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[0:10] Charlie Murphy: Hello, hello, and welcome to Mapping the College Audition.

[0:12] Charlie Murphy: I'm your host, Charlie Murphy, director of MTCA.

[0:15] Charlie Murphy: That's Musical Theater College Auditions.

[0:17] Charlie Murphy: Check us out at MTCA.com.

[0:19] Charlie Murphy: And today we've got Leenya Rideout on the pod.

[0:23] Charlie Murphy: For our new listeners in these artist exploration episodes, we aim to explore the paths to success that artists are forging and tease out how their theatrical training has helped them to blaze that trail.

[0:33] Charlie Murphy: And this is a fun one because Leenya is a friend and also is on here promoting a show with Friend of the Pod, Bedlam Theater Company.

[0:41] Charlie Murphy: So this one feels very internal to me.

[0:44] Charlie Murphy: Uh, even if it's not quite as much MTCA, it's very internal to Charlie specifically.

[0:48] Charlie Murphy: But what it gives us is a really great opportunity for us to have a candid conversation since I know Leenya about what it's like to make a life in this business, especially a life in the theater.

[0:58] Charlie Murphy: You know, we talk about that as sort of that's one of the uh subject matters of Music City, which is designed to promote, which is like, how do you mix capitalism and the arts?

[1:07] Charlie Murphy: And so we get to talk through some of those differences, especially in terms of what it's like to work at different levels of this industry.

[1:13] Charlie Murphy: Um, I hope all of you out there are doing well.

[1:16] Charlie Murphy: I just got back from my many travels, the whirlwind of showcasing the showcase series.

[1:22] Charlie Murphy: Now, poor Kelly, our producer, is deep in edit mode.

[1:25] Charlie Murphy: She's trying to put together all these different reviews and interviews and different camera angles.

[1:30] Charlie Murphy: I hope we can make some cool episodes for you.

[1:31] Charlie Murphy: I think it's gonna be really cool.

[1:32] Charlie Murphy: But especially gonna be a pretty cool video pod for those who are mostly listening on audio.

[1:37] Charlie Murphy: I respect that.

[1:38] Charlie Murphy: Most of it's just my face, but not this time.

[1:39] Charlie Murphy: We'll have different kind of uh videos here.

[1:41] Charlie Murphy: It's gonna be a bit more produced than I think your average episode, where I'm mostly just talking on a microphone.

[1:47] Charlie Murphy: Here I am, I'm on a ferry, I'm on a plane.

[1:49] Charlie Murphy: You're gonna get all kinds of different stuff.

[1:51] Charlie Murphy: I'm sending some love to all of our seniors in our class of 2026 as they officially become MTCA alumni now.

[1:58] Charlie Murphy: Um, I know, of course, there's still wait list movement to happen, so you're not officially done, all of you.

[2:02] Charlie Murphy: There will be shifts and changes.

[2:03] Charlie Murphy: But for the most part, we now release you, and at least in terms of talking about you as MTCA students, uh, and say goodbye to the class of 2026 and say hello to the class of 2027, class of 2028, class of 2029, come on down, right?

[2:16] Charlie Murphy: Uh, I know it feels so rude that we're like, you are our seniors, you are everything, and they're like, bye.

[2:20] Charlie Murphy: Um, but I say that all because of course that's true in the MTCA world to some extent, but with these podcasts, especially these episodes, especially the artist episodes, they are really still geared toward you.

[2:31] Charlie Murphy: So they're geared toward you at 18 as you're now graduating and going to college.

[2:34] Charlie Murphy: But really, as you go into college and beyond, these are uh geared a little bit more toward you than even our high school listeners.

[2:40] Charlie Murphy: I mean, to varying degrees, you'll hear different artists' episodes that may be aimed a little bit more at one or the other.

[2:45] Charlie Murphy: I really do try to cover the full spectrum of like 15, 16, all the way through your mid-20s, even to late 20s, in terms of our alumni who might be in college or right out of college, sort of figuring things out in the city, all the different kinds of things, right?

[2:57] Charlie Murphy: Um, but you know, conversations like we're gonna have today of like how do I have a family in this business?

[3:03] Charlie Murphy: I do think that's more of a consideration for our listeners in their 20s, or at least our listeners in college, than most of our 15, 16-year-old listeners.

[3:09] Charlie Murphy: They're probably not yet thinking about having a family.

[3:11] Charlie Murphy: Though who knows, maybe you're the precocious young person who's thinking about all that at 15.

[3:16] Charlie Murphy: So if you're a senior and you're hearing these well wishes, my point is please do keep listening on, right?

[3:21] Charlie Murphy: Even if you start skipping all the school episodes, I'm fine with that, but keep listening to these artist episodes.

[3:25] Charlie Murphy: They definitely are for you.

[3:27] Charlie Murphy: All right, we've got a long episode here and some long takeaways at the end.

[3:30] Charlie Murphy: So I'm gonna keep this snappy and just jump right into this interview with Leenya Rideout.

[3:40] Charlie Murphy: Well, we are so excited to be joined by Leenya Rideout.

[3:44] Charlie Murphy: Leenya has been all over the stages.

[3:47] Charlie Murphy: She's been on Broadway's in War Horse, Cyrano de Bergerac Company, alongside a good friend of this podcast, Elizabeth Stanley, uh, Cabaret.

[3:55] Charlie Murphy: She's on the tour of My Fair Lady, off Broadway's, all over the place, including Music City at Bedlam Theater Company, which is upcoming.

[4:02] Charlie Murphy: We're gonna talk about that commercial production and places like Shakespeare in the Park, who wouldn't want to work there?

[4:07] Charlie Murphy: Uh, some great regional work, all these things.

[4:09] Charlie Murphy: Also, some great TV and film, but we're not gonna talk any about your TV and film, Leenya.

[4:12] Charlie Murphy: We're only gonna talk about uh your theater because I want to deep dive on the theater of it all.

[4:17] Charlie Murphy: And I often say this at the beginning, but I'll say it at the end as uh an education of what to see you boulder, where she majored in voice performance with a minor in violin performance.

[4:27] Charlie Murphy: Leenya, welcome on the pod.

[4:29] Leenya Rideout: Thank you.

[4:31] Leenya Rideout: Thank you so much for having me.

[4:33] Charlie Murphy: I'm honored and excited to have you.

[4:36] Charlie Murphy: Um before we're gonna talk really mostly about your career and kind of double-clicking the different places that you've worked and different sort of modes that you've worked in.

[4:43] Charlie Murphy: But before we dive into that, can we take you back a little bit to 16, 17-year-old Leenya?

[4:48] Charlie Murphy: As you were thinking about college.

[4:50] Charlie Murphy: I'd love to hear kind of as much as you remember of like what your college journey was, but also sort of like what were you thinking about in thinking, hey, I think I wanted to get a degree in music performance.

[5:00] Charlie Murphy: Like, what did that mean for young Leenya?

[5:04] Leenya Rideout: I mean, I've always been the kind of person who has a hard time deciding what I wanted.

[5:10] Leenya Rideout: I mean, like choosing one art form.

[5:14] Leenya Rideout: And most of my life I've been sort of not listening to people who say you have to choose one.

[5:20] Leenya Rideout: And so far, it's worked out okay.

[5:22] Leenya Rideout: Thank you.

[5:22] Leenya Rideout: Um, it made it a little difficult to do to choose undergraduate.

[5:27] Leenya Rideout: Uh-huh.

[5:27] Leenya Rideout: I mean, obviously, I wanted to go to NYU or Juilliard or USC where I was like thinking of or Oberlin or like Indiana University.

[5:37] Leenya Rideout: I was sort of thinking bigger like that and then I think in that world are you thinking to be a voice major?

[5:43] Charlie Murphy: That you're thinking to be a Juilliard voice major or an Oberlin voice major.

[5:46] Leenya Rideout: Yeah, or acting or acting.

[5:48] Charlie Murphy: That's a qu that's my question is what were you thinking more?

[5:51] Leenya Rideout: Like I I kind of when I was in high school I was the you know concert master of our orchestra.

[5:59] Leenya Rideout: Yeah.

[5:59] Leenya Rideout: I was in three choirs.

[6:01] Leenya Rideout: I was, you know, playing the leads in the in the musicals.

[6:05] Leenya Rideout: So and plays.

[6:07] Leenya Rideout: So I I just was literally I I wanted to do it all.

[6:12] Charlie Murphy: You wanted to.

[6:12] Leenya Rideout: Yeah and I also wanted to get like a full ride scholarship.

[6:17] Leenya Rideout: And so that that kind of ended up being why I chose University of Colorado.

[6:23] Leenya Rideout: Um there were a couple scholarships that was offered but that one was like full ride.

[6:28] Leenya Rideout: Um and I did not get any kind of scholarship at NYU they accepted me at Tisch I think and then uh, but I would have had to pay and I was I couldn't and same with I you know I don't even think I I don't even think I really auditioned for Juilliard.

[6:42] Leenya Rideout: But um so that was a little bit of financial decision and I was also in state with University of Colorado and I knew the the the uh professors there.

[6:54] Leenya Rideout: I knew they were very good and well regarded and I was able to go there and then be a vi uh uh I I was a voice major.

[7:06] Leenya Rideout: Yeah.

[7:07] Leenya Rideout: Mostly classically based.

[7:10] Leenya Rideout: And then I um was a violin performance minor and was in the in a quartet and like in orchestras and took lessons with Oswald Laneert, who was great.

[7:21] Charlie Murphy: But are you thinking of yourself are you visioning yourself as at this point at nineteen or whatever, as you're now in school, are you visioning yourself as a musical theater performer or as maybe as an actor or maybe a violinist?

[7:31] Leenya Rideout: Like, are all three of those paths really still open to you at 1920 as you're going through school?

[7:36] Leenya Rideout: I think I always thought music theater, but but I also but I loved I loved classic like opera and also classical violin music and playing quartets and I by the time I was twenty, I had decided to be I was a double major for a while.

[7:55] Leenya Rideout: Uh-huh.

[7:55] Leenya Rideout: With violin and and voice.

[7:57] Leenya Rideout: And I and also I took as much acting and dance as they would let me because I was not a m I was not a theater major.

[8:07] Charlie Murphy: Right.

[8:07] Leenya Rideout: And you know, different schools work differently, and also music theater m majors weren't as prevalent when back in the old age.

[8:16] Charlie Murphy: If you were going to school today, you might have gotten a BM in music theater where you also can take violin or whatever, like but that was not quite as common back then in terms of.

[8:23] Leenya Rideout: Right.

[8:23] Leenya Rideout: And and no one thought of like actor musicianship as a thing.

[8:26] Charlie Murphy: No, that's what I was gonna ask you, is how precocious of it was that a conscious choice where you thought, hey, I'm going to be a musical theater actor where violin is going to be actively like I actually don't know from that perspective.

[8:36] Leenya Rideout: Certainly by the time uh I guess I was in high school, there already were some of these productions.

[8:42] Leenya Rideout: There was like the Sweeney Todd, I think what maybe was happening around then.

[8:45] Leenya Rideout: Maybe I was in college then, but but it it was starting to happen then, but I don't think that w you know, f that wasn't such a common thing of like, oh, you'll definitely play violin while you sing in the until it was.

[8:55] Leenya Rideout: I wasn't You know, the only thing that I think had sort of happened at that point was Pump Boys at Dinets in the 80s.

[9:01] Charlie Murphy: I haven't even heard of that.

[9:02] Leenya Rideout: This is embarrassing.

[9:03] Charlie Murphy: Yeah, yeah.

[9:04] Leenya Rideout: Um, and that definitely was a little more humming and strumming, like that wasn't really the John Doyle um concept yet.

[9:12] Charlie Murphy: And of course the first- Do you remember when when was the first John Doyle?

[9:15] Leenya Rideout: Was that in the late 90s?

[9:17] Charlie Murphy: Um not to put this as a trivia question.

[9:21] Leenya Rideout: No, no, no.

[9:22] Leenya Rideout: He he Sweeney Todd was 2004, 2005.

[9:26] Charlie Murphy: Okay.

[9:27] Charlie Murphy: All right.

[9:27] Charlie Murphy: So I'm in college at that point.

[9:28] Leenya Rideout: But in fairness, I'm in college.

[9:29] Leenya Rideout: I in my mind I was like, well, that's 13 minutes.

[9:33] Charlie Murphy: Yeah, exactly.

[9:33] Charlie Murphy: So that's in the 2000s was that those John Doyles.

[9:36] Charlie Murphy: And then of course it's gonna continue with stuff like once, and you know, that's gonna become a much more popular network.

[9:41] Leenya Rideout: I mean, the first big thing I did was c uh cabaret, and that that was 1996.

[9:46] Charlie Murphy: But you were not playing in that.

[9:48] Leenya Rideout: Yeah.

[9:48] Leenya Rideout: You were oh yeah.

[9:50] Leenya Rideout: We listened to the the cast recording.

[9:52] Leenya Rideout: I'm the only violinist.

[9:53] Charlie Murphy: Oh yeah, that is so cool.

[9:55] Charlie Murphy: So all right, so that that is my my my next question is just yeah, talk to me about what how has that that skill, and I'm gonna say specifically violin.

[10:05] Leenya Rideout: I know you play violin a lot, but I noticed on the IMDB we had like eight different things you say you play.

[10:10] Charlie Murphy: So, like, how has that musicianship itself influenced?

[10:14] Charlie Murphy: I mean, you're like they may be wrong, I mean it also says you horseback ride on your hands.

[10:19] Leenya Rideout: But how do you feel like the musicianship informs you as a performer?

[10:24] Leenya Rideout: I mean, again, so you're saying you took acting classes, but not majoring in acting or whatever, but so with the the vocal musicianship, but then also with the instruments.

[10:31] Leenya Rideout: How do you think that has informed you as a performer beyond the castability?

[10:34] Leenya Rideout: I want to talk about how it's made you more castable, but just from you as a as a performer, how do you think the musicianship is related to your acting and to your performance?

[10:42] Leenya Rideout: I mean, I can sight read, which is awesome and saves me a lot of money.

[10:48] Charlie Murphy: You're saying 'cause it m saves you time learning.

[10:50] Charlie Murphy: You don't have to pay someone to learn and make you track, stuff like that?

[10:53] Leenya Rideout: Totally.

[10:54] Leenya Rideout: And um also there'll be times when I'm like learning a song and I'm like, what if I accompany myself on the guitar just to sort of learn it and also like, oh, this is this is sort of how this song I can decompose deconstruct a song and then put it back together in the way, you know, like it it it all it all informs itself.

[11:15] Leenya Rideout: It you know, in different ways.

[11:17] Leenya Rideout: And uh being able to I mean musically my learning how to phrase with a with a with a violin makes is it it really informs how I sing too.

[11:33] Leenya Rideout: And then also being able to play guitar and accompany myself.

[11:39] Leenya Rideout: Um, like I'm gonna be playing actually up the Hudson um opening for Will Swenson, um, who's a little concert, and they want me to come and play songs from shows, but also my own stuff, and I can show up and accompany myself and I am not gonna have a piano player with me.

[11:59] Leenya Rideout: Um so that's it's just kind of fun to sort of take some time songs and put it in a different style.

[12:05] Charlie Murphy: Like, I mean, literally, and then in all those gigs you're saving the couple hundred dollars you'd be paying someone else to do if they're paying you and you to pay someone else.

[12:12] Leenya Rideout: That's true.

[12:12] Leenya Rideout: I I wonder if it's and maybe it's tough to also even know like some of the understanding that you likely have as a musician, as someone who's doesn't have that, that I feel like, you know, I'll hear people talk about okay, what the composer is telling you here, and I would go, I don't I don't know, I'm I'm not listening to whatever the composer is telling me.

[12:31] Charlie Murphy: Okay, interesting.

[12:32] Leenya Rideout: In a way that, like for like Shakespeare, I'm like, I will sometimes teach that.

[12:34] Charlie Murphy: I'm like, well, you can tell because of the meter, this is like something's going on here that I'll sometimes watch other students.

[12:40] Leenya Rideout: That is something where I'm that's opaque to them, and then it becomes I think a little easier to learn Shakespearean meter than necessarily to learn that's cool.

[12:46] Charlie Murphy: High level violin or whatever.

[12:48] Leenya Rideout: But there's something that I wonder that if you understand too that you know, people who don't have that sense of rhythm or that sense of natural musicianship wouldn't necessarily understand in in the Sondheim line of what is Santheim doing by putting it this way.

[12:59] Leenya Rideout: I always go, I don't know, what is he doing?

[13:01] Leenya Rideout: Tell me, I want to know.

[13:03] Charlie Murphy: Yeah, yes.

[13:04] Leenya Rideout: And then you know, of course, what he's putting behind, you know, in the and the accompaniment.

[13:09] Charlie Murphy: Right.

[13:09] Leenya Rideout: If you're doing one thing, he's doing another thing at the same time.

[13:14] Leenya Rideout: Uh Sunday in the Park with George, like the pointillism and the you know, really illustrating what George Sharra, you know, did and what his technique was.

[13:23] Charlie Murphy: Yes.

[13:24] Leenya Rideout: You can just hear it, you know.

[13:25] Charlie Murphy: And see, always, yeah.

[13:27] Leenya Rideout: Sometimes the fine line to the with this true with Shakespeare too.

[13:29] Leenya Rideout: It's sometimes the fine line that of going like, okay, but how do I act that?

[13:32] Leenya Rideout: What is that?

[13:33] Leenya Rideout: Like, I see that deep thing.

[13:34] Leenya Rideout: I'm not sure, I'm not sure how that informs your acting, but sometimes you go, It's it's good to know.

[13:38] Leenya Rideout: It's always it's nice to understand.

[13:40] Leenya Rideout: Sometimes you don't have to, because you, you know, it's like you don't have to put the hat on the hat.

[13:43] Leenya Rideout: You've got the hat's already written for you.

[13:45] Charlie Murphy: Yeah, you're just wearing the hat.

[13:46] Leenya Rideout: Yeah.

[13:47] Leenya Rideout: Yeah.

[13:48] Charlie Murphy: Yeah.

[13:49] Charlie Murphy: Look, I made a hat, yes.

[13:51] Charlie Murphy: I mean uh okay.

[13:51] Charlie Murphy: Well, can we talk through a little bit just your journey to success?

[13:54] Charlie Murphy: So maybe and and if there's anything else you want to add about the CU Boulder experience too, in terms of it seems like it was a positive experience, you getting to do two crowds of different things.

[14:02] Leenya Rideout: Yeah, it was, yeah, I have wonderful professors and a wonderful theory um instruction, also, which was great, and some some jazz improv, which you never know what's gonna be helpful.

[14:14] Leenya Rideout: And like, why not just study all of it, you know, and get curious about everything.

[14:19] Leenya Rideout: That's that's what I I feel like if you know it makes a good artist as your curiosity.

[14:26] Leenya Rideout: And I'm I'm digressing now, but uh, you know, whenever you're learning a new role, you're learning a you're gonna tell another story.

[14:34] Leenya Rideout: You might have to be in Cornwall, England.

[14:36] Leenya Rideout: You're like, okay, now I have to study about that area of the world and maybe a different time period.

[14:41] Leenya Rideout: And you it's such a blessing to be like, and especially now that we have Google and the internet, instead of having to go to the library and like look at an encyclopedia, you know, it's so easy and it's at your fingertips to be like, I can learn about a different part of the human condition and a different time period or you know, and then that makes you a better, a better artist, a better, you know, a curious person.

[15:03] Leenya Rideout: It's just it's such a wonderful that in itself is such a wonderful gift. And what we want to do. Anyway, so uh you were asking about CU and um I really I think because it didn't have a music theater program, it made me I was like, I'm going to create my own major. Yeah, and to let and take as many classes as that as they'll let me and just knock on doors and say and say, You gotta let me in, you gotta let me do this, and sort of made me that kind of person. So when I arrived in New York, um finally, I was able to also be that way as a professional performing artist, you know. And I think that that makes a big difference. And when I see that in a young student, I'm like, you're gonna be good.

I and talk to me about that journey. It's something I actually was just talking with someone about that. It's something I recognize in Elizabeth, you know, having gone to a prestigious program in its terms of name, but not having that musical theater degree, not having a showcase where she just left and had an agent or some of those things. There is a different kind of hunger and will to prove herself. Yep. Even still in her 40s, where I go, I probably shouldn't have said in her 40s. In her uh 25-year-old brain that she plays. Uh exactly. Um, but that it's I still see it, and I go, I actually don't know that I see that in all my Carnegie Mellon friends. Like that you go, there's a different hope and expectation of I should be here by this point.

That I think sometimes when you don't come from you mentioned the NYUs and the Juilliards and the Oberlins, that you know, there's a different kind of expectation of I'm gonna have to scrap and prove myself and earn. But so talk to me. What was the scrapping and proving yourself? You probably did not graduate from school and immediately have jobs that were just waiting at the door for you. So how did you go get those jobs? And I'm gonna I'm gonna I didn't read the list of hundreds of jobs at this point, but like I'm old, dawg. Well, doesn't hurt, but it takes the years and it takes the work in during the years to make it all happen. Yeah, it does. Um gosh, what did I do? So after college, I took a European year rail trip, which was crazy and insane, and just you know, for spent a couple months just exploring the world, which was really looking back important and sort of awesome.

Yeah. And then um, I moved to Southern California. I don't I don't know why. I was thinking maybe I'd go to grad school at USC. All the best Broadway's in Southern California makes sense, yeah. Right? I know, but I was thinking I'm gonna do movies. I don't know what I was thinking. I had relatives there, I had friends. I didn't really have as much of a support system here. And not so far from Colorado. I mean, it's a plane ride, right? But you're still close enough. Oh no. Some ways. Yes, it was closer. And also I also was like, oh I can be in my car and like I don't have to figure out the subway system. I don't know. I had like there was a little bit of my fear kind of getting the best of me.

And I was there for like three or four years. And I went to a bunch of I just would like look in the paper because this is before computers. I mean before I had a computer and we computer had been invented at this point. We just had rocks. We banged them together. Anyway no I so I I would go to like auditions for community theater and like stuff like that and just kind of kept oh and I did a dinner theater situation which I'm afraid I'm ashamed to tell you what the show was. No we needed I'm gonna tell you I was in King and I and I did not play Anna. Uh-huh I understand I played top 10. I understand it's a different time of rock it was the nineties hopefully it will be forgiven so I did that and then I auditioned for a cruise ship which you know there were certain things that you could go to auditions for there but not nothing like New York which is where I should have been but I don't know if I was ready to go to New York when I was 22, you know and I went to an audition for a cruise ship and I got that and I sort of saved up some money when I was out there and sort of writing a cabaret show and sort of I don't know being a showgirl but also kind of figuring out what I wanted to do and luckily I only stayed there for six months.

I back I got back to Southern California and my friend was like you should go to New York um and drive twenty six twenty seven I know I was at this point I was I was like twenty three. I think twenty three okay so okay. You said you were there for three years, but no. I don't know, so long ago, Charlie. Many moons ago. So uh I was still very young. And I so I drove I flew to to to New York and I had a cousin there, yeah, who I you know in. Hope and a prayer. You're going there with you don't have connections, you don't have you don't have an agent, you don't have to do it. Nothing. No, no, no. And I watching on a couch. I came out the door of where I was staying, and I was like in Union Square, and I was like, this is so scary.

I was like, what? You know, and I opened up and I went into the a a newsstand and I opened up a backstage, which is you know, was a paper then. I don't even know if you can buy it that way now. And I went through and I was like, Oh, there's so much. Yeah. I guess I'll go to a couple auditions. I don't I I guess I ha brought some, you know, headshots with me and blah blah blah. I was there for one week. I went to three auditions, and the third one was for an international tour of my fair lady. Uh-huh. And it was a non equity tour. And I booked the role of Eliza Doolittle. How? How Linia? How did that happen? Three auditions in, you're clueless, you're you're you've just come off King and I fame.

23 years old. I mean, how do I mean I look back and I'm like, uh how did I even walk around the city? Yeah, yeah. The city by myself. The naivete of youth of going, I don't know enough to know that uh I shouldn't be booking this, I'm gonna book this. I remember, yeah. And I remember before that, I was like, I'm gonna go up to the Met. And I was just standing at the Met going, Oh wow, and I went on a tour inside and I was like, all right, I'm gonna live here someday. And then I booked this thing where it was like a tour, and then also went to Asia for like a year. I was Eliza Doolittle and my and and I got all these, you know, mostly good reviews. Yeah. Um all over the country that I would gather and like take a Xerox of and and then when I when I got done I was able to that's the thing.

If you start getting connections here, you can start subletting with people who were always out doing something. So you're like you get a sublet. And then I came here with I had like I don't know five thousand dollars saved up or something from the cruise ship gig and and the and that tour and I just sublet for a while and I didn't have to have a day job because I had saved up this money. And I would open up backstage circle these auditions go and at like six o'clock in the morning and wait on the street on the sidewalk while they're like picking up trash in front of me like wrapped up with over my pajamas with my Sony Walkman like shivering outside until they finally let you in. You sign up for a thing you come back you know with your makeup done and go to do the audition and that's how I started my career.

And now from Eliza Doolittle do you now have an agent or you're still now figuring out so I I did yes so I was able to take all those you know little snippets from and I put it on like one page. Yeah and then I had made a a cover letter uh and then I took my resume my head shot and I put them in eighty three different manila envelopes looked picked up a Ross report at the um the drama book store which still exists and yes sir I was like, I guess I've heard of these people. I don't know. I kind of guessed and sent out eighty-three agents, some casting directors. Yeah. Yeah. And I got five responses to go and meet people in their office for agents. And I was so young, you know. And I ended up kind of uh freelancing with three of them.

Yeah. And then finally signing with one. And the one that I signed with, Michael uh Howard, who I'm sorry, Hardig. Michael Howard was my acting teacher who uh was wonderful um for many years. Um Michael Hartig. I chose him because he I remember I was like, I booked this thing that was understudy overseas and it was more money, but then I was also offered Maria in Sound of Music uh in Media Pennsylvania. Uh-huh. And he would and for less m much less money. He goes, You should take that because you're not understudying, and also it's gonna be near town. Like he thought his thought process on how to choose, like that's one of the hard things is like sometimes you get three offers, and then sometimes you don't have an offer for nine months, you know what I mean?

But then choosing which of those things, you know, saying no to a job is so hard, but you can't do three jobs at once, and that was the thing that he was I was like, oh, this guy's not in it for the money. He's thinking of my career long term, and so I signed with him. And I was with him for 17 years or something. And this may be implied from some people, but do you mind just defining what's freelancing mean when you say I was freelancing with three? So um you you can you can freelance with more than one agent. It gets complicated because it sometimes they'll they'll both of them will submit you for the same thing. Uh-huh. So you have to that's it's a bit difficult juggling, and that's why a lot of people don't do that for a long time.

So you're allowed to, you just have to really communicate with each agent. Um, you can also have a manager at the same time. Um that you owe your your agent 10% of all your income, and a manager is gonna take usually 15% on top of that. So hopefully they're negotiating a big salary. Yeah, how do you navigate if multiple agents submit you for the same thing in terms of who gets the commission? Are they splitting it? How does that work for you? Um, you just have to. [25:05] I would, if I were doing it, I'd be like, hey, by the way, so so and so submitted me for this, I'm going in for it. Um, I heard from them first. Right. I mean, they would get the commission. Yeah, yeah. But but to your point of it's not something that you necessarily do for too long, like it like a relationship, because it can feel a little bit like, all right, you gotta, you know, crap or get off the pot, I guess at some point in terms of who are we going with here?

Who's getting this commission? Yeah, it's like, yeah. If you're if you're good at that dating around, then have fun. But but yeah. [25:35] Charlie Murphy: This is awesome. Let's take a little break. And on the back end, I want to dive a little bit more into the breadth of different theater work. So we're back in a flash.

[25:43] Charlie Murphy: Okay, we are back with the amazing Linia Rideout. We're gonna talk a little bit about the breadth of your career. We're already getting into it in terms of these early moments. I, you know, happy to kind of hear some of these amazing Broadway's successes as they come and you know, to hear that journey. But I I'd love to kind of just if possible, talk a little bit about just the overview of what all the different kinds of theater that you seems like worked your way up through, and then still navigate all the different iterations of, right? When you're talking about, you know, you've done musicals, you've done, you know, the Shakespeare, you've done obviously straight plays, you've done Broadway's, off-Broadway, off-off Broadway's.

I mean, all the different versions of this at this point, the regional dinner theater productions, all the different things. So we'll I want to kind of wrap and uh end with sort of a double click on the off Broadway's commercial experience that you're about to open here with Music City. But can we just talk a little bit about like what those different mediums I don't know say should I say media, what I'm saying mediums. I can't doesn't sound right. Different media what that looks like in terms of, you know, let's maybe start with Broadway's for clarity. Like what is the experience of working on Broadway's? Just from like an actor perspective, how you're treated, how you're paid. I mean obviously give me a little bit of like a median Broadway's experience.

I know you've worked at Lincoln Center is gonna be different than other theaters and those kind of things. But for sure. What does it feel like to work on Broadway's? What is that experience when you're there versus some other places? It's um it's interesting because the first time I was on Broadway's was with cabaret and when we started we were it was with Roundabout which is a little bit like Lincoln Center where it's it's a Lord eight plus contract which is less money. Right. Not um not real Broadway's Broadway. It's Broadway's but it doesn't count to the same Broadway's contract. You can still win a Tony. I don't know why. But and we did. So that's awesome. But better yeah and so I think I didn't realize and I had been off Broadway's all already at that time and I didn't realize wait oh this is a big deal.

Yeah. Like this this is gonna be a big deal. Right. But it I didn't because it has the word Broadway's because now you get to put on the top of your I mean kind of s silly that roundabout versus another amazing you know non profit off Broadway's theater feels different but it does because it's got the word Broadway's right well I just didn't I was also more naive then. But it's usually okay, so usually with a usual Broadway's show, you're like, sweet, you know, the income is much better, and you can kind of relax about that. Yeah. Um, it definitely becomes more your world, like more your whole world. You don't have you're doing promotion, you're doing outside stuff. It's it's you think, oh, I'll get in this show and I'll write another show while I'm in that show.

It's really hard because it takes up your whole, it sucks a lot of your energy in mostly good ways. But um, and especially and tech drags on for about six weeks as opposed to one week or ten days, you know. That's hard. Tech and previews and previews, when you know, when you start performances, you're still rehearsing during the day and making changes. Yeah. That is the big difference. And that people can't afford to do regionally. Sometimes off Broadway's they can do that. But it means for your life, it's stopped. I mean, this is what you're doing. You're not doing side jobs too, you're not you're in previews, you're there. And you do 12, it's like 10 out of 12s for six weeks. It's so and it's so overwhelming.

Yeah. And and it and exhausting, and you have to figure out how to pace yourself through that. That's it's hard to explain that. But then once you open, it it does feel like, oh, thank goodness. Unless you're an understudy, and then you start going to understand rehearsal. Immediately towards the scale, which is can be very overwhelming as well. Um and do you mind just for you you don't have to reveal all every dollar you've ever earned? But do we have a sense of brass tax in terms of like what am I getting paid on Broadway's? What what might that look like for the average person? I know you negotiate for yourself a hundred thousand dollars for every contract, but for s for like a normal Broadway's person, uh, what might that look like?

[29:49] Leenya Rideout: Now, uh, I would say I'm gonna go per week. I think the minimum now for on Broadway's is around twenty-two, twenty-three. Uh, that was the most I ever made because it's been a while. Um, but you know, you can depending on the role that you've been in and the experience you've had and the agent that you have, you can negotiate above that. But the expectation a lot of people in the ensemble, many people are making minimum. That's not you're not necessarily all negotiating. Hey, have you seen my Instagram? I definitely get 5,000 or whatever. For uh, that's true. And I've even like been surprised talking to people in I'm not gonna name the show or whatever, but like people who have decent, you know, speaking roles that are barely making, you know, they're just making minimum, you know.

Which you know that that's it is worth noting, and I think it's some of what I think wanted to talk about the life of an actor and different things, you know, for our students, you know, that is good money if you're talking about 2200 a week, but you know, that's still is if you rent it for the whole year, 100,000 some dollars, not much more than 100,000, which is good money, but is not but you're living in New York. You live in New York to live in New York and raise a family for trend of that go, that's not easy. I mean, that's still, you know.

[31:04] Charlie Murphy: What about are there other, you know, I want to move down the spectrum putting Broadway's at the top, though, though you could tell me also it's your pyramid. Like, are there other experiences that feel similar or even elevated above Broadway's in terms of like, you know, I've known you've worked at Carnegie Hall or you've done a fancy cruise ship, or if there are things where you go, this actually was from a sort of feel life feel perspective, you've been above Broadway's, or are there other places that feel similar to that?

[31:26] Leenya Rideout: I mean, working the public sure was fun. I mean, it's rustic because you're basically outdoors. Um, that felt kind of important. You're talking about like Shakespeare in the park. Yeah, tame you the crew. To me, that is like I mean, again, from a prestige perspective, it is as much as broad, it is the thing. You're Meryl Streep's coming to your opening night and you feel like this is the main. But I mean, when you talk about how much money you make though, it's like you're making minimum wage. I mean, I you know, Yeah, yeah.

[31:54] Charlie Murphy: Yeah.

[31:54] Leenya Rideout: I mean, just in terms of the it's not Broadway's raid wages, at least maybe you negotiated that, but it wasn't for me when we worked there. Off Broadway's minimum, if you were at it like Irish rep or public is like nine hundred something.

[32:08] Charlie Murphy: So it's not even a thousand.

[32:09] Leenya Rideout: Right. Um, and then you can negotiate above that, or if you're instrument rental or you know, different things. Well, you're getting on the instrument fees too. But I mean if you think again, you're thinking nine hundred dollars a week, I mean th that is not a it's if you're especially because you're talking about some of these days where you're working a lot. It's not like nine hundred dollars a week to work a couple of days. I mean you're talking about that's that's eight shows a week.

[32:29] Charlie Murphy: Still eight shows a week.

[32:30] Leenya Rideout: Yeah, still eight shows a week. Some regional theater shows are m seven, six or seven shows a week and that that I actually don't love I hate having two days off in a row when you're in when you're loving a a show.

[32:43] Charlie Murphy: Right for the rhythm of it.

[32:44] Leenya Rideout: Because you're like, yeah, you're like, Oh, I have to get back into it on Wednesday. What? You know, but if the Tuesday night show can feel like, God, it's been a while since we've done this really yeah. Strange. Or like I worked at Hudson Valley Shakespeare. That was super fun. And we'd we'd perform like two shows in a row and then like have three days off and come back, you know, 'cause I was only doing a lot of people are in rep and I was only doing the one show. And um, yeah, that that definitely felt like, what is happening? You know.

[33:11] Charlie Murphy: I I I I've also worked at Hudson Valley for a couple seasons and the l I mean w the rep of it all so wonderful. We we'll talk about regional theater in a second. The rep of it also wonderful, but I noticed for the people who are not in rep that can be jarring of like I'm not I'm not in the same rhythm as everybody else, even like it's like they're cross-training and I'm not cross-training or they're doing this differently.

[33:29] Leenya Rideout: Yeah, and you'd like jump on the train and like head ho back to New York and then you're really not there. You know what I mean?

[33:34] Charlie Murphy: Yeah, yeah.

[33:34] Leenya Rideout: I mean it obviously it's great, but like it's hard. But let's talk about that. So that what that next level and you you to give me the pyramid for you in terms of, you know, would it be the commercial off Broadway's theater, which you know, I think again can feel closer to Broadway's in some ways and some of the commercial aspects of it. Or, you know, you mentioned the public really can felt like that in terms of certainly the prestige of the public. It's you know, yeah, I what about nice regional theaters like the Guthrie? How would you sort of range those different um theaters for yourself?

[33:59] Leenya Rideout: I mean, frankly, off Broadway's is my favorite. Uh-huh. Not financially, but there's not a You're not just saying that here 'cause you're here to advertise Bedlam, right? You're not just saying that.

[34:07] Charlie Murphy: Well, yes, that is why.

[34:10] Leenya Rideout: But but also but it is true. It is true because I mean, that's what I'm I'm trying to tell some of some of the young'uns. Um I'm like, you you you you think that you're like this is hard financially. I said, but this is the best we are. It's collaborative if you're with the right people, it's creative, you're part of the process. There's not such uh pressure to be perfect or commercial or uh it it feels much more like you're part of this process.

[34:43] Charlie Murphy: I I love a collaborative process.

[34:45] Leenya Rideout: And like I also love not having to do exactly the same move for every line I say. Uh huh. And some shows are like that, especially on Broadway's.

[34:53] Charlie Murphy: Yes.

[34:54] Leenya Rideout: And that I don't I've never really I've always been lucky enough to work with directors who want uh it to evolve and to you know what I mean?

[35:05] Charlie Murphy: A hundred percent.

[35:06] Leenya Rideout: No, I've said it many times on the pod. I mean, I do think I don't think it's a hot take. I think some of our students will hear this as a hot take, and I'm like, I don't think it's a hot take to say in general, the best work that happens in New York is off-Broadway. I mean, that's in general, of course there are exceptions. There's amazing art fully artistic things that happen on Broadway's, and of course there's crap that happens off Broadway's. Nobody's saying there's not crap that happens off Broadway's and off off Broadway's. But when you talk about the best stuff, the most pure artistic work, even sometimes in what will eventually be the Broadway's production, people will say, but did you see the off-Broadway? Oh, it was so good before before the money got in there before the commercial got added in there.

[35:37] Charlie Murphy: It's very true.

[35:43] Leenya Rideout: And I and also you're still home. Like I'm I get to walk home, like after a broad an off-Broadway show or whatever. It's so much and like I love that, like when I was working in Irish rap, I did um It's a Wonderful Life this last uh winter. And um you'd you look out in the audience, you're like, oh my god, there's AJ or whatever, you know, like I haven't seen that person for a long time, and I didn't have to invite them. They just showed up, you know, like it people that you know every day, you know, it's it when you're regionally, it's only when somebody goes out of town to come and see you.

[36:17] Charlie Murphy: So um, and you have to sort of prove to them that you did it as opposed to when it almost feels much much more real when you do theater in the city, no matter what it is.

[36:27] Leenya Rideout: And so I prefer clippings or the equivalent of 2026 of what your clipping would have been to make your one sheet. You don't have to do that and you you mentioned a give a little bit of salary range. You say we might be in the $900 range. I mean, certainly I know with some off-Broadway theater, even pretty prestigious stuff, it might not even be there. Um but what are we talking about in terms of what it is like from a a living conditions perspective, you know, in terms of the experience of both off-Broadway and off off Broadway's, like what has that been like in terms of dressing rooms and in terms of just what what the experience of actually working again, I think it's what our 17, 18 year old and even our college students, if they're in college listening, might not always know like what does that look like to work at Irish rep or to work at love or to work at some of these places where you go. I've heard of that theater, that's so great so exciting, but you're like, but what does that literally mean for

[37:11] Leenya Rideout: Right, right, you know. I mean, uh again, like I I've had some really tiny little dressing rooms. The you know, I mean, obviously what was uh the the best was like when Elizabeth and I were dressing roomies, you know, on Broadway's and we had our own little place and we could decorate it, you know, how we want it.

[37:34] Charlie Murphy: Um little couch or whatever, all those things.

[37:37] Leenya Rideout: And also ultimately, this is a weird side note, but I I prefer not having my own dressing rooms m most of the time, just 'cause it's more fun to sort of I don't know, it can be lonely. I've anyway.

[37:49] Charlie Murphy: Totally makes sense.

[37:50] Leenya Rideout: So uh I've definitely one of the weirdest situations was that I was working at 13th Street rep and this was off Broadway's. And it was a show called Before We're Gone, and um there were four of us in the cast, two women and two men, and they put us in the same dressing room.

[38:07] Charlie Murphy: Oh my.

[38:09] Leenya Rideout: Okay. And only one of the guys was gay. And so it was like it was just weird.

[38:15] Charlie Murphy: Yeah.

[38:15] Leenya Rideout: And they could have probably put a divider down the middle so we could but I don't know, it was just a weird little play in a weird little theater that has this a kooky, strange history, and it was off Broadway's, so we're just kinda like, whatever.

[38:30] Charlie Murphy: And I think that's the kind of thing, that's the kind of story where I think, especially all of our students coming from, you know, if you go to even not necessarily the most prestigious university, but a s a university that has money, that is gonna have a nice building, nice facilities. I don't think they always expect of like, wait a second, this is this isn't even off off off Broadway's. This is just a good off Broadway's theater, and this is what it can be like.

[38:50] Leenya Rideout: Yeah.

[38:57] Charlie Murphy: I mean it we there's space is is much more expensive here in the city. There's it's it's a commodity. You know, and so uh the dressing room is probably the thing that's gonna get c you know, just doesn't see it. We'll put up with in what you're like, how is that a million dollar apartment and the sink is in the bat in the kitchen or whatever the bathroom the toilets in the kitchen? Not quite that bad. I will say that um some of the best dressing rooms in the city are the Vivian Beaumont um for at Lincoln Center.

[39:28] Leenya Rideout: And they're just brand new.

[39:29] Charlie Murphy: Somebody some some person who obviously had been an actor came in and said it was three million four million, five million dollars, and they changed it all and the oh the the there's showers in everyone's bathroom and there's there's actually a bidet in everyone's bathroom.

[39:48] Leenya Rideout: So it's like it's yeah, that's one of the best.

[39:51] Charlie Murphy: The bidet in every bathroom.

[39:52] Leenya Rideout: That's what I think people picture a Broadway's dressing room is gonna be like.

[39:55] Charlie Murphy: Like I'm we visited Sean Alan Krill after right after Sweeney Todd and it you know, I was like, this is what they all should be like.

[40:01] Leenya Rideout: It is so I didn't say Sweeney Todd, not Sweetie Todd, but that was Floyd Collins, what I mean.

[40:05] Charlie Murphy: Um she's like, this is what they should all be like. It's you know, and then you see some Broadway's ones, you go, This is woof.

[40:11] Leenya Rideout: Yeah.

[40:12] Charlie Murphy: Um not to go too deep on the Broadway's, uh the the dressing rooms of it all.

[40:16] Leenya Rideout: Well, and also like I I also want to say like when we were at the Henry Miller, which is now the Sondheim Theater, but this is before they tore it down and then put the Sondheim Theater behind it, you know, as as Kit Kat Girls, we would get done and we'd have to every time we went to our dressing room, it was like five floors.

[40:32] Charlie Murphy: So you're and and actually, you know, this is the case in most Broadway's uh houses is like you're doing stairs every day.

[40:40] Leenya Rideout: Yeah, you know, many times.

[40:42] Charlie Murphy: So it's kind of great because you stay in shape, but also like hopefully your knees are good.

[40:46] Leenya Rideout: Yeah.

[40:47] Charlie Murphy: That's the the more ensemble and younger you are, the higher your dressing room to be crazy.

[40:51] Leenya Rideout: I I I'm hopefully hopefully hopefully I do it that way. Um what about can we double click on this specific journey you're on with Music City and you know I think again we didn't really talk about the distinction but between you know non profit off Broadway's theater which so let's say that the first production of Music City at least the one that I I saw though we can talk about the development of it too was an uh an off Broadway's show which was for a not produced by a non profit theater company.

[41:17] Charlie Murphy: Right now right it's kind of like we just talked about with Adam Guan when we're talking about all the world stage like hey so Keene Company is producing this thing. There might be future productions that somebody else and it will always be this is the one who produced it first but that's the nonprofit version. Now you're about to do the commercial version of the show which has this open ended run. Talk to me a little bit about the journey and the distinction I guess between those two things and what that means for the actor.

[41:33] Leenya Rideout: I mean uh uh have I done a commercial off Broadway's show before th there's aren't that many of them yes I have. I did I did um Cowgirls again way back in the day was at the Manette Lane Theater, but it was produced by a commercial you know producing team.

[41:58] Charlie Murphy: Yeah.

[41:59] Leenya Rideout: Um so that's the only thing I can think that sort of I I was an I was an understudy uh for a couple of people in that. And that was also uh sorry, actor musician, yeah pre John John Doyle, also pre-cabaret. So that was another one that was like kind of groundbreaking. Anyway, um so until since then, the only off Broadway's I've ever done is is pr you know, like Irish rep or 13th Street rep or you know um nonprofit companies, or is that theater company bedlam, right?

[42:28] Charlie Murphy: So um, or classic stage, um the public.

[42:32] Leenya Rideout: For the public, yeah, sure. I mean, and it feels weird that public is nonprofit to most people you'd be like, the public is it, but it is, it's for the public good, or even though it's prestigious, and they do the public will then do Broadway's shows.

[42:41] Charlie Murphy: You know, Hamilton starts at the public, but it's nonprofit before it for profit.

[42:45] Leenya Rideout: Right.

[42:46] Charlie Murphy: So uh it's been a while since I've had uh commercial producers for an off-Broadway show.

[42:52] Leenya Rideout: So it'll interesting to see the difference. I mean, so far they definitely had, you know, the the the challenge for them was finding a space.

[43:00] Charlie Murphy: Right.

[43:00] Leenya Rideout: Because everyone thank goodness, everyone wants to do a show now. Yeah. I mean, you know, it was always it was a bit of a worry since COVID and all that, but it's just I feel like there's it there's so much out there. Beautiful that we're here in 2026.

[43:14] Charlie Murphy: Yeah, great.

[43:14] Leenya Rideout: They've they've been trying to find a pl a space and think, do we really think outside the box or do we take a theater and you know, so that's different for them as opposed to classic stage. That they have we know we're gonna be in in that theater, you know.

[43:27] Charlie Murphy: And the idea specifically with this show being that because it is takes place in a bar, the idea is the theater itself m may we want to feel like a bar.

[43:34] Leenya Rideout: They were looking for a theater that was a bar like space. I mean for a while we were they were kind of gonna take a bar and turn it into a theater space, which I think probably is more challenging.

[43:46] Charlie Murphy: Yeah, yeah.

[43:47] Leenya Rideout: That's it, just for uh all the whatever legal reasons of that.

[43:50] Charlie Murphy: Yeah, again for full disclosure to the people who are not regular listeners. I am on the board of Bedlam, so technically I'm one of the co-producers of this show.

[43:57] Leenya Rideout: Oh, yeah.

[43:58] Charlie Murphy: I do not see any financial gain, only Bedlam, but it technically but so some of this journey we know I know a little bit more of in this specific show. But from an actor perspective, I mean it's kind of odd in the Bedlam case because also these are both were open-ended runs to some extent, right? You the even the nonprofit run was uh open-ended, which is I guess.

[44:16] Leenya Rideout: Yeah, I mean, there was talk about like continuing it on into June or whatever, and uh and it did extend a couple time. It was just so hard to get people to come above, you know, Central Park. I don't know why.

[44:38] Leenya Rideout: It's a wonderful theater company, and um hope hopefully that's changing. But it was it was um yeah, anyway. Now, as you think of it as an actor, now is this the kind of thing where you go, I might sit with it for a year, I might sit with it for who knows how long. I mean, uh like the same thing with the Broadway's show that theoretically it could run for a long period of time. Is that are you and the other actors thinking, you know, you don't have to tell me reveal your plans I'm getting out after six months, but but is the idea of going like, hey, I I I might run with this longer than certainly if you're doing something Irish rap, it's not likely to run for two, three years. No, it's got a close end to it.

[45:11] Leenya Rideout: Um so Music City is about I mean it it f it it is a love story between two songwriters, but there are other characters in the show. I'm not gonna give away the plot because um there's some sort of surprises having to do with especially one of my characters. I'll give it with away the plot, no problem. Yeah, great. Yeah, yeah. Um, so there's it it takes place in Nashville, and apparently I've I both spent very little time in Nashville, but people who live there or from there are like, oh, I I walk into your sp your theater and I feel like at home, you know, and they're like, this feels like a Nashville dive. And it it really is a it it takes place in Nashville, but it's more about to me, it's about how do you create art in a capitalistic America? And how and what are the obstacles to that?

[46:05] Leenya Rideout: And there are other people, other characters that, you know, if you're gonna talk about a hero's journey in a way, it's like that there's you know what what are they what other characters do they find that have sort of fallen by the wayside of this road to success, right? And um one of my characters is a is a well to do um record producer who's trying to find the next big thing because her career didn't exactly take off. She was you know she was a backup singer for somebody for a long time and um but now she's like in the other side of it and making a lot of money with it but sort of not happy. And then I have another character who's the mom of one of one of the love interests and uh I have my own story of how I was uh chewed up and spit out by the music industry and I won't go into too many details about that but um the two characters are very different and I go back and forth in each scene between playing them.

[47:10] Leenya Rideout: And sometimes people be like I didn't know until intermission that you were the same you were playing two characters. And I was like, yes, you know. So it is one of my favorite things to do to play a couple different characters. They're so you know, they're so different. It's very satisfying to me. Um, so that's and it's a cool story to tell every night, and it's kind of for everybody also. Yeah. Like it has a little bit for of for everyone. It's in in this day and age and the political divide, it's so hard to find a show like that. And that's what this is. And it's so it's so current, even though it was uh it's been kicking around for several years, but like w the way it's landing now is like it it it's such a story that resonates with so many different people in so many different ways.

Male, female, you know, like gay straight, like um, it's just a a story like poor, rich, you know, it's like and um uh so that being said, I'm gonna get back to answering your question, which is while we're while we're shouting outside the music's incredible, and you do play instruments too.

[48:16] Leenya Rideout: There's you have a band as well. It's not just actor musicians, right? But you play it gorgeously and as do a lot of the other actors play. I'm playing banjo, which I'm so excited because my my dad my dad's banjo was finally being used again. These are one of the many eight instruments I saw on your IMDB. They're all it's true, it's not even a lie. I love it. Okay, anyway, you're getting back to my question. Yeah, no, I was just gonna say to finally get back to answer your question. This is the kind of show, and I felt this about company too, that I could do for years. If I can afford to.

[48:43] Leenya Rideout: Yeah. You know, and um, it's just it's it and it's immersive and each audience is so different and and m you know, the audience is really a a member of of the cast once you walk through those doors. And it's so satisfying. Yeah. It's so fun to watch everybody go, Oh, you know, and be brought along with this and be surprised by, you know, oh, it's not just like a fun honky tone thing. It's it's it's it feels like doing a play.

[49:14] Charlie Murphy: Well yeah, well, it yeah, it definitely feels that way to the audience too. And I think shout out to the the cast in general. It seems like you're not the only one of people who are sticking with it through this whole journey who who have stuck with it, you know, it's been a long t time off, and then I know there's also a moment where the venue was lost and it was now we found it again, and it's that but that it seems like the cast is sticking with the whole journey. I'd love to you because you meant you you mentioned some of the one of the themes of this show was how do you create art in capitalist America, which was some of the inspiration for why I wanted to talk through this version of the podcast with you.

[49:45] Charlie Murphy: What does that mean? How do the castmates create art in capitalist America? Especially, you know, you mentioned what that can mean from a Broadway's perspective, because Broadway's can be, I know, many years of development. You do the workshop and then you wait six months, you gotta keep yourself available and then you do the out-of-town thing, you gotta keep yourself available. So, like, what does that look like in terms of how you're keeping yourself available for a job that, you know, I imagining it's not paying you Broadway's wages, it may be paying more than the standard nonprofit off Broadway's, but you know, that if that's when you're on and you're gonna run it for a year, but it takes this year up to that point where you're holding stuff and can't do this job because you're doing this.

[50:20] Leenya Rideout: So how do you how do you specifically supplement and how you know as you talk about the cast, how do how does everyone make that work? How do you get a whole cast to make that work hold putting their lives on hold in order to do it? For everyone. And uh it was my biggest fear when we had another delay, and I was like, if we if we lose any one of us, someone's gonna take a job. It was such a collaborative process making this work. And first of all, our director, Eric Tucker is a genius.

[50:45] Leenya Rideout: Friend of the pod's, been on the pod. We agree. Yep. I absolutely love working with him, but it's very interesting. His process starts with kind of like, let's play. What do you got? What are we what are we gonna do here? What do you, you know? And then he starts to come in and go, okay. Do you know what I mean? But that messy process to begin with. And and starting with hiring the right people.

[51:08] Leenya Rideout: And no, like you can see him, like I've had different people play different parts through in the workshops that I've done. And you can see him go, that's not gonna work with my process, right? But when he gloms onto someone that um, you know, that he can he can work with and paint with, right? I mean, it's it's a little bit like John Doyle, also, but John is not quite a it's not he has a way of painting, he's the painter, but John is. But Eric hires painters.

[51:41] Leenya Rideout: He hires painters and has him put but to that is almost exactly. I mean, get back to the beautiful point you made earlier about off Broadway's theater. It's like there's something because of the messiness, there's something that's so artistic about that mess, which is anti-capitalist. Like it is you go, that means the actors are not replaceable in the same way. Broadway cannot do that. Broadway cannot create a show that's gonna run for 10 years where only one actor can play it. They would go, you have to fit into the costume and fit the role enough.

[52:08] Leenya Rideout: I mean, people again, there's freedom, and we've talked about that with Broadway's. Glinda's in your Glinda's not the same as other people's Glinda, but there's a role a lane that is Glinda, yeah, in a way that I think the way Eric works, he's not trying to create a Glinda that everybody can play in the world. I mean, don't get me wrong. We have wonderful understudies who also shout out is my former MDCA student.

[52:27] Charlie Murphy: I looked at this, Danny Hayward. Shout out to you, Danny. I'm so proud of you. Former MTCA, here's my I was his monologue coach way back in the day. And I saw him the website and went, Danny, yes. He's marvelous, and he also understudies all the guys.

[52:39] Leenya Rideout: You better. I mean, that's how it works in Opera. You gotta do it all, yeah. So it's country's using all the instruments, also. Like he's he's incredible. So luckily we have found people, you know what I mean? Um still swim in that same kind of pool of going, I I can do this thing. It's not it's not a uh repeatable paint by numbers kind of task.

[52:57] Leenya Rideout: No, you have to be individual painter. Yeah. And they were, you know, they were looking for someone to to understudy me, because for to understudy my daughter and myself is a is like it just was they were trying, and it's only Elizabeth who can play.

[53:11] Charlie Murphy: Right, exactly. But um, but I I was like, okay, here are the five people that I know. And I gave them all the names, and they ended up hiring Megan Loomis, who is fantastic, and um, yeah. But you were doing a little bit of the brass task of it. You're saying someone might take a job because they are irreplaceable, or it's so difficult to replace the collaborators.

[53:32] Charlie Murphy: Well, how how is everyone making that work? I guess how are you making that work as you navigate all of it?

[53:36] Leenya Rideout: Uh you mean during this hiatus?

[53:39] Charlie Murphy: During the journey of it. I mean, you're talking about from development to this to that. This is now years you've been working on this project at this point.

[53:45] Leenya Rideout: Um, I mean there were a couple times that Eric was like, we're gonna do a workshop at this time. And I was like, I'm doing this job that I I have to do it because I'm making so much money and I have to, you know, and he he worked around me.

[54:01] Leenya Rideout: Wow. Like I which I take as a huge honor. Um, but then there were times that he would let us know enough time in advance to be like, don't accept anything during this. And you know, they'd pay us for the workshops and all that stuff.

[54:15] Leenya Rideout: So um, yeah, it's been it's it's like I know that he's assembl he's always gonna assemble people that I want to work with every night. Like these it's this cast is like so fun to play with.

[54:31] Leenya Rideout: It's and every night you're like, all right, what's gonna happen today? And you don't know. And you you're like, okay, we're gonna start. This is the way I always think of it. Like if it's working well. You're like, I don't even play pinball, but like at a pinball game, and there's all those things and you have a place to put your ball at the top, but you you could put the ball over here, start the pinball game.

[54:54] Leenya Rideout: A lot of you know, in Broadway's, you might have to like go like this. Yeah, but with with this this you you can go, oh you know what? Today I'm gonna go way over here, and everyone on the stage is ready. It's all gonna be like happen. I'm not saying you can do different blocking necessarily, but everything else, yeah.

[55:14] Leenya Rideout: But everything else is uh, you know, and also then you know the notes have to be correct, but but I will tell you that I don't always play the same thing every night. I'm like improvising on some of it, some of the everybody's bought into that. Everybody's saying we're we're all gonna play the same game. We know the game that we're playing and we're gonna push each other and play with each other.

[55:30] Leenya Rideout: I mean jazz. It feels more like jazz as opposed to something that's set the same every night.

[55:36] Charlie Murphy: That's a good analogy of jazz. I was gonna say I just saw Bedlam's production of Othello.

[55:40] Leenya Rideout: I saw the first preview, which is I'm seeing it on Sunday.

[55:42] Charlie Murphy: I'm seeing it Sunday. Ryan Quinn, also a podcast guest with one of my my good friends, and he was like, How dare you come to the first preview?

[55:49] Leenya Rideout: And I was like, it's so thrilling though, because it's the rawest version of it.

[55:53] Charlie Murphy: He's like, Some of the stuff hasn't even been set yet. We're just doing it for you, and it's not done.

[55:56] Leenya Rideout: I'm like, but that is as an audience so thrilling to see that, to see it when it is it is in its rawest most sort of distilled form of like actors making art, just actors doing it and figuring it out.

[56:07] Charlie Murphy: And Eric Tucker is in it.

[56:09] Leenya Rideout: He's in the same thing, yeah. That's unbelievable.

[56:11] Charlie Murphy: Yeah, he's great. I can't wait.

[56:13] Leenya Rideout: Um, okay, but so uh a the last finish question that I promise I'll get out of your pocketbook is just to talk a little bit how have you know, over the course of time.

[56:22] Leenya Rideout: I mean, we're talking about these individual moments of okay, and I imagine this means side jobs and different things between things that you're adding in, and then taking commercial jobs you mentioned of this one's paying me a lot, so I have to do that. But how how have you and your husband, both working actors, right? From the outside, you know, radical successes, right? you you I'm looking at a beautiful home that we're in, which not every actor can afford a beautiful home that you have, and because upstate, right? And you you guys have made yourself not just successes in this business, but really long-term sustainable successes, which that's a whole other level of hard not to hit it, but to hit it and hold on to it for this whole period of time.

[56:55] Charlie Murphy: So, what has that meant both in terms of I'd love to hear it like in terms of what you've had to do over the course of time to supplement income, and then also if there are places where you go, we had to sacrifice this, this meant this lean year meant this. You know, we talked about that a little bit from a commercial actor perspective of what that can mean, but uh, I mean commercials like um you know, Verizon commercials, but from as a sort of working theater actor, how how has that happened? What what does that look like in terms of your life?

[57:19] Leenya Rideout: Well, first of all, I am so glad that you're talking about this with young people, yeah. Because it was the one thing I was never taught. I mean, well, many things. There was a lot of things I had to sort of find out on my own, but but I remember like about I don't know, 10 years ago, I I went back to my alma mater, and they were like, Do you want to do some master classes? And I was like, Yes, and this is the one I want to do, and I want to talk about finances.

[57:42] Leenya Rideout: And it was interesting, like I would have it like a thing on a board, and I'm like putting the you know, and saying, okay, we gotta figure out you're around here and all this stuff, and you just see their eyes glaze over because they don't want to think about it. It's terrifying, it's so terrifying. And um, of course, also the way I broke into this business is gonna be different because it was a different time and things weren't as expensive, and you know, uh, so that it's it's a little difficult for me to really say, but um, yeah, and and my husband, who is one of the best actors, I'm biased, but in this business, um, he's in Stranger Things on Broadway's right now.

[58:20] Leenya Rideout: Um he also did not come from a family with money, like he it is his story is also incredible. Maybe he could be your next guest.

[58:31] Charlie Murphy: All right, we'll get him on the car for sure.

[58:32] Leenya Rideout: Yeah, but he, you know, yes, talent, but also just drive and and passion for storytelling, like he he's also like very humble and not into the glitz of any of it, so it's not about that for him, and I think people recognize that um and want to work with him, but anyway, I digress.

[58:57] Leenya Rideout: So getting making your life in this business is really difficult, and everyone has a different like like snowflakes, everyone has a different story.

[59:05] Leenya Rideout: Yeah, and also it's different if you have kids, yeah. And that I don't know how you do, and I'm looking at you either Linia, I'll tell you in 10 years if I survived it. I don't know.

[59:18] Leenya Rideout: Yeah, I I remember thinking in my twenties, like, of course I'm gonna have kids, and then you know be easy, and I'll just like have a nanny or whatever, and yes, all of that, but oh my goodness, you know, I'm just gonna from the outside, seeing that if you want to do that, you they get home from school, yeah, and then you have maybe an hour with them before you have to get on the subway and go and do your show, and then you get home and they're asleep.

[59:46] Leenya Rideout: So you see, and on the weekends, hopefully you don't have a five-show weekend, but if you do, you don't see your kids on the weekend.

[59:53] Charlie Murphy: I don't know how you do it.

[59:54] Leenya Rideout: Yeah. So that being said, we don't have that. Um, but I will say, and for a while I thought, oh, I don't know if I want to be married to somebody who's in the business because then you're always talking about it. I thank goodness every day that we are. We understand when we have to kiss people on stage. We under, you know, some person's working, the other like some person's not, you know, and we make that work and it's in it in and we are our our that was the thing is like our relationship financially and the way talking about it. Obviously, we get grumpy when we're doing taxes, but you know, we I have a really good relationship about that. We're a good partnership.

[1:00:34] Leenya Rideout: Um, and there are so many different ways to figure out how to make New York affordable because it is possible. There's housing that you can get on lotteries for, yeah. Uh sort of all over because you get a tax break if you're a landlord and you have some low-income housing. And it takes but it's just like finding a job in the theater. It takes a lot of stamina going out, getting on list, knocking on people's doors saying, Hey, can I sign up for blah blah blah? Not gonna come to you. Yes, it does not come to you.

[1:01:05] Leenya Rideout: And or sublets getting you know, there's ways, and you can do it online now. You can find places to sublet. Then you're in a neighborhood that you like, then you hear about somebody who's like, Oh, I this this n this is opening up, you know, you have roommates, you can live in the boroughs also, not horror, you know, it's fine. And like um there's many different ways to uh make to to live reasonably.

[1:01:32] Charlie Murphy: Yeah. And for you it's been more about creativity as opposed to other like for you it hasn't been big side jobs where you've worked as a copy editor or have you done a lot of those kind of things too. Have you done a lot of you know additional non-acting and non-performing stuff?

[1:01:45] Leenya Rideout: The only thing I've had to do is and I did I have to I don't know. I worked at NYU for a while and I was a voice teacher. You get as an adjunct.

[1:01:53] Charlie Murphy: Ought to do it. Do you have to do it?

[1:01:56] Leenya Rideout: Yeah. I didn't I think looking back like there are definitely being an adjunct is not the most financially.

[1:02:04] Charlie Murphy: Yeah.

[1:02:04] Leenya Rideout: And it's yeah it I learned a lot. I did it for two years. Um but being a teacher is a in that way in a private way. You you have some flexibility.

[1:02:14] Charlie Murphy: What you want is flexibility.

[1:02:17] Leenya Rideout: Yeah. A nine to five is really difficult to navigate some people do. I've never had that except for here and here and there like temping. Out of my apartment.

[1:02:33] Charlie Murphy: Um I don't hate that.

[1:02:35] Leenya Rideout: Like I the only thing is the scheduling. You're talking to someone who runs a coaching company Linia we understand. We we get it.

[1:02:41] Charlie Murphy: That's why yeah for sure.

[1:02:44] Leenya Rideout: And I adore doing master classes and things like that when I get a chance for that or concert work or you know TV film. Ted gets a lot of voiceover work which can be very lucrative. Um so there's always you know and sometimes if you're like wow nothing no one's like emailing me or whatever you'll go out and and that's the wonderful thing about this city is you you go to a party somewhere or you're walking down the street and you see you're like oh and you're the there's network situations everywhere and that's why that's why I did not like Southern California like here you know you meet people on the bus you're like oh wait so you're oh well let me give me my card or whatever like we still have cards here because in New York that you your networking situation you know and you'll get like a uh you know short term a reading of a new musical you do make some money or whatever you know and you know and I will also talk about navigating unemployment because if you your job ends um and you can go and sign up for unemployment you get it's not a lot but you can get something that that will carry you through 20 weeks so that's there's so many ways to sort of piece together a way to make a living and what's interesting is like so my accountant will be like wait you left cabaret and it's still going like why would you do that?

[1:04:12] Leenya Rideout: And you had to explain to them well because I didn't want to do the same show right over and over for more than two years. Like and and they don't like people don't understand that the making the decision to say no to big money right like we don't think like capitalists and you're not doing it for a better paying job.

[1:04:31] Charlie Murphy: Like they'd be like oh I get why you left one law firm for another law firm because it paid you more you're like no no I'm leaving it to go do a tiny regional theater job where I get to make you be the lead or do something different or whatever.

[1:04:42] Leenya Rideout: Yeah, because it's like I've always wanted to play witch in into the woods. That's what I want to do next.

[1:04:46] Charlie Murphy: Yeah.

[1:04:46] Leenya Rideout: And like, like I left Warhorse also in the middle of that. And they're like, what are you? This is crazy. You were gonna get a raise. And I'm like, yeah, but like, I need to, I need to stretch myself.

[1:04:56] Charlie Murphy: And so it's never, I'm obviously it is about money in that you have to survive and like, you know, but in the end, I don't need we don't need more than one little Kia car, you know, we need like, and we're lucky to have that. We don't need to have fancy things.

[1:05:13] Leenya Rideout: I thrift everything I buy. Every you know, I think you know somebody else who's like that. Like, you know, um, I make my own clothes.

[1:05:21] Charlie Murphy: Um, Ted is wonderful at fixing everything around the house.

[1:05:25] Leenya Rideout: Like, we're lucky enough to have these skills, and um, we love a bargain and getting things for free, and like this this table that I'm sitting at right now, like we found on the street and like brought in and refinished it, like that kind of that kind of thing saves you a lot of having to have another job.

[1:05:43] Charlie Murphy: Yeah, I'm you're literally looking at someone who uh uh my wife uh she was not willing to throw out the the excess of the stickers that Solvi so it had like these sticker things that made this cute pattern. She goes, but this is basically tape. We can use I was like, this is the surrounding area. I was like, this is trash.

[1:05:59] Leenya Rideout: Well, we're the same person. I think you know that.

[1:06:02] Charlie Murphy: Artistic tape.

[1:06:02] Leenya Rideout: I was like, oh my artistic tape.

[1:06:04] Charlie Murphy: Yeah.

[1:06:04] Leenya Rideout: So I I love that conversation. And and obviously I think it's something a lot of our parent listeners also will recognize that like if you're choosing to go into this art form, you probably are not maximizing your financial potential. Like realistically, we think look at our students. These are not, I you know, I always talk about I hate the phrase like if you could do anything else. I'm like, so many of our students could do so many other things. They're choosing to maximize something else in their life, right?

[1:06:26] Charlie Murphy: These are smart people who can do a lot of things, and you likely won't maximize compared to, you know, if you want to go work for an AI company or something, you probably can make more money.

[1:06:35] Leenya Rideout: But like, but what are you maximizing? What what do you gain from yourself in terms of your the joy of your life and artistically and some of those other things that other people don't have in their life? Emotional intelligence, empathy, uh work communic like communication skills, being able to work with somebody and and and collaborate.

[1:06:52] Charlie Murphy: Like all these things, if you're not good at those things, you're not gonna be asked back.

[1:06:57] Leenya Rideout: And it's not just about can I sing high notes?

[1:07:00] Charlie Murphy: Yeah.

[1:07:00] Leenya Rideout: Or kick high. Like those things are those are great.

[1:07:03] Charlie Murphy: Like if you can do that.

[1:07:04] Leenya Rideout: But it's it's I'm I'm my brother. Like I've known people who have to find another career eventually, or you know, and or you're working outside of it, and it's like you're like, oh, these people don't have those things.

[1:07:19] Charlie Murphy: They don't have curiosity, right?

[1:07:21] Leenya Rideout: They don't have the sense of humor that I'm used to, or or the the emotional intelligence. I'm I'm I'm I'm generalizing. Obviously, there are people in every career who have those things. I'm just saying, like, we take for granted sometimes that we like the the group of people that you get to go into the room with, and I call I'm starting to call it a sacred space, like your rehearsal room and your theater, like that that group of people, and sometimes you're like, oh my god, we worked together before, or I know you through somebody else.

[1:07:52] Charlie Murphy: It the community is I remember once I was uh invited to sing for Sondheim's 80th birthday.

[1:08:03] Leenya Rideout: 85th at Avery Fisher Hall.

[1:08:07] Charlie Murphy: And he had all the you know stars up there when they're red gowns, and they call they contacted all the people who've done his shows over the years, and they had us in the back, and we were dressed in black, and like right at the very end, and I'm gonna cry as I talk about this, but at the very end, this was a surprise, and he's sitting in the audience, right?

[1:08:27] Leenya Rideout: And we all we're all like come just out in the in the lobby. I don't know how they made it a surprise.

[1:08:30] Charlie Murphy: And we started going someday by the blue, poopoo, yellow, red, and we all came on and just stormed the stage.

[1:08:40] Leenya Rideout: I'm standing in front of Paul, you uh I can't Jim and Yani. Uh-huh.

[1:08:44] Charlie Murphy: And he's conducting the the fill, and it's like, and all of a sudden, this entire theater is filled with all these people who've done his shows over the years, you know, and we knew him and we loved him, and it was like hard to even sing it.

[1:08:59] Leenya Rideout: And like I thought I looked around and I was like, Oh, there's Donalyn Champlin, and oh my god, I've worked with this person. And it was like here we all were in this this one room.

[1:09:04] Charlie Murphy: And it was like, Why why do you need money?

[1:09:12] Leenya Rideout: No, here we are. What the money for is for that.

[1:09:15] Charlie Murphy: People then spend good money to have those kind of spiritual experiences.

[1:09:18] Leenya Rideout: Yeah.

[1:09:19] Charlie Murphy: Uh that's so true.

[1:09:20] Leenya Rideout: I I want to um move toward wrapping, but I I'd love to, if we can, you know, thinking about our let's say our 20-year-old listeners, our listeners who are in college who are looking at the daunting journey ahead of them of you know, of what this life is gonna be. What advice would you have for young artists as they're sort of forging that path?

[1:09:37] Leenya Rideout: Like, what are the things if they want to have this kind of sustained Leenya Rideout kind of career? What would you advise they do?

[1:09:44] Leenya Rideout: Find your grit. Find the thing that's gonna keep you doing this, even after all the rejections and the humiliations, and some of it is humiliating, and but you have your own dignity, and that is that you again it's tricky because sometimes it feels very selfish what you're doing. Especially when you're auditioning and you're just, you know, out there taking pictures of yourself and like putting yourself on social media. It feels very much like, look at me, look at me.

[1:10:16] Charlie Murphy: But all of you who are gonna stay in this business have the other thing below that, which is telling stories.

[1:10:23] Leenya Rideout: And I'm I'm getting emotional. What's wrong with me? Um telling stories is what human beings have done around campfires forever. And it is literally what we have. It's it's our instrument, it's our currency, it's and we know how important it is, and it's important for people who want to listen to those stories, but also come up and help us join join us to tell the stories, and it to me is sacred.

[1:11:01] Leenya Rideout: And um if you're lucky enough to been called to do this, just stick with it. And each heartbreak that you have with each rejection is something that you can use going forward as on as as an artist to tell the next story.

[1:11:21] Charlie Murphy: Because heartbreak, that's the thing.

[1:11:24] Leenya Rideout: It's like heartbreak, joy, sadness, all of it. Those are all our tools. They're all a blessing. It all of it. And instead of like, oh, I can't think of that time that I you know, it's like, oh, all that time that I felt like this, then now I can play the witch, you know. All that stuff.

[1:11:44] Charlie Murphy: And and that that is worth everything.

[1:11:47] Leenya Rideout: So well said.

[1:11:48] Charlie Murphy: I mean, and so the I you keep thinking about the things that don't feel like gifts that you go, how is this actually a gift?

[1:11:53] Leenya Rideout: I I've been playing with this phrase in my head of like everything that's not love is actually love.

[1:11:58] Charlie Murphy: You know, it's like how how is the thing the things that don't seem like they're coming in as love?

[1:12:01] Leenya Rideout: I'm like, how do I actually see on some how do I tie the thread to be like, but that actually is coming from a cry for love from someone?

[1:12:07] Charlie Murphy: That actually is a love.

[1:12:08] Leenya Rideout: No, I love it.

[1:12:08] Charlie Murphy: Somehow it's coming from that like how do you see that way?

[1:12:10] Leenya Rideout: But that's for in this industry that is so true of the the things that feel like, man, that was the hardest thing. You go, how is that actually something that's strengthening me?

[1:12:17] Charlie Murphy: It's preparing me for this next thing.

[1:12:18] Leenya Rideout: It's you know, how do you see it that way?

[1:12:20] Leenya Rideout: Um, this is silly, but like if I see a roach in my kitchen and I'm like, I have to I hate killing anything. But I have to find the killer inside me to go, oh, and kill you know what I mean.

[1:12:35] Charlie Murphy: Which for you, you're finding a character.

[1:12:37] Leenya Rideout: There, it's all we have a killer inside us. We have a lover inside us, we have, you know, an empath and stuff.

[1:12:43] Charlie Murphy: We have them, they're all there.

[1:12:44] Leenya Rideout: We just luckily they're smaller than other parts of ourselves, hopefully.

[1:12:48] Charlie Murphy: But like being able to know that all of those things that's all human and and it comes back to forgiving and it's and telling stories.

[1:12:58] Leenya Rideout: I love it.

[1:12:59] Charlie Murphy: Linia, this was so fun. Thank you for the time today. I really, really appreciate it.

[1:13:03] Leenya Rideout: Well, thanks for getting me all emotional.

[1:13:06] Charlie Murphy: I can be emotional and then hang up the call.

[1:13:08] Leenya Rideout: You're like, okay, great. Uh really, it was it was so fun.

[1:13:16] Charlie Murphy: Yes, yes, yes.

[1:13:18] Leenya Rideout: So fun to get to chat with Linia. I really appreciated that emotional vulnerability at the end there.

[1:13:23] Charlie Murphy: I just thought it was really beautiful.

[1:13:24] Leenya Rideout: I know we were like wrapping up, and I was like, this is really beautiful what you're where you're going to.

[1:13:28] Charlie Murphy: And you know, I just kind of wonder like what percentage of the population who are middle-aged humans can easily and comfortably go to those places.

[1:13:35] Leenya Rideout: I I mean, you know, you hear me say it all the time, but I think this training and this work and this career are really beautiful, magical things in terms of like the kind of human beings they create.

[1:13:44] Charlie Murphy: Okay, let's get into some of these takeaways.

[1:13:47] Leenya Rideout: Here we go.

[1:13:47] Charlie Murphy: I do think these are gonna be long, but we'll do our best.

[1:13:50] Leenya Rideout: Um, I do think it's worth noting as we did that little exercise, that like we went through a bunch of different levels or a couple different levels of theater, but we did not get into all the different distinctions of kinds of theater you can do.

[1:14:01] Charlie Murphy: I mean, that could be like a five-hour episode just on itself.

[1:14:04] Leenya Rideout: So, not by a long shot have we gone through all of them, right?

[1:14:07] Charlie Murphy: And if you're really interested in the minutiae, you can look up all the different contracts you can get. You can get different Lort contracts.

[1:14:11] Leenya Rideout: That's the leader of the League of Regional Theaters, and you can look at production contracts and off-Broadway commercial contracts.

[1:14:18] Charlie Murphy: You can find a lot of this information if you want specifics and exact numbers.

[1:14:22] Leenya Rideout: But uh it wasn't that I was so interested in going that deep on it.

[1:14:26] Charlie Murphy: Really, the biggest reason I wanted to do this, you know, to do that as an exercise of like sort of introducing Linia's pyramid, was really to help those who are newer to the idea of like what this might be, what a life in the theater might be, just to have some sense of like what exists beyond Broadway's.

[1:14:42] Charlie Murphy: What does it mean when you talk about stuff that's beyond Broadway's? Because it really is not Broadway's or bust in terms of the numbers of jobs, and there's so many jobs and so many more jobs than just Broadway's, kinds of jobs and all that kind of stuff.

[1:14:53] Charlie Murphy: When you're talking about making a life in the theater, there are just thousands and thousands of different places to work. But I do think it's worth noting that especially when you're talking about working in a place like New York City at different places at different levels, we can be talking radically different pay scales.

[1:15:07] Charlie Murphy: And so it's just worth thinking about what would that mean? If I'm making this much money, then what kind of different jobs might I have and how would that fit into my life? And you know, likely have a side job or multiple side jobs, depending on the work is, right?

[1:15:19] Charlie Murphy: Um, but I'm saying this as a takeaway just to note that like if you think you just got a comprehensive list, you definitely didn't. There are a lot of more jobs out there, both in terms of the different levels of theater, but then also more non-theatered stuff, stuff like cruise ships and theme parks and all these stuff that we just didn't even get into.

[1:15:33] Charlie Murphy: Okay, and this takeaway, I think it's a little bit silly, but I did want to just say it, you know, we're kind of laughing about that King and I example she gives on early on of doing dinner theater and being cast in the King and I, and how that certainly wouldn't happen today. You know, we're talking a bit tongue in cheek, mostly because when people talk about stuff like that, I'm sort of like, I don't know what you can do but laugh looking backward, you know.

[1:15:53] Charlie Murphy: And that's certainly before my day. I mean, Linia's a little older than me, so that's a little bit before my day in terms of what we're talking about. But I do think worth noting for our 17-year-old listeners, and even for our 27-year-old listeners and our 37-year-old listeners, just how different the world was not too long ago, right?

[1:16:09] Charlie Murphy: I'm talking about the theater world and the world world, right? The example Linia's giving is from less than 30 years ago, right? And in the grand scheme of things, 30 years is not so long. So if you just think about like how different this industry was 30 years ago, but then also how different the industry was 20 years ago and how different it was 10 years ago.

[1:16:27] Charlie Murphy: I mean, very different 2016 versus 2026. And so I think for our 17-year-old listeners, just to think about like how different the industry will be 10 years from now when you're entering that industry competitively. I mean, that's gonna be you only a couple years out of school, 10 years from now, and just how different the industry might be in terms of all those changes.

[1:16:47] Charlie Murphy: Um, so you know, keep listening on. Hopefully, this podcast will still be guiding you, but it will be a very different industry than it was, and very different than what it will be. Okay, and I hope you heard and enjoyed that part about Linia and thrifting. I know it's something Elizabeth talks about a lot of just like, what are the things that she had to give up in the moments when she was really grinding.

[1:17:07] Charlie Murphy: You know, I think she talked about often not having as many side jobs, similar to what Linia said, and you know, maybe giving up having as much money so that instead she could be really thrifty. And that was just the choice, right? That, you know, some people might choose to work a bit more. Maybe they do that extra bartending gig so that they can spend a bit more.

[1:17:24] Charlie Murphy: They can go out, they can buy nicer clothes. Whereas for her and for a lot of artists, they say, well, I want to make the choice to spend more time on my craft. I can prioritize the things that I really need for my career. And then they're happy to give up some of those other trappings of money, right?

[1:17:39] Charlie Murphy: But I think whichever route you go, whether that's more side jobs and trying to earn more or just more thriftiness and what you're willing to sacrifice, it all speaks to a kind of grit that you just need to cultivate a version of for yourself if you're gonna live this lifestyle. I mean, I'll say hopefully you won't have to. Hopefully, you'll be that lucky person out there who does book that Broadway's show right out of school, and you don't have to scrap and grind quite as much, right?

[1:18:03] Charlie Murphy: Uh, our sweet friend of the pod and our MTCA alumni, Ali Luz Borzgie, just got his Tony Nom and well, only a few years out of school before he's booking Broadway's, and now here he's got his Tony Nom. So likely he didn't have to scrap at quite the level that some other people did, right? May you all be so lucky. I truly hope that for you.

[1:18:19] Charlie Murphy: But that is more the exception. And I'll say, you won't all be so lucky. May you, the specific listener, be so lucky. I hope that for you. But you won't all be so lucky. That that is the exception, not the rule when you talk about like climbing the ladder to success of what it is to make it in this industry, right? So, and I'll say Ali, likely he too will have to scrap at some point along the journey as well, but more people do than don't, and more people would really benefit from that grit.

[1:18:43] Charlie Murphy: You know, I was talking about this a bit with the NMU kids at their showcase. You know, I do think, especially those who take a less conventional path, do need to have even a bit more grit and a bit more stick-to-itiveness and creativity to kind of make their success happen. You know, we talked about that in a little with Elizabeth's episode. You know, she went to a well-known school, but she was creating a BS in theater.

[1:19:03] Charlie Murphy: And I don't think she felt like she came to the city with a lot of momentum and you know, just riding that wave, right? She had to create it for herself. And you certainly heard that in this interview with Linia, that like she was really scrapping and creating for herself. She had this skill set, she had this violin skill set with help, which helped, but she was going, I'm building this from scratch, right?

[1:19:21] Charlie Murphy: And I think that's true for a lot of students, even most students, especially who don't go to those big name conservatory programs, right? And I'll say on the flip side, you will see sometimes grads of those big name programs, they have a bit more entitlement and maybe a bit more expectation that the red carpet's gonna be rolled out for them.

[1:19:39] Charlie Murphy: It's not to say, again, that doesn't sometimes happen, but it is the exception, not the rule that even if you went to a Juilliard or a Carnegie Mellon or a Michigan or name whatever school, you're likely still gonna need and really benefit from that grit and that self-creation, as opposed to going, it'll just be handed to me. I'll meet that perfect agent who just gives me my first job and I nail my first audition. That is just not how it happens for most people, right?

[1:20:00] Charlie Murphy: I'll probably talk about that more in a future takeaway, maybe on that very showcase episode, because I took a little note down as I was doing that. And then I know you're all probably sick of me talking about the idea of having kids as two actors. I know I've talked about that before on the podcast, but I guess I thought it was worth just adding in the context of sacrifices, you're talking about sacrifices, you know, about what that can mean for two actors, you know, in terms of what it is to have kids.

[1:20:25] Charlie Murphy: And I, you know, have talked about what it meant for me, right? You're gonna get a bit of this in a future episode with Kristen Beth and James Ludwig from NMU, who are both really successful actors who had a kid while they were both actors in New York City. And then their version of making it work and trying to find stability was to move into academia, at least partly while they are really staying active in the business.

[1:20:46] Charlie Murphy: They are, you know, as you're gonna hear about in the episode, they're actively one of them's about to take a big job that's gonna pull them away from academia. And how's that gonna work in terms of everything, right? But it is also just a version of stability that they have found and that I think actors find in general, which is really hard fought.

[1:21:02] Charlie Murphy: Each couple has a different story and a different path in terms of how they find it. But kind of really, no matter what you do, it's gonna be hard if you have kids. If you're both, if you're both actively working actors, I'll say, it's gonna be especially hard, right? And I mean, I think it's probably hard for everyone who has kids. I can't imagine anyone finds it easy, but it just there's an added level when you talk about the uncertainty of what it is to have two actively working actors, right?

[1:21:27] Charlie Murphy: So while we're talking about financial sacrifices of this business, it's just worth noting some of the life sacrifices that you might have to make as well, right? I mean, there absolutely are couples where both of the people are actively working actors, they have kids, they both really stay active in the business and they can make it work. Again, I just think it's really hard and you're gonna have to find a unique solution for you, right?

[1:21:46] Charlie Murphy: For some people, that means that whether they choose a partner outside the business who can offer some of that nine to five stability, or one of the partners makes that choice to say, Hey, I'm gonna try to offer that for our family, right? You know, especially if one of you is gonna be in that place where you might take a national tour or you might go do a bunch of regional theater and what that might mean, you know, you're gonna be throwing that kid's life out of whack if you're constantly moving from city to city and school to school.

[1:22:11] Charlie Murphy: It's just not realistic as you're doing, you know, regional theater, right? Someone likely is gonna need some stability on some level. Whether that stability means a long-running Broadway's show, which absolutely can do that. You know, we have we've had um MGCA uh coaches who one of them who's in Wicked for like like 13 years now, right? While they had kids, great.

[1:22:28] Charlie Murphy: If you're gonna be like, I'm gonna sit in that show and do that thing and that's gonna be my day job, that totally can work. Or it could be a professorship or something like that, right? But likely some version of stability is gonna be neat. And, you know, I've talked about it before with me, but that was the decision that I made for Soulvisor's early life that, you know, I'm really gonna lean into my MTCA life and this podcast, which started the year of her birth, right?

[1:22:49] Charlie Murphy: As opposed to stuff like doing regional theater. That doesn't mean for me that I'll never act again. But the idea of me actively auditioning and Elizabeth actively auditioning, and then me running MTCA while also trying to raise a child, I think that's more than at least our family could handle. And I think that's true of a lot of people that they find as you have kids, right?

[1:23:08] Charlie Murphy: Now, if Elizabeth was an accountant, who knows? You know, maybe I'd still try to do a show a year. I don't I don't know, right? But I'll say this she would be a bad accountant. She'd be a beautiful accountant, but a bad accountant. So I would not hire her as a CPA. But it's just the kind of thing that you might think about with the good and the bad of this life.

[1:23:24] Charlie Murphy: Because I do, I want to speak about the good a little bit because I really do view it as a gift to get to do this amazing profession. It is so beautiful, right? Linia talked about like what she was maximizing in her life. And while that may not have always been financially maximizing her, but like when she was talking about that Sondheim experience that, you know, of like that beautiful moment that she was tearing up describing, that's magical, right?

[1:23:48] Charlie Murphy: It is priceless. I think I said it in a version of like, that's what people pay for. That's what the money's for. I mentioned almost the opposite, but I'm saying like rich people would pay thousands and thousands of dollars for that kind of spiritual experience if they could, right? But you can't, you can't pay to have those experiences, right?

[1:24:01] Charlie Murphy: It's just like it's the kind of stuff that many human beings will go a whole life without experiencing. And honestly, you know, Linia is describing kind of the fancy version of it where Steven Sondheim's in the room. But I'll say I've had experiences like that in a rehearsal room with nobody to see them, or you know, three other actors that you've never heard of to see them that feel just as profound.

[1:24:21] Charlie Murphy: Just to be like, this is my job. I get to like explore the profoundness of the human condition as an art form as a profession. And I get to do that alongside like fellow like-minded artists who are on the same journey with me. It's an incredible, profound spiritual thing, right?

[1:24:38] Charlie Murphy: And honestly, you know, I love sports analogies, but I think there's a perfect one here in that like you'll hear athletes all the time reflect on this idea of like, can you believe they pay us millions of dollars to play a child's game for a living? You know, the joy of it and just how true that is of going, I who could be mad about a referee's call or whatever.

[1:24:56] Charlie Murphy: I get to play a child's game for a living. It's amazing, right? And for artists to get to sing and dance and give joy to people as a profession, what a gift, right? And and not just the entertainment side of a thing, but you know, on the profound end, like to make art, to get to like spend your days self-actualizing and making art.

[1:25:13] Charlie Murphy: I mean, all of the things we get to do in this life are really so beautiful. And again, I think it can feel like a spiritual experience, especially for those who aren't religious like me. I'm not a religious person, but I imagine also for people who are religious too, that it there is a spiritual aspect to this profession that is really profound and beautiful.

[1:25:30] Charlie Murphy: And you know, Linia talks about the experience of like finding a group of people to work with that. You know, she's talking about those like converted zealots of fellow artists and what that is of like, hey, we worked together before, and how beautiful that is. We have this shared language.

[1:25:43] Charlie Murphy: And I think that's almost even more true for me when it's with people that you haven't worked with. When you're there's someone you're like, I've never worked with you before, but like within 10 minutes, we have this shared language and this immediate kinship of like, which she would say, like you're a Bedlam person. Okay, you fit into this, you're one of us, you're a painter like me, or whatever, right?

[1:26:00] Charlie Murphy: Which, you know, that doesn't have to be Bedlam specific. That can be the any kind of artist who goes, uh a shorthand to say you're the kind of open artist that's willing to be vulnerable, who's willing to explore in this way, is willing to play with me in this way. And we have this shared training, we have the shared language of going, we know how to play at this level, right?

[1:26:18] Charlie Murphy: I mean, that's true of I've certainly active on the basketball court. You go, you can just see somebody cut at the right moment, you go, Oh, you know what you're doing. This will be fun to it'll be fun to pass and play with you. Like, we just get it, right? Like we get it together and we get to play together. To get to do that as artists is so special.

[1:26:31] Charlie Murphy: So, sports, art, whatever it is, there's a beautiful thing when you get to do that. So I just wanted to speak at least somewhat, I know I rambled a little bit there, but just to speak somewhat to the positives out there because it's important to talk about the sacrifices. I want to talk about the financial realities. We talk about the hardships, those are there, and you should be aware of those so that you're not surprised with them.

[1:26:50] Charlie Murphy: But when you talk about the flip side of it of like what makes it all worth it, which I deeply believe it is all worth it for many people. And you know, for whatever amount of time makes sense for you. But it may not be worth it for everybody for a whole life, but whether it means it's worth it for you to do it, go to school and then spend five years doing it, or spend one year doing it, or to go to school and spend 10 years doing it, or if you're that rare person who does make a life in 60, 70 years of doing this art form, what a gift it is.

[1:27:19] Charlie Murphy: I think it's a gift for whatever amount of time you get to do it. There's the sports analogy too, is you often hear artists or I mean athletes talk about like, man, I just want to keep that alive for is it for five years out of school, is it for 10 years out of school? I might go to Europe even though I'm not making any money, just come like, how much longer can I do this thing? And it's a beautiful thing if you can.

[1:27:35] Charlie Murphy: Um, okay, and I know we're running long, so I'm gonna save this bullet point on the value of off-Broadway theater generally. And I was talking about sort of from the artist's perspective, but I want to talk a little bit about off-Broadway theater as a whole. That's probably gonna be a future blog or a love letter to off Broadway's and some of the stuff we were talking about of where all that magic happens.

[1:27:52] Charlie Murphy: You know, I love that analogy Linia used in terms of the painter, you know, that the ability for on off Broadway's that the painter can be the artist who is painting up there, as opposed to, you know, more often than not on Broadway's, it might be that the director is painting with you and you are the paint. But the cool thing about off-Broadway theater is so often that is the case, where you get to watch artists up there really, really creating.

[1:28:12] Charlie Murphy: And that's, you know, she's speaking of something that is somewhat unique to Bedlam. It's one of the things I love about Bedlam, but also really a great thing that exists in pockets of the off-Broadway New York City scene. That's not unique to Bedlam. It's not only Bedlam that does that sort of thing.

[1:28:25] Charlie Murphy: All right, let's wrap there on another episode of Mapping the College Audition, produced by Kelly Prendergast with social media work by Jordan Rice. You know where to like and subscribe and follow us. You know where to write us a rating and review, and you know that you should, and you know where to go if you want help with your individual college process or to celebrate our class of 2026, which is mtca.com. That's mtca.com.

[1:28:45] Charlie Murphy: To my young artists out there mapping their journeys. Please trust that you're enough for the right program, exactly as you are right now. Now keep striving. We'll catch you next week.