STAGE TO SCREENS: Chats with Osment, Lindsay-Abaire, Ashley and Gaynor
By Michael Buckley
16 Nov 2008
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Haley Joel Osment
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This month: Haley Joel Osment (American Buffalo), David Lindsay-Abaire (Shrek the Musical), Elizabeth Ashley (Dividing the Estate), and Mitzi Gaynor ("Razzle Dazzle! The Special Years").
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Haley Joel Osment, whose Oscar-nominated "Sixth Sense" performance made the phrase "I see dead people" part of the American lexicon, makes his Broadway debut in David Mamet's American Buffalo (opening Nov. 17, at the Belasco). So now he can say, "I see live people." The actor laughs. "A lot of them; it's a big theatre."
Not on any ego trip, the former child star comes across as mature, friendly, sincere, and dedicated. Delighted that Barack Obama was victorious, Osment's an NYU student, with a double major: drama and history. (He sees finals.)
What does he consider the biggest plus and minus about child stardom? "There isn't a built-in downside. There are stereotypes people have, but not challenges that can't be overcome. Positive things outweigh any risks."
Has Broadway always been a goal? "It was something I wanted to do, but not something I was thinking about immediately before this happened. I feel lucky it happened so soon."
How did Osment become involved in the Mamet revival? "David [Mamet] and Bob [Falls], the director, approached me. They wanted to put a new spin on the play, with different types of actors portraying the characters."
Originally on Broadway in 1977, the three-character drama concerns a plan to steal a coin collection. Originating the roles were Robert Duvall (as Walt/Teach), Kenneth McMillan (Donny) and John Savage (Bobby). In the 1983 revival, the cast was Al Pacino, J.J. Johnston and James Hayden. A 1996 movie version starred Dustin Hoffman, Dennis Franz, and Sean Nelson. Now featured are John Leguizamo, Cedric the Entertainer (Cedric Kyles) and Osment.
Was he familiar with the play? "I've read it, but it's a tough read. During the play, my character, Bobby, goes offstage to do things. It's important for me to know what I do when I leave the stage. It has impact on the rest of the play and on the relationships.
"Bobby's someone who's grown up on the streets. He has no family, no friends. He's had a lot of trouble with heroin. Donny gets him to scope out jobs for him menial tasks, no big business but they give Bobby a purpose in life. Donny's a father figure, the one person who makes him feel like he's worth anything. He tries to please Donny, and be what Donny calls 'a stand-up guy.'
"Subtlety in film acting doesn't play onstage. You have to reach the back row. But it's fun, because it allows you to hit these moments and beats in a strong way. Rehearsal was intense. The dialogue's difficult, and we had to get comfortable with tech things.
"Mamet came by a couple of times, and we talked about the people who inspired the characters. His only advice was 'know your lines and don't bump into the furniture.' At the first preview, we really started hitting our stride finding moments that make the play richer. Every night's a learning process. By the time we officially open, I think that it's going to be in amazing condition."
Born in Los Angeles to (actor) Eugene and (teacher) Theresa Osment, he has a younger sister, Emily, "who's on the 'Hannah Montana' show [as Lily Truscott]." He was chosen, at age four, for a Pizza Hut commercial, "but that pizza didn't taste too good." One of his early movie roles was Forest Gump, Jr. Recalls Osment, "Tom [Hanks] was great; Bob Zemeckis, the director, fantastic!"
Did he have any idea, while making "The Sixth Sense," that it would become such a success? "No. I don't think anybody did. We knew we had a good project, but the level of success was a surprise. We all got along very well Bruce [Willis], Night [M. Night Shyamalan, the director], and Toni Collette."
Nominated for a 1999 Supporting Actor Academy Award, Osment lost his "Sixth Sense" bid to Michael Caine (for "The Cider House Rules"). In his acceptance, Caine acknowledged his younger (by 55 years) competitor's superb performance.
Caine's comment, says Osment, "was perhaps the best part of the night. And I got to work with him, a few years later, in 'Secondhand Lions' [which also co-starred original American Buffalo lead, Robert Duvall]."
Along the way were many TV appearances, including three series: "Thunder Alley" (27 episodes, 1994-95), "The Jeff Foxworthy Show" (24 episodes, 1995-97), and "Murphy Brown" (six episodes, as Candice Bergen's son, 1997-98).
Osment's other movies include "Pay It Forward" (with Kevin Spacey and Helen Hunt) and Stephen Spielberg's "Artificial Intelligence: AI." Upcoming are "Home of the Giants" (made "a couple of years ago") and "Montana Amazon."
While a fan of John Leguizamo and Cedric the Entertainer, Osment had never met either prior to rehearsals. "It's cool, because we all hit it off really well."
Concludes Osment, "I want to stay in this business. I've been lucky to have so much experience with it and I want to keep giving better performances all the time."
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David Lindsay-Abaire
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| photo by Joan Marcus |
David Lindsay-Abaire, a 2007 Pulitzer Prize winner (Rabbit Hole), is in an enviable position. Not only has he penned book and lyrics for Shrek the Musical (now in previews prior to a Dec. 14 opening at the Broadway Theatre), but also he's been signed to write the "Spider-Man 4" screenplay ("a boy's dream come true") and to adapt his Pulitzer play as a film (for Nicole Kidman's production company, to star Kidman). He says, "I feel very lucky."
He's fond of Hollywood mogul Sam Goldwyn's quote: "The harder I work, the luckier I get." Admits the playwright, "Yes, it's a lot of pressure but 'Hooray!'" I thank him for doing the interview on short notice. "I'm happy to not spend another minute in that theatre." (Welcoming a break from the pressure, answering questions must be preferable to creating dialogue and/or lyrics.)
Of course, he's heard the Larry Gelbart line about Hitler that, if the dictator's still alive, "He should be sent out of town with a musical in trouble." The writer laughs. "It's more than accurate [although the buzz on Shrek does not indicate trouble]."
Signed as book writer, "It was [composer] Jeanine Tesori who suggested I write the lyrics. Dreamworks was willing to give it a try. I wrote a couple of songs with Jeanine, and they liked them. That's how I became a lyricist."
Which lyricists does he admire? "Of course, Stephen Sondheim, who's astounding, but I learned a great deal from watching Amanda Green write lyrics for High Fidelity [his short-lived debut as librettist]."
Shrek challenges included "being loyal to the source material, but figuring out how to make it our own, and having Shrek sing. He's closed off to the world, unwilling to share emotions. Musicals crack open a character's heart. Emotionally and psychologically, Shrek has a lot going on, but how to show that truthfully, without being corny, took awhile. When Brian d'Arcy James came aboard, we figured it out. Brian reads a line and things fall into place."
Boston born-and-bred, Lindsay-Abaire comes from "a blue-collar family. My mother worked in a factory; my father in the Chelsea fruit market." How did he become interested in writing? "I did a lot of plays in high school, primarily as an actor. In the school I went to, every ninth-grade class did a musical. We did The History of the American Film [on Broadway for 21 performances in 1978], by Christopher Durang, who became my teacher at Juilliard.
"In the next grade, someone said, 'We should do a tenth-grade musical.' A friend said that it should be an original and that I should write it, because I was the funny one. That's how I became a playwright."
He wrote musicals the next three grades. "I kept writing plays, not knowing I was going to be a playwright. I went to Sarah Lawrence, primarily as an actor, but I kept taking [writing] classes. When I got into Juilliard [studying writing under Chris Durang and Marsha Norman], I thought, 'Maybe this is going to work out.'"
Writing influences include John Guare, Edward Albee, Georges Feydeau, Eugene Ionesco, George S. Kaufman and Moss Hart. "Their work mixes a lot of tones." Among movies he admires are "My Man Godfrey" and "Twentieth Century," Abbott and Costello, the Marx Brothers, [Frank] Capra, "and anything by Preston Sturges. Their tones are what I try to achieve in my work.
"Rabbit Hole is a serious drama, with comedy in it. I think it works because of the humor. Even Shrek has something deep at its heart. Yes, there's a funny donkey and scary dragon, but it's about an ogre and a princess [played by Sutton Foster, "who's astounding"]. Both have been told they are one thing when inside they feel they're something else. The characters are searching for friendship, for love. Nothing's goofy about that."
During his years at Sarah Lawrence, he met his wife, Chris Lindsay-Abaire, who's "an actress and also a post-partum doula, someone who goes into the home and helps parents adjust to their newborn. My wife and I took each other's names. She was Christine Lindsay, I was David Abaire." Both use the hyphenated name Lindsay-Abaire.
Manhattan Theatre Club presented four of his plays Fuddy Meers, Wonder of the World, Kimberly Akimbo, and (on Broadway) Rabbit Hole. "Sam Raimi ["Spider-Man" director] told me that Rabbit Hole was the reason I got 'Spider-Man 4.' Who knew?
"Spider-Man's like many of my characters an outsider in search of clarity. That's a theme running through my work." Lindsay-Abaire happily reports that "following the musical and the movie, I've been commissioned by Manhattan Theatre Club to write a new play. I have to get back to that." Continued...
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