When Ellen Barkin was at Manhattan’s High School of Performing Arts, the aspiring actress's teachers thought she lacked the talent (and the looks) to succeed on stage. This slight drove Barkin to prove the skeptics wrong. After appearing in several off-Broadway plays, she broke into the mainstream in 1982 with Diner, which kickstarted a prodigious career in films such as The Big Easy and Sea of Love, as well as on television and on Broadway. On this week’s episode of Table for Two, the Tony Award-winning actress sits down with host Bruce Bozzi and dives into her early years as a waitress in New York City, the lessons she learned from Robert Duvall, and why The Normal Heart was the most important professional experience of her career.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.