Photo: Julieta Cervantes
Laurie Metcalf will return to the Tony Awards this Sunday for the third time in three years having won in 2018 and 2017 forThree Tall WomenandA Doll’s House, Part Two, respectively.
Her sixth Tony nomination is forHillary and Clinton, which sees the Oscar-nominated actress tackle one of the most challenging roles of her lauded career: Hillary Rodham Clinton. Should she win her third Tony, Metcalf, 63, will be the first person to win acting Tonys in three consecutive years.
How do you even take in the fact that you’ve won two Tony awards back-to-back?
What it boils down to is I’ve been getting this great rush of material coming my way, and excellent people to work on it with. [Producer] Scott Rudin for three years in a row now has offered me these wonderful roles on stage. Each one has resulted in a nomination. That’s where it all starts for me, is with really strong writing.
What’s been great these three years in a row is being able to go to a lot of the same functions every year. And to meet a lot of the same people in theater in the city that I don’t normally have a chance to do. That’s what’s great about being involved in the Tony campaign I guess.
Does something feel different this time, given the subject matter of the play?
This show is unique. I approached it like I would any fictional piece of work even though we’re playing the Clintons, because we don’t do impressions of them. I just started from the clues that are simply on the page from Lucas Hnath, the playwright. It’s been interesting to sort of play somebody who you know is constantly under a microscope — and then here she is in a hotel room basically for the whole show with sweat pants and slippers on.
Hillary and Clinton.Julieta Cervantes
Not imitating her mannerisms or trying to physically resemble Hillary poses an even bigger challenge for you — there’s nothing to really hide behind. How did you pull that off?
Yeah, I mean I conscientiously try not to imitate her cadences or laugh or anything like that or posture, anything. But I think for an audience watching it, it might play tricks in an audience’s mind because we’re calling each other Hillary and Bill. We’re saying things that has actually been said before between the two of them that we know of. It seems like for an audience their focus might sort of drift in and out between what they’ve brought in, whatever feelings they have about the Clintons and then what they’re seeing.
Have the Clintons seen the show?
I think we’d know if the Clintons had come. I don’t think it’s possible for them to sneak in, in any way, shape or form. They’ve not been. They know about it of course and I think they’ve read it.
Have you met Hillary before?
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What are you pre-show rituals?
I try to eat at the right time and the right amount that will give me enough energy for the show but not also feel too full. I don’t like to feel too full on stage but be just a little bit hungry. I try to map that out in my day. I go early to the theater. We’re not required to be there until a half hour before the show, but I get there usually about an hour and a half before.
Then I just take my time getting ready, getting in costume and stuff. When Melissa comes in who does my hair, she starts blowing it out and when — this sounds so mundane — she starts that, that’s when I open up my script and go through all of my lines again. You know, real fast under my breath while she’s doing that. That seems to be a ritual that I can’t shake, I’d love to shake it because I can’t stand doing it. It takes like 40 minutes and I don’t need to do it anymore. Now it’s just out of habit and out of superstition that if I don’t do it, I’ll forget a line on stage. That eats up most of my time in the dressing room is going over my lines every day.
And post-show? Do you go out to unwind?
No, I usually always go straight home. I have a dog with me now, which makes it different. I haven’t done that before, or had a dog in the city. I usually just go straight home and I’ll stay up for another couple of hours.
Best of luck Sunday at theTonys!
Thanks. I’ll take my daughter with me. She’s my date. She loves it.
source: people.com
