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[0:21] Elliott Mattox: This is Equity One, Broadway's Happy Hour. Pour yourself a drink and join us as we chat about life, theater, and everything in between. I'm Elliott Mattox.

[0:31] Caleb Dicke: And I'm Caleb Dicke. Join us for your Equity One.

[0:42] Elliott Mattox: Welcome to this week's episode of Equity One. Hi Caleb.

[0:46] Caleb Dicke: We are actually sitting here in the Broadway Podcast Network studio, which you know we don't always get to do.

[0:52] Elliott Mattox: Oftentimes we're rogue at Open Jar.

[0:54] Caleb Dicke: Yeah, we like to go back to our roots.

[0:56] Elliott Mattox: Yeah, we like to go back to our roots and just keep it really self-made.

[1:00] Caleb Dicke: So and just make it as terrible as possible.

[1:03] Elliott Mattox: But we love being here.

[1:04] Caleb Dicke: Yeah, yeah.

[1:05] Elliott Mattox: And we are joined this week by our guest Mo Brady. Hi Mo.

[1:09] Mo Brady: Hi guys. Thanks for having me.

[1:11] Elliott Mattox: Of course. We're so happy to have you. I can't see you.

[1:15] Mo Brady: No, which is driving me crazy. I'm gonna I know what you look like.

[1:17] Elliott Mattox: I know, I know I've seen you a few times, but what I'm gonna do is this.

[1:21] Caleb Dicke: Oh scarably.

[1:21] Mo Brady: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay, because then I can see you. Yeah, how's that? Is that are the levels still okay?

[1:26] Caleb Dicke: Then you guys can't see each other though.

[1:28] Mo Brady: It's okay, but please. Um we are also here with um our new friend Brit, who's also a podcaster here on the Broadway Podcast Network. She hosts A Broadsway. You can check her out. But she is um fulfilling podcast dad duties today.

[1:43] Elliott Mattox: So if you're if if Alan is podcast dad and B is podcast like, like what is she, Auntie, like podcast cousin?

[1:50] Mo Brady: Auntie, yeah, cousin.

[1:51] Caleb Dicke: And a cousin. I feel like you're sick.

[1:53] Mo Brady: But it's like girlfriend.

[1:54] Caleb Dicke: Girlfriend.

[1:54] Mo Brady: Oh, girlfriend, I love that.

[1:57] Caleb Dicke: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, that's really sweet.

[1:59] Mo Brady: Yeah, I like that. Cool. Podcast GF. Great.

[2:02] Elliott Mattox: So this month we're We did it, guys. Off to a great start. We introduced everyone. Everyone's here. We're having some bourbon. Caleb is not drinking.

[2:10] Caleb Dicke: No, I'm we're almost finished. I do dry January every year since 2015.

[2:16] Elliott Mattox: You're a classy guy.

[2:17] Caleb Dicke: Thank you. Just in January.

[2:19] Elliott Mattox: Yeah. And then February February um February 1st hits that 1201, and then I have a beer in my hand.

[2:23] Mo Brady: Yeah. You're a hot mess.

[2:25] Caleb Dicke: Yeah. Totally. Great. It's just um the holidays, like, I feel like I like drink, drink, drink, boom, boom, boom. And I eat so much, and then I'm like, okay, we need to reset.

[2:32] Mo Brady: So well, you are fat as fuck.

[2:35] Caleb Dicke: So I know. Like I was.

[2:36] Mo Brady: So you're a monster.

[2:38] Caleb Dicke: You guys can't see Caleb right now, but he gained a lot of weight over the holidays.

[2:41] Mo Brady: That's why I'm not posting.

[2:42] Caleb Dicke: So like it's all like it's all Getty Images, I thought of myself.

[2:47] Mo Brady: Wait. Have you guys watched Don't Fuck with Cats?

[2:49] Caleb Dicke: No, my husband did, and he said it was fucked up.

[2:52] Mo Brady: It is insane. Just the guy talking about Photoshop.

[2:55] Caleb Dicke: Uh huh. It's a it's a must. I won't watch it, but Michael has watched it, and he decided to watch like three episodes of you and Don't Fuck with Cats all in one night.

[3:04] Mo Brady: And he was like, Can you hurry home? He was like, I can't go to sleep because I'm afraid.

[3:11] Caleb Dicke: Yeah, that's I hear it's scary.

[3:12] Mo Brady: I don't really do scary.

[3:13] Caleb Dicke: It's it's messed up.

[3:15] Mo Brady: It's messed up, yeah, right?

[3:16] Caleb Dicke: Yeah. And is there blood?

[3:18] Mo Brady: Um they talk about blood.

[3:21] Caleb Dicke: Okay.

[3:22] Mo Brady: But it like evolves. You think it's this in the beginning, and then at the end of the three episodes, you're like, mind blown. This is insane.

[3:29] Caleb Dicke: My husband's a true crime fanatic.

[3:31] Mo Brady: True crime podcast, yeah.

[3:33] Caleb Dicke: True crime Netflix docuseries.

[3:36] Mo Brady: Michael's the same way. He wants it all.

[3:38] Caleb Dicke: Yeah. Yeah, I don't really I don't really do do all of that as much.

[3:42] Mo Brady: What do you do?

[3:43] Caleb Dicke: Um a lot of Drag Race. I like I I like to re-watch things I've watched uh a lot of times. So it's a lot of Drag Race, it's a lot of the Bonapet YouTube channel.

[3:53] Mo Brady: Oh, I've heard the Bonapet YouTube channel is a true religion.

[3:58] Caleb Dicke: Do you watch it on a television like an old person or do you watch it on your phone?

[4:02] Mo Brady: I watch it like I I it depends on what I'm doing. So like if I'm like in the kitchen, I'll watch it on either my computer or my phone. And if I'm sitting in the like if I'm like waking up and having my coffee, I will put it on the TV.

[4:15] Caleb Dicke: Oh my gosh.

[4:16] Mo Brady: Yeah.

[4:17] Caleb Dicke: Okay. Appointment television.

[4:18] Mo Brady: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[4:21] Elliott Mattox: What are you watching, Mo?

[4:23] Mo Brady: Um, I am watching uh Oscar nominated films because it's that time of year.

[4:30] Mo Brady: It's the season for screeners.

[4:32] Caleb Dicke: Uh huh. Yes.

[4:33] Mo Brady: Um and I don't get screeners myself, but you know, you can sort of like yeah, you can feel it.

[4:37] Caleb Dicke: You kind of like find them on the street.

[4:40] Mo Brady: Yeah, sure. Or just like go over to people's houses and be like, oh, you got the screener.

[4:45] Caleb Dicke: Oh my god, I'd love to do that.

[4:46] Mo Brady: Did you see this one? I'd love to come over and watch the screener.

[4:50] Caleb Dicke: Yeah, exactly.

[4:50] Mo Brady: And then you can walk home with Parasite, which is what I did. Great movie.

[4:53] Caleb Dicke: It's amazing. I can't wait to see it.

[4:55] Mo Brady: I want to see it this week, but I want to see it in theaters.

[4:58] Caleb Dicke: Well, good luck. I don't know where it's playing.

[5:00] Mo Brady: Everywhere.

[5:04] Caleb Dicke: Apparently it's amazing.

[5:06] Mo Brady: Yeah. It's a good it's a good film. I watched um JoJo Rabbit.

[5:09] Caleb Dicke: Oh, yes.

[5:10] Mo Brady: Which I loved. And then I watched Joker, um, which is a movie.

[5:17] Caleb Dicke: Oh, I walked out of Joker because it shook me. Have you guys seen it?

[5:20] Mo Brady: No.

[5:21] Caleb Dicke: It was not for me. I didn't like it. I walked out because I was I didn't like how I felt.

[5:25] Mo Brady: Yeah.

[5:25] Caleb Dicke: Two thumbs down and two flat.

[5:27] Mo Brady: No, no, it's it's a really good, it's a good movie.

[5:29] Caleb Dicke: You saw it, Brittany?

[5:29] Mo Brady: Alright, three thumbs down.

[5:31] Caleb Dicke: I don't know if it's a good one. Take that, Oscar Noms.

[5:35] Mo Brady: Um we send my boyfriend screeners to my parents because they rent movies from the library because they don't have Netflix.

[5:42] Caleb Dicke: Oh my god.

[5:43] Mo Brady: So we sent them the original Stranger Things and they're like, we love this alien stuff from the 80s.

[5:47] Caleb Dicke: Oh my god, love that.

[5:48] Mo Brady: So I actually sent like 10 today through the mail.

[5:51] Caleb Dicke: Oh fine.

[5:51] Mo Brady: No get them on Friday.

[5:52] Caleb Dicke: You definitely didn't do that though.

[5:54] Mo Brady: No.

[5:54] Caleb Dicke: You didn't. I mean, you would just um my my parents are also scrum screen actor and kids.

[6:03] Mo Brady: Oh, sure.

[6:03] Caleb Dicke: Members as well. That's how I got into it.

[6:05] Mo Brady: Yeah, that's how I got into it. Totally. That makes sense.

[6:11] Caleb Dicke: Yes. Yeah. But there's lots to see. I well, I guess I have to see like 1917, but I don't really have any interest in war movies.

[6:18] Mo Brady: Yeah.

[6:19] Caleb Dicke: I don't have war movies either. I don't like um superhero movies or comic movies. So that's why I was not into the Joker situation.

[6:28] Mo Brady: Um Marriage Story on Netflix. That's one I haven't seen.

[6:30] Caleb Dicke: It's on Netflix and so sad.

[6:33] Mo Brady: Yeah. But I I'm I watched it and I'm still married, and so I feel I feel like I got through a major hoop.

[6:40] Caleb Dicke: Yeah.

[6:41] Mo Brady: Yeah. I was kind of afraid that I wouldn't.

[6:43] Caleb Dicke: You didn't like writing letters. You weren't like writing letters.

[6:45] Mo Brady: No.

[6:47] Caleb Dicke: I wasn't watching it be like, oh, I guess this is over, huh? This is all futile.

[6:51] Mo Brady: Oh my god. You're like, you're like, hey babe, can we watch this movie really quick?

[6:56] Caleb Dicke: We had the discussion about whether we were gonna watch Marriage Story together because we were like, it I feel like we're gonna like think about each other.

[7:04] Mo Brady: We didn't watch it together.

[7:05] Caleb Dicke: Yeah.

[7:06] Mo Brady: Oh god.

[7:06] Caleb Dicke: Yeah. Michael and I watched it together, and we were like, this is just so sad.

[7:10] Mo Brady: That was it. It was great. Really good. You're like, oh, look at those other people being sad. Not like us.

[7:15] Caleb Dicke: Like us over here. We're in the year.

[7:22] Mo Brady: Four years now.

[7:23] Caleb Dicke: Four years. A little over four years.

[7:24] Mo Brady: I know. It's not it's not as long as you and your husband.

[7:27] Caleb Dicke: How long have you all been together, right? Like a decade.

[7:29] Mo Brady: Oh my god. So old.

[7:30] Caleb Dicke: I know, right? Yeah. Fucking agent.

[7:33] Mo Brady: I'm I hope I'm allowed to swear on this problem.

[7:36] Caleb Dicke: Explicitly. We've all said we've all said the F-word.

[7:39] Mo Brady: You know, in the drinking.

[7:39] Caleb Dicke: Yeah. Yeah, yeah.

[7:41] Mo Brady: Yeah. No, we're going to be a little bit more.

[7:44] Caleb Dicke: Fast and Loose, like Erica Jane coming up on the Ambassador.

[7:50] Mo Brady: Have you seen her in it?

[7:51] Caleb Dicke: Wait, no, that's Velma. She plays Roxy.

[7:53] Mo Brady: She plays Roxy.

[7:54] Caleb Dicke: Okay. No, it's Velma that comes up and plays things fast and loose.

[7:56] Mo Brady: Oh yeah.

[7:57] Caleb Dicke: Yeah. But also. Did you guys watch the the search for Roxy?

[8:02] Mo Brady: No.

[8:02] Caleb Dicke: This I watched clips.

[8:04] Mo Brady: Yeah. Well, they posted the the winner.

[8:06] Caleb Dicke: Yeah, congrats to her.

[8:08] Mo Brady: Yeah. I don't remember her name.

[8:09] Caleb Dicke: Emma Plattin.

[8:10] Mo Brady: Emma Pittman.

[8:11] Caleb Dicke: Pittman.

[8:12] Mo Brady: Emma.

[8:12] Caleb Dicke: Pitfield.

[8:13] Mo Brady: Pittman.

[8:14] Caleb Dicke: Oh, look that up. We got Chaco.

[8:15] Mo Brady: Someone named Emma. Yay! Good for you.

[8:17] Caleb Dicke: This is horrible. But Pittman, Emma Pittman, right?

[8:20] Mo Brady: Emma Pittman.

[8:21] Caleb Dicke: Yeah, well, that's amazing. I mean, that's so exciting for someone to make their Barbecue debut playing Roxy. That's insane.

[8:26] Mo Brady: No dates, right? No dates yet.

[8:29] Caleb Dicke: No dates. No dates yet.

[8:30] Mo Brady: Yeah. Animal Chicago. I mean, they could throw her in for like a good Wednesday matinee and call it a day, right?

[8:34] Caleb Dicke: And that's your debut, yeah.

[8:36] Mo Brady: They're throwing people into that show all the time. You never know.

[8:38] Caleb Dicke: I mean, it I think they'd I I doubt they'd uh spend the money on a on a put in to just get one day out of her.

[8:44] Mo Brady: Yeah. She's probably eager or something.

[8:46] Caleb Dicke: She's a vacation swing.

[8:48] Mo Brady: Oh my god. You're ridiculous.

[8:50] Caleb Dicke: No, uh with the congratulations. Congratulations, Emma. I I didn't watch it. Huge accomplishment.

[8:55] Mo Brady: I didn't watch it. I'm not playing Roxy. That's incredible.

[8:57] Caleb Dicke: Yeah.

[8:55] Mo Brady: I didn't watch it.

[9:00] Caleb Dicke: Yes, exactly.

[9:01] Mo Brady: Oh my god. I will be the first male to play Roxy.

[9:03] Caleb Dicke: Oh my god. On Broadway. You know, we've all played it before in like a bedroom.

[9:07] Mo Brady: I was Renee Zellweger in my bedroom as a new year, new you, babe.

[9:13] Caleb Dicke: I still haven't seen Judy.

[9:15] Mo Brady: I haven't either. I I is it for is it just for older gays?

[9:21] Caleb Dicke: I don't know.

[9:21] Mo Brady: Well, you know exactly what happens. Like there's nothing surprised.

[9:24] Caleb Dicke: There's one thing that's yeah, and it's about the the most interesting time of her life, which is the end.

[9:29] Mo Brady: But it's not even the end end, it's before you don't even get to the end.

[9:33] Caleb Dicke: Oh, really?

[9:34] Mo Brady: Yeah. Pre-end of the rainbow.

[9:35] Caleb Dicke: End of the rainbow.

[9:37] Mo Brady: I love end of the rainbow. I feel like I saw it.

[9:39] Caleb Dicke: Yeah, but this is before that.

[9:40] Mo Brady: This is a movie.

[9:43] Caleb Dicke: Wait, so you're saying the movie Judy is different than the play?

[9:46] Mo Brady: No, I'm in the rainbow.

[9:47] Caleb Dicke: Well, I'm saying it is different in that Judy is a movie.

[9:50] Mo Brady: Yeah.

[9:51] Caleb Dicke: No what? Mediums.

[9:52] Mo Brady: Yeah, but no, we're I I know it's a movie.

[9:54] Caleb Dicke: Yeah.

[9:55] Mo Brady: That's how I'm saying they're different.

[9:57] Caleb Dicke: Okay, great.

[9:57] Mo Brady: Yeah. I mean, I haven't seen either I didn't see either, so I'm really talking out my ass here.

[10:01] Elliott Mattox: Wow. So like I can people must feel like they're in safe hands, but the experts of the American arts.

[10:08] Mo Brady: At Equity One.

[10:10] Elliott Mattox: And that's all the time we have with the next podcast for the month.

[10:15] Caleb Dicke: Okay, yeah. Take it away, Britt.

[10:17] Brittany: Hey, and uh our next guest for this episode is Brittany!

[10:23] Mo Brady: Coming soon. Um, we like to start off each interview um by dismissing our guest, but then asking them uh what first got them interested in the arts as a young person.

[10:37] Mo Brady: So, what first got you interested in the arts as a young person?

[10:41] Mo Brady: I assumed that's what you were gonna say. Um I don't think my story is that unique in that I was um a kind of a young, energetic misfit who uh was looking for a place to survive, you know, uh find a community. And I found that doing plays.

[11:00] Mo Brady: Um I had older siblings who would do this youth theater program every summer, and I saw them do it one summer and I was like that. I want to do that, and then it just sort of became the thing that I did.

[11:12] Caleb Dicke: How many siblings do you have?

[11:14] Mo Brady: I have six siblings.

[11:15] Caleb Dicke: Wow. Six siblings. Are you the youngest?

[11:16] Mo Brady: I'm third.

[11:17] Caleb Dicke: Third, right in the middle.

[11:18] Mo Brady: Right in the middle, well, four would be four of seven would be, yeah.

[11:22] Caleb Dicke: Four of seven. Six siblings, yeah.

[11:24] Mo Brady: Six siblings.

[11:25] Caleb Dicke: So it depends on your definition of right.

[11:28] Mo Brady: On the baby end. If if if if toward baby is to the right side, then to the right, you know, right in the center.

[11:35] Caleb Dicke: Yeah. I'm from a family of five kids. So I'm number four out of five. So like how like you're like you're like near baby.

[11:43] Mo Brady: I'm near baby.

[11:44] Caleb Dicke: Yeah. I think I'm not. I was baby at one point.

[11:46] Mo Brady: Yeah.

[11:46] Caleb Dicke: Yeah. As we all were.

[11:48] Mo Brady: As we all were, except for twins that were born really close to each other.

[11:53] Caleb Dicke: You're the youngest kids in your family are twins?

[11:56] Mo Brady: They are, but that wasn't what I meant. But they are yeah, six and seven are twins.

[12:00] Caleb Dicke: Oh my god. That's cool.

[12:01] Mo Brady: Yeah. That's so okay. So you are really close to the youngest.

[12:04] Caleb Dicke: Like no, I'm third. I'm third. So my youngest siblings were born when I was fourteen.

[12:11] Mo Brady: Okay, understood. So how what's the biggest age difference in your siblings?

[12:15] Mo Brady: That. 18. I think my oldest sibling was 18 when the twins were born.

[12:19] Caleb Dicke: Oh wow, okay. Do you feel like you're an uncle to them? Or like did you have like a different relationship than I have with my siblings who are closer in age?

[12:28] Mo Brady: Yeah, definitely. You know, like changing diapers and babysitting when you're you know your siblings.

[12:34] Caleb Dicke: Yeah.

[12:34] Mo Brady: Um but uncle gosh. I mean that's no because I like I I have nieces and nephews and they're like sure little guys, you know and I never tried to do that.

[12:37] Caleb Dicke: I never tried to do that with my youngest brothers. They're twenty five now and they've got their own yeah their own thing.

[12:52] Mo Brady: They're cooler than I am. For sure.

[12:55] Caleb Dicke: What makes them cooler? Why?

[12:56] Mo Brady: I don't know. They're just like that they're just like young and like listen to cool music. Like wear cool clothes. Love those and like go out to cool places. They're not even like millennials. They're like Generation Gen X.

[13:08] Caleb Dicke: Gen Z. Is that after millennial?

[13:11] Mo Brady: Gen No I'm a millennial.

[13:13] Caleb Dicke: Yeah. What's after us technically Jen Jen's this is a fascinating podcast.

[13:20] Mo Brady: This is a fantastic podcast.

[13:21] Caleb Dicke: Yeah. This is fa like really riveting.

[13:24] Mo Brady: We haven't checked on the birthday. What got me into theater? Good thing that you asked.

[13:26] Mo Brady: Yeah. Well well okay so like so you were s you remember seeing your siblings on stage and you wanted to get involved in this youth thing. Like what was the first like thing you did there that really like rocked your socks?

[13:39] Mo Brady: Um we would do a musical every summer. So stuff like The Music Man and Hello Dolly and Oliver and it just was the best part of my year.

[13:46] Mo Brady: Yeah. Like the month of going to those rehearsals and putting those shows together and it was like a kind of show where there'd be like a hundred kids in the cast and we would rehearse for like six weeks for four performances.

[14:00] Mo Brady: Exactly, you know the thing. And just a but like it felt like family and you felt like the sort of like things that made you an outsider or ostracized at school were the things that made you celebrated in this space. And so I just always kind of sought that out, I guess.

[14:17] Caleb Dicke: Where was this? Where did you grow up?

[14:18] Mo Brady: Uh Seattle.

[14:19] Caleb Dicke: Outside Seattle.

[14:20] Mo Brady: Oh, okay.

[14:21] Caleb Dicke: Wow. West Coast.

[14:22] Mo Brady: West Coast, but did that did you stay in Seattle forever, or where'd you go for college?

[14:25] Mo Brady: I went to Whitman College, which is a liberal arts college in Washington State, but on the other side of the state.

[14:30] Caleb Dicke: Okay.

[14:31] Mo Brady: Uh and then after college, after a quick trip to Orange County, California, I was back in Seattle for like seven years before I moved to New York.

[14:39] Caleb Dicke: So a lot of people um really interested in theater at a young age near Seattle.

[14:44] Mo Brady: Because we've talked to we've talked to Caitlin Kinnanen.

[14:46] Caleb Dicke: Oh yeah.

[14:47] Mo Brady: Caitlin was one of my students.

[14:48] Caleb Dicke: Oh really?

[14:49] Mo Brady: Yeah.

[14:49] Caleb Dicke: Oh wow.

[14:50] Mo Brady: So there's that kind of like so you guys are from the same area.

[14:54] Mo Brady: So you did the same thing. Uh when I moved back to Seattle, I helped run a youth theater program that was attached to a regional theater that I had worked at as a kid.

[15:03] Mo Brady: And um one of the students there was Caitlyn.

[15:06] Caleb Dicke: So Caitlin and I did, you know, I directed her and I choreographed her and taught her and worked with her mom and worked with her sister.

[15:16] Mo Brady: That's amazing.

[15:17] Caleb Dicke: Yeah.

[15:18] Mo Brady: I played Uncle Henry to her Dorothy in a last-minute understudy position in a production of The Wizard of Oz.

[15:28] Caleb Dicke: Always ready.

[15:28] Mo Brady: Yeah. Always ready.

[15:30] Mo Brady: Nothing says glamour more than the 25-year-old going into the youth theater production of The Wizard of Oz.

[15:38] Caleb Dicke: Those are professional dreams.

[15:39] Mo Brady: Exactly. Oh my god. I got my overall hack on. Let's put some Ben Nye Gray in this hair and call it a day.

[15:47] Mo Brady: So yes. Uh yeah. Um, I went to high school with Megan Hilte.

[15:51] Caleb Dicke: Oh, we were chemistry partners.

[15:53] Mo Brady: Um we were both terrible in chemistry.

[15:57] Caleb Dicke: Um my god, hilarious.

[15:59] Mo Brady: There's there, I think there's definitely like something about the like hippie granola crunchy liberal in the Pacific Northwest that like also connects to the arts and performing arts.

[16:07] Caleb Dicke: Sure, totally.

[16:08] Mo Brady: Um, and to be honest, I came from like the like wealthy suburbs of Seattle, and so there was money there for people to do theater and take voice lessons and take classes and do all the stuff.

[16:20] Caleb Dicke: Right.

[16:21] Mo Brady: So we I think that's why there's sort of like this. There's a lot of people that I grew up with that ended up in New York.

[16:29] Caleb Dicke: And you're able to get from Washington to New York City, which is not close.

[16:34] Mo Brady: No, it's a long flight.

[16:36] Caleb Dicke: It's a long flight.

[16:37] Mo Brady: It's a long flight.

[16:38] Mo Brady: I did that last last summer a couple times.

[16:41] Caleb Dicke: I've never been to Washington.

[16:42] Mo Brady: Twice.

[16:42] Mo Brady: Oh, because Michael was on NCL and they were.

[16:45] Caleb Dicke: Yeah, they were porting in Seattle.

[16:46] Mo Brady: Got it.

[16:46] Mo Brady: So I got to fly out there, and you want to do that flight direct for sure.

[16:51] Caleb Dicke: No stops.

[16:52] Mo Brady: No stops in Atlanta.

[16:53] Caleb Dicke: Uh uh.

[16:54] Mo Brady: Chicago, where flights go to die.

[16:58] Caleb Dicke: Chicago at the Ambassador Theater starting Emma Pittman.

[17:02] Mo Brady: That's Roxy Hart.

[17:03] Caleb Dicke: Congratulations.

[17:04] Mo Brady: It all comes back.

[17:05] Caleb Dicke: It all comes back.

[17:07] Mo Brady: Did you major in theater in college?

[17:09] Mo Brady: I did.

[17:09] Mo Brady: It was a liberal art school, so it was like a little bit of everything.

[17:12] Mo Brady: Like I wrote a thesis in gorilla marketing tactics for the theater.

[17:17] Mo Brady: Um, and that's where those were my jobs right out of uh college, where working in marketing departments of regional theaters.

[17:24] Caleb Dicke: Um, and so it was because it was like a liberal art school, you sort of did like a little bit of everything.

[17:29] Mo Brady: We did a lot of shows, we did like nine faculty-directed shows every year, and so there's lots of opportunity to be on stage, but there was also lots of opportunity to like make props and build the sets and design.

[17:39] Caleb Dicke: We're crew and stuff like that.

[17:40] Mo Brady: Yeah, exactly. So you were like always busy, which I loved.

[17:44] Mo Brady: I found out that I was good at making props in college.

[17:47] Mo Brady: I made like cool, like in like stagecraft.

[17:50] Mo Brady: Yeah, stagecraft like food. We had to make food crafts, and I was really good at that.

[17:54] Mo Brady: I think what I liked about props was like the organizing and the lists, not actually making or finding going to the warehouse and finding it.

[18:01] Caleb Dicke: Yeah, exactly.

[18:01] Mo Brady: Yeah, yeah. You're just like, these are the things I need. Let me check these off of a list.

[18:05] Mo Brady: Yeah, and then send someone else to them.

[18:07] Caleb Dicke: Yeah.

[18:08] Mo Brady: So congratulations to you, Caleb.

[18:10] Mo Brady: We would have been a great team. You made the list and I would have found it in the city.

[18:13] Caleb Dicke: Oh, there we go.

[18:14] Mo Brady: Yeah, let's go back to school.

[18:15] Caleb Dicke: Okay.

[18:16] Mo Brady: No.

[18:17] Mo Brady: Um, you said that when you first got out of school, a lot of your jobs were in marketing.

[18:22] Caleb Dicke: Yeah.

[18:22] Mo Brady: So talk about that because I think that's an unusual path for most people who um pursue performing.

[18:28] Mo Brady: Yeah, I didn't really think I was gonna be a professional performer at that point. I certainly enjoyed it.

[18:34] Mo Brady: Um, but I thought that what would make what made me more unique was my interest in why people go to the theater.

[18:42] Mo Brady: You know, I love this thing. We all at this table love this thing, but most people out there don't love going to the theater as much as we do.

[18:51] Mo Brady: And I was like, why? And so I was really trying to pursue that, and so I worked in the marketing department of South Coast Repertory, which is like a regional Lord House in Orange County, California, right out of school, writing press releases and like making department budgets and like you know, like not really that exciting stuff, but like it was like my first foray into it, and then after realizing I didn't really want to live in Southern California, that's when I moved back to Seattle and I helped run the youth theater program.

[19:23] Caleb Dicke: So, what was your transition from Seattle to New York? Like, what was that process?

[19:27] Mo Brady: Lots of little steps. So while I was running the youth theater program, I had friends who I'd grown up with gone to high school with being like, Oh, we're gonna do this community theater show, you should audition.

[19:37] Mo Brady: So then I would audition for the community theater show, and then I was like, okay, well, now I'm doing the community theater show. What if I auditioned for the equity theater shows?

[19:45] Mo Brady: And then started booking, and uh in like about a three-year transition, I ended up doing what actors in regional cities kind of get to do, which is piece your season together.

[19:59] Mo Brady: You know, I think um in the nonprofit world where everything is scheduled a year in advance, sure, you can sort of be in a Chicago or a DC or Seattle and get to September and go, I know what I'm doing for the next nine months.

[20:15] Mo Brady: I'm gonna be in this play, and then I'm gonna teach this class, and then I'm gonna associate direct this thing, and it got to the point where I could sort of have a season, and I was like, all right, I'm gonna take the leap.

[20:23] Caleb Dicke: Uh-huh.

[20:24] Mo Brady: And so I spent about five years as a professional actor in Seattle, which meant that I was acting, but also that I was directing, career grafting, assisting, and all the things.

[20:34] Caleb Dicke: Sure.

[20:35] Mo Brady: Yeah.

[20:35] Mo Brady: Um, so it was sort of a slow process, and I am definitely it it wasn't one where I just like took a leap and went, but uh it it ended up being fruitful as I was building relationships with theaters and you know, booking stuff.

[20:50] Caleb Dicke: Yeah.

[20:51] Mo Brady: So uh you built that that life in Seattle, and then what what brought you to New York?

[20:57] Mo Brady: Um, I well, two things. I had in my last year in Seattle, worked a lot at the Fifth Avenue Theater, which does a lot of pre-Broadway stuff.

[21:06] Caleb Dicke: Yes.

[21:07] Mo Brady: So I in my last season, they did maybe six shows, and I was involved in five of them.

[21:13] Mo Brady: I was Christopher Ashley's assistant on Memphis. I was Sam Buntrock, who directed um Sunday in the Park with George here.

[21:21] Mo Brady: He remounted it in Seattle. So I was his assistant in Seattle.

[21:24] Mo Brady: And then I was also in all of these shows.

[21:26] Mo Brady: And so I was working with people like Jerry Mitchell and Jack O'Brien and Sergio.

[21:30] Caleb Dicke: Sure.

[21:31] Mo Brady: I was doing the I did the pre-Broadway of Catch Me If You Can out there.

[21:34] Mo Brady: And so I was like, ah, I think I can do this. Like, look at all this.

[21:38] Caleb Dicke: Totally.

[21:38] Mo Brady: I'm sort of like in the I'm I'm I'm working with the people.

[21:43] Caleb Dicke: Yeah.

[21:43] Mo Brady: Um, and then also I fell in love with somebody who lived in New York.

[21:47] Mo Brady: And so we were doing long distance for like almost a year, and it felt like, well, it's time to see if that works as well.

[21:55] Mo Brady: So the idea that maybe I could make it work here, and then also that I wanted to see what the next step was in my relationship.

[22:03] Caleb Dicke: Okay.

[22:04] Mo Brady: And and what what was that transition like? What what was so what was different coming to New York from Seattle?

[22:11] Mo Brady: The beginning was actually really great.

[22:13] Mo Brady: Um, I was lucky enough to come with representation, which really is a game changer when someone can just get you in the door.

[22:22] Mo Brady: Um and so, and I think when you're fresh meet in the city, people are excited to see what you can do.

[22:28] Caleb Dicke: Absolutely.

[22:30] Mo Brady: And so at the very beginning, it was like lots of appointments.

[22:34] Mo Brady: Uh-huh. I was like constantly going out for shows, and I felt like I was like because people haven't put you in a box yet, right?

[22:41] Mo Brady: You know, and so people are like, All right, you're new, what do you do?

[22:44] Caleb Dicke: Yeah, and so that was a time where I was like in a the mix for a lot of stuff, and it took seven weeks for me to book my Broadway debut.

[22:52] Mo Brady: Wow, it was really stupid.

[22:55] Mo Brady: That is very fast, annoyingly fast.

[22:58] Mo Brady: Um, but it was I mean, of course it was being there at the right place at the right time.

[23:03] Mo Brady: The right track opened up in a show, and it was the right thing.

[23:06] Caleb Dicke: Well, and obviously not out of out of nowhere. You know, you'd been working in Seattle building these relationships with people.

[23:12] Mo Brady: Right.

[23:12] Mo Brady: Sergio, it was Adam's family. Sergio was the choreographer.

[23:14] Mo Brady: I'd worked with Sergio on Memphis, and so there was some relationship building.

[23:19] Mo Brady: Um but it was also really fast.

[23:23] Caleb Dicke: Yeah.

[23:24] Mo Brady: Do you remember your broad day Broadway debut?

[23:26] Mo Brady: I remember, I think I remember well, I remember two things about my debut.

[23:32] Mo Brady: One is that I had a week of rehearsal, which is pretty normal.

[23:37] Mo Brady: Yeah. But you know, you're it you're put in, which is that weird rehearsal where you're in costume and wig and mic and nobody else's.

[23:47] Mo Brady: And you're just like it just feels so silly, right?

[23:52] Mo Brady: Like you're dressed completely silly.

[23:54] Mo Brady: Around all of it.

[23:55] Caleb Dicke: Especially in the Adams family.

[23:56] Mo Brady: Yeah. Exactly. Playing a a dead conquistador.

[23:59] Mo Brady: Yeah. And then being like, oh, this is this is like the pinnacle of what we do, and yet I feel incredibly stupid right now.

[24:08] Caleb Dicke: Sure.

[24:09] Mo Brady: Um that to me, and I remember we made this entrance out of the pit.

[24:16] Mo Brady: So there was like a stairwell up from the pit, and we would come through this um entrance to a tomb, basically.

[24:24] Mo Brady: We would we would walk out and there was fog and lights, and we all came out.

[24:28] Mo Brady: And it it was just like the most Broadway thing.

[24:32] Mo Brady: Like all the lights were on you, and you like walked out, and everyone's looking at you, doing the thing.

[24:37] Mo Brady: And I remember standing at the bottom of, I was third coming up the steps, and I was like, I can't do this.

[24:44] Mo Brady: I honestly, like, I am so nervous right now.

[24:48] Mo Brady: I honestly don't think I can do this.

[24:52] Mo Brady: And that moment where you're like confronted with it, and like everything in my like physical being is telling me to f fly right now.

[25:02] Caleb Dicke: Yeah.

[25:02] Mo Brady: And yet, like logically, I know I can do this.

[25:06] Mo Brady: Like, I know what you have.

[25:08] Mo Brady: Yeah, I have done.

[25:09] Mo Brady: And that sort of like pushing the fear away and being like, we're just gonna do this because it it the music's gonna keep going, whether or not you go up those stairs.

[25:18] Caleb Dicke: Yeah.

[25:19] Mo Brady: And I got seven people behind me who needed to go out on stage as well.

[25:22] Mo Brady: So that yeah, I remember the put in being extremely silly, and that moment of I don't, I don't I uh I don't think I can do this, you know.

[25:32] Caleb Dicke: Yeah, but I did haha you did, and then it gets easier.

[25:36] Mo Brady: Yeah, and then you stop thinking, you stop thinking about it.

[25:39] Mo Brady: The my entrance in Adam's family was I I came out on stage and I did this double inside turn on the left foot, right?

[25:52] Mo Brady: Which is like annoying for a variety of reasons, right?

[25:56] Mo Brady: It's like it's like a on the inside, which is harder than doing an outside turn, it was on the left foot, which is not my dominant foot, right?

[26:02] Mo Brady: I had this helmet on my head, which was like weird for counterweighting.

[26:07] Caleb Dicke: Sure.

[26:08] Mo Brady: So, like my primary memory of being in the Adams family was just the like annoyance and fear of doing this one tr turn on my entrance.

[26:17] Caleb Dicke: Sure, right at the beginning.

[26:18] Mo Brady: Yeah, exactly.

[26:19] Mo Brady: And there were plenty of performances where she fell out of that turn.

[26:24] Mo Brady: She turned that into a cute suit new and moved on.

[26:27] Mo Brady: Hello, and that's it doesn't matter, you just sell it and the audience never knows any better.

[26:31] Caleb Dicke: No, but the choreographer does.

[26:33] Mo Brady: Yes, yes.

[26:33] Mo Brady: You might you might get a slip of paper.

[26:35] Caleb Dicke: Oh, sure.

[26:36] Mo Brady: Got those notes.

[26:38] Caleb Dicke: How long did you do Adam's Family?

[26:40] Mo Brady: New Year's Day to New Year's Eve.

[26:42] Mo Brady: So a year.

[26:43] Mo Brady: My first rehearsal was on New Year's Day.

[26:46] Mo Brady: Everyone loves rehearsing for their Broadway DBO at noon on a New Year's Day.

[26:51] Mo Brady: They couldn't find rehearsal studios open because, spoiler alert, it was New Year's Day.

[26:56] Mo Brady: And so we like were at like Roy Arya studios.

[26:59] Mo Brady: You know what? 43rd and 8th.

[27:01] Mo Brady: It's like maybe 40, 30 years.

[27:02] Mo Brady: Is that the one where you go like in the basement and there's like really it was upstairs, but like I've never heard before a sense of a Broadway show rehearsing there, and yet that was where we rehearsed for my music rehearsal.

[27:13] Mo Brady: Um and then we closed on New Year's Eve.

[27:16] Mo Brady: Wow.

[27:17] Caleb Dicke: What a cool year.

[27:18] Mo Brady: Yeah.

[27:18] Mo Brady: It was nice to sort of do I mean like an actual calendar year.

[27:22] Mo Brady: That's pretty wild.

[27:23] Mo Brady: Yeah, and it it you know, it's not a ton of time, but like, man, Broadway shows open and close in less than a year.

[27:30] Mo Brady: So the fact that I got to do it like 350 times is such a gift.

[27:34] Mo Brady: Yeah, absolutely.

[27:36] Elliott Mattox: Now, did you when you were doing Adam's Family, were you like, did you have a sense of like, I don't know how sustainable this is, like as like what I do for my life? Or did you did did your transition into what you do now come later?

[27:53] Mo Brady: I certainly was realizing that I liked being an actor in Seattle in a way that I didn't like being an actor in New York.

[27:59] Elliott Mattox: Interesting.

[28:00] Mo Brady: Um, part of it is that scheduling, you know, like you just know what you're doing six months from then, and that's just not the experience of being a New York actor.

[28:11] Elliott Mattox: No.

[28:12] Mo Brady: And you're just even if you're in a long running show, you never know. That show could close.

[28:16] Elliott Mattox: Yep.

[28:18] Mo Brady: And so that was really unsettling to me. And like frankly, like I like when you're in a regional theater city and you're doing plays, you're like, you're constantly rehearsing and doing a play in rep.

[28:32] Elliott Mattox: But being in rep.

[28:33] Mo Brady: Yeah. And so like I just wasn't used to auditioning this month. Uh-huh. And I was like while doing it at all at night. Because basically, like you would audition for me, you know, in Seattle in a season, yeah. Like, maybe there's 15 musicals, and so you can go through the audition process for five of those and book three of them, but maybe that's like 10 auditions a year.

[28:56] Elliott Mattox: Yeah.

[28:57] Mo Brady: Ten auditions in a good week here.

[28:59] Elliott Mattox: Right.

[28:59] Mo Brady: Yeah. And I was just like, ah, I don't like this feeling of being in the waiting room and hating my monologues, and like, you know, like all. And it was like, I these are two different things. It took me a while to realize that this the job of being an actor in Seattle or any regional city, I think, is different than being an actor in New York City. And then I liked one but not the other. And so as I was realizing that, I was like, all right, what's this marketing experience in my back pocket? What else can I do? I like being here. I like being where musical theater happens.

[29:35] Elliott Mattox: Yeah.

[29:35] Mo Brady: You know, like I love being part of the conversation about what's coming to Broadway and what's joining the musical theater canon. You know, like I want to talk about I want to talk about what's going on at the Winter Garden Theater and I want to talk about injuries at the side story. I think it's fun. And so I was like, how do I have a job in this space, but something that allows me to be here more long term than my show closing. And so that's when I started making relationships with um people in the marketing field, like my current boss who at Broadway Cares.

[30:16] Elliott Mattox: So now for for those who don't know, you're the now this is right, you're the communications projects manager.

[30:23] Mo Brady: Project manager at Broadway Cares Equity Fights AIDS.

[30:25] Elliott Mattox: At Broadway Cares Equity Fights AIDS. And um how how did that come about? Did you have other jobs up into the...

[30:29] Mo Brady: Yeah, I've sort of worked my way up a ladder. I've been there over seven years now, almost eight years.

[30:37] Elliott Mattox: Wow.

[30:37] Mo Brady: Um It came about because after Adam's Family closed, I was auditioning, and I was at a point where I didn't want to think about monologues anymore. And I was like, okay, I need something else to do. And so I'd when I was in Adam's Family, I had done a lot of the Broadway Cares events. I had done flea market and I collected and bears, and I was thinking, oh, I could I'll reach out to somebody there because I have somebody's email. And so I emailed the guy who's now my boss and I said, Hey, can I come in and like maybe like help out? He was like, Yes, come in tomorrow. And so I started volunteering, doing the things that I was doing at the regional theaters a decade earlier. Um and then they asked me to apply for a position, and I was like, I'm not gonna do that.

I'm an actor, I'm not going back. But the more I thought about it, the more I was like, Well, let's just see. There's nothing to lose. Yeah. And so I applied, and they ended up offering me the position, which at that point was mostly kind of marketing assistance with a little bit of video. And that was, like I said, almost eight years ago.

[31:48] Elliott Mattox: It was a is it like have you developed your own role in your process and like can I like put your own flair on it?

[31:54] Mo Brady: Yeah, sure. I um it's definitely ebbed and flowed over the years. Like there was a time where I was doing a lot more social media producing. Right now I have more of like an internal projects management kind of position where I'm responsible for timelines and spreadsheets, you know, all the things that I would have done when we were designing props and in college. Um that's that's been like a fun exploration at a different side of a different side. I mean, I in the end I think Broadway Cares is such a great organization. Such a fantastic hold and sort of the philanthropic spirit of the theater community that it's been fun to sort of learn different things over my tenure there.

[32:34] Elliott Mattox: Yeah, absolutely. I mean in your in your time at Broadway Cares and something theater adjacent, like that has you in the world that you love, but in a different sense. What have what have you learned about yourself that you may have had inklings of right at the end of Adam's Family that now with all that perspective and these new experiences um you can like name?

[33:00] Mo Brady: I mean, I definitely have gotten much more into video. I applied I applied for this position and had basically made some silly video music videos with like friends, basically. But when I was applying, they showed enough sense of, you know, I know how to deal with the software and I can tell a story and I know how to engage an audience. Now I think I'm much I mean I'm much more comfortable with visual video storytelling. Um period. But also, like just like the game has changed since 2011. You know, we we encounter video in a completely different way than we did a decade ago. And we, you know, we make videos, we watch videos in a completely different way.

[34:01] Elliott Mattox: Yeah. What do you like about working on social media?

[34:04] Mo Brady: Um, I like that it changes all the time. I like that it is uh a way of communication that feels authentic. And so there's a I mean, I don't think we can even remember really what life was like before social media in terms of like the way that stories would get to consumers.

[34:22] Elliott Mattox: Sure.

[34:23] Mo Brady: You know, I mean influencers is just sort of the last piece of that. But like the fact that you as a consumer or someone who's possibly interested in a Broadway show can not only get marketing messages delivered directly to you, but then like learn behind the scenes stuff and see what the actors are doing and communicate with the actors.

[34:44] Elliott Mattox: Yeah, yeah.

[34:44] Mo Brady: Like there's so many levels that we've progressed in the last decade. Um, and so I find that really fascinating. I yeah, I enjoy the fact that you have to stay on your toes. And that when it's effective, it's really effective.

[34:48] Elliott Mattox: Yeah.

[34:48] Mo Brady: Um, I don't know if I would have anticipated that, but like that was definitely my first foray into social media, which I enjoy working on so much now.

[34:59] Elliott Mattox: Yeah. No, I think uh social media can like really change buying anything. Like if you ri like you just like to be like, show me your Instagram, you look at it and you're like, oh yeah, I see a things that I like, I'm gonna buy it. So it really affects the consumer.

[35:12] Mo Brady: Yeah, I mean, and it and I talk about this all the time, but uh, you know, I'll talk to my friends from high school who I would like like d go to Broadway secret, like make Broadway secrets on like you know, paint or whatever, and we had like our like like the spring awakening like fan website. Oh yeah, sure, sure, for sure. And now it's like completely changed the game. And I I mean I say like thank thank god I wasn't a Broadway fan as a child in this era because it's it's opened up so many possibilities. I mean, people know what's happening in the theater on a day-to-day basis just because of what people in shows are posting on social media day to day.

[35:49] Elliott Mattox: Right.

[35:49] Mo Brady: You know, I've had brought I've had Beetlejuice fan accounts like post pictures of me like being like so happy Elliot's so proud of the cake he made. Like, did it you know what I mean? I'm like, they know I made a cake because I posted about it on my social media. So and it was interesting enough for someone else to share that story. Right. So it's just like things that we never would have um thought would have been. It all comes back to the part of feeling like you're a part of something, feeling a part of the community.

[36:18] Elliott Mattox: Yeah, yeah, that goes back to being in the music man when I was 10. Like I loved I think theater people love to feel like they are a part of something.

[36:26] Mo Brady: Yeah. Absolutely.

[36:29] Elliott Mattox: And now that's that's I'm glad we talked about you and what you do, but you're here because you're a part of the Broadway Podcast Network.

[36:39] Mo Brady: Yes.

[36:39] Elliott Mattox: And you are the creator, co-creator of The Ensemblist, which is um started as a podcast and has evolved into something really cool with blogs and different things.

[36:53] Mo Brady: Yeah, we sort of have three tiers, I think. We have a podcast, we have uh a website, which is mostly blogs or uh interviews, and then we have a strong social platform that's a lot of original photography that's uh mostly on Instagram.

[37:08] Elliott Mattox: Yeah.

[37:09] Mo Brady: So um tell us about what what got you inspired to um create The Ensemblist.

[37:15] Mo Brady: Well, like any crunchy liberal from the Pacific Northwest, I was an NPR. And so the idea for it really came out of me being in The Addams Family, and you know, when you're in a show that's been running for six months, you've learned your understudy tracks and you you're not going in for a lot of regional shows because you haven't got a closing notice yet. And so you're like, I got a lot of time. And this was before Instagram, so or maybe really at the beginnings of Instagram. And so there wasn't a lot of sharing of stories of people in ensembles. Yeah. Um, and I was like, I'm in this ensemble with all of these immensely talented people who have years and years of experience and expertise in this industry, no one's telling their stories.

Right. And so what if I take this like nerdy public radio thing and all of this free time I have, because I don't have understudy rehearsals, and I uh try to shine a light on these people that I'm in an ensemble with. And that's really where the idea came from.

[38:18] Mo Brady: Um, you know, like any podcast, your first episode sounds very different from your tenth episode, yeah. Sounds very different than your 15th episode. You really just have to kind of do it. Yeah. And so at the beginning we were really just like, you know, figuring it out. Yeah. Those episodes were structured very different. Um, usually had more guests, usually were a different length. Um, but uh through the years you sort of figure out how you want to tell your story and your point of view. And this was a time where there was maybe one other theater podcast.

[38:49] Elliott Mattox: I was about to say it was it was uh way earlier on in the in the like realm of podcasts because you know, around that time I knew about podcasts because I loved NPR as well. I would listen to it in the car with my dad, and I loved listening to Radio Lab, but I wasn't always in the car when Radio Lab would come on. So I was like Googling Radio Lab and found out that I could listen to it every week on my computer. Um, and so uh it's very much like, but that was my first and really only awareness of podcasts until moving back to New York and kind of like making them a part of my commute in like 2014.

[39:29] Mo Brady: I feel like it was team, which is around then when podcasts really started to pick up again.

[39:33] Elliott Mattox: Yeah.

[39:35] Mo Brady: Um I mean, I I can't even remember the podcast I listened to in 10 years ago. You know, you feel like you're so close to the podcast you listen to because they're right in your heads and they're in your head. Um But at that time it was, yeah, it was like a lot of NPR podcasts and Dan Savage. I remember listening to a Savage Love.

[39:57] Elliott Mattox: Savage Love.

[39:58] Mo Brady: One of the OGs, right?

[40:00] Elliott Mattox: Um, and before there was really when podcasting was like radio adjacent.

[40:06] Mo Brady: Yeah.

[40:06] Elliott Mattox: And independent podcasting was more like uh uh like underground, like a lot more independent than it is now.

[40:17] Mo Brady: Yeah.

[40:17] Elliott Mattox: Now I feel like everybody's part of a network.

[40:19] Mo Brady: I mean, I'm grateful for BPN for like taking us under the wing that's game. It's very rare to have an independent podcast anymore. Almost everyone is sort of part of a umbrella network.

[40:30] Elliott Mattox: Or everyone has like a mic and some free time and is just putting their podcast out for fun for what they do because it's right now it's such an accessible platform. You can, you know, it doesn't take a lot to produce, and you can just put it out there pretty easily.

[40:49] Mo Brady: Except for this podcast, which you guys are putting so much time and effort in.

[40:52] Elliott Mattox: I mean, we do put a lot of time and effort.

[40:53] Mo Brady: Yeah.

[40:54] Elliott Mattox: We took our hiatus to really plan one episode.

[40:57] Mo Brady: So this is an episode that we planned and we will start for 2021.

[41:03] Elliott Mattox: And we'll we'll get you in 2021.

[41:05] Mo Brady: Oh my god. Can you imagine?

[41:06] Elliott Mattox: That'd be great.

[41:07] Mo Brady: No, I'm just kidding.

[41:09] Elliott Mattox: No, I'm just kidding.

[41:10] Mo Brady: Caleb and I, you know, we like to do this uh, you know, extracurricularly. It does, it's a it's a creative outlet.

[41:17] Mo Brady: Yeah. Definitely for for me, you know, I still have those creative inklings that I had when I was a performer.

[41:26] Mo Brady: Um, and so this allows me to be a part of the Broadway community, allows me to be creative. Um, it allows me to have a few people be like, oh, you do the thing and you're good at the thing. Yeah, you know, like I think one of the strangest things about going from being an actor to not being an actor is that people don't praise you for your job anymore.

[41:45] Caleb Dicke: Yeah.

[41:46] Mo Brady: Wait, I like more. I liked the part where everybody stood and clapped for me at the end of my work day. And then I walked out of my office, and then people wanted my autograph or the picture with me.

[41:57] Caleb Dicke: Yeah, exactly.

[41:58] Mo Brady: Like that felt good. And so there is a little part of me that like gets to have that feedback and um encouragement still. Bourbon will always clap for you at the end of a day.

[42:09] Caleb Dicke: It does.

[42:09] Mo Brady: In the morning, though, it's a little rougher.

[42:13] Caleb Dicke: It slow claps you into the city.

[42:14] Mo Brady: Exactly. It's like it was a long night. You can do it. Um what now the the with the ensembleists? You talked about your three platforms. You write a lot of blogs, you have people guest write blogs.

[42:28] Caleb Dicke: And then I think it's been really exciting to see what you've been doing with the um the other branches is the social media kind of like the the images, the different kind of like spotlights you're putting on um different aspects of the ensemble each month.

[42:42] Mo Brady: Um do you want to talk about what the feature is this month, like who what you're featuring this month?

[42:48] Mo Brady: So uh what has been a goal of ours for 2020 is to be a little to combine the sort of nuts and bolts of ensemble work with more cultural conversations.

[43:02] Caleb Dicke: Okay.

[43:02] Mo Brady: So still doing mini-series about swings or creating characters in the ensemble, but also doing things that are about uh diversity. Um or more uh uh representation in the yeah, more like socially conscious things.

[43:19] Caleb Dicke: Yeah, so we have an ep we have a mini-series coming out this month that is about queer characters in the musical theater, specifically uh ensemble characters. Next month we're gonna be doing an episode, a couple of episodes with African American performers about their take on representation in the theater.

[43:39] Mo Brady: So we're uh I'm being less afraid to sort of not push people's buttons.

[43:49] Caleb Dicke: Sure.

[43:50] Mo Brady: I'm I'm sort of embracing that. I think it's more fun when it's an open conversation, yeah. When we get people riled up.

[43:58] Caleb Dicke: I think that something that I get to do now that I didn't get to do as a performer is be like, hey everybody, this thing's wrong over here.

[44:07] Mo Brady: Yeah, like it's like publicly have opinions.

[44:09] Caleb Dicke: Yeah.

[44:10] Mo Brady: Because when you're an actor, you don't want to piss anybody off.

[44:12] Caleb Dicke: Yeah.

[44:13] Mo Brady: Um, and so because I'm not I'm not auditioning anymore, I don't need your job. Um, and also I have the gift of working for Broadway Cares, which is an advocacy organization, and I think sort of doesn't look down on people on the staff being advocates for other people.

[44:30] Caleb Dicke: Sure.

[44:31] Mo Brady: So I can be like, all right, everybody, this shit is fucked up over here.

[44:34] Caleb Dicke: Yeah.

[44:35] Mo Brady: Let's go look at that.

[44:36] Caleb Dicke: Yeah.

[44:37] Mo Brady: Um, and so I'm grateful that I have the sort of stability so that I can do that for other people. Um yeah, so in 2020, I'm this is in its infancy, and I don't think I've talked about it publicly yet.

[44:51] Caleb Dicke: So exclusive.

[44:54] Mo Brady: Oh my god. I'm maybe. I'm working on a mini-series about why there's no best ensemble, Tony, and talking to people who actually know about the process of adding a category.

[45:03] Caleb Dicke: Uh-huh.

[45:04] Mo Brady: Um it is difficult to put together because people don't want to get on mic. But I'm hoping to have an informed conversation where we're not accusing people and saying, You're an asshole for not adding. But like, I don't know.

[45:33] Caleb Dicke: It seems very complex.

[45:33] Mo Brady: Yeah.

[45:33] Mo Brady: I'm not on the Tony nominating committee. I don't work at the Broadway League or the American Theater Wing. I don't know anything about adding a Tony conversation.

[45:33] Caleb Dicke: Yeah.

[45:33] Mo Brady: So or a Tony category. So tell me why it's hard.

[45:32] Caleb Dicke: Yeah.

[45:33] Mo Brady: I'm sure it is.

[45:34] Caleb Dicke: Yeah.

[45:35] Mo Brady: Even just in the even just in the like rebranding, the recent rebranding of kind of like not a chorus, but an ensemble of a musical.

[45:44] Caleb Dicke: Like, what is an ensemble?

[45:45] Mo Brady: I mean, come from away is an ensemble musical.

[45:47] Caleb Dicke: Yeah, sure.

[45:48] Mo Brady: And like that conversation of I don't think I have my own opinions about like what an ensemble would mean for a chorus as well.

[45:57] Caleb Dicke: Yeah.

[45:58] Mo Brady: I think it's probably easier for Tony voters to look at an entire cast and not know who's on a pink contract and a white contract who's not a principal and a chorus member.

[46:07] Caleb Dicke: Right.

[46:07] Mo Brady: And just say, Come from away is the best ensemble, even though no one is actually an ensemble member. And that is worth championing so that we can then in the future champion people who are on chorus contracts as well.

[46:20] Caleb Dicke: That's my personal opinion.

[46:22] Mo Brady: Yeah.

[46:22] Caleb Dicke: I'm not in charge.

[46:24] Mo Brady: Well, we look forward to that.

[46:25] Caleb Dicke: The detective and you're figuring it out.

[46:27] Mo Brady: This year.

[46:28] Caleb Dicke: We'll see if people talk to us.

[46:29] Mo Brady: Yeah.

[46:30] Caleb Dicke: Well, we're gonna play a game.

[46:32] Mo Brady: Oh my gosh.

[46:33] Caleb Dicke: I love games.

[46:34] Mo Brady: I do love games. I'm a big fan of game night.

[46:36] Caleb Dicke: Okay, cool. So in between easy questions, we're gonna play name that ensemble.

[46:41] Mo Brady: Oh my god. A tablet.

[46:42] Caleb Dicke: Caleb is bringing out the tablet.

[46:45] Mo Brady: It's 2020. This tablet is from 2010.

[46:46] Caleb Dicke: So she's a little slow.

[46:49] Mo Brady: So I'm gonna show you. My tablet hasn't been turned on for probably a year.

[46:52] Caleb Dicke: Oh, I had to charge this last night.

[46:53] Mo Brady: So it was dead. So um I'm gonna show a picture because this is an audio medium. We're gonna post it on our Instagram so people can play along, but just give a quick adjective of what you're seeing and then say the show.

[47:07] Mo Brady: Exuberance.

[47:08] Caleb Dicke: Ooh, uh, I don't know this, I think.

[47:11] Mo Brady: Gonna guess Fela.

[47:13] Caleb Dicke: Yeah, it's Pala.

[47:14] Mo Brady: Or the next one. Here we go.

[47:17] Caleb Dicke: Precision.

[47:18] Mo Brady: Anything goes.

[47:19] Caleb Dicke: Okay.

[47:25] Mo Brady: Crumbling tomb.

[47:27] Caleb Dicke: It's the Addis family.

[47:30] Mo Brady: Wait, that's not me, right? That's the original cast, right?

[47:32] Caleb Dicke: I think it's original.

[47:33] Mo Brady: Yeah, can you zoom in?

[47:35] Caleb Dicke: This is this would have been you, right?

[47:36] Mo Brady: That's Clark Johnson.

[47:37] Caleb Dicke: Yep, that's original.

[47:39] Mo Brady: Okay. What a doll. Number four.

[47:42] Caleb Dicke: Oh my god.

[47:43] Mo Brady: Oh, I never saw this.

[47:45] Caleb Dicke: But extension.

[47:46] Mo Brady: This is Promises Promises revival.

[47:48] Caleb Dicke: Yes.

[47:49] Mo Brady: Okay. Now we'll come back to the next ones, okay?

[47:52] Caleb Dicke: You can relax.

[47:53] Mo Brady: I will never relax.

[47:54] Caleb Dicke: I'm always ready.

[47:55] Mo Brady: I'm literally always ready for that.

[47:58] Caleb Dicke: So um we already talked about TV a little bit, but like must watch TV this weekend.

[48:03] Mo Brady: For me?

[48:04] Caleb Dicke: Yeah.

[48:04] Mo Brady: I need to finish Maze L season three.

[48:06] Caleb Dicke: Okay.

[48:07] Mo Brady: It's a solid one. Like I haven't even started it.

[48:09] Caleb Dicke: It's good.

[48:11] Mo Brady: It makes sense that when you get to the end, you're like, obviously, we couldn't just be like, have you how far are into you?

[48:16] Caleb Dicke: Six, maybe.

[48:16] Mo Brady: Okay. Like it's a lot of like jet sitting.

[48:18] Caleb Dicke: We're like, we're at jet settings.

[48:21] Mo Brady: So it's so expensive.

[48:22] Caleb Dicke: I love I mean, a the comedy is so fantastic and it's so well acted, but also there's just money, money, money, money.

[48:30] Mo Brady: It's like it's like the television version of Moulin Rouge.

[48:32] Caleb Dicke: You're like, yeah, I see all the money.

[48:35] Mo Brady: And I like it.

[48:37] Caleb Dicke: Um favorite place to sit in a theater.

[48:41] Mo Brady: Like like seat?

[48:43] Caleb Dicke: Like seat-wise.

[48:44] Mo Brady: I'm Okay. Can I give two answers?

[48:45] Caleb Dicke: Please.

[48:46] Mo Brady: I'm going to. Yeah. I used to really love the standing at the back rail because then you never have to sit still.

[48:52] Caleb Dicke: That's sort of like the theater creator person in you, where you're like, yeah, I want to watch players.

[48:58] Mo Brady: Allie, I've never heard of that.

[48:59] Caleb Dicke: Okay.

[48:59] Mo Brady: Yeah, you're like standing in the back of that, and then you can go to the bathroom.

[49:02] Caleb Dicke: Yeah, because the playwright paces in the back.

[49:04] Mo Brady: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[49:05] Caleb Dicke: Okay.

[49:06] Mo Brady: Um, but now that I am lucky enough to get press seats sometimes, I'm those fucking press comps, because those are great seats.

[49:13] Caleb Dicke: So where are they?

[49:14] Mo Brady: Uh usually like uh H on the aisle.

[49:20] Caleb Dicke: Oh work.

[49:21] Mo Brady: Yeah.

[49:21] Caleb Dicke: I'm usually like a front of Mez kind of.

[49:26] Mo Brady: Yeah, I used to be that until I got press seats.

[49:28] Caleb Dicke: Oh yeah, yeah.

[49:29] Mo Brady: Okay. Well, if anyone wants Equity One to come see their show and press comms, please email us at equity1podcast at gmail.com.

[49:37] Caleb Dicke: Thank you so much.

[49:38] Mo Brady: Or if you ever need a date, like how do you like your coffee?

[49:44] Caleb Dicke: Okay, I make cold brew in the morning.

[49:47] Mo Brady: Um I like it with ice because I like to chew ice.

[49:52] Caleb Dicke: I do too.

[49:53] Mo Brady: No.

[49:54] Caleb Dicke: I will never leave you, Elliot.

[49:56] Mo Brady: Never go away.

[49:57] Caleb Dicke: Uh depends on the size, but one splendor or two.

[50:00] Mo Brady: One splenda or two.

[50:02] Caleb Dicke: Okay.

[50:02] Mo Brady: Now, do you make it do you make it like overnight or do you make it like in the morning?

[50:05] Caleb Dicke: Do you have like a cold brew machine curate?

[50:07] Mo Brady: Cold brew maker that makes like five days of coffee.

[50:11] Caleb Dicke: And so I make it like on a Sunday and then in the morning.

[50:14] Mo Brady: Yeah.

[50:15] Caleb Dicke: Solid.

[50:15] Mo Brady: Okay, back to the game.

[50:17] Caleb Dicke: The guessing.

[50:17] Mo Brady: Here we are. We're leaving promises promises because you gotta one.

[50:21] Caleb Dicke: Oh.

[50:23] Mo Brady: Joyous, which is not the right word, but they all have their hands up because they're doing tradition.

[50:27] Caleb Dicke: It's fiddler on the roof in yin.

[50:29] Mo Brady: Very important.

[50:30] Caleb Dicke: Next.

[50:33] Mo Brady: Oh.

[50:34] Caleb Dicke: I don't I didn't see this.

[50:36] Mo Brady: Um, but it's shuffle along or the 1921.

[50:41] Caleb Dicke: Uh 1921 and all that followed.

[50:44] Mo Brady: Remember when we all used to know that?

[50:45] Caleb Dicke: Oh yeah.

[50:46] Mo Brady: That felt like a good one.

[50:47] Caleb Dicke: The making of the making of the musical.

[50:49] Mo Brady: No, everything else that followed, right?

[50:51] Caleb Dicke: Someone's gonna write it.

[50:53] Mo Brady: DM you and let you know.

[50:54] Caleb Dicke: Please DM us, please.

[50:55] Mo Brady: All right, onward, we got that one.

[50:58] Mo Brady: This is a hard one.

[50:59] Caleb Dicke: Oh, I know this.

[51:00] Mo Brady: It's Crybaby.

[51:02] Caleb Dicke: Yeah.

[51:02] Mo Brady: Oh, okay.

[51:03] Caleb Dicke: Um wow, okay.

[51:04] Mo Brady: I was trying to put on a 50s musical in three.

[51:06] Caleb Dicke: No, well, I was wondering if it was the bye bye, Birdie Revival, but it is Crybaby.

[51:10] Mo Brady: No, there aren't children on stuff.

[51:12] Caleb Dicke: Um I need an adjective.

[51:14] Mo Brady: Yeah, one adjustment.

[51:15] Caleb Dicke: Longing.

[51:16] Mo Brady: Longing.

[51:16] Caleb Dicke: Oh, yeah.

[51:17] Mo Brady: Okay. Last one.

[51:19] Caleb Dicke: Last one.

[51:20] Mo Brady: Well, that's Oklahoma, but it's the original Oklahoma.

[51:23] Caleb Dicke: Oh, you can tell it's original Oklahoma St. James because of uh the way that the lanterns were hung.

[51:29] Mo Brady: That's by just tied on rope.

[51:32] Caleb Dicke: That's an it that's an iconic part of the for me, the Oklahoma set design.

[51:36] Mo Brady: I love this picture.

[51:37] Caleb Dicke: That stage is full.

[51:39] Mo Brady: Yeah.

[51:41] Caleb Dicke: They're big skirts.

[51:43] Mo Brady: They are probably, I mean, the the most upstate drop is probably in two.

[51:48] Caleb Dicke: There are probably 25 people on this stage.

[51:51] Mo Brady: That was a time where we could hire people.

[51:54] Caleb Dicke: I know.

[51:55] Mo Brady: Can't hire anyone anymore.

[51:56] Caleb Dicke: No, it's too expensive.

[51:57] Mo Brady: I know.

[51:57] Caleb Dicke: But can you cover five tracks, please?

[52:00] Mo Brady: Yeah.

[52:00] Caleb Dicke: Yeah, I'd love to.

[52:01] Mo Brady: What an honor.

[52:02] Caleb Dicke: But at minimum.

[52:03] Mo Brady: Can you do that?

[52:05] Caleb Dicke: Oh, what a gift.

[52:06] Mo Brady: Well, we look forward to your next blog post about covering five roles at minimum.

[52:11] Mo Brady: And uh we want to thank you, Mo for coming on the podcast.

[52:16] Mo Brady: Thanks for having me.

[52:17] Caleb Dicke: Now, Mo, will you be at BroadwayCon?

[52:19] Mo Brady: I will be at BroadwayCon Friday and Saturday.

[52:21] Caleb Dicke: Oh my god, and you're doing panels?

[52:23] Mo Brady: Yes. Friday we are doing uh the Broadway Ensembles panel and Saturday we're doing the Broadway debuts panel, and each one has five actors currently in Broadway shows, uh, and they'll be talking about their experiences.

[52:34] Caleb Dicke: That's so exciting.

[52:41] Mo Brady: And so we will also be at BroadwayCon. You can come check us out at the Broadway Podcast Network booth.

[52:47] Caleb Dicke: Mo, will you have merchandise?

[52:48] Mo Brady: I do. We have triple threat shirts that will be on sale there.

[52:51] Caleb Dicke: Oh my god, well turn turn.

[52:53] Mo Brady: We will also be having merchandise available for sale.

[52:56] Caleb Dicke: We will be selling Equity One shot glasses.

[52:58] Mo Brady: They are so cute.

[53:00] Caleb Dicke: Adorable.

[53:00] Mo Brady: And and we might just I might just do a merch madness at Broadway at BroadwayCon where I um declare a winner of all the merch.

[53:09] Caleb Dicke: So stay tuned.

[53:09] Mo Brady: The triple threat shirt might might be uh contender.

[53:12] Caleb Dicke: Might be a contender.

[53:14] Mo Brady: Oh, oh yeah, yeah, yeah. Like I understand what you're doing.

[53:16] Caleb Dicke: I'll do a live, I'll probably do like a pseudo-live like merch madness at Broadway Control.

[53:21] Mo Brady: I think I'm gonna be in the field like interviewing. So it's a good thing.

[53:23] Caleb Dicke: Yeah, we're gonna be there.

[53:24] Mo Brady: Yeah.

[53:24] Caleb Dicke: We're gonna be saying hey.

[53:25] Mo Brady: So if you know the podcast, then come up to Caleb and I and say hello.

[53:29] Caleb Dicke: Um don't come up to Saymo and Don't come up.

[53:33] Mo Brady: I'll be like going undercover of night with like a big sheet over my hand.

[53:36] Caleb Dicke: Oh I'll be going, I'll be going as a Beetlejuice character, but yeah, it costs it.

[53:40] Mo Brady: It's just a ghost.

[53:42] Caleb Dicke: It's just a ghost of them.

[53:44] Mo Brady: It's gonna be hard to lead a panel like that, but it'll be easy to get the other thing.

[53:47] Caleb Dicke: The mic will be under so you can still hear it.

[53:48] Mo Brady: It'll be easy for people to spot you in the sheet at BroadwayCon, but where can people find you on social media?

[53:53] Mo Brady: Um The Ensemblist is on Twitter and Instagram at The Ensemblist.

[53:59] Mo Brady: And you can check out the Ensemblist at your website.

[54:01] Mo Brady: Oh yeah, the Ensembleist.com.

[54:02] Mo Brady: Yes, and on Broadway Podcast Network, of course.

[54:05] Mo Brady: Um you can find the show at Equity One Podcast on Instagram and Facebook and at Equity One underscore on Twitter.

[54:12] Mo Brady: Send us an email at Equity One Podcast at gmail.com.

[54:15] Caleb Dicke: Elliot, where can we find you at?

[54:16] Mo Brady: You can find me at Elliot Maddox on everything.

[54:18] Caleb Dicke: Uh Caleb Dickey on everywhere.

[54:21] Mo Brady: And until next time, cheers!

[54:23] Caleb Dicke: Mine's empty.

[54:25] Mo Brady: Mine's empty.

[54:34] Caleb Dicke: Not one guy, no more.

[54:38] Mo Brady: Not two guys.

[54:39] Caleb Dicke: Spit a big mo.

[54:41] Mo Brady: Not three guys.

[54:42] Caleb Dicke: Four eyes.

[54:45] Mo Brady: Not four guys.

[54:46] Caleb Dicke: Big Mo.

[54:48] Mo Brady: But five guys, each mo.

[54:52] Caleb Dicke: Five little guys, man.

[55:01] Mo Brady: Mounts up.