I was doing this children's theater play, and it was non-Equity. We were out of town to do it at the Kennedy Center, and it was always kind of, 'Well, the producers may have to turn this into Equity,' and that's what happened. It was kind of a silly children's theater play, but that's how I got my card.
William Cowper said that God made the country, and man made the town. If it was the opposite, there would be no country; because town can be created from the country but the country cannot be created from the town!
Having that college-town atmosphere with a live repertory company available was a real gift. I found myself gravitating toward the theater from about the age of nine. I guess it was the environment that got me started.
If you look at any sitcom that you watch, if it takes place in, say, a small town in Massachusetts, and it's about the dynamics of the people in that town, the showrunner probably grew up in a town like that, witnessed things, and created content.
I wrote a play that I directed and I was in, and I paid for the sets and the costumes and to put it up in a theater all through modeling. It really afforded me a lot of creative control in my life.
It's intimidating any time to have a piece of art that someone else created, and that person says, 'Let's see what you created based on what I created.'
I love theater. I started in theater when I was nine years old.
My return to the theater in New York was so specific. I didn't want it to be about leveraging my exposure or my fame, so the first show I did in New York was an ensemble piece at an Off-Broadway theater, and I wanted to make sure that it was just about the play and about the experience.
When I was young and growing up in New York, my parents took me to children's theater quite often - elaborate presentations of 'Goldilocks' and 'Rapunzel' for Upper East Side kids. As I grew older, they took me to adult theater, mostly musicals.
The director, Moisés Kaufman, just received the national medal of the arts from President [Barack] Obama . He wrote and directed The Laramie Project and he has directed several Pulitzer prize-winning plays. He's a pretty profound director in the theater.
There was interest from clubs in Italy and England, I believe. But I've never been attracted by the way they play in Italy. Staying in Spain was always my preference.
Theater is such a small community that every brilliant piece of theater raises us all up.
I really try to ask myself the question of nine. Will this matter in nine minutes, nine hours, nine days, nine weeks, nine months or nine years? If it will truly matter for all of those, pay attention to it.
In theater, they say a theater piece is only as good as its transitions.
I directed the play 'Amadeus' with puppets way back in the day for theater. I also studied puppetry at the Eugene and Neil Center with a lot of the 'Sesame Street' people, so I do have a little bit of a history with puppetry.
I've created, directed and choreographed for Lady Gaga since the beginning, so 'Born This Way,' this was musically such an amazing evolution and such a brilliant record. So when she played it for me, it took me a while to find out the visual interpretation that I could give back to her.