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[0:00] Charlie Murphy: Hello, summer break listener. I really hope you enjoy this re-air episode during our summer breaks. We like to go back and re-highlight one of the artists from this past season who we really enjoyed having on the podcast. For those who may be newer listeners, I do invite you all to check back through previous seasons for our other awesome artist guests. Many of these interviews are truly evergreen, I believe. And for those interested in our college deep dive episodes, do please check those out as well. I hope you're all enjoying your summers as you listen to this by the pool, and we'll be back in August with some fresh episodes for season four of Mapping the College Audition. Some cool new programs we've been trying to schedule for a while, some new voices from some of the most competitive programs and a few different kinds of schools, like another non-audition BA program, etc., as well as some really cool new artists always.

If you ever have feedback for the podcast you'd like to give us, and that feedback doesn't fit neatly into a five-star rating and review, don't hesitate to reach out to us at mailbag@mappingthecollegeaudition.com. Even while we're on break, we'll still be reading our email because we are sickos. Happy summer.

[1:15] Charlie Murphy: Hello, hello, and welcome to Mapping the College Audition, a podcast where we explore the landscape of the college theater world and try to demystify this daunting audition process. I'm your host, Charlie Murphy, Director of MTCA. That's Musical Theatre College Auditions. And today we've got Ali Louis Bourzgui on the pod, an MTCA alum and another young person, which we're thrilled to be able to have on for you all. We're gonna dive a bit more into the college process in this one than some of our other artists episodes, since Ali is so beautifully young. Another example for me of just how cool it is to interact with our alum as these amazing, impressive, full adults. Uh, Ali was just so at ease in the middle of this like exciting press tour swing, which anytime you're starring as a lead in a Broadway show, it means you're doing a ton of press.

And it's just so exciting to see him in that same realm of comfort as some of these older established Broadway stars we've had on the pod. For our seniors out there, we know you're beginning to get your results. You're in that kind of results receiving phase, and we're sending so much love and so many congrats to those who are having happy moments and well-earned acceptances. We're getting those texts and emails all the time, and it's just so thrilling for all of us. For those of you who are still awaiting that exciting yes, and maybe you've received some no's along the way so far, just please recognize there's still a lot left in this process. That's true with the yeses that could still be coming, and certainly plenty of the world of waitlists that could be turning into yeses down the road.

So please hold on tight for this ride. Even if it seems like all of your friends have gotten into their dream schools, you are not alone, and there's still a lot of game left. And for those who want to hear more about scholarship negotiation, which is a big part of your process coming up, please check out our next webinar that's coming up, I believe, on March 7th. I'm doing that off memory, so let's hope that's true. And if you're looking for something to do while you're whiling away the hours, checking your portals, why not write us a nice review in your podcast platform of choice? They say I'm supposed to do these calls to action at the top of the podcast rather than at the end when people tune them out.

So here it is. I'm calling you to action. If you're thrilled with your MTCA experience or you're just thrilled listening to this wonderful podcast, please do pay us back for the free content and the not-so-free coaching by writing us a sweet podcast review and letting future families discover what we're doing over here. For our juniors, are you all signed up for junior intensive? That's March 16th and 17th, in person online. It's a great way to meet us if you haven't met us yet, or if you've met us and you want to kind of get started. You're gonna work on a song, a monologue, and a dance. You're gonna do an exciting college Q&A with some faculty from NYC schools. You can get your headshots taken if you need to get that out of the way for the year.

One of the big things we'd like to talk about with our current juniors is like what boxes you can get checked off before the busy season. Headshots is a great example of what you can do now and not have to stress about it. So please come join us for this weekend. It's gonna be super fun. All right. I hope you enjoy this exciting interview with Ali.

[4:17] Charlie Murphy: Well, we are so excited to be joined by Ali Louis Bourzgui. Uh, Ali is an Ithaca College BFA alum. He's class of 2021, another young person. We've promised you young people on the pod, and here they come. Um, Ali is also an MTCA alumni class of 2017. He's about to star on Broadway as Tommy in The Who's Tommy. Uh, previously he's done National Tours of Company, The Band's Visit. And you're thinking to yourself, how is it possible he's done all this stuff in such a short amount of time? Didn't you say class of 2021? We're gonna talk about all of that today. Ali, how are you doing today?

[4:51] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Doing pretty good.

[4:53] Charlie Murphy: I'm so excited to have you on. And for so many reasons, but especially as I said, I've been trying to focus on having some younger guests on the show whose paths are a little more similar to that of our listeners. You know, some of our listeners are as young as 16, 17, some are in college, some are around your age, still in their early career. And of course, I hear you out there, parents, some of them are parents of such students. But I do think, of course, it needs to be said that your path is not typical. Not all of our listeners can expect they're gonna be starring as a Broadway lead three years out of school. But I would say, and I want to dive into the college process, your college process was not particularly atypical, at least from what I can remember.

Very normal experience, right? Um, and I think I'm, without insulting you at all, I'm gonna try to keep pointing out what was so normal about your process. Because I think it's easy from the outside to be like, well, but it was obvious for Ali that he was gonna be what, and it go, I don't know that that's true for every student who was in your situation at the time. So let's dive into it granularly, if you don't mind. Um, I'm gonna start you with the first question I ask everyone, which is just to take me back a little bit. Um, if you can remember 16, 17-year-old Ali, what was your sort of focus of the college process? Do you remember like what you were looking for in a school, what your goals for it were from the outset? What were you thinking about back then?

[6:05] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Yeah, you know, someone was asking me this sort of recently, because um they were asking for advice around that age. Don't call me on original Ali. This is a question that I asked for one night. But go ahead. Um, well, you know, I don't remember. It's funny, I just like I had a very clear image in my head very early in high school of wanting to do this. And then when the college process came around, I also had a very clear image of exactly the kind of school environment that I wanted. And for me, that was I really wanted a small program. I wanted to find somewhere where there'd be like 16 people.

[6:50] Charlie Murphy: You mean small theater program, like a cohort.

[6:51] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Exactly. A small, a small uh specifically theater program where I'd have like 15 to 16 people in my musical theater class. Um, and you know, I uh my mom, as most of the parents that are listening, like, you know, the parents are like the biggest support systems, and my mom drove me to all of these different schools for me to tour. Um, so I really got that amazing privilege to actually go into each environment and kind of feel it out. Um, I think maybe that's where I really honed that idea because there were just a few schools where I'm like, this is a little too big for me. This is a little, uh, this is or the energy here just feels like not really what I want. And I so I started to hone it down to like, yeah, I wanted something small and I wanted a program that really celebrated individuality and something that like looked at each of their students and was like, this is what's really diverse and unique about you, and we're gonna celebrate that and work on that and craft that. Um, so yeah, that's really what I was mainly looking for.

[7:57] Charlie Murphy: It's such a great answer. And I will say it is um, it's really refreshing, and I was sort of thrilled doing this research for the podcast, that I was actually able to pull up the answer that you wrote when you were 16, 17. I promised you a surprise here.

[8:10] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Oh my god.

[8:11] Charlie Murphy: I'm gonna read your 16-year-old self. You ready? Okay. This is what Ali says in our initial consult when we met. I want a strong BFA musical theater program that will train me as strongly as an actor while also applying the skills of voice and dance. I want a program that will train me as an artist, but also prepare me for the world. I'm not looking for a conservatory, but conservatory style training within a liberal arts college. You also said separately you wanted to be in a four-hour radius of Massachusetts, though I'm not sure if that shifted a little bit. So I partially read that part because I um I asked all of our guests that in terms of um for the sake of our students, like what would your focus be? And kind of cool that like you did basically describe where you ended up, right?

[8:48] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Like that's exactly it, because also I think it was exactly four hours away.

[8:52] Charlie Murphy: Yeah, I didn't do that math.

[8:55] Ali Louis Bourzgui: It was exactly four-hour drive. You talk about a northeast. It was a perfect, yeah, it was a perfect liberal arts school where I got a really and and again for me, you know. I realized that early, which I'm so thankful for because when I got there, when I look back, some of my favorite classes were like my biology class or uh my art history class. Like I got to take these other classes outside of just musical theater that for me, and you know, it's different for everyone, but for me, like that has informed so many things actually in my like acting world where uh or even like taking that art history class has helped me so much to understand um my own like critiques of shows and like what kind of shows I gravitate towards uh if I don't like something, um, whether I like I'm reading a script for something to be a part of, or if I'm gonna go watch a show, I don't just say like, oh, I don't like that.

Like I have the tools to be like very specifically what I what I don't like about it or what I really love about it, and um, you know, I learned some like critique elements through that, and totally uh I don't know, yeah. I did the liberal arts thing really worked for me.

[10:08] Charlie Murphy: Uh, so cool, and yeah, you know, I praise it not only of course I think it was a fantastic result and where you ended up, and I would looked at your results too, which also were great across the board. Um, but I do feel like it's such a success in the process, in that like it feels like you were able to vision board or or actualize the thing that you that you were going for, right? And and of course, sometimes it changes throughout the process. I'm sure we'll talk a little bit about things that might have changed um in going through the process. But um, I do think really successful that like you're like, I have this vision of what I want, and then you pursued it, and then you found it through the process.

And again, none of that too too remarkable, right? I mean, you obviously congratulations is a great job done, but it does feel like that is achievable for all of our listeners that they can go, what is it fit for me? What feels right for me? It's you know, how do I get toward that? Um, it's it's really good to be specific about it because then it really pays off. It's and and your list, would it look at just your list? It really reflects those goals. I mean, you have a list of schools that all are within four hours, BFA, liberal arts for the most part. I think you had like one BA on there, a couple exceptions, but for the most part, the scatter plot of what ended up being your final list was exactly what you're describing, which is so cool.

Um, okay, but let's dive into the college process a little bit. Do you remember the I mean it wasn't that long ago, right? Do you remember the individual auditions? Do you remember it looks like you did one of the unified, but mostly did on-campus auditions?

[11:26] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Yeah.

[11:27] Charlie Murphy: Um, do you remember Skype coaching? Do you remember the applications? What do you remember of the sort of college audition process?

[11:32] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Yeah, it was a whirlwind, but I still remember it as like honestly one of my favorite moments of you know the past 10 years, just because it was so exciting. I’d been waiting all of high school to finally be like finally get to do that, but also all of high school, I was one of the only people. Um actually no, I was the only person in my grade who was deciding to do theater as a career, and everyone else that did theater with me loved it, but they still kind of thought of it as a hobby. So to finally be put in a group of peers where everyone was there to make theater their career, and it was my first time being a part of like you know, a large group that um all had the same level of passion I did was just so thrilling, and then um I just got to meet so many people at each of these things were like I have a bunch of friends actually still that like I had originally met at some of these auditions that I that kept popping up and I kept seeing it.

[12:31] Charlie Murphy: Um then it's interesting, like even what's that?

[12:34] Ali Louis Bourzgui: I was saying those are your friends for life sometimes.

[12:35] Charlie Murphy: Yeah, you go, I met you through this random audition, and then all of a sudden you're like a real-life friend.

[12:39] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Exactly. Yeah. And uh, you know, I remember MTCA just helping me out so much because I did kind of go into the audition process a little blindly, and I wasn't sure. You know, it was so helpful to have someone sort of validate all of my feelings to validate like yes, you are good enough to do this and like give me a very clear map. I'm a very organized and scheduled Virgo. So for someone to it, it kind of there was a lot of smoke and mirrors up about the whole thing. Yeah, for someone to sort of help sit me down and give me a clear roadmap through the whole thing, uh was able to get rid of a ton of the stress and anxiety I had so that I could focus on the actual process of auditioning, which was I was looking back at your initial consult and seeing some of the notes that Leo took from it.

Um and even when you're describing like the kind of coach that you wanted, you're sort of describing that of like who's the kind of coach who's gonna, I forget exactly the way you like talked about lay a roadmap, but ask questions for me and help me decipher it for myself.

[13:46] Ali Louis Bourzgui: And it was like you described a lot of the coaches that you ended up with with Ryan and Joe. Um it was really cool. Just to be like, oh, cool, this is this worked really well. Um do you do you remember when you look back at the process? Do you remember anything that you feel like either that you did really well that you go, this was a big win? I would totally repeat that, or anything that you go, okay. If I could go back and do it again, I would change this. That's is an adjustment I'd give myself. Um of course, the uh the adjustment always is the first thing that comes to mind. We're acting ourselves notes first, of course. Of course. No pat on the back, yeah. So that was just that I I did most of my auditions um for a while try you know and you hear this from so many people but I I I really was trying to be something I wasn't for a bit.

Like I I think a few of those first auditions even though uh my coaches had set me up really well to be like this is who you are and this is how you should bring yourself into the room and um you know celebrate your own way of performing this it's so hard to actually believe that in yourself when you're doing it.

[14:50] Ali Louis Bourzgui: So I'd go into the room and I I you know my audition song was um if ever I would leave you from Camelot and I just felt this need to sing it like I was a trained 40 year old. Yeah so what is that impulse? What do you think because I mean we talk about all the time all the schools say we want to meet your authentic self. And I think sometimes students are like yeah of course that's what I want to do. Yeah. And we don't always speak toward what is the impulse to perform something else like w what what do you think it was in you that wanted to be some other you said 40 year old or maybe more masculine version or whatever the thing that you go I want to be this. I think the thought was just that like I want to show them that I am I am already ready for complete success I'm ready to work.

You know what I mean? Like I'm I'm I I would almost thought like I want to be the perfect performer that's like already at this level of you know being ready to star on Broadway or something and like I completely forgot about the fact that um I was there to show them that I was ready to be trained.

[15:51] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Um, like I I think, you know, I think it was Ithaca actually that was one of the people that stopped me and were just like, hey, hey, hey, just do it again, sing it in your own. They were like, I think they had me say my name, and they're like, see that voice, do it again, sing it in the way you just spoke. Yeah. Sing it like yourself. Um, we don't need to, you don't need to like present yourself like you've already gone through the four years of training and years of working out in the business. Um, that's what you're here for, and we just need to see the potential for it. Um, and I think once I reframe my brain to that, that was a those were action, that was like an actionable way of thinking to actually do that.

And also um, you know, I've I've heard this from from tons of people now too. And this is how I've gone about all my auditions, and and I started noticing more, a lot more success in callbacks and auditions once I started reframing my thinking to this. It's similar, but um just that idea of it's truly only my job to go in the room, perform the material that I have exactly the way that I I do it and I find fun.

[16:59] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Like I go in and I just perform it the way that uh appeases me and and the way that uh just seems right for my soul. Um, and if they like it, that's perfect. And if they don't, then I just I'm not right for them and they're not right for me. Yeah, yeah. I mean, it's but such a credit to you, and I think maybe you know, so many of our our students right now are in the middle of Unified's as we record this, and even as it releases, they'll still be doing their their auditions. You know, I think the even the fact that you came in thinking of it like a failure, that you were coming in performative, right? But that you were then you can't you did obviously come in open enough to the adjustment of, hey, Ali, slow down, let's do that back at yourself, and that you were able to do that.

To me, I'm like, that's a huge win still. Like I think sometimes people think they have to come in as like, I'm already this messy, organic, perfect. Like that, there's a it's almost like then you re-put perfect on it of like performative if it's like I'm performing this totally open, messy. What's like if you can just show up in the room, yeah, you know, and you showed up lit willing to learn and and you and and at least open enough to realize, oh, right, right, right. Okay, I'm here to learn, I'm not here to perform.

[18:07] Ali Louis Bourzgui: What a credit to you that you did actually did it really well, even if even if you still felt some instincts to, you know, even like, all right, fine, that's you've pulled you in that direction. But you were able to go, I see that I clock that, and I can adjust. That's a big one. That's what I would say for the things that I look back and say I did right, which is also another thing that I think is a huge um piece of advice that's really useful, is uh, you know, uh crave critique. Um don't go to college assuming or don't go to college already with the mindset that you know everything because you're not gonna get your money's worth. For the audition process and going into college, I went in craving to be absolutely teared down.

Like I wanted to be roasted, sliced and diced. I wanted them to critique me on everything. Um, because that's what I was there for. And I know I think I I remember a lot of my fellow students really getting upset and being really um self-conscious about getting all kinds of notes, but it's like that's why we're here. And I think you have to focus on that.

[19:13] Charlie Murphy: Yeah, it's such a good thing for young people to hear, you know, crave critique, you know, and it doesn't have to be masochistic in the way that you're saying tear me down, but maybe especially to say uh I don't crave validation. I don't want to take your beautiful crave critique and turn it into a negative because you said it the right way, but I think so often from an audition, we don't even realize what we're really hoping for as a gold star at the end. So that was fantastic. You were amazing. I think some of them students will come out and go, I it was terrible. And I'd be like, What was terrible about it? And it was basically that they didn't get a lot of compliments at the end. I was like, that's not a bad audition just because they didn't say you're amazing.

That's the best I've ever heard that song song or whatever, like kind of thing. Well, you know, it's great to get uh, you know, a lot of schools will will do find a really good balance of that. Whereas of course, like the validation is just as important. Um, so that you you know, you you're that your good work is recognized. Um you talked about having people who are able to say, Ollie, this is really good, keep going in this direction. We need that as a young person to go, that was good. I'm raising a two-year-old right now, and so it's always the balance of going, no, but hey, that was really good listening. That was really good. This time was good, like you need positive reinforcement.

[20:16] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Exactly. Um, talk to me about speaking of parenting, there was a good segue there. Your relationship with mom, you talked about driving you all over. I mean, you did a lot more on campus auditions back then. Um, what worked really well about your relationship in terms of um was she very involved in application stuff and helping you schedule emotionally supportive? Did she give you space in certain areas? What worked and maybe if there's anything that didn't work about the parental relationship? Yeah, I I actually love to talk about this um for both my mom and my dad. My mom uh really did pretty much everything, you know, and I think like what you just said, she had a perfect balance, and for everyone, it's completely different what they need.

For me, I and I'm still this way, I like planning things exactly the way that I do it. So she gave me the perfect amount of space to, you know, I dealt with all my applications the way I wanted to. I kind of set up the auditions I wanted to. Um and she was there anytime I needed the emotional support. She was there to help me. Uh if I came and asked for it. And uh, and the biggest thing was just, yeah, she, you know, she drove me to all the different on-campus things.

[21:29] Charlie Murphy: Um you didn't need organizational support. Sounds like you were pretty in advance, organized to go. I got my things, I got my essays, I got uh got these things all lined up, I know how to do this.

[21:38] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Yeah. That was something you you didn't need mom to help a lot with. Right. When you mentioned dad, too, what what did dad do well or or or what notes do we have for dad? Um well, it's just it was just that my dad is um from Morocco. Uh he's an immigrant, and uh, you know, I try to I've actually talked about this in a few different interviews because I I wish I had heard somebody talking about this uh when I was going through this. Um, but you know, some families aren't perfect, and you you have people that aren't gonna give you that support.

[22:10] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Um, and for a while he just was, you know, very unsupportive of it. But that's and and I think, you know, as an actor and as just a person in general, it's always important to go at things through empathy. And so now at the time I wasn't able to see through it, but now I just see it's like it's just because it was fear and he in his culture, theater isn't a career. Uh really the arts in general aren't like a uh uh regular career there. So for him it didn't make any sense. Um and I think it's really just focusing on the fact of uh, you know, it's lucky if you have like somebody that's actually supportive on one side. So I I have my mom giving me all the support I needed. Um, but I just needed to do it and push through. And then once I proved to my dad that this is a career, he's fully on board now um and he is super proud of me and and uh is super supportive of my career um I just needed to show him that it was possible.

[23:09] Charlie Murphy: Um well said and it's it's beautiful that you have found that place of empathy at 25. I feel like some people that's 15 years later and a lot of therapy before you're like I see it's because my dad loved me and that's why you know but it's awesome that you can see that now and yeah those certainly my experience both my parents were really not supportive of it and you know it but I from a place of love. It is a place of I I want you to do something else and you're so smart couldn't you do this and you clearly got you you could go to any college just on anything and you know why are you wasting your life all those things. All right so parents out there you've heard that great do you remember um you know after all those results came in do you remember narrowing down final choices like was it o obviously immediately Ithaca is the one do you remember you know w the negotiation and scholarship money and all that kind of stuff of like what made you go I'm gonna end up definitely here.

[23:53] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Yeah uh I mean Ithaca was the dream school. Um I had gone to like their summer program um between junior and senior year. Uh so I knew I liked the area. I knew I liked the energy of the school um and uh so that was top of my list and then the other two that I think were top of my list were uh Hart and Ryder just because they had a similar energy of the small smaller school like almost like more like a boutique musical theater school um and uh and I had those plus a few other schools that I was looking at. And then it came down to financial aid.

[24:35] Ali Louis Bourzgui: And I got very lucky in the fact that Ithaca gave me um one of the best financial aid packages. Uh but I also, and I, you know, if if you have an ability to do this, it it's senior year is already so hard, especially with these college editions, there's already so much going on. But um I took the time to sit down and just apply for other scholarships that I could find online. Like I really just did and and all research of like uh I think what was helpful for me too is I found scholarships that were really uh in a niche. Um so like I found like a scholarship for uh artists and people in media who are Muslim. Um that you know that that group, that specific niche is very small, so I knew I'd have more success within that.

[25:19] Charlie Murphy: Um or uh there was just a few others that like I I found had you have success? Did you get some of those scholarships?

[25:25] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Mm-hmm.

[25:26] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Yeah, so so then adding that to the financial aid package really helped me afford that first year. Um yeah, it was it was mostly about financial aid, and I just got lucky that my dream school gave me a great package.

[25:38] Charlie Murphy: Well, I wouldn't say all luck. There's some probably some strategy in there and some uh good pursuit of it with your your Virgo organized self.

[25:44] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Um, anything else you gained?

[25:46] Ali Louis Bourzgui: I think I also emailed and asked for a better package too. I think that was a thing we did, which it's possible. I feel like I remember like, hey, can you do a little better?

[25:54] Charlie Murphy: Certainly we would have advised you to do that.

[25:56] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Yeah.

[25:56] Ali Louis Bourzgui: I see because I see money signs by some of these things. Those those must have been the ones you were negotiating with.

[26:00] Charlie Murphy: I see Ryder has money side.

[26:02] Ali Louis Bourzgui: I think we even, which is so funny, and I this might have been my mom helping me, but I think we like negotiated. Like I think we said, hey, here's this package I'm getting from this school. Um could you do better? Or like can you mask that?

[26:15] Charlie Murphy: Uh Rider's gonna cost $5,000 a year. You cost $20,000. Can you get me halfway between?

[26:20] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Of course, that's how it works, of course. Now, uh, all RMTCA students who are currently doing this will know that. But if you don't know that out there for younger listeners, that is absolutely fair.

[26:27] Charlie Murphy: That Ali was not just lucky to potentially get um some scholarship money.

[26:31] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Um, anything else do you feel like you remember from your sort of the experience? You know, is there anything about uh stuff that you did with MTCA, stuff that you did outside? You know, um, tent polls to your year, I know it was seven years ago, but um anything else that you really remember of going, hey, this was really impactful or effective for me.

[26:46] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Uh it was really helpful to actually talk to the students. I I am a pretty sheepish person. I'm way better now, but especially during my senior year of high school, I was very shy. And so I was a little scared or felt like a burden to talk to the students there. But like A, they're theater kids. Uh-huh. And B, like if they're signing up to be at these auditions and tours, they want to talk to you.

[27:12] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Yeah. Um, so I think it's important to remember that. And the most useful information wasn't necessarily I mean, the teachers are gonna give you great information too, but really it's talking to the students that are there and asking like really specific questions, because they're the ones actually experiencing it.

[27:29] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Um, and they're the most helpful.

[27:31] Charlie Murphy: So I think talking to the students and not being afraid to talk to the students. Um I love that as you described this sort of shy, sheepish, you know, 17-year-old. I wish, and maybe we'll find a way um via the magic of social media, if with your permission to release this beautiful photo that I have of what is must be a 16-year-old Ali. I mean, handsome man, but definitely looks like a kid who just played Bobby Strong in Duranttown or whatever, as opposed to, you know, right now we see on Instagram this like handsome Broadway meeting man with a nine pack or whatever you've got, whatever. Like that to some extent, like, you know, that it's hard to believe. Like, oh, that person was shy and sheepish, but I feel like we pushed the photo out, they'd be like, Oh, yeah, yeah, I get I believe that a little bit.

Um, tell me a little about the Ithaca experience. So, um, you know, we've had a couple different people on from Ithaca. We had the wonderful Courtney Young, we had Carrie Butler, Kate Hamill was an actor there, talked a bit about the program. What was your experience, right? What did you feel like um really was great about your training? You mentioned the biology classes and other things, but um, in specimen in the musical theater world, what really worked for you? And was there anything that you go, I struggle with this a little bit?

[28:34] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Um well, you know, it seems like I knew at 16, but I really wanted a program that was acting-based first uh before everything, and Ithaca really is that. Um everything is so based in the uh impulse work and acting work, and you really work from the ground up. Um, the very I'll never forget the very first class we had was we went into voice and movement at 8 a.m. on our first day, and there was just like 50 balloons on the floor. And the first thing we did was uh Susanna, our teacher there just had us pick up the balloons and just play with them, like bounce, you know, do like beach ball with them, whatever we want. There was no rules, just play with the balloons, and I was like, Oh, here we go, here's theater school.

But it's stuff like that. Like my dad was right, what a waste of money. Exactly. I can't believe we're going here. I should be studying physics. Um, but there was a lot of that, and that voice and movement class I still credit as the class that I learned the most from. Um, but it's that see, there's so much of that uh mindset sort of thing that you really have to have to work with and change. Cause my first thought was kind of like, What is this? This is ridiculous. And then there were a few exercises after that where we'd like to crawl around on the floor and pretend to be an amoeba. Like that was another one. Uh-huh. And at first, my logical brain was like, What are we doing? This is a waste of time.

But then the more I accepted it, I realized that the whole point of that class was to get rid of the voice that tells you this is ridiculous. Um, or to or the self-conscious voice that that might make you embarrassed by doing weird things, because the most important part of acting is never questioning a single impulse. Um, and so it's just like If it go really has so many great classes, it's not just that in the acting class and the dance class. That first year you just break down all of your walls that you've been setting up your entire life, um, and just learning how to completely connect to your breathing and completely connect to the impulses that come up and and uh get rid of any of those filters that you have because that gets so in the way of performance. Um, so they were so focused on that, and that was life-changing for my uh tools as a performer.

[30:01] Charlie Murphy: It's so well said, and I think it's that kind of thing, though it's maybe hard to understand again if you're a parent listener, you're not in the theater or whatever. It's like, what is the value of a conservatory style training program where you're with 16 other people doing that? I think it's really hard to get some of those lessons, some of the value of that thing that anyone's gone to a conservatory has had that experience of like looking at your classmates' eyes and being like, I can't believe we're moving like a cow or whatever it is, I can't believe we're doing this is what we're doing in college. But like, I don't think it's easy to get that in like a private acting lesson. There's something about going through that communal experience where we're all agreeing to embrace those impulses and and and say no to that embarrassment and shame and fear and all the sort of defense mechanisms.

And the difference is a private acting class. Um, you know, it's great, but the conservatory thing is that that is just the foundation for a four-year process and that you're doing every single day. So that it's really about making all of that a subconscious thing. It gets like downloaded into your body, so that eventually, like now when I'm doing uh any kind of acting work, I'm not actively thinking about that stuff, but it all exists within me, and it's just like something I can tap into automatically, and that's because I did that kind of stuff every single day for four years.

[32:16] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Yep, that's always what's that. Um we often hear from our guests the ways in which school didn't prepare them for the realities of the business. But given your early success, you seem relatively prepared for the realities. Did you feel like you were prepped to hit the ground running with like what the industry was gonna be, or or was there still a lot for you to learn about those sort of industry?

[32:32] Ali Louis Bourzgui: I think there was a lot for me to learn for sure. Um it's funny because one of the things that I learned, and I feel like I've never heard this from anyone, and you know, of course, there's still time for it to change because I've only done a few things, but I almost felt like school brought the professional world up to this level, like a little bit of smoke and mirrors kind of thing, or like I thought it was gonna be this insanely high stake environment, and I thought the professionality level was gonna be up through the roof, and it and it is, but but it's not that deep. Like I joined both of these, both the bands visit and um the company tour, and then even working on on Tommy. That it's it's still the same kind of people you've been with through high school, through college, like it's still just a bunch of artists that are weird and love what we're doing and it's not like as cutthroat uh in the room it is you know it's not as like cutthroat and like cruel and scary as as they say and um and i and i i realize that there is a lot more room for uh fun.

[33:18] Charlie Murphy: No it's it's so well said but it and I think I I wish for you to hold hold on to that feeling because I think you're absolutely right I think it's often the process of getting jobs and the life of actors that can kind of make you feel more of the competition and more of the jadedness and more whatever. But you know I always felt like it's like the goal was getting back to that work I was doing in school. I mean like the goal is and and we and there is a shared communal of like good artists making good art whatever school they've gone to or not training or whatever. But to be like to set up that kind of an open supportive room that is what the goal of every good show is. It's just sometimes in the audition rooms in the process of trying to get the age and process that can feel maybe it's not quite as artistic in that yeah.

But it I think it's important to also you know recognize try to get rid of any of that uh I mean that that's what's helped me so much in in the audition process too is getting rid of any of that kind of comparison um or like or thinking of it of any of it as a competition because like even now you know I go to so many of these auditions and it's my friends that I'm up against. And it's not up against it's i I I've had to again change my my mindset to we're all here and I'm not against these people. I'm just gonna go in and show my work and they're gonna choose who works best for them but it's not I'm doing my job. We're not competing. Cause like it's destined the part is destined to go to one of us and it's not it's not gonna change today based on like who's gonna do it better because we're all just doing our best work and it's they're they're gonna choose and it it's it's it's destined. It's planned.

[35:13] Charlie Murphy: So it's so true and so important for longevity in this business. I mean, if you're gonna make it 20 years, you need to have that that mindset. Well, what was the showcase process like for you, right? Um you you obviously began working pretty quickly, but you also graduated in the middle of the pandemic, right? This was still we nothing was back yet, I think, right? If if anything, maybe it was just about to be like Lion King back in a couple.

[35:33] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Yeah, yeah, they had some like tours that were auditioning. That's I auditioned for the band's visit in my last couple weeks of school um because they were about to start up in a month. Well, and you you talked about that sort of um attitude that you have now, which is so great in that m mind shift. Did you feel some like I can imagine some frustration with the kind of unfairness of what it was to graduate? I'm sure your whole class was feeling are you kidding me? We're graduating in 2021 of all the. I remember from my class, we graduated in the financial crisis, which was nothing as bad as that nowhere near. It's like was just like a small blip compared to COVID in terms of, but you know, would were people a little less interested in bringing people on that in our class would talk about oh, we're so unlucky. Last year's class got this and the was there some of that of like, oh, we done two years later or one year earlier. How did you combat that for yourself?

[36:20] Ali Louis Bourzgui: The entire year was just full of bitterness uh from all of us. And like no one's getting agents as much as previous classes. I mean, it was just everything. It was like we're we got back to school. Well, we we were in London when it happened. So uh we all got sent home from London early, which set up bitterness, and then we didn't know what was gonna happen, and then they were like, We're coming back, but it's all gonna be virtual, and you're gonna pay the same amount of money. Um I'm paying what I would have paid to be in London to sit in my room. So well, senior year we we weren't we weren't gonna be in London, but senior year, you know, I I don't know, it we had all these things that you you look forward to in senior year, but all of a sudden it was all gonna be in our living room on our laptop.

Yeah, and again, paying the same price. And so we were all just so bitter about it. And I think we definitely luckily my roommates and I still had an apartment in Ithaca, and we all got to have that experience of at least being with each other, yeah. Um, which helped. But we were definitely bitter the whole first semester, and it was just another one of those things where I got halfway through the year, and I thought I can't I can't keep going about this so negatively because now I'm not learning anything or getting anything out of this, so I have to try to focus on any positive here. And there were, you know, it was like I was getting camera training because everything was with this FaceTime camera.

Um, so I was kind of starting to learn how acting changes based on when it's just your head in this little box. Um started to learn exactly like how you can adjust emotion with just like moving your eyes across the camera or just your face a certain angle. Like I learned some of those cool tips that have then helped me with film acting. Um because the school didn't have to pay for uh hotel rooms for guest artists. We got so many more casting directors, um uh uh you know, other actors, directors. We had a lot more guest artists who could just zoom in. Um and that's one of the times I met Peter Van Dam, uh who, you know, is works for Terra Rubin, cast the band's visit, so I got to make that connection early on, which then uh when I got to audition for bands visit, uh that's the other thing.

Everything was self-tapes. So then friends I knew who had been uh driving to New York City during senior year to like audition for all these things. I didn't have to do that, I just got to audition from my living room. Um so that was great too. And after all of it, I I have to recognize that the biggest positive, which was timing. Um, the pandemic sucked so much, but uh the band's visit would have finished out their tour while I was in my senior year of college and it would have ended. But it got put on pause and people left and became uh you know nurses, which it's amazing. But that opened up um some slots so that when the tour restarted, right as I graduated, I was able to just join right in.

And Tommy was also slated to happen in they were starting to get ready for 2020 and 2021. That was a project they were working on uh back then. So that would have also happened and had passed me by. So interestingly enough, I think it's a great thing to trust the process because so many good things come out of the bad times.

[39:38] Charlie Murphy: Uh yeah. Well, and you you can't control the Tommy or the band's visit timing, that's luck. But but you can control your attitude in that class of going, cool, I get to meet this awesome casting director from Tutera Rubin, as opposed to oh, why's mine have to be on Zoom? They don't get to see me in person, and it would have been some of the things that I'm gonna do too. Yeah, and to just trust the fact that you might lose out on something, but that might down the road cause room for something else that's positive.

[40:05] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Yeah.

[40:06] Charlie Murphy: Well, we're gonna take a short break and on the back end, we're gonna talk about that amazing positive thing that happened and all the many things, but especially um the wonderful Broadway debut that's coming back. So we're back in a flash.

[40:18] Charlie Murphy: Okay, we're back with Ali Louis Bourzgui, and we're gonna talk about some of the phenomenal success that has been happening. I think just just can we nerd out a bit on this moment of your life. You're about to make your Broadway debut. You've already had some really impressive tour experiences, regional experience. You played this role in Chicago, right? But now you're gonna step onto a stage, a Broadway stage, as a leading role at 25 years old, in an iconic role, in a beloved show. Just where are you at with that? What's the what's the primary feeling in your life as you're you're about to start rehearsals in a couple weeks, is that right?

[40:50] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Yeah. So what what is like leading from your center right now in the world?

[40:55] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Yeah, you know, it's funny, over the past couple weeks, of course, I've been asked that so many times of just like, what are you feeling right now? Are you excited? Like, are you blah blah blah? And it's it's um I think I I've I'm at the point right now where I'm just managing my expectations, I'm managing my feelings because uh I have a lot of anxiety, and I have learned that the best way to deal with it is to just, you know.

[41:20] Ali Louis Bourzgui: I mean, this is what every therapist and yogi and meditator like ever says is just deal with what's happening exactly right now. Um and I've also learned with the pandemic that nothing's ever promised. So I'm just taking it day by day, and I am insanely excited, and I have bursts of like insane excitement. Like yesterday I went down to uh 41st Street and I just saw they just put up the whole front of house and the marquees up, and you know, it's just like little moments like that are that you've dreamed about your whole life or insanely special. So I stood there and just kind of felt the weight of the moment. And I think that's what I've been trying to feel. Like, like letting myself have these really uh great moments of excitement that are more like uh standing still, breathing in it and like feeling the weight of what it is.

And and and sort of I've enjoyed doing this because I feel like the way that I can really feel the gratitude is by remembering 16 and 17-year-old me and remembering that like this isn't this didn't happen in a vacuum. Like there's been years of work that I put in because I've had this dream in my head and I've never doubted it. Like it just it popped up in my head, and I there was nothing else I was gonna do. It's just been so clear that this was gonna happen, and I and I just have been so tunnel visioned to get to this point. Yes. Um so as exciting as it is, I I I just I also just have to like sit in it and be focused on the gratitude of it. Um but you know, also I'm terrified.

[42:55] Charlie Murphy: I imagine so.

[42:56] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Yes, of course. Yeah, well, I I've done the role, so I I have the role under my belt and I and I I know the show is set to go. It's just now like learning how to suddenly be thrown into a spotlight as a very private person. That's gonna be a new a new thing for me. But um stared at and judged and be looking at reviews about the show, which have to do with you, even though it's not really about you. It's like you're sort of put into that um we talked about a bit with like Lauren Patton and in her interview of just like now all of a sudden people are gonna be talking about you, but they're not actually talking about you, like this weird thing where it's like they don't know me personally at all, but they're talking about me because I'm out on the world and all that stuff.

We'll get more into that in a bit, but um, I was just gonna talk about the um the balance of it. It's something we talked a lot with some of the older actors, especially of like because of course the dream is not over now. You've played like you're right you're playing a lead role on Broadway, but if you've got more to your dream of establishing a career, and we will talk about what some of those dreams are, but but how you can also try to really appreciate and enjoy this huge milestone without sitting back and resting on your laurels and being like, I'm done. Because of course you've got more that you want to achieve, and you have to actually do the show and succeed and all those things that you want to do.

That's an interesting balance. Um, do you remember the audition process? I'd love to talk a little bit about like, was it a lot of rounds? How did that did you know this was gonna be at the time definitely Broadway destined? What was it a sort of slow motion? Hey, it's a broad thing, it's Broadway hopeful, but or do you know it was going? What was that experience like for you um as that was happening?

[44:18] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Um I I've watched so many interviews where people talk about how they land the roles that they really think they weren't gonna get and don't get the roles that they thought they absolutely aced the audition for. Um that was true of this one. I I got the initial audition request, and um I knew the album, I knew the Tommy album. I'd listened to it a long time ago, and I thought it was really cool. Uh, but didn't I don't know, it wasn't really on my radar that much. And I didn't know the show, I didn't know the musical version of it at all, actually, somehow. Um so I did a little bit of research on it, and I had already been cast in a show that was gonna be at the same theater, it was gonna be at the Goodman play, uh, Leolina that was gonna be there through the whole winter of Chicago.

And I had also just gotten off a tour for a year, and I had just gotten this apartment. And so in my head, emotionally, I was like, I don't know. This is gonna be another four months in Chicago, right after those other three months, and that's gonna be like half a year uh in Chicago, and I just got this place. So there was a split second where I was like, I don't, I don't know if I want to take this. And I talked to my agent and she was like, No, no, no, you gotta take this. This is like a Broadway uh tryout, Broadway leads to it. And she like really talked me into it, and I was like, Yeah, you're right. And also like I'm a huge rock fan. Like, I I the shows that inspired me growing up were Spring Awakening and American Idiot.

Um and so like, you know, I just needed to like talk to someone about it and realize, like, oh yeah, what am I talking about? Like, it's my dream to do a rock show. Um so then we took the audition, but it was a whole week of just so many rounds of of uh doing the audition.

[46:12] Charlie Murphy: But uh what is that look? What's so many rounds look like? Like you're you're going in for some people and then more people are coming to the room, or it's the same people again and again. What was what was the multiple rounds looking like?

[46:22] Ali Louis Bourzgui: I went in for my first audition, and this is what I'm talking about, where I just was like, I don't think I'm right for this, because uh uh I I felt like I was too young for the role for some reason. I just I I think I was so afraid of the weight of it that I was just finding every reason I wasn't right for it. So I was like, I'm too young, I don't have enough of like a rock voice for this. I was just coming up with all the all the excuses. Um so I went in and I was like, that was fine, but they're not gonna want me. I'm not the right type for it. And then I got a callback, and the other rounds were I just kept doing the same material, but they just kept working with me. Um, which is honestly the coolest kind of audition because it ends up being an acting class, and you get to work on this material and push and pull and like sort of already start to work on the character in the room.

Um, and then I did a just some different music work, and there was um I did the dance call actually. I kind of forgot about that. I fully did the whole like pinball wizard ensemble movement, because uh if you see the show, it's very movement based, including for the principals. You know, I don't do too much moving around, but uh everything is very isolated and like sharp, and even the principals are doing like really interesting, wacky futuristic movement. Um so they needed to see that. But then you see how you pick up balloons, that's what it is. Can you connect your impulse?

[47:49] Charlie Murphy: Exactly, yeah, exactly. Do you remember some of that in the in the, you know, as they're working with you? You know, because I think we often talk about adjustments from a college audition perspective of like, how do you show your flexibility and all that kind of stuff? But maybe a little bit different in the professional world. What what was the work that you were how were you trying to show up to that room where you're going, I'm not here to just learn for four years. I'm here to see how the two of us are gonna fit together in a in a rehearsal room. What was that experience like of what you call the push and pull of quote unquote working with you?

[48:17] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Um yeah, you know, I I I went in the room and and sort of also felt like with working with Ron and Rick, who are the uh music supervisors, and then working with Des, who's an absolute legend. Um, but I was you know, I I you kind of have to feel out what is this actor director relationship gonna be like too. Um, and like I've mentioned, I I am really one who loves somebody that challenges me and uh tear me down. Somebody who like kind of keeps me in check of uh the work I can do. And and Des is such this incredible director where he sees so much more in everybody than they might see their ceiling. So, you know, I had this idea of my ceiling, and he he held this other idea, like to be like, no, you need to get here.

And that made me work so hard, both in the audition room and then once I landed the part. Um, he had such high expectations for me that I had to come up and meet that, and I grew and I'm now doing things that I didn't even know I I had available to me. Um yeah, it was it was kind of feeling out what the director was like, um, kind of learning what the energy of the show is gonna be too because I didn't know what they're how they were gonna change it.

[49:29] Charlie Murphy: Did you feel like you were making a lot of active choices? Like, like how much did you feel like you were like, yes, and from the director's perspective, yes, I'll I'll adjust to what you're saying, Des. And how much did you feel like you were like, oh, and I think maybe this like, did you feel like you were adding a lot of your own, like, this is my strong artistic voice, or were you more going, I'm flexible, I'll do whatever you want to do?

[49:48] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Um both. I, you know, I was open to anything they threw at me, and I didn't see it as like a note, you know. I th I really saw it as oh, that's fun, that's a cool idea. Let's play with that, let's play with that. But but I do remember uh I I'd been to a few other auditions where the style was different, and and I always kinda I just know that the work I want to do is based in like hyper-realism and and uh or just the the way that I approach everything from an acting standpoint. So I approached this same thing from a very heavy acting standpoint, and they they liked that. Like uh, and so we kind of kept going down that route of um doing these songs from a really interesting uh place of emotion, like not just kind of singing it like a rock song.

Um Dez has this really cool thing that he said to me the very first audition, and then has also brought up multiple times in the rehearsal room, but he said, Don't smile, because I was smiling through my audition songs, which is kind of a an easy thing. I I you know, everyone does it. I do it at every audition. I'm like, uh, I don't really know exactly what this moment is, so I'm just gonna kind of smile and perform through it and just sort of play like you know, uh I don't know, that kind of just Broadway face. And uh he said, I'm gonna give you a challenge, do not smile at all. And he said, Um, you know, they tell skydivers when they're when they're when they're doing it to uh to smile the whole time so that when they take photos, their face isn't making some like crazy face.

Um he said, when you smile, it cuts out like all of the a hundred different ways your face can be contorted, or like the different emotions that can express through your face. So he said, if you don't smile, uh, we're gonna see so many more interesting, obscure facial expressions from you as you're singing this and kind of experiencing the words uh simultaneously. And that was true, and that that brought out some really cool uh ideas. So it's just uh playing around with little things like that and just being completely a hundred percent ready to play with all of it.

[51:56] Charlie Murphy: It's it's so cool, and and I think it's helpful maybe to hear for especially our younger actors, just finding some of that balance of especially if you're gonna end up playing a Broadway lead, a leading role, that of course we need that flexibility, but that there is some artistic point of view of here's how I think I would play it. Not meaning, and I would ignore your direction, but that you are bringing it sounds like you bring some style, some some of your own sensibility, this is who I am into the room with enough confidence that you're not just an empty vessel. I think sometimes people think I'm just walking in and I'll do absolutely whatever you want. Part of that's really good, but it's also being like, and here's what I think, or here's my perspective, or whatever. That's a cool uh um balance of the and hard to find.

[52:34] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Yeah, I think it's cool to find like kind of I mean, it's hard to choose like what your style is, or like what you the same thing that under you know, the common denominator that you bring to each character. So sometimes I I think you need other people to kind of tell you that. But for me, like something I've heard for a long time is that the characters I play, no matter who it is, I always bring a sort of innocence to them. And so I don't I guess I don't think of it like that, but uh the way that I go about every single character is you know that idea of um that everyone is capable of some form of empathy. Um, and so I make all of my characters empathetical, including um villains or you know, antagonists when I go out for those, because I just find that interesting to watch in other actors.

Um that's kind of that informed what I went in for Tommy with was just like a complete I didn't think of this guy as uh like someone that was uh I didn't play the trauma and I didn't play um you know, there's two different versions of Tommy. There's Tommy that's sort of in this like catatonic state who's completely trauma ridden. I didn't try to play that trauma, and then there's also the Tommy that's the superstar, right? This like uh guy who all of a sudden is like, oh, I'm a rock star and I have all these, I'm a I'm like a celebrity, and I'm uh sitting back in that. I I went through both of those versions of him from a complete uh just open eye innocence and blank canvas. Um and uh yeah, I don't know. That just it just ends up being really interesting.

[54:17] Charlie Murphy: It's really cool, and you know, in some ways you're describing when you're saying what other people are telling you about yourself, it's like you're describing their comments on the vessel that you're bringing into the room. And to some extent, we are as artists, we have to be responsible for the I am playing the part through this voice and through this body, you know, for whatever control I have over those things. Uh I mean, Tom Kitt, this is maybe a couple weeks ago, was talking about that. Um, with one of the actresses that was playing uh a lead in Next to Normal, and that she was basically saying, like, this is how it's gonna sound in my voice. Like, I'm open to all the notes, but this is what my voice does, and it's gonna sound like this, you know.

This is a 40-something year old actor, so she just goes, I just know, and just so you know, this is what I can do, and here's what I can't do, and I I know where I am, and you know, there's something that's kind of cool about the confidence. If you know your face looks innocent, and that's what you're bringing into the world, and whatever perspective that you have on that, uh but also just to say focusing on that, but also not letting it always define you because I say that, yeah, and then I also tried to find so many reasons.

[55:19] Ali Louis Bourzgui: I'm like, well, this is me, and I can't play this kind of role, or like this my voice doesn't go that high. I don't sing rock like that. And then I just did it, and then I got the role, and then I had to learn how to sing like a rock star. And so, like to yeah, don't yeah, don't put yourself in a box too much. That's that's right. To not limit yourself. Do you remember the call or the official yes? Did it happen that week? Was it a big quick, oh my god, now I have it, or was it months of waiting? Do you remember when you renew it? Uh no, it was pretty it was a pretty quick turnaround. Uh yeah, I think there was like a week of auditions, and then I remember I was at I was at a Broadway show. I can't remember.

I can't remember what it was right now, but uh my friend and I left the show and I had like two calls from my agent. I was like, oh my god. So then I picked it up, and it was it was kind of perfect. It was kind of funny. Just like I was on 42nd Street, and she called me up and was like, You got this part, and I was just on Broadway. You're like, I'm on Broadway right now. I'm there right now. It's perfect. Um then we went to uh Ippido Ramen and you really treated yourself. Really treated yourself. Um, obviously you've done the show out of town before, right? And of course, doing the experience of playing lead roles in theater is not brand new to you. What is new about the Broadway of it all, other than the name, you know, that now you could say I'm a Broadway actor, right?

Um we talked about doing some press, and you're this first time probably doing this level of press, at least through the Chicago of it all. You're gonna do award shows and all those things. But is there anything else that you've experienced that sort of like, wow, this is so different if it is different than doing it at the Goodman or doing a tour or those kind of things? Um I guess I can't speak to it too much since we haven't started. Um so I'll have to get back to you on that. But I can tell you that right now, um, my friend Will Will Blum in uh in company, who's you know been in a few Broadway shows now, he gave me some really good advice that I've been trying to focus on, which is um it's just the same thing you've been doing.

It's just like the regional theaters you performed at, it's the touring houses you performed at, it's even the college shows you performed in. The only difference is it happens to be in New York. Uh it's still a theater, it's still an audience. Just do the work you've been doing, and it just so happens to be in New York City, and uh, and then you know, you just gotta focus on the fact that yeah, there is more of a um a pressure and just in terms of like it's more spotlighted. So uh but instead of a Jeff Award, it's a Tony Award or whatever, but it's still the same idea, it's the same theater.

[57:51] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Yeah. Well, I think and I think I just personally at least I might this might change as I go about it, but I'm trying to compartmentalize like the show is here. I got that locked and loaded. I know I know that. I know that world I'm okay. And then that I just now have to put a lot of my energy and focus into learning the new business of interviews and um press and being you know under just like mass radar. Uh I just have to learn what that is and and figure out uh almost like not a care uh because I still want to bring myself completely to that world, but almost finding a little bit of a character of like who Ali is in in the spotlight just to protect a little bit of peace.

[58:32] Charlie Murphy: Absolutely well no that that and you anticipating my exact next question which maybe I should have just thrown in there at the beginning was just that idea of how do you seek that kind of guidance. Maybe it is Will or something but I mean it seems like you've been training your whole life to do the show. So it's not I don't not like how would you possibly do the Broadway show but as a 25 year old not having tons of experience in the business business of it you know how how would you figure out how to do the award shows in the press and the what like do is it do you have separate calls with you know alum actors that you know and be like all right talk me through this is my first times interview this is my first whatever like is that something you've been thinking about of like how do I do you get coaching on it like you know athletes have like press coaching you know basically where they they figure like is that the kind of thing where you're like because I know Ithaca did not train you on doing press scores Carney Mellon didn't you know like how do you figure that out for yourself?

[59:20] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Yeah I mean I I'm kind of learning that as I go. I have the wonderful um privilege of having uh Adam Jacobs playing my dad and Alison Left playing my mom and Bobby Conti playing my cousin and you know, all these guys have uh great careers with and they've done this before. So I'm gonna have a great, like actual little family of people that can give me tips and tricks. Um it's so funny because Adam Jacobs is one of those guys that you know, when I was this age, when I was doing all this uh college prep, I he was one of those guys where like on YouTube I'd watch his proud of your boy uh studio recording like all the time. And it's it's that's one of those moments I think you know, you're asking earlier, like, how how's it feel?

It's like little moments like that of full circle. Um that I'm like, oh wow, yeah, okay, now I'm like at this level. I'm like working with these heroes of mine. Um be people listening to this podcast and watching you on YouTube and seeing and who'd be like, oh my God, I want to be work with you. And then 10 years from now they will be in the big side of them. But yeah, just I I'll have I'll have friends that'll help me out. And also uh YouTube is just such a great resource because um I learned so much of my acting and my performance from just watching uh shows, like just go going to like see shows or um watching YouTube clips of I just learn from not imitation but seeing how people do things and and putting that in myself.

[1:00:48] So it's the same for press. I watch the those like variety like actors' round tables, I watch actors on actors, all those great interview things, and I see these A-list celebrities and just kind of learn from how they do it. It's I I've heard you reference it a couple times. I've heard people tell like talking about audition stories, or that's the like even just the way that you uh have a comfort level with this experience of what we're doing now, which not every even very successful actor, not every person. If you haven't studied that and put some effort into it, of being like, Oh, oh what what do people normally say? And how do I how do how how could I react to this if it's a tough question question that Charlie's throwing me with that guy? That's awesome that you're you got that.

[1:01:25] Charlie Murphy: Um, what about strategically? Do you feel like um you and your team, you know, obviously you're about to start rehearsal so it's not like you're already a year into this run. You got you know the b the show's gonna be a phenomenal hit it's gonna run for years we want all those things for you of course have you started thinking about like okay and now what's my next step? How am I parlaying this into stuff? What do I want to be doing? What do I want to want to make sure I get myself out there while I'm doing this award season is that all kind of kind of stuff that's been a conversation or something that you've got on your your radar to go how do I you know make this stick feels to whatever but you know it's there are people who do amazing hits and then that's their only show and there are people who do 12 year careers or 20 year careers or 30 year careers. You know, have you started thinking about like how do I hold on to this juice?

[1:02:06] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Yeah yeah I mean you know again that's gonna be a process but um just like this I have a very clear image of where I want the ladder to keep going and that's very much film and TV. Um I love the theater so not not saying that I don't want to keep doing theater because I I would love to just do both first and only theater show. You're saying this is over after Tommy one can to see in a theater show. No no no no I mean the dream would just to be able to you know bounce back and forth because I don't I think I think just like a you know going linearly through a a player a musical will always be my favorite and doing it live is always going to be my favorite way of doing it. But um right now there's just so many interesting and creative TV and and and film and I I just so want to be a part of that world. Like when people ask me what directors do you want to work with? Uh it's always film and TV uh directors that come to my mind first and and foremost.

[1:03:08] And uh you know, even this past this past film season, there just were so many really cool and almost theatrical um films that came out. And uh I just I I there's moments in Tommy where there's like camera work. They put cameras up and we kind of you almost watch a screen of us performing. So uh I would really love to be able to um, you know, hopefully invite some names that I'd like to work with in the future to come see the show and make some connections there and uh sort of make a transition into that so I can bounce back and forth between film and TV.

[1:03:45] Charlie Murphy: Well we're putting it out there.

[1:03:46] Ali Louis Bourzgui: The way that you put out your mission statement for college and then achieved it, we're gonna put that out there and make that true for you.

[1:03:51] Charlie Murphy: Let's come on, big big film producers, film directors, co see Ali in the show.

[1:03:55] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Um, you mentioned a little bit about your prep for the role. Um, is there anything specific you've been thinking about or that you thought about as you prepared yourself, whether it's about uh um, you know, for the rigor of the HO week of the physical demands of the show, you know, vocal training, dance training that you had to sort of you seem to be in phenomenal physical shape according to Instagram. I'm like, oh my god, okay. What is that photo? That's embarrassing me looking at this. Um do you um did you watch any footage from previous productions? Like what did you do to prep yourself, um, if anything?

[1:04:23] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Um Yeah, this was an interesting one because it requires so much. It's kinda like, you know, I used to um watch all those like fly girl Broadway.com vlogs and stuff, and I I used to see how like, you know, the alphabets had to treat themselves like like monks in a sense, and um I actually just saw uh uh interview the other day of Leslie Kritzer talking about spam a lot and having to do the exact same thing. It's kinda again, it's like when you have to sing at this level, you do have to sort of lend your your life to the show in a bit, but I don't know. I'm the I'm a kind of personality that really likes to just put my all into whatever I'm working on, so I don't mind it that much. I also don't I don't go out in general, so I've not given up like any kind of party life or anything. I'm it's fine. My favorite thing to do is put my headphones on and go walking in the park. So I still get to do that.

[1:05:19] Charlie Murphy: Um, but it's it's did did you have to do anything vocally though? I mean, you mentioned like, oh, I don't know if I sing this kind of rock style. So uh is there voice lessons or just like how how are you doing it?

[1:05:27] Ali Louis Bourzgui: So I came into the process and was like I have to find a balance between uh musical theater just in the way that I'm gonna be singing this eight times a week, so I have to have something that's gonna carry me through. Um, but I also don't want to just make this insane like I I'm obsessed with classic rock and that whole era of rock, and there's you know, there's a there's a dirtiness to it, there's a rawness to it. There's like it's not you you don't want to hear this like pristine sound to it because it's not uh exciting, it's not dangerous, and and rock has a grit that kind of keeps you on the edge of your seat, and the story lives within that same energy. Um so I knew I wanted to honor that and honor the like original. I mean, so many people that are gonna see this show are are Who fans. Um, also not, which is great too, but for the Who fans, uh now that I've become such a big Who fan, I wanna pay homage to that.

[1:06:27] So I I just have listened to hundreds, every single live version of like most of their songs. Um, and I tried to sort of emulate that sound while also adding it to like what my voice already is. Um but I worked with uh Katie Agresta who works on a lot of uh Dez's shows. She works on Jersey Boys and um she's she works with all the Frankie Valleys and she also works with a lot of different pop stars, but uh she has saved my life just in terms of she gave me a very specific warm-up routine and a very specific cool down routine that I can just copy paste to every performance and know that I'm keeping myself I'm doing the right maintenance so that when I actually do the show I can go to certain points of sort of danger or like things that I wouldn't normally feel safe doing but I know that I prepped my voice for that work and then afterwards I can calm it down and put it in a box for the night.

[1:07:25] Charlie Murphy: Um so it was really having someone give me tools so that I could let myself get out of my head about it.

[1:07:35] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Yep. Your voice is already in a box called your voice box. Right lives there all the time.

[1:07:40] Charlie Murphy: Yeah.

[1:07:40] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Um okay can we talk a little bit about social media? I've mentioned my own social media stocking of you and prepping for this interview. And one of the things I was sort of intrigued by I was going, ooh, and here it is on January 24th as or 25th as we record this. You had a very normal number of followers for a human being on Instagram a very TikTok too very normal, right? I'm imagining even by the time we release this or maybe from a month from now it's gonna be 10 times that and then a hundred times that and who knows um where that's going. Is that something that you're thinking about in terms of like your public presence and how you might use those tools of social media again and sort of um parlaying some of that success and some of the attention that's gonna come, but also just preparing yourself for that is inevitably coming.

There are gonna be young women who come see this show and go, oh my gosh, he's so cute. I want to follow him, and then all of a sudden each night you're gonna get 200 followers or whatever. Like is that the kind of thing that you've started thinking about and been preparing for?

[1:08:34] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Yeah, that's uh I it's been on my mind. Um, but I've always kept a it's always been a focus for me to keep my social media presence at a safe balance because I don't personally love it.

[1:08:52] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Uh and I I I use it pretty strictly as like a um hey, here's what I'm doing. Uh, you know, if you like my stuff, follow along. And like I I I just kind of post things mostly just about my show, and I kind of keep my personal life a little off there and keep pretty private. Um just to again to pr sort of protect my piece. Um, but you know, I also use it sometimes. I I love music and I I use it as a way to um to suggest different like playlists I've been listening to or artists I've been listening to, and kind of share that. Um but I I think of some of the actors I really uh love and they don't really have much of a uh social media presence. Um so I think the eventual goal would be to to use it to help me just to just to kind of put me out on the radar on social media to further my career.

But eventually, if I if I got not gonna if luckily I got to like a place where I didn't need the social media to market myself, I I would probably try to peter it out because I I don't be on it, yeah. I don't love it. I think it's pretty dangerous in terms of like what we were talking about, the comparison, comparing yourself. The people who are good at it, they're people who are bad at it, but I don't think any people are addicted to it. But does anyone enjoy it? Is anyone like I love the time I spend on Instagram? I just really I mean I I I could be wrong. Maybe some young people have talked about like I really love scrolling TikTok. The experience of watching someone scroll TikTok to me seems like I I like You don't have any time, are you?

If I've like I've really gotten my Instagram and my TikTok to send me uh art. So I I love animation. I love everything animated and I love um music. So if I'm on there and I'm scrolling and I just see a bunch of uh art and animation and music, then that's the kind of content where I'm like, this is great because this is these are like indie artists that now have a platform to share their art where I I might not have seen this before. And those are the moments where I'm I really enjoy it. But and is that something for you too? I think I I saw something that you were maybe doing a cover or something. Are you a a burgeoning singer songwriter yourself? Is it something that you might want that we were trying to do?

[1:11:00] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Yeah, yeah, my roommate and I uh write a ton of music together and um I'm definitely hoping to have that. You know, I I I think as this steadily becomes a career, like a like a you know, full-time career, like I'm I've realized one of the things about being you know, being able to work and it's great. I'm so grateful and I'm so lucky to be able to work like this, but it does eventually you know fall into that line of like, okay, this is also a job and now I need hobbies outside of this. And so being able to write music and play music, it's still in line with, you know, like my artistic self, but it almost feels like a side project. Um that's like I I also have something outside of uh of of doing theater, and I I'm excited to like maybe get some time to to put some more focus in that too.

[1:11:52] Charlie Murphy: I was like, we're talking about, you know, well, how do you do the show physically eight shows a week and you're obviously just now prepping for it? You know, seven months in, there's a different thing of like how do I sustain my sanity? And that, you know, you don't have we're not quite at that point yet, but uh um that's coming soon. Um, what if we can we wrap? I have two advice-based questions for us. So let's wrap a little bit with um any advice for other early career artists, right? Uh if you think about uh your 25-year-old fellow colleagues who are out there, maybe have not achieved quite this peak of success yet. What what would you say to them in terms of like um what's been working for you and what you would advise them to kind of keep doing themselves?

[1:12:26] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Um, yeah, there's a couple things. I I I think uh, you know, really focusing on like what I said earlier of um just sort of figure out and this is so hard to do when you're when you're that age because you're still finding out who you are. Um, but like just think about the things that you really, really love and the parts of yourself that you're proud of. Um and just really like that's because like that's what's gonna get you to the work. It's like those really specific things that make you so yourself. Um when you walk into those that room, if you're trying to be somebody else, if you're trying to emulate uh an actor that you've like for example, I I was obsessed with Jeremy Jordan when I was that age, and I still am. He's great, he's amazing. Um, yeah.

[1:13:11] Charlie Murphy: You're gonna be sharing a Broadway season with him?

[1:13:13] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Exactly. Um, but I wanted to emulate him so bad that I was trying to sound like him and sing like him, and I was just like trying to be that guy, and I I'm not like I'm I'm so me. So it's like find inspiration in those people, but then find what's special about you and really celebrate that because there's only truly only one you, and that's what's gonna be your superpower in the room.

[1:13:39] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Um that's first advice. And then second advice is once you get to college again everyone al always has their own experience but I got to my first year of college and I realized that there's sort of this um kind of like what I was saying where some people just come in with an attitude of like they just got into college and they're already like trying to leave. They're already trying to be like oh yeah I just went to this audition and I I just gotta get out of here. I gotta I gotta go get you know I gotta get on Broadway already. It's like I have the patience to understand that you spend all this time on your education and and I think I remember almost feeling caught up in that and being like oh God everyone's auditioning for stuff. I need to audition for stuff I need to get out of school and it's I'm so glad I just was patient in my four years and really focused on my training and then let the career happen afterwards.

[1:14:33] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Um and and also there's a lot of negativity sometimes from just like this kind of environment of of there was a lot of kids that just gossiped about each other and gossiped about the teachers and complained about just remember how just remember to practice gratitude for where you are and uh I think the thing that has gotten me so much um work and success and like what's continued is that I've been I've only led myself with empathy and patience and I've uh not ignored the crew members you know like go up talk to the crew they're they're working just as hard as you and um everyone on the creative team and uh don't ever allow yourself to kind of become um narcissistic and cut off like everyone that's working at the same level as you try to always put yourself in the shoes of everyone around you, including your teachers and your peers, and um lead with kindness because that is gonna keep you working.

[1:15:35] Charlie Murphy: It's it's amazing advice.

[1:15:37] Ali Louis Bourzgui: And not just sorry, not just keep you working, but also like it's important as a human being.

[1:15:41] Charlie Murphy: Also as a human being and what we put out of the world.

[1:15:43] Ali Louis Bourzgui: No, but I was gonna say the the amazing advice about patience has gotta be absolutely infuriating for everyone to hear of being like, but you're 25 years old and you're a leader. It's I couldn't follow that advice.

[1:15:53] Charlie Murphy: So no, you but you did, but you stayed in school and you did you you were you craved critique and then you know um uh but it's always I'm just saying it's boy that sounds so nice when it's like and then I didn't have to be too patient out of school, didn't exactly um but what about advice? So here's my challenging question advice to your future self because we make all these old people give advice to our young listeners.

[1:16:13] Charlie Murphy: So our 45-year-old um uh guests and then test talk to 22-year-olds or whatever. What are you hoping if you were to gonna talk to your own 45-year-old self, what are you hoping you've held on to? What what would you say to this person?

[1:16:27] Ali Louis Bourzgui: I really hope that you you you keep this about what I've done. What you know, what advice would you give to that 45-year-old self 20 years from now?

[1:16:36] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Uh I think I hope that I get better and continue to let myself fully feel the negatives to then also feel the positives. Uh I think just constantly living in that balance of accepting the fact that like everything's always moving on a wave and that um like I I I even now I I've found moments of because I think it's because I I run away so much from like negative moments and negative emotions. If you don't let yourself sit in that, if you don't let yourself feel feel that, you're just you're not gonna feel the positive side of it either.

[1:17:17] Ali Louis Bourzgui: If you don't, yeah, you have to feel both. And I and I I hope I get better at that, and I hope that I continue to feel that. People ask why actors meditate, do yoga, therapy, all these things you're talking about.

[1:17:31] Charlie Murphy: This is why you must be someone who does all three.

[1:17:33] Ali Louis Bourzgui: I I I didn't say it before and when you were talking about preparation, but uh uh I've never really been a huge yoga person, but I started doing yoga before Tommy. Uh and I get the hype. I get why people it's real kind of get a cult following mindset for it because it it's very, very helpful.

[1:17:53] Ali Louis Bourzgui: It's very helpful.

[1:17:54] Charlie Murphy: Yeah.

[1:17:54] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Um, and any any kind of meditation um that works for you and some kind of creative outlet. Uh I d journaling doesn't work for me, but songwriting does. And so just finding finding something that you can write through uh when you're going through something hard, whether it be songwriting, journaling, um whether it be talk therapy or uh whatever or painting, anything, just finding something that you can health healthily put your emotions into.

[1:18:24] Ali Louis Bourzgui: And I often I would throw in that advice of like, and it can't just be doing theater. I have some friends who like they find it so meditative. I understand it's theater to me is so meditative because you have to be so present. It it is like forced therapy, but then you're crazy when you're not in a show. Then it's like you're doing great when you're in a show, but I'm like, the times you need it is when you're not on a show, really.

[1:18:41] Charlie Murphy: Can't just be showing up to the theater that's meditated for you.

[1:18:44] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Um, Ali, this was so fun. Thank you for doing this. Um, any last thoughts?

[1:18:48] Charlie Murphy: We gotta follow you.

[1:18:49] Ali Louis Bourzgui: I'll say you can get a million followers, Ali dot Louis, and uh blah blah blah. Um, anything else that we gotta throw say to the people?

[1:18:55] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Uh no, but I hope you come see the show.

[1:18:58] Charlie Murphy: Because it's gonna be really fun. We'll we'll have advertisements and links in the the show notes for sure of uh where they can check out that information.

[1:19:05] Charlie Murphy: Um thanks so much for doing this, man. Really appreciate it.

[1:19:07] Ali Louis Bourzgui: Yeah, thank you.

[1:19:12] Charlie Murphy: Yes, yes, yes. I love that conversation. I really loved Ali talking about how he craved critique as a young person and all of the ways he sort of found his openness.

[1:19:22] Charlie Murphy: Um, we talk about that before with the kind of balance of confidence and humility and finding openness while still having that strength and conviction of your choices.

[1:19:30] Charlie Murphy: The balance of knowing yourself without limiting yourself.

[1:19:32] Charlie Murphy: Yes, yes, yes. I thought that was all just so intelligent and well said by Ali. I also really appreciated his vulnerability in talking about his family.

[1:19:39] Charlie Murphy: You know, we hear a lot of like, my parents were so supportive, which of course is ultimately true in most cases, and that the overarching thing they get is support.

[1:19:47] Charlie Murphy: But I think it it's kind of easy to kind of gloss over the bumps and bruises that are so often true in the choice to make a life in the arts and you know what that means in a family dynamic, many of which are not used to the idea of having an artist in the family.

[1:19:58] Charlie Murphy: But just really beautiful to hear of his difficulty and the learning with his dad, and I'm sure his dad is very proud of his success today.

[1:20:04] Charlie Murphy: Um, I also really enjoyed Ali's comparison of schools to agencies with that idea of like boutique mid-level A-list.

[1:20:11] Charlie Murphy: I think there's something really interesting there. It's not an exact analogy, but I do think in the same way that not every actor is the right fit for a CAA or a William Morris.

[1:20:20] Charlie Murphy: And even if you kind of could be represented by them, if you could trick yourself into the agency, you might actually be better off with the boutique or mid-level agent that might give you a bit more personalized attention that you need at that point in your career with whatever your goals are.

[1:20:31] Charlie Murphy: I really do think the college search has a lot of interesting comparisons to that.

[1:20:35] Charlie Murphy: That people think they want a certain school, and you go, actually, I think this school might fit what your actual goals are at this moment a little bit better.

[1:20:41] Charlie Murphy: And just the slightly deeper dive I want to chat about is just Ali's comments on his attitude.

[1:20:47] Charlie Murphy: I mean, I'm sure you can all hear it in Ali's voice, you know, what he talked about in his experience of the pandemic.

[1:20:52] Charlie Murphy: But it is just so valuable for a young actor to be able to model his attitude.

[1:20:56] Charlie Murphy: What you can control and what you can't.

[1:20:58] Charlie Murphy: I mean, it is a hard business and a hard college process, and you all have every right to be bitter.

[1:21:04] Charlie Murphy: You have earned and deserved the ability to be catty and frustrated and feel that the world is unfair.

[1:21:10] Charlie Murphy: You're right, of course, the world is unfair.

[1:21:13] Charlie Murphy: But I think as Ali discovered in his education, that bitterness is not helpful to you.

[1:21:18] Charlie Murphy: It's only gonna come back and bite you and eat you up.

[1:21:21] Charlie Murphy: So you can go there if you want to, but if you can find that ability to focus on what is in your power, it's just gonna serve you so much better.

[1:21:28] Charlie Murphy: It won't guarantee your ability to book a Broadway show.

[1:21:30] Charlie Murphy: You could do everything right and still not book that big Broadway gig.

[1:21:33] Charlie Murphy: But if you give in to the bitterness and take yourself out of the game, it will guarantee that you won't.

[1:21:37] Charlie Murphy: If you can keep that focus on the positive, if you can see the opportunities and the doors that are opened when another one gets slammed shut, it's just gonna leave you open to all of the good possibilities that could come your way.

[1:21:47] Charlie Murphy: Okay, that's it. Another episode of Mapping the College Audition, produced by Meghan Cordier and Kelly Brennergast.

[1:21:53] Charlie Murphy: I CTA'd you with a rating and review talk at the beginning. So I'm not gonna do it again here.

[1:21:57] Charlie Murphy: I'm not even gonna insist that you follow us at MT College Editions on Instagram.

[1:22:02] Charlie Murphy: Not gonna insist that you check out our TikTok.

[1:22:04] Charlie Murphy: I won't tell you about our website at MTCA.com.

[1:22:06] Charlie Murphy: None of that.

[1:22:08] Charlie Murphy: To my young artists mapping their journeys.

[1:22:10] Charlie Murphy: Just watch out for those late night critique cravings that can really get you.

[1:22:14] Charlie Murphy: No critique after 10 p.m. is my role.

[1:22:17] Charlie Murphy: We'll see you next week.