PLAYBILL.COM'S CUE & A: Jonathan Cake

By Ernio Hernandez
13 Nov 2007

Jonathan Cake
Jonathan Cake

Jonathan Cake — who co-stars in the current Broadway revival of Cymbeline — fills out Playbill.com's questionnaire with random facts, backstage trivia and pop culture tidbits.


Full given name: Jonathan James Cake
Hometown: Worthing, England
Zodiac sign: Virgo
Audition song: I once sang "All Shook Up" for the man who directed Les Miz.  He seemed confused.
Special skills: I know the words to a lot of pop songs. Is that a skill?
First Broadway show ever saw: It sounds terrible, but somehow I never seem to see Broadway shows. I did see Spring Awakening.
If you could go back in time and catch any Broadway show, what would it be? Lee J. Cobb in Death of a Salesman.
Favorite show tune: It's in Company... the song by the three men - sweet, sad... Ah! [Current co-star] Michael Cerveris just told me it's "Sorry Grateful."
MAC or PC? MAC, but barely
Most played song on your iPod: "Suzanne," Nina Simone version.
One CD you couldn't live without: "Whatever People Say I Am, That's What I'm Not" by Arctic Monkeys
Last book you read: "Happiest Baby on the Block" [by Harvey Karp]
Must-see TV show: "Sky Sports News," Channel 124, only between 7 and 8 PM nightly, You wont find Rugby and Cricket anywhere else.
Last good movie you saw: Finally saw "My Dinner With Andre" the other night.
Favorite board game: Trivial Pursuit
Performer you would drop everything to go see: Morrissey, Stephen Dillane, Philip Seymour Hoffman
Pop culture guilty pleasure: "Top Chef"
First stage kiss: In Scarborough in 1993, directed by Alan Ayckbourn in a play about rowing. I kissed Saskia Wickham, bleeding profusely from a hand gashed by an oar.
How you got your Equity card: Playing an innkeeper with a rapidly unsticking mustache in She Stoops to Conquer in Harrogate, England, 1992 (British Equity); Medea (American Equity).
Worst onstage mishap: Performing The Mill on the Floss to a baying schools matinee in Madras India. I had to leave the stage during a frenzied and erotically charged waltz to be sick into a fire bucket.
Who have you played on "Law & Order"? Which edition? Never been on, but I have slept with one of the detectives.
Worst costume ever: As a lanky 17 year old I played Falstaff, padded so much I couldn't get through the door to backstage and with a wig that looked like a sheep had expired on my head.
Cats or dogs? Isn't that like asking "women or men"?
Favorite cereal: I like Puffins.
Who would play you in the movie? Cate Blanchett
Worst job you ever had: Working for a trucking company in East London with a man who insisted I call him "Mad Dog."
TV or commercial gig you most enjoyed: I lived in Rome for a summer filming "Empire" for ABC.  The vita was never dolcier.