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[0:00] Ari’el Stachel: Hi, I'm Ari’el Stachel, and welcome to The Theatre Podcast with Alan Seales.

[0:11] Alan Seales: Hey, everyone. Welcome to The Theatre Podcast with Alan Seales. That is me. I'm your host, Alan Seales. And our guest is Ari’el Stachel, who is a Tony and Grammy Award winner, who you know from the Broadway scene. And I just have to say, this episode is one of the most powerful and deeply honest and personal ones that we've had in a little bit of a while here. A little bit of a while? I don't know. It's early for me. So Ari’el and I, we dig into what it really means to put your whole self on stage with anxiety and identity and the compulsion he just felt to write this one-man show called Other that is opening down in the Village here in New York off-Broadway. And unsurprisingly, he gets into the fact that he treats his performing like an athlete who trained for the Olympics.

I mean, we talk about this all the time and how actually therapy became one of his most important tools after talking to one of his good friends and getting advice from this person, Leslie Odom Jr. And the only way that he can feel his art really matters. As he puts it, it isn't about acting. It's about survival, honesty, and learning to hold hands with the parts of yourself that you are sometimes trying to hide or not sometimes, oftentimes. Can't wait to share this with you. Make sure you're following the podcast on social media. Watch the video version of this on Spotify and Patreon. And now, everybody, please enjoy this episode with Ari’el Stachel. Today, we're joined by a Tony and Grammy Award winning actor, singer, and writer whose career spans Broadway, film, and television.

He won the 2018 Tony Award for originating the role of Haled in Band's Visit on Broadway. And screen credits include Don't Worry Darling, Zola, and The Night Agent. Now, he's bringing his very deeply personal new one-man show called Other to the off-Broadway stage, which explores identity, anxiety, and the search for belonging. Ari’el Stachel, welcome to the theater podcast.

[2:09] Ari’el Stachel: Thank you so much for having me, man. I'm happy to be here.

[2:13] Alan Seales: And we are recording in the midst of final rehearsals before your show opens, right? Are you in tech yet?

[2:19] Ari’el Stachel: We are starting tech tonight. I just finished an incredibly grueling first week of rehearsals. Solo shows are done a little bit differently than sort of ensemble shows. You can rehearse like three, four hours a day. And by the fourth hour, you're toast.

[2:38] Alan Seales: What is that like for you, rehearsing versus in the other shows you were in, and especially like Band's Visit, which was such a massively huge ensemble piece, right? Everybody was on stage all the time. How does that compare to this?

[2:54] Ari’el Stachel: Well, it's a completely different thing. I mean, on so many different levels. On one level, it's my own writing. So that's already its own thing. But as a performer, it's like, I don't know how to describe it. It would be like the difference between taking a walk and running a marathon, which is not to... I'm trying to figure out which is which. Okay, so taking a walk is Band's Visit. Well, it's a 90-minute show. I had one song. I mean, actors talk about this. There are levels to this, right? Every role in every Broadway show is not created equal. So I would say that this is a marathon. This is a complete marathon. I mean, usually before I go on stage, I sort of take a breath and I'm like, okay, because once you're on, you don't stop. You don't have any moment for a break. You don't get to reset. Whatever feelings you're carrying with you, they go on stage and it is live. So it's a little masochistic.

[3:55] Alan Seales: Well, how do you prepare for that versus... I mean, you're not even in preview set and get an opening. So obviously, I'm sure you're chilling and rehearsals are obviously the intense time leading up to opening. In addition to the press engagements like this one, you got to do to promote the show, right? So how are you preparing for this and this time, the one-man show versus what you've done in the past? Are you just going into hibernation outside of rehearsal?

[4:24] Ari’el Stachel: Yeah. I mean, literally vocal rest. The only time I'm talking is with you and then I'll shut my mouth. I mean, it is a massive task. The way that I'm prepping is complete vocal silence. That's one thing. But it's more psychological, spiritual, emotional than anything else because you got to be on stage by yourself for 90 minutes. And I would say that each minute on stage is like an hour in life. You know what I mean? It's like dog years. In some ways, I would say. You know what I mean? You think, oh, 90 minutes is an hour and a half. That's not what on stage every second you're being looked at and you need to communicate and guide an audience. And so the way that you prepare is by trying to release as much as possible, but also trying to sort of connect to your why because the why is kind of what gets you through it.

And the why is the way in which I can find a level of relaxation on stage. And what you're going for at some point is like some kind of zen relaxation. You're trying to be in control. You're trying to also be free. And so like you're trying to hit this very, very sweet spot and you don't get it every moment on stage. You don't have every second, but usually there are stretches during the show where you're sort of in that kind of zone. And so what you're trying to do is trying to get yourself as prepared as possible to be free, to feel confident, to feel comfortable. And then just the basics. You really have to treat it like an athlete. You got to eat. I've done shows where I tried intermittent fasting, almost died after 30 minutes. So there's also just like a rigorousness that you need to treat yourself with. And I treat it like an athlete, honestly.

[6:14] Alan Seales: Well, that goes with the metaphor that we've said on this podcast for a bajillion years like Broadway is the Olympics of theater. So Olympians are always going to put their health first, their physical health and their mental health first to make sure that they can give the best performance, whatever's possible. So that's completely understandable.

[6:30] Ari’el Stachel: I'll tell you actually a funny story. So I called my friend, Leslie Odom Jr. before this started, and I was like yelling at him. Did your toes hurt? You dropped a name on it. Are you okay? My toes hurt a little bit, but it's important. I was like, bro, what do you suggest? How do I deal with this? Because Leslie also, we produce Pearly. So we understand, but it's not just be the actor, but come in with a lot of hats on, which I'm coming in. And I thought he was going to give me some answer about regimen or whatever. He's like, you got a therapist. You got a good therapist? Get your ass one. That was the first thing you said. It's really about your head. It's really about managing stress. Because the thing is there's a lot of noise.

It's New York City. It's a lot of pressure. And ultimately what you're trying to do is calm yourself down enough to just tell your story and do what you do. But in order to do that in the most competitive, high stakes environment in the country...

[7:31] Alan Seales: Sorry, it's a podcast.

[7:33] Ari’el Stachel: Yeah. You got to keep your head straight. The first thing you said, you got a therapist, get you one. And every other Broadway star that I could name drop would say the same thing.

[7:44] Alan Seales: Yes. As someone who has talked to, gosh, 450 some people now on these episodes, I would 100% agree that whenever people are feeling stressed out, go to therapy, talk about things, figure out why you're doing what you do. And when you can put it in perspective like that, then it gives you the motivation to tune everything else out. And exactly what you were saying. But to the why of all of this, though, I'm fascinated behind the story of Other. I heard lead producer LaChanze name drop there too. Lead producer LaChanze stated, this show is for everyone who has ever felt othered. And I want to dive into that straight away because I think that's going to lead into my normal questions of like, why did you get into theater? And where did you come from? Etc. But why are you doing this? Why did you write this? Because it is a deeply personal, very emotional story you are putting on stage now.

[8:48] Ari’el Stachel: Yeah. So I'll give you a number of... So the first thing that I'll tell you is that I think that I felt a little bit disillusioned from what the life of an actor was. Like, when I was in high school, I was just like, I just want to be an actor, right? And then you auditioned for college, and I was lucky enough to get a scholarship to NYU. And yay, I'm at NYU. And now I want to be on Broadway. And you're looking at your classmates, and which one of us is going to make it? And I made it. And then I got a Tony for it, right? So within four years of graduating from undergrad, it sort of achieved what many would call the pinnacle. And I started to feel like, in no shade to anyone else who loves this, but like, I would get auditions.

And I was like, why? Why? I always asked why? Like, what is... Like, why am... I don't know, it'd be like, detective and I like, or in my case, like, Salim Makhak Durbar from like, some made up Middle Eastern country. And I was just like, why am I doing this? Like, there's this machine. And I felt like, in many cases, people were pursuing things for fame, for attention, or for money. And the reason why we got into it completely gets lost in this sort of grind mill of the industry and of status and of clout. And so like, the barometer that people are measuring projects on is like, who's attached? What's their name? How famous are they? And without shading any projects that I've done, I've done projects with really famous people and didn't give a shit at all.

Didn't care. Why are we telling the story? And so, and the other half of it is that like, I come from a... Like, my mom is someone whose whole life is about service. Like, she has an organization that brings solar energy to clinics in Africa. And so in the back of my mind, there's like, why am I doing this? And like, what service am I providing with the skills that I've received with my God-given talent and with what I'm trained to do? And so without sounding like patting myself on the back, I felt like I wanted to tell something that could matter. I wanted to tell something that could create conversation, that could create transformative experiences, both for myself and for the people in the room with me.

And I think that the most magical thing about theater, when it's done right, is that we go into this small room in the dark and there's a contract. People are telling a story on stage and people are listening to it. And the beauty of that, if you do it right, is that it creates this opening and an intimacy and a vulnerability that we don't do every day in life. Like, when we go and have dinner with people, yeah, we're scratching on the surface or coffee dates, right? But like, theater gives us permission to go where we need to go as human beings that we often don't go every day in our lives. And so I was really struggling with anxiety and I was sitting in my dressing room at the band's visit with a bottle of whiskey and vape pens full of weed and hiding it and going around and being like, oh, my life is so good, but I couldn't function.

I literally would finish the show, hit my vape once, twice, three times, every time I needed to just go say hi to people after the show. What's going on with me? And as that happened, I started seeing people, public figures come out with their mental health stories. Even NBA players like Kevin Love, and I used to want to be an NBA player. So when he said that, it meant something to me. It made my shoulders drop. It made me stand a little taller. I'm not alone, right? And so I endeavored to create a story that used my own struggles and my own experiences, not to do therapy, but to create a piece of entertainment that could create conversation. And that if I was really doing my duty and my service as an artist, it was going to have to cost me something.

Why else do art? And if it costs me something, it means something to other people. And I found that the deeper that I went and the more personal I went and the more specific I went, the more it cracked people open. And I'm talking a lot because I'm passionate about it. But when we did the first run at Berkeley Rev, I walked down the stairs at the end of the show, and there are usually people. And it wasn't like, hey, can I get your autograph? Hey, can we talk? Can we have a selfie? It was like, yo, the story that you shared remind me of when I hid my identity.

[13:25] Ari'el Stachel: And there were people, like people in their 70s, were like, it reminds me of when my parents were in internment camps, Japanese. And, and I hid my Japanese identity. And so, I really feel without sort of like, you know, coming off as pretentious that it is the greatest service that I could provide with the talents that I've been given and all of the training that I've, that I've done in my life.

[13:52] Alan Seales: It's really interesting. You know, as you're sitting here telling me this story, the, the one thing that, that me now in my, my mid 40s, my 45th birthday is coming up soon. You know, I'm like, I'm doing the whole, what's my purpose? Have I been making the right choices? You know, like, not, not full on midlife crisis, but I've had my moments, right? And it's the, it's the why of what we do that I have to keep going back to. And, and while you're sitting here telling me the story that you just said, it's, I'm like, yeah, everybody doesn't want to feel alone, yet they still feel like they are all the time, for the most part. Because as we move on as, you know, where we are, especially in our culture here in the US, it's so much, so much like fame and fortune driven and how much social clout do you have and making everyone think that you have this great life and it's just not the way to go.

And, and now like what you said though, about, you know, bringing people saying like, yeah, I didn't realize that I felt that way too, or now I don't feel alone. Or even the fact that you wrote this because you heard someone else say it too. It's become this, it's snowball effect.

[15:10] Ari'el Stachel: Yeah. Totally. And I just want to add one thing that like, it wasn't a rational choice to write this. It was a compulsion and it was a need. And when I started writing it, I really, so when I won the Tony, I went on stage and I had this triumphant speech about how I'd hid my whole life and I'd finally come into my own as a Middle Eastern person. And like, that was the story that I was telling. But my life was so much more complex than that. And so when I started writing it, I thought it was a story that had a really happy ending, which is like, hey, and we'll get into this later. But a lot of the story's about hiding my Middle Eastern background. And I thought like, if you just accept yourself, you'll find the answer.

And I did, right. But I was also dealing with this anxiety. And so when we get into sort of the process of writing it, I realized that was the deepest, most vulnerable thing that I could share. And that the anxiety was really interacting with my identity. And it wasn't an identity centered story. It was a story about anxiety and the way that identity interacts with it.

[16:29] Alan Seales: Was your anxiety coming from how you identify or hiding how you identify?

[16:35] Ari'el Stachel: The anxiety was coming from hiding my anxiety. You know what I mean? Look, I mean, it's a chicken or the egg question. No doubt that there's real prejudice in the world. No doubt that there are people who feel scared because of what they look like or what they believe in or what background they come from. And that's very real, right? But in my case, the extremity with which I took it and one of the igniting or catalyst moments in the show is being this Jewish Arab kid, 10 years old when 9-11 happens and getting called Osama bin Laden or terrorist enough that I literally decided to try and hide my dad and pretend I was not Middle Eastern for like eight years, right? So it's like on some level was survival.

On another level, it was a really anxious way of reacting to that moment. And so the play tries to sort of untangle these things, but there are no clear answers, right? Like the world is shitty for certain people at times, but we have a relationship with ourselves with our own anxieties and we can choose to deal with that. We have some agency. We have a lot of agency is what I learned in my writing.

[18:00] Alan Seales: Don't go anywhere. We're going to take a quick commercial break. All right, everyone. Now we're back. Well, you said it was a compulsion to have to write this. Why did you have catharsis? I was going to say deal with it, but that sounds kind of weird. To process this, to have the catharsis, to bring it to the surface instead of burying it inside. Why did you have to write something? Why not go out and do concerts? Why not sing other people's work? Why did you bring this as intimate as you could?

[18:32] Ari'el Stachel: Well, there's this other layer that we haven't spoken about yet, which is that I am a Jew of Mizrahi background, which means that Mizrahi is called the Jews who come from the Arab countries. And in the United States, there's not a lot of those kinds of Jews. United States is what we call a lot of Ashkenazi Jews. And so I was raised around my dad, who's Yemenite, and like a couple of his friends who were Jews of Yemeni descent. And so I really, really felt alone. And you asked the compulsion. The compulsion is that I've never felt understood. I've always had to sort of like qualify. People really, like, no matter how many times I tell people, like, no, I'm Jewish. It's okay, your dad's Arab and your mom's Jewish.

No, no, no, no, no. Both of my parents are Jewish. My mom is an Ashkenazi Jew and my dad is Yemenite Jew. And people still like, but you look Arab. Yes, yes. I am a Jew from the Arab world. All of that is true. All of that is true, right? But it's like, for whatever reason, because we don't have that context here, people don't get it. And so the other compulsion is this need to be understood, this need to be seen, and feeling like there's this gap of understanding of what Jewish people are and who I am and my people. And somehow it felt like problematic to me. And so I didn't write the story to wave a flag. But in telling my story, and if the show is not, I am a brown Jew, I am a brown, it's not that.

It's like, it's a story about a kid grappling with his anxiety and trying to figure out how to sort of deal with it. But it also is a story of a person who is a Jew of Yemenite descent. And that's exciting for me to like, tell people that and have people listen to that and have these moments on stage where I get to share aspects of this culture that has felt like has lived in this little tiny silo of like my own small community. And, you know, I actually started writing it long before, you know, what I would call is a really massive onslaught of anti-Semitism. But that also becomes, in my mind, a way of combating it by saying, like, look at the full spectrum of who we are. You know?

[21:04] Alan Seales: Interesting you said that, combating it. There's an advertisement in a subway station that I frequent almost daily that right now it's advertising for like an LGBTQ film festival. And literally, it's like, come to the festival. Queer film is a form of protest. And I look at that almost every morning and I'm like, yeah, that's true. And in a way, because, you know, there's especially who we have now controlling the media, trying to control the media and putting out there what's getting put out there to have stories that are of underrepresented people and are like an Arab Jew. You're right. I can't name other than you now, if you were just like, stop me on the street quick, name your first Arab Jew that you know of. I'm like, I don't know. I don't know. And I'm sure there's tons out there, especially here in New York. And I just don't know.

[22:04] Ari'el Stachel: There are. And but, you know, I'll take that and raise you 50, which is that the most radical thing to do is write a story that centers a person, but isn't about that. It's about them being a person. And so, you know, I have to give my director, Tony Tacconi credit, who is a genius director for solo shows. The last one he did, it was Latin History for Morons. But the one that most, John Leguizamo, name drop, boom, my feet hurt. But it was him who was like, I don't think this show is really just about identity. And I, as an actor, who, you know, I think a lot of the way that we as as artists of color get attention is being like, look at me. I'm this. I'm that, right. And that's how we like, carve our space in the marketplace, but at the disservice of our own art, at the disservice of our own humanity, because the only thing that I want to write about isn't just that it's a human being, living life, right?

And that's the thing that makes the story. And that's why Lashon, go back to Lashon, why she says it's for everyone. Because my director pushed me to tell a story that got to the core of what I was going through as a human. And that is what cracked open this story and made it not a flag-waving identity piece, but a piece about a human being who is this thing, and is dealing with what it means to be a Jew of Yemeni descent, in the context of a broader life. So again, I think that the greatest act of resistance is, is not writing to what people want you to write, it's writing the truth. And I think it's a it's a it's a, it's a trap that a lot of artists can get into when they're trying to get their stuff produced, and wanting to sort of make it feel important and make the pitch of like, this is the story, no one's ever heard the story about X, Y, Z, da da da.

And, and so I think that's also why it's taken me seven years to write, to also like clear my own internal pressure of writing to that, but instead writing this story about a human being. And it's hard to know, when you're feeling sort of subconscious pressure to write to that expectation, rather than write to what you really need to write about. Does that make sense?

[24:28] Alan Seales: Yeah, it does. It really does.

[24:30] Ari'el Stachel: And your head spinning a little bit.

[24:32] Alan Seales: No, I just, it does. It is. And when you said, you know, make, make, bring in characters that are not your typical characters, but don't make their differences the focal point of the plot. I think that is key. And I because it normalizes it. And one of the first one of the first times I ever really noticed this was, I think it was talking with Brandon Uranowitz, years ago, when he was in Burn This, you know, with that-

[25:01] Ari'el Stachel: Fame drop?

[25:01] Alan Seales: Yeah. And his character was an openly gay man, where being gay had nothing to do with the plot. And he, he had told me at that time, and this was what, 2018, I want to say 2019, it was before the pandemic. And he was saying that this is the first time, that was the first time in his entire career, when he got to do that, when he was playing a gay man, where it wasn't the comedic sidekick, where it wasn't the best friend or a plot point, right? It just was. And it was so much of a, of a normalization for him, a catharsis for him, that all of a sudden, he can just like, kind of be more of himself on stage, and it carries into his real life. And I, and then now I've ever since he said that I've noticed, I've been noticing when people, when, when TV shows or movies or whatever I'm writing just happens to be like, all right, I got, I got a teenage son, daughter, whoever, and they just happen to have a same sex love interest. And it's not like, oh, look, they're, they look, it's just it.

[26:04] Ari'el Stachel: Totally.

[26:50] Ari'el Stachel: And there wasn't an answer, but the answer was, in their minds, the Israeli characters were Jews in the way that Americans see Jews, which is Ashkenazi, and that the Egyptians were brown, like me. And that really hurt me. It really upset me, because I felt like here's an opportunity to really show Jews the way that I know that they are. And not only that, in that town in Israel, it would have been all the Yemenite and Moroccan immigrants. That's really the town it was based off of. So, that was another thing that made me say, ah, there's this thing. I will not be seen as Jewish unless I literally write my own story.

[27:33] Alan Seales: So, then you said you've been writing this for seven years?

[27:39] Ari'el Stachel: Seven years is when I started writing it.

[27:41] Alan Seales: So, seven years. It's 2025 now. That means 2019, right?

[27:45] Ari'el Stachel: 18.

[27:47] Alan Seales: 2018, you started this. And Band's Visit was right around that time. Did that kick in this need where all of a sudden you needed to feel seen and express this?

[27:58] Ari'el Stachel: I've always felt the need to create something. That was before Band's Visit ever existed. I started writing what I would say were monologues from this show in college during a dramatic writing class at NYU. So, it was always a thing. And when I was kicking around auditioning and not getting things out of school, I would go to Starbucks, and I'd write two pages about what it felt like to be me, I remember. But I never quite had the confidence, and I really wanted the validation from the industry before I put out my own work in the world. And so, what I would say is that the Band's Visit gave me the validation that I needed or the industry credit to be like, okay, that's it. I'm doing this thing, and I'm going to make it happen. And as I said, bring you back to that image of me in my dressing room with a Tony Award and a vape and a bottle, and the complete dissonance between what the world saw and how I was feeling.

[28:58] Ari'el Stachel: And so, I ended up getting a lot of reinforcement about my speech at the Tonys, and people were just feeling really seen by the narrative of hiding your background. And so, I ended up meeting this writing coach I was connected to, whose name is Gretchen Cryer. And I would, between my matinee and evening shows, bike up to her place on Upper West Side, and I would start sharing bits of my story. And when anything was interesting to her, she'd be like, oh, darling, that's wonderful. Write that, write that. And that's who Gretchen was. And so, we created this first draft, and I read it for my managers and to my friend and the producer of the Band's Visit. And the producer, Oren Wolf, said, go get a director.

Go get a director. And he said, go get Tony Taccone. He's the best. And so, I emailed Tony, and I said, hey, man, I have this story. And he said, cool, send me a draft. And I sent it to him. And he emailed me back, said, good job getting it on paper. I have questions about the dramatic time. And we met at the public theater in the lobby, and he gave me three hours of notes. And he said, I can't tell you that I'll direct it, but I'll read another draft. And his notes were about, why is the adult telling the story? Because the show was really centered on a kid who, in the aftermath of 9-11, hid his father and pretended he was half black and half white to survive high school. And he kept saying, why is the adult telling this story?

Why are you so obsessed with it? And I was like, this is interesting, and I need to tell it. And we started exchanging drafts over the next two years. And he kept being like, hmm. And every time he said, hmm, it put a dagger into my soul, because I was working hours every day trying to understand, what does this man want?

[31:44] Ari'el Stachel: So we finally get into a workshop at Berkeley Rep called The Ground Floor. And it had been two years since we started working, two and a half. And he looks at me one day, and it's clear that if we don't crack something or see eye to eye, he's going to walk away. And I mean, he's a master. He's the guy. And he goes, why are you telling the story? What does your character, the narrator, want? And I was like, dude, he wants to feel whole. He's like, that's not a want. I was like, what does he want? I was like, I don't know. And then at some point, I say, he wants to feel less anxious. He goes, that's interesting. Leave. Go write about that. And I came back the next day, man, with 25 pages. And it unlocked this portal.

And we understood at the end of that workshop that it was a story of anxiety. And it was of a guy who in the highest moment of his life crashed. And he needed to go on a hunt to understand why and how he could get better. And so it became this very active journey of this narrator who's very open about his anxiety and tell the audience, I'm fucked up. And I need to understand why. And I need to get better. Because if I don't, I'll die. And the narrator then weaves through the story of the past, looking for how did he get here. And the character thinks that he's the whole time, he thinks, I'm going to solve this. I'm going to solve this somehow, some way. Medicine is going to fix it. Weed will fix it.

Meditation will fix it. Running away will fix it. Calling myself American will fix it. Until ultimately, spoiler alert, the character realizes that nothing will fix it other than holding hands with it. And I think it's a story that a lot of people come to with this thing. And it's really hard to come to grips with that because you're so desperate to feel normal. And you're so desperate to feel safe and to feel like you belong. And life isn't binary like that. And so, we opened the first run in July 2023. And the story is about coming to grips with anxiety and coming to grips with this, in the central the father and how he hid his father, he, I, but it's easier to say he, for years. And so, we opened it at Berkeley.

And three months after that, October 7th happened. And we're trying to get this thing produced in New York. And I'm meeting with artistic directors and producers. And everyone said, yeah, but is October 7th in there? Get that in there. Huh? Get it in there, squeeze it in there. And it feels like there's this political agenda on this story that we worked so hard to crack. And so, the last two years have been about understanding the conditional nature of identity, right? And how I thought when I opened the play at first, that 9-11 was the last time that I would wrestle that deeply with my identity. Boom, the world says no. And so, it went from, I'm really wanting to hide that I'm Arab to, I really feel uncomfortable as a Jew.

And cracking the play back open. And it became like, it's the same play, but it's not. And it's a living, breathing autobiography. So, a lot has happened the last two years that have radically impacted my life and the lives of many people in my community. And so, figuring out how to weave that in, and again, still center what we discovered, which is a guy who's trying to make peace with himself is why it's taken this long.

[35:22] Alan Seales: Wow. Wow. I'm just letting this sit for a second. That's intense. And it's a lot to work with. We're going to take a quick break for a few commercials. All right, everyone. Welcome back to the episode. Are you constantly looking for rewrites? Or are you just trying to get this set like any other normal show?

[35:33] Ari'el Stachel: Dude, the reason why I'm not in person at your studio is because we have been going through rewrites so extensively that I lost my voice in the final run through the last week. And everyone was exhausted. And if I'm being candid with you, the reason why we were exhausted is because, again, I was dealing with the very thing I told you I didn't want to deal with, which is, what is my truth? What is this story that I really need to tell? And how do I then minimize the noise, the expectation, the political pressure, the cultural pressure, the representation pressure that I feel, and clear the noise to tell the story that we set out to tell? And coming to New York as a Jewish person, it's a lot of pressure.

And I really leaned on my team, our director, my dramaturge to help me deal with the anxiety of that and deal with the anxiety of like, no, no, no, no, no, no. Remember what we're after. Remember what this play is. And, you know, that's why the therapy is important, man. I mean, I don't know what to say. I can't be somebody who is writing for a political agenda. I'm writing a story. About a guy for me.

[37:01] Ari'el Stachel: And so what's funny is that I got these notes after my last run before we opened here, and I went nuts. I was writing 10 hours a day, like, oh, I got to check it. And we'd already gotten really good reviews, and people really liked the story. So I come back, and I read this, and my director's like, you trying to ruin the play? No, no, no, I'm trying to make it like, don't fix what ain't broke. And so what you end up learning is that the tiniest surgical changes have seismic impacts for a play. And so what ended up being eight hours a day and probably 50 pages, I threw out in service of five lines.

[37:46] Alan Seales: Wow.

[37:49] Ari'el Stachel: And those five lines are exactly what you need. And you need to go through the 50 pages to understand what are the most essential ingredients that need to be expressed? And so what we haven't spoken about just yet is coming from as an actor and then writing. That is its own thing. Not a journal entry.

[38:03] Alan Seales: Yeah, let's go there. Because you have to write dialogue. You have to write something that's engaging for the audience. So you know how to convey when somebody else has written that, but how did you approach that for this scenario?

[38:23] Ari'el Stachel: Well, so one of the things that was most natural for me as an actor, since I was a kid, was like mimicking voices. And part of that came from the OCD and being bilingual. And so I would hear sounds and voices and be able to do them. And then of course, my lifeline in high school was pretending to be a different race. And so I became really, really good at voices and hearing dialogue. And so the easiest thing for me in the world to do was the dialogue, was the scene. I remember it like memory and I play them. And that was easy. That is completely different than creating a piece of drama and creating a dramatic arc. And so that, when I talked about the process of my director, like, what does your character want?

That was the hardest part. I can tell you a hundred interesting scenes from my life. My dad's really funny. And here's a really crazy thing that happened in high school, but a story. And people think that, well, it's your life. So that's easier. You have the source material. I think it's harder because how do you distill that? How do you tell that as a story? And there's a lot of things that feel important to me that don't fit the story. And then there's, well, right now something feels really important to me, but does that fit into the story? And so, I mean, these guys, God bless them. Madeline Holden, my dramaturge. Shout out, shout out, shout out. She was a dramaturge at Berkeley for years.

She ran the Ground Floor Project under Tony Taccone when he was artistic director there. Oh, she's been through the ringer because I will come in and I'll be like, I have this thing. And they're like, no, no, no, it doesn't work.

[40:14] Ari'el Stachel: And it will take me sometimes weeks to understand what they see because I feel so passionate about it. And, you know, so the, the, the, the, the, the, how lean you need to be and how you need to mine for the things that show and don't tell was very non-intuitive for me. I want to tell, I want to, I want to sermon, not playwriting, you know? And so like, again, that's where the 50 pages is built into five. How do you show it? And you're mining through all of these things to find out how do I serve the story? So, you know, it was like really trying to understand what language works on stage. And, and, you know, I, I, after my last run, I, I, I got a book deal with, with an agent. And so now when I come and they're like, put it in your book and get it off of our stage.

So like, so like, you know, so I was lucky enough to, to really have masters mentor me and guide me every step of the way. And it's a testament to how much they believed in my story. And I suppose, believe in me as a performer because my director said, if you weren't as good of an actor as you were, like, I would have ran a long time ago. So, you know, so, you know trial by trial by fire, you know? And, and it's just, it's just, people don't really understand that in order to go to a show and you see something and you're like, that looks kind of obvious. People don't understand that like every sentence, sometimes a word is a five-hour argument. The difference between can and will, what does it say about the character?

And so I would say that the, the journey of, of being lean and of being efficient and of understanding the structure, ongoing journey. Yeah. Trial by fire completely is you're, you're going to a very vulnerable place in a very vulnerable performance method while still trying to figure out how to do both.

[42:34] Alan Seales: Yeah. So you're building a plane while you're flying it.

[42:43] Ari'el Stachel: Yeah, yeah, yeah. And, and exactly. And, but listen, man, you know, here's the other, here's the irony of it all. Of course, people say, if you're so anxious, which I'm anxious, why, what, why are you being, why are you going on stage by like, that is like the most torturous thing you can do for yourself. Why would you do that? Here's the funny thing. When you have as much feeling as I do inside and I feel, and, and I have so much intensity, like almost all the time that using every part of myself, my brain, my body, my soul, my spirit is the most relaxing thing I can do in some way. And so by the end of the show, I am like a wet rag and it, and it's like a sedative. It's, it's, it is a sedative.

It's like, it's like, I feel so cleansed because that is the space for all of the intensity that I feel and I have felt can just live. And so I like that. I like that. I feel alive. And, and so going back to like, well, why did you want to write this thing? And my agents would always like, when I wanted, one of the time they were like, you know, I was getting auditions for these movies and they like, didn't understand. I was like, no, no, I have this play I want to write. No money. And, and, and it's because it, it is, it, it is just the greatest way to just like stretch yourself as a human. Wow. Yeah. You know?

[44:25] Alan Seales: No, I don't need anyone to glean anything from what I've said.

[44:29] Ari'el Stachel: No, you haven't been. I mean, you're, you're just, you're talking about how you feel, which is what this whole podcast is about, but the, it's interesting. I mean, you're saying like you're writing all this stuff. It's not journaling, it's writing dialogue, it's performing and whatnot. And, and that's something that people have been recommending to me for years is to journal is to just write it down, you know, like modern day diary and in, yeah, to, to be able to express that it gives you this perspective. It gives you, you know, like we've said catharsis many times, but it gives you this ability to put things in perspective and to understand things. Cause you can read your own situation back to you as, you know, sort of objectively and like, and I know I don't want to keep you too much longer cause I want to save your voice, but, but, but like the, uh, after you, you've gone through these multiple iterations of the show and you're opening off Broadway and, you know, finally you're getting, you know, more and more steps.

Like what, what have you learned about yourself through all of this process? Like, what is this show? What is right? Like you wrote the show because you had to, but why, like, what is the why? What have you learned from this?

[45:35] Ari'el Stachel: The why is that, um, well, what I've learned is, is, is that I, is that you have to trust that little voice inside of yourself. I mean, you've got, you have to, it's the, like your intuition doesn't lie to you and the fortitude and stubbornness that it required to get here. I cannot explain to you. I cannot explain to you how many times it would have been easier to be like, fuck it. Get me on a cop show. But I couldn't, but I couldn't, but I couldn't do it because this voice kept pushing me and telling me, this is your purpose. This is your purpose. This is your purpose. And, um, but what I've really learned is that, um, very cliche, but that I'm me and I can only be me and that the world is going to keep changing and that my response to it is only to just be me.

And it's, um, sometimes a radical act to accept yourself. And that's what the play has done. I mean, it's, it's just helped me to sort of like, look at myself, accept the contradictions and accept the things that I think are not so pretty and, and, and not the best, but they're me. It's, it's, it's, it's a journey of a guy trying to make sense of his life. And what he comes through is that like, this is who I am. And, you know, for anyone who is really struggling with anxiety, I remember, um, shortly after I won the Tony award, I was on my way to present at an award show. And I was in, I had this beautiful SUV that was sent for me and I, and I was high and I was so ashamed in the back of that car.

Like I'm going to like, I'm in the best moment of my life and I'm high right now. And I'm going to go get on stage and I'm going to be a little high because that is the only way I can. I was so ashamed. And I thought, why the fuck do I have this body that just like, can't be around people without like sweating? And why do I need to do this? I was so angry. Two days ago, I went, I shouldn't say this. I did a really big interview two days ago and I went and I was not high and I was a little anxious and I brought my little sweat rag and I went into the interview and I told the reporter, I said, you know, just so you know, I'm going to have my little sweat rag with me, but let's keep pushing through.

Right. And on the way to that interview, I was not ashamed. I knew I was like, you know what? I'm a special person. My body gets excited. That's who I am. But on the flip side, I'm doing what I love. I get to tell a story that moves people. And hopefully by being real about what I'm going through, I can let other people feel safe to be real about themselves. And so the lesson for me and for anyone else who is struggling with anxiety is that the journey towards holding hands with it is slow. It's painstaking. You're probably going to not get the outcome that you really hope for, which is the elimination of symptoms and the elimination of feelings. But I'm living proof that your perspective on it can change. And if your perspective on it can change, you can feel freer and you can look at these things that feel so shameful. It's just part of who you are. That's what I've learned.

[49:11] Alan Seales: That's beautiful. And I think a wonderful place to flip to our ending mode. And I haven't looked at my notes once. Literally.

[49:19] Ari'el Stachel: Really?

[49:21] Alan Seales: Yeah. This has been great. This has been so damn good.

[49:24] Ari'el Stachel: I did my intro and then I've been looking up the whole time. All right. So let me find...

[49:32] Alan Seales: You're the best, man. I've loved this conversation. I'm sorry. I've even felt myself just going all over the place, but sometimes it'd be like that.

[49:42] Alan Seales: So we've got 60 seconds up on the clock for plot in 60 seconds, a little wind down game I like to do at the end of the episodes. I have 17 musicals in front of me on a list. Give me a number one through 17. It will correspond to a musical I have. And then you have 60 seconds to give me the plot to that musical. What if I don't know it?

[50:07] Ari'el Stachel: Then you make it up. This is meant to cause fun anxiety. So have some fun with this. I'll sweat through it, man.

[50:13] Alan Seales: Yeah. All right. So give me a number one through 17.

[50:15] Ari'el Stachel: 15.

[50:21] Alan Seales: 15 is Company. Go.

[50:21] Ari'el Stachel: Company is about a man or a woman, depending on how you cast Bobby, who is facing an existential crisis on their 35th birthday. They can't seem to figure out what they want from their life.

[50:36] Alan Seales: 45 seconds remaining.

[50:36] Ari'el Stachel: They don't know if they want to have kids and marry or have a single life. And there's this birthday party, and there's all these friends, and all the friends have all different perspectives. And then we learn that marriage can be fun. We learn that it sucks. We learn that being single sucks. We learn that it can be awesome. And then there's these beautiful songs, Being Alive, Earl Esparza, Katrina Lenk. That's part of the plot for sure. Ty Benson, my buddy, that's also part of the plot. And then there's 100,000 people, and there's dating, and it's just the existential thing about being life.

[51:10] Ari'el Stachel: And the reason why I relate to it is because I'm 34, and I'm going to be 35, and I love life. And I don't know what the hell I want to do for my future, but I know that being human is awesome.

[51:18] Alan Seales: Five, four, three, two, one.

[51:19] Ari'el Stachel: I love that. That was great.

[51:21] Alan Seales: One.

[51:22] Ari'el Stachel: That was good. I'll go with that one. Okay. So my three standard closing questions. The first one simply is just what motivates you?

[51:29] Ari'el Stachel: Growing.

[51:30] Alan Seales: Growing. All right. And I think you've probably answered this next question in a million different ways in this interview, but what advice would you give to your younger self and younger people starting out now and down a similar path?

[51:40] Ari'el Stachel: Go on a journey. Keep going. One foot in front of the other. Don't give up.

[51:47] Alan Seales: Last question then. Hardest one. If you could only see one show for the rest of your life, but you can see it as many times as you want, what would you see?

[51:55] Ari'el Stachel: Oh, Fela.

[51:58] Alan Seales: What is it?

[52:00] Ari'el Stachel: Fela.

[52:00] Alan Seales: What is that? I've never heard of it.

[52:02] Ari'el Stachel: Fela was a musical. It was my favorite musical while I was in college. It was about a Nigerian musician, Fela Kuti, and it had the best... It was the guy who created Afrobeat. It was on Broadway, and I just love the groove. I love the Afrobeat.

[52:16] Alan Seales: Oh, I'm going to have to see if I can find a slime tutorial of that.

[52:19] Ari'el Stachel: I don't know how to pronounce it. Sar Naguia. I don't know how to say his last name, but he was the lead. Unbelievable.

[52:24] Alan Seales: I'm going to see if I can find a slime tutorial online or...

[52:28] Ari'el Stachel: My first thing was Hamilton, but I was like, that's too obvious, so I won't do it.

[52:31] Alan Seales: Yeah. No.

[52:32] Ari'el Stachel: In my resistance, I said Fela.

[52:34] Alan Seales: All right. All right. So everybody, please go check out Other at the Greenwich House Theater down in Soho, right? In Lower...

[52:44] Ari'el Stachel: It's on 7th and Bleeker. It's in the Village.

[52:47] Alan Seales: 27 Barrow Street. The Village. That's what it is. All right. First preview October 8th, opening night October 19th, and it's a limited run going through December 6th only. So everybody check this out. And where can we connect with you online and share our own stories with you?

[53:01] Ari'el Stachel: Other at the Play and REO Statue on Instagram and TikTok.

[53:05] Alan Seales: All right. And I am on Instagram, TikTok, Facebook threads. I don't know. I'm on the places. Gosh, I'm just... Find me online. Leave a rating, leave a review or a comment if you're watching this on Spotify. Thanks to Jukebox the Ghost for the intro and outro music. Thanks to welcometotimesquare.com for the lovely use of this studio. And Ariel, thank you so much, man. This has been a vulnerable and very honest conversation, and I thank you for it.

[53:32] Ari'el Stachel: Thank you, brother. Thank you so much.