(upbeat techno music)
- Each and every week we are fired up
to bring you "The Broadway Show."
That's why I'm so glad you're here.
I'm Tamsen Fadal.
Batter up.
The revival of "Take Me Out"
is finally returning to Broadway
with a star-studded cast.
Paul Wontorek is here now,
throwing heat with one of the major players
in Take Me Out:
Jesse Williams.
- Thanks, Tamsen.
Best known for his performance
as Dr. Jackson Avery on TV's "Gray's Anatomy,"
"Take Me Out" marks Jesse's Broadway debut.
We talked about him getting his game face on for the stage
and so much more at the Renaissance Hotel.
Jesse, welcome to Broadway. - Thank you.
- How's Broadway treating you?
- Wonderfully.
Wonderfully. I'm having the time of my life.
It's terrifying and exciting.
It's just all rolled into one.
It's a thrill ride.
- You're in previews now. - Yeah.
- You're heading towards opening night.
You're in front of audiences. - Yeah.
- What is it like actually getting in front of everybody?
- It's incredible.
Our audiences have been great.
They're listening.
They're attentive.
The material is so rich and dense and layered
and it unfolds in a really unorthodox way.
So I definitely feel tethered to the audience.
We're feeling this connective energy with them.
So you couldn't ask for a better group
both onstage and in front of it.
It feels good.
That first show was thrilling and stressful,
but I'm having fun.
I'm having fun.
I try to turn any nervousness
into excitement and anticipation.
- You play Darren Lemming- - [Jesse] Yeah.
- who may or may not be inspired
by some real pro baseball players in terms of personality.
- Uh-huh.
- He's a real confident guy- - [Jesse] Yeah.
- [Paul] who has found great success in the game.
A lot of confidence in that character.
- [Jesse] Yeah. - Is that easy for you,
for Jesse to connect to?
- For pieces of my lived experience
and folks I've been around:
yeah.
You gotta believe it yourself
before you expect anybody else to believe it.
You gotta be a little irrational.
You gotta be really committed.
And then combine that with an incredible skillset.
- All the action of the play
sort of jumps off the very beginning:
he announces to the world he's gay.
Richard Greenberg,
when he wrote this 20 years ago
I think it was sort of like a fantasy.
Well, imagine if a pro athlete actually did this.
We have actually seen some athletes come out of the closet
in those 20 years. - Yeah.
- It almost feels like an impulsive,
he just sort of does it.
But because of who he is
he's able to just sort of make the announcement
and then it like sets the play in motion.
- Yeah, it's an interesting entree to it
because a lot of stakes are established in that preface.
That period of anticipation, stress, strain, practicing:
you don't see any of that.
As you say, he comes out
and really pretty casually,
pretty casual demeanor,
and couches it in language that is about,
"But I'm still here to play the game.
We're still just here to have fun.
Let's go on out there and play ball."
And Richard is very specific in his language.
Every syllable is there for a reason.
And there's a reason that we start,
I'd say not only,
we start the moment
after I've said those choice words, right?
It's really interesting.
It's the end of my press conference
after I've actually come out technically.
And it's really about me telling everybody how to behave
and that we're all just gonna move on.
Darren doesn't actually change the way he behaves.
He doesn't do anything differently.
Everybody else's projection onto him
as to what they think that means
and what they think that you think
that I think that you think that means.
And so that speaks to some of the fragility
in what we consider kind of heteronormative masculinity
and the performative quality of it
and vulnerability
and being honest in male relationships in general.
All of that stuff is so ripe
for story and drama and tension and betrayal.
- I also love the dynamic between Darren and Mason,
- Yeah. - played by the other Jesse:
Jesse Tyler Ferguson,
who is an openly gay guy
who sort of discovers his love of baseball,
which is such a beautiful thing about this play.
What is it like sort of
developing that relationship with him,
the really opposite sides of the of the gay community.
- Yeah, it's really wonderful.
Man, I mean, Jesse Tyler, I can't say enough about him.
He's not only just a stellar performer and human being,
he's so charming and inviting and generous
that I sometimes get lost in his performance
while I'm on stage with him.
It's really wonderful to behold.
It is a wonderful relationship.
He's so charming.
And it's kind of the only relationship
that Darren has in the play
where there's no threat of antagonism.
- Right. - Right.
He actually makes a safe space for me.
He's calm, he's vulnerable, he wants to learn.
And it allows Darren to kind of relax and be playful
in a way that Kippy points out
a lot of the straight players on the team
feel like they've lost
by me coming out.
My presence now has made it difficult
for them to be playful anymore
because they have to overcompensate
to prove that they're not me
for some silly reason
that is deeply entrenched in American masculinity.
- When you do a Broadway play,
you're with this group of actors
and you're doing the same material every night,
but obviously it adjusts night to night.
Is there a parallel at all with that
and doing something like "Grey's Anatomy",
where you work with the same group of people
over long periods of time,
but different words every week?
- Interesting. Yeah.
That's a fair comparison.
In theater though,
it's certainly heightened
because we are all on that high wire together.
And the slightest gust of wind,
the slightest misplacement can throw the whole thing off.
So we have to constantly kind of have our muscles activated.
You don't get to rest in off camera work.
You don't get to be half in wardrobe.
You don't get to be sitting on an apple box.
All these little behind the scenes things.
Everybody's in full tilt,
360 degrees available
and that's taken some learning.