This transcript was automatically generated and might contain errors.

[0:01] Jayke Workman: Oh my god. Uh not me making myself laugh at my own podcast. I'm talking to no one. Oh my god, did you hear? Did you hear? Did you hear? Oh my god, guys. Oh my god. Oh my god, oh my god, you guys! What's up, you guys? My name is Jayke Workman, and this is Oh My Pod, you guys, a musical theater and pop culture chat show where I interview some of your favorite Broadway stars and talk to people from every facet of the creative world.

[0:40] Jayke Workman: Allow me to introduce myself. If you don't know me, my name is Jake. I'm 26 years old and I live in New York City, and I'm a musical theater performer. I have had the pleasure of playing Merry Sunshine in the Broadway company of Chicago the Musical, as well as the National Tour pre-COVID, which I think ran um approximately 17 performances before we got shut down. So that was cute. Um, but yeah, I've worked regionally in some really, really incredible places across the country, and I've gotten to know and love so many incredible artists, theater performers, designers, musicians, actors, makeup artists, models, so so many people. So I cannot wait to introduce you to some of those incredible people.

[1:27] Jayke Workman: I lived in New York City for about four years. I moved here right after I graduated in 2019 from the art school, got my BFA in musical theater there, and then I moved to New York and pretty much immediately booked my first national tour. So I wasn't in the city for that long before I was then out on the road. However, obviously, my time on the road got cut a little shorter than anticipated by a year because of this little crazy girly named Covisha. So, like most, I um ended up going home for a while. Home for me is Minnesota. My parents and my sister live there. And um, I've been a Midwesterner all my life. I grew up in Lawrence, Kansas, and then I moved to Minnesota when I was 12. And let me tell you, you can take the girl out of the Midwest, but you can't take the Midwest out of the girl. Don't you know?

[2:18] Jayke Workman: So, yeah, that transition from the Midwest to New York, well, Connecticut first, and then on to New York, was interesting. But I already had the opportunity to leave home a little sooner than most. I went to a boarding school for the performing arts in Minneapolis, Minnesota, my junior and senior year of high school. So I was used to living away from my parents at an earlier age than I think some of the people entering into my collegiate experience were. So that was really beneficial. I absolutely love living in New York City. It is so so full of artistic opportunities. Whether it's participating in them myself or just getting the opportunity to go and experience art. I'm truly so lucky to get to be here and to have friends who push me to do things that I may not have done by myself.

I've learned and I've grown so much, not only as a performer, but as a person, and that's largely to the credit of this pool of amazing and giving artists. And I cannot wait to share them all with you.

[3:22] Jayke Workman: Oh, a little um housekeeping thing. LOL housekeeping. Who do I think I am? My very first podcast. Um, I have a Gmail account for this podcast. It's oh mypod you guys at gmail.com, and I'm gonna be using it to check in with all of you guys. I'd love it if you guys want to send me in stories you want to share, if you have questions from me or for any of the guests that I'm gonna have on, if you have suggestions for topics that you want to hear me talk about, or if you just want to say hey. So again, that's oh my pod you guys with the letter U at gmail.com. And who knows, maybe your story will be read on the show.

[3:52] Jayke Workman: Oh my pod, you guys. It's time. It's time to welcome our very first guest to the podcast, the incomparable Miss Beth Malone. Yay! Welcome.

[4:14] Beth Malone: How are you?

[4:16] Jayke Workman: I'm good.

[4:17] Beth Malone: I'm in Chicago shooting of Chicago Med.

[4:22] Jayke Workman: Oh, interesting day yesterday on the set where I had um I had to vomit and also get surgery.

[4:31] Beth Malone: So as you do, of course.

[4:34] Jayke Workman: That just seems like a regular day's work. Glamorous actress lifestyle, you've heard so often.

[4:40] Beth Malone: Of course.

[4:41] Jayke Workman: Oh my god. Well, thank you so much for coming on and and um agreeing to chat with me. I'm so excited. Um you we met very recently for the first time in Aspen, Colorado, which was obviously a thrill, but um, I feel like I just I hit it off right away with you. So I was like, who better? Forever besties already, because uh that that situation where we were, you know, singing show tunes for wealthy people at Christmas time in Aspen, Colorado was like it's a very bonding experience.

[5:13] Beth Malone: It surely, it surely is. We we made the joke a few times because it was the holiday cabaret, but um we said nothing, nothing says Christmas, like and now life has killed the dream I dreamed.

[5:25] Jayke Workman: Oh um I'll have another eggnog for that one.

[5:29] Beth Malone: Yeah exactly. Um well let's I want to ask you some questions. So you said you're doing Chicago Med right now. That's a fifth. How when did you start doing TV film? Was it was it pre-theater for you?

[5:43] Beth Malone: Uh, you know, I used to do a lot of commercials when I lived in LA. I lived in LA from 2000 to 2014, a lot of commercials and like the odd guest star, but it was really hard for me to get, you know, into that world, even though I had an agent, really small agent, and I couldn't get seen for lots of things, and pilot seasons would come and go, and I have like one audition, and then when you get one audition a year, you're just terrible at it. And so it just was like not gonna happen. And then Fun Home really like um just opened up that world for me, and all of a sudden, because in New York, the same people who cast TV go to theater and um all of a sudden like my phone was ringing off the hook.

[6:29] Beth Malone: But what happened for me as a lesbian actress was that? Yes, talk about it. I was not like butch enough to play lesbians on TV. I kept not booking gay women, and I'm like, uh okay, well, I'm not booking straight women and I'm not booking gay women. Super short hair. So during COVID, I grew my hair out. Um just didn't cut it the whole pandemic. And um then when I started auditioning again, I started booking like crazy, and it's like so weird. It's just like a type thing. Cause um, you know, the camera sees just this, they don't see like the little dude like I am. They it doesn't pick up.

[7:13] Jayke Workman: Sure. Um okay, yeah. So Fun Home for sure. I mean, that's like how how I came to know you first, and then I got to like go back and you know, listen to like your original music and everything. But what was your experience like with Fun Home? Because as far as I uh can tell, you you started with it like from its inception, basically.

[7:34] Beth Malone: Yeah, the thing the first thing that happened was I I had decided to quit the business, and that is that is okay, great. True. I was like, I'm done with this, I'm just done because I I'm you know, I'm in my 30s or whatever, and I was like in late 30s at that time, actually, and thinking I I just don't want to be a commercial actress my whole life. That's just not why I came to LA. It's like I'd rather teach, you know, I got a master's degree so that I could not end up waiting tables, and so I could not end up like doing stuff that made me sad. What makes me excited is making things with smart people, so I was like, well, I can do that in a university setting, and I can have a house in a town with the ski area, you know, like all the things.

I was like, I'm very pragmatic in there's a practical side to me as well. And so I was like, okay, I'm gonna quit the business. My friend Peter Schneider, this um wonderful guy who's also a producer, and he just happens to be a good friend of mine. He used to be the head of Disney, like he's a big deal, but he's also just a dear friend, and he was like, Before you quit the business, you gotta give yourself like a year of doing these like five bullet points. And he gave me like a five bullet point thing. It's like, don't leave the house for less than a thousand dollars, don't uh only say yes to things that are someone you want to work with someone you're you've been dying to work with a show you've been dying to do a role you've been dying to play or something that has legs something that's gonna go forward um so those those things made my like my yeses get way less uh huh so I just said no no no to a bunch of things that were time wasters and only said yes to things that were like meeting those criteria and then he also said was like do something that scares you do one thing that scares you and like for me that was like to write my solo show and tell this story about like when I came out my parents disowned me and they and they and it was a big deal and uh and it was painful and hilarious and me trying to get laid at the same time you know it's like it was it was funny and then I told it with pop music and then Lisa Crohn saw that and then um you know so she I was on Lisa's radar from that from doing the thing that Peter told me to do so basically what he told me to do was like the thing that it does is it's like if you make the stuff that only is true to you that you want to make and it is not someone else's engine if you make it the people your people will be drawn to you.

You'll be you'll end up with you're supposed to be in because if you are a meteor heading in a trajectory and and some there's another meteor heading toward that same trajectory you're gonna collide the good stuff the stuff that you like this podcast for you.

[10:33] Jayke Workman: Totally, yeah. I I am so glad that you said that because I I really feel like um this is something that's out of my normal realm of you know, like what I think I am capable of, and I'm so excited to you know, like learn how to do this because it's so fun. But like it's great that I have people like you who are so um generous and open to to help me start it. So I'm and also and you I mean, we're all gonna say we knew you when, like eventually the world is gonna catch up with you.

[11:03] Beth Malone: Oh my god, you are way too way too kind to me, but I appreciate it. I want to live in the world because Jayke Workman is a genius, and we all get it now.

[11:13] Jayke Workman: That is the world I want to live in.

[11:16] Beth Malone: You are so sweet. Well, if you haven't listened or if you haven't seen the the solo show, Beth's solo show, it's called Beth Malone So Far, and it is so good.

[11:26] Beth Malone: There are clips on YouTube that I have, of course delved into. Um, but it's excellent. So it's gotten a lot better since then.

[11:35] Jayke Workman: Oh yeah, do you still do you produce it across the country?

[11:40] Beth Malone: Last time I did it, I was like, I've said this story enough. I'm done. I'm like, I've it for me, it was like I don't need to tell this story anymore. But then once in a while, like I get a request to do it and I'll like pull it back up and revisit the whole thing. And the thing is, is like I've done so much work on it that now it's just like tight, it's a really super tight show. And I had to build a solo show while building a solo show. So like if anybody thinks they should do it, then you should do it. I think you should do it. You learn a lot doing it.

[12:09] Jayke Workman: That's so cool. Was it hard?

[12:11] Beth Malone: Really hard. Um, it's hard. It's hard because, um, you know, you don't get to just like say, take it to anyone, like in right from you. So when you're out of ideas or when you hit a ceiling, the show hits a ceiling, and the show is out of ideas until you get two ideas, and you're like, okay, I know what this is. And what also I learned to do is like let things percolate, and then like your brain keeps working on things even when you're not actively thinking on it, and you wake up someday and be like, that's what it is, that's what that is.

[12:48] Jayke Workman: Totally. Have you ever seen Elaine Stritch's one woman show?

[12:53] Beth Malone: Yes, at Liberty. It is like I think it's like the pinnacle of comedy writing. I think and her deliveries, yeah, it's just brilliant. But she is like that's what you see as a woman who's like, I fucking know who I am. The rest of you can like suck it, you know. If you don't get me, then see ya, you know, then just fuck off.

[13:15] Beth Malone: Yes, you know, but my friend Liz McCartney, I don't know if you Liz McCartney, her mom, when she saw Elaine Stritch at Liberty, she goes, oh Elizabeth, you could play that part. Incredible.

[13:29] Beth Malone: Well, I um when Elaine was doing um the revival of night music, my dear friend Kat, friend of the pod, um she was Kat was playing um her granddaughter Fredrika, and they were in rehearsals um during like the hiatus where they like switched over the from the first cast to the second, and so I got to meet Elaine on on like the way into rehearsal, and the one word she said to me was I I of course I like was gushing over her. I was like, Miss Stritch, Miss Stritch, I have been a fan of you forever. I'm I'm like 12 at this point. She's like, whatever. But I like went on this long spiel. And she turns to me and she goes, hello. That was it. I was like, okay, that's just her. That is exactly who Elaine is. Through and through.

[14:20] Jayke Workman: That's hilarious.

[14:21] Beth Malone: I had the good fortune of having second row seats, and she pulled her wheelchair up right in front of me and sang liaison.

[14:31] Jayke Workman: Wow. Was it everything?

[14:33] Beth Malone: I was like, I was like this. Like this. And she was like spitting on me. And I was like, she's like, not even figs, raisins. Bring it. And that was back in the day when she was still calling for line, you know, like line.

[14:49] Jayke Workman: Yes.

[14:50] Beth Malone: Um, okay, wait. So Fun Home happened. You you auditioned for the show, you booked the show, then the iteration becomes off Broadway.

[14:59] Beth Malone: So here's the story. Like, I had done all the things, right? I had done the solo show. I had done the show that I really wanted to do with the people who I really wanted to make something with. It was this lesbian musical called Breakup Notebook. And I was in the middle of like writing my CV so I could become like so I could start applying to teach at universities. And my agent called and said, uh, hey, the public theater wants you to put yourself on tape for this reading. And I was like, wow, okay, cool. That's cool. No, the public never calls me and says, hey, put yourself on tape for this reading. So I was living in LA at the time.

[15:42] Beth Malone: And what came through was this really strange, like monologue of basically Alison Bechtel did these video blogs back in the day. She would just like record herself doing her process, and she'd be like stream of consciousness, chatting while she would do it. And they kind of like lifted whatever she said, put it on the page, sent it to me. So I put myself on tape, um, doing this thing where I'm like, I am video recording myself, taking a picture of myself so I can draw myself. Nuts, right? So that was part of the update. So I sent it, and they were like, yeah, we'd like you to do it. And I'm like, huh, okay, cool. So they started sending me music, and the one of the first things that came through was like Janine Tesori singing maps.

It was like one of the early, early songs that got written in maps was ended up being in the it was one of the rare things where it's like a song that was written early. But it was so arresting. Like immediately I was like, this is so awesome, so special. I can't stop listening to it. Even just like the odd little like demo tracks from Janine just playing and singing in her, like the one thing that came was like that kind of like dissonant chord, dun, dun, dun, dun. Janine going right angle of the leg. Hmm, the gathers in his sweater, or his glasses around. No, square across the top, bum bum, bum, half moons and me, striped shirt, and actu watching dad, thought balloon, daddy, comma. Hey daddy, come here.

Okay, I need you. So Daddy Hib Daddy was in that was part of another thing, was part of another thing that all got cut. But even all of that, I was like, what, what, what, what, what? Wow, that's so wild. What's happening with this music? What is happening with this person? It was just like so the minutia, the detail uh and and the and the dignity of of a person's thought process, a person's artistic practice. Um and and the beauty of that like layering of that kind of a mind. I was in. I was sucked in. I was like, I don't care what I want, I want to do this, I'll do this for free.

[18:08] Beth Malone: Yeah. And then so ended up going first to the off-Broadway. First, I mean, we did a ton of workshops, you know, it just took forever to develop. First thing we did, like a tiny nine reading at the Alnsbagger or Lewester Hall, you know, the different little weird theaters all around the public. We fit in all of them. Like, first we did a little 29-hour reading with like folding chairs at Lewester, and then we did this thing called this this developmental lab that is just designed to torture actors called um a lab production where you come up in the morning, you work, and you build a show, and then you take a small break, and then you perform it in front of a live audience every night as it's being developed. And that was when I started going, I think this is a thing because famous people started showing up.

[18:59] Beth Malone: Ah, yes. Remember like looking down and seeing Meg Ryan's tennis shoes because I was in, you know, I was on this little tiny stage. It was in a teeny tiny, like they built a tiny platform, and then they set up chairs on risers, and like like this far away from the audience. And the the show was vastly different then. It was vastly different. I'd love to see that version of the show. It was like so odd, but so much more raw and you know, tons of things.

[19:31] Jayke Workman: And then did you know that I mean you mentioned that you felt that it had legs, but was there a point where you were like, oh, this is this is different. This is something really, really special, like this is gonna go somewhere?

[19:46] Beth Malone: Like when producers started to become attached to it, and then we started having these like cast meetings in the downstairs dressing room of the Newman and and these Broadway producers were standing there going, hello everybody, and being very, very nice to us. I was like, huh, they're really nice and those people are really nice to us, and all of a sudden, you know, and then it was interesting. Like Sondheim came and Spielberg came, and you know, those kind of folks sitting in the audience, and that Peters was there, and we were like, okay, what is happening? You know, because for years it's this thing that's in your inbox, and you're like, I'm doing this reading called Fun Home, and there was like, oh, that's nice. Um, but then we're just like, how's that fun house doing? How's fun house? Like, I don't know about that show, Funhouse. I didn't know about that show, it's called Fun Home. But yeah, it was a wild journey.

[20:44] Jayke Workman: And then when you were nominated for a Tony, was that what was that like? I mean, were you surprised that you had gotten to that point?

[20:53] Beth Malone: Or was that sort of like did it feel like the the year before a bunch of us were nominated for the off-Broadway things? And the only person that won was one of the kids. One of the kids won for like best supporting, and then he he didn't even go forward with it. But um, I wasn't nominated for any of those because. Because down in the Newman, when the show was in the proscenium, um, Allison, the big Allison had to just keep, you know, hugging, hugging the walls so I wouldn't be in the way of scenes. So my show vastly changed when the prose when when the proscenium went away and we were in the round, because then I could be, you know, it was it was like I was in the show finally.

[21:37] Beth Malone: In it, yeah. So but I still didn't expect to be nominated just because that part is so odd, and I wasn't like sure anybody could really was even following what I was doing out there, you know. Well it's like wow, like going, hmm, you know, a lot of the show. So I'm not sure that's a really nominable thing, especially in the category of lead actress, you know.

[22:00] Beth Malone: So I was nominated against Kristin Chenoweth, Chita Rivera, Kelly O'Hara, and Leanne. Yeah. Wow. That was my category that year. I was like, okay.

[22:15] Beth Malone: I mean, it's just insane, but it's also so incredible. I think part of part of the reason that people were so fascinated by the show and are still so drawn to the material is because of the the level of queerness that is being embraced. And so I think it's like that I remember watching that Tony's and being like, whoa, I didn't I've never seen a show like this, you know, and like me being in the Midwest and a kid who just like has stars in their eyes and wants to do theater.

[22:50] Beth Malone: I was like, whoa, I that was my first introduction to Fun Home was watching the Tony. So seeing somebody like look present queer was really cool on a stage like that.

[23:05] Jayke Workman: Was that important for you in terms of like the process of like did you have a lot of questions for yourself or for other people about like the queer representation as an openly gay woman?

[23:17] Beth Malone: It's really, really important that Allison be a butch presenting lesbian. It was really important. And then like in subsequent productions, um it's been one of the things that the writers, the creators have had to like continue to fight for because people want to um make it more palatable for audiences. It's like, no, no. This is this gender identity is the subject. Totally. It is the subject. It is not, it's not open for interpretation. Um so it's been tricky. It's very I get really mad when I see like big Allison wearing earrings or any kind of mascara. I'm like, you're you're you are missing the whole show. If you think that's what you should be doing right now, then you are missing the whole show.

[24:18] Jayke Workman: And do you feel that that like big sense of ownership over it?

[24:23] Beth Malone: I just get very because it's Allison, it's not like a person that doesn't exist. She's a real person, you know, and she's alive and she lives in Vermont, you know, and just like just like this is her story, man. You have to have dignity when you approach someone who's telling their truth, and and I get really I get really uh you know I got very close to the family and the story, and of course, you know, I had a lot of I feel a lot of possessiveness about like protecting her and her the legacy of what she was trying to say and do.

[24:57] Jayke Workman: Yeah, I mean you you guys got the opportunity to go and um stay in the house, right? Like in her actual home.

[25:02] Beth Malone: Yeah, we did. It was unreal, it was so surreal. When you're when you're treating somebody like a literary character, you know, like because it's on paper and she draws things meticulously, and um, and then you're like put the book down, and you're like, oh, that's that lamp. Oh, that's that little notch in the linoleum where Bruce Spechtel threw a cup all those years ago, and it nobody's changed the linoleum, and that's still there, you know, and that was a fight between him and Helen. And he threw a cup and it's in the book, and it's it's in the house. And that's when I was like, this is for the people.

[25:45] Jayke Workman: Wow.

[25:46] Beth Malone: Yeah.

[25:46] Jayke Workman: That's so wild. And then so what was it like to work with the kids?

[25:51] Beth Malone: Oh my gosh. Oh my gosh. All of them are like wheedled into my heart strings, even to this day, you know, wherever they are, and however their careers go and their lives go in this in this world, I will never not care about them. I love them.

[26:11] Jayke Workman: Um that's amazing.

[26:14] Beth Malone: Lucas think she was like, you have you seen the new Matilda?

[26:20] Jayke Workman: Yes.

[26:21] Beth Malone: That kid, how brilliant she is, and her little minutia. Sydney Lucas was every bit, every bit of that kid's brilliance.

[26:29] Jayke Workman: Wow.

[26:30] Beth Malone: Very similar to her in the way she processed deep emotional material. Um, so watching her, she didn't know how to be bad. Like, even when she was reading cold, she was a better actress than I'll ever be at the age of 10. She was crazy brilliant. She was nuts, you know. Um, and then um Gabby Pizzola, who took over, you know, she ended up being a stranger things kid, and now she's her career is blown up. If you look on her Instagram, she's got like 40,000 likes for everything she she puts on. I'm like, oh my god, Gabby, because she was the uh Broadway Matilda, and then she came to us as like the replacement for Sydney, even though she was older, she was shorter.

[27:17] Jayke Workman: Yes, when Sydney bucks she could stay in and do it.

[27:22] Beth Malone: It's crazy. Um so I was actually just watching Tick Tick Boom.

[27:26] Jayke Workman: Oh, yeah.

[27:29] Beth Malone: Was that like a surprise to you when they approached you to do that?

[27:34] Beth Malone: Well, here's how it happens like Lynn texts me, and he goes, Hey, call me. And I was like, Why isn't it wanting to call? And and uh he was like, Well, it's this thing, and I have this idea, and I have this idea for for this dream sequence, and I was like, that sounds amazing, yes, I would love to do it. And then COVID happened, and it just all was frozen and and and wouldn't it didn't happen for a long long time, and then when it did happen, um, we were all masked and shields, and Netflix put us in housing. Even though I live in New York City, I had to live in Brooklyn for two weeks in a hotel where they would like an ankle bracelet situation.

[28:19] Beth Malone: And was in the same hotel, we couldn't hang out. You know, it was like each other. We could just like text from our separate hotel rooms. Joelle was also in it, and we couldn't see each other. Um, you know, it was crazy times. And then when we were on set, we were in this massive warehouse, and we couldn't talk to each other. They put our like our star chairs like in this zigzag pattern with these circles around them where we couldn't cross out, and we I was like, oh my god.

[28:50] Jayke Workman: That's insane for being too chatty, you know.

[28:54] Beth Malone: Baby New Earth was like, anyway, so blah blah. You know, she's abroad, she likes to like and I was like, oh, I can't shoot the shit with Baby Newert. What the you know, this could be the hang of the century.

[29:06] Jayke Workman: Right, exactly.

[29:08] Beth Malone: Peter's across the way, I can't even go say hi to her and Joel Gray and oh, it was nuts, it was amazing. But just to be in the room, oh god, I get choked up when I think of like oh, and also Andrew Garfield, because I had done Angels in America with him. You know, we were like from across the room, going um plug or roll all over each other on the floor like we wanted to.

[29:34] Jayke Workman: Of course.

[29:34] Beth Malone: I mean, I would also like to roll on the floor with Andrew Garfield.

[29:37] Jayke Workman: Um, can you tell me about the difference between the experience of being in a musical versus being in a play like Angels in America?

[29:48] Beth Malone: Oh boy. Well, Angels was like the capacity of my physical body. I couldn't have done another day. I mean, like Nathan Lane was the one who was like, we are only doing seven shows a week. We are not doing an eight show a week. We cannot do it. Because it it that show just taxes you to the the end of human uh capability. That is what that showed. At the end of every night, I mean, people weren't even acting on stage. They were surviving. They were just fucking surviving the play. And and your acting gets so good when you're that tired. It's true. It's just like all we I cannot do anything extra. I just am going out there to get what I need from the scene.

[30:31] Jayke Workman: Yeah.

[30:31] Beth Malone: And I'm get off. That is what people do in life. And then acting becomes really, really real. Um, but that's it was an amazing experience to have that script in my head every day to have the monitor that language every day, those ideas every day. It affected me profoundly. I've taken it forward in my life. I don't think I'll ever be the same.

[30:53] Jayke Workman: Wow.

[30:56] Beth Malone: That's incredible.

[30:57] Jayke Workman: Do you have a favorite experience, like theatrical or TV film that like has moved you in that way?

[31:04] Beth Malone: What would you say that it could be Angels in America?

[31:08] Beth Malone: It wasn't fun. I'm not saying it was my favorite. It was hard. I wanted it to stop.

[31:12] Jayke Workman: We all do.

[31:14] Beth Malone: Wow. We all were like, make it stop. But also like it was like working out, you know. It's like fucking painful. And you feel so good afterwards. Like you feel like you really left something out there. Um, I'm really proud of my work in Angels in America. I'm proud of that show. I'm proud to have been in it. In the same way that I was proud of Fun Home. It was like, can you imagine being in two more amazing things?

[31:41] Jayke Workman: Truly.

[31:41] Beth Malone: I mean, yeah, I can't.

[31:44] Jayke Workman: No.

[31:45] Beth Malone: And I'm so used to my my whole like frame of reference is like commercial, you know, musical theater. That's like what I have done. And so I I'm excited and scared for the opportunity to get to do something like that, where you know, it's you are stripped down and it's raw, and the story that you're telling is more than just uh an exciting whimsical tale, you know, like it's real.

[32:11] Beth Malone: I would love to. There is the show in your future. There was this article in the New York Times this week about like the future of the gay play, and it it's really good. You should read it. I'm gonna send it to you. And everyone should read it because um it's all about this exciting uh frontier that we're on, where gay tales get to be about not shame or not coming out or not anything. It's like the the uh the fact of gayness can be like on a shelf and it just happens to come out through the thing. It's not the subject, it's just my hair is also brown, you know, that kind of a feeling, which is it's thrilling, and that's totally I am thrilled because I don't have to reinvent the wheel when I'm writing my own show, which I'm doing now.

[32:57] Jayke Workman: Yay!

[32:58] Beth Malone: Yeah, so the thing that I'm most excited about today and right now is the fact that I'm um in the middle of creating uh a musical with my friend Marianne Stratton and Emily Sayers of the Indigo Girls, who's writing the score, and it's called Starstruck, and this is the year you're gonna start seeing Starstruck on its feet because it's been in development um the last couple of years, so but now I look forward to it.

[33:26] Jayke Workman: That's so exciting.

[33:27] Beth Malone: Well, Bethany, thank you so much for being here.

[33:30] Jayke Workman: Thank you so much for chatting with me. You're such a treat, and I hope that our paths get to cross again soon.

[33:37] Beth Malone: And obviously, it was divine in in Aspen, but we can hang in New York if you want.

[33:42] Jayke Workman: Okay.

[33:46] Jayke Workman: Well, everyone, that's it for episode one of Oh My Pod, you guys. Thank you so much for listening, and don't forget to like, rate, and subscribe.

[33:54] Jayke Workman: Talk to you soon.

[33:56] Jayke Workman: Bye.

[34:01] Jayke Workman: Oh my god, oh my god, you guys.