung: I don't think I bought this when it came out.

[14:07] Telly Leung: Yeah.

[14:08] Telly Leung: I think I bought this much after.

[14:10] Ben Rimalower: Like, did you have like the other albums?

[14:13] Telly Leung: I'm a big, absolutely.

[14:14] Telly Leung: Big Betty Buckley fan.

[14:15] Telly Leung: Big album.

[14:15] Telly Leung: I had the Elaine Page album, that Encore album with like all their 11 cats and the recordings.

[14:20] Telly Leung: I had all those albums.

[14:22] Ben Rimalower: Who is your number one?

[14:22] Ben Rimalower: Who was like, you know, like you have your special relationship with Patty?

[14:26] Telly Leung: Mine was Betty before.

[14:28] Telly Leung: Wow.

[14:29] Telly Leung: Betty Buckley.

[14:29] Telly Leung: Absolutely.

[14:30] Ben Rimalower: Well, those were amazing Betty years because I mean, you know, I remember uh around the time that she was going in replacing Patty in Sunset in London.

[14:40] Ben Rimalower: She had just released two studio albums.

[14:43] Ben Rimalower: And then immediately she had uh a London concert album and a Carnegie Hall concert album.

[14:48] Telly Leung: Yes, I had all of them.

[14:49] Telly Leung: So it was four back to back of her in the craziest amazing voice.

[14:49] Ben Rimalower: Amazing voice.

[14:54] Ben Rimalower: I mean, arguably, you could easily make a case for Betty being the best of all of them.

[14:58] Ben Rimalower: The best certainly technical.

[15:00] Telly Leung: Incredible.

[15:00] Telly Leung: Yeah, it was incredible.

[15:01] Telly Leung: Her voice was incredible. I mean, there was something like what I love.

[15:04] Telly Leung: She, I also enjoyed Betty because like there was something you never really heard like the mix part of her voice.

[15:10] Ben Rimalower: No, there wasn't.

[15:10] Telly Leung: She sang like a man.

[15:11] Telly Leung: Like a man.

[15:12] Telly Leung: Like a man in a lot of ways.

[15:14] Telly Leung: There was a very like mask.

[15:15] Telly Leung: Even like her back in the day doing violin.

[15:17] Telly Leung: Like he plays the violin.

[15:18] Telly Leung: You were like, I don't, I don't know.

[15:19] Telly Leung: It's that like resonance and that brightness and that like weight.

[15:30] Telly Leung: I've numbered 12.

[15:50] Telly Leung: I was like, I don't understand.

[15:51] Telly Leung: But they did not appreciate.

[15:52] Telly Leung: I mean, they went out, this is how you know they're homophobic, and they made the movie of 1776 with the entire original cast, except they replaced Betty Buckley.

[16:01] Telly Leung: The only track I care about on the Broadway album.

[16:06] Ben Rimalower: Did you hear now that um what's her name? Diane Paulus is doing uh all female.

[16:10] Telly Leung: I've heard, yes.

[16:11] Telly Leung: Brilliant.

[16:12] Telly Leung: I am very curious to know what that's gonna be like.

[16:14] Ben Rimalower: Yeah.

[16:14] Telly Leung: Maybe I'll finally get into the score after all these years of missing the boat.

[16:17] Ben Rimalower: Yeah.

[16:18] Telly Leung: Um, so okay, you listened to the Patty album.

[16:21] Telly Leung: I did.

[16:21] Telly Leung: And you know, and what I also appreciated was so the second side was all Broadway tunes that we knew.

[16:26] Telly Leung: And all this and also it was also an education because she told you about the show.

[16:29] Ben Rimalower: Yes.

[17:29] Telly Leung: That's how you know we couldn't find them.

[17:29] Telly Leung: Like, you know, like I had heard Betty Buckley does Metal Ark.

[17:29] Telly Leung: I didn't know the story behind Metal Ark and that the show was a big flop, and that nobody came to the Kennedy Center, and the way Patty tells it is hysterical.

[17:29] Telly Leung: I mean, the fact that that patter is captured on a CD.

[17:29] Telly Leung: I mean, I do a lot of patter myself, and I go, this is how patter should be done.

[17:29] Telly Leung: This is brilliant.

[17:29] Ben Rimalower: What does she say about the balcony seats?

[17:31] Telly Leung: You know, it says a lot about somebody that buys a second row, a third row balcony seat and decides to stay there.

[17:38] Telly Leung: It was, I love that.

[17:39] Telly Leung: Our auspicious opening.

[17:40] Telly Leung: Yeah.

[17:41] Telly Leung: At the Kennedy Center Theater.

[17:42] Telly Leung: 2500 seat theater where we played to 25 people.

[17:45] Telly Leung: I mean, like the patter is so brilliant.

[17:46] Telly Leung: The delivery of it.

[17:48] Telly Leung: Yeah.

[17:48] Telly Leung: And that's, you know, that's a testament too to was it right?

[17:51] Telly Leung: Was it um who wrote the Jeffrey Richmond?

[17:53] Ben Rimalower: Yeah, those guys.

[17:54] Ben Rimalower: The executive producer of Modern Family.

[17:55] Telly Leung: Yeah, those guys who crafted this show for her were so smart.

[18:00] Telly Leung: Um, it's her, I mean, it's straight through now to the Philharmonic show.

[18:03] Telly Leung: She's still working with Jeffrey Richmond and Scott Whitman for everything.

[18:05] Telly Leung: Yeah, that team's done, yeah.

[18:07] Telly Leung: It's really, and having just seen that show and now listening to this, I'm like, it really is very similar as far as especially the number she chooses and like the way she tells the stories.

[18:16] Ben Rimalower: It's great.

[18:16] Telly Leung: So I didn't know, I didn't know she was the first Fantine.

[18:18] Telly Leung: I had no idea until I was like, oh, right, she did it in London because I always had the Randy Graff recording, Robert recording.

[18:25] Telly Leung: I didn't know.

[18:25] Telly Leung: You know, same thing with it was stuff, stuff like um, even stuff like I'm looking through the, I'm through looking through the list right now, but like, you know, oh, like all of this stuff in here about oh the Nancy and Oliver.

[18:38] Telly Leung: I did not know she did that.

[18:40] Ben Rimalower: Right.

[18:40] Telly Leung: Well, that was such a flop, that revival.

[18:42] Ben Rimalower: Oh, really?

[18:42] Telly Leung: And I didn't know, I didn't know.

[18:44] Telly Leung: See.

[18:44] Telly Leung: It was Karen McIntosh, and then um, it was a bomb, and then when he did it in London with Jonathan Price a few years later, he got a new director.

[18:52] Telly Leung: Because that had been like a retread of the original.

[18:55] Telly Leung: Then he got actually, I think it was Sam Mendes.

[18:57] Telly Leung: Somebody great directed it in London.

[18:58] Ben Rimalower: She did not sing that one in the Philharmonic, right?

[19:01] Telly Leung: As long as he needs the recent prize, yeah.

[19:03] Telly Leung: I mean, that's also great too, because that's again brilliant comedic patter, right?

[19:06] Telly Leung: Um, I steal costumes.

[19:08] Telly Leung: I steal costumes from every show I'm in.

[19:11] Telly Leung: I steal costumes, I steal jewelry, I steal wigs.

[19:14] Telly Leung: I'm surprised, I leave the scenery.

[19:18] Telly Leung: I can't wait to get my hands on that Norma drag.

[19:30] Ben Rimalower: Brilliant.

[19:31] Telly Leung: Well, and that coupled with that Twitter post she just posted of her with the Evita.

[19:35] Telly Leung: Was it the wig?

[19:36] Telly Leung: But yeah.

[19:38] Telly Leung: Although then she sold everything on eBay in the early aughts.

[19:42] Telly Leung: At some point, I mean, I guess when you're Patti LuPone and you're a living legend, at some point you go, it's just sitting in my garage.

[19:48] Ben Rimalower: Right.

[19:48] Telly Leung: I have the memory of what this is.

[19:50] Telly Leung: With a bunch of jerseys.

[19:51] Telly Leung: I'm glad she's like giving it to Columbia archives now.

[19:54] Telly Leung: When she was selling it on eBay, I was a little like, whatever.

[19:57] Telly Leung: My, um, my hubby works at the Smithsonian.

[20:00] Telly Leung: So I don't know, maybe Patty should give some of that stuff.

[20:03] Telly Leung: Here's Patti LuPone's wig from Evita.

[20:05] Ben Rimalower: Well, her famous story is when they asked her to screen test for the movie of Evita at one point when they were in the 80s and they were in between Liza Minnelli and Barbara Streisand or whatever.

[20:15] Telly Leung: Patty said the commercials in the Smithsonian.

[20:18] Ben Rimalower: Oh wow.

[20:19] Telly Leung: Yeah.

[20:19] Telly Leung: I also respect the fact that like disc one, those are disc two was like her hist of the history of her.

[20:24] Telly Leung: But disc one, she had all these great Kurt Weill songs.

[20:26] Telly Leung: I didn't know who Kurt Weill was either at the time.

[20:28] Ben Rimalower: Right.

[20:29] Telly Leung: So like listening to her do Stranger, you know, Stranger Here, Myself and all of those songs.

[20:33] Telly Leung: See here before you a woman with a mission.

[20:38] Telly Leung: I must discover the key to his ignition.

[20:42] Telly Leung: And then if he shouldn't make a diplomatic proposition, how could I possibly refuse?

[20:51] Telly Leung: So how can I possibly refuse to be a little bit of a woman when I'm Australia?

[21:09] Telly Leung: All these great songs.

[21:11] Telly Leung: Like, you know, Surabaya Johnny, like all that stuff.

[21:14] Telly Leung: Like these songs that I wouldn't know, Lush Life.

[21:16] Telly Leung: I didn't hear Lush Life.

[21:17] Telly Leung: You know what I mean?

[21:18] Telly Leung: I love her.

[21:19] Telly Leung: Her Lush Life is so crazy.

[21:20] Telly Leung: To tempt me to madness.

[21:22] Telly Leung: Yeah.

[21:24] Telly Leung: Then you came along with your siren song to tempt me to madness.

[21:31] Telly Leung: I thought for a while that your poignant smile was tinged with the sadness of a great love for me.

[21:43] Telly Leung: Oh yes.

[21:45] Telly Leung: I was wrong.

[21:51] Telly Leung: Again.

[21:57] Telly Leung: Do you remember Show Music Magazine?

[21:59] Telly Leung: I do remember Show Music Magazine.

[22:00] Telly Leung: I was like deep when that would come out a new issue.

[22:03] Telly Leung: And I remember the reviews, uh, the review of that this album in Show Music.

[22:08] Telly Leung: It was like reviewing three albums, Patty LuPone Live, and then two other.

[22:14] Telly Leung: I don't know if it was like not Judy Kuhn.

[22:17] Telly Leung: Whatever, there was two other like vocal Broadway albums.

[22:20] Telly Leung: And they were like the blah blah blah diva, the blah blah blah diva, and they called Patti LuPone um the idiosyncratic diva.

[22:27] Ben Rimalower: Oh.

[22:27] Telly Leung: And they were sort of taking issue with the nasality of her voice and like the yodeling and the swooping.

[22:34] Telly Leung: I mean, it was like really for so long in that period, she was really getting red.

[22:39] Telly Leung: Like everything she did, people were like coming for all the like Pattyisms.

[22:43] Ben Rimalower: You know, it's so interesting, you know, because Patty to me, like, she straddles this world of there's only one Patty.

[22:51] Telly Leung: Just like there was only one Merman, and there was only one, you know what I mean?

[22:54] Telly Leung: Like there's these iconic, there's only one Channing.

[22:56] Telly Leung: Only one Judy.

[22:57] Telly Leung: Yeah, there's only one Judy Garland.

[22:58] Telly Leung: Like you hear them and you know who they are, and I feel that way about Patty.

[23:01] Telly Leung: And then she's, she's also, she straddles the other world of that like late 70s, early 80s musical where sort of women started to sound the same.

[23:10] Ben Rimalower: Right.

[23:11] Telly Leung: Do you mean like I can tell, I can tell Patty's Fantine, but like I don't know, there's a whole bunch of Fantines after that that they all sort of sound the same.

[23:18] Ben Rimalower: Right.

[23:19] Telly Leung: Do you know what I mean?

[23:19] Telly Leung: And same thing with Evitas, like so I, I don't know, like she's from, she's, her tradition is from that world of, yeah, it be.

[23:27] Telly Leung: I don't know why she wasn't accepted for that for so long, but it is very evident on that album.

[23:31] Telly Leung: And it is funny is, I mean, all those songs that you mentioned, the Kurt Weill songs and Lush Life, those were the first versions that I knew.

[23:38] Telly Leung: And I definitely learned parts of the songs wrong by knowing Patty paraphrasing, yeah, yeah.

[23:45] Telly Leung: Because, you know, and then all, and then weird words that I never ever made sense of, you know, until I've heard, you know, Betty Buckley sing them, and I was like, oh, it's goaded, you know.

[23:56] Telly Leung: It was not something that was necessarily evident to um, to the listener.

[24:01] Telly Leung: But I love it.

[24:02] Telly Leung: I love her.

[24:02] Telly Leung: Okay, so baby Telly listening to this and wanting to be a Broadway star.

[24:07] Ben Rimalower: What was this part of, you know, when you were dreaming about, well, what were you dreaming about?

[24:13] Telly Leung: I don't know what I was dreaming about.

[24:15] Telly Leung: I mean, I probably listened to this album in my like high school years, right?

[24:19] Telly Leung: So I'm thinking, I mean, I don't know exactly when I bought it.

[24:21] Telly Leung: We know the album came out in '93.

[24:23] Telly Leung: I know I saw the concert at the current that was like '95, '95 ish, right?

[24:28] Telly Leung: So, like, this album was definitely playing during those high school years, and just hearing, I mean, what I always appreciated about Patty, and she's done this in other albums.

[24:37] Telly Leung: There's like the Don't Monkey Around with Broadway albums, where she is a, she is a creature of the theater.

[24:43] Telly Leung: Yeah, and she is unapologetically.

[24:45] Telly Leung: I mean, that's why you can't really get mad at her when she's yelling at somebody about their cell phone because she has such a, she, this is her home.

[24:51] Telly Leung: Right.

[24:51] Telly Leung: This is her temple, and don't f with Patty.

[24:53] Ben Rimalower: Well, and it's for the audiences.

[24:55] Telly Leung: Yeah. Like I saw somebody post the other day. I would say his name if I could remember it, but he's somebody in some Broadway show now. And he was complaining on Twitter about the people with the phones and everything, but he was complaining about how it affects the actors. And I was like, at least pretend that your beef is how it distracts the rest of the audience.

[25:13] Ben Rimalower: Right, right, right.

[25:14] Telly Leung: Like, yeah, I mean, things are hard for actors anyway. I mean, listen, it is distracting for the actors. Like, I, you know, I remember the flying carpet in Aladdin is by far the dark, it's the most dimly lit scene in the whole new world. And the cell phones, I mean, you can see I can tell you exactly the seat, right? Of where somebody's sitting, but it's also I understand what you're saying, it's also my job to stay in it.

[25:35] Ben Rimalower: Right, right.

[25:35] Telly Leung: So it's well, and lots of things are probably distracting that are not anyone's fault. I mean, you know, people could sneeze or subway channel. We're hyper aware.

[25:41] Ben Rimalower: I don't, I don't actually I don't, I don't hear sneezes and coughs.

[25:46] Telly Leung: I don't. Um I feel like sneezes and coughs I don't really get on my side. I know for like playwrights and directors, like when they're in previews and they hear they are counting the sneezes and coughs, right? Because it's like uh oh.

[25:56] Ben Rimalower: That's funny to hear, because as an audience member, I mean, so many, especially with straight plays, especially with older people. Like I have seen a couple on that nays over the last few months when I was like in all the Broadway openings, and it was like, you know, Broadway shows before the Tonies, and I was like, you know, you just hear this like symphony of people, you just cursing people in their phlegmy.

[26:18] Telly Leung: But uh, but it's I guess it makes me feel a little better. At least think, you know, at least maybe the actors don't hear.

[26:22] Ben Rimalower: No, I don't I don't. I mean, that's me personally. I don't really hear it, I don't see it, but I didn't get past the phone. But the phone, but the ph but lights you do see because when you, you know, for sure, it's you I it is definitely noticeable. I don't know if it would ever distract me to the point where I go up or I forget a line or like you know what I mean, or I forget where I am.

[26:38] Telly Leung: Well, seeing it's different than hearing it. That's where I think it's yeah, yeah, yeah.

[26:42] Ben Rimalower: But okay, so you're you're it's divescent, you're into Broadway, were you seeing a lot of Broadway shows?

[26:47] Telly Leung: I was, I would save up my money and I would go see um I would save up my money and go to the TKTS booth or go play the Rent Lotto or get my $20 Chicago seat if I felt like being inspired to go to dance class, and that's what I did.

[26:59] Ben Rimalower: I mean, when you were seeing Rent, were you like someday I'm gonna be Angel?

[27:02] Telly Leung: Uh uh, no. Oh, not I mean, I mean, I love that show. It was was my, you know, Hamilton, it was my spring awakening, it was my generation show that that made me want to be a part of you know, this community for sure.

[27:14] Ben Rimalower: Yeah because the show was about community.

[27:16] Telly Leung: Right. And so I uh for sure, like I I never thought I'd get to do it one day. That was like I remember you do not want to.

[27:23] Ben Rimalower: Oh of course I would want to. I mean did you want to be Angel or No, I just wanted to be in it.

[27:28] Telly Leung: Like I I would wanted to be anybody in it. So like when I got to be Steve and others and cover Angel, it was great. Because I was like, the more tracks I know, the better on the stage.

[27:35] Ben Rimalower: Right, right.

[27:36] Telly Leung: I remember this the stage manager who uh her name is Crystal. She was actually one of the original stage managers from New York Theater Workshop.

[27:41] Ben Rimalower: Wow.

[27:42] Telly Leung: And she put me into the show. And they gave me three weeks to learn my Steve and other tracks at the Needle Andrew Theater and the Angel stuff. I I learned my Steve and other stuff in like like three days or four days.

[27:52] Ben Rimalower: Yeah.

[27:52] Telly Leung: And she said, Telly, you've never done the show before. Like, and I was like, No, but I've been doing it in my head. That double album. I mean, that's the album. That double album that double album too. But like, you know, the summer that rent came out of was like the summer of what, 96, 97, like that was the year, right? That like that was because it was only 20 dollars to get your rush seat, uh I did that all the time.

[28:12] Ben Rimalower: I would sleep with the bums on 41st Street when it was not safe, when it was like kind of seedy, still a little bit seedy sometimes, but like in the mid 90s it was really seedy.

[28:20] Telly Leung: Yeah, and I would get my 2020.

[28:22] Ben Rimalower: How did your parents feel about you sleeping in the house?

[28:25] Telly Leung: My Chin my Chinese parents that barely knew where Broadway was. I just were going to work. Yeah, I was like, I'm I'm gonna go get tickets for a show. I'm gonna line up at 5 a.m., 4 a.m., whatever it is.

[28:33] Ben Rimalower: Did they ever come okay? You're crazy, be safe. Did they ever go to shows with you or well?

[28:38] Telly Leung: So I I they didn't really know what Broadway was. I kind of discovered Broadway watching TV, actually. Um, you know, I I I grew up with ri pretty strict Chinese parents. I had a tiger mom who was very adamant about academics. I mean, sort of the stereotype, you know, of like a strict Chinese mom, only because they were immigrants and they wanted me to have a good education and you know, go to Harvard and be a doctor and have a better life than they did coming here as immigrants.

[29:01] Ben Rimalower: My dad worked in restaurants, my mom worked as a seamstress, or they were like, our we want our kid to do better than that, you know, understandably so.

[29:08] Telly Leung: So they didn't let me watch anything but PBS as a little kid because it was educational.

[29:12] Ben Rimalower: That's where they went wrong.

[29:13] Telly Leung: Yeah, but so of course, like Into the Woods pops on and great performances. That was my first exposure to musical. That was filmed uh into the woods, it was filmed live from the Martin Beck Theater.

[29:25] Ben Rimalower: So you saw Into the Woods before you saw like Ant.

[29:27] Telly Leung: I was eight, yeah, I was eight years old.

[29:28] Ben Rimalower: Oh, yeah.

[29:28] Telly Leung: I guess my first musical exposure would be Mary Poppins and Sound of Music, right? Because those were the things that played all the time, and you you know, you I learned all those songs, and so I guess you know, if anybody's really responsible, it's the very younger.

[29:41] Ben Rimalower: Yeah, but I got it though.

[29:42] Telly Leung: Yeah, I don't know. Somehow, like I because I knew those characters, I knew those fairy tale characters for sure. And it was the style of how it was told that really grabbed me. I said, Oh, this is funny.

[29:52] Ben Rimalower: Okay, you're seeing rent, you're seeing all that stuff. And so I would save up my money and I would go, you know, disco rama, get my $10 albums, or go to Footlight. Remember Footlight Records?

[30:01] Telly Leung: Oh, and all that. And you would go be like, what import Japanese version of a Vita can I can I save up money to buy?

[30:07] Ben Rimalower: You went to Footlight. The dumber kids went to colony and paid like 12 times the price.

[30:11] Telly Leung: Right. Well, you would go to colony to be like what just came out.

[30:14] Ben Rimalower: Yeah.

[30:14] Telly Leung: Right? But then you would go to Flight, you would go to Footlight to Petit.

[30:24] Ben Rimalower: And so I would only get like a couple of afternoons to like go down and like see a Broadway show. And it was like a big sacrifice sometimes.

[30:32] Telly Leung: I want to go down to Footlight where I can buy more CDs, but I don't really have time. If we want to see a matinee, I'd better just pay the up charge and buy it at Colony.

[30:41] Ben Rimalower: I mean, this is so badbreaking. You know, I didn't think about taking taxis than it would have been.

[30:45] Telly Leung: I remember like at Footlight, you could actually like put on headphones. They would have like listening stations.

[30:49] Ben Rimalower: You could hear stuff.

[30:50] Telly Leung: Also at Tower Records.

[30:51] Ben Rimalower: Yeah.

[30:51] Telly Leung: Which was right next to like you would go to Tower and you would just like listen to like whatever was sampling the CDs.

[30:56] Ben Rimalower: Yeah, you would sample the open anything to hear.

[30:58] Telly Leung: Yeah, it was really, it was really just a different time. I spent so much time in Tower

[31:02] Ben Rimalower: Right. Were you formulating your plan then to be an actor?

[31:04] Telly Leung: I don't know if I had a plan.

[31:05] Ben Rimalower: Were you doing shows in high school?

[31:07] Telly Leung: I did high school musicals and I loved that. And I well, okay. So my freshman year, we did Pippin and I played Lewis and Pippin.

[31:14] Ben Rimalower: That's the handsome brother.

[31:16] Telly Leung: That's the right. That's like the and so my first time ever in a musical, I was like, I jumped on stage in white tights and I was like, you know, flexing my muscles and kissing myself.

[31:23] Ben Rimalower: And like, were you? You like about buff and stuff then?

[31:25] Telly Leung: No, absolutely not. So like I did that in front of my entire like student body, and I was like, it was trial by fire. I was like, if I could be like out, no, not at all.

[31:33] Ben Rimalower: But you were not ashamed to be.

[31:35] Telly Leung: No, I don't, you know, listen, I I was first of all, like, first of all, I, you know, you have to remember this is like early 90s.

[31:40] Ben Rimalower: Right.

[31:41] Telly Leung: So like kids weren't coming out at high school. I didn't really come out to like college. But that's why as a gay kid, I was very restrained. Like, if I had been cast in a part like that when I was in high school, I would have been traumatized because I wanted to like hide.

[31:53] Ben Rimalower: Yeah.

[31:54] Telly Leung: Um, but you were felt and also like, I don't know, like there was I remembered like even my parents' relationship with dating, you know, because they wanted me to do well in school, they're like, no time for dating.

[32:03] Ben Rimalower: That's cool.

[32:06] Telly Leung: Right, right, right. So, like, so really like even like the idea of like, you know, and also growing up in sort of an Asian culture, like sex is not talked about, right? So, like, we don't really talk about it very much.

[32:15] Ben Rimalower: So like, I didn't have the birds and the bees talk, I didn't have it.

[32:18] Telly Leung: So, I was sort of a late developer in that way of thinking about that. And I, you know, I and I dated girls all through high school, like, so that just wasn't really a thing.

[32:27] Ben Rimalower: I didn't really ask those other questions until I got college thinking of being gay.

[32:32] Telly Leung: No, wow. I wasn't. I like I was just a guy who liked doing theater, and I and I did, I dated girls all through high school.

[32:37] Ben Rimalower: Did you like have your girlfriends listen to Patti LuPone live?

[32:40] Telly Leung: I remember going with my high school sweetheart to see Rent sitting in the front row.

[32:43] Ben Rimalower: But rent was cool.

[32:44] Telly Leung: I remember. It was cool. I mean, it was really cool. So like I remember having that experience with her, you know, but like it was, you know, it wasn't really a thing.

[32:50] Ben Rimalower: It wasn't until I got to acting school where they were like Did you go to NYU?

[32:55] Telly Leung: I went to Carnegie Mellon.

[32:56] Ben Rimalower: Oh, Carnegie Mellon.

[32:57] Telly Leung: Where they where you sort of like, and I remember like going I went to a math and science high school in New York City where I wasn't asked to like ask any questions of myself.

[33:06] Ben Rimalower: Right.

[33:06] Telly Leung: And then I went to acting school, but I was a really good student. And then I went to acting school and I was like being a really good student. I was like the person that read every book on Stanislavski and Strasbourg and everything.

[33:15] Ben Rimalower: And then I remembered like one of my first semesters in acting, they were like, I got a C.

[33:18] Telly Leung: And it was like the first C I ever got. I was like that really smart Chinese kid in class that never got a C in his life. And my acting teacher was like, listen, the only way to do this is to actually dive in and do it.

[33:28] Ben Rimalower: You can’t study acting like you study for a test.

[33:32] Telly Leung: There's no test at the end of this. I know that's what you're used to your whole life, but like this thing that you're about to embark on about of being an actor, like it is a craft for the rest of your life, and it's going to demand that you ask tough questions of yourself and challenge yourself and fail.

[33:47] Ben Rimalower: The only way you're gonna learn anything is to like fall on your face and ask those ask yourself those really hard questions that might be difficult to ask.

[33:55] Telly Leung: So and and you'll learn more about yourself and you'll become a better artist.

[33:59] Ben Rimalower: Did you know what that meant?

[34:00] Telly Leung: I did I now know what that means a little more now that I do more teaching, but I I didn't at the time.

[34:05] Ben Rimalower: Was that frustrating to hear that?

[34:07] Telly Leung: It was frustrating, but I eventually as I started to d as I started to like be in that environment of being around those actors, I I got it. You know what I mean?

[34:14] Ben Rimalower: And did that coincide at all with your coming out process?

[34:16] Telly Leung: I did, absolutely. Absolutely. That I think that helped a lot. You know, there's no way to like there's no way to play a scene truthfully until you dive into your truth.

[34:25] Ben Rimalower: Your own.

[34:25] Telly Leung: I mean, that's a thing. It's like in a way, like, yes, it it was my parents' dream for me to like, I don't know, go to Harvard and become a doctor or lawyer or something, or you know, have some cushy office job somewhere that they didn't have.

[34:35] Ben Rimalower: But at the same time, I don't know, like, would I have been 35 with my cushy office job and never asked those questions and then come out at 40, do you know what I mean?

[34:43] Telly Leung: And ask them later in my life when I when when my mortality was looming. This this conversation is turning, taking a big turn. But like that's really part of it. I feel sort of lucky that the arts made me made me ask myself those things.

[34:55] Ben Rimalower: Right.

[34:55] Telly Leung: And I feel happier about that, you know.

[34:57] Ben Rimalower: And you had those people, like your teacher to direct you and say that.

[35:01] Telly Leung: Yeah, I don't think my teacher was like, You're gay. But I think my teacher was like, You're not digging deep enough.

[35:07] Ben Rimalower: But like I don't I don't believe it.

[35:09] Telly Leung: I don't believe it because I don't know you, I don't think you know who you are yet.

[35:11] Ben Rimalower: Mm-hmm.

[35:12] Telly Leung: So it's very important for you to understand who you are. And I think that was a really good lesson. You know what I mean?

[35:17] Ben Rimalower: And and the only way you really know that is if you're brave enough to not be afraid to fail.

[35:23] Telly Leung: Yeah. And not be afraid to like ask tough questions. If you're afraid of the answer, you're not gonna know.

[35:27] Ben Rimalower: What are the things you did after that that employed that bravery and and you know what what were the I mean sometimes you just have to like dive in and look a fool, right?

[35:37] Telly Leung: I think I think with I think going to a math and science school and and you know, where where there is a right or wrong answer to the equation, you know, understanding that with the arts there is no right or wrong.

[35:48] Ben Rimalower: That is something actually I push on my I push on my students all the time now.

[35:55] Telly Leung: Right and they watch, you know, before the but they watch every version of Define Gravity before they get up and sing it. And I was like, there is no right or wrong.

[36:02] Ben Rimalower: Like you what you have to do is find your version of it, right?

[36:05] Telly Leung: I didn't have YouTube, right? So like I had I had cast recordings, I had titled a pone on a recording, and I had to use my imagination.

[36:12] Ben Rimalower: But like if I had to get into a song, that I would have to find my version of it.

[36:16] Telly Leung: Let it come from you, then it will be new.

[36:18] Ben Rimalower: Then it will be new.

[36:18] Telly Leung: But it's totally what about a situation like with Aladdin where you're going into a big show that's like already running.

[36:23] Ben Rimalower: I mean, I've been working with Leroy Reams on this coverage.

[36:25] Telly Leung: I love Leroy Reems so much. But he's come I mean he's he's got so much to say about when he was in the producers as a replacement for Gary Beach, and what he also replaced Gary Beach in Beauty and the Beast, and how much of a struggle it was for him because he didn't want to do it the way that production already expected it to be done.

[36:45] Ben Rimalower: And so how do you um for yourself reconcile that?

[36:49] Telly Leung: I think it's twofold, right? So when you say, if the gig is I'm originating a show, yeah, fine. It is your responsibility to fill in the blanks, right? Because it is if if if you are originating this role, the role only exists on paper.

[37:05] Telly Leung: It is your job then to breathe life into it, right? And to create the structure around whatever choice you're making. And know that you've been hired to originate that role because some of the people that hired you believe that you are the person you are the right person to breathe life into this role for the very first time.

[37:21] Ben Rimalower: Well, if the gig is replacing, and I've I've had both of the pleasure of doing both, right?

[37:25] Telly Leung: Like with Aladdin, I was replacing. Well, listen, the person they chose to do that was Adam Jacobs. He built a structure for what this show is, right? And it's a multi-million dollar musical that is a well-oiled machine that runs around kind of what he built already. So, you know, and he had all of these, he had two out-of-town tryouts to figure out what worked, what didn't work. Like, why should I come in and reinvent the wheel? Like I'm gonna go, hey Adam, what worked? Yeah, right, and like what works about this? And then of course, within that structure that he's built, find my individuality in it and find my way of getting into it. But there's, you know, you are restricted by what has already been built for you.

Right. But also understanding that what's been built for you has taken many years of many readings and workshops and out of towns to figure out what that is. So know that the legwork is done for you, and then the challenge becomes as the artist to go, okay, within that rigid structure, where is me? Like where do I fit into this? Or why was I brought into this, right?

[38:24] Daniel Nolen: Yeah.

[38:24] Telly Leung: Sometimes, you know, I know for a fact, I know, like I was given plenty of freedom around what I wanted to do with that role. Whenever I've been asked to replace, especially in shows like Rent, like when they when it was time for me to understudy Angel, the first couple of shows I went on, I was trying to do a copy of the actor, and actually they were like, it's not good. They were flat out like it's not good because the show is tables, chairs, lights, and people. They're like, if you're trying to mimic somebody, it comes off as false. And that falseness actually is magnified because there's nothing, there's nothing on that stage except you. So the only way for you to make this work is if you find your version of it.

So of course, you hit your marks and everything, but you know, how I even down to how I phrased it musically was up to me. And they were very good about that. And even in Aladdin, even in a big show like that, Casey was smart enough to go, yeah, make this yours, you know.

[39:14] Ben Rimalower: Well, it goes back to what you're saying about college. You know, there's no right or wrong answer. You have to know yourself and you know, do it your way.

[39:21] Telly Leung: Absolutely. That's cool. So talk to us about that. You finished Carnegie Mellon, didn't you come straight to New York?

[39:26] Telly Leung: I did. I came to New York. Um, and I sort of had a crazy experience where so my senior show in college was Company. And um, Billy Porter came back and directed me in Company.

[39:37] Ben Rimalower: Who you Bobby?

[39:38] Telly Leung: I was Bobby. Okay. And um, and what happened was, you know, his when he graduated Carnegie Mellon in 91, his first Broadway show was Miss Saigon. And he uh he joined that company as a John cover and as a first tenor and all of that, but he also met that small family of Asian actors that worked in New York City. And so um when it was time for me to graduate, this was 2002, he knew that the Flower Drum Song revival was coming with so many of his Saigon friends that were involved. So he picked up the phone and he called his dance captain back in the Saigon days, this gentleman named Mark Oka, called Mark and said, Hey, I know you're working on Flower Drum Song. I have a couple of Asian kids that I'm teaching at Carnegie Mellon.

They're great. They have no agents or anything. So, like, are you looking for people? And they said, actually, we are hiring. He goes, Great, I'm gonna send them down to you. Can you get them seen for Flower Drum Song? They were like, it's except, you know, Telly is Bobby in Company. He's in every scene. And we're teching the show. He's like, he can't miss tech. Right.

[40:36] Telly Leung: So I tech the show till midnight. I got on a Greyhound bus from Pittsburgh to New York. I got to New York around like quarter thirty, around nine in the morning. Oh my god. Splash some water in my face. I was at my first Broadway. At Ripley Greer. That was my first, that was my first dance. Broadway dance.

[40:49] Ben Rimalower: Wow.

[40:50] Telly Leung: And that's how I got my first Broadway show.

[40:52] Ben Rimalower: And you booked it.

[40:53] Telly Leung: Yeah.

[40:54] Ben Rimalower: Wow.

[40:54] Telly Leung: And actually, ironically, they had heard that I'd come in from that I was Billy's student, that I'd come in and that I was doing Company and at my call, at my, you know, I did the jazz call, they kept me. I did the ballet call, they kept me, and then they were like, here, read some signs, sing some songs to cover, right? And I ended up covering Jose Lana in the show. And um, they were like, they were like, We hear you're doing Company, sing Being Alive. So I actually sang got to sing Being Alive from Prior Edition, which was great.

[41:16] Ben Rimalower: Yes.

[41:16] Telly Leung: Which Patty does a great version of course that super fast version of Being Alive on her Gets Faster album every day.

[41:22] Ben Rimalower: It's so good.

[41:39] Telly Leung: Somebody crowd me alone.

[41:43] Telly Leung: Somebody force me to care.

[41:47] Telly Leung: Somebody let me come through.

[41:49] Telly Leung: I'll always be there.

[41:51] Telly Leung: Let's try to love you to help us out.

[42:17] Telly Leung: Yeah.

[42:18] Telly Leung: Belting a big old high E at the end. I was like, oh gosh.

[42:21] Ben Rimalower: Yeah.

[42:22] Telly Leung: Fuck, I do love that number. I remember seeing you in Flower Drum Song and noticing you.

[42:28] Ben Rimalower: Oh, really?

[42:29] Telly Leung: Even though it was the four fourth fan dancing boy on the left?

[42:32] Ben Rimalower: Well, you know, I think I'm conflating my memories because I saw you in Flower Drum Song and I saw you in Pacific Overtures.

[42:37] Telly Leung: You probably remember I had songs in Pacific Overtures, so maybe you would remember that more.

[42:42] Telly Leung: There was a reading of Sunfish.

[42:44] Ben Rimalower: Yes.

[42:44] Telly Leung: And I remember seeing you in that.

[42:46] Ben Rimalower: Uh-huh.

[42:46] Telly Leung: And it was like at NYU, like on Second Avenue.

[42:49] Telly Leung: And around that time was that Sondheim thing at the New Amsterdam that the cast of Pacific Overtures did a number in.

[42:58] Ben Rimalower: Oh yeah.

[42:58] Telly Leung: And I remember, well, this is so bitchy, but I remember at some point I had clocked you amongst those things.

[43:04] Ben Rimalower: Yeah.

[43:04] Telly Leung: And I remember seeing the number led by BD Wong.

[43:07] Ben Rimalower: Yeah, yeah.

[43:08] Telly Leung: And seeing you behind him.

[43:08] Ben Rimalower: And I remember thinking like BD is like a great actor who can't really do musical theater.

[43:13] Telly Leung: And he's dead center because people know who he is.

[43:15] Ben Rimalower: And Telly Leung is a Broadway star.

[43:18] Telly Leung: And I remember just like seeing you behind and just like knowing that there was just like an electricity, you know, you didn't dance, but it wasn't just pre, I mean, you definitely had that. But it was you were you were like a triple threat.

[43:32] Telly Leung: Like you really, like you danced like a star, not like somebody who just like sweated it out and knew where to step, you know.

[43:37] Telly Leung: You know what? I didn't always, you know, I was sort of convinced that I was gonna be that guy that graduated Carnegie Mellon and would, you know, sing high notes in the back and cover, and that was gonna be my, that was gonna be how I got onto Broadway. And then I started doing summer stock.

[43:48] Telly Leung: And um, the person who really pushed me to dance is, you know, God rest him, it was Tommy Walsh, Tony Award winner, Tommy Walsh, you know. Day in Hollywood, night in the Ukraine, and um, you know, my one and only and uh you know when you're doing and he wrote that amazing book about chorus lines.

[43:56] Telly Leung: Yes, yeah, on the line, on the line. Um, but he um he, you know, when you do stock you have 10 days to throw up a whole musical and you're, you know, you're they, they he doesn't get to pick his dancers you know you get chosen you're like you're in this you're gonna do this show you're gonna do carousel in the day and then you're gonna do a Gershman review at night you know while you're rehearsing Oklahoma next week and then you know things kind of go up like that at the Muni.

[44:26] Telly Leung: And so you know I remembered like Tommy was like do you tap?

[44:29] Telly Leung: And I was like nah not really he's like you will in 10 days right because you're in the number.

[44:34] Ben Rimalower: I mean had you had any of that dance training?

[44:34] Telly Leung: Of course you do but like I didn't start dancing when I was a kid.

[44:39] Ben Rimalower: Were you even studying musical theater?

[44:39] Telly Leung: I was yeah I studied musical theater.

[44:39] Telly Leung: Yeah, yeah I was at the School of Drama. I was there during a really great time, you know, uh, uh, Billy, I mean Billy Porter was there during that, like Michael McElroy, Natalie Belcon, that time right and then there was that whole class, there was that whole next section of people that was like, you know, Christian Borle, Patrick Wilson, like that group right I was there, you know, during the um Zachary Quinto, Matthew Bomer, uh wow, uh, uh, Josh Gad, Rory O'Malley, Megan Hilty, uh Leslie Odom Jr. like that was my, that was sort of like my time of being there.

[45:14] Ben Rimalower: Wow, yeah.

[45:14] Telly Leung: Wow and are you friends with all those people?

[45:14] Telly Leung: So yeah, I mean they we all went to college together of course and it was a small program.

[45:21] Ben Rimalower: Yeah like my had a giant musical theater class and my class was 15 and that was huge.

[45:25] Telly Leung: Oh like the classes before and after me were like 10, 9, you know 12, you know.

[45:31] Ben Rimalower: So do you would you credit um doing summer stock with helping you get out of the ensemble?

[45:31] Telly Leung: Well, I think understanding that the ensemble is the hardest working part of the show and underst it helped me kind of just understand um it just helped me understand kind of w I I think I think everybody ever everybody serves a very important function in the theater.

[45:57] Telly Leung: And I had this great high school teacher who directed me in Pippin in high school, right?

[46:04] Telly Leung: Um and he directed all of our high school shows, actually.

[46:06] Telly Leung: So he and he volunteered his time to do it.

[46:08] Telly Leung: He never got paid extra to do it. His name is Vinny Grosso, he's no longer with us.

[46:10] Telly Leung: But Vinny said it doesn't matter if you're the star of the show or if you're the person whose responsibility is to sweep the stage every night, everybody's job is important.

[46:16] Ben Rimalower: Uh-huh.

[46:17] Telly Leung: And so I think understanding that has actually helped me. Just going, oh, right, everybody has a part to play. The theater does not exist in a vacuum. You know, I say this too, that other artists, you know, you can be a sculptor and you can put lock yourself in a room with a big piece of rock and come out with something, right? Theater doesn't happen that way. Like if there's no actor to say the line, if there's no writer to write the line, there's no actor to say it, there's no director to tell you where to go, there's no lighting person. I mean, it involves bringing people together, and everybody's function is important. One piece is missing and it's not theater anymore.

[46:49] Telly Leung: Machine falls back. It's not theater anymore. So I think I don't know, like I view everything as sort of as ensemble. I really do. Even when I'm Aladdin and I'm a leading man, I go, what's my function as a leading man? Right. It's my function to carry the story along every night. It's my function to lead the morale of a company. Is my so like in some ways I kind of think of it that way.

[47:09] Ben Rimalower: When did you start adding on the cabaret concert um yeah.

[47:15] Telly Leung: Avenue to your I I started, well, first of all, I was inspired by people like Patty. When you would hear Patter on an album like that or see her at the curd, you were like, Oh yeah, that's amazing. I also would go see Betty Buckley's acts all the time at the Bottom Line, I would go see her and you know, which is no longer here anymore in New York City.

[47:31] Telly Leung: Yeah this tiny little club in the village. You know, so I was I was definitely inspired by by those divas for sure, for cabaret. And the what was the other person that I that I oh Karen Mason always did a lot of cabarets, right? You would hear even though I was like old enough to get into these clubs. You knew that they that was something that they did.

[47:49] Ben Rimalower: Yeah, yeah.

[47:50] Telly Leung: Um, but I remember my first Barba show was Flower Drum Song, and it opened and closed in four months. And as a young person who just finished four years of conservatory training where you're eating and breathing in sleeping theater and then jumping into a Broadway show, like all of a sudden to go, okay, now I'm just like a 22-year-old in New York City without any artistic any like outlet at all. I said, I gotta I gotta push I gotta do this. I'm just gonna go to Don't Tell Mama's, I'm gonna like find a musical director, you know, and backstage. I found like a musical director in backstage. I talked to Sydney Meyer. I just said, Hey, I'm a young cat, I just graduate. I was like, how do I book a room here? I just did it myself.

[48:26] Telly Leung: Um I became friends with Andrew Gans, Andrew Gans over at Playbill.

[48:30] Ben Rimalower: Ah, sure.

[48:30] Telly Leung: Find some songs for me, actually. Pulled me a really great Judy Gold song, Julie Gold song, and um and said, try this, you know.

[48:37] Telly Leung: And so was pulling material for me. I'm at Andrew Gans because I've been reading Diva Talk every time every Friday. Obsessed me too all through college, and I had moved to New York, and he used to do this thing in his columns where he would reference like bootlegs that he had that the public didn't necessarily have.

[48:55] Telly Leung: Oh, and Matters of the Heart, Patty's next album after Patty LuPone Live was coming out, and it wasn't coming out for like another month, but he referenced like a uh like a uh teaser EP that he'd been sent. And I like found his like email address and I like emailed him cold, and I was like, I need that too.

[49:14] Ben Rimalower: Was that the one with Back to Before Notadigo's right and playbill and all of those things?

[49:19] Telly Leung: Oh, that was such a good one.

[49:20] Telly Leung: So Andrew sent me a copy, and then like we became friends and started like having like video nights and all that because I was like, I need that type of phone tape, but he gave it to me.

[49:28] Telly Leung: It's so I mean I I hate to I also I too had bootlegs. I was on AOL.

[49:31] Telly Leung: Oh god, I was on all the chat rooms. I, you know, because before the Rent double disc came out, I had to get the the eight cassette tapes that was Rent.

[49:40] Telly Leung: Do you mean the bootleg, you know, the cassettes of Betty Buckley doing Sunset Boulevard in London. The, you know, the bootlegs of Carrie, the musical that were all on tape, you know, Betty Buckley and Barbara Cook.

[49:51] Telly Leung: You know, you had to have all of them.

[49:53] Ben Rimalower: Right, of course.

[49:54] Telly Leung: Of course. Yes, like I had to have all the cassette bootlegs. I wonder where those are now. I would love to get my hands on it. A lot of it's on YouTube.

[50:01] Ben Rimalower: Oh, yeah.

[50:02] Telly Leung: I had, you know, my piece de resistance was the Patti LuPone at doing Sunset, you know, Sidman 10.

[50:10] Ben Rimalower: At Sidmonton, like at the workshop.

[50:12] Telly Leung: Yeah. You know, I was like, oh, I can't believe that. Okay, so I interrupted. So Andrew Gans, you have to be friends with the other.

[50:17] Telly Leung: So I really it was I came out of a need to just keep doing it. I didn't realize you had started doing that stuff so early.

[50:23] Telly Leung: I did. I was 23 and my first show was called Let Me Sing. You know, the Irving Berlin song, Let Me Sing. Amazing.

[50:28] Telly Leung: Stephen Ray Watkins was my first musical director. So you found good. And I charged an eight dollar cover just so I could make enough to pay Steven. And that's really how it started.

[50:39] Ben Rimalower: Because I just said I need to I just need to keep out consistently keep doing that as you built the rest of your career, or was there a gap before you sort of came back as a star to like doing?

[50:50] Telly Leung: Oh gosh. It's so weird. Like hearing the word star still really drives me, it drives like makes me like a little bit like wince a little bit. It's so interesting. I just had a friend of mine text me and was like, uh I'm writing this play. Are you too much of a star to come in and read from my play? I was like, wait, wait, when did I become too much of a star to like audition for a play? I don't know, I don't know. It's very bizarre to me to like hear the word star.

[51:11] Telly Leung: But I don't know, now it's become a whole other career for me, right? Like it's become a whole other way for me to make a living between Broadway shows, and I love being able to do that. But really, what I also found it in the beginning as an artistic challenge.

[51:24] Telly Leung: Yeah, right. I started to then as I was living in the city, go to cabarets and go see people's acts, and I started to learn what I liked and I didn't like. You know, I always found that when people would just get up and sing their book of songs, I was always turned off by it.

[51:36] Telly Leung: But whenever I got to go see somebody like Patti or somebody like Betty Buckley.

[51:41] Ben Rimalower: Well, but or even the real cabaret art.

[51:42] Telly Leung: I mean, I met you watching Brandon Cutrol.

[51:47] Ben Rimalower: Oh, yeah.

[51:47] Telly Leung: And I mean, to me, he is someone who I mean almost peerlessly is really a cabaret artist. I mean, he could be like a Nancy Lamont.

[51:56] Ben Rimalower: Absolutely.

[51:56] Telly Leung: You know, just that it's not at all a recital kind of thing. I mean, Brandon has to happens to have a really great voice, but he has a way of phrasing and building a number. And it's its own kind of storytelling.

[52:09] Ben Rimalower: Absolutely.

[52:09] Telly Leung: It's so exciting. That it's individual.

[52:11] Telly Leung: Yeah, that it's not the same old song done the same old way. And also that it reflects, it goes back to, I mean, you learned something about Brandon when you listen, you taught when he talks about his family and his shows and why he picked the song. You learn something about him.

[52:23] Ben Rimalower: I know so much about Sandy Patty only.

[52:26] Telly Leung: Correct. But even that, like, that then I know. Oh, right, like he's a big Sandy Patty fan.

[52:31] Ben Rimalower: Yeah.

[52:31] Telly Leung: Oh, because he grew up in a really religious home.

[52:33] Ben Rimalower: Yeah.

[52:34] Telly Leung: So you've learned something about him.

[52:35] Telly Leung: Absolutely. Like, and that too, to me, I found that as the new challenge as an artist.

[52:39] Telly Leung: Yeah. In my young 20s as I was putting together cabaret shows. Oh, it's not Telly playing a role. It's Telly as Telly, and to trust that my story is enough.

[52:47] Telly Leung: And that and to trust that, you know, if I am very truthful and honest about my story, that it will inspire others to be truthful about their story. It's just it's kind of what my acting teacher was trying to get at.

[52:54] Ben Rimalower: Totally, yeah.

[52:58] Telly Leung: Freshman year.

[52:59] Telly Leung: Yeah. And it was also something that I remembered, like I was I was working on Company with Billy Porter, my senior year in college. And you know, when you go to college, they teach you voice and speech and they teach you movement and they teach you technique and the right way to pronounce words and all of that, and the right way to phrase Shakespeare.

[53:13] Ben Rimalower: It's great.

[53:13] Telly Leung: And then I Billy was like, Listen, you say everything right, you look right, you're just not talking and listening to me. And I was like, What? I am talking, I'm saying the line.

[53:21] Telly Leung: He's like, No, no, no, you're saying the line. You're not talking and listening. Like, I need to hear you, Telly, speak these lines. There needs to be some sort of time where I lose Bobby in this, and how Bobby should sound and Bobby should be Telly, Telly should be Bobby. It should be you speaking this.

[53:35] Telly Leung: That was sort of it sounds so simple, but it was actually a revelation to a student, to somebody who was a good student, to somebody who went through years of training to like, you know, I mean I grew up in Brooklyn. I used to say coffee, chocolate, water.

[53:50] Telly Leung: It took hours to like knock that out of your system. And if I'm drunk, you'll still hear me say chocolate.

[53:55] Telly Leung: Coffee. Let's go get coffee at the diner. Like you'll still hear me say like hairspray, like I'll drop the R's. Do you know what I mean?

[54:01] Ben Rimalower: But like if I'm drunk, it'll still come out, you know.

[54:04] Telly Leung: That's so funny. I mean, that advice is so important, and it's also so hard to implement because it makes so much sense intellectually, but how does he then have the way in?

[54:15] Ben Rimalower: Yeah, you know, I mean, I've had teachers say that to me, and then it's like, oh okay, but how do I do that?

[54:21] Telly Leung: Well, and you know, someone like who was always a good student doing things the right way. When someone says no to say it to me, it's like there's an instinct, you're like, Oh, I'm doing it wrong. And so that you automatically judge yourself, and that makes it all the harder.

[54:31] Telly Leung: So cabaret, it is it is the epitome of that. There's no hiding behind anything, it is just you and a mic.

[54:38] Ben Rimalower: Yeah.

[54:39] Telly Leung: You know what I mean? And it's so bare. And it actually what ended up happening was working on cabaret like made me a better actor.

[54:46] Telly Leung: That's what Patti LuPone said. That's what it actually ended up happening. It made me a better actor, a better storyteller.

[54:51] Telly Leung: It made it makes me a better, you know. I just MC'd an event last night for BIV for Broadway Inspirational Voices.

[54:56] Ben Rimalower: Oh, great.

[54:56] Telly Leung: They're celebrating their 25th anniversary. This amazing organization, my dear friend Michael McElroy started this choir, and it made me a better. I didn't sing last night, but you know, keeping the pat having patterned many years in cabaret and keeping an energy going for the night, like it helped me host it.

[55:11] Ben Rimalower: Well, that's an incredible testament to how well you've done, not just career-wise, but in terms of taking that advice from your teacher and being yourself and being a real storyteller and communicator that Michael McElroy would want you to do that, not just to come and sing a song.

[55:29] Telly Leung: Yeah.

[55:29] Telly Leung: In fact, that you're somebody that can be a personality, the audience can relate to and have the host be.

[55:35] Telly Leung: Yeah, right. And it's, it's well, thank you. I really I enjoy doing it. I'd love to do more of it, Jimmy.

[55:41] Telly Leung: But also, you know, creating your own work also came out of necessity.

[55:45] Telly Leung: Sure, right. You know, as an Asian American actor, there just weren't that many opportunities for me. You know, I came to New York in 2002, Saigon closed in 2001, and I was like, oh congrats, that was it. I just lost my chance.

[55:54] Telly Leung: And not knowing the Flower Drum Song was around the corner and not knowing Billy Porter was gonna like pick up the phone for me and like get me an audition. So like I, you know, I just didn't know.

[56:05] Telly Leung: I didn't know. And so the cabaret keeps you going as an artist and keeps your muscles going, then it's good for you.

[56:11] Ben Rimalower: Well, um, all right, so we are running out of time. We have a game that we play with our play with you.

[56:16] Telly Leung: Um, you know the game Maryfuck Kill.

[56:18] Ben Rimalower: Oh, you oh oh no.

[56:19] Telly Leung: So we play a game called Dolly Concert Kill, and we're gonna give you three performers, and you choose one to see as Dolly Levi on Broadway, one to see in a peak career concert, okay if you're choosing, and the third one, unfortunately.

[56:33] Ben Rimalower: I have to kill?

[56:34] Telly Leung: Oh no.

[56:35] Ben Rimalower: Oh gosh.

[56:36] Telly Leung: Now, some of the older generation struggled with this. We made a special version Dolly concert chill.

[56:40] Ben Rimalower: We're a concert highway and not a hatus, but no, you're underfree.

[56:44] Telly Leung: Oh, like cryogenically freeze them so that we don't actually kill them.

[56:46] Ben Rimalower: Maybe like Walt Disney.

[56:47] Telly Leung: But you actually have to kill them.

[56:49] Ben Rimalower: Oh yeah.

[56:50] Telly Leung: So I think they obviously have to do Patti, Betty, and Bernadette, I guess.

[56:54] Ben Rimalower: Patti, Betty, Bernadette's pretty much the trifecta.

[56:57] Telly Leung: Well, I would, I mean, because the other two ladies have oh gosh, this is really difficult because at the end of the day, kill somebody or chill somebody cryogenically freeze stuff.

[57:09] Telly Leung: Um I've seen them in concerts so often. So I would say I actually I would say I would Dolly Bernadette.

[57:20] Ben Rimalower: Wow.

[57:21] Telly Leung: Okay. I saw Bernadette, she was brilliant. I have to make a confession. My favorite, and I've actually told her this was Donna Murphy. She was actually my favorite Dolly of all the Dollies.

[57:30] Ben Rimalower: Um wanna know my favorite?

[57:32] Telly Leung: Who?

[57:32] Ben Rimalower: Carol Channing.

[57:33] Telly Leung: Carol Channing.

[57:33] Ben Rimalower: Well, okay, got it.

[57:35] Telly Leung: Understood.

[57:35] Telly Leung: I guess I also saw Carol.

[57:37] Ben Rimalower: That's our lunt.

[57:38] Telly Leung: There's nobody that's Carol, of course.

[57:40] Telly Leung: But um, but uh I guess I would, you know, I hate to say this, I would concert Betty.

[57:46] Ben Rimalower: Uh-huh.

[57:46] Telly Leung: And I would kill Patti only because I actually feel like she would—yeah, but I also feel like she would come back from the dead anyway.

[57:56] Ben Rimalower: Jimmy, like you can't kill her.

[57:58] Telly Leung: Right.

[57:58] Ben Rimalower: You just can't kill Patti.

[58:00] Telly Leung: Okay.

[58:00] Telly Leung: So I'm gonna try. She'd probably kill me.

[58:03] Ben Rimalower: She'd probably kill you back.

[58:04] Telly Leung: Yeah, she killed me first. That's hilarious.

[58:07] Ben Rimalower: Um is there anything we can we can plug for you?

[58:10] Telly Leung: Um, plug. Um, yeah. So I um I don't know. I as a new native New Yorker, I um I love uh you know, I love this town.

[58:19] Telly Leung: And Billy Joel's New York State of Mind has always sort of been a New York City anthem for me.

[58:24] Ben Rimalower: Yeah.

[58:24] Telly Leung: And so what I wanted to do, since Gabe since World Pride was happening in New York City this year, and we're celebrating Stonewall, I wanted to do a dance remix.

[58:31] Telly Leung: I've never done a dance remix in my entire life, but I was like, let me try this.

[58:34] Telly Leung: It's just done a full dance. I released it, it's out.

[58:39] Telly Leung: So you can go on Spotify and go on iTunes. You can go, um, you can go download my remixes of New York State of Mind.

[58:44] Telly Leung: Um there's an awesome remixer that I love. And I also love dance music. Like that's the other, that's what I like to listen to when I'm at the gym, or if I'm walking down the street in New York City, I'm actually not listening to show tunes because that's what I've done.

[58:57] Telly Leung: But like, you know, I mean, I love it. I love an old school Deborah Cox, I love an old school.

[59:02] Ben Rimalower: Yeah, I think I yes, I will like, I love like I'm listening to house music and EDM all the time.

[59:07] Telly Leung: Because just because I feel like it's good New York City music.

[59:09] Telly Leung: Yeah, there's this great, there's this great DJ out in Florida, her name is Twisted D, but she's from Long Island.

[59:15] Telly Leung: And so she did a great remix on it. Um she does a lot of remixes of like Janet tunes and stuff like that.

[59:20] Telly Leung: So if you're on like SoundCloud or if you're on you know Spotify and stuff, you can get her stuff.

[59:23] Telly Leung: But um, she did a really cool mix on it. So I yeah, that's um that's that's out.

[59:31] Telly Leung: It's a dance mix of New York State of Mind. And also, um, play it after the show, too.

[59:35] Ben Rimalower: Yeah, please, please do that.

[59:36] Telly Leung: So there's this cut, there's this thing. Cheetah Rivera is doing this new thing called Cheetah and Friends.

[59:40] Telly Leung: So we're trying it out for the first time.

[59:42] Ben Rimalower: Didn't you do that at Carnegie Hall?

[59:43] Telly Leung: We were supposed to do it in Kansas City. Cheetah got sick, so we had to postpone the date.

[59:47] Telly Leung: So we're going back, we're returning and wonderful. And her friends this time are me and Corey Cott.

[59:53] Telly Leung: Amazing. So she's basically found two Broadway leading men to be able to like hold their own and sing some material of their own.

[59:59] Telly Leung: But I mean, I like I'm a Broadway leading man, but Cory and I are like so excited to like sing.

[1:00:03] Ben Rimalower: Oh, you're gonna see her Shiva.

[1:00:07] Telly Leung: I need all the videos.

[1:00:08] Ben Rimalower: That's a dolly I want to see. Cheetah Rivera.

[1:00:11] Telly Leung: Totally.

[1:00:12] Ben Rimalower: Right? Wouldn't she kill it?

[1:00:13] Telly Leung: Absolutely, absolutely.

[1:00:14] Telly Leung: You can get a taste. You can see pictures because she was in um Jerry's Girls.

[1:00:18] Ben Rimalower: Oh, yeah.

[1:00:19] Telly Leung: And there was a number where they all did Hello.

[1:00:22] Telly Leung: I think they all did together on Broadway Just Leave Everything to Me or one of the numbers.

[1:00:25] Ben Rimalower: So you can see her in the drag.

[1:00:27] Telly Leung: Oh yeah.

[1:00:29] Ben Rimalower: And where can people follow you on social media?

[1:00:31] Telly Leung: Oh, yeah, I'm at Telly Leung. Super easy.

[1:00:33] Telly Leung: And my website's uh tellyleung.com.

[1:00:35] Ben Rimalower: Amazing.

[1:00:36] Telly Leung: We love you, Telly. Thank you for the fun.

[1:00:40] Telly Leung: All right.

[1:00:41] Telly Leung: Um thank you, thank you.

[1:00:42] Telly Leung: Oh my gosh, yeah, sure.

[1:00:45] Telly Leung: New York's Day of Mind.

[1:00:47] Telly Leung: I'm in a I'm in a New York's Day of Mind.

[1:00:51] Telly Leung: I'm in a I'm in a New York's Day of Mind.

[1:00:56] Telly Leung: I'm in a New York State of Mind.

[1:00:59] Telly Leung: I'm in a I'm in a New York.

[1:01:01] Ben Rimalower: Thanks for listening to Ben Rimalower's Broken Records on Broadway World.

[1:01:04] Ben Rimalower: For more episodes, visit Broadway World, iTunes, Stitcher, or wherever podcasts do be.

[1:01:11] Ben Rimalower: Come back next week for Real Housewives of New York City star, Countess Luann de Lesseps.

[1:01:15] Ben Rimalower: Coming in to talk about Madonna's first album, Madonna. Other upcoming guests include legendary columnist Michael Musto, cabaret goddess Natalie Douglas, and Tony Award-winning lyricists and director Scott Whitman.

[1:01:27] Ben Rimalower: This episode was recorded at CDM Studios in New York City and was edited by me, Daniel Nolen.

[1:01:32] Ben Rimalower: Special thanks to Emmy winning composer and lyricist Lance Horn for the Broken Records theme song.

[1:01:37] Ben Rimalower: Follow us both, Ben Rimalower and Daniel Nolen on all y'all's socials.

[1:01:40] Ben Rimalower: That's Ben Rimalower, B-E-N R-I-M A-L-O-W-E-R.

[1:01:47] Ben Rimalower: And that's Nolan with an E, not Nolan with an A.

[1:01:49] Ben Rimalower: Because Nolan with an A, isn't it?

[1:01:52] Telly Leung: I'm in U.

[1:01:54] Telly Leung: I'm in a New York State of Mind.