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[0:06] Robert Bannon: It's the Roundtable with me, Robert Bannon. You know, one of my favorite times everybody of the year is when Tribeca Film Festival comes to New York City because I get to see some incredible films, and we're so lucky to be able to partner with the film festival. And here on Broadway World, over here on the Broadway Podcast Network, iHeart and Spotify, we get to see and talk to some of the most incredible actors and people out here making incredible work. Incredible, incredible work. There's a new film that I think we all need to talk about, and a lot of things that we need to talk about. The Wedding Entertainer premiered at Tribeca. What is it? What are we talking about? What is this incredible journey? Malky, welcome to the Roundtable.

[0:44] Malky Goldman: Thank you for being here.

[0:48] Robert Bannon: Hi, thank you for having me. Congratulations.

[0:52] Malky Goldman: Oh, thank you. I am so excited.

[0:54] Robert Bannon: Yeah, let me tell you a little bit about this film.

[0:56] Malky Goldman: Please.

[1:07] Robert Bannon: Uh, it's also having a struggle between the addiction, but also to find money to marry me off. And that is really, really, really difficult for him because he's gotten complicated with his job due to drinking. So now he is gonna do everything to get a really good gig and get $20,000 so he can marry off my character.

[1:37] Malky Goldman: 20 grand, what a steal. That's all it is.

[1:41] Robert Bannon: So how did this film, how did the film come to you? Did you audition? Did you self-tape? Did you get it through somebody you knew? Like, what was the journey for you to get this part?

[1:50] Malky Goldman: Oh, it was such a journey. So in 2019, I had a film in Toronto Film Festival, and I met the director, and he told me about this movie, and he said this takes place in the ultra-orthodox community. And I was like, hmm, I know a little bit about that since I grew up ultra-orthodox. Um, so we got to talk and we had a great time. And a few years later, I get a call if I want to audition for this part, and then got really excited. So I did this audition, and then I had a Zoom, and I do the Zoom audition, and the guy playing my father looks just like my father. So I go like, Hi dad. Your daughter is a lea. And apparently, the director said this is how I got the part. But um, they have been looking for so long, and they couldn't find the balance of this character, and then he remembered me from Toronto Film Festival, and this is how I got it. It was just so incredible.

[2:53] Robert Bannon: Wow. So for you, uh, when you get this part, you know, I'm sure it is in some ways you say he looks like your dad, and you have some history about being, you talk about being ultra-orthodox. You're originally from Jerusalem. So when how old were you when you came to the United States?

[3:11] Malky Goldman: 19. When I was 19, my father had decided to move the family to New York. And then when I was 23, I did the second exit to the bigger world.

[3:24] Robert Bannon: Yeah. Was it something that was very scary? The adjustment to it, did you already want to be an actor at that point?

[3:31] Malky Goldman: Yeah, I don't know. Honestly, because I grew up in a big family, and we had plays every Saturday, me and my siblings. So that was just a normal given. But on the other hand, I didn't really understand what it means to be an actor and what it means to pursue that. And when I left, it was more okay, this is not my world. I want a new world. And then I came into acting in this really cool way where I was helping out consulting on the film for John Turturro, and then I got to see everything. I got to see the set and the camera and the acting. And I was like, oh my god, this is amazing.

[4:13] Robert Bannon: You know, that's kind of a big deal to be on set with John Turturro. That's not just a little, that's a big, a big gigantic moment.

[4:20] Malky Goldman: I know, I know. And he was so good to me. He still is. He's just such a beautiful human being. Um, but that's how I saw the world of acting, and I was like, okay, I'm gonna take acting classes just for myself. Um, here I am.

[4:38] Robert Bannon: Right. And then just for your, you know what's funny. Um, not that this is about me, but when I was a, I was a, I'm a school teacher, I ran an English department, and at what a certain point in my life I decided I'm gonna go to acting school just for fun. I was 33 years old, and then three years later I ended up with a degree in it because I think it hooks if you have that artistic part of you, it hooks you. You become part of the work. So for you, you have quite the career of theater and television and film. So how do you balance it all? Are you surprised that you've been doing all three of the mediums? Or do you focus more on one or the other? How does it work for you?

[5:13] Malky Goldman: Yeah, I am surprised. I always get really excited every time I get something, I'm like, oh me, you want? Oh, okay, great. I'd love to. Um, I love doing stuff all the time. So I don't like empty space, so that's one thing. The way I feel about that is it feeds different parts of me. Theater is just this beautiful ongoing journey every night, the audience feeding off of you. It just has such magic that I love, and then film, but if I do too much theater, I'm like, I just want to do something more intimate and close, or I don't have to train my voice every day to be projecting, and then if I do that for too long, you know, I just feel that the balance feeds one character to another. Right before I did this film, I had a play. I came off from a play, went on a plane to film this, and I just thought it was the best gift to be going from this intense theater practice to a film set, and it was just like almost doing a boot camp before you're going to do a crazy run.

[6:27] Robert Bannon: That's a really interesting, fun way to put it for sure. We're here, everybody. We're talking about The Wedding Entertainer, which just debuted here at Tribeca Film Festival. How was it to be able to go to the festival and see the film and all the buzz and excitement about it?

[6:42] Malky Goldman: It was so magical. It was so magical. Everything from the energy this year was amazing because they were celebrating 25 years. Um, we were just welcomed so nicely and made us feel so good and treasured, and then we had our screening, and the audience loved it. Everyone said they wanted more. Um, we were showered with compliments and love, and it just feels like what else can you ask for? You know, it really was the night of the premiere was magic, magic, magic. Um, I love it. It's a comedy. Um, and it, and if you're looking and it's in Hebrew, it's in Yiddish, it's in English, it's an incredible story. But no matter what religion you are, where you come from in the world, family is family. So if you think you want to see some laughter about a dad and a daughter and their hijinks of what happens, no matter what you are, where you come from, this movie is gonna be for you.

[7:38] Robert Bannon: Do you hope that it has a big release and people are able to see it? And do you have any information about what the future is for the movie?

[7:45] Malky Goldman: So I have a lot of hope that it's gonna have a big release because indeed it's exactly what you said, it's about a family, and it just makes it a little bit more cinematic that it takes place in such an ultra-orthodox environment, which makes the stakes higher.

[8:03] Malky Goldman: But the response of people is like, oh my god, that is me, this is my father, this is my uncle. Um, so I do hope people see it. Uh, there isn't yet anything that I am allowed to say. I'm gonna try to say something without getting in trouble. Is there's streaming uh interest of uh serious platforms? The director wants to first do uh um theater release, so they're talking to distributors. I'm not sure if they have a deal or not, they haven't told me about that, but I just know that even before Tribeca, there was already a little bit of a company competition between different streaming services. So more to come, more to come. More to come. More to come. And your Instagram information, if you want to follow her, is going to be below so you can stay up to date.

I'm sure as we find more information out, as news gets out, you'll be posting about it and sharing it after well. So for you, not to turn this into a very political conversation, but you know, you have done a lot of work about your background and religion. I mean, you were in Unorthodox, then you have done a movie like this. How important is it? Is your culture, your upbringing, where you're from? Uh, is it important to bring that art here to the United States so the whole world can see it?

[9:19] Malky Goldman: Yeah, thank you for this question. I appreciate that. It is important to me because I think that from my corner, there isn't enough truthful representation. And I, there it's just very easy to stamp a whole group of people and to hang on to the stereotypes and the um struggles. But I, uh, it's so important for me for people to actually realize these are human beings with wants and needs, and there are smart people and stupid people, and there is a combination, it's like the big world except in smaller with more dish with more restrictions, but there is, it's just like it's not them, it is just an individual world. And I also, what is important for me is for people to realize the love and the joy that exists, the humanity that exists.

It's so easy to understand why someone goes away because of all of we know, why someone leaves. And obviously, I'm critical. I left that community, it wasn't for me. But I want people to understand why people stay and why people are there and are choosing to be there because community's community, humans are humans, and I've the ones who are being talked about in white media are my family, are people that I love, and I want a better understanding of what's happening in there, less of a judgment of like those who are looking like this, these people are, and more an understanding of individuality, complicity, and humanity.

[10:56] Robert Bannon: Yeah, I think that's beautiful. I think we all need to understand that it's way more complicated than just a two-minute news story or what you think you know. And I think that's everyone has to do what's best for them. You also, um, I see have done been doing a lot of and very with some really incredible people over the past few years. Do you do a lot of kind of um charitable outreach if it's about democracy, if it's about women's rights, if it's about, you know, equal rights across the board? Does being an activist and standing up for things tie into you as an artist?

[11:31] Malky Goldman: Yeah, yeah, it's that fire inside where you're like, can we be kinder? Can we have more justice? Can we be a little bit better to each other? And can we just bring more love to the world and more ability and possibilities for everyone? It's just I cannot help it. And yeah, I did, that's why I'm, uh, that's why I joined the worker circle to be that voice of like, hey, democracy. Absolutely. Everyone has a voice and everyone has a say, or at least it's supposed to be. We need that more than also sorry, I'm cutting you off, but it ties in from growing up in an ultra-orthodox community where women aren't given equal rights. So, not that the big world is everyone has it equally, but it was felt so strongly. And I, when I look at someone and then when I see that difference, I just, I know the pain a little bit more.

[12:31] Robert Bannon: Yeah. Oh, that's beautiful. It's beautiful. So this, this film, this film, uh, people having the chance to see it, uh, The Wedding Entertainer, which was directed. Tell me a little bit about working with the director and about this cast that you got to work with.

[12:45] Malky Goldman: Yeah, the director is so, he really has a vision. He knows how the cast has to be. It takes him, took him forever. Since I got cast until we filmed was another two years because he needed to head pick every single person. Um, he and he works a lot on rehearsal rehearsal. We rehearsed so much, but the moment the camera was on, he was fully trusting. And it was this really interesting feeling where suddenly the more you feel trusted, the more you feel free. And we started with that you feel prepped. So it doesn't, you just, the character was by the time we started filming, the character was just screaming out of me, and then he was just so gentle and so trusting on the process, and then the actors, oh my god, the people playing my parents were, they are legends, and they were in the room, and I, and having mentioned that the father reminds me a lot of my father, there were moments where it just felt so real that cut was like, 'Yeah, we're in a movie kind of thing.'

It was just, you can't, you know, Lin Cohen, the late Lin Co Lin Gunn once told me, You're only as good as the people you work with. It definitely was just so, so, so, so much of them that made my performance beat the way it was.

[14:17] Robert Bannon: Oh, I love this. I can't wait for people to check this out and to find out more information about this film. So, for you, as you continue on, I'm sure we're gonna see you more on stage, more films, more television, more work.

[14:29] Malky Goldman: I hope so.

[14:31] Robert Bannon: Of course you are! Where are you going? We need, we need more incredible work. We're gonna be following you on social media to stay up to date. Thank you for this incredible story. Thank you for the incredible work that you do and the voice that you give and the representation that you give. We need it more so than ever. It's so important to hear all different viewpoints and ideas and people coming together and for creating great beautiful art.

[14:53] Malky Goldman: Thank you so much. Really, thank you.

[14:56] Robert Bannon: If you are, the Tribeca Film Festival continues through this weekend, if you have a chance to head on down there, so go take a chance, go see a new independent movie, go see something you don't know about, go see a story or a community or people that you don't know anything about and expand your horizons in your mind. That's what art is all about and makes it so much worthwhile that people give their whole blood, sweat, tears, and peace of their soul to make this incredible work like you did. And uh, I'm so grateful for you to spend some time with us. Congratulations.

[15:23] Malky Goldman: Thank you.

[15:24] Robert Bannon: Thank you so much. Thank you, thank you.