Joe Mantello is an actor and director best known for his work on Broadway productions of Wicked, Take Me Out and Assassins, as well as earlier in his career being one of the original Broadway cast of Angels in America. He began his theatrical career as an actor in Keith Curran's Walking the Dead and Paula Vogel's The Baltimore Waltz. He directed the Jon Robin Baitz play Other Desert Cities at the Booth Theater in 2011. He returned to acting for the first time in over a decade with the role of Ned Weeks in the Broadway limited engagement revival of The Normal Heart in April 2011, for which he was nominated for the Tony Award as Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role in a Play. Other shows he has directed include the Off-Broadway world premiere of the musical Dogfight, the Broadway premiere of The Other Place, and Sting's new musical The Last Ship. 

What did Joe and I chat about? Listen in to hear:

Why Joe loathes auditioning Actors, but what he looks for.

How he forgot who Julia Roberts was weeks after working with her . . . and why that was a good thing.

How he dealt with failure by returning to his roots, which bounced him back to better than he was before.

What Norbert Leo Butz told ME about the tryout of Wicked and whether or not Joe agreed.

How he “pivoted” (oooh, such a buzzy business word) from a Broadway Actor to a Broadway Director and how you can transition from one job to another too.

Keep up with me: @KenDavenportBway

www.theproducersperspective.com 

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