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Burlesque girls were alchemists. They were steel-tough performers who were willing to use kitchens as dressing rooms, haul their costume bags through the snow, and go into debt over fake diamonds, all for the five minutes onstage when they were goddesses.
I feel like I wear kind of the same things on stage that I would wear every day, unless I'm being lazy, and then I just wear trackies. But actually, if I'm honest, I wouldn't really walk down Kilburn High Street in a leotard, and I would wear that onstage.
The premise that we're working with is that when most people go to a show, they're not really watching what's going on onstage. They may be watching what's on the screen. But when the songs are playing in their mind's eye, they're actually watching a movie.
My goal was becoming the next David Copperfield. I learned how to be a performer by emulating him as a kid - his formula of just talking to people onstage, being free to improvise, being charming and witty with a crowd, together with great, beautiful magic.
I have friends of mine that are actors or singers, and they're the classic guys where, they're onstage, and they're like, 'Okay, the blonde in the third row, seat 24, bring her to my dressing room.' I've never, never taken advantage of that, I swear to God.
I've never acted, but I'm an entertainer. So I kind of used what I know from being onstage. I've done a thousand and two interviews, and I've been on camera a million times, so I'm not uncomfortable on camera, but it was interesting for me to be someone else.
I've seen people that get onstage and sing while they have tears running down their face - I can't do that. When I cry, it starts like in my throat, so when I have something that's really emotional, sometimes if I access that too much, I can't finish the song.
My background is a small town with no movie theater. So... I always pictured myself onstage. I went to acting school and learned all the skills. I left early because I did my first movie and discovered that I really loved the minimalistic work with the camera.
My real name is Joseph Herbert. My dad is white; my mom's Asian, Filipino. And when I started stand-up 22 years ago, I used to go up as Joseph Herbert, and I would just have to defend my name. Every time I went onstage, it was so annoying. People would heckle.
My general advice for writers/comedians is, make stuff you like and are proud of. Put it in a place where people can see it, whether that's onstage or on the Internet or wherever. Just do the things that make you happy creatively, and then show them to people.
Everyone will clearly be a bit nervous and scared before going onstage. But what I do is just remember that this is my passion. Once I get on the stage and see everyone smiling and looking at me, the joy that it brings to me makes me forget all about my nerves.
Carly Simon abandoned the stage for seven years after collapsing from nerves before a concert in Pittsburgh in 1981. When she resumed performing, she would sometimes ask members of her band to spank her before she went onstage, to distract her from her anxiety.
I love the chemistry that can be created onstage between the actors and the audience. It's molecular, even, the energies that can go back and forth. I started in theater, and when I first went into movies, I felt that my energy was going to blow out the camera.
I get an idea about something. I just start thinking about it, and then I get onstage and I talk about it, and then I think about it some more and talk about it some more, and think about it some more and talk about it some more, until it starts to take a shape.
It's not onstage as often anymore, but whenever I got anxious, I used to talk a lot more, and I wouldn't even know what I was saying... it was so bad. If I just talk myself through something, even if it's just talking about nothing, it usually gets me out of it.
I'm a selfish person, and I'm going onstage to have a good time, and I'd love if you want to be a part of it. So if people don't get it, they're wrong. I think they're wrong, and I think they either don't want to have a good time or they just don't like my style.
The first time I did stand-up I was 17, and I was really a stand-up once I was 19 in New York, and now I'm 41, and I still feel like I haven't found myself onstage. Earlier in my career, I was really tight, really together, and knew who I was and I was confident.
Sometimes, occasionally, people will make out in the audience, completely not aware that there's a human being onstage just yards away from them, who can see them. Sometimes people think that you're on television while you're onstage, so you're not even a person.
Denzel had made it apparent that he wanted me to bring my own interpretation of 'Cory'. I was definitely aware of Courtney B. Vance's performance in the original production, as well as that of Chris Chalk, who performed the role onstage with my cast back in 2010.
Being on stage was all about the palpable energy of a rapt audience hopefully buying into a life onstage. The immediate connection with the audience was the best part for me. The camera is not as fun, but your work is preserved forever. There's immortality to it.
As far as being onstage, commanding presence, I've always looked up to people like Axl Rose and Freddie Mercury and Paul Stanley - the rock gods. I've always wanted to be able to achieve that level of commanding nature onstage and really leading people at a show.
I was in 'Seussical,' and I was in a cage onstage in a purple yarn suit singing backup, and I was like: 'I've had it. I can't do this anymore.' I will say for the record that I did love the show, but I was like: 'I want to do something else. I need a little more.'
I don't use the big video screens that a lot of other artists use because personally, I think it's kind of a crutch. I think sometimes it's like watching television as opposed to really getting involved with what is happening onstage and the people in your section.
I was three years old, and I walked onstage during a performance that my father was a tenor in 'The Barber of Seville.' I walked out onstage, and people started laughing and clapping, and that was it. That was all it took. Laughing and clapping, I still enjoy today.
Figure out a way to get back onstage because once you do it a few times you'll get over it. Unless it's like a clinical thing. I don't know about clinical like stage fright, that might be worse than what I'm talking about. But if it's normal stage fright get over it.
I have to phrase this perfectly: I'm just not convinced that the attention we give to creating what we think of as a character isn't actually quite often the means by which an actor overcomes his own terror of standing there onstage and creating a mask to hide behind.
When you become a professional, there is all this other stuff you have to do. That part is the job, capital J-O-B. They're very different things, but they're all part of the same career. Once you get onstage and you get to perform, that's your reward for doing your job.
The Moodies is a responsibility to deliver the goods every night onstage and to do it sincerely; otherwise, it doesn't work. You've got the three guys left in the Moodies that really want to do it onstage, so I think we're truer to the old records now than we ever were.
I have a responsibility to diversity onstage, but one of the things I've heard about our production of 'Boys' is that it's a bunch of white guys. Well, race is a component of this play. You can't just drop people in willy-nilly and say, 'Well, we're going for diversity.'
I definitely am a performer, and there are different styles of stand-up; I mean, some people are writers and they get onstage to get jokes out, and that's definitely not what I do. I like to just go up and, if I'm telling a story about someone, I'll play his or her part.
When you're holding people's attention, I feel you must give them high-quality ingredients. They deserve nothing but your best. And if they need information, get it, cross-check it, and try to be right. Do not waste their time; do not enjoy the ego trip of being onstage.
What people don't normally know about us is the hustle is very real, and it's sorely driven a lot by how we consider ourselves. We don't pay a whole lot of attention to any type of judgment that we might get from outside people. I think that comes from growing up onstage.
First of all, magicians practice a lot. It requires a lot of discipline. Second, you can't be afraid to be a leader, to go onstage, and you learn to have presence. You need to be able to visualize and connect and create. Most important, you learn to think outside the box.
When I first started acting in college, at Cal, the thing that I loved about acting was not being onstage but going into rehearsals. The thing, as I look back on it now, that I was most attracted to, was that I felt like I'd found my family. It was just a bunch of loonies.
Howard Stern gave me the best advice about Twitter and the N word. He said maybe onstage people get the intention behind the joke, but a tweet is 140 characters or less, and maybe that's why people overreact. I don't need to rustle any more feathers and lose any investors.
The way I view comedy clubs is, people are drinking, they're ordering food, they're out for the night, and there's also a person onstage talking. And with the theater, they came to the theater, and they're waiting to hear what you say. So you'd better have something to say.
I've had jokes stolen a thousand times. But if you can do it better than me, you can have it. I've had jokes stolen from me in the club when I'm next on stage. And my brain will start to turn, and the gears will start turning, and I'll go onstage and create a whole new bit.
But I think what made me go into theater was seeing my mother onstage. The first thing she did was Mrs. Frank in 'The Diary of Anne Frank.' The second thing she did was a play about Freud called 'The Far Country.' She played a paralyzed woman in Vienna who goes to see Freud.
It's intimidating when you have to stand onstage amongst a bunch of men who are dedicated to maintaining peak musculature and athleticism, and they're six-five, 240 pounds of twisted steel and sex appeal. It's a lot to stand up to... My goal is to not look like Chris Farley.
I was staying with my sister and messing around with the guitar every day for my own amusement. Then she took me around and introduced me to Muddy Waters, Jimmy Rogers, Little Walter, and the first time I saw that onstage, it inspired me to play. I thought that was the world.
I feel like I have a job to do, like I constantly have to reinvent myself. The more I up the ante for myself, the better it is in the long run. I try to interact with my fans as much as possible. It's good that the person I'm being onstage isn't really an act. It's really me.
I can't speak for anybody else but myself 'cause I usually get in trouble when I speak for other people, so I've learned my lesson not to do that, but for me, I've been known to pace for quite a while when I walk onstage, and that's just because I'm becoming one with my shell.
My wife Juliana and I first saw Eurovision while on our honeymoon in Greece in 2006, and we were amazed by it. They basically recreate a music video onstage, and pyro cannons, LED video screens, background dancers, fireworks, costume changes, and wind machines are their tools.
If actors could actually make a living doing theater, that would be my first choice. Sitcoms are the closest thing to being onstage in front of an audience. If I had to choose, it would be theater and doing the occasional movie once in a while, and spending time doing nothing.
We're blessed to be at a level in my career where I can afford to take out a bus of my own and bring my whole family with me, so that's great, too. The boys are out with us all the time, and it's just great to be able to turn around onstage and see my wife back there behind me.
I remember acting in a school play about the melting pot when I was very little. There was a great big pot onstage. On the other side of the pot was a little girl who had dark hair, and she and I were representing the Italians. And I thought: Is that what an Italian looked like?
I loved Roy Acuff with all my heart, and I never dreamed I'd be able to meet him or see him onstage, or especially become good friends with him. For all this to happen, it's hard to explain what a dream this is when you love something as much as I love traditional country music.
For years, I was stuck behind a keyboard rig. When I started playing guitar onstage, it was a bit of a release - not to be stuck in one spot the whole night. It's really enjoyable having the freedom to move around. You just have to remember to end up somewhere near a microphone.
Half the time, when I first run onstage, I can't look directly at the audience just because of self-consciousness. It's human nature. Sometimes you feel like the man, and sometimes you don't. But sometimes that self-conscious energy is good for the show, it draws people in more.
I was 17 or 18 when 'The Twist' came along, and the rest is history. Sometimes I regret it. I would have gotten more into acting. I would have been more of a legitimate performer onstage like Liza Minnelli. But I got so caught up in the dance thing that I never got into theater.