(upbeat dance music)
- Thanks so much for joining us once again,
for another episode of Broadway Profiles, I'm Tamsen Fadal.
Eric Petersen is a veteran of four Broadway shows.
Most recently, the Jimmy Buffett musical
"Escape to Margaritaville."
Now, his big break in television.
Eric stars alongside Annie Murphy, of "Schitt's Creek".
In the ambitious new AMC show, "Kevin can (beep)."
Yeah, we definitely can't say that on network TV.
It's a dark satire, lampooning the frequent sitcom trope
of wisecracking schlubby husbands
with wives who ruin the party.
And more importantly,
what happens when those women take the lead.
- Hey, where's our breakfast?
You're not supposed to have favorites.
- Kevin's my husband.
- I'm the gift that keeps on giving baby.
(guitar chords)
I'm sorry. I passed out in your rosebushes last night.
(high-pitched ringing)
- Oh, Miss Hercules, over here.
- You got a new show
and I'm actually not allowed to say the name of your show,
but you're allowed to say the name of your show.
So what's the name of your show?
- The name of my show is Kevin Can (beep) Himself.
- (laughs) So how did you go into a pitch room with that?
I'm just curious, how did that work?
- Well, when it was, when the show was pitched to me,
I was like, wow, this title is captivating
and it really gets your attention.
And you know, when they were asking me to,
you know, audition to play said, Kevin,
I was like, I need to know,
I need to know more about this script.
And once I read it, I was, I was so excited
because I love multi-cam sitcoms,
and I've done a lot of multi-cam sitcoms in my career.
And getting the chance to be a part of a show
that was going to essentially make a multi-cam sitcom.
But then also just like, shake the hell out of it,
and dump it on its head, and then put it back,
and have this whole second half of the show
that happens in the single-cam
that's much more real and gritty.
I was like, this is awesome,
this is such a great idea.
You could, as soon as it was described to me,
I was like, I can see it.
And then once, the way that they, sort of,
edited it all together and executed it.
I think it's really come together beautifully.
- And there are so many examples of those
kind of traditional ones,
where you've got like the hot wife,
then you've got, you know,
you've got a king of queens and you've got,
you know, all sorts of things.
But it's, it's exciting to see a premise
like this with that twist,
because that's a serious twist,
and we never get to see that, usually.
- It really is.
And, and, you know, I think the way to watch our show
is sort of explained to the audience
within literally three minutes of the pilot.
The show starts in a brightly lit sitcom,
classic sitcom, living room.
And it's got all the sort of tropes
that you would expect, the sort of schlubby husband,
the hot wife with the laundry basket,
the dumb best friend,
the sort of dad who's grumpy in his chair,
the best friend neighbor,
who's kind of a wisecracking gal, you know.
So it has all those things that feel familiar
and feel funny, and feel like, oh, yes, I know this,
and this makes me happy.
And then as soon as Allison, played by the brilliant
and wonderful Emmy-winning Annie Murphy,
leaves the room, we follow her,
and it's like, boom, smash cut.
And you see that kitchen door close,
and you see the cameras zoom into her face,
and you see all the cracks of the house,
and there's cockroaches, and it's dimly lit,
and there's no laugh track,
and you really see her reality.
And then, the show goes back and forth
between the two, really beautifully.
- Are those two totally different sets or what do they do?
And then they just make one or is it just where it's filmed?
- It's just the way it's filmed.
That's what's so, so trippy about it.
Is, you know, all of the dimensions of everything
stay exactly the same,
that when we shoot the multi-cam,
for instance, in the family room,
the sort of sidewalls are maybe angled just slightly.
And then once we go into the single camera,
they're sort of straightened out,
and then we bring in the fourth wall and the ceiling,
and the way that that can change the show
and the feeling of the room is nuts.
♪I'm a little bit, I'm a little bit, ♪
♪I'm a little bit (vocalizes) a little bit Alexis. ♪
- Let's talk about Annie Murphy
coming off of her amazing run on "Schitt's Creek."
What was she like to work with?
- You know, Annie was just great.
I was sort of in the middle of bingeing "Schitt's Creek,"
when this all, this show happened.
And so I was so excited and I felt,
I felt like, oh my gosh, I'm meeting Alexis,
because when you're in the middle of a binge of a show,
you know how you feel --
- A little bit Alexis
- You, yes, a little bit Alexis.
And you really feel like you know
these characters like deeply.
And so when I met her,
I was so happy to see that she's not Alexis.
She is Annie Murphy,
but she is so sweet and so funny and so smart.
And she's such a great leader of our show.
And, you know, she's just a kind person,
she's very Canadian in that way,
that she's just kind and looks you in the eye
cause it's professional and polite.
So she was a dream to work with.
("Cheeseburger in Paradise")
- [Tamsen] Jimmy Buffett, "Escape to Margaritaville,"
When can we expect you back on the Broadway stage?
- I don't know, but I hope soon, you know --
- Me too.
- I, I, thank you.
I love doing Broadway.
It's my first love.
It's sort of, you know, the way that I came up.
So I like there is never any sense in my mind
that that would be my last Broadway show.
Like I view my career as like I do Broadway
and I do TV and film
until like I, whatever project comes next, I go there.
But I, I am hopefully, fingers crossed,
will be doing something again, hopefully very soon.
(upbeat pop music)