From the Archives: Patti LuPone

Patti LuPone was only four years old when she realized she belonged on stage, and she started by entertaining family members in her Long Island living room. LuPone won her second Tony Award for Evita, which she initially described as merely “noise from Britain.” Although she has enjoyed tremendous, long-term success, she talks candidly to Alec about blows to her career and ego. Originally aired February 18, 2013 See omnystudio.com/listener https://omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Speaker 00

  This is an iHeart Podcast. Guaranteed Human.

• 0:04Speaker 01

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• 1:04Speaker 03

  Hey, I'm Niall Rogers. This fall, I'll be driving across the country, meeting some of today's coolest and most fascinating artists. We'll explore the stories before the moments that changed everything. Because every musician remembers the moment where it all began. Experience Before the Moment, a Lincoln Original Series on the iHeart Radio app, YouTube, or wherever you get your podcasts.

• 1:36Alec Baldwin?

  This is Alec Baldwin, and you're listening to Here's the Thing from iHeart Radio. According to the online Urban Dictionary, today's guest has become a verb. "To loupone is, quote, 'to give an outstanding theatrical performance, to make an audience revel in open-mouthed awe at your unparalleled brilliance,' unquote."

• 2:00Alec Baldwin?

  Patty LuPone has 26 Broadway credits to date and has won two Tonys, one for Evita and one for Gypsy. In London, she originated the role of Norma Desmond in Sunset Boulevard and Fantine in Les Miserables, for which she won an Olivier Award.

• 2:41Alec Baldwin?

  She's worked in film and on television, most notably as the mom on the ABC drama Life Goes On. Before all this success, Patty was in the first class of the drama division at Juilliard in 1968, which seems like a reasonable place to start dreaming of a career in the theatre. But Patty LuPone's story really begins even earlier.

• 3:03Speaker 05

  I knew when I was a kid that I had a Broadway voice. I wanted to be a rocker, because I grew up in that era, transistor radios at the beach.

• 3:11Alec Baldwin?

  What music?

• 3:12Speaker 05

  The Rascals. The Rascals. We started in the 50s, Little Anthony and the Imperials. I mean, all through the 50s and 60s and 70s. I knew I didn't have a rock voice, though. I knew I had a Broadway voice. This is all instinctual behaviour, completely instinctual behaviour. And my mom listened to opera and my dad listened to jazz.

• 3:33Alec Baldwin?

  What did he do?

• 3:34Speaker 05

  He was a principal of an elementary school.

• 3:36Alec Baldwin?

  On Long Island?

• 3:37Speaker 05

  On Long Island, in Northport. And my mom was a housewife, a homemaker.

• 3:41Alec Baldwin?

  How many kids in your family?

• 3:42Speaker 05

  Twin brothers and me. You know, typical, in a ranch house on Long Island, right? Typical.

• 3:47Alec Baldwin?

  I know the drill.

• 3:48Speaker 05

  Yeah, exactly. And I was enrolled in dance at four years old, and I fell in love with the stage. But that wasn't really the first inkling of some sort of connection to the stage. My mother used to troop me out in front of guests to do my Marilyn Monroe imitation, and I don't even know how I came up with this, but I would come out, they'd laugh, and I'd go, "Oh, this is cool." Well, like, you know, I was, I was pretty astute when I was very, very young. I'm pretty, so I started dancing and I fell in love with the audience. And so the performance aspect started very, very young in dance. When Juilliard happened, I only

• 4:24Alec Baldwin?

  How did it happen?

• 4:25Speaker 05

  Well, my, my brother attended the dance division of the Juilliard School and told me that they were starting a drama division. I actually had moved into New York City and was auditioning for musicals and working, and I just wanted to be in musicals and hang out in New York City and party. And I auditioned and I got in. And what happened in the four years, the course of the four years of the Juilliard Schools, I fell out of love with musical and in love with classical theater. And I was actually trained as a classical actress. So we did no musicals.

• 4:51Alec Baldwin?

  With a lot of other great classical actors.

• 4:53Speaker 05

  Yes, Kevin Kline, David Stires, David Shram, Mary Lou Rosato. And then, of course, the classes below me have gained more recognition than my class did. We were the very first class.

• 5:06Alec Baldwin?

  But that girl from Northport who's doing Marilyn Monroe impersonations in the ranch house with your family, what's that like for you, that transition to be in that very heady, sophisticated environment?

• 5:15Speaker 05

  Well, it was, it was tough for me because I was not a favorite at school. My best friend, who I met in the first year, Nancy Nichols, was a favorite and I was not. But Nancy and I would always pal around together and make trouble, but Nancy would get the roles and I would not. And that went on for several years. I think it was only my third year when I realized that they were trying to throw me out of school. And what they did, they couldn't throw me out because they didn't like my personality. But what they did was they threw every conceivable role in my direction to make me fail as an actor. But what happened was they

• 5:47Alec Baldwin?

  Why do you think they did that?

• 5:48Speaker 05

  They didn't like me.

• 5:49Alec Baldwin?

  Did they feel you didn't belong?

• 5:50Speaker 05

  Yeah, they didn't like me. They, or that, you know, I didn't get cut. Every year, students got cut. So we started with thirty six.

• 5:58Alec Baldwin?

  There was a weeding program where they wanted to thin out the herd over the years.

• 6:01Speaker 05

  Totally. We ended up with seventeen of the original thirty six in the fourth year. I never got cut. So I'm, I'm confused as to why that actually happened, because why didn't they just cut me? Possibly because every role I played, I succeeded in. But what they did was they trained one actor in my class in versatility, and the rest of them were pigeonholed as, you know, life will pigeonhole you

• 6:23Alec Baldwin?

  The ingenue.

• 6:24Speaker 05

  Into, exactly, the subrette, the leading lady, the character woman. But I went back and forth, back and forth, back and forth, which taught me

• 6:34Speaker 05

  That I could.

• 6:35Alec Baldwin?

  There were no boundaries.

• 6:37Speaker 05

  No, and if you look at my history, I've done more plays than I've done musicals. But because, I guess, the voice is a powerful instrument. Do you know what I mean? And it's an American cultural event, the American, the musical, not the Broadway.

• 6:50Alec Baldwin?

  Well, also the music that you've performed. When someone is as successful as you, and I've said this to people who have careers in music beyond the theater, as leading actresses in the theater, music distinguishes things because it's a product you can consume anywhere. You know, your career goes to another level where I can drive in my car and listen to the soundtrack from anything goes.

• 7:12Speaker 05

  I never thought about that.

• 7:13Alec Baldwin?

  I can be on the beach and I can listen to the soundtrack from Sweeney Todd. Music performers will always have the upper hand on actors. But you were saying how you, the versatility thing, you were almost forced to embrace this versatility to survive. And you graduate from that program, the first class graduates, what year?

• 7:31Speaker 05

  1972.

• 7:33Alec Baldwin?

  And where do you go?

• 7:34Speaker 05

  John Housman, so in our third year, he presented a season to the prominent people in New York theater and critics. And Mel Gussow was the one that said, Mel Gussow was a second string critic for the New York Times, and he was the one that said, why break this company up? Why not form a permanent acting company, which was John's cue? And when we graduated, he handed us our Equity Card and four years, but we stayed for four years, of touring the country, performing classical plays in true revolving rep, which is a different play every single night. So we got even more training because in our first year, we lost several bookings because we didn't know how to tour. We didn't know how to maintain a performance. We only did three at Juilliard, and we had no idea what happened on the fourth.

• 8:18Speaker 05

  And that sounds crazy, but it's, we lost gigs.

• 8:21Alec Baldwin?

  Do you think this acting company idea and the touring was what Housman had up his sleeve the whole time, when he instigated the Juilliard program?

• 8:28Speaker 05

  No, I don't think so. You know, the training was intense and emotionally intense, psychologically intense, physically intense. But there was one production where the company formed an invisible circle of support around each other, and that was his, he saw the ensemble. And I remember, I mean, I don't, it was Boris Tamarin's production of You From The Bridge. And, oh, I could cry now thinking of it. It was an extraordinarily powerful experience to be a student actor, but in a professional mindset.

• 9:08Speaker 05

  And I remember our curtain call and the pride and the power. And it was an amazing moment that changed the course of all of us. And we understood what ensemble meant, and we understood what support meant, and we understood the power we had as individuals and as actors. And John saw that in his actors. There's been a couple of experiences that I've had that it's that same ensemble mentality. So that's the other thing, I have to interject here. When I left Juilliard and left the acting company and then, of course, landed musicals, we all did, by the way. David Styers did, Kevin did, Mandy did. We all landed musicals. But there's only a couple of times where I felt I had that kind of ensemble.

• 9:53Speaker 05

  And one was Les Mis in London, because it was a Royal Shakespeare Company actors. And the other was Gypsy, where every actor owned their part, big or small, and gave themselves to the play every single night. The other one was Sweeney, too. And our stage manager said in Sweeney that we acted more like a band than a bunch of actors.

• 10:13Alec Baldwin?

  Right, right. I love that feeling. So the acting company thing lasts for how long? You did it how many seasons?

• 10:17Speaker 05

  I did it for four years. Nobody goes in for four years anymore. We all did it for four years. And you know, I thought about the other. I don't know why we stayed, except I'm sure we all went, we are not going to be able to play these parts in real life.

• 10:29Alec Baldwin?

  And that was back in a time when there were the very last vapors in the air here in New York of the old way. And the old way was you went downtown and you carried a spear for Joe, or you carried a spear in the park, and there was an apprenticeship in the theater. And if you didn't have cred in the theater, you know, Raoul and Chris Walken and Segurni and you and Kevin and everybody, everybody who were the princes and princesses and Mandy of the theater in New York, that's where you headed. So when you finished the acting company and you've decided, you know, you've done enough, it's four years, which was atypical of people then, where do you go then?

• 11:04Speaker 05

  We came home. Kevin and I came home and...

• 11:07Alec Baldwin?

  So you're with Kevin?

• 11:09Speaker 05

  Yes.

• 11:10Alec Baldwin?

  Kevin and you were, Kevin and you were a couple.

• 11:12Speaker 05

  For seven years. We broke up, we got back together, we broke up, we got back together, we broke up, we got back together.

• 11:19Alec Baldwin?

  Can you imagine the children you would have had with him? Good God in heaven. Good God. They wouldn't have a theater big enough to house that person's ego and talent.

• 11:28Speaker 05

  So, we both came home and Kevin went off and did a play. And I had auditioned for and didn't get The Baker's Wife, Stephen Schwartz musical, The Baker's Wife, based on Marcel Pagnol's La Femme de Boulanger. But I got a telephone call from David Merrick's general manager, Helen Nickerson, and to ask if I was free because they wanted me to come out to LA to replace The Leading Lady. And I wanted to do this musical so badly. So, I went out and I did my first big, gut-wrenching, rip-out-of-your-body, squish-heart, the most horrible-

• 12:13Alec Baldwin?

  Vulnerable.

• 12:13Speaker 05

  ...experience of my life, The Baker's Wife. Who does he think he is? Who could be as handsome? Who could be as smart as he thinks he is? He just has to snap his fingers. Women fall apart. What does he think? That'll slink away with him? That'll follow him, writhing, drooling? It was an unbelievable disaster and we were on the road for six months with the show.

• 12:42Alec Baldwin?

  What made it so?

• 12:43Speaker 05

  That is-

• 12:44Alec Baldwin?

  To the extent you can say it.

• 12:45Speaker 05

  That's the big question. It is a great idea. It's a great film. It had Stephen Schwartz music. It had Joe Melziner's last sets. Jennifer Chipton to the lights and Theoniolids did the costumes. David Merrick was producing. It had all the potential to be a smash hit and it got progressive. I joined two days after they opened in LA and it got progressively worse for six-

• 13:08Alec Baldwin?

  And you knew it while you were doing it.

• 13:09Speaker 05

  Months. No, I thought it was going to be OK, but I didn't realize that. Nobody realized what was really going to happen to us and it.

• 13:17Alec Baldwin?

  And what did happen?

• 13:18Speaker 05

  Well, six people were fired. The show never got better. David Merrick came out. One of the most theatrical moments I've ever had in my career was David Merrick showing up in San Francisco. We were performing in San Francisco with no director. We were told to stay after the show. They assembled us- On the stage and there was, it was not lit except for the ghost light. David Merrick showed up and stood in front of the ghost light. So he was totally backlit, couldn't see his face. Only saw the outline of a long coat and a bowler hat and proceeded to ask us to go into rehearsal for nothing so that we could save this wonderful show. And it was so dramatic because he's incredibly dramatic. And so in the light of day, everybody went, what?

• 14:01Speaker 05

  We had just gotten out of rehearsal for nothing. We were in rehearsal every single day, performing at night for six months. And what we rehearsed that day went in that night, only to rehearse the next day. And that stuff would come out, some new stuff would go in that was not better than what we had just taken out.

• 14:17Alec Baldwin?

  You were in a laboratory.

• 14:18Speaker 05

  It was, we were in.

• 14:19Alec Baldwin?

  You were in Dr. Frankenstein's laboratory.

• 14:21Speaker 05

  But people were dying, the rats were dying, the rats were losing air.

• 14:25Alec Baldwin?

  You were killing a lot of rats then.

• 14:26Speaker 05

  Oh, my God, it was so horrible. And you know, there's an expression, Larry Galbraith's expression, if Hitler were alive today, his punishment should be to send him out on the road with a musical in trouble.

• 14:36Alec Baldwin?

  I did a movie once and that movie was going really badly and said, this is as if the government made movies.

• 14:43Speaker 05

  You know, I've always said there's a fine line between a hit and a flop and it's, you don't know what it is. You don't know why it is a hit and you don't know why it is a flop. You know, if it's really terrible, you know, right off the bat and you're not going to take the job. But if it has the potential to be a hit and ends up being a flop, you can't figure it out.

• 15:02Alec Baldwin?

  So you do this show and when you come out of that, like, what's the lesson for you? Was there something you said to yourself, never again am I going to?

• 15:10Speaker 05

  No, I went into a depression for nine months. I was on Valium to sleep for the six months and I went into a Valium depression for nine months, gained 40 pounds, woke up, went, what the hell just happened? And I couldn't say.

• 15:26Alec Baldwin?

  Why do you think that is? Like, you, you care a lot. There's nothing casual about you. There's nothing amateurish about you. You know, you're very serious and you're very dedicated, you're very hardworking, along with being very talented. And you feel these wounds. Why do you think that is? Why did it affect you so much?

• 15:42Speaker 05

  Well, our business is subjective. It's all subjective. You know what I mean? You talk to anybody from The Baker's Wife and they can remember it as if it was yesterday. And there's blood spilled and we became blood, a blood family. I just saw Timmy Jerome, who's in Phantom now. And we see each other and what we recall is that bonding and that horrible experience. And we can talk about it as if it was yesterday. I think it's because, you know, it happened to us. Of course, it happened to the creators, but they're not on stage. We're on stage succeeding or failing in front of an audience. We're on stage being judged by the audience. We're the messengers.

• 16:16Alec Baldwin?

  We're the ones who take the hit.

• 16:17Speaker 05

  We take the hit all the time.

• 16:19Alec Baldwin?

  We're the ones who take the hit.

• 16:19Speaker 05

  And this was really abusive. It was just horrible. I woke up one morning and my face was filled with what looked like whiteheads. The entire face had raised bumps on it. I didn't know what it was. I went to sleep, woke up, and the entire face. I, maybe it was from the Valium, I have no idea. But I was, things were happening to us, physically happening to us.

• 16:41Alec Baldwin?

  And when does the sun come out for you? When does the sun come out for Patti LuPone career-wise?

• 16:46Speaker 05

  I think when I go back to work with David Mamet. I go back and work with David. I go into-

• 16:52Alec Baldwin?

  What do you mean, go back?

• 16:53Speaker 05

  David and I did a play in Chicago. Was that after Baker's Wife? Was that? I see, I'm trying to keep, I'm trying to keep it straight.

• 17:01Alec Baldwin?

  What play did you do with him first?

• 17:02Speaker 05

  The very first play I did with him was a thing called All Men Are Whores. Kevin, Sam Chichifis and I did it at Yale Rep for one night. I said, "Hey, Dave, we opened and closed in New Haven." And New Haven used to be one of the circuit, you know, when you took a show out of town, your first stop was New Haven. And it was a big deciding factor. So we opened and closed-

• 17:20Alec Baldwin?

  We bombed in New Haven.

• 17:21Speaker 05

  We bombed in it. Well, and from there, he gave me a play called The Woods.

• 17:26Alec Baldwin?

  And what happens when you do The Woods?

• 17:28Speaker 05

  Well, I go back to what I was trained for. And I go back to an honest environment, pretty much.

• 17:36Alec Baldwin?

  And you're back to the circle of trust.

• 17:39Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 17:39Alec Baldwin?

  Having feels right.

• 17:41Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 17:41Alec Baldwin?

  This is more like it.

• 17:42Speaker 05

  And it's a risk. It's a big risk. I mean, every time I work with David, I learn so much as a human being-

• 17:47Alec Baldwin?

  What year was that approximately?

• 17:48Speaker 05

  And I think 19, late 1976, 77.

• 17:52Alec Baldwin?

  So you had a relationship with him-

• 17:54Speaker 05

  Yes, well, we met him-

• 17:55Alec Baldwin?

  For 35 years?

• 17:56Speaker 05

  Yes, yes. And I will, I will drop everything to do a play by David. Everything. I, I don't care how risky it is. I, I learned so much from David and I, I instinctually have the Mamet speak. That's something that I know how to do. His, his rhythms.

• 18:13Speaker 05

  And I think it's because, as someone said, I cut my teeth on David, David's words, when, you know, starting with All Men Are Horses and The Woods and The Water Engine and Edmund. I had finished Evita and I went down to the Province Town Playhouse at the opening of Edmund. And I said, why couldn't I have been in this in the back of my head? And not two weeks later, I got a call from Gregory Moser and David saying, would you replace Linda? Linda's a Chicago actress and she wanted to go back to Chicago.

• 18:38Alec Baldwin?

  And she was playing what?

• 18:39Speaker 05

  The wife. She came on it. She was at the beginning.

• 18:42Alec Baldwin?

  In the beginning. And she's gone.

• 18:44Speaker 05

  That's it. You know, and then she visits him in prison.

• 18:46Alec Baldwin?

  The maid broke the dish, or whatever it is.

• 18:47Speaker 05

  Exactly.

• 18:48Alec Baldwin?

  I'm leaving you. She says, what do you mean, you're leaving? Of course, we're leaving. We're going to get him dressed. We're going to think, no, no, I'm leaving you. What?

• 18:54Speaker 05

  Do you know this? Well, you know this.

• 18:56Alec Baldwin?

  I begged Mamet to give me the rights to do the movie, but he gave it to Bill Macy.

• 18:57Speaker 05

  Yeah. And so, I joined the company and my agent was so furious with me. He said, this'll hurt your negotiable, you know, ability. And I went, for what? You know, if anybody in the business knows who I am, they know that this is where I came from before I did Evita. And, and they did not want me to go backwards. They didn't want me to go to the Guthrie to do Rosalind in As You Like It. But I was able to work with Liviu Chule, a great Romanian director who just passed, God rest his soul, in his internationally famous production of As You Like It. At the Guthrie, I was raked over the coals by the critics. One critic said, you know, basically, what was Evita doing here? And it was, it was difficult, as you say, to straddle that, but I kept doing it because I was given the opportunity to do it.

• 19:40Speaker 05

  And I wasn't going to say, no, I have to wait for the next Evita part to come along. If I waited for the next Evita part to come along.

• 19:47Alec Baldwin?

  You would wait 10 years.

• 19:48Speaker 05

  I'd still be waiting.

• 19:49Alec Baldwin?

  Right. Is Evita the next big thing for you?

• 19:53Speaker 05

  I'm trying to think.

• 19:55Alec Baldwin?

  In my recollection, Evita is the big thing. Evita is the thing that changed your life.

• 19:59Speaker 05

  It is. That was 1979. But in between.

• 20:02Alec Baldwin?

  And how does that happen?

• 20:03Speaker 05

  I audition.

• 20:03Speaker 05

  Joanna Merlin is Hal Prince's casting director and of course-

• 20:07Alec Baldwin?

  Hal directed.

• 20:08Speaker 05

  Hal directed. And as I said earlier, all of those people had come to see this acting company at Juilliard, this ensemble-

• 20:14Alec Baldwin?

  They were aware of you, the casting people.

• 20:16Speaker 05

  They were aware, yes. And so I was brought in for a preliminary audition and then I was told to make myself free, make sure that I made myself free for the final callback. And as I understand it, Hal wanted to cast actors in the role, the roles, as opposed to just musical theater people. So I think that's one of the reasons why I got in there, because I knew, they knew I was an actor. In between, there were several plays. There was stage directions by Israel Horovitz, John Glover, Ellen Green and I down at the public, while Merrill's doing-

• 20:45Alec Baldwin?

  You're doing everything you can to scratch that itch of yours and not become a star. No, I get it.

• 20:49Speaker 05

  No, no, it was the, it was the available work.

• 20:53Alec Baldwin?

  We're about to talk about the moment when perhaps one of the greatest musical stars of the last 50 years is born on Broadway.

• 21:01Speaker 05

  What a compliment, thank you.

• 21:02Alec Baldwin?

  So let's talk about how the moment this happens. Hal Prince wants people who can act and sing and you go to the, make yourself available to the final callback and what happened. How do you feel when you're in that room?

• 21:12Speaker 05

  Well, I was very mad because I was actually shooting 1941 and there was a little issue about-

• 21:18Alec Baldwin?

  Spielberg's movie.

• 21:19Speaker 05

  Yes, about letting me go. And the producer said, "If you're not back tomorrow or the next day, you'll never work in Hollywood again." So I left Hollywood with those words ringing in my ear and I woke up in New York to the 1978 blizzard where there were like two feet of snow on the ground.

• 21:34Alec Baldwin?

  Couldn't get back to LA?

• 21:35Speaker 05

  I couldn't get back to LA, no.

• 21:37Alec Baldwin?

  Did they fire you?

• 21:37Speaker 05

  No, Christopher Reeve got me on the plane. I only missed three hours of shooting. When they said, "How'd you get here?" I said, "Superman."

• 21:44Alec Baldwin?

  Superman.

• 21:44Speaker 05

  I did. It's absolutely true.

• 21:47Alec Baldwin?

  That Juilliard camaraderie.

• 21:48Speaker 05

  Exactly. So I went to the final callback, but I was really mad because I didn't want to do this musical. I didn't like the music. I thought-

• 21:56Alec Baldwin?

  Which one?

• 21:56Speaker 05

  Evita.

• 21:57Alec Baldwin?

  You didn't like it?

• 21:58Speaker 05

  Uh-uh, no.

• 21:59Alec Baldwin?

  What specifically, you're a smart woman, what specifically didn't you like?

• 22:03Speaker 05

  Well, I didn't like, I heard the White Album, the Julie Covington, David Essex, Colm Wilkinson, very rocky, weird music, but it rocked out a lot. And I thought, "What's the matter with me? I'm a rocker, I want to be a rocker."

• 22:13Alec Baldwin?

  Here's your chance.

• 22:14Speaker 05

  It was really, really high. Didn't grab me. I mean, I grew up on Rodgers and Hammerstein. I grew up on Julie Stein, Meredith Wilson, Stephen Sondheim. This was not a musical to me. This was noise from Britain. You know what I mean? It wasn't, it just didn't, it did-

• 22:31Alec Baldwin?

  So how did you go out there and do it?

• 22:32Speaker 05

  I went out and the final audition, I was wet from my knees down. I was wearing sneakers and jeans, not knowing it was gonna snow. You know, I did, so stupid, I didn't look at the weather report.

• 22:41Alec Baldwin?

  Yeah.

• 22:41Speaker 05

  I went out there and I blasted, literally blasted through, Rainbow High, Buenos Aires, and Don't Cry For Me, Argentina. And there were tears in my eyes, apparently, and there were tears of rage, certainly not tears of...

• 22:54Alec Baldwin?

  Right.

• 22:54Speaker 05

  And I left and I got a call on the set, I made it back, and I got a call on the set in the makeup trailer, and they said, "You've got the part." And I started to cry again because I had promised David that I would reprise The Woods at the Public Theater with Ulo Grosspar directing.

• 23:11Alec Baldwin?

  What I love is that you're gonna blow your Hollywood film career to go do a musical you don't even like, and then that one they offer to you, you're not sure you're gonna take that because you gotta go do another little Mammoth play.

• 23:22Speaker 05

  Well, I had been trained to be an actor, and I thought my responsibility was to act at every possible opportunity, and especially good opportunities.

• 23:32Alec Baldwin?

  Keep working.

• 23:32Speaker 05

  You know, put, you know, ply your craft, and if it's good material. And David and I forged a friendship and a bond, and I didn't wanna let him down. David and I became really, really good friends. David lived on 20th, Kevin and I lived on 21st Street. He'd come over all the time for breakfast, we'd walk around, we'd do antique.

• 23:50Alec Baldwin?

  I'm gonna start calling you Al, by the way, because you keep changing the subject. What happened with Hal?

• 23:54Speaker 05

  I didn't mean...

• 23:55Alec Baldwin?

  How did Hal get you to do that material, and it became what it became?

• 24:01Speaker 05

  Well, no, I knew I had to do it. I cried because I knew that I would have to, I couldn't do The Woods, and I had to do Evita because I knew, I wanted to work with Hal, and I knew that it would change the course of my career.

• 24:11Alec Baldwin?

  You knew going in that it was gonna be a hit.

• 24:13Speaker 05

  There was so much hype before.

• 24:16Alec Baldwin?

  Had they done it in London?

• 24:17Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 24:17Alec Baldwin?

  So it was a big hit in London?

• 24:18Speaker 05

  Huge hit in London.

• 24:19Alec Baldwin?

  And you were in the American cast, it was a huge hit in London, so you knew this was a big opportunity.

• 24:22Speaker 05

  And there was hype, you can't believe, that was my first indication that this was gonna be a tough experience, because it was, I went, how am I gonna get around the hype? It was the first musical that I was aware of that had so much pre-opening hype.

• 24:37Alec Baldwin?

  The modern way.

• 24:38Speaker 05

  Not even buzz, you know, not word of mouth, hype.

• 24:43Speaker 05

  Media hype. And it was created, of course, by, really, Isfal, by Andrew's company. Do you know what I mean? That's how he operates. And it was frightening. And I had no vocal technique.

• 24:52Alec Baldwin?

  So now this thing is all hyped up. You've been through everything you've been through. You've had some good times and some tough times, and you've worked hard, God knows, four years in a row with Howesman and that company. And you step out for the Broadway opening, the opening of Evita. What was it like for you? How did that evening go?

• 25:07Speaker 05

  I had the flu.

• 25:08Alec Baldwin?

  Perfect. Of course you did.

• 25:09Speaker 05

  Yeah. And I threw up in the sink before I sang "Don't Cry For Me, Argentina." I'm sure it was a combination of, I got, I got extremely bad notices opening in L.A. And extremely bad notices opening in San Francisco. And Hal came to me and said, "We're going to laugh about this in 20 years, Patty." They pulled the entire company together. And he said, there was an article coming out in Susie Nikoparker's column the next day, that I was going to be fired, and that Actors Equity was waiting to clear Elaine Page to take my place. And this was in the newspaper.

• 25:42Alec Baldwin?

  She was a Brit.

• 25:42Speaker 05

  Yeah, she's the one that originated in London. "I'm dealing with all of this press of me being fired and me not being able to sing the part, and still going on for my six..."

• 25:51Alec Baldwin?

  Throwing up in the sink.

• 25:52Speaker 05

  Well, that was, that was opening night.

• 25:53Alec Baldwin?

  And so, so you go out and do the opening, and what happens?

• 25:56Speaker 05

  Bad reviews again. Actually, they weren't bad. They dismissed Hal. And this is, this was an innovative, this was an innovative concept, an innovative production. They dismissed Hal, and they barely touched on Mandy and me. And that's worse, when you're ignored. It's one thing if they're passionate and you're bad, and passionate when you're good. But when you're ignored, and Mandy and I, at one point, I said, "You want to go out for a drink?" He said, "Yeah." And we, we were on 52nd, I think that's where the Broadway theater is. And we walked down 8th Avenue, and simultaneously, we burst into tears. I mean, we worked hard in those parts, and then to be ignored is tough. And then, of course, nine months later, they give us the Tonys.

• 26:42Alec Baldwin?

  More after the break.

• 26:44Speaker 03

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• 26:55Speaker 05

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• 27:12Speaker 03

  Hey, it's Niall Rogers, host of Before the Moment, a Lincoln original series. I'm driving across the country, meeting some of today's most fascinating artists. We're exploring the stories before the moment that changed everything. This week, I'm joined by my friend, John Legend. What still makes you just sit down at the piano?

• 27:36Speaker 06

  If you sat down at nine AM and then at noon, you had a full song that you recorded and put in your voice recorder or you recorded at your studio, you just created something brand new that didn't exist when you woke up. What a beautiful feeling it is. I'm always excited to write something new. I've been writing for Broadway, which has been a new challenge with new collaborators and amazing performers who are triple threats, who can sing and dance and act and do all these amazing things. And I want to keep feeling that. And so that means not resting on my laurels, going out there and continuing to create something new.

• 28:11Speaker 03

  Experience Before the Moment, a Lincoln original series on the iHeartRadio app, YouTube, or wherever you get your podcasts.

• 28:21Alec Baldwin?

  When you win the Tony, was it any vindication for you at all? Or was it just an update?

• 28:25Speaker 05

  Oh, of course.

• 28:26Alec Baldwin?

  It was. So you felt good when you won?

• 28:28Speaker 05

  Oh, yeah, it's such a relief. It was such a relief because really, if you read my-

• 28:31Alec Baldwin?

  Did it wipe everything away?

• 28:33Speaker 05

  No, because I was still performing and still scared out of my mind every night. I envied Mandy because Mandy was just all over the place. He didn't have a problem singing it. So he literally, he told me, he told me something the other day, we were talking about it, Vito. And he said, well, Hal told me to go, he wanted me over there. And I said to Hal, how do I get there? He said, I don't know, just get there. And so that's where he does a jeté across the stage. And I went, I would see it every night going, why is Mandy doing that? And it was because Hal told him to get there, get him there.

• 29:04Alec Baldwin?

  Didn't care how.

• 29:05Speaker 05

  And Mandy put it in. He didn't care how, so Mandy put it in and it became part of his performance. And so, and I suppose in that respect, Hal gives the actor freedom.

• 29:16Speaker 05

  But I didn't have that freedom because I was so tied up in a knot because I didn't think I could sing it.

• 29:39Speaker 05

  Really, you know, when you, in a rehearsal period, you know this, you have to do it over and over and over again. So you're not hitting that D in "Screw the Middle Classes" once. You're not hitting that G in "Screw the Middle Classes" once. You're doing it over and over again. I didn't have vocal technique to know, but I didn't have to hit those notes every day. I didn't have vocal technique. I got it during the run by, from a kid in the chorus.

• 30:08Alec Baldwin?

  Who?

• 30:09Speaker 05

  David Vosberg. I came offstage in L.A.

• 30:12Alec Baldwin?

  He gave you tips?

• 30:13Speaker 05

  I, they got him a piano, they put a piano in my dressing room, and he worked with me an hour every single day before the show. He would come to me and work out of the goodness of his heart.

• 30:25Alec Baldwin?

  David Vosberg?

• 30:26Speaker 05

  David Vosberg.

• 30:27Alec Baldwin?

  Where is he now?

• 30:28Speaker 05

  He's in Ohio. He's a director of opera. But he would give me a vocal technique. He would warm me up. And the difficult thing was to be, to apply what he had just taught me that night because I would do one thing right, something else would go disastrously wrong. But at least I was getting a technique to sing that part. He saved my job. And they, they knew that, and they paid him.

• 30:54Alec Baldwin?

  Now, you say, when you talk about this, you talk about the tension and the anxiety and the fear, and you don't really want to necessarily be doing a video because you've got another David play and this and this and that. When did it start to become fun for you?

• 31:06Speaker 05

  Oh, "Anything Goes" was a ball.

• 31:08Alec Baldwin?

  Okay, so talk about that. Why?

• 31:10Speaker 05

  Oh, because of the material and because of the cast, and, and it was hysterical.

• 31:13Alec Baldwin?

  Who directed you?

• 31:14Speaker 05

  Jerry Zax. And Jerry did a great job of directing.

• 31:17Alec Baldwin?

  And he's tough.

• 31:18Speaker 05

  Yes, he is. And, but, however, these were the way musicals used to be written. You'd have a joke coming and then a gorgeous song. The material was so ripe and so beautiful. If I was in a bad mood, all I had to do was hear that. And, okay, I know where I am tonight.

• 31:40Alec Baldwin?

  Yeah, exactly.

• 31:43Speaker 05

  Just looking at the audience and seeing tears of joy from laughter. The only thing we are is actors are messengers. That's all we are, correct? We are delivering the playwright's intention through the concept of the director. And I come on stage, if I feel confident in the role, then I give it away. I give it away anyway, but it's all about them. So I have to go out there and love them. And I do, and I think they see that. They can relax with me because they know I'm giving it to them. I'm not, you know, there are some actors that don't want to be on stage.

• 32:18Alec Baldwin?

  Well, it's funny you say that. Well, because you just nailed it. Because Patti LuPone to me is a woman who comes out there. And the first thing she does, she stops there and she's like, you know, "How's everybody doing?" It was like a little moment, like a nightclub singer, like, you know, "How you all doing tonight?" Without saying, "How you all doing tonight?" Like, just connect to them, let them feel like, if there's no place else we'd rather be, is there than here right now?

• 32:37Speaker 05

  Well, I think our responsibility is to relax them. You've been in an audience, I've been in an audience, where we're worried for the performer. And then we're not having the experience. They're paying a lot of-

• 32:50Alec Baldwin?

  And if I'm worried for the performer, and they should be worried for it, then I'm worried for me because I want to get the F out of there, yeah.

• 32:56Speaker 05

  Hello. Our responsibility is, the minute we hit the deck, is to relax the audience. And that is what is called command.

• 33:12Alec Baldwin?

  How long did you do Anything Goes?

• 33:13Speaker 05

  Uh, 15 months, I think, 15. Oh, I laughed my ass off on that show. We had such a ball.

• 33:19Alec Baldwin?

  And the same thing is this idea that someone said to me, "Why do you like doing the theater?" I mean, even now, like, did you get it? A lot of actors do it for a period and you get it out of your system. I said, "You know, the one thing I've never gotten out of my system is if the play's the right play..." I said, "I go to work at 6 o'clock. I like to get to the theater early."

• 33:34Speaker 05

  Me too.

• 33:34Alec Baldwin?

  And kind of drain the day out of me. And then I go out on stage and I said, "You know what I love?" I said, "I know exactly what I'm going to say. I know exactly what-"

• 33:52Alec Baldwin?

  The other guy is gonna say for the next two and a half hours. And I know exactly how people are likely going to react. I said, how often can you say that in your life? You know exactly what's going to happen. And it's a good thing for the next two and a half hours of your life. I never get tired of that.

• 34:06Speaker 05

  No, and I, it's magical. It's magical. And you taught, you said drain the day out. Drain the day out, to have a magical night. Do you know what I mean? Really, to have an experience with a group of people. Do you know what I mean? Not just your fellow actors on the stage, but people that want, that leave the theater going, oh my, I mean, I've done that. I've walked out of a production going, oh my, oh, oh, oh, what street are we on? You know, we've been transported. We've been taken away. We've drained the day out of our life. And we've experienced something that has changed us. It's another thing I love about our profession, the arts. I mean, you can do that in the, in the movies, too.

• 34:40Alec Baldwin?

  Was there, now, as a woman, as an actress, who is known for a raft now of these heavy-duty, you know, powerful musical roles, was there another one that I'm missing between Evita and, and?

• 34:55Speaker 05

  No, we did all, I did Oliver.

• 34:57Alec Baldwin?

  Anything else?

• 34:57Speaker 05

  I did Oliver.

• 34:58Alec Baldwin?

  In London?

• 34:59Speaker 05

  No, Oliver here, Les Mis in London.

• 35:01Alec Baldwin?

  Who were the leads in?

• 35:02Speaker 05

  Oliver, Ron Moody and Graham Campbell, God rest his soul. Ron Moody was reprising his role in Spagnum. Yeah, he was great.

• 35:08Alec Baldwin?

  Beautiful song.

• 35:09Speaker 05

  Gorgeous.

• 35:10Alec Baldwin?

  As long as he needs me.

• 35:11Speaker 05

  Gorgeous.

• 35:11Alec Baldwin?

  One of the most beautiful songs in all of the musical theater.

• 35:14Speaker 05

  Oh, my God, yeah. He wrote a great score. And then I went to London and did Les Mis.

• 35:19Alec Baldwin?

  So, Les Mis, you did only in London?

• 35:21Speaker 05

  Yes.

• 35:21Alec Baldwin?

  Why?

• 35:22Speaker 05

  Well, and this, because I didn't want to do, well, and it's a, it's a, it's a reason that I have questioned my entire career. When I was at the Barbican rehearsing, the Barbican was then the Royal Shakespeare Company's London home, it felt so much like being in the hallways of Juilliard. It was a maze, the rehearsal rooms. I just felt like I was at Juilliard. And Trevor actually said to me, if anybody belongs in this production or with the Royal Shakespeare Company, it's you, Patty, because Michel Saint-Denis was an artistic director of the Royal Shakespeare Company. Michel Saint-Denis was one of the co-founders and an artistic director of the drama division of the Juilliard School. So I came full circle, two different countries, but I had come full circle in training.

• 36:05Alec Baldwin?

  How were the notices for you when you did Les Mis in London?

• 36:07Speaker 05

  I don't even remember, but I won an Olivier Award for Fantine, so I have no idea.

• 36:11Alec Baldwin?

  Everybody that I know that saw you do it said you were breathtaking in that role. So there was no desire you had?

• 36:16Speaker 05

  Well, this is what happened. Two weeks after we opened at the Barbican, I came offstage in my barricade uniform, because I was in the barricade scene. And I went, "I can't do this in New York." It was an instinct. "I can't do this in New York." And I went to the stage door to drop off a name to the stage door man. And Cameron MacIntosh, the producer, you know, besides RSC, was standing there. And I said, "Cameron, I can't do this in New York." I was the only American in the company. He said, "I know the part's too small." I said, "No, that's not it." I said, "This is my company." I realized, when I came off the stage, that I was in the perfect theatrical environment, in the perfect play, with the perfect cast. And I didn't want anything to touch that memory. And I made a decision.

• 36:56Alec Baldwin?

  It would be different in New York.

• 36:57Speaker 05

  Totally. It would be a reproduction of this production. And I didn't think that I would be...

• 37:03Alec Baldwin?

  Interesting.

• 37:04Speaker 05

  And, you know, I've never known whether I made the right decision or not, but...

• 37:07Alec Baldwin?

  What did you do after that?

• 37:10Speaker 05

  LBJ. I came back to do LBJ.

• 37:12Alec Baldwin?

  Now, talk about film in your life now. Because in and around all of your historic career in the theater, what was going on for you film-wise?

• 37:23Speaker 05

  Nothing. I wish it did.

• 37:24Alec Baldwin?

  Not nothing, I mean what...

• 37:25Speaker 05

  But minor. But I don't know why I don't get cast. Or I don't know why that, you know, and now it's probably too late because I'm one of those women that are too old for Hollywood. Or maybe, maybe I'm coming into my film career now. I don't know why it didn't happen, but it didn't. I did Driving Miss Daisy, and Alfred Yuri was responsible for my casting in that. I did, um...

• 37:44Alec Baldwin?

  What's the best experience you had making a film?

• 37:47Speaker 05

  All of them. Working, especially working with the Australian directors, Bruce Beresford and Peter Weir.

• 37:53Alec Baldwin?

  What did you do with them?

• 37:53Speaker 05

  We did Witness with Peter Weir, and I did Driving Miss Daisy with Bruce Beresford.

• 37:58Alec Baldwin?

  Did you ever work with La Met?

• 37:59Speaker 05

  Very little. I had a tiny, tiny little part in... Something, I can't remember what it was, but I thought, oh my God, I would love to have worked with him.

• 38:06Alec Baldwin?

  Who were the stars?

• 38:07Speaker 05

  Um, I, I don't remember the whole experience. I was, I, literally, I had one tiny scene and I can't remember if it was a movie or, I can't remember.

• 38:15Alec Baldwin?

  Television series?

• 38:17Speaker 05

  Could have been a television series, but I can't remember.

• 38:18Alec Baldwin?

  No, what about, what about, what about television?

• 38:20Speaker 05

  Um, Life Goes On for four years, and then, you know, guest spots here and there. But it was, it's odd that, that, that I haven't had that opportunity.

• 38:28Alec Baldwin?

  You probably did have that opportunity, but you passed on it, correct?

• 38:31Speaker 05

  No, I don't think I could.

• 38:32Alec Baldwin?

  Didn't the chance to do a television series come your way?

• 38:35Speaker 05

  No, I, it's interesting. I'm a hard sell, Alec.

• 38:43Speaker 05

  I've been cut at the studio level on auditions in California because they didn't believe I was, I could do this or that. You know, it's like, it's, I'm a hard sell in California. I'm a hard sell in movies. I'm a hard sell in TV, you know? I'm always a hard sell. I could tell you a story right now, but I can't. I've been asked to audition for a musical, and it's 25 years since I've auditioned for a musical. When does it stop?

• 39:12Alec Baldwin?

  Coming up, Patti LuPone talks about the most painful loss of her career, her subsequent illness, and how she recovered from both.

• 39:20Speaker 05

  But the tigers come at night.

• 39:27Speaker 05

  With their voices soft as thunder. As they tear your hope apart. As they turn your dream to shame.

• 39:57Speaker 05

  Small businesses like yours. Whether you're buying equipment, expanding your team, or bridging cash flow gaps, OnDeck's loans up to $400,000 make it happen fast. Rated A plus by the Better Business Bureau and earning thousands of five-star Trust Pilot reviews, OnDeck delivers funding you can count on. Apply in minutes at ondeck.com. Depending on certain loan attributes, your business loan may be issued by OnDeck or Celtic Bank. OnDeck does not lend in North Dakota. All loans and amounts subject to lender approval.

• 40:24Speaker 03

  Hey, it's Niall Rogers, host of Before the Moment, a Lincoln original series. I'm driving across the country, meeting some of today's most fascinating artists. We're exploring the stories before the moment that changed everything. This week, I'm joined by breakout singer-songwriter Alex Warren.

• 40:44Speaker 05

  I'm like a kid when I play music and I make music and I'm constantly asking questions. You know, whether it's an instrument I haven't played, or it's a melody that seems foreign. You know, this every night you play a show and it's the same set, but it's not the same show. At a certain point, your brain kind of goes on autopilot. When I'm in the studio, or if I'm making music, that's where that curiosity kind of comes back, you know? I haven't lost it yet, but I'm also on my sophomore album, so, and you, you obviously are an expert here.

• 41:10Speaker 03

  Experience Before the Moment, a Lincoln original series on the iHeartRadio app, YouTube, or wherever you get your podcasts.

• 41:26Alec Baldwin?

  This is Alec Baldwin, and you're listening to Here's the Thing. Patti LuPone originated the role of Norma Desmond in Andrew Lloyd Webber's Sunset Boulevard in London. She was set to move with the show to Broadway until she found out she was being replaced by Glenn Close. To say she was devastated is an understatement.

• 41:56Speaker 05

  You know, there's always going to be some kind of... Stuff going on in a musical, that's just the nature of a musical. But it was a great company, we had a great time. It was the exterior information that was coming into me that was very painful. I mean, clearly, when I didn't get the reviews Andrew wanted me to get, I was on the chopping block. But I didn't find that out until after Glenn Close opened in New York and Vincent Canby gave her this review against my bad review. Meantime, I'm getting standing ovations in London. And there's nothing about me in the press in London. Because I show up every night, I'm turning in my performance.

• 42:29Alec Baldwin?

  It's working.

• 42:30Speaker 05

  Yeah. But Andrew wanted something else, and the way they got me out was, the way they were going to get me out, was to have me quit because of the barrage of negative publicity. And my agents and the lawyers said, "Stay onstage." And I don't know if it was worth it, because it was really painful information.

• 42:46Alec Baldwin?

  And you did.

• 42:47Speaker 05

  A month before I closed, I got a telephone call from my agent. I'm in the dressing room, getting ready for the show. My agent called, he said, "Are you sitting down?" I said, "Yeah." And he said, "You've been fired. Glenn Close is replacing you in New York." And I went, and I got up and had batting practice in my dressing room with a floor lamp, and left. They could hear me crying and screaming. And the company came up, and the company manager, I said, "I've been fired." I said, "I'm leaving. I'm going. Bye. I can't take this anymore." And if people say, "What would you do if you saw Andrew again?", I said, "It's not what I would do, it's what my husband would do." Because whatever, I had to absorb. I then took out on my husband when I came home. And that was like, I went into therapy, I was on Prozac. It was like a, it was like a long healing process, because I had to absorb it, and I

• 43:30Speaker 05

  couldn't, there was no place I could release it, because I had to perform every night. But that company was extraordinary. And we had a great time, we had a great time.

• 43:37Alec Baldwin?

  So after that, you do Sweeney.

• 43:39Speaker 05

  Then, the next musical I do is Sweeney.

• 43:41Alec Baldwin?

  With?

• 43:42Speaker 05

  John Doe. Oh, well, then it's 2000. This is interesting. I come home, beat up emotionally, and also physically. I find out. Well, through a routine eye examination, that I am in the middle of detached retinas in both eyes. There's like 400 shots of laser in one eye, 250 in the other eye. Kevin Anderson gets into a life-threatening motorcycle accident, and Bob Avi, the choreographer, comes down with a really, really severe case of, I don't know, shingles or something. So three of us are manifesting illness at the end of this experience, which was so bad. So I take time to heal, and I do a movie, I do bits and pieces, but the next

• 44:25Speaker 05

  big thing that comes, comes on the heels of breast cancer. They say, "Do you want to play Nellie Lovett in Sweeney Todd with a New York Phil, Bryn Turville playing Sweeney?" I went, "First thing I said to Steve, 'No, because I've never been cast in a Sondheim musical.'" They said, "Yes, he gives the approval." I said, "Of course I do, but this is a year earlier." Within that year, I find out that I have breast cancer. And what happens is I deal with it. There's nothing else I can do, but deal with it and go through radiation. And on my last day of radiation, start rehearsal for Sweeney Todd with a New York Phil.

• 44:55Alec Baldwin?

  The one for the Phil?

• 44:57Speaker 05

  Yes, the quintessential New York moment. The New York Philharmonic on a New York stage in a New Yorker's production. And that was an unbelievable experience. Here we are, hot from the oven.

• 45:15Speaker 05

  What is that? It's priest. Have a little priest. Is it really good? It's too good, at least. Then again, they don't palm it sins of the flesh, so it's pretty fresh.

• 45:31Alec Baldwin?

  Now, let's talk about Mamet's last play. So here, your last venture in New York is you with your old buddy. So he calls you, he's got the play, and he calls you.

• 45:42Speaker 05

  I called him.

• 45:43Alec Baldwin?

  You did?

• 45:43Speaker 05

  I saw November, and I saw, after the play, I saw his wife Rebecca Pigeon. I said, "Rebecca, I'm hitting David up for a play. It's too long. It's too long that we've worked together." And I wrote him a letter, and I said, "I don't want a relationship to end with the old neighborhood." I said, "Let's do something." And then he called me and he said, do you know who Kathy Bodine is? And I did, but I didn't. And then he started to tell me about, he was thinking about writing a play about the weatherman or an anarchist. And I went, oh, cool. And then I found out, this was last year, and then I found out that the play was being done in London. And I went, no, no, no, man. I said, I have to play this part. And I wrote to him and I said, is this the part we were talking about? I said, they don't want me in London, because they don't want me in London, but can I do it in New York? And he called me, he said, screw London, let's do it now.

• 46:27Speaker 05

  So that's how that happened. I knew it was a risk, but that, you know, I always take a risk with David. And I-

• 46:33Alec Baldwin?

  Had you been directed by David before?

• 46:35Speaker 05

  Mm-hmm, a lot.

• 46:36Alec Baldwin?

  Right.

• 46:37Speaker 05

  More often than not.

• 46:38Alec Baldwin?

  You were comfortable with him in both aspects?

• 46:40Speaker 05

  Very, very.

• 46:41Alec Baldwin?

  And we talked about, because I came and saw you, that last performance. And we talked about how the financing and the financiers themselves have changed a lot, which is if they don't get those results very, very quickly, they jump.

• 46:56Speaker 05

  That's right.

• 46:57Alec Baldwin?

  They put the parachute on.

• 46:58Speaker 05

  This was a risky play. And you know what Broadway should be, what Broadway is supposed to be, which is a vehicle for every idea. And I also am frustrated with the producers that have made gobs of money. They should have a levy taxed, a tax levied against them. They should open a black box theater. They should support all the new playwrights and composers. There should be a great deal of support. Art is the soul of a nation, and our art is not being supported or developed.

• 47:32Alec Baldwin?

  Being fed.

• 47:33Speaker 05

  Yes. And it's very, very, very depressing. It's very depressing. If I go back on the stage in New York, I'm going to find out who the producers are and who their partners are, and I'm going to sit down and talk to them, and I want to find out what their marketing campaign is, what their marketing, you know.

• 47:45Alec Baldwin?

  You need some answers going in.

• 47:47Speaker 05

  Yes, you definitely. And I want to pay and play, which you don't have pay or play on Broadway. You don't have that. But, you know, they don't think we take the risk with them. We most certainly do. Actors do.

• 47:56Alec Baldwin?

  Well, we book out. The pay or play concept in films is important because we book out. And sometimes you've got to take a deep breath and go, maybe I shouldn't care so much.

• 48:03Speaker 05

  I don't know whether that's true, Alec.

• 48:05Alec Baldwin?

  It's tough not to.

• 48:06Speaker 05

  It would reflect in your performance. Do you know what I mean? I think that you can see when people care and audiences can see when they don't care.

• 48:14Alec Baldwin?

  Because you seem like someone, in the years I've bumped into you, run into you, known you, known you better, you seem to care of the exact same amount as you used to.

• 48:26Speaker 05

  I love what I do. And I love the audience and I love the fact that I get to do it. And I love our craft very, very much. And it's a noble craft. We have a responsibility to it and to the audience and to the playwright and to the message. I won't ever care less. (singing) If the sky should fall into the sea And the stars fade all around me All the times that we have known here I will sing a hymn to love.

• 49:10Alec Baldwin?

  Next month, Patti LuPone will go on a national tour with her concert entitled "Far Away Places." This is "Hymn to Love," from the CD of the same name. Her book, "Patti LuPone: A Memoir," is now available both in hardcover and as an ebook. So the last thing I want to say to you is a comment and a question embedded in a comment. And that is, and I want to say this as carefully as I can, because I don't want to get myself in trouble here on public radio. Watching you perform, Patti, sometimes, it's like having sex with you. I mean, it's like a sexual experience.

• 49:42Speaker 05

  What a compliment.

• 49:43Alec Baldwin?

  It's like sex.

• 49:44Speaker 05

  Oh, Alex.

• 49:45Alec Baldwin?

  When you do what you do, and when you're done, I almost get this feeling like you're looking at me personally, looking at me going, "You really enjoyed that, didn't you? That was good for you, wasn't it?" Do you realize, my question is, do you realize the effect you have on people? Do you know? When you come out there, can you feel how much they're digging what you do? You must be able to feel it.

• 50:04Speaker 05

  Well, I don't know if, I don't go out there going, "They're going to dig me." I go out there, and I do know that the people that have come to see me know that I have them in mind and that I already have them on my side. They know that I'm doing it for them. It could be a persona, it could be a body language thing, but they know that I know they're there. And the difference is, when actors don't acknowledge the audience, the audience can't come.

• 50:36Speaker 05

  When an actor acknowledges the audience, then you can have a moment of ecstasy.

• 50:48Speaker 05

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  Hey, I'm Niall Rogers. This fall, I'll be driving across the country, meeting some of today's coolest and most fascinating artists. We'll explore the stories before the moments that changed everything. Because every musician remembers the moment where it all began. Experience Before the Moment, a Lincoln original series on the iHeartRadio app, YouTube, or wherever you get your podcasts.

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  This is an iHeart Podcast. Guaranteed human.