And that's what you really missed with Jenna.
And Kevin an iHeartRadio podcast.
Welcome to and that's what you're in this podcast. It's Jenna without Kevin.
Boohoo.
We're missing Kevin right now. He's actually deep in tech at spelling Bees. So I took this one. I actually stole this one from him because we have one of my childhood heroes, Adam Pascal is here.
We one and only Roger from Wren.
Also, one of my other favorite musicals he started was Aida, and then he also was in Chess at the Royal Albert Hall, which ironically out now Liah is in New York, so full Star called there and we have a really lovely conversation. He's a wonderful human being and I'm just so please.
That I got to meet him and interview him by myself. Sorry, Kevin, enjoy the interview, Saudi. How are you great?
How are you?
I'm good? Thank you, thank you so much for joining me. I'm sorry Kevin couldn't.
Be here, but he sends his thanks. And we just watched the movie yesterday, so.
Oh you did? OK?
Yeah, yeah, I don't.
Think I've seen it literally since I went to the premiere.
Oh my gosh, Wow, that's a long time ago. Well, I'm so excited for you to be here. I have to say, if you told like fourteen year old Jenna that she'd be talking to Adam Pascal, I think I would have probably like thrown a shoe at myself or something like that.
So that's very sweet if you think you.
Are just an icon in the Broadway history books, and thank you.
We are just wildly talented and just so I was like yesterday I was.
Saying you, you and Wren and all the pieces that you were a part of like really raised me.
It's so very exciting to chat with you.
I appreciate that. And I can tell you that from my own experience, I had a very similar upbringing with the movies of Hair and the Rocky Horror Pictures Show. So both of those movies for me were you know, And it's really it's great because it's such a full circle moment for me because because I had that experience with those shows, and specifically we're talking about the movie. So I've never seen Hair on stage. I've seen the movie about one hundred and fifty times, but I've never
seen it on stage. And Rocky Horror, same thing. I've only ever seen the movie, but seen it so many times, and both of those movies had such a visceral effect on me as a kid growing up, yeah, and having never seen them on stage. And so then cut to
the movie, the Rent movie. So the Rent we had a very similar well I'll backtrack, So a lot of kids coming up to me who have only ever seen the movie and they've never seen on stage, and they are affected by the film in the way that I was affected by Hair.
Right, So there's like a touch point there, something that you can understand what they're yeah, holding on to.
And both of those movies had a very similar trajectory in that they were both widely popular on Broadway. Then they were transferred to film and had sort of moderate success and divided the fans of like, you know, some people loved it, some people hated it. Same with critics and all the stuff. So it was a very similar, very similar reaction by the fan base that Hairhead.
Wow.
Well, I we'll definitely get into more of the Rent movie, but I just wanted to backtrack a little bit. I see you're from Woodbury. I am also from Long Island as well. So hell, yeah, I'm from East Meadow, of course. Yeah, And I went to Holy Trinity High School, which had a wonderful theater department at the time, and it was just like we did a million shows a year, and I just yeah, Long Islander, you know.
Yeah, And I've been back there a lot. I'm actually I've been teaching at Long Island University and directing the show at Long Island University and so wow, my sister still lives at Huntington. I was just there, yeah to go, So yeah, love them funny.
So you started out more as a music artist versus like a stage actor, is that right?
Yeah? Yeah. So I grew up on Long Island at in New York City, and I grew up playing in rock bands. Wow, yeah, I was. I spent you know, my my high school years, my college years playing in bands, playing all the all the clubs in the city, and you know, doing that whole circuit and trying to get a record deal and trying to become a rock star.
You know. That was that was what I was focused on in those years, and and theater was not something that I had ever considered as a career path because quite frankly, for people like me at the time, it wasn't a career path right back in the mid nineties, you know, there wasn't a plethora of people that kind of came out of nowhere and didn't have any training and all of a sudden they're on Broadway, Like I
might have been the first one. So you know, like so it just never occurred that that that would be something I could pursue. And until it happened that I realized, oh wow, this is but but you know, it's it's it became so it became such a logical extension to who I was, you know, and and and and it
and also the way that I sing. I used to get from guys and bands all the time they're like, stop singing with amos vibrato, Like I'm sorry, man, that's how I sing, you know, I think you know, I always had you know, it was always that kind of rock but sort of you know, I don't want to say Broadway sounding, but you know, sort of a bigger sounding voice, you know, because those are the guys that I was attracted to as growing up as as as singers.
You know, all of these you know, high tenor and I'm not a high tenor but all of these you know high tenor Freddy Likedy exactly for Mercury and Steve Perry and and you know Lou Graham and all of these guys that were my heroes, you know, and I just I just screamed my head off for hours a day for years, you know, trying to sound like them.
What a perfect departure, I guess or transition into Rent, though, yes, you know, what a perfect score and like what music to sing? So how did how did Rent come to you? And what was that whole journey?
Like? So, Idina Menzielle and I grew up down the street from each other. She is also a ssiasid High school graduate, Right.
I forgot about that?
Yes, so so I. Dina and her boyfriend at the time, Glenn, she had been cast in the show and they and and so she knew that they were having trouble h casting the role of Roger, and so they thought of me and they were like, he's a rock singer whatever. They called me up. They were like, a, Dina's doing the show. It's gonna run like four weeks off Broadway, and is it something you'd never be interested in auditioning for? And I was like, well, I've never auditioned for anything before.
What do I do? They They're like, I think you just go down with your guitar and sing a song. And I was like, all right, sure. You know, I had just broken up with the band that I'd been with all of those years, and I was like looking for my next thing. I certainly never thought that, you know, I always thought my next thing would just be another band.
But that's you know, but this opportunity came along and it just, you know, one thing just led to another and and it all of you know, I have four auditions in that week, and then by the end of the week, you know, they had given me the part. And you know, I often get asked like, oh my god, what what was your reaction when you got cast? Is Roger and Rent And I have to remind people that, like, it's not.
Later exactly.
My reaction was how am I going to keep my job? How many go to rehearsals and keep this job?
You know?
So right, yeah, I mean there's something to that, right, Like people always ask us like did you know it was special?
Or like, what was it like getting cast in the show?
And you know, you can only hope that something special happens with it, but that's not really what you're hoping for.
You're hoping for a really.
Good time and to have a great job and you know, to do good work.
And lots of experiences are very special. They don't necessarily go on to be huge successes, but they're still there. They can be equally memorable as memorable and special, you know.
Sure.
Now I'm curious, though, like, because you you were there from the beginning and the inception of this thing that is now rent, Like, what was it like hearing that music for the first time and needing Jonathan, and like who was he at this point to you? Like, because so few people get to talk about him and experience him, because you know, it was so tragic.
But my, my, I, as you can imagine, I get asked this often and my answer is usually disappointing to people, which is that I didn't know Jonathan that well. I knew John I was cast in the show in you know, the December of ninety five, so at the end, and Jonathan passed away in January, right six, so I only knew him for like four weeks, you know, and during most of that time we were in rehearsal and we were working, so there wasn't a lot of socializing going on.
So I unfortunately, like everybody else, right out on his presence, you know, in my in all of our lives, and so you know, the few times I sat with him and talked with him were great, and he was a lovely guy. I wish I knew him better, you know, Yeah, like everybody else wish they knew you know.
And yeah, no, that makes total sense.
I mean, I'm I'm curious though, like because he became so he became so infamous after for his his work and his art, and you guys got to keep that alive, right, and you got to almost see him as the figure that he never got to see himself as. What was like that journey like after and the successive rent after you guys opened and you went a Broadway and you know that kind of like momentum went right, I mean.
It was, it was. It was so much bittersweet irony, you know, like like exactly, like especially with my character in particular, because my character was the musician and you know, and my character was the character who's you know, one desire in the show, in the story was to create some something wonderful. He wanted to write a song that people would remember after he was gone, you know, yeah,
and that was what he was striving for. That's what kept him, That's what kept him motivated, and that's what kept Jonathan motivated. And it was it was the show that Jonathan wrote. And then he ended up in many ways living that well or not living through that experience, you know, by but but but he but he achieved what he wanted to achieve. He just didn't see it, you know. But but but again, if you think about the character, the whole thing was what to achieve it
after I'm gone, you know what I mean? He literally did that. And then for me personally, you know, I always wanted to be a songwriter and an artist and a singer and all of those things. And I, through that character and that song, also achieved the things that I was striving for by by now being connected so closely with that show and that music and specifically again that song about what he's saying. So it's it's there's so much sort of intercellular connection between the show, me, Jonathan's,
that song, all of that stuff. It's it's it's it's been I've thought about it a lot over the year.
I'm sure, I'm sure.
And then even like the the tic tic boom of it all, where you get to see that journey, but we didn't get to see him in that time. Like it's just it's really, I don't know, it's very it's beautiful and tragic and special in all the ways. And you were just so deeply connected with it, so so fascinating.
But you asked before when I thought about the music, you know, when I first heard the music, I have to be honest, I was so the first thing I heard was so I went and auditioned, and and and after my first audition, they gave me, Bernie Telsey gave me a cassette copy of one song, Glory to go home and learn. And it was it was Jonathan Larson singing it, you know, and on his little t and Jonathan was not a great singer, and so and I was.
I was kind of underwhelmed. I was like, this is a rock musical, quite so, and I and and and then I remember, of course, and then it grew on me, and once I started to sing it, it started to make sense to me, you know. So yeah, on an emotional and musical level. But and then I remember starting rehearsals. The first song we learned together was Seasons of Love, and I was like, these are the weirdest lyrics, all these numbers and all this stuff like it was so it was so weird to me.
And then you heard love you whatever You're like.
I was like, what is all this stuff? They literally gave us like a you know, an information sheet so that we would know who all of these people that we were talking about.
That's funny. Yeah, the dramaturgy of it.
Oh yeah, I didn't have these references, you know, I didn't know what they were. And so, yes, the music it was it was interesting. Look, I came from a world of you know, certainly at that time, this is mid nineties, I was I was head over into Sound Garden and Pearl Jam and you know, yeah chains and all of that stuff like that was the rock music that I was listening to at the time. So when I heard rock musical, of course, I was expecting to
hear something along those lines. And clearly that's not the case now.
But there's just so the show is so beautifully dynamic and newtin from the sung dialogue, you know of the the opera of it all, but then there's these like beautifully melodic songs and you know, like what you own and you know, I'll cover you all. It's just it's absolutely brilliant and obviously everybody you know, that's why it's
such a massive hit that lives on forever. But you guys really did like reinvent what Broadway could be for a lot of artists and a lot of producers and creatives to say, like, oh wow, like Broadway doesn't have to be Rogers and Hammerstein, it doesn't have to be
you know, these insanely classical, you know, traditional music. So I'm curious, like that must have been very exciting for you as a rock artist and a rock fan, and but what would do you remember what that was like in the time when when you guys were around and when it started to really like some momentum started to hit.
Yeah, I mean it's only in hindsight that you can see the effect that it happened on the art form and everything that came after us. At the time, it was, you know, there was so much going on so fast, all at once. You know, I'm sure you can ask any of any of the kids that were in Hamilton, you know, and like it's just there's so much happening
every night, every night, you know what I mean. And then on top of that, of course, you know, Jonathan died and so like you know, am envious of all those kids in Hamilton is that they didn't have this looming black cloud over their experience in the same way that we, you know, and the maybe self inflicted burden of need to feel to carry that weight and that message and Jonathan and what he was trying to do
and all of that stuff. You know, like we internally that we really felt like we were the champions of that. And you know, and I tell you know, I work with so many students and so many kids, especially working on that show, and I always say to them, look, it is not your responsibility to carry any burden, to to to put forth any message. It's your job to
have fun and tell a story. If an audience going to get a message from it, great, but it's not your job to cram it down their throat or feel like it's your responsibility to carry that because it's not for actors. And you know, and I wish I could have told the old me that thirty years ago.
Wow. Wow, that's profound fun fact.
I was actually opening on Broadway the same year you guys open event.
I was doing The King and I Danille Simon in six.
Okay, So okay, I'm gonna tell you a funny story. Then you'll appreciate this. It's not my story, it's Anthony Repp, Okay, but it's one of my favorite stories, and I always make him tell it. So when Anthony was a little kid, he he was in The King and I on the national tour. I think it was like one of his first jobs. So now I don't I'm not familiar with the show. So I'm going to explain something to you, and you're gonna know what I'm talking about.
Sure.
At the end of the show, the King is laid out and I and I dying or he's dead or whatever it is.
Yes, he's died.
Yes, And a little kid comes comes and says something like mother, the ship is something like this. Some kid says something right, So that was yes, right, yeah, So he comes out to deliver his line and he goes mother and you'l Brenner is on the tour. J'l Brenner, who's lying dead goes Louder.
Ah, oh my, that is brilliant.
That's really good. That's really good. Thank you for that. Wow. He was the son of Yeah, that's right. Oh how exciting.
Okay, So the movie, I'm curious, Uh, this was a long time after the rise of the show and everything, and I'm curious, like, what your thoughts, what, how did the movie? How was it presented to you guys, And what was the process of like revisiting that in the screen form and just the experience overall and the movie just like yeah, so as.
You can imagine, very quickly, as soon as the show became popular, talk of a movie became a subject. You know, the movie, the movie. Is there gonna be a movie? Is there gonna be a movie? At some point early on, and it was in the late nineties, somebody had written a script and Spike Lee had it, and Spike Lee was going to direct it. Wow, But he didn't want any of us in it, and so it was gonna
be some other version. And I always heard rumors that there was gonna be like justin Timberlake, is gonna play Roger and Christine everywhere? Is gonna play Beaming Like I don't know, if any it usually happened. That's actually true, but those, of course were the rumors at the time. But anyway, that whole thing just disappeared and went away. And and you know, literally cut to two thousand and five or four or whenever it was, and I get a call from my agent saying, the Rent movie is happening.
Chris Columbus is directing it, and he's very interested in having you know, as many of the original cast as he can go meet, yeah, you know, and I was like, okay, So I went and went and met with him, and he was just lovely and just the biggest Rent fan and super excited, and he hired me, you know, and and I mean it was it was really exciting. It was so much fun to be able to bring it to the screen, you know. Anyway, it was you know, of course we missed some of the original cast members
that weren't there. Daphne wasn't there or whatever, but they they did a wonderful job of, you know, bringing on Rosario and Tracy Toms and it felt very comfortable and natural and doing those scenes. Doing all of those scenes on screen was very similar to what we all did on stage. You know, I I would venture to say I did pretty much the same performance on screen as
I did on stage. You know, you make adjustments for camera and lighting, and you know, make technical adjustments, but the performance was essentially the same.
It really was.
And it was so nice to see most of you guys, a majority of the cast there, because I feel like a lot of the time when they do Hollywood, you know, a movie from a stage production, they often do recast it and you're hearing and sometimes I can be very refreshing and you can hear new voices and a new
take on the character. But for Ren, because it was so iconic, I guess, you know, there was something about it that I was like, I don't think I want to hear anybody else do this in this rendition, which is so nice that you guys were able to do.
That was I'm curious about.
Like the the removal of the opera and the obviously you know, the dialogue and bringing that dialogue to life without singing.
It was that weird for you guys.
Did you have any part of say, And I'm just curious because on one hand, I was like, I think the part of the magic is the opera right of it, and then on the other hand, like, yeah, you have to make adjustments for screen and that I just I.
Think, you know, I have my feelings about the movie, but that I think worked great. You know, like I I don't think that that was an issue. I think it was the right choice.
Yeah, and you know I.
Think that that. Yeah, I think it was the right choice. And it wasn't. It didn't feel strange at all because we because the numbers were still the numbers, you know what I mean, And so there was these added scenes and there was a lot of added dialogue and stuff, and look, you know, it was it was an experiment from from from the top. Like Chris didn't go in
there going Okay, I know exactly what I'm doing. Really every day it was like we would have them, not every day, but like often we would have meetings with Chris and he would say to us, and I think that the reason, one of the reasons he wanted us is because he wanted our input in terms in terms of how race because he either you know, yea. So we would sit down a lot and talk about how we were going to shoot the scene and you know what we you know, and it was a very collaborative process.
He was so wonderful in in how he incorporated our thoughts, you know, into his decision making. You know, of course he was the final decider on everything that happened, but he wanted to know what we thought, you know, and that was really that was really great, you know, and and and we all very much appreciated that consideration.
Yeah, no, definitely.
It's just it's reminiscent of working on a TV show where you have guest directors weekly that come in and out of your house, and you know, these characters back front for you know, inside out, and they're coming in saying, you know, let me guide the ship, but also be respectful.
Of the people who have been in this house forever.
So there, I think there's a level that it's similar because you guys have done this before for a very long time and helped kind of the genesis of it, so that that definitely makes sense.
There was a big dramatic scene that had a lot of dialogue and he ended up cutting it out of the movie, and I was like, oh man, that was the best scene. They might cut that.
Out, but the second part of Goodbye Lhybe that's what Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, that's right.
That's exactly right. And also, look and Christmas Bells, you know, like Christmas Bells is my favorite number in the show. It's my favorite. It's my favorite number. And it's not in the movie. But quite frankly, like I didn't know what to do, Like, like the reason it's not in the movie is not because we shot it and then it was like, oh, this isn't working, let me cut
it out. We never shot it. Nobody had any idea of what to do and had to shoot that number, and so it was like, it's not going to be in the movie. Yeah, And look, sometimes sometimes big changes happen in these things. I remember, you know, we were talking about Hair. The original ending of Hair was not how it ends in the movie. You know, Burger dies
at the end of the movie. Claude dies at the end of the show, right, I got to be honest with you, I thought the movie was so much more effective in that ending, in the way they did that. I just thought I was like, oh my god, Burger, Like I just like, you know, I to that hit hard? So that hits so hard? It's hard?
It does it does? What about Seasons of Love?
Like, why did you guys move Seasons of Love to the top of the movie.
I think's decision was because as it works great as an opening of the second act, but it's very theatrical, it's very of the stage, and it would have broken up the pace of the movie to all of a sudden, have this, this this performance on a stage of all of these you know, it just didn't have a place in the movie. The only place that really had was either at the beginning of the end the.
End, right, Okay, no, no, I'm that makes sense. That's very enlightening.
And you and Anthony have had a long journey together and now are performing shows together at like fifty four below and beyond. Can you talk a little bit about like, yeah, you know, you guys have worked together.
Well, you know, very soon after we stopped doing Rent together, one of the things I started doing was going out and performing you know, gigs and stuff on my own and whatever. And I would always I would get asked often like, hey, you and Anthony ever do anything together? You and Anthony. Now, Anthony had put out a solo record. He wasn't out gigging, but he had a solo record out that was great. Yeah, And I think I just went literally went to him one day and was like, hey,
you want to do some gigs together. You know, I have some people that are interested. And he was like, yeah, sure, and like honestly, that's how it started. And we've done so many different kinds of shows together over the years, like you know, different types of performances. For a long time, we would do acoustic performances where I would do a set and he would do a set, and then we
would do like, you know, maybe fifteen minutes together. What we hear past couple of years was, you know, we put a full band together and we decided, you know, let's just both be on stage the whole time like a rock It's not me, it's us the whole time. And that's been the most successful. All people want to see us together and.
Here are right. Yeah.
So it's been so much fun for us to to be able to do that and and and you know sort of present our arrangements of it. There's a lot of pop and rock stuff like it's it's not you know, it's not. As a matter of fact, I would say that theater stuff is the least of what we do. And you know it's a surprise to people, but the audiences end up loving it, you know, like we we we interweave things together so it all makes a cohesive evening.
You know. It's not like we're just playing sort of random rock songs, you know what I mean, Like they all have like a reason. Yeah, and then they and that and that they connect in ways to Rent and things like that, so we try and tie it all in.
That's exciting. I mean, I would want to see you guys.
Oh you should come. We'll be back yeah January.
Good, Okay, all right, we'll definitely come back. You've done a lot aita, I mean, jazz, It's crazy. Is Rent your favorite?
Or do you have a favorite project that you've worked on?
Rent is not my favorite? And only because it's the first thing I ever did, you know. Yeah, And you know I've had so many wonderful experiences since then. I wouldn't say it's any less than anything else, you know what I mean. It's such it was such a unique experience, and that I could really everything I've done since Rent I could sort of compare against each other. But I don't really compare Rent to any of those things, because it's just such a unique inexperience and of course became
so enormously successful. Right So, but you know, over the years, I love to laugh and I love to make people laugh, and I've really you know, I love doing the musical comedy stuff, you know, Disaster and something Rotten. And getting to do things like that, you know, have been so much even I just did Drag off Broadway, like, you know, getting to do these things, to me, that's what's been
the most fun and the most exciting. And getting to learn from, you know, my whole career, I've gotten to learn from so many amazing artists who are better at what they do than I am, you know, and so to watch them and you know, maybe not the singing part,
but all the other stuff, you know. And so you know, I very much you know, absorbed what everybody was offering just by being around it, you know, like and I continue to do that in my life wherever whatever I venture into, if it's something new, I don't want to do it alone. I want to do it with somebody who's already done it and is really good.
At you know, right right right right, you know, sure did you always have a really good voice or did it take a lot of training or like where did the voice come from?
Where was the voice? Discovering?
It happened, you know, I discovered, you know, at an early age. The earliest things I can remember singing were like Barry Manilow songs in the seventies as a little kid, you know, I was six seven years old. And then I remember I remember discovering like Elton John and Billy Joel like those songs when I was little and singing
along to them, Simon and Garfunkel. I remember very specific things from when I was very young, and ironically enough, the cast album of a chorus line, you know, things that my parents would play in the car, you know what I mean, that absorb and to this day, that's my favorite cast album. I've never seen, you know, but I can. I can sing every song I know everywhere.
It is great.
Yeah, and so so I just started singing and realized that it felt good, and I thought it sounded pretty good, you know. And then when I was like ten or eleven years old and MTV debuted and sort of that wave of like heavy metal bands that came along in the early eighties, Like I was completely entranced by all that stuff, and I started to sing along to those songs.
You know, these rock bands like Iron Maiden and a guy named Ronnie James Dio and you know, all of these like powerhouse hard rock singers that I just you know that those were the guys I wanted to be. Those were my heroes, and I spent you know, I didn't have any formal training, but I would say I practiced as much as anybody ever practice, because I would sit up in my room for hours and hours a day singing onto those records, you know, not as much
practice as anything else, you know. And and it's because those guys, because they sounded the way they sounded, you know. Dickinson from Iron Maiden is probably the single biggest influence on my voice, I think, certainly, very those very formative early teenage years, you know. And he has a very strong operatic sound, and I wanted to do with sound like him, and so that's where I developed. I think a lot of that sound. And and it's only by
sheer luck. I think that my voice developed in a in a healthy way, if that makes any sense.
Yeah, I was going to ask about that, because you're screaming a lot of the time, but you can't be actually screaming, right, You're healthily screaming.
Right, I've developed you know what I couldn't. I couldn't describe it to you. I couldn't tell you what proper technique is, only to tell you that I know I have it because because I've never lost my voice and I've never had any vocal problems.
That is crazy.
And as I you know, as my career had gone has gone on, I've certainly learned by being on stage and doing theater how to take care voice in a way that works for me, you know, you know, And I work with the little vocal trainer, which I love, that little thing that you know, like you blow into I'm into it. That thing has changed my life. But you know, I've I've been very lucky in that in that I know how to do what I do.
Unreal, unreal. Yeah, that's crazy.
It's like, I don't know, your placement must be just perfect, you just must have instinctally found that placement for yourself.
Well. Also, I do a lot of experimenting with my voice and with trying to figure out how to make certain sounds and hit certain notes and hit them in certain ways. You know, that's important for singers to do, is to go in a room by yourself and make crazy sounds and make crazy noises, and try and do crazy things with your voice, and see what what you're capable of, See what hurts, what doesn't hurt? See you
know what I mean? And so that's how I have figured out how to do a lot of this stuff is just by playing around with my voice like a like an instrument. You know what, what am I capable of doing? You know what? What can what can I achieve? How can I continue to push it? You know? My
upper and my lower you know what I mean? So much of my formative years trying to push the upper that I ignored the you know, the lower, my lower register, and and and it's only in the last ten or so years that I'm like.
I like to stay lower now kind it yeah and so but but but it's it's been, it's been, and it always is a process of experimentation with me with my voice.
Yeah, I mean, I love that you're just still experimenting and still learning as an artist, you know, even after your incredible like career and all the things that you're doing. And it sounds like you're teaching a lot and so you're imparting a lot of this like learning wisdom on younger aspiring actors, Like what has that been like for you?
I mean, I think that that's that's the best thing I can offer is my wisdom at this point in having done this for you know, for decades. At this point, you know, I'm not a trained singer and I'm not a trained actor, and so I can't I can't teach somebody technique. You know, I'm not a vocal technician. I can't I can't make somebody a good singer. I can't tell them what to do. And because I don't know, I've never done it right. So that's not my thing.
So and and there's a lot of people that are really good at that and by all means do that. I think what I offer as a teacher is just is just knowledge wisdom of the of the life and the world that a lot of these kids are striving for. I think what I can offer them is to the truth about what that is, the truth about what that has been and what it is now and where it's going. You know, it's very important for kids to who are
getting into show business. I have two sons and you know, in their early twenties and they're both in show business in one per or the other, you know, And it's it's super important to see that what has all had, what's come before us, is not what's in front of us. And you can't you can't go about things in the way that it's always been done. The way it's always been done is over, and we are all collectively now figuring out how it's going to continue to be done,
you know. And I think that it's very important for people to realize that and to prepare for that, and to know again, know what the realities of a life in theater is like, you know. And I assure you it's it's it's not glamorous because and look, you know, I mean it's you know, you're an artist, you're an actor, you know what it's like. My perspective has always been, my job is not to be a singer or an actor. My job is to not quit this horrible business. That's
my job. The payoff is what I get to work, is when I actually get a job and I get to make some money and I get to do this thing that I love to do. That's not the job, you know what I mean. The job is not quitting to me. That's why I always felt That's the way I always sort of looked at it, is like, that's that's the job, and it's a hard job, and you.
Know that, and so no, it's so hard, yeah, and.
So and I think it's I think it's important for for for young artists to internalize that, you know, and that most of your time is going to be fighting.
Yourself, knows, constant, fighting your.
Ego, fighting your you know, your all of the it's that that's going to be what you're spending most of the time doing, you know. Yeah, and as an actor, the most frustrating thing as an actor. And I'm so grateful that I that I play an instrument and that I sing. You know, I encourage actors who don't sing and don't play an instrument to do something where you
can practice your creativity in your art by yourself. The thing about acting is that you can't do it in a vacuum like you can do any other art form. You know, you can sculpt, you can paint, you can write music, you can sing, you can play an instrument. You can do all of these things by yourself and get for them. You can dance, right, you can't do that with acting, you need an audience. It doesn't work in a va. It doesn't work alone, you know what
I mean. You can't stand there and look at yourself monologuing in a mirror and get any sense of satisfaction out of that, you know, like it just so, it's it's it's a very difficult profession to be and when that's the only thing you do because you very rarely get a sense of completion.
Yeah yeah, and then once you do, you're chasing the next one. So it's tough. I think that's why it lends to like what you were talking about in the future of this business and how you can create and teach these young people to create on their own, to get people together, to do things that fuel them, that keep them going, and don't get bitter and don't lose the love because in this business, after all these years, it's very difficult to find the joy in it because it is so difficult and challenge.
And we're only again as actors specifically, the only validation you ever get is from other people, you know, like we're constantly chasing somebody else's validation of our art, where again, these other art forms you can go you know, what. I'm a good singer, I know it. I don't need anyone to tell me. Or I'm a great guitar player. I'm a great I don't need other people to tell me that, because I know I could sit in a
room and do it and do it really well. You can't do that act and you need that response you need And so I tell people, like listen, forget about instruments and that stuff, that that's not something you're interested in doing. Do a puzzle, Go mow the lawn. Do things that you can do to completion where you finish it, you know it's done, you know, and you know, and you know you've done a good job, and you don't need somebody else's validation to tell you that. I think
it's very important in life to have that. And as actors, you never get that, you know.
You never get you know, Wow, what do you do to you?
I mowed the lawn. I wish I could turn this somewhereund and show you my enormous law that I'm mow you know, and especially now I'm not kidding satisfying forward to mowing the lawn. It keeps me off my stupid phone. It keeps me off of social media. Yes, and it gives me these things that you know, So I do things like that, I do outdoor things, I chop would I mow the lawn? I yes, I do the laundry, I cook all my meal. I do these things because
they make me feel accomplished. And I don't need anyone else to say, good, good boy, you did a good job. You're talented, you know what I mean?
Yeah, or waiting around for them to let you.
Yeah, in that life that I need that, I needed other people to pat me on the head. I just I can't stand that.
Yeah.
Yeah, it's a challenging part of it to find that and to for people to be waiting around for you, to wait around for other people to let you do your job exactly.
That's like it's so difficult. But luckily we've.
Both had very fruitful careers where we have been able to do that a lot and had a lot of time to fill as well with mowing the lawn or organizing your closet.
So, but finish, that's.
The that's the key. You have to finish the task.
Yes, yes, must complete finished.
That is what we're talking.
That's the Yeah, it's counterintuitive here we always ask all of our guests who have come on the show, who were affiliated with Glee and we're a part of it, what is the feeling that Glee leaves you with? So I've got to ask you what is the feeling that Rent leaves you with, given that is was such a massive, massive part of your life.
Gratitude, I mean, just gratitude at everything that it gave me, everything that it continues to give me. Uh and and and gratitude at being associated with something that is so beautiful and that has moved so many people and continues to and continues to affect and influence people. I mean, I couldn't have more gratitude for being connected to something
like that. It's just the most incredible feeling. You know, like people could be connected to a lot of different things, you know in show business as well, you know, but you know, and enormous hits, enormous successes, enormous things. But the combination of such an enormous success and what it is and content of what it is and the effect that it has on people.
No, I mean, you guys were are a part of something so much bigger than I think anything you could probably ever grasping your lifetime, but you can grasp most of it right, you know, but it was really impactful for me.
And so many of the people that I grew up with.
It shaped my career, shaped the inspiration for how I went about my career. It was really just really important and just as small, you know, just a window into some of the impact you guys have had.
So thank you.
So of course it's my pleasure, you know. I it's funny.
I have friends who you know, my age, who were did study theater and were at you know, graduate excuse me, graduating from my Carnegie Mellon at the time or whatever it was when Red came out, And now they tell me what their reaction to it was and how like it was everything and it was everywhere and all everyone wanted to do, was like and that's it's so funny to me to hear that, because I didn't know any that was going on at the time, you know what I mean, Like, yeah, you hear all that stuff, and
it's like, for sure, Wow, that's really cool, you.
Know, no, really really really amazing. Well, thank you so much for coming taking the time to chat with me. It was really such a pleasure to meet you. And yeah, Thank you so much.
Of course, anytime.
Bye.
All right, see it.
What a nice, nice grounded man. They say not to meet your heroes, but here I am meeting a hero. Adam Pascal was such an iconic voice and an amazing actor singer, and he's just just such a like you could turn on any album, any cast recording and he would start singing and you'd be like, oh, that's Adam, you know. So it's just very distinctive. And Rent was so important to me. So that's such a special interview and I'm so excited that I got to chat with him.
And I hope you guys enjoyed the episode and that's what you really missed.
Thanks for listening and follow us on Instagram at and that's what you really miss pod. Make sure to write us a review and leave us five stars.
See you next time.