This transcript was automatically generated and might contain errors.

[0:00] Leah Walsh: Hi, and welcome to The Compass, the podcast documenting the struggles of life as an artist.

[0:05] Leah Walsh: I'm Leah Walsh. My guest today is Laura Gragtmans. Laura is a wonderful actress, a singer songwriter, and she was one of my guests at the Compass Live episode at the beginning of November. Sadly, the audio of her interview was messed up and I wasn't able to release it. But she was kind enough to agree to do a full interview now. So even if you were in the audience that night, we cover a lot more ground in this conversation. We did get the audio of her singing her beautiful song "New York City" at the live episode. So if you want to go back and listen to that, the episode was released on November 11th, 2016. And if you listen to the end of the episode, you'll hear that gorgeous song. We went to undergrad at the University of Evansville at different times, and I'm so glad to be getting to know her better now.

I have such respect for her thoughtfulness as an artist. So thank you, Laura, for your patience with this process. I will also have a full episode with my husband, actor Frankie J. Alvarez, coming out next week, since his interview at the live episode was cut a little short in the recording as well. So keep an eye out for that. And I hope you enjoy the 59th episode of The Compass.

[1:28] Leah Walsh: So what do you do to try to keep from going to the dark side as an artist?

[1:35] Laura Gragtmans: I think that I get very emotional right away. And then I think I let it surround me, probably. I said this in our first interview that I think that winter is a really important time of the year for me because I, well, my first winter in New York was definitely the hardest one. But it was the most important one because I really didn't have anywhere to hide. Like I didn't know what was going on with my career, I didn't know how to navigate my career. I was very much alone in the city. I had wonderful friends, but I didn't really know how to—I feel like when you move to New York you start to—you have to learn how to ask for like a coffee or a drink or um the energy is very, very different from anywhere else.

[2:41] Laura Gragtmans: Yeah, and just, I mean, even from your friends, like to that you—it's a muscle that you develop to travel to get on the subway and go to a friend's house and hang out with them, or to sit down with your roommate and talk to them in a way that's not roommate talk, you know, just A, B, and C. And so, yeah, anyways, the question was how do I fuck with this? And I think that I'm sure a lot of people have said this, but I think that it is not as much for me—my experience, my personal experience is not not going there, but it's walking through it, finding a way through it and engaging with it and trying to understand it more. And my first—in my first winter in the city, I wrote that song "New York City," and I wrote it when my roommate was out of town for I think like a month, so I was alone in my apartment and the heat in our apartment was messed up and so it was like 95 degrees in the middle of January or something like end of January in our apartment. It was so hot and it was so loud, it really like the clanking.

[4:02] Laura Gragtmans: Oh, clanking, the clanking. And Frankie's old apartment used to do that as well. Yes, and we also had some like vermin problems in our apartment. And so, um I remember—this was like a big turning point for me—was I remember being in my apartment in the middle of the night and the exterminators were coming the next day at like 7:30 or 8 o'clock in the morning, and then I had a full day of work the next day, and I was sleeping in my living room because the heater was too loud in my room and it was so hot, and then this car alarm started going off outside. And so I was like, well, this is my life right now. That's okay, and in perspective, it's a lot better than a lot of other people's, but this is my life and it doesn't feel super—um anyways, and so that's when I started writing "New York City." And I mean that's one of my favorite pieces because I feel like it was truly engaged in the reality, you know, and what was there at that moment, you know.

[5:22] Leah Walsh: Do you find that your music is a tool that really helps you deal with some of the dark side feelings or figure them out?

[5:30] Laura Gragtmans: Yeah, I think so. I don't think that I am a very good writer unless I'm hurting. I mean like unless I'm like fat in the middle of that fight. I think that when I've—the times where I've landed on work that I think is the most truthful is when I'm experiencing those things or in the middle of some sort of challenge or, yeah.

[6:02] Laura Gragtmans: Yeah. So yeah, 'cause I don't think that—I think I'm a person that needs to be in silence and be in stillness to be able to hear, to be able to listen more clearly. And so when I really find myself rolling down that hill, I think that finding silence and finding stillness—whether that's meditation or whether that's just kind of sitting and lying on my floor and daydreaming—that helps to put things in order a little bit more and my creative brain starts to turn a little bit.

[6:50] Leah Walsh: That's great that you can allow yourself to do that because I feel like sometimes we feel like we need to be doing something.

[6:58] Leah Walsh: Well, I mean, to be productive instead of just letting your mind do what it needs to do.

[7:03] Laura Gragtmans: Well, somebody said to me one time, a really—oh yes, a really good friend of mine said to me that she takes like thirty minutes a day of daydreaming time. And she is by far one of the most successful artists that I know. You know, and she takes thirty minutes a day and she just dreams. And I think that that is really beautiful. Like I can be very useful and I found that that's the time when you're—I almost feel like when you're trying to put things on paper, you're trying to work the problem too early, then you don't allow things to come and go. You c—it's like I find that I latch on to things when I'm really trying to work a problem, I latch on to an idea and that, okay, how can I morph this idea and okay, oh no, it doesn't work.

Like I'm okay, I'm gonna latch on to this idea. How can I work this idea? Like how can I mold this into something that's good? But because all of a sudden your critic comes in and you are trying to create something that's good. But I feel like that's the death of creativity—let it marinate more before you start putting it on paper. That's my own process, which I have no idea what it is anyways.

[8:29] Leah Walsh: When did you—since you went to school for theater, when did you start music as well?

[8:36] Laura Gragtmans: I start—well, I played piano for like nine or ten years when I was in starting in elementary school and then I quit when I got to high school because I—or a little couple of years in high school because I wanted to do theater and piano giving my theater interests. And so I—but I actually—I never got through a concert or a recital without forgetting my piece entirely or just stopping and walking down to my seat, going to get my book or messing up and kind of having to go back and go back and go back and then I finish the piece.

[8:36] Laura Gragtmans: And that's so interesting. So I never—I had a really bad fear in relation to piano and playing in front of an audience and I didn't really realize that until I—because I didn't really realize that until I got to graduate school because I would play by myself a lot through university and through the end of high school. I would find a room alone and play by myself, but once I got to graduate school, we took this class called actor-generated work, and it was taught by Joan Macintosh, who is a lovely actress and director and teacher.

[9:19] Laura Gragtmans: It takes up with my teeth and she was teaching a class that was essentially learning how to deal with the dry periods of your life as an actor.

[10:17] Leah Walsh: I think that's so amazing that they have that in the program that you...

[10:17] Laura Gragtmans: It was one of my favorite classes. It was very powerful. And one of my classmates, Miriam Hyman, she is—her, I guess, I don't know what we would call that—like her band name, but her musician's name is Robin Hood. She's an incredible musician now and her work started in that class as well. And so I decided that for my project for that class, I was going to try to conquer my fear of playing the piano in front of people. And I decided that I wanted to start writing and I had a couple of—sorry, the little boys who are elephants just started to start playing above our heads.

[11:08] Laura Gragtmans: Oh yeah, that was—I know, my God, yeah, the live episode in The Compass. I wonder if you could soundproof that skill. I know, I don't think so either. Well, I think it's just today since I didn't think about it being New Year's Day kind of observed.

[11:27] Leah Walsh: Right.

[11:28] Laura Gragtmans: So usually if I record during the middle of the day, they're at school. But so anyway, so I had a couple of seeds of songs that I was really just had from playing by myself that every once in a while I would, you know, not read sheet music and start to—so when I was deciding what to bring in for this class, I began working on these pieces. And I was actually—I was going through a breakup at the time and I was feeling some anxiety about leaving school. I went straight through from undergrad to graduate school, so it was a big transition and I knew that I was going to have to make a big transition out of school into the world, and I had no idea how to do that. And I've only recently, I think, landed a little more firmly after five years of being in the city, you know, it takes time.

And yeah, so I brought in a couple of pieces. I taught myself the ukulele, and I feel like I still have the same amount of skill that I did when I started because I have not expanded my ukulele knowledge.

[12:46] Laura Gragtmans: But I taught myself ukulele and I brought in a couple pieces on that, and then I brought in a couple pieces on the piano, and that's how it started. And also I think that my singing voice really started to erupt out of me after I started writing my own music because I feel like when I was at Evansville, where I went to university with you, after you and then for my first couple years at Yale, I was trying to sing a certain way. I was trying to sing the way that I thought I was supposed to sing, and then as soon as I began making my own music, I thought, oh no, I sing like I sing, and that was really liberating and very—just, yeah, that's so exciting.

[13:46] Laura Gragtmans: Yeah, it was really a beautiful time to realize that the skills that I already had and the body that I had and the voice that I had was useful because it was what I had or something.

[14:06] Leah Walsh: Yeah. And to not try to make it fit into some other boxes.

[14:10] Leah Walsh: How did the actual project of getting over the fear that you had associated with music in front of people? How did that go throughout the course of the class?

[14:21] Laura Gragtmans: You know, I don't really remember it being an issue in the class, but once I started being asked to perform, I opened for a couple of bands in New Haven.

[14:33] Laura Gragtmans: And then when I got to the city I got asked to play at a lot of fundraisers and stuff like that. That's where it really became evident to me that I had to just keep playing through and I would do something where I would stop and go back a little bit and then play instead of stopping and continuing from the spot that I was at in the music. And I think that it was really important for me to just learn how to keep going and to make a mistake and keep going.

[15:08] Leah Walsh: Do you think it helped also when you started playing your own music? Did that feel different than like when you were playing piano growing up and those recitals would happen and yeah 'cause I guess there was a right and a wrong in that situation.

[15:21] Laura Gragtmans: Something that I have learned that was is a part of my album which is very far from anything that's even resembling perfection. Um it is that the mistakes are a part of the creation.

[15:39] Leah Walsh: Yeah.

[15:40] Laura Gragtmans: And that they're not even a mistake, they're just an element of the creation. And so I practice and practice and practice for my concerts, and I practice and practice and practice for the recording of my album, but I still make mistakes and I make mistakes in the album and I make and there are a couple of mistakes that we couldn't edit out, and they just had to be there.

[16:00] Leah Walsh: Right.

[16:01] Laura Gragtmans: But you have an album. Like think of if you had waited and waited for it to be perfect. If you had waited for it to be perfect, you never would have made it, you know.

[16:09] Leah Walsh: It's so true.

[16:10] Laura Gragtmans: And I remember at my release party, I made some big mistakes musically. And I had had this pep talk with myself before I went out on stage that I was going to allow that to be a part of this night. That I was going to allow that to live. Those I mean, I went to a birthday party a couple of like last year, and Stevie Wonder played.

[16:43] Leah Walsh: Oh my goodness.

[16:44] Laura Gragtmans: It was very, it was incredible. And um, and I was as close to him as I am to you.

[16:52] Leah Walsh: Oh my goodness.

[16:53] Laura Gragtmans: And he kept messing up his songs. And he kept singing, I messed up, I missed. And I was like, he messes up too. He messes up too. But he's just having a good time. And yeah, and there's something, there's joy, and there's and there's uh empathy, and there's this uh deep humanity in that, you know.

[17:14] Leah Walsh: That's and it is very satisfying to see a musician or to see an actor or to see an artist, any sort of artist who is perfect, who like a musician who plays something perfectly, um, but then there's something else that you gain from seeing someone who plays fully but also has a lot of you know, has mistakes, you know.

[17:42] Laura Gragtmans: Maybe it's a little more um but it's easier to identify or connect with them, yeah.

[17:46] Leah Walsh: Yeah, with that sort of experience. Um can you talk a little bit about self-producing your album and kind of the things that you learned?

[17:53] Laura Gragtmans: Yeah. Um that you weren't expecting a lot.

[17:57] Leah Walsh: Yeah.

[17:59] Laura Gragtmans: Because I'm sure there are other people who would find that useful information. Well, I learned that my the first thing I learned was that my community is incredible. I was so profoundly humbled by the support that I received. Um did you do I did a Kickstarter for it. And then I also um I also sought uh private funding, a little like a smaller percentage of private funding for people that I for so that I could have like a nice balance between the two.

[18:34] Laura Gragtmans: And it was amazing. I mean it was it I was very nervous about it, but I mean people from that I went to high school with gave to it, people that I went to college with random people that I didn't I couldn't remember that who they were gave to it. I was like, this is amazing, you know. And I think that that has to do with the fact part of that is that when you make theater, people have to come to it to be able to enjoy it. And with the album it was tangible as something that could be sent and that they could get it immediately into their iTunes and um have it to listen to it and they could listen to it as many times as they wanted or didn't want to.

[19:15] Leah Walsh: Right.

[19:16] Laura Gragtmans: That is really cool. And so that I think that that makes a difference that it's compact and that it's tangible, you know. Yeah. Whereas theater is so fleeting, uh which is part of the beautiful thing about it. But I had done a couple of Kickstarters with my theater company in years before, and so that it was a it was a completely different experience. And also because it was just me who was who was asking, who's doing the asking, it was um I think it was a different experience because I I wasn't surrounded by other people who were I mean Sally Cade Holmes, who was my um executive producer, she and my other producers, um, Ben Quinn and Ben Charles. Um they of course they like put the word out there, but it was my thing that I had to do.

[20:05] Laura Gragtmans: So and so anyways, um I I was very overwhelmed by the the incredible community of support that I saw so clearly during that experience, and then um I realized very quickly that it was a good thing that I had a lot of people surrounding me that were a lot smarter than me. Yeah, they I to have uh Sally Cade who was um I went to high school with Evansville with I didn't know that.

[20:36] Leah Walsh: Yeah.

[20:36] Laura Gragtmans: Yeah, to have her at the helm with me, just sort of leading the charge. We sat down, um she was the first person that I sat down with and I was like, I I had a dream, I wanna make an album, let's do it. And she It helps when you ask for help and then you feel like, well now I have I'm accountable to someone who's helping me so you know so helpful. And I don't think because I had had people had said to me, like some of my good friends were like, You should put out an album, like in the years before, and I was like, nah, uh no, it's not really something that's inside of me. I don't think I have enough music, I don't think my music is good enough. Like I would rather not deal with that right now. And then it was like I woke up one morning and I was like, it's time. We've we've gotta make this happen.

[21:22] Laura Gragtmans: And so I met with Sally Cade and immediately she was holding me accountable, and that was very helpful. And then we brought in um Ben Quinn who was the musical producer. Okay. Um Ben was also an Evansville graduate. Um and he had experience already. Yeah, and that sort of thing. He had recorded with the Good Morning Nags, they're a wonderful band, and he is just an incredible musician, and I had needed I needed somebody who would be strong with me, but also be open to me leading the charge in terms of the the music.

[21:56] Laura Gragtmans: And he was an incredible orchestrator uh throughout it. He, you know, he would take some of my songs like Senior Magnifico, one of the songs on the the album. He wrote all of the uh the choir parts. I had an idea of what I wanted and I tried it a lot of different times to to make sense of what I wanted and I didn't know how to do it, and so he just took it home and and he and he like wrote the choir parts and then we had the choir parts and that's awesome.

[22:28] Leah Walsh: But I mean I learned I learned a lot. I I mean I think that I I had no idea how complicated recording is. Um we were given a space which was incredible, but we weren't given the the um the all of the equipment that we used.

[22:48] Laura Gragtmans: So um yeah, space was generously donated to us by a good friend of mine. Um and uh but then we had to like rent all of the equipment and transport it and bring it up there and so I mean I think that that we were able to be in the space as long as we wanted which was really awesome.

[23:05] Leah Walsh: Well that's I was gonna ask did you how many over how many days did you record?

[23:09] Laura Gragtmans: So we recorded over a period of three days in the studio and then I spent one day recording in an apartment afterwards that with the songs that involved the loop station because we didn't need we didn't need the piano we didn't need the sound of the space in because they were going directly into it was going directly into a loop station and then that was being dealt with in the computer. So um to have like the the resonance in the space was not as important for those and we also ran out of time because we were trying to do 13 songs in three days and uh and I remember our cellist Paul when I was originally talking to him about the work he was like oh so you we can do like a a song a week and I was like Paul Brantley and uh anyways he rolled with it. It was amazing.

[24:09] Laura Gragtmans: Um that was the other thing is the generosity of the musicians that came in and helped helped us. We had a pianist named uh Noriko Tsunamoto and she played on one of the songs and then Paul Brantley Pitt played cello. Uh Ben Quinn, the musical producer played mandolin. Anyways we had a couple of wonderful people come in. Um but like Paul, for example, I I saw how he worked, and I was like, that's the kind of artist that I want to be because he he recognized what the project was, he saw that it was like a grass roots piece and that we had limited resources, limited time, but a lot of very a lot of very enthusiastic people.

[25:06] Leah Walsh: Yeah.

[25:06] Laura Gragtmans: And I think he also liked liked the tunes that we were playing. Yeah. And so there was one, you know, he came in for one day and he just rolled with it. And there was this one moment where we didn't have the the uh vocals recorded for a couple of the songs. And so he didn't know, he had listened to the songs, but he didn't know by heart how they moved, like how they we had we had rehearsed them together, like he he knew all of that, but he didn't without the words, he didn't know how they moved forward.

[25:45] Laura Gragtmans: So he said, Well, why don't you conduct me? So I stood on the gr I laid on the ground and lay on the ground, I kneeled on the ground with the headphones on, and he had his headphones on and he could see me and I could see him, and we were both listening to the track on our headphones, and I kind of moved with the music and like used my hands and my shoulders and my arms and my face, and that's how we recorded his pieces.

[26:14] Leah Walsh: That's amazing.

[26:15] Laura Gragtmans: And it was so beautiful. I mean, and he came up to me at the release party and he was like, That was one of my, you know, I I really that was a really special uh experience for me because it was so intimate, you know.

[26:27] Leah Walsh: Yeah, and he, even though I was a an earlier musician, um, he was so generous with me.

[26:34] Laura Gragtmans: And that's a special skill to be able to kind of fit yourself into someone else's vibe or someone else's project, you know. You know a lot more than they do.

[26:44] Leah Walsh: Right.

[26:44] Laura Gragtmans: But I think one of my I think that one of the things that I did somewhat well, I got a little stubborn in certain moments. Um, but I think that I was really good about recognizing the skills of the people around me. Um, which was kind of a beautiful thing about being an amateur musician in that position of creating this thing, was that I was I didn't feel like my ego was really getting in my way because I was learning so much so quickly.

[27:19] Leah Walsh: Yeah.

[27:20] Laura Gragtmans: As an actor, I feel like I have a little more entitlement.

[27:24] Leah Walsh: Yeah.

[27:24] Laura Gragtmans: Because I've trained for it a lot, and I I feel confident in my abilities and I I feel more confident in my opinions.

[27:37] Leah Walsh: Right.

[27:38] Laura Gragtmans: And uh and and I think that I expect certain things of the people around me, which I think is a good thing. But also because there was a little more fluidity to my position in this album recording and release, I was uh I was able to have this uh a very pure experience, you know.

[28:03] Laura Gragtmans: Um Yeah, and really be open to learning from everyone else. And of course I listen to it now and I'm just like in certain things, you know, in certain that you would do differently now.

[28:14] Leah Walsh: Yeah.

[28:14] Laura Gragtmans: I mean there's so many things I would do differently, but it was really it was a really uh um it was a really rewarding experience and continues to be a very humbling experience because it's there, it's it is tangible and it is and it's out there.

[28:32] Leah Walsh: So okay, it's out there.

[28:33] Laura Gragtmans: Yeah, it is so different from theater in that I mean I've had that experience a tiny bit with the podcast of like, oh someone can be listening to it and you have no idea.

[28:42] Leah Walsh: Yeah.

[28:42] Laura Gragtmans: Somewhere out there.

[28:43] Leah Walsh: Yeah.

[28:44] Laura Gragtmans: They're listening to you and it's like. And I you know, I've had I don't know people, I've had people email me that have said, you know, like I like strangers who found it.

[28:52] Leah Walsh: Yeah, yeah.

[28:53] Laura Gragtmans: And or people that heard me play at a fundraiser and they like looked online and like, you know, so it's it's been a it's been a an interesting ride.

[29:04] Laura Gragtmans: I still don't really know how it's gonna continue to unfold. But I I'm I'm working, you know, actually I'm not gonna talk about this on the something that has to do with an extension of this album, but I'm not gonna talk about it.

[29:20] Leah Walsh: Sure, yeah.

[29:21] Laura Gragtmans: No, but it's it's so great that you have besides your acting that you have another outlet that you can do on your own. Yeah, um, that you can express yourself when you're in between plays or in between acting work.

[29:36] Leah Walsh: Yeah, there's a part of me that wishes that I had the same amount of um abandon with my acting work.

[29:48] Laura Gragtmans: Hmm. Because I think that there are moments where I have that when I'm doing my acting work, but but it's different because it's somebody else's words, somebody else's story. The story can only be told in relation to the other people on stage, which is part of the beautiful thing of acting. And then there's something beautiful about being the single storyteller with maybe other musicians, but like that the words are yours and the you know that the right and this it's your experience. I'm kind of curious about how you deal with auditioning. Have you learned anything in the five years since you've been here that have kind of helped you deal with that whole system and how bizarre it is.

[30:36] Leah Walsh: Well I'm asking for a friend.

[30:39] Laura Gragtmans: Yeah. Well I definitely started to notice when I when I'm giving my power away so that's something.

[30:50] Leah Walsh: That's interesting.

[30:51] Laura Gragtmans: I think that being um I think I've noticed that the more present I can be throughout the experience the the better. An example is uh I was auditioning for something at um I don't think it was Ripley Greer but it was like one of the loud like Pear Studios or something it was like loud and lots of people and it's loud and how do you how do you some audition for a giant musical down the hallway. And it was I think I was auditioning for a really awesome play at the time um and uh, so I was excited about it, but I was like, oh my gosh, like I oh, yes. Okay, so I was auditioning for um I was auditioning for the humans and I was so excited about the play and thought it was amazing, and um, and I had put a lot of pressure on myself, you know, with that sort of a situation.

[31:38] Leah Walsh: Right.

[31:38] Laura Gragtmans: And I was so angry at the people who are in this who were in this this audition space, and then I was like, okay, I'm just gonna allow these people into my experience. I'm going to allow them into my preparation. And so I just listened and I heard this little girl singing um uh it was a song from Sound of Music. It was my favorite, my favorite things. Is that yeah?

[32:32] Leah Walsh: Yeah, that's my that's sound of music.

[32:33] Laura Gragtmans: Yeah. So but she was like belting it. It's like raindrop songs. She was like singing it so loudly, and it was like with an annie voice, and then I don't feel so bad. It was like so loud, and it she kept repeating this like one, like the end of the song or something, and I was like, that girl is ridiculous and amazing, and she's just doing it, and she's going for it in there, and so I was like laughing uncontrollably as I was listening to this, and I brought, you know, and then they called, called me in, and I came in and I like was just like still um dealing with the debris of this like girl who was e singing, and they were like, You ready to start? And I was like, Yes, I'm I'm I'm ready to start, and and I was like, I'm sorry.

Do you have you guys been listening to this? Can you hear that? Yeah, so are you like, yes she's like oh and and so anyway so there was this like moment of just being people and um and that was it was such a satisfying thing to just be people and to see the people in the room as people.

[33:48] Leah Walsh: Yeah I mean it doesn't sound like a big deal but it is those situations can be so formal and weird and you feel like you have the least power in the room or whatever it might be.

[33:57] Laura Gragtmans: Yeah but I I think that I yeah I think I I try to I mean auditions are like so so weird. I think just like trying to be as prepared as possible is always a go to but that's like for the for I feel like any actor is like I'm gonna be as prepared as possible.

[34:15] Leah Walsh: Yeah.

[34:15] Laura Gragtmans: But yeah I feel like just like listening not trying to like do anything but just kind of like being present.

[34:24] Leah Walsh: Yeah.

[34:24] Laura Gragtmans: You know that it's this sh it just reminds me because we're doing drunk I'll give you right now with three day hangover. And it's upstairs at the Russian Samovar, just this very old Russian restaurant in midtown and they have live music every night downstairs and it's like they've tried to do all the soundproofing but there's just a constant like piano music coming from downstairs like during the play. And sometimes it helps it as a checkout play and it's kind of appropriate. Sometimes I'll just be in the stairwell about to enter and I'm just start laughing because the song that's playing is like it's some tragic moment in the play and the song that's playing downstairs is like a rag time. And I'm just like, this is kind of perfect. And I just I'm like laughing about it.

[35:11] Leah Walsh: Yeah.

[35:13] Laura Gragtmans: I mean, I feel like that's useful. I remember, oh, it was Chris Bays, um, when I was at Yale. He talked about rolling objects and children and animals. That if you acknowledge them and you allow them to come into the room, like if if if a a ball starts to roll and none of the actors look at it, then the whole audience. Right, that's the only thing focused on the ball. And but if the actors look at it and they like make a joke about it, yeah, or they, you know, or they just they acknowledge it somehow, then the audience is okay with entering back into their story because they have invited that into their story, so it's not like a loose canon that's like, what's the what's the book is gonna do, you know?

[36:00] Leah Walsh: Yeah.

[36:00] Laura Gragtmans: But I think that that's the same with you know, so so much of this, like when you're when you're trying to do your work and the circumstances are out of your control, which is all auditions, then allowing allowing the world to be a part of your world. Your experience is necessary.

[36:20] Leah Walsh: Yeah, I like that. Can you tell me a little bit about the show you just did in Philly? Were you were you involved in like creating it or I was it already written or it was it was already written to a certain extent.

[36:32] Laura Gragtmans: Um so the play is called Jib, or The Child Who Went Forth to Learn What Fear Was. And the music is written by Amanda Palmer and Jason Webley. I don't know if you know Amanda Palmer's music.

[36:44] Leah Walsh: I don't think so.

[36:45] Laura Gragtmans: Yeah, she she's married to Neil Gaiman. He's a wonderful writer and he's so um so the play is uh essentially about the interconnectivity of a lot of different random people, you know, as one of them is uh one of them is a musician who is whose career is building, and all of these people are s their their lives are kind of they're somehow interwoven, um, and the there's like this energy that's traveling between all of them and that is ultimately expressed in this woman's music. Um and she's Jib. She's the lead role. And I played Maris, who is a um I think she's like a music journalist who who has a daughter um who is who is now like an everything journalist, but I think in like her past she was a music journalist, and her daughter is in a coma in the beginning of the play, and essentially her daughter like travels with Jib throughout her career, like during her coma.

She she anyway, so it's like it's it's very complicated storyline. But um but uh yeah, we all we all play a lot of different characters and um it has there's like ghosts and there's you know like a lot of music. It's a rock show we it's we publicized it as a rock show. Um so I played a lot of different instruments and Brendan Titley, who you know is he played a lot of different different instruments, um, and so it was a cast of seven people, and we were performing at the neighborhood playhouse, which is in old city, is it old city or old town in Philadelphia? I think it's old city.

[38:32] Leah Walsh: Um the neighborhood playhouse is this old beautiful building that was a church and then a basketball has like a basketball court on the second floor on the third f fourth floor will be where we were, and we used two floors um of the building, and the audience down halfway through. Um and yeah, so we're hoping that it'll come to the city.

[38:52] Laura Gragtmans: Why Philly? Um we had some opportunities in Philadelphia, and also we didn't want to premiere the show in New York because New York is where young shows go to die.

[39:04] Leah Walsh: Well, I have not spent a lot of time in Philly, but I hear it's just a great theater town.

[39:08] Laura Gragtmans: Yeah, it's cool. I mean, the we definitely noticed that for a bunch of New York theater makers to come into a town that was not their town. Um it was a challenge. But by the end, work word got out there and we started to get larger houses, and um, I mean, they're just lovely people in in Philly, and like it's a booming art has a booming art scene, incredible museums, and uh just a lovely place to spend, you know, a month. I was there, we were we rehearsed in New York, and then we moved to Philadelphia. And uh yeah, the hope is that it'll come to New York. I think that those wheels are already turning and and we'll see. I'll keep you posted.

[39:54] Leah Walsh: Yeah, I would love to see it.

[39:55] Laura Gragtmans: Yeah, was it a a lot of friends from grad school or so it was co-produced by my theater company and by uh another company?

[40:03] Leah Walsh: What's your theater theater company called?

[40:05] Laura Gragtmans: My theater company is called Old Sound Room, and we um we formed about a year after I left school uh out of just a bunch of Yale students, and we've we started with a show called Old Sound Room Lear where we um interviewed oxygenarian artists, and we did we we can we um severely cut down the King Lear script and we um inserted some of these interviews uh that we would like we would do the interviews of these oxygenarians um first of all telling the story of Lear and then also we discussed um the responsibility of the young to the old and the old to the young that's really cool we kind of had that mirrored in the throughout our cutting of Blair and anyways it was a crazy you know like a company's first show figuring out how to do everything it's crazy you know I was right out of school yeah um but it was really fun and and I mean I so cherish that time because again like that was you know to go back to your original question that I think that like sitting in the darkness of that first winter was really important for me to to find my way out to see out.

[41:31] Laura Gragtmans: I think that when things start to when things start to go badly I think that it's easy to turn inward as an artist and as a person and I think that like really allowing myself to sit in the in the silence of of winter and the silence of solitude and of um of unemployment and um, you know, it it's I think it's a really good thing. And it it changed me entirely, and it helped me to see outside of myself once I kind of moved through that initials, those initial stages. Um, and I, you know, saw all of these artists that were hungry for the same thing that I was interested in. I saw my interest in this this art form that I knew very little about, but I I enjoyed and I felt a very pure expression through it.

Um it helped me to see relationships that I hadn't seen before, see people that I hadn't seen before, to empathize with people that I hadn't been empathized, they've been able to empathize with before. Um and now I I find that I'm developing different skills to where like I I think that there are different things that are triggers to go to the dark side um now. And I'm learning how to how to better manage those.

[43:10] Leah Walsh: And but I don't think that if I had avoided, have I tried to avoid it in the first place that I would have learned anything about it.

[43:16] Laura Gragtmans: Yeah. So at least it's like being defeated by greater and greater foes or something. It's just like not engaging in the first place, you know.

[43:29] Leah Walsh: So what what is winter this year gonna be like for you? Do you feel like since you since it was a powerful time for you that first winter in New York, is it something now that you dread, or are you do you kind of look forward to that regeneration time in the winter?

[43:42] Laura Gragtmans: Yeah, last year I really dreaded it. This year I I'm actually kind of excited about it. I think that um you know I'm getting married in July, so this will be a a winter of a lot of planning. Um, but I've also noticed that since I decided to get married, I realized that I needed to if I you know if I'm gonna be with my partner for my life or hopefully my life um that I can't depend on him for everything. And so where I for some reason this year I feel very strongly that I need to kind of really dive back into understanding like how to how to uh engage with myself without like depending on other people to help me do that, you know.

[44:40] Yeah and I think that that was very much my first winter that I didn't I didn't have anybody else that I could really that could help me in the way that I thought felt that I needed it. And so I was kind of forced into that situation, and now, you know, five years later, four years four years later, I'm noticing that that's something I'm yearning for.

[45:02] Yeah. I'm yearning for solitude, I'm yearning for space of mind to be able to understand. I mean I also think that I'm getting a little bit older, so I want to be a little more deliberate with how to move forward. Yeah, I think that this winter is going to be great. I think it's gonna be really hard.

[45:24] No, that's a great perspective to go into it with.

[45:27] I hope so. I'm gonna take a page from your book.

[45:30] You never know, like you never know, right?

[45:32] Yeah, you never know. Things things will life is a series of surprises. But but I I definitely think that I have I feel better equipped to deal with some of those surprises than I did, you know, yeah, X amount of years ago.

[45:53] And I think that I I remember reading somewhere, I did I can't remember if I said this to you in our last interview. I love Rilke, I love Maria Roka's work, and he writes a lot about the winter, and I was reading somewhere recently, some like study was put out that talked about the importance of the winter for a tree and how the essential like microscopic changes that happen during the winter for a tree are what allow it to blossom in the spring.

[46:32] And Rilka talks about that all the time in his poetry. Um he talks he talks so beautifully and poetically about the about the importance of leaves being stripped from the trees, of the importance of color leaving the world, of the importance of being able to see the sky through through branches that would normally you wouldn't be able to see the the sky through before.

[47:03] Yeah. Um because it gives you it it it allows you the space to to change in ways that when things are like gushing forth that you don't have the same opportunity. It's not fertile ground, it's not as it's a different kind of fertile ground.

[47:23] Um I honestly think that the most important changes, the most important work is done in the driest and coldest periods of time, which is also that's the I mean that's why I called my album Hug the Lonely Cactus because it has to do with growing something fruitful in a seemingly dry and barren landscape.

[47:46] Yeah. And um, and that in turn, you know, one thing one like living thing can become a home or reservoir or shade or water for for the living things around it.

[48:04] That all of a sudden when you're able to like invest in that landscape, then you can become a source for other living things, you know.

[48:16] I like that. How is it for you and since your fiance Ben is an artist as well? How is it for you guys kind of figuring out that relationship when you're both artists?

[48:29] Um it's it's complicated, but it's doable. I think that we both worry about money, and we both we would both we both wish that we had a situation that was maybe a little more forgiving.

[48:44] Yeah, but um I mean we get creative, you know. I feel like that's the thing that I have again that I've started to really think about as we've prepared to actually like you know, we've started to plan for the long haul.

[49:02] Um I think we started that early because we knew we wanted to be together, but now it's it's a little more um tangible. I think that we're gonna have to make some sacrifices, honestly.

[49:18] It's scary, isn't it?

[49:19] Yeah. Um, yeah, I mean, I don't know any other way to I don't think that there's a sugar coated version. I think that it's I think we're both gonna have to sacrifice um our artistic lives, part of our like you know portions of our artistic lives, and also vice versa, like a time with each other for our artistic lives, and um have you guys done a ton of long distance?

[49:52] We've done some long distance. We did we did a couple of months when I was in Dallas, and then we did a couple of months when I was in Rochester, and then he was in Salt Lake City, so we've done long distance.

[50:04] We haven't done like five months or six months of long distance.

[50:09] Um keeps growling.

[50:12] Um but I I think that that will we I I feel like we're pretty we we figured out our groove with long distance.

[50:22] Um and we also go to see each other regularly when we're as much as we can. But I really I really think that we're we're kind of seeing that I think one of the reasons that we work is that for neither of us our career is more important than our relationships.

[50:41] And I don't think that it's a bad thing for your art or for your profession to be more important than your relationships, but I do think that it's important to know that about yourself.

[50:52] And so for us, I think our relationships take precedent.

[50:57] Yeah, and so the fact that we both understand that, I think will do us a lot of good.

[51:04] And I think we we want to we we're both ambitious people, we really want to be artists in the world, and we I really want to be an actor, a working actor in the world.

[51:18] Um when I am, it's amazing, and when I'm not, it sucks.

[51:23] Yep.

[51:24] But um but I also think like I need to take ownership of that decision that that's what I want to do, and also I'm not gonna sacrifice my, you know, I'm not gonna we're both.

[51:39] I think the fact that we're both artists actually helps with the with the long distance or with the no, you understand how important it is to the other person, yes, and because we both understand that you have to make sacrifices for each other and for the work that's that's that works in our favor, yeah.

[52:01] Um but I mean it's hard, it's really hard, but do you think that you guys will stay in New York long term?

[52:10] How are you feeling about the city right now?

[52:12] Well, our apartment rocks, yeah.

[52:15] But our our our apartment is beautiful, and it's it the it's the first real home that I think I've felt in the city, and that's made a huge difference, yes, and uh and just having having a sanctuary has made me feel like New York is a little more palatable, and I like New York a lot.

[52:35] I think it's a cool city. Also, also I know hundreds of amazing people that live here, so that's something that I'm not going to ignore, but I think we both long for more green.

[52:46] And I think we're both interested in a less saturated scene.

[52:53] Um that that maybe needs art a little bit more. However, we both like to be challenged by our communities.

[53:03] Right.

[53:03] And you're not gonna find that in places that are that don't have a theater or any sort of theater scene.

[53:11] You're not gonna find people that that challenge you. So we really it's a it's a back and forth.

[53:17] I think that for the next couple of years we're definitely gonna be here, and depending on how our careers go, we'll we'll see.

[53:26] But um I think that's the other thing that's worked for us as an artist couple, is that I don't think that either of us see it as one it has to be this way or it has to be that way.

[53:40] I think that we are recognized.

[53:42] Open to possibilities.

[53:43] Yes.

[53:44] Yeah, that's good.

[53:45] Yes.

[53:46] I think we're recogni we've recognized that things might change quickly or slowly.

[53:51] Yeah.

[53:52] When you are having a a period where you're feeling like you're being drawn to the dark side, you're kind of dealing with a lot of those those issues.

[54:00] Are there any like concrete things that you reach for again and again? Like you mentioned the poetry, but are there any books that you read or music you listen to?

[54:10] I I I do read the Book of Hours, which Wilkes wrote um the Book of Hours. Uh it's he was an atheist, but he has a s a s an artist spirit, an artist's spirituality that I think is very universal for anyone.

[54:28] Um, and then I also reached for Pema Chaudrin who wrote When Things Fall Apart and Living Beautifully with Uncertainty, I believe is what it's called.

[54:40] But um When Things Fall Apart is incredible.

[54:43] She're nodding so uh Do you know Nick Jokesy?

[54:47] I don't.

[54:48] He he recommended that one.

[54:49] Oh it's so it's so good.

[54:51] Yeah.

[54:52] And then um I read I think that like picking up any wonderful fiction like some Marquez or some Allende or some I don't know.

[55:06] I'm reading Ava Luna right now, so that's more in that day.

[55:10] But um like I like a vibrant, like really vibrant that you can really just get engulfed in.

[55:18] Yeah.

[55:18] Yeah.

[55:18] Yeah I mean like a hundred years of solitude is is I would say but um but I I mean The House of Spirits I read last I think last winter and music I go to um folk singers.

[55:34] I go to Joan Baez, Bob Dylan or Johnny Mitchell.

[55:39] It's kind of classic.

[55:40] Nice.

[55:42] But uh yeah.

[55:44] Um and then the the last thing I wanted to ask was just if you've seen anything recently that you want to recommend.

[55:50] I know you've been out of town but of any art form.

[55:54] My friend Adina is gonna be in the play Indecent by Paula Bogle that's coming to Broadway in um in a couple of months, I guess.

[56:07] And it's a really powerful play.

[56:09] So I would recommend that one.

[56:11] And uh come see Jib if it comes.

[56:15] For sure.

[56:16] Um, yeah, I'm trying to think if there's anything else.

[56:19] Go see Uncle Vanya.

[56:24] Yeah, thank you.

[56:24] I need to go see that one.

[56:26] Yeah, please come.

[56:27] We need we need friendly faces.

[56:29] I know.

[56:30] I'm so sorry.

[56:31] Um, and I also I listen to when I go to the dark side, I very much listen to the podcast on being.

[56:40] Yeah, that's a great one.

[56:41] Yeah, I love that one.

[56:42] And I listen to them off all the time.

[56:44] Yeah.

[56:45] I love the podcast.

[56:46] I need to put that one back in my rotation.

[56:49] Yeah.

[56:50] Well, Laura, thank you so much, and thank you for being open to doing this again.

[56:53] Yeah.

[56:54] In addition to the live episode.

[56:55] And I know that there were things that we talked about in the live episode that we didn't talk about today, but so that's just special for the people who were there.

[57:03] I don't remember what they were.

[57:04] I feel like I was less articulate this time around because I was more relaxed.

[57:08] No, this is good.

[57:08] It was a nice calm, calm chat.

[57:12] Um, so yeah, thank you.

[57:13] Thank you so much.

[57:24] Leah Walsh: Thank you for listening to the Compass Podcast. I'm Leah Walsh. More episodes are coming soon. Please look for us on Facebook, in iTunes. I'd like to thank the following people for their generosity. The Compass Cover Art is by Kim Miller, music by Brendan Spieth, audio assistance from Nick Choxie, and a special thanks to Frankie J. Alvarez. See you next time.