Achoo! We’re falling in love with the one and only Faith Prince. You Might Know Her From Modern Family, Emily in Paris, Melissa & Joey, Spin City, My Father the Hero, The Last Dragon, and Broadway productions of Guys & Dolls, A Catered Affair, Bells Are Ringing, and BOOP!
Faith talked to us about grounding her character, Valentina, in the cartoonish plot of BOOP!, coping with fame during her star-making turn in Guys & Dolls, and leaning on her co-star Gerard Depardieu in one of her first leading roles on camera in My Father the Hero.
Faith also shared stories from working as a Broadway replacement in the cumbersome costume of Ursula in The Little Mermaid and the notoriously “realistic” production of Anne as Miss Hannigan. All that, plus working with theatre legends like Jerome Robbins, Abe Burrows, Betty Comden & Adolph Green, doing dialect work at Joey Lawrence and Lily Collins, doing her best Cyndi Lauper in cult fave The Last Dragon (and making pals with Berry Gordy, and working with Jean Smart and Mary McDonnell in the short-lived High Society.
This one was a HOOT.
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Discussed this episode:
Evergreen topics for Anne and Damian: Tyne Daly in Gypsy, Grease, Spice Girls track listings, we look like cats in Heathcliff, the cast of Mannequin 2 aka is it Jonathan Silverman, no it’s William Ragsdale in Herman’s Head, Sex and the City/AJLT
Cynthia Nixon’s kitchen tour
Tom and Lorenzo and their SJP adventure
Plays Valentina in Boop on Broadway
We love Dancer/Choreographer Rachelle Rak
Coughing as Adelaide was tougher than talking and singing in character voice
Bob Saget used his stand-up to differentiate himself from Danny Tanner
Nathan & Adelaide are famously the SOUBRETTES in Guys & Dolls so Jerry Zaks put them forward instead of Sky and Sarah (this changed how future productions positioned the 2 couples)
Jerry Mitchell says it’s important to pass the baton down to the next generation of musical theatre stars
Arthur Laurents aka “the meanest man in show-business”, Jerry Gutierrez, Abe Burrows, Comden & Green, Sondheim, Barishnykov, Howard Ashman, Jack Plotnick, Tina Landau,
My Father the Hero w/ Gerard Depardieu
“Dirty Books” from The Last Dragon / Suzanne de Passe and Berry Gordy produced the soundtrack. Berry Gordy took her OUT and called her “baby”
“One More Time” in First Wives Club
“How do you know if someone has lived through trauma — by the way they get someone who doesn’t like them, to like them.”
Cole Escola of Oh, Mary! on CBS Sunday Morning
Was in first 6 episodes of High Society with Jean Smart and Mary McDonnell (based on AbFab and Faith played the Saffy character)
Faith Prince’s “Men” from Nick & Nora. The show was a notorious flop. Arthur told Faith she was making a big mistake by leaving show to do Guys & Dolls. Mary Rodgers told her she could find a way into Anna through Gertrude Lawrence, who was a comedienne.
Was offered the role of Audrey in the original Off-Broadway production of Little Shop of Horrors
Went to CCM with Jim Walton
Had taken the revue, Scrambled Feet and was doing an IBM industrial so couldn't’ take LSOH
Lance Roberts is currently in Just in Time
Ellen Greene did Adelaide at The Hollywood Bowl
Studied Donna Murphy who she replaced in The King & I and then did Wonderful Town (at LA Opera)
Katie Finneran talked with us about James Lapine’s realistic interpretation of Annie and Miss Hannigan in the 2012 revival. Said it was a challenge in the NYT.
Re the 2012 revival of Annie: Andrea McArdle said “I didn’t know we were doing Secret Garden”
Associate Director Wes Grantham LOVES HUMOR, unlike Lapine
Martin Charnin & Charles Strouse KISSED HER FEET when they visited her backstage
John Doyle who directed A Catered Affair also backs away from the humor
We love Bells are Ringing - Faith starred in the 2001 Broadway revival. Difficult because of Mitchell Maxwell who produced
Had to ride an actor in Grey’s Anatomy because character’s IUD got stuck on her ex-husband’s Prince Albert penis piercing
Does some great character work in the indie film Our Very Own (got gig from doing reading of The Women with Allison Janney)
IMDB lists her on an ep of Mad Men. INCORRECT.
Martin Short was in Dennis Quaid movie, Innerspace
My Favorite Broadway: The Leading Ladies was an incredible, formative concert
Managing Ursula costume in The Little Mermaid was worse than managing the wig in her Lifetime movie with Kathleen Turner, Friends at Last
Vicki Lewis told us she held Dixie Carter’s spit cup in a production of Mame she was in with Faith
Christopher Walken kept pickled things in the pockets of his costume during James Joyce’s The Dead (Marni Nixon was also in the show)
We interviewed Annaleigh Ashford who is maybe made in the mold of Faith Prince
Damian is seeing an Italian production of Cats / Anne is seeing her nephew do Grease Jr. in Sicily
DUCK ASS HAIR for Danny Zuko
