(This was digitized by an automated process and may contain transcription errors.)

Patrick Oliver Jones:

This past weekend, I got a chance to see a very unique theatrical production called the Circuit. It's an immersive silent disco dance piece that takes place in the streets and sidewalks and parks of Brooklyn. And as the dancers move from location to location, we, the audience, follow along with them. It is certainly very different from the usual theater we're used to, with the stage in front and seats for us to sit in. And for the creative team who put this theatrical experience together, that's exactly what they were going for. Something out of the box and out of the ordinary.

Katherine Winter:

Hi, my name is Katherine Winter. I'm originally from Toronto, Canada. I now live in New York City. I am a multi hyphenate theatre maker and the co founder and creative producer of New York Theatre Company.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

The New York Theatre Company is a relatively new producing organization with their first production coming last summer, an Off Broadway revival of Machineau at New York City Center. But for their current production, they took to the outdoors and brought in co director John Kroft and choreographer and co director Josh Zacher.

Josh Zacher:

Hi, I'm Josh Zacher. I'm originally from Fort Wayne, Indiana, but I've lived in New York city for almost 13 years. I'm a director, choreographer and artistic educator.

John Kroft:

My name is John Kroft. I'm from New York City and I still live in New York City. I grew up in Manhattan and now I've moved all the way to Brooklyn. I'm an actor primarily, but in the past year or two, I've really gotten into directing and a little bit of writing as well.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

And so this episode is going to be a little unique as well in that instead of hearing three stories from one guest and you'll be hearing one story from each of these three guests. From the creative and logistical skill it takes to create outdoor theater to the very personal experiences of losing an agent and being fired from a show. Kathryn, Josh and John reveal challenges they faced and what it took to overcome them. As theater moves forward, it is young creatives like these that are bringing energy and innovation to a whole new generation of theater artists. I'm Patrick Oliver Jones and you're listening to why I'll Never Make It.

John Kroft:

If I followed acting, it would take me into all kinds of diverse, meaningful life experiences. I don't know what my life is going to be. I'm going to just follow this thing and it will take me everywhere. But I think what I've actually really learned is that you don't really make anyone happy when you try to make everyone happy.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Well, welcome, Katharine. It is so good to have you and the rest of your theater company on the podcast. So I'm so glad that I get to talk to you today.

Katherine Winter:

So happy to be here. Yes.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Well, you have an interesting story as far as being introduced to the arts with one of the all time greats, the most beloved of performers, Ms. Barbra Streisand. Of course. This was your introduction to the arts. Like, she was all over your house, you say?

Katherine Winter:

Yes, there were like more photos of Barbra Streisand in my house growing up than there were of my own family. My mom was a huge fan. My third word was babwa. It was mama, dada babwa. We had like a photo of her on our staircase. And when my mom would take me up and down the stairs, you have a kid, you're like, oh, chair, table. You point out things to them so you learn words. My mom, I'm sure she went up and down the stairs, would say, barbara.

Katherine Winter:

And then one day, Barbara Streisand, the COVID of I think Time or Life magazine. And my mom was reading it and I went, bob and mom's like, no way. And it was her favorite party trick. And so, yeah, it's just always been around me and like, you know, grow up. There's like baby videos of me be like, I'd rather be woo. Thinking of you and doing all of that. And so like Funny Girls departed my life. All the old Hollywood movie musicals.

Katherine Winter:

There was a great video rental store across the street from my house in Toronto. And in the basement, you meant like 13 videos for 11 bucks for, for a week. So like in the summers we like pick, you know, Gene Kelly and rent all of Gene Kelly's movies or all of our stays or all of, you know, all of that. And so it was really exposed to that old Hollywood glamour and the big production numbers and all of that from, from the time I was born, it

Patrick Oliver Jones:

was similar to me growing up. Like I watched more black and white movies than I watched color movies growing up. Just because I love those old style movies and characters. And it really was a different style of acting, especially like 30s and 40s, you know, listen here, see, I'm going to tell you something. See if like, I don't know what it was, but as a kid I just loved all of.

Katherine Winter:

Absolutely. Yeah, it was just the best. And you know, as I got older, I could start going to the theater. There's so much amazing work in Toronto, where I'm from. And so being able to go to all of that. And yeah, it was, it was Quite the gift.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Now, obviously your mother loved Barbra Streisand. Did you have that same love or were you like, oh, gosh, mom, stop it.

Katherine Winter:

No, always. I never revolted. Yeah.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

What would be your favorite Barbara? Either album, movie project that she did?

Katherine Winter:

Oh, I mean, it's Funny Girl. It has to be Funny Girl. It's really. It's not really a competition. They're singular. Especially now, going back because so much was just like whatever was always on in the past, like five, six years. Especially with her memoir coming out. Going back through her discography has been really special.

Katherine Winter:

Or finding I'm like, oh, I don't think I ever heard or ever really clocked this song before. How amazing this is. Or my most listened to song on Spotify last year was Gotta Move, the Barbra Surprise. And I went to the museum in Chicago and did the whole like, gotta move, gotta get out. So, yeah.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Was your own style of performance. Like, when you started getting to performing, did you try to emulate Barbara?

Katherine Winter:

Not really. I felt like she was this untouchable thing. And like, I felt like very early on my mom told me, like, Barbara does Barbara. No one else can do Barbara. Like, no one else should even do Funny Girl. They shouldn't remake the movie. Like, that is Barbra Streisand's thing. And so I was always like, oh, that's over here.

Katherine Winter:

And I love it, but I never tried to touch it. I was always a big fan of really broad characters. Like, I wanted to be Lena Lamont growing up. I would do the voice or I wanted to do specifically Minnie Driver as Carlotta in the Phantom 2004 movie was like my favorite thing of like her crazy Italian accent. And so I was big on the big like characterizations and big impersonations that way. Or I got really into once I got into dance and getting into the big tap dance numbers and all of that sort of thing. And then later on transitioning to a lot of the Fosse work and all of that amazing repertoire.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Was there ever a moment at which you did like a Barbra Streisand song and a cabaret or something like that?

Katherine Winter:

Honestly, no. It just really felt like this is like something you just shouldn't do. It felt like this big, almost like the Do Not Sing list that you kept hearing about. And it just never really. I briefly thought about doing her version of putting it together in like grade 7 to no backing track, just like an acapella putting it together from the Broadway album. But I quickly went like, this is a bad idea.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

There's, there's a friend of mine who loves Barbra Streisand as well. And every year he does this Christmas thing and one of the songs he has to do is Jingle Bells because no one there. There is no other version than Barbara's version of that song.

Katherine Winter:

Absolutely. I have in more recent years, like, done like choreograph, like dances to a lot of the Barbra Streisands, especially the more eclectic things like the who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf and, you know, we're the Jingle Bells, those sorts of things. But never, I was never like, this is. I should do my version because Barbara's is over here. Like, I don't want to touch it.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

And obviously, I assume your mom was ecstatic about you getting into performing as well.

Katherine Winter:

Absolutely. Yeah, she was. She grew up wanting to go into dance and ballet and then ended up transitioning out of it was briefly in photography and then end up, you know, doing her own thing. But yeah, she loves the excuse to come to New York every other month and see theater and be a part of things and be on the outside and, ooh, that's this person. Oh, my God. You know, so and so, so that's amazing.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

And so what was it that brought you to New York for the first time?

Katherine Winter:

For the first time? It was actually just like a trip with my cousin and my aunt and my mom and I, we went for like my cousin's 16th birthday. We did like a girls trip for four or five days when I was a kid. And then it's so close and it's an hour flight or eight hour drive from Toronto. So we started coming, you know, two, three times a year, Take the overnight bus Friday nights after school, get a cheap hotel for one night, see a bunch of shows, take the overnight bus back, go to school Monday morning sort of thing. And so since probably 2008, 2009, coming two, three times a year until I eventually moved here. I knew by time I moved here, I was like, oh, I know where everything is. Like, I know how to use the subway. I knew, you know, it wasn't like this big culture shock in any way.

Katherine Winter:

It felt, it felt similar to Toronto in a lot of ways. It's, you know, Toronto is just the cleaner, more spread out New York.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

That's what I always tell people. It's like they're very similar. I think Toronto's a little bit more like Chicago in the fact that Chicago is just slightly smaller, a bit more. There's a bit, it's just a bit Friendlier vibe to it. But. But yeah, Toronto is definitely one of my favorite cities. I love to visit.

Katherine Winter:

As Steve Martin says, Toronto is just like New York without all the stuff.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Yeah, but like you're saying you still have all the arts and everything to be there, you know, because touring productions come through there, it produces its own.

Katherine Winter:

There's a lot of great, like independent theater. There's a lot of great, like it takes a village theater. I went to performing arts high school in Toronto and it was very much like, I think I learned the craft of theater making. Even though I was a drama major. We did. We spent less time learning like necessarily how to act or like this is this technique of acting, but more of like this is how you make work. This is how a lightboard works. Like you have 10 bucks, go to the dollar store and make a wedding dress.

Katherine Winter:

Like you want to make this happen. Like you raise money at the corner and you do it in the fringe. And it was very much like everyone knew how to do a bit of everything. And you band together and you make it happen no matter what. So there's a lot of really small independent, like black box, 50 to 100 seat spaces in Toronto that are really cool. That same sentiment doesn't exist necessarily all the time in the like, mainstream New York City venues. It definitely very much exists. But I felt like in college I felt like there was only very few of us who were like, oh, wait, but we can just make this happen for ourselves.

Katherine Winter:

So that's kind of how this all came to be.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

I think that's one of the benefits of being in a city like Toronto, because it's a big enough city to where there's opportunities, but it's still small enough to where independent productions are still vital and such a vibrant part of the theater community that you do have to really make it on your own.

Katherine Winter:

Absolutely.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

And a friend of mine who lives there, who's. Who does a lot of work within the city, but she says that so much of especially the bigger productions are now tours. They're coming from outside the city rather than being produced there. It's only with those more independent, smaller productions that you get the local actors.

Katherine Winter:

Absolutely. Those same people tend to do things over and over again as well.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

How do you think that sense of community either helped you or maybe you had a bit of a learning curve coming to a bigger city like New York?

Katherine Winter:

Well, I moved to New York to go to nyu and so I haven't really been a working professional living in Toronto in the same way. I've reps up there. I've gone to auditions, I've done some work, but it hasn't been the same of I've been trying to hustle in Toronto in the same way as I have in New York. What I have found is the Canadian expats in New York. We all find each other, and we tend to all work together, even New York theater company. The company I founded is Michellina Kennedy, who's also from Canada, worked all the time in Toronto. I helped her start a theater company in Toronto about a decade ago now. But it's.

Katherine Winter:

We all find each other, and all the immigrants really find each other in New York, especially those making theater. And so you really band together and be like, it's so hard. Like, come join. Come with me. And that feels like the epitome of New York City. Like, anything canon will happen. And it is that, like, you know, you have to just leave. What good is sitting alone in your room? You have to go outside and make life happen for yourself in a way that's really exciting.

Katherine Winter:

And so that community is still very much present in New York. You have to do some initial searching to try to find it. But I think that once you find your people, it's easy to glom onto them and start gathering more and more and expanding that network.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Well, that gets us right into your first story that you wanted to talk about, which is this arts piece called Voyeur, the Windows of Toulouse Lautrec. This was done during the pandemic, and I want to know a little bit more about the. The show itself. So it was done. It was done outside, but kind of inside. Okay, so explain the. Explain the concept.

Katherine Winter:

So we start in August 2020. For. In. For reference, the dining shelters weren't even open yet. Like, I was still, like, leaving my house with one glove to open a door and, like, putting a new glove on when I come back inside. Like, we were in a very different times. And it was called Boy, you're the Witness of Toulouse, the Trek. We took over abandoned storefronts in Greenwich Village.

Katherine Winter:

So it started at the duplex. So there was a local bar as a place to, like, house the. Some of the actors. And then, like, there's the organization Shashama that gave us space and some of the other real estate folks and landlords that gave us their empty storefronts. And so an actor would be a. Behind a storefront with a mask on, and the audience would be eight people at a time outside. They'd have almost like a tour guide, like, character that was A narrator that would bring them from place to place. They'd watch vignettes behind storefront windows.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Okay.

Katherine Winter:

As it happened, from place to place. We were able to run for 10 months entirely safely. And then, like, each stage, there was three stage managers, and each one, like, took over the area and watched over, like, you know, two or three different scenes and kind of kept an eye out. But it kept contact really low because it was only one or two performers in a scene. And that actor would do their scene eight times a night, every 30 minutes. So they would do their one scene or five minute scene and they would repeat it again. And it was almost all like dance, physical theater, puppetry. Because you were masked, you couldn't really talk too much.

Katherine Winter:

The narrator outside would maybe have a line or two, and then it was all, like, in, like, a music box that was wound up the show as it moved from place to place outside.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

But Lautrec was the basis of the show. And how did that factor into it?

Katherine Winter:

Yeah, so it was based off of vignettes of Toulouse Lautrec's life. So part of it was at the brothels. Part of it was about his childhood, part of it was about his mother, part of it was about his father. One of which was in By Jefferson Market Garden in Greenwich Village. There's that triangular space. There was a girl who was up on a ladder in a big hoop skirt. And then inside, her skirt lit up. And inside there was a puppet show of essentially, like, Tulu La Trek's childhood.

Katherine Winter:

And there was a little puppet interacting with the characters inside the skirt, on the outside. And so it was a lot of, like, very European feeling, theater in a lot of ways. And so each one was kind of a vignette of different moments of his life ending with him, you know, having ODing on absinthe and other substances and all that. And as you know, not a happy story.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

I mean, Lautrec is certainly a fascinating character. Just himself, you know, the life that he led. Where did this idea come from? Because it sounds pretty involved, especially as you have the audience going from place to place. What was the initial concept and how did this idea come to fruition?

Katherine Winter:

Yeah, so this wasn't my idea. I worked with a theater company called Bated Breath Theater Company. They previously had an off off Broadway show running called Unmaking To Lose Lautrec that was set inside Madame X, which was a bar in the Village. And so it was about kind of the end of Toulouse Lautrec's life. So it was set in sort of this, like, Moulin Rouge type place with the cancan girls and other characters came into play. And so when the pandemic hit, the artistic director at the time thought about, we have this great story. I can tell you about all these costumes. She was really obsessed with a lot of the material of the piece and decided to how could we reinvent and kind of devise a new show? And so there was a new company of folks that were devising these different moments based on the, you know, site response to the locations.

Katherine Winter:

Over in the Village, this feels very Parisian here. Some of the West Village feels very Parisian. And those little streets and the lampposts and, oh, this is well lit over here. We have a contact over here. Okay, they get mad at us over here. We'll do something over here now. So every, like, three months or so, the show would change because, like, you know, someone would then rent the space. So we lose our space and have to find a new place somewhere else.

Katherine Winter:

But I was the rehearsal director. I was the dance captain for the show, and then I was in it. And I played a whole bunch of different tracks over the course of the 10 months. I think I played almost every character at some point. So I got to really good at, like, learning how street theater is made and the. The joys of it. And also, like, you know, someone threw toast at me and naked magnatude, a carton of eggs. Suddenly you're in the middle of a parade that suddenly formed, and you're like, okay, this is happening.

Katherine Winter:

And, you know, the magic that is

Patrick Oliver Jones:

New York City, because city is still happening around you, you know, not. Not making way for your production. The on.

Katherine Winter:

Yeah. And then you get used to the people who are, like, always excited that you're there. The people who are always mad. The person that always wants to try to walk through the scene or, you know, be. Be funny. But also at that time, like, we were the only ones. Everyone's like, you can't make theater. You can't make art.

Katherine Winter:

You're not do this thing. We were like, the only ones who were doing it. And it was really magical. And people. I feel like people in New York missed the, like, what is this weird New York thing that's happening? Because that wasn't happening anymore. They didn't see the buskers on the streets anymore. And so we were that really cool, beautiful phenom to happen.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Well, it's interesting, this kind of vignette. By vignette, I mean. I mean Sleep no More kind of does a little bit of that masquerade. The new Phantom version is doing a bit of that, where it's like, you do this vignette, go to the next place, go to the next place. And those are kind of like, choose your adventure where you can follow this character or go into this next room. Masquerade's a bit more strategic, but sleep no more. You really could go anywhere. Was yours a bit more like that or was it more structured? Here, Here, here.

Katherine Winter:

It was linear. You had to follow your group in your guide and go from one one place to the next. And so you travel as a little pack. Same theater company did a show called Chasing Andy Warhol that you move as a pack. And same with the show we're creating now called the Circuit. I also worked on Money Heist, the Experience, the immersive show, as well as to Nightmares, the Jimmy Fallon immersive haunted house thing. We're all, like, linear. You have to move.

Katherine Winter:

You had your allotted time that you entered the show, and then you move almost like a Disney ride, which also how Masquerade operates. They have, like, a go button at the top, and you move with the show.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Now, this kind of show, being that it's, you know, vignette to vignette, the. It's almost like a, you know, instead of a progressive dinner, it's progressive theater where you're taking one course at a time. That is obviously very different from the, you know, act one, act two, intermission. You know, all the things that we do on a stage. Obviously, acting and portraying a character can be similar, but it seems like the actual mechanism of doing this kind of theater is vastly different.

Katherine Winter:

Yes, it's a lot of math. It's a lot of game theory. It's a lot of crowd management and, like, being able to read people in a different way. It's very insular in the. In the creation of the scenes themselves. Of how can that be more excellent in the nature of the immersive stuff? Whether you do it twice a night, whether you do it, we did it eight times a night in Voyeur. In Andy Warhol, we did it five times a night. Money heist, we did it 50 times a day on a weekend.

Katherine Winter:

But, like, it's also interesting meditation on craft because you're like, oh, I didn't get that right this time. Let me do it again this time. And also, you get no applause because they're all moving on.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Right, Right.

Katherine Winter:

So you don't get that, like, and now we're done. They just. They keep moving. And maybe the last thing you might applaud, there'll be certain moments where there's a hoot and holler or whatever it is, you know, what kind of scene it is. But yeah, it's a very interesting. Like, I'm going in to do this thing. I do this thing. Okay, now we do it again.

Katherine Winter:

And it's just a very interesting moment of diving really in deep with one 5 to 10 minute sequence.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

It reminds me of my days in theme park where there would be times where I would do five shows a day, same thing. It's just, you know, you. You do it, take a 45 minute break, do it again, you know, it's just back and forth, you know, for the whole day. And it seems like it's more a test of stamina than, say, skill percent Obviously there's skill involved, but stamina is really the biggest thing to maintain it from that first performance until your eighth performance or whatever it was that day.

Katherine Winter:

Yeah, I think it also depends on the nature of what the show is. And voyeur definitely felt that way because it was so many times and it was so insular. And also, like, you were by yourself in this room. Like you didn't have friends. Maybe some of them had. They had. Might have a partner with them. I think some of them had two people in the scenes.

Katherine Winter:

But there were many times, like, it's just you and you're like twiddling your thumbs. Then you hear them coming down there, or you see the stage management, like, slow, and you're like, oh, okay, they just finished two scenes away. I'm gonna like, put my lipstick back on now or I'm gonna, you know, powder my forehead and I'm gonna go get, get set. So I'm ready. But it's a very funny, odd thing to remove all the normalities of the dressing room and the proscenium and theater itself. Yeah, the show my theater company is working on now, the circuit, it's very different because they have a holding space that is all of their dressing rooms. It's not pandemic times. And the show itself does require an immense amount of skill.

Katherine Winter:

Like, the choreography is very heightened and very intricate, and there's a lot of partner work. And it is a little bit. While it's based off of La Ronde, the nature of it is that there are also vignettes. They are woven together and there is an adding on to. And there are, you know, nuggets of things you have to drop along the way to make the audience get the story by the end. And so it's a little bit more Of a linear storytelling more similar, I guess, to a masquerade because there is an actual full story being told, not just, like, moments of things that are artistic for different reasons about a person.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

What would you say is the hardest part, that most challenging part of doing that type of performance versus the stage? What do you think is the biggest difference?

Katherine Winter:

The hardest things are the hard days. There are times when it is the most magical thing. You're like, there's nothing else I'd rather be doing. I am outside in New York City Circuit, for instance, is like, oftentimes at golden hour in Dumbo, like, you can see the Manhattan Bridge or the Brooklyn Bridge in the skyline by the carousel. And it's stunning. And you see everyone's faces being like, this is magic. Or you see the kids that go by that aren't even, you know, watching that are actually part of the show and their faces light up. Or they might be seeing some of this dance for the first time, or seeing, you know, a queer couple partner together for the first time.

Katherine Winter:

And you see that. You see that excitement, which is really magical. And there's the days that, like, it's windy and cold and wet and nothing goes your way. And there's a flea market where you were going to do your scene, and so we're doing it over here. And then this person ran through the middle of the scene, or we couldn't do that lift. Or this thing happened. And so the hard thing is, like, the hard days. And there's not that you will have the extremes in doing outdoor theater in general, and especially immersive theater.

Katherine Winter:

You'll have the audiences who saw this as a cool thing to do in New York, it's a date night, and they're just there to take photos and, like, do not want to watch the scene. They just want to wander around. You have to be like, no, you have to come follow us. This is not sleep. No, more like follow and follow the leader. Okay, how do we change those instructions? How do we deal with that? Crowd management? How do we, you know, oh, someone decided to have a dinner reservation. How the show, they decide to leave. You're like, what do you mean?

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Yeah, yeah. I was wondering.

Katherine Winter:

You talk about the hardest thing is the hard days.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Yeah. You talk about people walking through does that. Obviously, I think most people are considerate enough. They see a crowd of people, they avoid it. But then there are those people who just want to make a scene or whatever. They'll just walk through as you're performing.

Katherine Winter:

I mean, yes, we have a lot of our stage management team, as well as we call them, the public who are somewhat crowd control, part of the world building of the show for the circuit in particular. A lot of things I've learned from my other outdoor experiences because we have more. A little bit more manpower. We have people saying, you know, on the. Almost creating a proscenium for the. For the audience to stand around and that. To have little batons and try to say, like, hey, something's happening over here. Oh, just watch out.

Katherine Winter:

Something's about to happen. To really make sure one, the performers are safe, and two, that the audience members and passerbys don't get kicked in the head, the children don't run through the scene at the child's birthday party. Doesn't end up, you know, in the middle of the big kick sequence or whatever's about to happen. But there will always be. There'll always be those random things that happen. That's also somewhat what's magical. It's what's magical from the audience to be like, how are they about to deal with the person with this truck that's about to drive through? Okay, we're gonna shift. Okay, we're gonna move everyone over here.

Katherine Winter:

And we have certain hand signals of like, we have to move or we have to pause. We have to stop, stop. And like, plan A, B, C, D for all of these. Or you get to your scene, suddenly something's not where you said it would be. Yeah, there's a lot of flexibility. You have to be excited by it being different every time it is. If you. Someone likes their same show eight times a week is immersive.

Katherine Winter:

Outdoor theater is not for you.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

And when it came to Voyer, you said it lasted 10 months. Were there moments at which you thought, we can't keep doing this? I mean, besides the pandemic, that was its own, you know, thing, but just the show itself. Was it a challenge to just keep it going for that long?

Katherine Winter:

I mean, yes, certainly. We started. And so we used to rehearsal it in August. The original plan, I think, was to go to, like, end of October, early November. That being said, we only did it, like, once, one or two nights a week. It wasn't an everyday sort of situation. But, like, there was the time where we then got our winter clothes, how we have a rain version of our costume. So a lot of that.

Katherine Winter:

There was also a lot of turnover. Like, it really isn't for everyone. I think it was me and one other person who lasted the entire run of the show. Someone else lasted, like, came Three months in and stayed for the rest of the run. But, you know, every. Every time we had, like, a renewal of contracts, we usually lost a good. A good chunk of people because, like, great. I did that.

Katherine Winter:

I tried it. I don't need to keep doing this. It's hard on your body to dance on the street. It's a lot of, like, pre and post care. Yeah. You have to have this. You have to both be intent in your performance and also have that spotty sense, as you would walking down 8th Avenue in Rush hour, of, like, the people around you and, like, be aware of, like, being a New Yorker in the city and, like, what might be around you and what's going to happen. And is this safe to go here? And is this person okay? Okay, great.

Katherine Winter:

Let's keep moving.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Yeah. It reminds me of when I was at Disney World speaking of theme park. I was in this dinner show. And while the show itself was structured, there's this one segment where we're all out in the audience. We're talking to them. There's a song that happens, but it's still very interactive with the audience. We never kind of know how they're going to react, what they're going to say. We can talk to them, that kind of thing.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

And so that is where I really learned how to think on my feet. Not just stick to the script, not just do this, but to really interact with an audience, bring them into the show. And it seems like that this was your way of learning that kind of thinking on your feet and always being ready for whatever comes your way, which is. Is a great skill to have, especially in theater.

Katherine Winter:

Yeah, it's really. It's. Yes. And. But a completely different. Not in a like, let's make it funny way or. That's like a. Entertain people.

Katherine Winter:

It's like a. Yes. And like, this problem has arised. Yes. And I'm not going to stress out about it. What's the next option? What's the creative problem solving? Great. This has happened. Yes.

Katherine Winter:

And like, we, for instance, with the circuit, we have routes of plan A, B, C, D. And also we want to be great neighbors. You know, things are happening in the Dumbo area. It's a great place. Other people host events. Like, we don't want to get in anyone's way, but it's just. Yes, Annie. Let's find a different version.

Katherine Winter:

And let's also find a different version that feels just as if not more exciting half the times. The second or third choice version becomes our favorite versus the original idea of one of these things when you're location scouting for these outdoor shows.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Well, you've been mentioning the circuit a few times, and so let's dig into that, because obviously, Voyeur was a challenging but fun experience, and so it didn't put you off to this kind of outdoor, immersive experience that you're now bringing to the circuit. So when did talk of this idea, this circuit idea, how did that begin?

Katherine Winter:

So let me go back a little bit. About a year and a half ago now, Selena Kennedy and I founded New York theatre Company, which is a production company, artist collective based in New York City. Shockingly, no one had the name, which is how we got the name.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

I don't. When I heard the name, I was like, that's really never existed before. So funny.

Katherine Winter:

Yes. Didn't exist. And so this is really the first show to come out of the artist collective. We had our first commercial production last year, which was Machinal at New York City Center. The idea predated the theater company itself being formed. And this was the first production of that theater company, then the artist collective. We have, you know, once every other month, meetings or so. And one of the very first ones, someone said, I want to do rogue Hamlet outside in Washington Square Park.

Katherine Winter:

Someone else was like, well, if we're doing something in the summer, I want it to be like, a gay party. I don't want to do Hamlet. And someone else said, I want to do something with Laurent. I've always wanted something with Laurent. And I was like, wait, can Laurent become a gay dance party outside of New York City? And so they started exploring that idea together. We kind of, like, creatively match made two of them, which is John Kroft and Josh Zacher. It then became, what if we do a dance piece that's based off Desiree but happens in, like, the Hudson river piers or something like that? And then I remember the biggest problem we always have with these outdoor shows was noise complaints, was people in the neighborhood, like, they're fine with it once or twice. They live on Christopher Street.

Katherine Winter:

They live in the village. Like, they're used to noise. Like, you hear it four times a night, eight times a night. Like, it gets very annoying very quickly. And so Josh Sacker actually is very much a part of the silent disco community. It's called Float. They're an amazing organization that runs, like, traveling dance parties outside New York City. I was like, what's that technology? Like, can you use that? It then evolved to, what if it's more of a structured play than just, like, vibes or A dance party.

Katherine Winter:

And then flash forward, you know, six months or so. And we commissioned a writer. This. Over this past eight months ago now, we commissioned a writer, we commissioned a composer and sound designer to create this entirely original score and original script for the show. We hired voiceover actors to record the play. And then we went forward to hiring dancers to be in the show, to be the ones that are doing it.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

So it's in the headphones is where you're getting the actual characters and story, and then the dancers are basically embodying that particular scene.

Katherine Winter:

Absolutely. So you hear a play in an original EDM score, and then you watch the story unfold through dance outside on the streets of Dumbo. And then each scene happens in a different location. You move from place to place, and it's really this amazing. Made me kind of move in this explosive dance happens. And then we disappear because we're entirely silent. If people don't look up, like there's been people walking their dogs, they have no idea we're there.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Right. It's just a group of people, but you don't know that something's actually happening.

Katherine Winter:

Yeah. They see someone dancing. You're like, wait, what? What's happening over there?

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Because the dancers have the headphones on as well.

Katherine Winter:

They do, yes.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Right. I assume then that. I mean, it happens with any audience, but it seems like with this. Because it is so insular. You really are in your own kind of space of how you perceive what's what, what you're hearing, how you're perceiving what you're seeing, how they. How the two marry together. It really is going to be very individual for every audience member.

Katherine Winter:

Absolutely. It has that moment of, like, that private and public that we strive for in theater. A lot of having that private moment in public of, like, how obviously LeBron is all about desire, intimacy, and these various intimate encounters. And so our modern version still deals with very much that theme and different forms of intimacy. And so it's a way to kind of keep that very secretive. And it's a. That, like, people on the street can watch the show. They just can't hear the world that we're building inside of it.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Right.

Katherine Winter:

And how you create that soundtrack in New York City, I'm sure we've all walked around New York and listened to a song and be like, wow, can't believe I live here. And listen to the song as I'm walking down the street. And we try to create some of that as well as you're, you know, walking by on the main street of. Of Dumbo. And you can see the carousel in the background on the bridge in the Manhattan skyline. You're hearing this, like, beautiful score with, like, the saxophone playing, and you're like, wow, I live here. That's what we. That's what we're going for now with

Patrick Oliver Jones:

a more traditional show. Obviously, there's. There's the writing process, rehearsal process. Then you finally get in front of an audience, and that audience will tell you what's working, what's not working. But with this, how does the audience play a part in that production process?

Katherine Winter:

Yeah. So we had a variety of test audiences before we started previews. We worked on the script around the same time. We started working on some of the scores. We then locked the script, record all of the voiceover performances of the play. We then hand all of those off to our composer and sound designer. They created it with those voices. We then decided, actually, we don't need all of these lines and scrap this or move this over here or change this to this, or, you know, some of the songs, some of the text.

Katherine Winter:

We recorded a lot of the characters saying the same thing to see who we wanted to actually say it when we see it and all of that. We then held auditions to find the dancers for the show. And that audition was a whole other unique experience which we can get into later. We then spent two weeks in a studio teaching all the choreography, almost like it was a formal show. And we gave a sense of, like, over here there's a brick wall, and over here there's this. This is a railing. Here's a ballet bar to be the railing, and that sort of thing. And then we spell it into about a week on location, setting each scene in its place, and then also teching it in the dark.

Katherine Winter:

Because the show happens, you know, from daylight to sunset into the dark, depending on what time you see the show. So trying different, like, handheld lighting equipment that we can easily create theater magic with in a very simple way that can also travel with the show. And then we started bringing in test audiences to see versions of it. And see, do they tend to follow us. All these instructions we give, are they helpful? Are we giving too many instructions? Oh, we learned we were across active streets. We have to say, like, please stay on the sidewalk. Like, we don't own the streets. Like, don't stand in the middle of the streets.

Katherine Winter:

Like, there's little things that we learned over time that we have to make sure we mention this and be very specific here, or this is too much information. You don't need this. So a lot of it's about how we're guiding the audience and then also training our lovely members of the public, who are the ones, they're in neon vests and have batons, who are like, you know, leading the group and also being the caboose to make sure everyone's safe and travels and has the best experience possible.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

When it comes to the stage managers and people that are corralling the audience, do they come through the headphones as well? And so when they speak or is that something that they do? Take headphones off.

Katherine Winter:

Physical gestures. We have a prerecorded curtain speech where we introduce them. After you move the first time, it becomes pretty obvious of like, we're moving, we're stopping. The scene manager that travels with the show because two shows happen at the same time. They have a God mic. If they have to ever pause the show or it's lightning and thunder, okay, we're going to pull. We're going to pull the side, you know, whatever it might be, or maybe have certain signals that, like, if a cast member feels unsafe to stop the show, and then they'll get on the God mic and say, we're going to pause here, or whatever the instructions might be. So they have a God mic, but otherwise we don't really give additional instructions there.

Katherine Winter:

Everything's preset in the headsets. Then after the show, there's also instructions of what to do and where you're going and all of that, how to return your headphones.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Now, theater itself is this expensive and collaborative, and it can be a long process to bring something from the page to the stage. And so there's a lot of logistics with that. Everything that you're describing and explaining seems like exponentially more logistics and things to deal with when you're. When you're outside in these immersive things. So I'm curious, why go through something like this when you could do it inside of a black box theater or some other structure?

Katherine Winter:

I think that we want to make theater that is very exciting. We one of our and a part of our mission statement. Your theater company is like, you want to do things in the century old theater and in the loading dock behind it. And I feel like especially. Especially in the Off Broadway space recently, and there's been a big resurgence of opera, which is amazing. But it feels like there's the recent NYU grads doing things for literally $5,000 and then doing the two, $3 million off Broadway commercial runs, which is amazing. But we really think there should be something in between all of that, that feels commercially viable and exciting and engaging and all of the above. And so, at least New York Theater Company as a whole are really trying to find projects that excite us artistically.

Katherine Winter:

And I think this show in particular, it's about, like we like to say, New York is our scene partner. I am such a fan of New York. I fell even more in love with it over the pandemic. And, like, walking all of the streets of the scene is the most magical place. And I really try to impart everyone else to make it feel. I want them to feel how magical it is to me as well. And so it feels like it's the only place for this show to happen. I think it was created for this outdoor art form.

Katherine Winter:

Yes. Would it be lovely if we could, like, block off all of the streets ourselves and, you know, have this endless. New York is ours, and we spend, you know, $20 million to do that. And it happens every night, and it's spectacular. Yes. But we want to make something that is kind of pack and parcel, that feels both a nightlife experience, a theatrical experience, as well as possibly a tourist experience, and really kind of bridge those areas of things, possibly even make theatergoers out of people who like to go to the club or make theatergoers out of people who just want to see the Brooklyn Bridge. And any and all of those things, I think, can be true. We definitely want to do as New York Theater Company shows in big, fancy proscenium spaces, in.

Katherine Winter:

In the round, in a found warehouse, anything and all in between. But this really felt like it was the moment to do it outside and to really see New York. And I remember when we walked around Dumbo over a year ago now, we were like, this is so magical. I know whenever I'm down there, when I go to St. Anne's I was like, I should spend more time down here. It's so beautiful. There's so many amazing little streets. There's so many wonderful little cafes and restaurants.

Katherine Winter:

And we've gotten to work with the double business improvement district and so many different local businesses. I've been there for 30 years. And the amazing community that's there that I didn't expect, that really lives between these two bridges, all these old cobblestone streets.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Yeah, yeah, yeah. This is a perfect kind of show that the city itself is a character that. That a show like this would really. Would really thrive in that.

Katherine Winter:

Yeah. I think there's something to making New York feel alive. And also, we're doing this on as. As Lean a budget as possible. I learned a lot from what was missing from our very ragtag voyeur and Andy Warhol. Like, we're working with, we have union performers, we have rag performers in the show. We're working with AgVa, which is the union that represents the Rockettes and Cirque du Soleil, making sure everyone's insured and has PT equipment and has an air conditioned place to be and bathrooms and all those things. And like, it feels like now's the time where we're a new theater company.

Katherine Winter:

All of us, myself and Josh Zacher know each other for 11 years now. John and I know each other for a few more years. But like, we're young, we're gritty, we want to, we want to make the work we want to see and like, this is what we're able to make happen. And the goal would be that this is wildly successful. And we do this again in New York in a different area every year, or we do it in Chicago, we do it in Toronto, we do it in Miami or Atlanta or in London. And we're able to, you know, we have, we have the score, we all know the moves. And then we get to location scout and figure out the timing of those things and being able to bring it to different places and having people ignite their public spaces in a new way.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Well, welcome, Josh, it is so nice to, to meet you. So glad to have you on the podcast. Thanks for coming.

Josh Zacher:

Thanks for having me.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

And, and as a kid, you, you say you grew up in Indiana and so touring productions would come through. There was a local ballet company. So you were at least introduced to the arts as a young age, right?

Josh Zacher:

For sure. I, I attended a really great school, Canterbury School, that was really committed to exposing us to the arts. I also had grandparents and parents who were really passionate about getting me and getting, getting all their children, but I was the most interested into the arts. So there is, I'm from Fort Wayne, Indiana. There is a roadhouse there, the Embassy Theater, if you've played it or you've heard of it. I have never played it. I have toured three and a half times and I have never played it, but it's fine. And yeah, we would go see stuff.

Josh Zacher:

And then there's a truly a world class ballet company, the Fort Wayne Ballet, which my mom is actually the chair of the board there now because she's a boss. But yeah, we would go see those productions. We would also go to Chicago. That's like where I saw Wicked and a bunch of other productions. That would tour through Chicago. I was a Midwest kid, still am.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

And so with these touring productions that would come through or these ballet performances you would see, was it you expressing interest or did they kind of like bring you along? And then that interest grew over time.

Josh Zacher:

I mean, I. We started.

Katherine Winter:

They started us.

Josh Zacher:

Start them young. I mean, we. It was just like, we're going. You know, it was like a special thing. Like, we'd, you know, we'd go out and it would. We would have dinner somewhere and it was always on a weeknight. I remember that it was like, it's a Tuesday, but like, we're gonna go, you know. And we were little kids, like, it's late to be out at the theater at 10 o' clock at night.

Josh Zacher:

But then pretty quickly, it was clear I was into it. And then my mom, when I started, oh, my gosh, I don't remember if it was like eighth grade or ninth grade, but we started every year for Hanukkah. My present would be that we would go to Chicago and spend the night and see some shows. And after I got through finals and all that. And actually, to this day, I obviously live in New York City now. She comes and visits me and we see as much as we can because she loves it and obviously I love it.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

When was it that you wanted to be on stage as well?

Josh Zacher:

I mean, I just always loved it. I was not a sports kid. That was abundantly clear. But I. The Canterbury does a. They used to do like an all inclusive elementary school musical. So I did that. And then in middle school, I was much more.

Josh Zacher:

It was not. It wasn't required, so I had to, like, actively be a part of it. But actually, I always wanted to choreograph. Like, after fifth grade, I marched into my drama teacher's office and was like, I want to choreograph the musical next year. And I really think she thought I was kidding, but I wasn't. And I choreographed the musical every year from sixth grade until I graduated high school.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Now, what was that like? Because these are fellow sixth graders, right?

Josh Zacher:

Yeah, sixth graders. Kids that were older than me in eighth grade. I was choreographing for the high school school, which honestly, like, the best prep of. Of this career. Like, I'm now in a place where I'm. I'm directing and choreographing people who are double my age. And, like, they trust me. They're, like, looking for me to answer their questions.

Josh Zacher:

And, you know, being a 13 and 14 year old and having to, like, tell an 18 year old, what to do. But they listened, which is crazy. They did not have to listen, but they did. But no, it was fun. I just was so. I was think I was so passionate about it and everyone maybe could feel that, or I just, like, have some authority and. Yeah, I think it went well. If you attended Canterbury and you hated your time, I'm so sorry, but I think it went well.

Josh Zacher:

I had fun.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Yeah. I mean, not being a dancer myself, I've certainly done plenty of movement in my day, but I heavily rely on the choreographer, the dance captains, all those people to really know what I'm doing and help teach me those steps that just take a little longer than I think other people. But, yeah, I think there's a sense of certainly your skill level and just knowing what you're talking about, but then the confidence to be like, no, this is what you do. And a way of teaching. Because everybody learns differently. I'm sure you figured that out early on. Everyone learns steps differently.

Josh Zacher:

Yeah. And it's. You know, I still teach a lot of dance. It's. A lot of people are quick to say, like, I can't do it, or they sort of like, bar themselves off or shut down. And it's. I think my antidote to that is, like, we're really just here to have fun. Like, some people are performing brain surgery.

Josh Zacher:

Like, we're just trying to kickball change. It's not that serious, but it is, you know, it is important. And it. And it is good for you, and it's good for your body and your mentality. And whether you want to just do it for fun or you want to be winning a Tony. Like, it's all good and it's all kosher.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Yeah. Like, part of your mission is to get other people to enjoy it. Whether or not they're good at it, whether or not they pursue it, is to just enjoy it.

Josh Zacher:

Yeah. I mean, I. My avenue into the theater was dance. I was a competition dance. Like, I was much more of a dancer before I moved to New York than I was anything else. I really was not a vocalist. I really wasn't an actor. And then I went to NYU to work on those things and to, like, expand the skill set in a way that I needed.

Josh Zacher:

To me, it's. I want to elevate the theatrical experience, and I want to do that through dance. Like, I love me a straight play, but I love me a straight play more. That has movement and I love. You know, that's just what excites me. And it doesn't excite everybody. And I respect that. But I think there's such an undeniable viscerality and excitement to watching humans move, to watching humans react.

Josh Zacher:

It's animalistic in a way. I feel like that's something I talked about a lot in the circuit. There was a lot of like, you're like a wolf or you're like a this. And even if you have no idea the technical terms, like the leg is bending in ways that you didn't know it could, or you. You can feel that very raw, that very carnal, that very pure sense of being that I think is only translatable through dance. We have many, many amazing words and many, many amazing writers and. But I do think that there is a. There's a reason we still have it, and there's a reason that it is still so appreciated and respected.

Josh Zacher:

And it is the reason why we talk, then we sing, then we dance. Let me just say that the reason it's on top.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

I hadn't thought about that way, but that is true, because dancing really. And kind of what you're alluding to is that it incorporates all of it, especially in the musical. There's the singing, but then there's movement to go along with it. There's acting, but we're also moving in a way to inhabit that character, to put forth a certain emotion. And dancing incorporates, head to toe, all of those facets into one art form. For me, at least, that is what's been so difficult. Yes, I'm not a dancer, but I do say I can move well, you know, love a movement enough, right? I've done it enough to where I know I can pick it up. It just may take me a little while longer.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

But at the same time, there have been those dances where it's like, I don't know what this is. I don't know how, you know, I don't know what it has to do with. But then there are those certain times where I've worked with a choreographer and they'll explain as to why this certain movement is happening. It's like. Like when I did Adam's family, we were ancestors. We're dead. We are zombies, basically. And certain of those herky jerky movements, like, right, this is how a skeleton would move.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

And certain choreographic terms, whether it's you're a zombie or you're a wolf or all these different words, I think can certainly help us non dancer brains clue into what we need to be doing.

Josh Zacher:

I mean, it also helps me as a choreographer. Like, I don't I love to go see, like, modern dance companies and things like that, but I sit there and I'm like, I could. I really don't think I could ever do, like. I don't think I'm that creative to just, like, create shapes and pattern. I mean, I can, but there's been a long list of people who can do it better. But what I do think, the reason I like choreographing for the theater is you have all these things. You have a book, you have lyrics, you have a story, you have motivation, you have, you know, given circumstance, you kind of have a really clear sort of hallway. And you just have to decorate it.

Josh Zacher:

And you just have to decorate it to the best of your abilities. It also really helps because a lot of actors get scared of dancing, which is fair, you know, to each their own. But I think the more you can make it feel like it's a piece of text or a lyric or. You know what I mean? The way that you can sort of take the dance out of it, I have found, is what, one, keeps the company happy, and two of, like, well, there's a. There's a meaning, there's a. There's a this and it. And it is correct.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Absolutely. Absolutely. Well, let's get into your first story. And as a dancer, whenever you were looking for talent representation, were you predominantly looking for agents that represented dancers or more that were kind of, like, all across the board?

Josh Zacher:

Yeah, there was only, like, four or five actual dance agencies left in New York. And so I was doing the summer program at Broadway Dance Center. I was doing all these mock auditions, and there were all these agents coming in, and I, like, just. No one was really interested. And then there was, like, a random class, and there happened to be an agent, and she was peeling off from one of the big agencies and starting her own. But she was kind of legendary in the dance world. And so I took the class, and she just, like, offered to sign me right then and there, and I was like, oh, my God. And she.

Josh Zacher:

She repped choreographers, and she repped dancers, and I was like, this is it. Like, I. I'm set for the rest of my career. And that was till, like, I forgot. I think I had to be 21. Maybe. I was 21, 22. I was.

Josh Zacher:

I was a baby. But I was like, yay. I did it until I didn't.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Right, right. And we'll certainly get to the part where it didn't happen. But at first, were you getting auditions? Were you in the rooms where you wanted to be?

Josh Zacher:

Yes and no. So I signed with her. I was still in school. I was finishing, like, I remember they did, like, some made for TV reboot of Dirty Dancing. I think, like, Nicole Scherzinger was in it or something. Anyway, I remember that came through, and I, like, didn't. It was Andy Blake, and I should have gone to that audition. I wouldn't have booked it, but I should have gone.

Josh Zacher:

And honestly, I wasn't tracking my auditions in the way I was now back then. But let's say, yes, I was getting a decent amount of auditions.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

But as far as this representation, you felt like, okay, great. I'm now on the path. This is what's going to be the next step. It felt like that to you?

Josh Zacher:

Yeah. I mean, I wanted to do commercial work. I wanted to do theatrical work. I wanted to do all of the things that she had clients that were represented in. And so I was like, great. Like, yay. We're hopefully, like, on the path to success. And that was.

Josh Zacher:

That was really exciting. It was. It was. You know, you. I had spent a lot of years, you know, in class and doing all these things, and, like, you hear about these things, you hear about an agent, you hear about casting, and it was like, oh, like, I'm actually getting to do it now. Like, it's no longer a piece of theory or a piece of academia. It's like, no, no, no. Like, you're going in and you're, like, trying to get this job, and Broadway dancers are next to you, and it's like, okay, cool, cool, cool, cool, cool.

Josh Zacher:

Like, this is happening.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

And what was that relationship like with her as you were starting out?

Josh Zacher:

Oh, God, I was so young. I didn't really know how to talk to an agent. I didn't really understand. I think that's actually true of a lot of people, is like, there's a lot of misunderstanding of, like, who this person is or what this person can be, and it's different for everyone. Like, some people are, like, best friends with their agent, and I'm like, wow, that's amazing. You know, it was like she would email me when there was a job or, like, an audition. She called me when I got my first job, and I was super excited. That was really special.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

What was the first thing you booked?

Josh Zacher:

The first thing I booked was west side Story, a regional production, and it was magical. I remember she called me, like, super early in the morning. I was in my college dorm, like, literally still in school, and I. I remember being, like, so excited, and I just remember being like, okay, Like, I'm. I didn't go to school for nothing. You know what I mean? Like, when you're a senior in college, you're like, did I do the right thing? You know, like, am I going to go be a full cycle instructor? No shade at all to soul cycle. I know it, I love it. I rep it.

Josh Zacher:

But it's just like, it was like, okay, like, I'm going to get paid. I'm. I have booked work. I get to make theater professionally. Like, this is so cool. Obviously, I was Baby John. And that. That job actually led to, like, 10 more jobs.

Josh Zacher:

Like, I did Westside like, seven times, and basically just because I did that one.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Well, yeah, especially with shows like that where it's so dance heavy. If you've done it and you understand that language, then, yeah, you can kind of parlay that into several productions of the same thing.

Josh Zacher:

Oh, my God.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Totally.

Josh Zacher:

Totally.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Yeah.

Josh Zacher:

I can do west side Forever.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Yeah. Yeah. For me, Mandala Mancha is that. Is that show, man. La Mancha is that show that I could do forever, and I've done it four times. And I love the show. I love the music. I love the.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

The ambiance, the story, the characters. Yeah. So we all have those shows where it's like, you know what? If I could just do one show. There it is. So there's obviously, you know, you're. You're coming out of school. There's the pressure of, like you said, I want to make sure that I'm putting my school to use. I'm actually doing these things.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

So there's that expectation you have on yourself. But was there an expectation that you felt from her as well as your agent? Like, I don't want to disappoint her. I want to make sure that I'm doing these auditions. I'm getting callbacks.

Josh Zacher:

Yes, Yes. I am incredibly harsh on myself. And, like, I have incredibly high standards for myself. So I don't know if it was as much about her as it was about me, but it was definitely, like, part of it. I mean, all of it. I think we all feel like we have a lot to prove, but especially at 22, you feel like you have everything to prove because you're like, here I am, world. And so it was. You feel like you have to climb Mount Everest.

Josh Zacher:

And in some ways, like, you do. Like, there's 10,000 people who also want to be in this nonic production of Footloose who all showed up, and, like, it's like you just feel. It feels insane. But I think I Felt good that I was like, I have. I have this agent in my corner. And that I, you know, I was like, I know I knew objectively that I was a strong dancer. Like, I could. It wasn't that I was the best, but I was like, I am.

Josh Zacher:

After being in the audition room, it was like, I can. I know that I am a strong dancer. I can hold my room at this level in this sort of circuit. And that, to me, was just kind of what I kept going back to. I was like, people who are nowhere near as good of dancers as you are booking a lot of work. So it's like, if I just keep going, hopefully it'll happen.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Yeah. And auditioning is as much about confidence as it is about skill. It's just about belief in yourself, for sure.

Josh Zacher:

It's also so much about vibes. Like, especially now that I'm on the other side of the table. It's truly so much about, like, she seems insane or like, she seems awesome.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Well, yeah, you. You get a sense of. Of what it's like to work with people in those few minutes in the room. You get a sense of, do I want to spend time with this person or not? Yeah, yeah.

Josh Zacher:

It's fascinating.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Oh, absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. I've been behind the table as a reader, so obviously not judging people, but still getting to just watch people in their element and see what they do, you know, I know what I do in the audition room. What are other people doing? So it's always fascinating to see that

Josh Zacher:

that's honestly the best master, any and all. If you want to learn, like, read, sit behind a tape. Like, I have learned more in watching auditions than I did in my four years of college. That's not true. But, like, we could say it's true.

John Kroft:

Yeah.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

It's just a different way because, like, in school, you're learning just the craft, you're learning the. The building blocks, whereas behind the table, you're seeing it all put into use, or maybe not. And you're getting to see how people are manipulating, how people are cajoling, how they're imbibing character, you know, all the different ways that they try to get work. You see the different tactics that people use.

Josh Zacher:

Yeah. And it's. It's really interesting. And you. You just see a lot of things in a whole new way and you're

Patrick Oliver Jones:

like, oh, well, it sounds like it was going fairly well with this agent until it wasn't.

Josh Zacher:

Until it wasn't.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

So what was the day?

Katherine Winter:

What.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

What happened? Like, how did this conversation go?

Josh Zacher:

Well, so, okay, let me. Let me. In order to explain this, I need some context. So, like, I got into this because I wanted to be a Newsy. Like, I am of an age where Newsies was on Broadway and I was actually single, still in high. Not even. I was still in high school. And they did, like, this audition tour, and I drove four hours to Louisville, Kentucky, and I auditioned, and then I got called back to New York, and so I was like.

Josh Zacher:

Like, Newsies was a huge, like, gateway drug into this thing we call musical theater. You know, I didn't get the Broadway. I didn't get the tour. And so it was that season where everyone was doing it regionally. Like, every theater under the sun. I, like, was. I had not booked a Newsies, and I was like, all I want to do in my life is be a newsie. So I book one.

Josh Zacher:

Yay. I was supposed to do it in Phoenix, and it was actually with a choreographer that she repped. And I was like, I couldn't be happier. It's, like, all I ever wanted. And then a friend of mine was like, you should go audition for the Chorus Line national tour. And I was like, they already put me, like, Bayork didn't want me. Bayorkly. Isabelle Stevenson, Tony Award winner, Bayorkley.

Josh Zacher:

And so they couldn't find what they needed. So I went back in. I wore a different shirt, and I actually booked it. And I was like, oh, shit. That was unexpected.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

And these two productions were at the same time.

Josh Zacher:

Well, so that was the thing is they. They overlapped by, like, two weeks. Basically, it came down to I couldn't do both. I. I hate to say this, but I. I didn't want to do A Chorus Line. Like, I don't mean that disrespectfully. Like, I wanted to be a newsy.

Josh Zacher:

I was 23. I had great jumps. Like, I was like, I want to tap. I want to do all this stuff. I was like, I don't really want to do A Chorus Line. But I knew that doing A Chorus Line. Well, one. A national.

Josh Zacher:

It was my. My first time touring, so a national tour credit. Yay. And I was like. And to do A Chorus Line with Bayork Lee, like, that's gonna mean something to a lot of people. Like, a lot of people aren't gonna care that I did Newsies at this random regional theater. But, like, he worked with Bayork. Like, that means something.

Katherine Winter:

Yeah.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Cause that name is now gonna be on your resume.

Josh Zacher:

Well, and also, I had. I was. I didn't. You Know. I was just like, she's not the youngest. Like, I was like, I don't know if she's gonna be doing it again or that much. And, like, with no disrespect. So I was like, let's.

Josh Zacher:

I was like, I think I, like, have to. I was like, I. I can't not. And so I told my agent. I was like, I think that I need. And she didn't want me to do it. And I was. That was what was confusing to me.

Josh Zacher:

I was like, why. Why shouldn't I do this tour? And I don't. It might have been because I was going to be out of town, and that meant she couldn't send me out on stuff, which, like, sure, I get it, like, if you're an agent. But she didn't want me to do it. And so then because of that, she. I remember waking up early in the morning. I had to be at work early, and I got this email that, like, read me to filth. Like, basically saying, like, I have a horrible attitude.

Josh Zacher:

I'm a problem. I got. I've. I've actually sort of blocked it out. I used to have it, like, basically, like, saying I'm. I was a diva, like, all these things. And then she's like, we are no longer working together. And so that was something I did not see coming.

Josh Zacher:

So I called the office, and her assistant answered the phone, and it was so abundantly clear that she was sitting right there. But, like, she was like, oh, well, she's not available. And I, like, apologize. I was like, I don't really understand where this came from. But I was just like, yeah, like, I would like to still be a client. Like, I would like to still be represent. And he was like, yeah, well, we might be in touch. And then I never hear from them again.

Josh Zacher:

And that was a gut punt. That was like, I was not ready for that. I was like, here I was thinking. I was like, oh, I'm set for life. I have this perfect agent. I'm going to be a Broadway performer, and then I'm going to be a choreographer, and she's going to rep me the whole way through. And then it was just, like, gone. Like, she was like, fudge you.

Josh Zacher:

And respectfully fudge her. Actually disrespectfully fuck her. She's retired. It's fine. And that. And I remember, like, I had to call my mom, and she was like, what? And I was. And I called one of my kind of mentors at the time. It was like, the biggest rug pull that I had ever experienced.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

It definitely came across that it was because of this decision, of course. Line over newsies.

Katherine Winter:

Yeah.

Josh Zacher:

And I think it also, like, I had questions and. And people had given me advice of, like, things to ask for. And so maybe I did come across in my questioning as not, you know, but, like, I know that for a fact she did this to everybody, so I'm not special. After some time, of all my friends, like, oh, yeah, she did that to me too. And I was like, it's like, that actually makes sense. But, you know, lesson learned. Was it fun? No. But do we learn? Is that probably why I have severe trust issues? Yes.

Josh Zacher:

But, you know, we live, we learn.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

And so did that decision turn out to be right? Was Chorus Line the better choice for you?

Josh Zacher:

I. One of my best friends who I actually knew from college, but we. We call each other husband and wife. She's lovingly married to a straight man. But we bonded deeply on that tour. I made some friends. I'm not gonna lie. That tour was the worst professional experience of my life.

Josh Zacher:

But again, you take something from everything, and I do think that the credit did mean something, and it did help me in ways to sort of go forward. Would I do it again? Never in hell would I want to do the show again. Yes. But I think it was, like, the right choice. It just came with, like, a lot of carnage.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Yeah, there's the professional right choice, but then there's the personal. Maybe not the best choice. Did it start from rehearsals, this trouble? Or was it mostly on the road that that turmoil began?

Josh Zacher:

Yeah, it just. We were young. There's. Actually, there's. You know, we were just all young. We needed a leader. We needed management, and we, like. It just was.

Josh Zacher:

It was like this. I could write many books about that shit that happened on this tour. And, like. Like, oh, my God, like, people got arrested. People got left behind. People were assholes. People got injured. People got into screaming fights.

Josh Zacher:

All of our bodies were broken. It was hard. And I was like, this shouldn't be this hard. My favorite was the direct. So we had multiple people giving direction, and, like, it would be directly contradictory. Like, they would be like, so you raised the right hand on three, and then, as if that had not been said, the person next to. And so you raise the right hand on four, and we'd all be like, so what is it? And they, like. As if they could not hear the person next to them.

Josh Zacher:

I almost quit opening night because the dance captain screamed at me. Like, I. I was. I. Oof. I spent the Entire opening night party, sobbing on the sidewalk. Like, it was not fun. I do not miss it.

Josh Zacher:

But like, I do think that I've learned a lot about what I don't want to do and a lot about how I do not want the rooms that I'm in to be because of that experience. And listen, there are people who, like, that was the highlight of their life and I respect that for them and I love that for them. It was not for me.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Yeah, we all have our own experiences when it comes to that. And deciding to just kind of bucket up and get through a terrible experience can really be a lot of lessons to learn in there, you know, a lot to take from that. And learning what not to do in your career or in a room or whatever is just as valuable as learning what to do.

Josh Zacher:

Yeah, I mean, it was also like I, I had only worked in Equity theaters as a non Equity actor, so I didn't really understand the difference. I was like, well, that's what non equity is. And then like, this was a like capital and non Equity tour, which, like, let's get real, we're not going to talk about Actors Equity today, but I have a lot of feelings about that. But that tour was like, oh, like it is the Wild West. Like, it is there. Like, there were so many times where we would do like, bus buddy check where you like, we're about to leave the bus. And I'd be like, my, my buddy is not on the bus. And then we would start moving.

Josh Zacher:

I'd be like, my buddy is still not on the bus. And like, it's just insane. But also like, you know, I got to perform in Detroit, where a lot of my family's from, and I got to see a lot of parts of the country that I had never been to. Like, you know, there's pros and there's cons and you have the memories. But I, unfortunately it was, it was not, it was not great as far as I'm concerned. We can laugh about it now, but it was rough. We got trapped on the side of the road in a snowstorm, like literally on the highway for truly like nine hours. There's like pictures of us having like a snowball fight on the side.

Josh Zacher:

It's like it was bad. It was so bad.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Thankfully, I've only ever been on Equity tours, so I, I feel very fortunate. But I've heard both good and bad. I've heard your version, but I've heard other non act tours where they actually care. And they may not pay you much, but at Least they're, they care.

John Kroft:

Yeah.

Josh Zacher:

Well, I mean, I will say now I'm the associate choreographer of the Grinch national tour and like I am obviously not a company member, but it couldn't be more different. I mean like it's a, just the, the familial and the nurturing and the, the community. If you're right for that show and you're not a member of the union, like, please submit and, and it's, it's a lovely, lovely experience. So do not let my experience be a catch all for, for the rest of tours of the equity or non equity capacity.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

I can certainly tell you of the three tours I've done, I've enjoyed all of them. I've, I've certainly seen from afar the tensions that can happen. But fortunately within my bubble, within the tours that I've done, it's been, it's been a good collegiate collaborative experience. So I've, I've been very fortunate in that regard. So I'm, I'm appreciative of that. So you go off and you do. Chorus Line had its ups and its downs. So how long did it take you to find representation again?

Josh Zacher:

Oh, it took, let's say a year maybe about it. Well, I was gone, so I didn't really. And then I signed with a. I'm really giving representation a bad rap today. I signed with a garbage manager. He was having like an open call. You know, like it's such a mind to get, you know, like it's just like not the simplest thing. I mean it can be like the easiest thing or it can be the hardest thing.

Josh Zacher:

And so I was like, well, this person says they're signing people. So I went to this audition and I danced and I sang and we chatted. And he was like, yeah, no, I'd like to represent you. And I was like, oh, really? I was, I was like, okay, great. Also garbage. I mean, actually he got me some stuff, but he was a crook. He tried to like cheat me out of my money.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Yeah, See that's the difference between a manager and an agent. And this is something that I learned because I've only ever had one manager. And the rules that govern an agent, there are none. Like you say the wild west. Managers are wild west. They can really do kind of anything. Whereas agents are bound by union rules generally.

Josh Zacher:

Well, so we didn't even have. It was actually, it was the pro. He was trying to take like double what he was entitled to.

Katherine Winter:

Yeah.

Josh Zacher:

And I actually. And so I just like. And he got so shitty Right away, I had learned I was a little older by then. I was like. So I was like, can you just, like, remind me what the agreement. He's like, we agreed to this? I was like, well, first of all, we didn't. It's a verbal agreement. That's not.

Josh Zacher:

That doesn't hold up in the court of law. But, like, okay. And he's like, if you don't want to work together, that's fine. But, like, that's not. That can't be the case until after you're done. And I was like, oh, my God. Like, fuck all the way off. And so I actually think.

Josh Zacher:

What happened? So I didn't get paid the first week of the. This is for the prom national tour, but I didn't get paid the first week. It was just, like, a fluke. And so I think that he thought that I was withholding money, because after that week went by, he, like, wrote me back and he was like, actually, it's fine. You can just pay me, like, what I'm supposed to be. I mean, I won't say, like, it was, like, 5%. He was like, he's like, actually, that's fine. But I think he thought I was withholding money, but the truth was that I just didn't get paid.

Josh Zacher:

And I was like, okay, great. I'm glad that worked itself out.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

But you did eventually find a good agent?

Josh Zacher:

Yes, I now have two. I actually am lucky enough. I have two agents. For creative, I am represented by Amy Wagner at Stuart Talent, and for performance, I'm represented by Brian Herrick at the Health Kitchen Agency, and they're both really, really lovely.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Yeah, I'm with Brian as well. So there we go.

John Kroft:

Oh, you are?

Katherine Winter:

Yes.

Josh Zacher:

Oh, yes. I love it. I text Brian, you know, I love that I can text Brian, I love you. I can ask him for what I need. You know what I mean?

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Same.

Josh Zacher:

Like, I'm just like, did I get it? Did I not? Like, what is happening? And it doesn't have to be, like, a whole rigmarole. If I didn't get it, it's fine. I'm also, you know, a woman of a certain age, so it's like, it's fine. Like, did I get it or not? Did I not. Am I getting in the room? No.

John Kroft:

Fine.

Josh Zacher:

Okay, great. I'm going. I'm going out. Like, no. Yes. I'm very grateful for both of them. Foreign.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

John, it is so good to have you on the podcast. So happy to have you with me.

John Kroft:

Thank you so much for having us.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Now one Thing that I loved about your earliest memory of being in the arts or, you know, getting introduced to the arts was actually a drama teacher that would tell stories to your kindergarten class. And there, there's one particular story that you really remember.

John Kroft:

Yes, the. The tale of the Headless Horseman, Sleepy Hollow, Ichabod Crane, all that. I mean, he was the head of the high school drama department. He would teach, he would direct the middle school plays as well. But he had this yearly Halloween tradition of coming to the kindergartners and really just scaring the bejesus out of them with this story. And he was the kind of teacher and director who really, the way that he gave direction was by kind of acting out the part for you and like, just showing you how much vigor and passion could be put into it. And I just. I don't know.

Josh Zacher:

He.

John Kroft:

He had this, like, big bushy mustache. He, like, chained, smoked outside the school. He had a leather jacket. He was just kind of this, like, larger than life figure. And he really was an early example to me of like, oh, adults can also be like that. And that seems very fun. That seems very, like, larger than life.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Was it that sense of, of play and just energy that he gave that attracted you so much?

John Kroft:

Absolutely. Just like the faces he would make, the way he would modulate his voice and make sound effects. And like, he was really just a full grown adult with a mustache. But, like playing pretend in all of the ways that I liked to play pretend. And, and it's. It was like, oh, okay, I guess I don't have to outgrow that. I can. That could be a part of my life forever.

John Kroft:

Like, that's what I want to do. And I also just. I've always loved, to this day, my favorite forms of theater are when you just have a person in a room telling a story with as few special effects as possible. And just the power of a good story to really create theater of the mind and create magic in that way is those are still always my favorite and most chilling experiences.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Well, I think that's one wonderful thing about this era of podcasting. I mean, yes, it's starting to get into the video realm, but. But podcasting as it is is an audio form where we just listen to either interviews like this, you know, people telling, having conversations, or those actual true crime stories or fictional audio drama, you know, all these kinds of different ways that people are telling stories. And we just hear it, we feel it, we. We start to imagine, and it really gets our wheels turning in our brain.

John Kroft:

Yeah, absolutely.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

And so how do you think that this Sleepy Hollow story, this teacher, larger than life, that he influenced or impacted your own journey as a performer?

John Kroft:

Well, I mean, I think I had been saying that I wanted to be an actor for a long time, even around that time, before I had ever done a play. And then the earliest opportunity I had to do a play was the middle school play which he directed. And I went to an all boys school. So we were doing, for these middle school plays, we doing Shakespeare plays, but the boys were playing the girl parts. And I got cast as Kate in Taming of the Shrew, which I thought was the coolest thing to ever happen. And I was like, I'm the lead. And not only am I the lead, but I'm playing a girl. And I'm playing this badass, you know, take no BS girl.

John Kroft:

And up until that point in middle school, all my friends had been like the sporty jock guys. And they did not think it was so cool that I was the lead girl in a school play. So all of my friends changed that year from the jocks to the theater kids. And that kind of set my life on a very different trajectory.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Yeah, yeah. Playing a part like that, especially such a strong willed woman is not going to sit well with, with some of the more macho jock types.

John Kroft:

But I had seen at BAM actually the year before, I had seen this British company called Propeller that did the same thing. All male company, they would do productions of Shakespeare plays. I had seen them do Taming of the Shrew and the woman who played Kate was just on fire. And that was what inspired me to go, oh, this can be, this can be a very powerful and cool and badass thing.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

And what's so interesting is that this was several years ago at Shakespeare in the Park, I saw an all female version of Taming of the Shrew. So the woman playing Fred was so good. So good. And so it was really interesting just to see the exact opposite of the experience that you had.

John Kroft:

Yeah, I've never, I've always wanted to. There was a company that was doing a lot of those, an all female company that was doing these kind of like, I think a lot of them were set in prisons of like the history plays and stuff like that. I never, I never got to see those, but I would love to.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Well, let us get into the story that you wanted to talk about. And this is right after drama school. So you graduated in 2016. So around that following year you were cast in this big time project. It felt perfect for you. You loved the Material. It was led by Tony winning director. But it didn't exactly go as you planned.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

And you were eventually fired from the show. I mean, being fired from a show is so rare for an actor. Certainly we may leave a show for whatever reason, injury or personal things, but to be fired. Ugh. So, first of all, let's just talk about the show itself. Tell us about this project and why it. It was so significant.

John Kroft:

Yeah, it was a new play. It was written by a poet, actually, not a playwright, but a poet who was really in the zeitgeist at that moment. And it was all about white privilege and race relations and microaggressions. And it just was a particularly harsh light on a certain type of wealthy, liberal family, purportedly liberal New York family, elite family. And I just found what the play had to say really exciting. And I felt such a strong sense of, I understand who these people are. I understand who this character is. I think in the audition, I don't usually do this, but I.

John Kroft:

I was researching the director ahead of time, and I saw that they went to my private boys school's sister school. And so I went into the audition, and I basically, after I gave the audition, which I felt was a very strong audition, and I don't usually feel that way, I basically said to the director, hey, I know you went to this school. I went to this school. I just want you to know I know who these people are. And I kind of think in some ways that was a big piece in her choosing me, because it just. I had a. A confidence about it that I. That I often don't in auditions.

John Kroft:

And what I learned after I had been cast is that the whole cast had done a workshop of it a month or two prior, like a long developmental workshop. And that the entire cast from that workshop was the cast of the show except for me. My part was the only one that had changed.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Interesting. So did you find out why you. You particularly, or why this role in particular was changed?

John Kroft:

I did not find out why. All I know is that when I was fired, I was replaced by the person who had been in the workshop previously. So my interpretation of that is that she wanted him all along, and maybe he just wasn't available, or he wasn't available and then became available or. I don't know. That's. That's what I tell myself. Because what my experience was was that the audition felt so right. I felt I was so right.

John Kroft:

I felt like I did a really good job. And then I came in, and from the first day of rehearsal, Every choice I made was wrong. And I really couldn't get more than two or three words out in rehearsal before her interrupting me and correcting me and giving me adjustments and giving me notes and really just micromanaging my performance within an inch of its life.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

And my guess is she was not doing this with other actors.

John Kroft:

No, pretty much not at all. And I felt in a tricky position because it was my first job, so I was incredibly green. So I was very much, you know, do exactly what this director says. They have a Tony and you do not. So, you know, they're right. But also, you know, I was really privileged at Juilliard to work on many, many new plays and be a part of collaborative processes in that way. And there was. There was a lot about the way that she was working with this new text that was not what I had experienced, was not what I had learned about how we work on new plays.

John Kroft:

And I found it really jarring. And I was. I was trying to ride the line, and I don't think I was riding it very well, of sticking to my guns about what I really felt about the character, which was very different from what she felt, but then at the same time, trying to make her happy. And I think the result was that I was just paralyzed.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Would you say that it was your youth and experience at that time that really kind of kept you from being more vocal or at least maybe trying to find a middle ground or compromise?

John Kroft:

I don't know, because, honestly, I mean, I'm not. I wonder what I would do if I got hired to do that job today. Because I certainly now have a lot more experience and a lot more backbone to articulate the things I believe in. But at the same time, I still don't have a level of clout, I guess, that. That this person would respect. So it. It's hard because to a certain extent, you do have to do what the director tells you to. I think over the years, I've just gotten a lot better at taking a director's insistent direction and just going, okay, I'm gonna give you enough of what you want so that you'll get off my back.

John Kroft:

But I'm still going to create the performance that I want to create.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

I've. I've had those directors that are much more deliberate. And it's like this. You move here, you go there. Now you exit there. Then you do that. You know where it really is. Like, they have a blueprint and you need to follow it.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Then there are those where it's just like, all right, let's just get up on our feet and start. And then you don't know where to move, where to go. You just. You're just kind of making it up, and then they'll adjust. So, yeah, every director is going to be different. And. And I think you speak to something when it comes to drama school, whether it's Juilliard or really any place, they prepare you for what they know and for their system. And so it's not always going to be, like you say, every other director or every other production that you have is going to follow that same route.

John Kroft:

Yeah.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

And with the context of this particular show, I'm guessing you felt like you never really caught on to the style, to the format that they wanted.

John Kroft:

Well, to. I mean, to tell the truth, I think that the play wasn't ready. I think that the play was. Had a very good idea at the center of it and was very interesting, but it needed more development. And I think that that is also partly why she. I mean, that was the part of it that really struck me, I remember, was how much control this director was taking over the play and the text itself, like, quite literally in the rehearsal room, talking over the. The writer and contradicting the writer and going. Because I think because the writer was a poet, was going like, this isn't your realm.

John Kroft:

Let me make your play a play. And the play, in a lot of ways, had ideas, but it didn't have a clear voice yet. And I think that the director was just trying to sort of carve one. And in my mind, I was like, I think this play needs a little more development. But I was still trying to kind of. To what you were saying. I was trying to find it organically in the room, but the energy of the room was not fostering that kind of spirit. The energy of the room was very much like, okay, we're going to this regional theater, we're going to get a good review, and then we're going to Broadway.

John Kroft:

Because this play is timely and it's important and ambition. And now.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

So obviously, the director had her struggles with you. Did you get that sense from the rest of the cast, or did you at least feel connected to them in some way?

John Kroft:

I felt very connected to the rest of the cast. I felt like I was. I was particularly with the actress who played my mother in the play. We were really bonding and hitting it off, and she seemed to think I was really good. And I remember very distinctly, it was two weeks into rehearsal. We had. We were just doing our first run through, which at that point for me was a big deal because it meant that she couldn't stop to interrupt me. So I finally got to do the whole play without being interrupted.

John Kroft:

And I felt so good. I was like, great, if I could just do this a couple more times, I will feel solid. And then when she was giving notes through the run through, I got no notes. And I was like, oh, that's not a good sign.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Yeah. Yes and no. It's. It's like. And sometimes no notes is good notes because it's like, okay, great. Or you can take it as, they've given up on me. I have. There's no hope.

John Kroft:

That was how I took it. And I remember I was so depressed afterwards, and I was talking to this actress who was playing my mother, and she said, oh, sweetie, don't worry. If they were gonna fire you, they would have done it already. Like, we're going into tech in a couple days. There's no way. And then I got the call that night.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

So it was after run through?

John Kroft:

Yeah, it was after. It was after our first run through, maybe four days before we rehearsed in New York. It was maybe four days before we were going to leave town and go to do tech in the. At the regional theater.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

So what was that conversation like?

John Kroft:

There wasn't a conversation. I got a phone call from my agent who said, hey, what happened? I just heard that you're getting fired. He said, I got a call from the casting director and I guess the director told the casting director who told my agent, who told me, and they didn't give a reason. They just said, we're doing this, it's not working out. The casting director was incredibly nice about it and, you know, told me, he said, we think he's great. We thought he was so perfect for this. I want you to know that this does not at all damage his relationship with us. And, you know, we still think he's wonderful and et cetera, et cetera.

John Kroft:

But. Yeah.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Now, since then, have you been in front of this director since.

John Kroft:

Yeah. Have not been in front of the director, but have been in front of the casting director? Yes.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Yeah.

John Kroft:

I was also very lucky at the time that I already had another job lined up that I was looking forward to with a different really fantastic director who I had done a workshop of that play in development. So I. I knew to a certain extent, like, okay, I was. If I didn't have that opportunity, I think I might have really spiraled a little bit more.

Josh Zacher:

Yeah.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

I was about to say, like, with a firing like that Especially being so fresh out of school. Did that make you reconsider things like, am I good? Should I be doing that? Were there any of those kind of doubts coming out of it?

John Kroft:

Of course. Of course. And yeah, I would say, genuinely, there were. There were two things that really helped me get through the experience, which was one, that I had this other job lined up that I had already worked on a bit and had such a positive experience with that critically acclaimed director. And then two, I heard a lot of stories about this particular director who fired me, and I. I learned that I am by no means the only actor that they have fired and that they have a reputation for firing people and that some other directors who I had worked with who know this person were like, don't worry about it.

Josh Zacher:

You're.

John Kroft:

You're gonna be fine.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

It's almost like a badge of honor now. It's like, oh, you're one of the many who've been fired by this person. Congratulations.

Josh Zacher:

Yeah. And.

John Kroft:

And also, too, you know, and I. I don't want to speak too negatively, because I actually also think that this. This director is. I mean, has a career that totally speaks for itself, and they're incredible. But I just had so many disagreements. Even at the time, as green as I was, I had so many disagreements with, like, how they ran the rehearsal room and what their perspective on the play was and what their perspective on the character was. And I don't know, it's been interesting over time to. To kind of hold both of those truths at the same time that, like, that that's possible and that's okay.

John Kroft:

And it doesn't mean that they're bad, and it also doesn't mean that I'm bad.

Katherine Winter:

Yeah.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

And I also want to just bring up the fact that we aren't mentioning this particular project by name or the director by name. I've certainly had other guests do that. They want to talk about an experience, but they're not here to throw anyone under a bus. They're not here to. To damage or burn any bridges. And while it can be good to name names sometimes, you know, like with the whole Scott Rudin thing, once all that came out, it's good to, like, name names and, like, hold people accountable. But when it comes to just differences of creativity and difference of process, I think, like you said, it doesn't mean they're a bad director or you're a bad actor. It just means it didn't mesh.

John Kroft:

Yeah, no, this is. This is not a story of abuse or of any. Any kind of, like, Misconduct like that.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

It's just. Yeah, you know, a difference of opinion, a difference of way of going about things. What would you say that you have learned from that director? Obviously, that experience, you were kind of butting heads, but do you feel like that you learned something from that director?

John Kroft:

Yeah, I do feel like one of the biggest lessons I've learned is, I think, classical drama training, and certainly at Juilliard. The object of it is like, okay, we're going to. We're going to expand your tool kit, and we're going to expand your artistry so that as an actor, you. You can inhabit the broadest possible range of characters and stories and styles as possible. You know, which I internalized as, how can I make everyone happy? How can I fit every single mold possible? And I also, you know, I was so young. I was like, I was 17 when I got in, and all I knew was that I loved acting more than anything and that if I followed acting, that it would take me. It would take me into all kinds of diverse, meaningful life experiences. I was like, I don't know what my life is going to be.

John Kroft:

I'm going to just follow this thing, and it will take me everywhere. But I think what I've actually really learned is that you don't really make anyone happy when you try to make everyone happy. And that actually the much more rewarding experiences I've had is when I go, okay, what makes me happy? Why am I an artist? What do I think about this character? What do I think about this story? And then that's the thing that ultimately disqualifies you from a lot of work, because you have an opinion. But it is also the thing that uniquely qualifies you for the work that you're meant to do.

Patrick Oliver Jones:

Thank you so much for listening to why I'll Never Make It. For early access to episodes and bonus audition stories, visit why I'll never make it.com and click subscribe or use the link in the show notes. I'm your host, Patrick Oliver Jones, in charge of writing, editing, and producing this podcast. And the theme music you're hearing was created by me, with additional music by John Bartman. Join me next time as I ask the final five questions and why we talk more about why I'll Never Make It.