What gave rise to your show? Was is that you weren't getting any work and you wanted to do something, or was it that you felt this story had to be told?
Well, the resemblance was the first thing. People have always said I look like Jackie my whole life. I wanted to do a one-woman play, I've always liked doing my own stuff and it seemed like an interesting challenge. And then Jim Simpson down at the Flea Theater recommended that I write a one-woman play. He noticed that I'd done some Jackie Kennedy stuff before and said I should write a one woman play.

At first I thought, "Oh, I don't know... there's so much stuff about her, who wants to see something else about her?" But then I kept thinking about it and I considered shows about, you know... my family or whatever. But I mean, we've seen that so many times. So I got a bunch of books and started reading, and the more I read, I got completely fired up about it. There was a lot more there than I realized. Honestly, I had always just saw her as this rich socialite. I didn't realize how much more interesting she was. But I didn't want to write it unless I was really excited about it, and once I read two of the books, I was bouncing off the walls.

So I read tons and tons of books and watched videos... anything I could get my hands on. And then I realized I didn't even know how to begin to write a play. So I called my friend Liza Lentini who is an amazing playwright and asked her if I would get a group together, would she teach a play writing class? She said yes, so I e-mailed everyone I knew and organized a group and during the first 8 week session, I wrote the first draft of the play. Then we took a little break, then she did an advanced class, which is when I completed it.

I couldn't have done it without the class. It was mainly about having the accountability and the structure... writing is so isolating. I think so many actors have a play they want to write, but they can't get it moving on their own because it's so isolating. I think writers really need some kind of group, class, workshop... something.

Where you performing bits of it to develop it? Was there a "workshopping" process?
Not at all. Just totally writing and writing. I was writing and researching so many hours that I got carpal tunnel syndrome from being at the computer so much. I would be up until... I just... I couldn't sleep! I was crazed over getting the words down just right. It just took over everything.

How did you pay the bills during this period?
I work as an assistant to a writer. For ten years I've been working with her, so I go in there three hours a day, and I also run career groups to help people figure out what they want to do. Those two things are enough to pay my rent. And it's good too because I have flexibility with my schedule... I can go in whenever I want, which is perfect.

It seems the usual process is to "workshop" and perform pieces during the writing and development process. There was none of that?
The interesting thing that happened with the evolution of this play is that when I finished writing it, I contacted Charles Messina, the director. I didn't really know him that well, I had just seen one of his plays and heard about another and I thought he was so good. So I called him up and left a message saying I'd written this script and that I'd had him in mind as the director as I was writing it. I was thinking about doing some directed readings to try to raise money.

I had images of the typical path, you do readings, you develop it... but everything turned upside down. Because after he read it he said, "This is ready to go... you don't need to develop this, you're just being a chicken. Let's do it, let's just do the whole show."

Here I was thinking about, you know... maybe a year of development, but I had already booked a theater for ten weeks later thinking that it would just be a reading. But now we were planning to actually do the full show... in ten weeks! And I personally did all the sets and all the costumes... I was trying to memorize it and it was just... it was just crazy!

Two weeks before it opened I thought I just couldn't do it. Because I couldn't get all the lines in my head. I was doing anything... I was taking ginkgo biloba to try to improve my memory. It made me sick to my stomach. I went to hypnotist to see if she could suggest into my brain that I could memorize it! Because I was really, really desperate... and I did it, but it was really by the skin of my teeth!

But two weeks before it opened, I mean... everything was falling apart! Because I had to do everything myself, and I didn't have money. The whole thing cost me about $300 on my credit card, the costumes and everything. But it took a long time because I wanted everything to look just right and I didn't have any money. The two-level table on the stage? I found that in the trash. The covers I bought from a site that does chair covers, they were really inexpensive. The coat rack was $25. I went to the Salvation Army, I went to Goodwill... I combed them all the time for good stuff.

But it did well, and right away it caught fire and just kept going. I didn't know that would happen... I had no idea what would happen.

How did you publicize the show? Whom did you contact and why?
The strongest publicity tool I had was the postcard. My resemblance to Jackie is a really strong selling point. So I produced 5,000 of the postcards and then everywhere I went, I handed them out. This was way, way ahead of time, when I was still writing the play. And I brought a notebook with me and collected e-mails, I would just tell people that I was doing this play and I'd e-mail them the details. So I got the buzz in people's ears months and months in advance. And then as the show got closer I just started sending out these mass e-mails.

I also made a press release and faxed that or mailed it anywhere I could with the postcard attached. I would just look through papers and magazines and find out whom to contact and just send it to them, I would comb through Backstage looking for e-mail addresses, I contacted the alumni associations at both my schools and asked for lists of alumni in New York and e-mailed all them. I was just constantly thinking about who would be interested in this. It actually was a very creative thing, just trying to imagine how else to get this out there to the most people.

I went on Google and typed in "Jackie Kennedy" and of course got thousands of pages and I searched through them for e-mail addresses... anyone who'd written anything about Jackie, if there was an e-mail address, I grabbed it.

So you didn't have a target audience per se, you were just going for anyone and everyone?
I definitely tried to go after people who already had an interest in Jackie, but I didn't know exactly who the audience was. There are a lot of women over 50 who are interested, because they remember Jackie and many of them admire her. There's a large gay segment of the audience, students... a wide cross section of audience members.

So how did the promotional effort pay off for your first run?
The theater gave me four nights, and we sold out every night. And the theater noticed. And they actually approached me and wanted to extend it for six weeks, I think it was. So it was extended and then I got more press reviews and then there was a possibility it was going to go off-Broadway, there were negotiations and it seemed like it was really going to happen, but a lot of complicated things went on and... basically, it didn't happen. The producers wanted me to use a different director and I just couldn't do it because I chose my director carefully and we brought the project forward as a team.

That was a blow, I was so depressed after that. I mean, they were saying I was going to be making so much money. I mean, not that it's all about that, but still... after all these years of struggling... you know...

Can you give me a ballpark figure?
I was going to be making about $4,000 a week. Because, as the writer and the performer, that's two paychecks. Stuff like that, plus... there was other stuff I got a real kick out of. They were going to put my picture on the sides of buses... that was part of the marketing plan. And it was so exciting!

But... eh.

Since then, you've been performing it all over the place... various places in New York, New Jersey, D.C... are you getting sick of it?
I don't mind having little breaks in between because each time I come back I feel like it deepens, kind of on it's own. Then I feel like when I come back to it, it's stronger.

But it's funny because sometimes people say "God, you've been performing the show for two years, when are you going to do something else?" Thing is, first of all, there's nothing more exciting for me than doing my own play. There's a sense of accomplishment about having written it and writing a part for myself that's really a fantastic role. It's a great role for an actor. So other people have offered me different things along the way, but I didn't take them because I really felt like I wanted to put my energy into this. Because it's so rewarding!

If I were doing eight shows a week, that would be different because, I mean... that would be over 800 shows by now. But if you put all the shows I've done together, I've probably only done 35-40 performances total. It's not that extreme.

But I really recommend it for actors. Actually everybody. Get a good writing teacher and write something. It's really so empowering!

So this show is running now one night a week... are you auditioning for other shows? What's happening?
Not so much. People have asked me to audition for other things, but I don't want to do another project that would take me too far away from this. Because I feel like this still has a lot of legs on it. Doing another show would take so much energy away from it.

I was actually cast in a play about Andy Warhol, and I was going to do it, but it would have overlapped with rehearsals for this run. It was very heavy rehearsing and I thought, "My god... this is going to take over my entire life!" I thought Jackie might kind of fall by the wayside... I've worked too hard these last two years to put this on the back burner.

What is your hope for the show? What did you imagine when you started to create it?
Off-Broadway. I love Off-Broadway. I'd love to go to one of those really phenomenal Off-Broadway theaters like Cherry Lane. It's getting pretty close. Right now I'm at the Triad Theater which is listed as Off-Broadway. So that's nice. I've always been a bit ambivalent about 8 shows a week, though. It's so intense, this hour and a half by myself. So this works out really well, one show a week. It's almost the perfect thing.

It seems to me that you've chosen a unique path, that you're in an enviable position having your own show, not running around desperately to auditions, confident enough to turn down a job because it would interfere with your own work. What characteristics set you apart from so many other actors who are feeling at the mercy of "the industry"?
Well, I did the whole thing, trying to get an agent. I did it many a time. I did huge, expensive mailings... and I didn't get one. And at a certain point you realize, "Well that's just stupid... all this energy I'm putting in trying to get an agent, I could put into creating stuff myself." I have freelanced with agents, and even interned for an agent, though.

So, part of it is that the most success I've ever had has been because of this play. And so because of that, since doing this play, I've removed myself more. Until I did this play, I was very actively auditioning. Constant, constant, constant, constant. I was doing the Backstage thing... and I was doing okay. But it was still always that feeling of just scrambling. And I read this thing that said, if you take a well-trained actor, he can expect to get one of every 100 roles he auditions for. That's a well-trained actor. And things like that... little pieces of information like that work on you.

And then I thought about all my best experiences as an actor and an opera singer and they mostly came through my own efforts... an opera I produced in college, plays I've produced with friends here in the city. And I think actors tend to think, "It's me versus them". "Them" being agents, casting directors, those types of people.

And I think a lot of young actors turn those people into their parents and they go in on knee pads in a state of fear. They think, "Oh, I'm a lowly actor... I'm down here and they're up there." And I think they believe their careers are totally dependent on these people, and I don't think that's true! I think we have so much more power than we realize. Whenever I've removed myself from that arena, I've been the happiest and the most successful.

So I just can't encourage actors enough to just go for it. Find something you like, find a part that you like, get your friends together and just do it. Don't wait around forever. People think, "Oh, well when I get my agent then everything will work out." And then they just sit at home, picking their nose, waiting for a call from their agent and it doesn't happen! If the basic goal is to be in the act of doing this art and being creative and being on stage, then I say do it any way you can. Don't wait around for someone else to do it for you. Because you can be waiting forever.

I think that actors, for the most part, really need to support each other more. I think a lot of actors, because of the competition of the field, they get into a self-focused bubble. Which is fine, but I kind of think that what goes around comes around and that when actors go all out to see each other's shows and support each other, I think that sort of effort is really important.

I think actors tend to feel alone and frustrated and just trudging along... and that's a shame. Because I think actors have a lot more power than they realize. They really are the life-blood of the industry. Because you can't do a play or a movie without actors. And I think we tend to forget that because of all the auditions and the rejection. But I think actors can provide so much support for each other. I have acquaintances whose shows I've gone to see and after the show I'll always send an e-mail and tell them whatever I liked about the show, but then these people... I mean, they get so wrapped up in what they're doing and they still haven't come to see my show yet.

I feel actors really need to make a concerted effort to support each other. I think you can build a lot of power in that. Even down to sharing ideas, sharing contacts. I really go out of my way to help other actors because I really feel it creates a fantastic energy in the community. It's something I feel very strongly about and I wish more actors had that point of view.

 

For more info on Andrea Reese's one-woman show,
Cirque Jacqueline, click here .

-KW

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