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[0:01] Robert Bannon: Are you ready? It's The Roundtable with me, Robert Bannon.

[0:08] Robert Bannon: Well, welcome to The Roundtable, everybody. My name is Robert Bannon. You're listening to us on Broadway World, the Broadway Podcast Network, iHeart, Spotify.

[0:16] Robert Bannon: I'm trying not to be vain because Laura Lee has really good lighting right now, and I am in my dining room because my little office is being fixed, and overhead lighting is the devil.

[0:25] Robert Bannon: And I said, you look fantastic. I'm so excited that you're here, and I'm so excited to hear about the show. The show is called Tuesday. It's an original one-woman show.

[0:35] Robert Bannon: It's going to be at United Solo Fest. I love things that are solo works because it's so brave, incredible as an actor.

[0:43] Robert Bannon: You've seen our next guest on all the New York shows and all the television shows. She's got the Law and Order credits and all to prove it.

[0:50] Robert Bannon: Yes, you know it. And she's a writer, and she's going to tell us all about all the things about this very special show in the wake of the 25th anniversary of 9-11.

[0:58] Robert Bannon: Thank you so much for being here. Welcome to the show. I'm going to try to say it right. Laura Lee Botsacos.

[1:06] Laura Lee Botsacos: Yes, very good. Very, very good. Yeah, nice.

[1:09] Laura Lee Botsacos: Yeah, that's very good. It's good. It's great. And thank you. Go ahead.

[1:15] Robert Bannon: What does that mean? Are you Italian?

[1:18] Laura Lee Botsacos: So I'm of Italian and Greek descent. Botsacos, Botsacos, that's the Greek last name.

[1:27] Robert Bannon: I was going to say, it sounds like Italian and it sounds like Greek, but I don't know. But isn't Italians and Greeks the same thing?

[1:34] Laura Lee Botsacos: We are the same thing. We are crazy, too crazy, dramatic, over-the-top cultures who love food and drama and beauty.

[1:44] Laura Lee Botsacos: Yeah, we're like the creative. We're like the, you know, what is it? You know, art and drama. That's in our bones. That's in my bones.

[1:54] Laura Lee Botsacos: My mom's Rose DiMeglio. So my mom's all Italian. And when I watched My Big Fat Greek Wedding, which my dad is all Irish, he is the Irish.

[2:01] Laura Lee Botsacos: Like there's four people in his family and my mom's side is 864 people.

[2:06] Laura Lee Botsacos: Yes, it's so true. It's so true.

[2:09] Robert Bannon: So I feel like I know you already. Where did you grow up?

[2:12] Laura Lee Botsacos: Oh, my God. I'm sorry, sir. So I was born in the Bronx and then my dad moved us to Westchester and I did the rest of my time in Westchester.

[2:22] Laura Lee Botsacos: Yeah, but we're very much like Bronx, New York people. That's and that's part of what the show is about.

[2:27] Laura Lee Botsacos: But it's so funny. Yes, we have 64 people in our family too.

[2:33] Robert Bannon: See, there you go. So you you're born. The show comes out. Well, you're going to tell me what's how. Why do people want to do a show by themselves?

[2:44] Laura Lee Botsacos: Is it scary or is it cathartic? Is it cheaper than therapy?

[2:49] Laura Lee Botsacos: I will. Well, first of all, I don't know, because every time I start rehearsing, I literally turn to my director and go, why did I do this? Why am I what made me think I could do this? What is wrong with me?

[3:00] Laura Lee Botsacos: And there are definitely days like every night I work on my script, memorize my lines. And I'm like, I cannot believe that I'm about to put myself through this.

[3:10] Laura Lee Botsacos: I don't know why. I think I think the reason why I'm doing it is because I've been an actor for pretty much my entire life. And this story has, you know, been within me for years.

[3:25] Laura Lee Botsacos: And gosh, and I just felt like, you know what? I'm constantly doing like I've been in a lot of original plays and they're all wonderful. And these some of the writers and directors and obviously actors as well are incredibly talented.

[3:39] Laura Lee Botsacos: But I started thinking to myself, well, you know, it would be kind of fun to be able to. You know, I've got words, I've got a message, I've got some stories that live within me that I would love to share.

[3:51] Laura Lee Botsacos: And I was like, I'm going to try it. And I would never consider myself a quote unquote writer. But this thing just it just kind of really, really honestly just kind of came from just came out of me.

[4:03] Laura Lee Botsacos: I'm so excited for people to check it out. It's going to before we get into it. It's called Tuesday and it's going to be a part of the United Solo Festival.

[4:10] Laura Lee Botsacos: It's Saturday, November 21st at two o'clock. And then they added another show. They added another show Friday, November 20th at 830. It's right on Theatre Row, right on 42nd Street.

[4:19] Laura Lee Botsacos: You can just grab some food, have a drink and go see this incredible piece of work and then talk about it, think about it and have a moment together.

[4:27] Robert Bannon: I think it's I like cabaret. I like concerts. I like concerts more than theater now as I because I like to tell me what to do.

[4:36] Robert Bannon: But besides that, but I like to be myself. You're you in this show. You're telling us a story. Is that fair?

[4:40] Laura Lee Botsacos: It's very fair. It is very fair. And I am very me. I obviously I interweave it with playing multiple different characters.

[4:50] Laura Lee Botsacos: But, yeah, I'm very much me. And interestingly enough, in some odd way, Robert, that's actually difficult because I'm like, wait a second. Like, who am I? And so. But to your point. Yeah.

[5:03] Laura Lee Botsacos: And there's something really vulnerable about it. And to talk when you made the comment about therapy. It's actually kind of funny because full disclosure, when I started rehearsing this, like all this stuff started to come up for me.

[5:16] Laura Lee Botsacos: And I'm like, wait a second. I must be like triggering like old trauma or something because it just I don't know. I guess little, you know, little thoughts, little memories, little buttons.

[5:28] Laura Lee Botsacos: And, you know, as the writer, it's one thing. But then as the actor, it's another thing. And then just being the person that experienced all this. So to your point.

[5:36] Laura Lee Botsacos: Yeah, it's really it's been on a very personal level. It's been such a humbling experience because I didn't know that it would trigger the things that it's triggering in me, even though I wrote it.

[5:50] Laura Lee Botsacos: Does that make like I know that sounds ridiculous, but.

[5:52] Robert Bannon: It brings it up.

[5:52] Laura Lee Botsacos: Yes. Yeah, it does.

[5:55] Laura Lee Botsacos: Because it's the truth and it's art and it's what you're doing and it's it's human. It's human emotions. UnitedSolo.org is where you can get your ticket.

[6:02] Robert Bannon: So tell me, what is Tuesday about?

[6:05] Laura Lee Botsacos: Thank you. So Tuesday is based on my experience of surviving 9-11 on that Tuesday, September 11th.

[6:15] Laura Lee Botsacos: But it's really a story about faith and family and grace and remembrance of a time when, you know, we all gave because we were human.

[6:26] Laura Lee Botsacos: And I interweave that day, 9-11, and I go back to my childhood and then back to present day.

[6:33] Laura Lee Botsacos: And so I kind of take this, you know, if you will, this plethora of emotion and time frames and kind of interweave them to tell a story about humanity and to share a story about.

[6:47] Laura Lee Botsacos: Because, in my opinion, I feel like so much so much has changed since that day. We all came together and survived this tragedy.

[6:57] Laura Lee Botsacos: And I feel like since then, I feel like things have really shifted. And and it's about that, about grace and forgiveness and what is really love.

[7:10] Laura Lee Botsacos: And how do you show up for people? I think during the day I'm a school teacher.

[7:15] Laura Lee Botsacos: And when I teach on September 11th, my students are at the age now where they were not alive.

[7:22] Laura Lee Botsacos: So they don't understand what it was like or they don't understand. They know the salacious part.

[7:27] Laura Lee Botsacos: They know the oh, my goodness part, but they don't understand what it felt like to be there.

[7:34] Laura Lee Botsacos: And I'm from Jersey. So I was a senior in high school. I saw it across the river as I was in my senior year and you actually living and surviving through it.

[7:43] Laura Lee Botsacos: They don't understand what it was like to be in the tri-state area, but in the country, in the world at that time.

[7:48] Robert Bannon: How do you walk the delicate tightrope between entertaining us and playing respect to what happened and being humorous and being truthful?

[7:57] Laura Lee Botsacos: It's a it's a it's a navigation you have to take us on throughout this.

[8:01] Laura Lee Botsacos: Yeah, it really is. It's definitely a delicate balance.

[8:04] Laura Lee Botsacos: So I make sure as hard as I can to first of all, just present a story that's devoid of anything political just to tell a story.

[8:15] Laura Lee Botsacos: And the humor really comes from more of my my the Bronx antics and what it was like growing up, you know, in this crazy Greek, Italian, American family going to Catholic school.

[8:28] Laura Lee Botsacos: And and exactly. And in terms of, you know, when we when I go back to that day, there's there's really nothing funny about it.

[8:39] Laura Lee Botsacos: Right. So the funny has to come. And from the breaks, the humor comes from the other things present day, my perception of things.

[8:48] Laura Lee Botsacos: Now, what happened is, you know, the perception of a little kid growing up in the Bronx, going to Catholic school, who was very dramatic and very impressionable.

[8:57] Laura Lee Botsacos: And so, yeah, I thank you for saying that or asking that, I should say. I think we do a really good job of presenting it in a delicate balance that is respectful.

[9:11] Laura Lee Botsacos: And I think sheds light on something that was so tragic and is so tragic.

[9:18] Laura Lee Botsacos: The hubris of it is so heavy. So naturally, you need this.

[9:23] Laura Lee Botsacos: You need some kind of comic relief. Yeah. And I love that.

[9:27] Robert Bannon: And I can only imagine what your childhood was like. I can't wait to hear more about it.

[9:31] Robert Bannon: And when people go and see the show, I don't want to give spoilers out. But where were you on 9-11? Can you say?

[9:37] Laura Lee Botsacos: Yeah. So I was one of the first residential buildings to be evacuated.

[9:41] Laura Lee Botsacos: I literally was right across like I was living like my when I and this is in the play.

[9:49] Laura Lee Botsacos: But when I looked out my living room window, I had direct views of the tower.

[9:56] Laura Lee Botsacos: It was right there. It was like I could touch it.

[9:56] Robert Bannon: Oh, boy.

[10:04] Robert Bannon: Twenty five years later. And not that anything is good out of that tragedy, but is there something you learned? Is that is and I'm sure it's in the show. Like, is there something you learned about human spirits, about community, about what?

[10:18] Robert Bannon: We're so divided. We're so divisive and divided right now. And I remember that day. You didn't care if you were red or blue or you didn't care.

[10:55] ♪ Musical number ♪

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