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We talk to Jason Denuszek!
We went to theatre school. We survived it, but we didn't understand it. 20 years later, we're talking to our guests about their experience of going for this highly specialized type of college at the tender age of 18. Did it all go as planned? Are we still pursuing acting? Did we get cut from the program? Did we... become famous yet?
I'm Jen Bosworth Ramirez
and I'm Gina Pulice.
We went to theater school together. We survived it, but we didn't quite understand it.
20 years later, we're digging deep talking to our guests about their experiences and trying to make sense of it all. We survived theater school and you will too. Are we famous yet? Do you know the coolest thing about crows? No, but I want to know they remember people's faces and if you fuck with the Crow, you better hope that Crow doesn't see you come around his parts again. Oh, you better hope that crow's goes blind. And I learned about this because one of these true crime podcasts I was listening to, it's like an unsolved mystery.
And I forget now, but it was something about like the crows. No, but you know, obviously you can't like interview. I can't take a Crow down to the station, but that animals, we see so much stuff.
And if they could just talk, I think you can just talk if your German shepherd could just talk, like there's so many true crime where dogs are involved to crime shows.
Well, do you know about the doll, the, how they're teaching dogs to communicate? Yes. I follow this account on TechTalk of this certain dog that they have these buttons, like this is constellation of buttons that she, that the owner puts on the horse. It's so cool. And this dog that, you know, I was watching it when it started with like the dog had three words. Now the co the thoughts are so complex. Like, like one of them, one time it was dad went work.
I'm sad. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. So snow and they'll be able to solve crimes. The crime solving dog McGruff can be a real, like, can do a live action of McGruff when use a real dog. That is fantastic. Yeah.
How is your media record? Mogul data scoring. Hey, you know, it's interesting. It it's hit we've, we've hit a, a snag where I don't know about a snag, but it's just like any other business where getting people to respond to emails is really is, is really challenging.
But you know, I'm going to figure it out. I'm trying to, they're going to, my band is going to Seattle for 18 days, where they're from, where one of them's from. And they have all these shows lined up and I'm trying to help them get into more radio stations and more while they're there and make the most of the trip and getting people on the phone and getting people on an email is real challenging. So it's like, no, you're going to go to feel okay. Oh my God, a plane, me, but I'm, I'm going to have to fly. Cause I I'm, I'm marrying, I'm officiating a wedding in Chicago. Yeah. My agent, my agent's getting married and asked me to officiate her wedding and that's, and that's later after, after your visit.
And so I'm doing that. So I have to get on a plane, but mine has nothing to do with the virus. As we know, like I'm not afraid of the virus. I'm afraid of flying. I don't care. There's snakes on the plane. I don't give a shit. Have you always been afraid of flying? No. It started getting and it's totally, it's totally psychology. Like we always say, so planes took my mother away all the time. When I was young, starting from when I was five, my mom traveled, travel, travel, traveled. It's no mistake, but I just sort of blocked that out and I didn't have, and then I started becoming obsessed, like, cause I was weird at eight or nine, when all the, like I started getting obsessed with playing crashes.
Like, I didn't know they could crash. Right. Until then I knew they could crash. Just like, I didn't know, true crime existed until I knew it existed. And then I became obsessed with it. So. Okay. So then I got that. It, it sort of morphed from, I think what happened was planes were scary. Cause it took my mom away to no planes are scary because they crash all the time, which is not true. But when they do crash, everyone dies, which is pretty much true. And then it morphed into, I know I have no control. It's just psychology. It's like, obviously duh, but it's psychology upon psychology upon psychology for me. And I've gotten better in that. I do it.
It's not like I don't do it. But if, if given the chance between an Amtrak, like to visit you or something, or, and I have the time I will take the Amtrak. Now my ass could die just as easily on an Amtrak crash. It's just, it makes no sense. Yeah.
Well, yeah, but fears don't first don't make any sense usually. So no, I, by the way I figured out about why I always lose my train of thought. I, so I sort of self-diagnosed like 10 years ago with ADD just the inattentive type. And then I went to a psychiatrist and I have got an actual yeah. But I have never endeavored to really learn about it mostly because I feel angry that especially girls don't, this does this behavior.
Doesn't get recognized as frequently as a D you know, because in attentive is not a behavior problem. Whereas the impulsive thing is a behavior problem. So girls, you know, so whatever issues I had were chalked up to, oh, actually laziness. The thing that we were talking about last time, like, and it was always like, Gina's not living up to her potential, but I recently, because two of my kids have the same problem and they like learn about it. They learn all about it. And they'll, they'll periodically, they'll say like, did you know that people with ADHD anyway, one of the things is when you have six thoughts at the same time and you're trying to choose
six thoughts?!
Yes. Holy
shit. No one. Yeah, sure.
And I hear it when I'm editing this, that I start to say one thing, I get reminded of another thing. I go into the third thing and then I've then I've and I've lost that I've lost everything. Or sometimes even just trying to pick from among the six thoughts causes me to forget all that.
Holy shit. Well, that makes perfect sense.
Anyway.
So you're basically talking about fears and how fears make no sense. They're not rational. And they get, I don't know the word I'm looking for. Is it confabulated they get mixed in with other stuff that is made that does make sense because I'm not psychotic. So it's not like I have a fear that, you know, aliens are going to steal the plane. It's more, or I'm not paranoid. It's it's that I have psychological issues with control and loss.
Yeah. That's that makes see, see, that makes perfect sense. If you told me a person who has issues with control and fear of loss, I'd say that would be their biggest fear. It's fine. Right. Or, or, or anything related to it falling. Are you afraid of no being trapped?
It's mostly, it has all been, it has worn the mask of flying, but then it's creeped into stage fright. Right? So same thing. So it is, it is intense. It is creeped into other, it is creeped into an area and of like, we've talked about a lot of forgetting my lines and, and, and it's more than that. It's then humiliation and shame of forgetting them and, and having people depend on me and not meeting their standards. That's Hey, it's morphed. It's morphed a little bit, but flying still is. It's still is not pleasant for me, but I do it. I will do it.
I'm not going to fly. I'm not going to drive to Chicago again,
that it would require for you to get all the way over your fear. I, I think would be, I mean, you just have to do like a completely cognitive behavioral approach to it. Like you would have to PR it probably they'd probably make you do the flooding technique where you spend a lot of time talking about flying, watching videos, maybe doing a flight simulation. Like the, one of the hallmark treatments is approach. If you have approach avoidance, which is to say you avoid approaching things that you're afraid of, then you have to, you know, approach, approach and, and like do take your little baby steps to getting to where, because, well, I don't know, but is it a problem for you?
Would you rather not have this fear or are you
oh yes. I would rather not have the sphere. I would love to go to Japan. I would love to go to Australia. I would love to go. Yes, it is. It is a problem. It is. Yes. The answer is yes.
We'll experiment leading up to your first flight. Maybe like four weeks out, you could start just talking to yourself about being on the plane and thinking about picturing yourself in the plane and doing things that make you feel a little bit nervous or antsy. So that by the time you actually do it, it'll feel like you've been doing it. Yeah. Let me run this by you. So that's what actually, the thing I wanted to run by you is also about approach avoidance. I have gotten to where I'm almost pathologically averse to talking on the phone.
I talked to you. I talked to my husband. I talked to my mom. I do, I, my kids, if they call, I do not want to talk to one other person. I wish everything could be entirely online. I wish I never had to, you know, call the appliance repairman. I, people that I like, I don't still, don't like to talk to them on the phone. I have friends who call me and I don't take their calls. And the more I do it, the worse it gets like it used to be that I had it, but we didn't have any like other means. So I just would be like, well, whatever this is, this is my method. But now that we have other means of communicating with people, I become irate that somebody would call me instead of texting me or emailing me, which is 1000% my preferred method of communication.
That's really good to know.
I mean, this is, I really mean it when I say, except with the aforementioned people. I love talking to you on the phone. I love talking to my mom on the phone. I love talking to my husband on the phone. I, I really don't know what it is and it's, and it's such a problem that there's a person in my life who loves talking on the phone. And she calls in the first few times, you know, I, we chat she's bored. She doesn't have anything to do. So we would chat. And then it got to be like, okay. Then I think the other thing that I don't like is idle, chit chat. Like we're talking about the weather we're talking about.
COVID we're rehab for this one particular person. We're just rehashing like Trump over and over again. And it's not that those are just why, I don't know. I just have this feeling of, I just have this thing of like, this is, it's not that it's a waste of my time. I really, I have to get to the bottom of it. It's very good on the, I mean, you're you love it, right?
Well, I, I too, when someone calls, that's not you or not a person, I see they're calling, there is a part of me that goes, oh, oh, like a small part. I'm like, oh, and mine comes from fear. I always fear I'm in trouble. Right. So if someone calls, I must be in real trouble if I don't know them very well. Like if I see, you know, but I do once I'm on there, I'm fine. I like it. I, I wonder, I did think there's something about time. There's something about, well, several thoughts come up. One is the phone is definitely more vulnerable than email and text.
Right? There's vulnerability involved. You hear the timbre of someone's voice. You hear the breath you hear it is, it is a more vulnerable thing. Okay. We've also been
more intimate, intimate, intimate.
That's the word. Yes. And we've been, we've been really separated from people for a long time. And so this, this, this it's just like my flying thing. I haven't had to practice it because we can't fly. We couldn't fly or we weren't supposed to fly. And now with you, it's like when you're separated, everyone has sort of reserved resorted to online activities and texting and emails. There's not been, I haven't talked on the phone that much actually during the pandemic. It's as though we thought we could give each other, the virus through the phone, you know what I mean? Like, but you'd like just let's stop all intimacy, but no, not true. And I think that for you, I it's interesting.
I wonder if it's, well, I do think there's an element to don't don't, don't waste my time. I've wasted from what I hear from you. It's like I've wasted so many years. The feeling I've, I've wasted so much time in my life already, which is a feeling that I totally relate to. Or like I spent, I have been spinning my wheels for me. It's like, I've spend my wheels in my thirties and twenties. I don't want to do that anymore. And so I think for you, it sounds like it's a mix of its is a combo platter. And I think it's a combo platter. It sounds like of increased intimacy and vulnerability, which is scary, mixed with this is not important,
dude. You're you're a hundred percent, right. It's when you said that about vulnerability intimacy like that. Of course, I was like, oh yeah, of course. That's what it is. That's always something I'm afraid of. But yes. Then there's this other thing of, I, I can, I can be in a frame of mind to do the idle. Chit-chat sometimes it's fun to just, but maybe as I get older or maybe this year or whatever, I just, the, I, I, if, if, if I call somebody, I have something to say to them and I want somebody to call me when they have something to say it. But at the same time, I recognize that for many people, including many people that I love, they, the thing that feeds them is just the talking.
It doesn't matter what you're talking about, but it doesn't work that way for me. So I'm, I'm trying. So I've been vacillating between just, and, you know, whatever, just, just talk because this is what the other person needs and you have to give this to the other person versus no. Why don't they ever learn to just so I'm in the middle path. It's hard.
So it's like learning, like we talked about love languages, right? So it's like learning your, and I think, I think you could also think about saying to the person the truth of it, which is like, dude, this isn't like I tried and it's just not my love language. Like, it just doesn't if, if you're close enough now, something you can't really do that to the bill collector when you can't, this is not my love language, please email me. And they're like, what the fuck? But
excuse me, Comcast. I getting entirely. Yeah, it's too intimate for me.
I need you to email me more form letter the better, but yeah. And I think you could say it, but I definitely know the feeling of not wanting to avoid avoidance, just totally avoidance of the thing. And I think it can hurt people's feelings, but it's better to say like, look, dude, I just, I just, I just hate the phone. I'm trying to get over it.
I did actually tell somebody that and they just keep going, which you know, you know, but then I feel like, okay, well then when I don't answer, they know, yeah.
You told your truth, you know about it. And also, you know, maybe they just like to leave messages. I don't know. There's people that leave really long messages, really long messages. And I'm like, and I listened to like three fours and then I just call the person back. Cause I'm like, but they like leaving long messages that just trail on and on. Okay. Well there you go.
Do you have, what do you avoid ?
confrontation. Flying? I think those are the two main ones. Shame, shame, avoidance. I'm very shame avoidant, which is what confrontation for me. Confrontation of avoidance is just shame avoidance. So anything where I'm going to be, feel like I'm going to be humiliated picked on left resource-less. I will avoid it. So even like getting notes when I was an actor and when we did actual live theater, like you talked about it a little bit, how you had to give notes to an actor that was extremely sensitive and I'm like that, but I would never show it. I would never say it. I would never, because we didn't do that in my family.
You know? So I just inside I'm dying. I'm like, oh my God, here it comes. They're going to tell me, get off the stage. You're terrible. You don't deserve to be here. So, and usually it's like, you forgot to pick up the hat stage left. You know what I mean? Yeah.
So I used to also be very conflict avoidant, but in the last five years I've gotten to where I love a good conflict. Love confronting somebody, probably not with like big, big, big, serious issues, but I've had several,
I know you've been really good.
I've had several in the last several years of my life. That's been a number of times where I've called somebody up and said, you know what? I'm going to tell you a little, something about a little something. And it's a real mixed bag with how it's received. Some people never talk to me again. Other people are like, thank you. I, you know, I didn't know that, but I think I was always afraid of that thing of like, if I have a conflict with somebody that they don't love me anymore, or that means our relationship is over and a there certain relationships that I, I don't care if they're over. I mean, if, if confronting the person with something that's real and truthful is enough to end the relationship, then so be it.
But yeah, I just I'm like, listen, life is too short to have a relationship with somebody where I'm keeping where I'm, because the thing that I did so much of in the past was never tell the other person when they were upsetting me, just do it all inside, blow up and end the friendship. And the other person being like, wait, what I have, I have blown up four. Very good friendships that way. Just like one day I happened, the first one I did it with was my very serious high school boyfriend. I woke up. I had never said one single thing that I didn't like about what he did.
I woke up. I said, it's time to break up with Michael. I drove to his house. I, he, I put his stuff on the lawn and he's, and he was there. He saw me like in midway through it. And he's like, what are you? What are you doing? And I was like, goodbye, I'm leaving. And wow. It good in the moment. But it was a terrible thing to do to him. It would have been much better to tell him how I was feeling. Wow. I did that with two, like basically like three, basically best friends of mine that I had that I just, so that is something I don't want to do anymore.
I want to be real with people. I want to tell them when they're hurting me, I hope they tell me when I'm hurting them, because it goes both ways. I've also been ghosted by people and I'm sure that that's what happened to them. That they were so fed up with me and then it just didn't feel like they could say anything about it.
Oh my gosh. That's,
you know, you helped me a little bit with this because the F I had a fight with you, or I felt upset with you with around my wedding. Cause you weren't going to come to my wedding and I called you. And I think I was so scared to call you because I thought, well, this is it. She's never going to talk to me again. And instead I called you and you said, oh my God, I had no idea. And, and you, you met my needs. I think it was the first experience I had ever really had of somebody, me telling them how I feel. And then, because if I would tell my dad how he feels, you need to be like, oh no, you don't have a personal problem.
Good luck with that. Good luck with that. I don't know what to tell you. I don't have that same problem. So anyway. Oh yeah. You're welcome. I mean, I think, I think it's important. I think as an adult, if I am going to not live in constant torment, I have to get more conflict curious. Let's just call it conflict, curious and less conflict avoidance. And I'm going towards that. So like, you know, we've had stuff on, on the podcast with people where it's gotten a little hairy and dicey and w w we've worked through it. And I know as we proceed as artists, and as I proceed as a writer, and as I, you know, I, now I did the thing of hiring my old school teacher as a mentor.
She's giving me, I met with her. She gave me some real talk feedback about my idea and about it was not easy, but I was like, okay, you're, you know, it helpful if I'm like, you're paying this lady for this, you're paying this lady for this. And the same thing with friends. You're not paying them, but you're, you're invested. You've invested time and money. And time is money into this friendship. Like, this is important. Like, hear them out, like don't shut down and just run away. Don't shut down and just run away. But it's a constant self-talk of like, show up for the things, show up for the weather, whether they, you know, and, and you can tell, like, when I talk to people and you're one of them who's really open to feedback.
They, you can tell they're like, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. I want all feedback, good feedback. And they really believe it. And I'm in awe of those people, because I want to say only prizing praising feedback is right, but that's not true.
What did you really learn after you get a bunch of that? Is it doesn't help you grow? It doesn't really, I mean, it's nice to hear when you need an ego boost. Okay. But, so what is the thing that happens to you when you get the no, I mean, what is the, what is the major alarm bell that it's triggering? Like this person hates me. This person thinks I'm not a good writer.
It's, it's embarrassed. It is it's shame and humiliation. So it, it, it, it, it feels like a flush of heat, right? Literally a flush of heat and in my body. And then it feels like I need to run away. I cannot tolerate this. That's what it is. I feel that I'm going to be incinerated and that I cannot tolerate what is about to happen, even though what is about to happen is not usually a incineration. Right.
But is there a thought connected to it? Like,
no, it is, it is so primal. It was like, I can't hear this. I have to disappear. I'm not, I'm not, I'm not, it's so physical. It's like, okay.
Okay. So that's very interesting. That means it's very primal. It's a primary process and not a secondary process. It's not, it's not connected to a thought of whatever the spirit. So that's very, so you have to be very gentle with yourself about it. You have to do a lot of careful talking to yourself.
It goes real, real deep. Like, so I think this is sound money, sound crazy. But when my mom was pregnant with me, okay. She didn't want another kid right away. She, my sister, she had trouble with my sister trouble getting pregnant, getting got pregnant that had my sister and then thought, whew, I got some times she just wanted a child. I think she didn't really love. She told me, she told me she stopped loving my father when my sister was born. Okay. So then she got pregnant with me and I'm, she didn't want another kid. So I think it goes so deep that it's that. And that's what I need to work on.
It's like some weird pre project.
It does not sound crazy at all because one of the things I recently heard somewhere or read somewhere is cause I have always had this feeling. I think I've said this on the podcast before. I apologize for re iterating myself, but I have always been really emotionally set off by anything related to sexual violence. Even though I have never been raped. I have been assaulted a few times, but not, not raped. It is such a and I'm, and it's like this thing of like, it, it automatically turns my stomach and I have a morbid about, about it.
My mother has basically the same thing and she has also never been assaulted, but her mother had a terrible, terrible abuse history. And I think her grandmother had a terrible. So they say you're when you're you first exist in your grandmother's womb, you are an egg inside of your mother who's in of your grandmother. So that makes perfect sense that about generational trauma, not, I always thought of generational trauma as being something like you perpetuate onto somebody else, but it can be literally just the, the, the trauma, the, the, the reaction to the trauma of it.
Even if it's not your own. Yeah.
Yes. And I think that's so right on. And I think my mom was like one and done. I got my child. That's what I wanted. And then here I came.
So you feel like you don't have a right to
it's really rough, so I'm working on it, but it's, it's rough. And it comes out in, in conflict. And when someone has, it's not even conflict, right. It's feelings, it's feedback. Feedback is just feedback, but it becomes so threatening, which is how I easily, I'm shocked. I didn't end up with borderline personality disorder. Like I'm shocked. I didn't get into it. That was not my situation in terms of like I self-harm and all that stuff. Because, because whoa.
But yeah, the thing that's really interesting about that, and maybe this will be somewhere. You can go with your feedback avoidance. It, that makes sense to me because if the message that you got in the womb was you don't deserve to exist, or nobody really wants you here. Feedback is very clearly stating you do exist. And I, and you are a person and, and I want you to be here. And I, and I took the time to read your thing and to give you the reason you don't like it is, is it's actually the validation.
This is all psychological this morning. I love to do.
That's what I love to do. So great. Yeah. So like when somebody is giving you feedback, they're saying, oh, hell yes, you exist. You're forced to be reckoned with and you're, and there's better in you. So, oh, you can look at that
Today on the podcast. We're speaking with Jason, Denuszek, Jason is somebody who went to the theater school at DePaul university. He graduated and he started a company with some other DePaul grads. He's done coaching does a dad. He's a husband. He's really interested in working on himself as a whole person. And we found that fascinating. So please enjoy our conversation with Jason, Dennis. It's all gold. Anyway. So hi, Jason, you survived here. Oh my Lord. Good to see you too. Where are you sitting right now? I'm just curious about your back quietest
Location in my house, which is the backyard because inside I have a seven-year-old and a four-year-old and a dog. And of course my wife and a cat and they're well, the cat's not making too much noise, but everyone else makes a lot of noise.
Yeah. Okay. Good. Well that sounds, I hear a little birds tweeting, so that's okay.
There are birds out here. I hope this is okay. I, I there's a garage in the garage. You might not have good internet. Okay, good. No,
You sound great. You sound great. So thank you for sending us your bio. That was no, it was, it was super helpful. A because I, you filled in a lot of the blanks, but also because I'm like loving this phrase, intentional communication. Is that something you're calling it or that's a preestablished.
That is what I mean, I didn't come up with the term, but it is something that pinnacle and the founder, Gary Mills and David Lewis came up with and I, Gary is a theater school alum, if you, if you know, if you, I don't know, I think he was pre all of us. I think he was around when Gillian Anderson went that time period. Anyway. Yes, they, they started a company called pinnacle performance company. And essentially it takes the techniques that we, as actors have honed and learned, which is I needed a specific objective. What do I want my audience to do? Or what do I want to get from them? And then I'm going to use my intentions, which is again, making us feel something to achieve that objective.
And you can apply it across any business cause everyone has objectives and everyone wants things from people.
That's fantastic. I mean, I, I love that. And, and just as a side note, he also owned Webster fitness.
Yeah. He was the owner of Webster fitness. That's how I originally met him. And actually I met him as a playwright through timeline and another show that we did at prop theater. Do you remember properties? Yeah. Oh yeah. It just, it recently just closed. That's a bummer. But so I'd worked with him a few times and that's how I met Dave, his partner. And some time went by, after having met them. I live with living in New York and he and Dave had started this company and was in, I moved to LA. Then I asked, I reached out to them because it had been going well. And I was trying to figure out what, what to do next with my life and or what, you know, how to fill in the gaps of employment.
And it did more than fill in the gaps. It became like a second career. Do you love it? I do. I do. When you see people get it and they start becoming more confident in what they can deliver and what they can bring in. And they see, oh, I can see it's neat to see that connection. And then you go, oh, I'm bringing value to them besides, you know, entertainment, which is fun. You know, as of course as an actor, but when you can bring that sense of empowerment as a coach or a teacher, it's always
Really nice. One thing I loved about your bio is just seeing how many theater companies you worked with my God and what it would have been better to list that the other companies you haven't worked. That's quite an Oscar
Goodman theater I could go through. I could get on. Not that I'm better.
So it's a little bit about your experience right after you graduated. Did you, you started a theater company with some other theater school, tell us that theater revolutions that was called
It's called theater. Volusion cause I thought that was clever. Like if you could put it all together, cause the R E when you spell theater, that way could go into revolution. And I thought, oh, isn't that clever theater volition or theater revolution. However you want to say it. Yeah. That we, me and Kelly, Holden Hogan Aker, John Hogan, Aker, Matt Carter, Mike Rushton, who is my old roommate, who was a theater school guy who got cut Chris Schultz. But then he moved and Dave does small chin. We were the oh, Jimmy McDermott where the initial people behind it.
And it, it, it, it, it sputtered and went for about five years as most as those companies do. And that may be B being generous five years, but we kept it. We kept it going in. Ways we
Went into in one year is a victory.
Yeah. Yeah. We, we did the Murray, Archie theater festival a few, like a couple of years in a row. And that was like, awesome. Cause I met a lot of other theater people like Sean from the hypocrites grainy. I met him and I met a bunch of other people through Mary Archie. Yeah. Got me in the man who, who runs mariachi rich. Why am I forgetting his name? Yeah. I love rich. And so that was, yeah. So we did mostly showcased it, those, but we did a few places. Other theaters were or spaces. I wouldn't even call them theaters or coffee shop. So, so right after the theater school, myself, Matt Carter, Mike Rushton, Jimmy, not Jimmy.
He would come over all the time. And then two other chaps that I knew. We, we moved into a windowless warehouse in downtown Chicago and had access to far too much alcohol and drugs and, and, and just lived a Bacchanalia life in this windowless warehouse. We went crazy. We went crazy and we did some and some art. Yeah. We lived illegally in this space and I had the only established room. Cause it used to, it used to have like machinery. It did some kind of like printing. I don't know what it did. And in front
Of glamorous is what you're saying. No,
We didn't have a fridge or a shower for the first six months. And we had to go to jail. That's why we had girlfriends in gym memberships because we would go to the other people's places for, for these things. Anyway, I can't, I think about it now. I remember I brought my grandfather in to see it. He was always so encouraging. He looked around and he goes, it's got potential and that's, that's all he could say. And then he,
Oh, that's so sweet. What was the like mission statement of theater volution?
That is a good question. And I would have to, I would have to look into that. I, I, I allow it, a lot of it was like re-imagining classics or trying to, I was really into Grotowski and theater of the poor, poor theater from Joseph Loic, who, who inspired our first production. We did a production of void sec at the theater school and then later remounted it. And, and just that sense of where does the line between the audience and the performer drawn, what any space could be considered a theatrical space.
And then we would take classics and try to just put them in different, like re-imagine how they could be staged. You know, not just traditionally,
I'm just curious about it because so many people who graduate from theater school start a theater company. There's something it's almost like you could call it your fifth year of school that because of the number of people who do it and, and it's, and it's this thing of like, as you're doing it, you go, this is not going to work. I mean, when nobody has any money, you know, like we're not, or like, this is a very, there's a very small chance that this is going to last, but yet we all hold up. We all feel that ours is going to be different. I'm just, you know, that's just interesting to me. Yeah,
We did. We did, we did hold onto that like, oh, ours, ours we'll make it.
Okay. And you know, it did in a lot of ways for a while and it's, I mean, five years, even a generous five years is a long time. I saw void sec, did you do it at like the via docs or some under, where did it move to?
He did it at a coffee shop that was across the street from web sort of fitness. And w and that in that cafe, there was a, there was, or that where we all got lunch, there was a coffee shop there that had a big back room and we did it there.
I don't think we paid them.
Yes. That was our second show. And we did that.
You were one of the 12 people that saw it. I thought, I thought it was really good for Schultz being very, very good in it. Oh, no, that's all
Right. It was me and Mike rushed in and Kelly Holden at the time, Holden, and then Jimmy directed and our friend Peter did sound in music and we were three. Yeah. Yeah. I, it was what it was, it was great. W we had a good time with it,
The time watching it. So there you go. It moved me. Awesome. Yay. Okay. So Jason, tell us about how you came to pick a conservatory as your, for your college experience. Had you been doing theater in high school and before?
Yes. I started doing theater in like seventh and eighth grade because I w I didn't really like sports. And I was a kid that would just break down and cry really intensely if their sports team was losing. Or if I got anxious at the chalkboard and thought I was failing, there was a lot of emotion that would come out of me and it was awkward. And I probably needed therapy as a kid, but what I got was theater and yeah, lots of people. And so I went to in, I lived in Milwaukee, I grew up in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and there was a theater camp for kids that when it ran year long, called first stage theater academy.
So I guess you could call it academy. And I did a lot of theater there. And then I went to Northwestern one summer. Have you had any cherubs on? And so I did the chair of program, and I met some theater school people at the chair program, but I met PJ powers because he was an older, he came in, was one of my faculty associate. They called him a FAQ ass. And he, she turned me on to the theater school. And I originally wanted to go to Northwestern because that was the experience I had. And just to tell you what theater that, that chair of experience was like, have you, have you give, you know, what it is or it's,
I think boss does buy from Evanston. So I, but why don't you tell us, tell us in your, in your pitch,
It's a tear for, for pre adolescent for, you know, tweens, or even later than at teenagers where you go for six weeks and you live there in dorms, hormones, raging, and you do theater. You like your, your crew, a show, it's a conservatory. You do, you study theater movement voice the whole time. And I loved it. I loved it. And that's when I was like, that's what I want to do. This is what I want to do and go to, so coming to the theater school and had PJ had kind of told me about it. I was like, yeah, it, when I got there, there was no surprise on what was going on there.
Cause I was like, yeah, this is what I'd like to doing to begin with. I also had done a lot of improv comedy called comedy sports when I was in high school. That was another thing I gravitated towards and improv the first year I was like, oh, sweet. But it was not the type of improv. I was used to like come up with the funny line and do the funny bit. Right. And it was like, I couldn't talk. So I, it really messed with, or I enhanced my improv abilities in ways that I was like, oh, I, this is not what I used to with improv. So I kind of had that like, oh, this feels comfortable going in. When I went, when I got into the theater school,
Did you audition for other schools? Or how did you, how did that go? Okay.
Yeah. In addition for why I wanted to go to Northwestern, but like, I didn't have the grades really. I thought I had the extracurricular, but anyway, I did, did, did didn't work out. And then I auditioned for Carnegie Mellon and even did a lot of choir in high school. But when they asked me to sing, I was like, I just choked. And it would like that, that, that part of the audition was the UN what else did I audition for? Those were the only Boston college or, or North Carolina school of the arts. And then I knew I, New York seemed too intimidating for me, so I didn't, but Chicago seemed just right. So I, I auditioned for those schools.
Okay. Do you remember the model on you did just, I always like to ask them,
I look, cause I've been listening to this podcast. I was like, what was the monologue? I looked it up. It was from a show called sideshow by Miguel Pinero. And I did a about, it was like a kid who snippets a hot glue and talks about watching his friend, like jump onto the tracks and kill himself. And it was a pretty intense like monologue. It doesn't, you don't see it coming. And then at the end, he just, you talk, he talks about how the glue just makes him numb out and like, and so it, it worked, it w it was a fun monologue. And I don't know if it was appropriate for me, but it, you know, anyway, this
I've never asked anybody this question before, but do the type of material you chose for your audition, is that your type of theater that you like, or did you pick it based on what you thought? Like maybe the character was similar to your age or because we, so many people choose something that's just so wildly off from who they are that it's, you know, it's, it's almost never going to work, but yeah,
That is a great question. I think, because I certainly have picked pieces that I was like, I saw someone else do it, who was much older and was like, oh, I love that piece. And I tried to do it as a 16 year old, but I think with that piece, you know, I found it in a monologue book and I talked to my theater person, my theater teacher at the time, and he encouraged me and something about it. I just connected with it's, you know, there was that, that, that there, that therapy element of I have pain to share and I can tap into it and here is a safe place to do that on stage.
Right. And so I ultimately liked theater or pieces and stuff that was like, oh, this is kind of funny, but then whoa, he hits you with something serious. Yeah. Hmm.
Yeah. And after, after I heard the names of the first two shows you did with theater evolution, but was Al, was it all pretty like dark gritty stuff?
Yes, we did. I'm trying to remember all this, like the hand we did the dumbwaiter we did. So that's pretty, it's kind of heady, but it's pretty, there's some fun in that we did, who did six character Pirandello we, we explored Pirandello through and he is just, he's a misogynist, like he's a son of a bitch and he, and so, you know, there was no, it was all intense stuff. I'm looking at it now, like, yeah, there was no light romps or comedies. It was all pretty heavy.
I was just thinking just quick share. I was thinking my monologue was, I was 16. And now that you said 16, that's how old I was 16 doing a monologue about a 30 year old that who is traps a rapists in our house since, and, and beats him to death. That was what I did now. What, because voice pivot at pivot theater workshop probably said, that's a good idea, but great. I mean, you know, but like, thinking back I'm like you said, you looked it up. Jason, does that mean like it was in your journal or something? Oh, look, you said you looked up the name of your monologue.
And I did this as a thing to be a prepared actor. They're always like have monologues. I have an old file folder of all. Anytime I do a monologue, I type it out on either a word processor back in the day, or I R I double space it on a, so I can do work on it, but I always file it and I have it and I saw I could, so I could essentially go back to it and looked through and I go, oh yeah, I remember when I did that one or that one. So that way it's a little easier for me than to yeah. You know, does that one have notes on it? Oh, I don't know. I, I, I don't have to be honest. I don't have that one anymore because I just from thinking, I do remember what, what, and I tried to look up the book, but I don't think I have the notes on it anymore.
Okay. I just, I was asking because I thought, oh, that'd make a great thing to put on our Instagram picture of your notes of one of your monologues. Yeah. If you, if you're so
Inclined, I can, I have the file. I'll look through some of those. Those would be fun. Yeah. I draw sometimes there are pictures on the side or things like that. Yeah.
Yeah. So you, at an early age, you were using theater for therapeutic reasons. Did you graduate to therapy therapy doing it real
Well until mid, not till my mid thirties and up to today. So, but yeah, I, I certainly threw out DePaul was and I've, and I'm so glad I've been listening to these podcasts that you guys have put together. I, I listened to Paul home quest cause you just released it. And I had so much relate-ability to, you know, numbing out throughout college, not being able to handle certain intense emotions, but only on stage. And, and just trying to putting it in there. And then, you know, sitting around with my friends who may be having some crisis and being like, I don't know how to deal with you, or I don't know how to deal with this.
And yeah, those, those kinds of thoughts come to mind. So I, I wish I had found therapy earlier, but in the meantime theater was, was doing good.
My experience of you was really, and this is, and, and it's going to be wrong because everything I knew about everybody was wrong. It was like this happy go, lucky guy who's always in for like, like a group event, like really positive and really earnestly, willing to participate in things. And how off the mark, how off the mark am? I,
I that's pretty right. I, I was, and in many ways, a huge people pleaser and still am and working that out. And, and a lot of that was because I wanted to be a part of something. Fear of missing out was a huge thing I've been working through in my life. And, and those were all like, but at the same time I was up for anything, like you said, I was, I would be positive. It'd be like, yeah, let's do it. Let's, let's, let's jump in. So that's not off, but I often just felt maybe also inside a little like that, that those insecurities of like, oh, I wish they would have no one called me this weekend.
Or I would, I always felt that was maybe forcing my way into things because I needed to, or I wanted that connection and couldn't sometimes just let a well alone be, or, or, you know, let, let things be. So to add to that, to add to the mix there of what you said, bys.
So we have recently become really interested in talking to everybody about their intros, steer a member, your intro.
Oh, they were, there were some good ones and bad ones as they were. I remember. So the intros that I did, let me think the first one I did it might've been laughing wild, which I know you've talked about with some other folks on this. That was awful. That was, that was, it was fun because it was like all these people that were really funny, but it's like a two person show and here we are all competing for these. And they were like, like twice as many guys as there were girls. So even the guy, the guys then got really, really fierce, but at the same time it was, it was, I know if it was just left a weird, it was a weird experience.
That was the first one. That was the first one. And then I saw, and I remember seeing other people's and being like, man, they got like a full part. And I always, so it was like a little disappointing to do that one. And it was, yeah. So that was the first one. And the second one was the diary of Anne Frank and Bella directed that Dr. Bella. And that was a gem because it was very moving. We, we, we, you know, that feeling when you do a show and then everyone's just really silent afterwards and you finish because that show gets super heavy. And we, we entered with such a bang. Like we, it was like, it had that palpability of like, oh, we're really doing something effective. And, and it was my first, well, my second time working with Dr.
Bella, she knew me from a, I do at a crew for the seagull. Do you remember the seagull that Carrie Peters, she played the main, yeah. And so I was a first year doing the crew and they needed those extra parts filled and I auditioned, and I don't know because I, I made Bella laugh in the audition and I think that's why she, she went with me cause I always was a good for a laugh. And I, and I actually told, I put a story on the Facebook of Dr. Bella for Eugena. I think when we were talking about Dr.
Bella's stories were, and I'll just talk, just do it really quick here. But my, my, my first time as a first year, I'm going to be, I have like two lines or one line, and I'm supposed to be a servant that brings in arenas bags and asks for a tip, or she gives me a tip in. And I thank her and I don't, you know, it was well into the rehearsal process. They're about to go into tech. So I don't know any of these upperclassmen and I'm just sitting off to the side being like, I got to carry in these bags, what should I do? And in my default mode, especially back then was make a joke, be the clown. So I carried the bags in as awkwardly as possible, like just stacking them, kind of dropping them, trying to make like my best Charlie Chaplin bit or whatever I could out of it.
And then I like turn and I go and look for the tip. And I just, it was silent in the, like the seniors are like, like, just like, no one's doing anything. And no one really laughed at my bed. And I look over at Dr. Bella and she's like this, her hands. And then she just looks up and smiles and says, now just bring in the bags.
But you know, I have to say, I am so impressed that you took it upon yourself to do that, to make a choice. You made a freaking choice, dude. Like, I mean, I think there's that thing of like, you go for it and then they can bring you back if they, if that's not what they're looking for and you just went for it. I don't know, man. That is rape
To me for it. And she, yeah, she brought me back. So, so that again brings me then to, we did that show a diary of Anne Frank with her on, and that was really great. And then the last, I don't remember my third intro. Oh, it was hay fever. Another like a light. That was, that was fun. Yeah. Yeah.
So those were those, I think that the teachers picked plays, like, what do you think the ratio of picking a play that they wanted to do artistically versus what they thought? Like, do you think anybody said what this class really needs is wish they did that. I wish they did that. I don't know. I mean, I feel like Rick did that with the adding machine, but I also think a ton of it was that he just, you know, that he wanted to do the play and hear the play out loud and said, we're going to make it work like laughing wild or whatever that was. Was that Jenkins?
No, it was, it was Don Hilco
Hilco. Okay. So he probably wanted to hear it. I don't know. That definitely has two characters.
Yeah, man, and a woman. And they, I believe it's the one where they keep resetting it, like the time resets and they can come back and then they get another, I, I believe that's that play. I might be even getting that wrong, but
Yeah. See, because Don Elko directed my intro and he did meet museum by Tina Howe. It has like 40 characters in it. So everybody. Yeah. So that's interesting. He went, wait, what are you a one year or two years behind us? I am we graduated. I graduated in 97, 99, 99.
So I'm one year behind you buys into behind you.
Yeah. Okay. So that's interesting that he did that back to back. They did whatever the fuck they wanted. They were like, and now being like that age now, and, and, and if I was given a chance, I'd be like, oh, I really love to do, you know, the weirdest shit or like the, I would hope that I would try to make it mindful of the class that I was working with. But I think, I think it ultimately just comes down to whatever the fuck they wanted to do in 1990s, you know, like
Spend all these evenings with these kids and be like, well, what do I want to hear them do? Yeah, dude,
I can relay, honestly, I have been asked to direct so many plays that I don't like, and it's, it doesn't turn out good. You know what I mean? Like you're like, okay, sure. I can direct anything. And then you just don't feel it. You just don't F you, you don't feel inspired and it's not good. I mean, honestly, that that's, I don't know. I think it would be very hard to be a director for hire for that reason. Oh yeah. What about, so after, what about other shows after interests?
Third year I did. Oh man. So what are the shows that stick out? I did grapes of wrath my fourth year with Michael Maggio. And that was, that was pretty awesome. Endeavor. I did the search for delicious. I wasn't
That with you, but I don't play. I play the wife of someone.
I, and I remember David just not being present. He had some health things going on or, and that whole year he was not very present. He was my first year teacher though. And I got true. Delicious. Is that, was that, is that a kid show? Yeah, it was, it was a kid show that David Kali directed, but then the assistant director who was a student kind of had to take over. Yeah.
Oh, wow. What was his health problems?
Yeah. You know, I never really asked, but it was, he's got a string of health problems. Yeah.
And then I remember just feeling like this is because we were in, I was in the yellow boat and so with Gina.
Oh yeah. Oh man. Yeah. So we
Were in that and that was such a, for me, it was intense, but the show itself, you could tell the app Kelly really cared about. And then being in search for delicious was sort of like a, like the, the one-off reject of that, where I was like, this is sort of a mess, but you know, we did it, we did it, we just did it.
And I remember wanting that cause I, I saw the power of AF Kali when, for that, like from yellow boat and really wanted that experience. And it was what it was, it was, yeah, you're right. We pulled it together, but it wasn't the, what I was really hoping for. But because that show and I got cast in that and I was a bit like, oh man, I wasn't really well, what I wanted that casting round. That's one. I did, that's when I brought void sec to the table, because I read that and then came to a few other friends at the theater school and was like, do you want to do this with me? And we, and then we kind of, and that became like my most memorable, like experience at the theater school.
So, you know, okay.
I, I have to ask you something because we've had a number of people who've described this experience, just doing a play on their own while we were in theater school. I don't know. How did you do that? Because yeah. How did you find the time? I mean, I don't think I ever did that. And, and also like, yeah. When did you rehearse it and where did you, how did you invite people? How does that work? Well,
When you're in the theater school, I found that getting resources was relatively easy. You could just sign up for a room. I believe that was the thing you could just kind of if, or just wander around to you find an empty room and go, this is the room I want, but I know it was, it was, we did it in conjunction with spring awakening, which, which was the, or note, sorry, rites of spring, spring awakenings is a play, but rites of spring where the new, where the playwrights put up new pieces. And so that was already going on. So we're like, well, what's just put it, like, let's put our show together during that because other people will have be, be doing that. And because I was in search for delicious and our show was during the daytime, the nighttime, I had the evenings free to, to pull people and to rehearse.
Cause some people who, I, who I did it with again either. Yeah. So that's how it all came to. There were, there was just time that I found from, I mean,
I guess if you really want to do something, you'll find the time. Right. But, but it, but it seems insane to me. I mean, I, I think about that, I'm like, I couldn't even keep my shit together during the day. Okay. And I find that to be brilliant when people have done that, people are like, yeah, we did this production. I'm like, wow, good for you. Good for you all. I,
I, I think I just had this realization. I think I, I find that I always have to keep myself busy with too much stuff. Like too, like that's the theater school like, was great at that, piling it on. And now in my life, like my family will call me and be like, what other five things are you doing? And I'm like, oh yeah, this, this and this. And that's just not that I, I don't know if I thrive in it, but that's the type of like, that's what I want to be in. I want to be in.
So your choice to be bobbling, all of these suitcases was really an allegory for your life. And that, and that reminds me, you've mentioned a couple of times like being a clown or that's that being something that you resorted to. I would imagine that that has been a good thing as an actor, to be able to employ that clownish illness. Have you had clownish type parts that you've been able to really show that off?
Yeah. I got to play puck many, many times at Chicago Shakespeare touring around the schools and on their main stage. And that I had, I stopped counting, but I think I did almost a hundred performances of that, of that character. And it was like, do you know when that, that one, what was that? What is it? Raid bread,
Fucking puck.
It was, it's a lot
Of fair fairy Sprite action for, for one person.
Yeah. There's just certain roles that I was like, yeah, this is me. And, and it was a, it was a hip hop, rapping puck. I don't know if you ever, I got to, I got to like, and there was a live percussionist and I was wrapping a lot of the Collines not alive, but, and I had a blast and I, when I loved, because I love that character because he is the direct connection between the audience and the characters. And he breaks the fourth wall. He breaks, there's no forethought on Shakespeare. Like he's talking to the people mostly like, so I was like coming in, climbing on people like grabbing their hats. Like I was, I got to be a punk. Like, and then, and you paid for this, you paid for me to do this.
I really loved that. Who directed that at shake? Jerry Griffin.
Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Huh. Wow. That's a lot of puck. Was it a paired down version of a play?
And then I later did it at Notre Dame did a summer Shakespeare and they did the full length and, and that I got to do the full length there. Yeah. Wow. But it was, yeah, the paired down was nice because you're in and out in 90 minutes, you're doing Shakespeare and like at his split.
So you started this company, you were acting a lot in Chicago. What informed your decision to move to LA
Show that I also did at Chicago shakes was called rose rage, which was Henry the sixth part one, two and three, all three parts done in one, six hour marathon. And it was originally a production that was done in England by a company called propeller. And they brought the, the director came and chose a Chicago cast. I think Chris Henderson, another theater school alum from Chicago shakes had seen it and said, we want to do that in Chicago. And we did it in too much. Praise in Chicago. Got it. Went over really well. And then that show went to New York. And so that's what ultimately said, oh, I'll try moving out of Chicago.
So you went to New York and you, how long, how long were you in New York?
About eight, seven or eight years. How,
And you were doing the off-Broadway and, and did you love New York? Did you hate it? What was your vibe? Man?
Love hate, man. It's someone put it to me this way. You like, when you go to New York, if you go to move there, it's like the only place you want to live. And then when you leave it, it's the last place in earth you want to live? Oh my God.
That's so true. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Actually I think we were living there at the same time because I lived there from 2006 to 2012. Yeah.
Would have crossed over because I left around 2010. So yeah, definitely. Oh
Yeah. All of these people were there that I, you know, I had no idea. I was up in Washington Heights and I had two kids, so I didn't, I couldn't see anybody anymore.
And did you have kids in New York? I know for ourselves, like every, all our friends, once they had kids, they left New York within a year. Were you there longer than a year? Yeah,
We were there when, when I moved there I had a newborn, so yeah. So we lived there for six years. It was hard, man. Real? Yes, no, no, no, no. Our, well, sometimes it was a walk up when the elevator wasn't working
With kids and strollers and all that. Oh man.
I remember. Yeah. The stories you would tell about strollers on the subway. Oh my God. Yes. And you had to like every trip you made, you wanted to plan it around, which station had an elevator because you know, occasionally people would help you bring it up, but sometimes you didn't really want that. Person's help depending on who was trying to, and, and yes. And the smell of urine. I mean, honestly I, I, and every time we go back to New York city, I'm like, I'm so fucking glad you don't live here anymore. Nope.
Well, when you get there and you get that vibe, that New York city.
No, sir. No, sir. I mean, I never was a person who only wanted to live in New York. In fact, when we made the decision to move to New York and Aaron always reminds me of my husband was reminds me of this. We had a choice between moving to LA and moving to New York. And I don't know why, but I had this idea that I would really hate LA and now that's the only place I want to live is greener. The grass is always greener. Okay. But then how'd you get from New York to LA?
I met my wife in, well, not in New York. So there was a bit of a side trip once I left Chicago and I went to New York for some reason I know in between that in between the end of the show in Chicago, I moved to LA because I thought that is what I was supposed to do. And I was in a brand I did at a breakup and, or, you know, I kind of coincided, I, I D I, I have this way of every so often blowing up my, and then being like, I, now I'm going to go somewhere else. And I kind of did that. And I went to LA and I hated it. But that in LA is when I found out I was going to be going to New York.
So it was this just a quick stay in LA, but I did meet my wife in that quick stint and we got closer. And then ultimately she and I moved to New York. And yeah, I say everything that's significant in my life happened through the theater school because I met her through Chris Schultz, who was my roommate throughout the theater school when they were doing a show at the actors gang in LA. And so I, that's how I met her. And then we moved to New York and then once New York played itself out and we were at that stage of, do we want to have kids? Like, where like, cause we'd gotten married and we're like, what's next? We knew we wanted, well, she's from Southern California.
And you can only take a girl from Southern California out of Southern California for so long. She's like, yeah, I've got to go back. And she's right. It's not to not to rub it in, but it's like,
It's the jam. It's the best. I know. I know I'm going to go there for a little visit in August. Is your wife an actor?
She is, she's an actress. And she did a lot of sketch comedy with like the Groundlings and then moved more towards, is trying to move more towards writing. It would be, we had, it was very difficult for us to have kids. We had a lot of starts and stops and it was a very challenge. It was especially obviously for her. And so she went through a lot in that time and moved, started moving more towards writing and doing voiceover and things and, and still loves acting. But so, yeah, she's like a Jack of all trades, like, like many of us
I'll have to be right. Is, is the actors getting the thing that David started?
No. Oh, that was called the hot house, which was an improv school. No, the actors gang notably most famously is Tim Robbins theater company. And, and it's, it's a bit of a cult of personality of, of a, of a theater company when we were there. I'm, it's still thriving. And I, and I love all the people I met through there, but it was, it was had its politics.
Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Like every, like every cult of personality, situation, politics, abound politics. So can we go back just for a second to the theater school? Cause I have some, some follow-up questions. Okay. Now I'm obsessed with the warning system and the cut system because I just feel, it was so specific to that time when we went to school, what was your relationship like? And people are telling us they had mentors there. Did you have mentor like, like Bridget or advised that her advisor was like her mentor?
Like my advisor was Rick Murphy who basically asked me what Sinai was, asked me, why I wasn't living up to my star potential and then kicked me out of the office. So what was your relationship like with that whole system?
Oh, it was a bit of one thing I learned in the Midwest from my, my, my family was how to bury my head in the sand and to, to kind of ignore things that I didn't really want to face. And so what I, how I handled the cuts system was to completely ignore it and will myself to think, I, I'm not going to get cut. I'm not going to get cut. Just keep every, you know, don't worry about that. No way, not you. And so I, it was this denial that I lived by so strongly that, that that's what got me through it. I, my advisor was David F Collie and he, I did not get a warning and I, but I think because I knew, I think I figured out how to please David in, in, in his class and I would use it.
I, yeah. So it was a very much play up to what he wanted and I figured that language out. And I figured out that, and I think that's how I got around getting more into her cut.
So your skills, your, your, your, your skills or whatever you developed as a kid or whatever, however that went down and how you use it to your advantage. Well, yeah, but you use it to your advantage to make what I think is an intolerable situation, more tolerable for you. You know, I just think of the, the pressure and the M the fear that I had, and it felt intolerable. And so you did what you had to do to make an intolerable thing. You know, it worked for you at the time, and you said listening to listening to a lot of heads to Paul, what, what, what stuck out about what Paul home quiz said?
I'm just curious. Cause you mentioned that episode
Should be that the episode to me changed my life in terms of how I looked at our experience, it was a really, and you don't have to go into specifics, but I'm just wondering, like what things, because for me what it, what it, what was the vulnerability of how, like how vulnerable we were as kiddos. Yeah.
And I, and I, I connected with that. Like how vulnerable he, he, he, his experience and, and how some of the faculty took advantage of that. But I, I'm not, I, I don't know. I can't, I can't articulate it right now. Yeah. I'm not sure. Well,
While you're thinking about it, let me pose a question to both of you, which is that I think all of us would say that we were people-pleasers. Yeah. I'm just thinking, like maybe being a people pleaser and like learning and growing are not, are, are mutually exclusive. Like, if you are people pleasing by definition, you cannot be getting better. Right. You can't be like learning and growing because all of your focus is on the person you're trying to please. And you only get the feedback. If that person seems pleased or displeased with what you're doing, that doesn't help you when you go.
I mean, it helps you when you go on to please the next person, just because you have general like, get really good at reading people's. But like, I kind of think that maybe that was the biggest reason, at least for me and Barbara is that we could, like Rick said, I never heard you say that before Rick said, why aren't you living up to your star potential? Like, I was just thinking like, well, she wasn't because she was people pleasing and she wasn't making it about like her own, you know what I mean? Like you had, basically from beginning to end, you had no idea that you were going there to learn something for you. You were just going to like, figure out what all these other teachers wanted. Right. I think that is so right on Gina, that like we being a people pleaser really, and now I'm working on it in this industry myself.
It's like, I it's like, it blocks me from accepting helpful feedback that would actually make me better as an artist and a human being. So I am blocked from receiving any sort of gifts of like, let me help you basically. And what we're kids based that, that let me help you. Wasn't so helpful when they were doing that. I mean, maybe it's just some people, it was not living up to your star. Potential is not very much a helpful note, but I couldn't even express like, oh, I want to live up to my star potential. It's just that I'm trying to please your crazy ass. And so I can, you know what I mean? It's just so fascinating to me. And look we've said it, it was a certain time.
It was a certain place, but I'm, I think Gina said it right where it's like, people pleasers cannot, it's a full-time job. That's what I'll say.
Yeah. And ultimately you're like, you get, so you get the laugh, so you get the part. So you get like, and you're just doing it to please. But ultimately you're not, you're not really giving your genuine self because you're too busy trying to mold it for someone else. So it is, it has, it gets in the way it gets in the way of you really being a genuine person in a room or in a situation. And just being like yourself because you, you know, and, and I think a lot of it is like, oh, there's that? And maybe me it's that voice in my head that says, no, they don't want to know that they don't want it. They don't want to hear about thing, but that's the genuine part of me. Right.
And that's the thing that I'm not sharing when it comes to people. Pleasing is, is that sometimes, you know, so,
And the other thing I was going to say is like, when you decided to do the plan, your own voice, sec was your, it sounds like to me was your first attempt really? At the theater school to say, no, I'm not going to people please. And to be in this place and you want me to be, I'm going to take a leap and so good for you for doing that because I never, I, my ass was like, I'll just stay here forever until someone discovers how great I am. Even though I don't know who I am. You know what I mean? Like, it's so good for you that you did the started that theater company. Yeah. But Jason, were you saying that just right now, you were thinking in your head that we don't want to hear something you were saying, or you're talking about when you were in theater school, you were here.
No. In theater score. When I find in the past have been at my most people pleasing, you know, when, when, when, when that, when that gets in the way of ultimately success is because I'm too busy trying to figure out, oh, what does that person want? Or what w why didn't, you know, when it's just like, just give them, you just give them what you got. And, you know, it's so simple to say that, but it's so hard to do when you're also a people pleaser from such a young age. You know,
One of the things that has informed my people pleasing a lot is this idea that like, I'm inherently uninteresting. So I have to always put myself in this category of like, I'll pretend to be this personal, what, and what I've learned. What I learned being a therapist is that is the most boring thing you can do, everybody glazes over when you're not yourself. Meanwhile, if you are yourself, you could be just doing the most mundane thing. And maybe it's not riveting, but it's, you
Know, it's interesting. That's why animals are so interesting to watch on film. Right. Cause they're just, they're just are. And so you're like, wow, that dog just stole the show.
Right? They're not, the squirrel is not like, is this good? Which is why the squirrel did I eat that nut? Right. Which is why it was interesting to talk to people like we were talking to Siler Thomas, who was like, you know, I'm not really that into acting anymore. I'm just sort of doing my thing. And all of a sudden, he's getting cast now, years later in all these roles. And he's like, I'm just sort of doing the thing, which is why beginner's mind really works. It's like, that's, what's interesting. And I think, I don't know, my question is in terms of what the work you're doing now in your life, are you acting, are you able to, do you feel as though you're able to bring more of you to your work as at pinnacle or at, at other places?
Certainly at pinnacle, there's like I have these skills that I've developed in that I think you will find useful. And so there is an empowerment of an, any, I do feel more like myself and feel happy with that work. And as far as acting, you know, I've got a, again, a four year old and a seven year old. So I'm, I'm, I am learning how to be a present dad, which was also really hard for me to instill a challenge for me to be. So I want to be more about, you know, what's going on with them or I'm trying to, and, and, and there's still, you know, I'm not, I'm less concerned about if I'm going to get a commercial or, or do do do theater work.
I want to, and I know it'll be there when I'm ready to go back to it. And I still like long for it. Like there is still a part of me that, so I'll sit around and tell stories to my son while he's eating to make a meat. So he's like, tell me a story. So that's my little performance that I get for the day.
Well, what I was going to ask you is what are, if you've thought of it, what are, as you look at the second half of your life, what are going to be your goals, your creative goals for the second half of your life, is there, is there like a dream project you have in mind, or even a dream, like change of career you have in mind,
Honestly, this, this second chapter or this part of my life has really been more about being the best version of myself and not doing that people pleasing and not. And so I am man to go to a dream. Yeah. There are certain shows. Like I have a very distinct version of Macbeth that I want to do or, or, or things like that. But you know, it's not now, I don't know. I guess kids, kids can change it when you really like, enjoy and start to enjoy having kids. And because I will be honest, I, there was times I didn't, I was not always happy.
And, and, and so, so again, I don't, I don't know if I'm not really answering the question, but, but it
Was no, that's okay. I think what you're, I think your answer is, yeah. My, my goals are to be the best version of myself. I can be, you know, you're, you're not which I can relate to too. And maybe when you feel more, what you want to be with that that'll allow the room for whatever your like creative goals might be. I think so. Well, we're going to have to end soon, but I'm just curious if you have any little anecdotes or things you wanted to make sure to share.
Yeah. There was a story that I don't think I've heard you share yet boss, but I know you were involved in it when I was crewing for Andrew CLIs in the lion and I got to meet Patrick and you and, and, and Russell harden. And again, great cast. And I was crewing. I was on the set and there was a time when the, the, the Empress, she got sick, Stephanie White, Stephanie White, and someone had to go on in her place. Did you, have you talked about the story?
Yeah. We talked about it a little bit, but my Stephanie, Stephanie, she hasn't, her episode hasn't come out yet. I
Was backstage for this whole, and this was one of those moments where I was like, theater is awesome because this, this young lady had to go on. Not knowing. She's like, I think I got it. She didn't really have it. And she had an ear prompter in her ear and the stage manager.
I'm sorry, I have to, I have to stop you. Cause I've heard this story three times and I never figured out who is the person who got picked to be, was she in the play already? Or was it no. No,
You shouldn't have done it. If anything, because you were like next, you should have been that part. And I don't know, but then
Who would have been named needed me, they needed me to drag her around. It was Kate McKiernan. I'm pretty sure with
Kate McEwen and that's right. And she who got sick. Right. Because definitely when he got sick and Kate went on that's right. And, and so I was backstage with the stage manager. Who's reading the lines in the ear prompter, but Kate's not saying them. And so we're both like what's going on, what's happening. And, and Jen, you're doing your best to like, kind of fill in or do your thing. And then, and then the stage manager goes, Kate, if you can hear me raise your hand. And from the side, we're watching the teleprompter. We just see slowly as Jen's trying to do her lines, you just see her slowly, raise her arms
And look around,
Like, she's justifying that. And I just, it was, it was hilarious. And I, and I, I know she was in a panic, but it was still just beautiful how it was. And it just stuck with me as like, man, they pulled it off and those kids still loved it. And, and wow. Look at, look at, look at the collaboration. Look
At the true ensemble of motherfucking experience, dude, this is fascinating because the first time I heard this story was when boss told me. So I heard it from her perspective of dragging the girl around. And then we heard about it from Stephanie, which was her, which her experience was figuring out when she knew she was too sick to go on whether or not she could figure out a way to, you know, her, her whole extort story about it is of course not the show because she wasn't there. It was like leading up to it and thinking the show must go on and how, you know, I think she was, I think she told us she was being kind of people were telling her, like, it doesn't matter how sick you are unique. And she, she said, no, I, I can't.
So now we have to have Kate on. Yeah. And see
What the panic experienced.
The lion would have such a leg. You know, You liked what you heard today. Please give us a positive five star review and subscribe and tell your friends. I survived. Theater school is an undeniable Inc production. Jen Bosworth, Ramirez, and Gina are the co-hosts. This episode was produced, edited, and sound mixed by Gina for more information about this podcast or other goings on of undeniable, Inc. Please visit our website@undeniablewriters.com. You can also follow us on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. Thank you.