Barbeau Goes Beyond The Rainbow in GARLAND

Adrienne Barbeau has done it all from TV to film to the stage and she is back in NYC after a long absence to light up the stage as Judy Garland in THE PROPERTY KNOWN AS GARLAND, now playing at the Actors Playhouse at 100 7th Avenue South.

Barbeau made her Broadway debut as Hodel in Fiddler on the Roof and received a Tony nomination and a Theatre World Award for her role as Betty Rizzo in Grease. Over 150 television and film roles followed, including Maude, The Fog, Escape From New York, Swamp Thing, Cannonball Run, Back to School, Creepshow, the voice of Catwoman on Batman: The Animated Series, The Drew Carey Show, Lifetime's Shattered Hearts, and most recently, HBO's Carnivale. Her son, Cody, fronts The Cody Carpenter Band and is a gifted composer. Her twins, Walker and William, are unbeatable athletes and the smartest mathematicians in third grade. Her husband, Billy, is a brilliant playwright and the love of her life. Adrienne recently had her first book published—a memoir titled There Are Worse Things I Could Do—and is currently at work on her first vampire novel.

OK, so I sat down with Adrienne to talk about this unique show and hope you enjoy this as much as I did...

TJ: Now, this is your first time back to the New York stage in quite a while?

BARBEAU: Yes, since 1972 when I did GREASE.

TJ: And your first Broadway appearance was in FIDDLER, right?

BARBEAU: FIDDLER in 1968 where I stayed there for a couple of years and then did a play called STAG MOVIE off-Broadway. After that I wound up joining a tour of FIDDLER, which ended in September or October. Then, in December, I auditioned for GREASE.

TJ: Ah yes, with one of my favorite songs, THERE ARE WORSE THINGS I COULD DO… (at which point I noticed her new book on the table to my right.) I didn't know it was out already.

BARBEAU: Yes, it just came out.

TJ: That must have been very exciting to have the book released.

BARBEAU: I haven't really been able to experience it yet as I have been so involved with Judy. I think it's just in the bookstores this week. I took my kids to Barnes and Noble in New Jersey the other day. They were at the other side of the store and I heard one of them go "Oh GOD!!" And I thought "What??", as they're not supposed to use that word anyway. I went running over. They were very excited about it.

TJ: Now I look at the cover of the book and reminisce back to when you were on MAUDE.

BARBEAU: We actually shot that poster back in 1978 or 79. We may have just finished doing MAUDE.

TJ: Did you always know you wanted to be an actor?

BARBEAU: My memory is that it wasn't until I was in my first year of college that it crossed my mind I could do it professionally. My mother had started me taking classes when I was young. I sang and I was doing community theatre. I started out with the San Jose Light Opera, which was a pretty big organization at the time and is now a major organization. You can't really call it community theatre anymore as they job in Equity actors. Well, I did this all through high school and when I graduated, I went on a tour, like a USO tour, sponsored by the State Department. We went to, what in those days they call the Orient; nowadays they call Southeast Asia, entertaining the GI's. It was a musical comedy revue under the auspices of the San Jose Light Opera.

Well I came back to attend college and was doing another production for the Opera Company. I shared a dressing room with a woman who had done LITTLE MARY SUNSHINE off-Broadway and she said, "You know, you ought to go to New York and study because that's where all the teachers are." Now I was going to go to San FranciscoState and get a degree and probably teach acting. But then I thought about it, "Hmm, that's what I should do..." So in my memory, that's when it started.

When I look back at it, I had written a term paper when I was fifteen and I wrote about how I was going to achieve acting as a vocation. So, it was fairly early on.

TJ: What type of research did you have to do for GARLAND?

BARBEAU: I looked at everything. The things that I drew from which were the most helpful were videos of her talk show appearances like Barbara Walters, Jack Paar, Dick Cavett, Mike Douglas, Merv Griffin, Ed Sullivan… A&E had a two hour special called AMERICAN MASTERS. E! TRUE HOLLYWOOD STORIES did one as well. I heard the bootleg tapes, the audio tapes that she had done. And I read everything I could get my hands on from Scott Shecter to John Fricke to John Meyer to Gerold Frank….anything I could.

TJ: So basically, you did a lot of intense research.

BARBEAU: Yes, but I am not doing an impersonation of her. It's more of a representation of her, an impression of her.

TJ: What's been the hardest part for you in bringing this icon to the stage?

BARBEAU: Her physicality I think. Even though I say I'm not doing an impersonation, Judy was known for using her hands and her body. And I'm not that animated. That was one of the things that came later in the rehearsal period, but one of the things I had to work on because that wasn't my usual style.

TJ: When was the last time you were on stage before GARLAND?

BARBEAU: I did FIDDLER ON THE ROOF in Pittsburgh with the Pittsburgh Civic Light Opera. I played Golde, after many years of playing Hodel (laughing). It was in between the time we shot the pilot for HBO's CARNIVALE and the first season of the show. That would have been the summer of 2002.

TJ: Did you miss being on stage?

BARBEAU: You know…no (laughing).

TJ: Honesty is good.

BARBEAU: You know, I love all three of the mediums. All six of them actually, if you include talk show host, recording and the night clubs. For me, it really depends on the project. I love doing FIDDLER because I love FIDDLER. I have such an affection for it. I'm a woman two kids who get up at 6:30 in the morning and have a full day of stuff that has to be done, so working at night takes its toll. I am loving being back here and, as Judy says on stage in the show, "I do so prefer the concerts to the movies, though. I love the immediate response." And that's fantastic, it really is fantastic. But it's hard. It's a challenge every night as opposed to doing a feature, where you just do it, hope you get it right and then you move on.

TJ: Do you have any special preparation that you do before a performance to get yourself into Judy-mode?

BARBEAU: It's a two character play, but it's pretty much a fifty page monologue. So often-times before I go on, I look at the words again. Not because I don't know them, but because as time goes on, I find I might be changing a word or dropping a word in a sentence. And then, I think, "Oh, there's a "but" there instead of an "and"… But other than that, unless I am nervous…occasionally there may be someone out there that I want to impress…then I might do a relaxation exercise before I go on.

TJ: Did you have any hesitation about playing the role?

BARBEAU: Initially, before I read the script, having just listened to the autobiographical tapes that Judy had recorded, I anticipated an entirely different script. And I said to Billy van Zandt, the writer, " You know, I don't think I want to do this. You know, when we think of Judy, we think of the really hard times of her life and the pain she was in and the darkness." And I thought that's what he was writing and I thought this didn't sound like a fun evening for an actor on-stage every night to have to get into that. Then I read it and realized how witty it was and how uplifting it is. It's really a tribute to Judy's spirit and her sense of survival. Then I was excited about doing it. And also I understood from the director and the writer that they did not want an impersonation of Judy, which was great because that was just not my talent.

TJ: Do you find the audience has expectations when they come in about what they are about to see onstage?

BARBEAU: I think some of them do, certainly. But not all… We're getting a real mixed audience. It's very interesting to me. There were a couple of kids in the audience last night who weren't more than thirteen or fourteen, which surprised me. Age range, couples, gay men, straight men, gay women, straight women…a real broad spectrum of people who are interested in seeing the show. I 'm sure there are people who come who have their own proprietary feelings about Judy Garland and who want to see that or expect to see that. And a lot of them come not knowing what they're going to see. Whether they're going to see Judy dragged through the mud or what, you know. But the audience response has been fantastic. They're standing up at a lot of the shows and really loving it!

TJ: Have your kids seen the show?

BARBEAU: Only the last fifteen minutes because there is language in it. They complain as I am driving down the streets of LA and I forget that they're in the car and curse out the woman next to me. My younger one would say to me "Mom, I think that character is really affecting you. I don't think you should be doing that."

TJ: Did you have out of town tryouts for GARLAND?

BARBEAU: A year ago, we did four workshop performances in New Jersey, before there was any idea of coming into New York. Just to see if the material worked and what audience response was. It was those performances and the people who attended who were interested in bringing it into the city that led to our coming here. Then we rehearsed for about two weeks in LA before we came out here and had two dress rehearsals. Rip Taylor and Jim Bailey came. And of course, Rip traveled with Judy and opened for Judy for several years and Jim, of course knows her inside and out. They both went nuts for it and gave their blessing. So I thought "OK, we're in the ballpark."

TJ: Now your husband, Billy van Zandt, wrote the script. When he wrote it, did you have any idea you would be performing it?

BARBEAU: The idea came because he says he was looking at the bookshelves with all these biographies of Judy, and he thought "Nobody's ever written about her the way I see her, as a survivor. Sort of the way as I see Adrienne", coincidentally as I was crossing his path from the bedroom to the living room. So it was in his mind from the beginning. And like I said, when he first started doing it, I said that I was not the person, don't think about me for this. It wasn't until he finished it, put it away for a year and then pulled it out for some other reason that I read it and thought that I could do this.

TJ: What would you like people to take away with them after they leave the show?

BARBEAU: I certainly think they're going to know more about Judy. A lot of people that wait after the show have said that they didn't know anything about her other than THE WIZARD OF OZ or they didn't know about A STAR IS BORN. They're going to get a sense of what her life was like and how she ended up the way she did. They're going to get a sense of what the whole studio system was like and what it was like for performers in the forties and fifties. I hope that they leave feeling like they spent a little time with her.

TJ: OK, I always end up my interviews with something called FIVE FAVORITE THINGS, to let people know a little bit more about you. SO here goes…

FAVORITE TV SHOW: RESCUE ME (with Denis Leary)

FAVORITE FOOD: Bread

FAVORITE COLOR: Well, they painted my dressing room green for me so it must be one of my favorites.

FAVORITE PASTTIME ACTIVITY: Reading and playing with my kids.

FAVORITE THING IN THE WHOLE WORLD: I love to travel. And I love having kids. I love the whole process, being pregnant and delivering and all of that.

OK, theatre lovers, you want to see a truly wonderful tour de force performance, catch Adrienne in this show. She is truly riveting and on the money as Judy Garland. The 13-week limited engagement runs NOW thru June 4th at The Actors' Playhouse (100 7th Ave South, just below Christopher Street). For tickets, CALL TELECHARGE at (212) 239 6200 Inside the NY metro area and (800) 432 7250 Outside the NY metro area. Also check out the website at www.propertyknownasgarland.com and her own personal website at http://www.abarbeau.com/ .

As always, I am off because theatre is my life! Ciao!!!