Kristen Johnston
Let's talk about Martha in Scarcity. What drew you to this role in this play?
Every year, Neil [Pepe, artistic director at the Atlantic Theater Company] asks me, "What are you doing? Are you available for some theater? Do you want to do something with us?" Theater is something I don't take lightly. You're working onstage every single night, and it's absolutely the hardest job in terms of what we do as actors. When I decide to do a play, I meet the director, meet the playwright, and I ask tons of questions. With this play, I just couldn't say no. Lucy Thurber's voice is something you don't hear often. It's really raw and unstudied; it comes from some visceral part of her body. Her voice is dark and twisted and deeply funny.
She's a tough cookie, this character, not really sympathetic.
When I read the play, I realized that Martha is somebody I don't know. I've done Shakespeare, and I felt I knew those women. I get Beatrice [in Much Ado About Nothing]. She's single and lonely and witty and much more. I didn't know the woman in Scarcity. I have a little house in a corner of Connecticut, and this is the woman who packs my groceries up there. I don't personally know her.
There's a scene in Scarcity where you tell your teenage son, played by Jesse Eisenberg, how proud you are of him, but then you switch gears into a terrible parent. And you do that in a second.
You've been working at Atlantic Theater Company for several years...
Tragically?
You've done a lot of theater, mostly off-Broadway. What are some of the joys of working in a small house?
What are the drawbacks of working off-Broadway?
Uh, well, money.
Do you miss doing TV?
What did you love about the show?
You were once quoted saying that actors should go to Hollywood to take the money and run.
So you've moved on and made some big comedies. You were a riot in the Austin Powers film, and more recently there was Music and Lyrics.
Hugh Grant and Drew Barrymore are tabloid fodder in a way that you have avoided.
Do you think of yourself primarily as a theater or film actor?
Like Beatrice in Much Ado About Nothing a couple of summers ago?
Does Shakespeare require a different acting style?
Yet Benedick and Beatrice have all that banter. It's like a tennis game between those two.
What about a show in a very different, high-comedy style, like The Women?
And you don't mind being scary onstage.
You also make Martha kind of sexy.
Well, in Third Rock you were sexy. You know that you're sexy.
You're also good with the funny.
So you're willing to play any villain?
Has your career turned out as you expected?
See Kristen Johnston in Scarcity at the Atlantic Theater Company.
It's been an amazing experience. We start rehearsing, and it turns out that I completely know this woman [laughs]. The producer and director saw it in me. I get her now and love her very much. She's doing the best she can with what she has. There's something about her lust for life and her passion that I connect with. On the other hand, she beats her kids. She tells her son he's going to be great—and then she hits him. It's not sane, it's not okay. Hopefully, that is tempered by the fact that she is a loving person. At least we understand where she's coming from. She's totally in love with an alcoholic [played by Michael T. Weiss]. I know a lot about alcoholism; there was a lot in my family. When you have that in your life growing up, you're constantly on guard, watching to see if it's going to be a good day or a bad day. Martha is one of those women whose life changes on a dime. Somebody brings home ten dollars and it's a great night. Someone comes in drunk and it's shitty.
The whole thing for me is that I only like actors who make it look easy. I think I do that. I don't like watching actors where you think, "Wow, they're really working hard." Those actors get a lot of love. I prefer an actor who makes it look easy. That is difficult, but I'm sort of used to it. I found an ability to go from 0 to 60 very quickly on the sitcom I was on. They would have Sally do that all the time—weeping and then full of rage a second later.
I've been working at Atlantic for 20 years now. Actually, longer than that, since I studied here. I joined them when I was 19. And I'm about to turn 40. Tragically!
Just kidding. I don't really care. As an actress in film and television, you are supposed to get upset when you turn 40. But you know what? In the theater, the really good parts are starting to come for me now. I'm happy about that.
For me, off-Broadway is about the love of the art. Sometimes you need to sell tickets, but since the Atlantic has a subscriber base, we don't worry about that. It's always good to get rave reviews, but it's disappointing to see how often the success or failure of a show is totally contingent upon reviews. Because the fact is that theater is a living installation of art. I wish more people could see it that way. When I get to theater each night at 7 o'clock, I think, "What do I want to do tonight on that stage? What do I want to work on in my artistry? I hope you come along on my journey with me. I would love that." I've only done one Broadway show, so I can't talk in depth about Broadway versus off-Broadway, but what you feel from everyone involved is the incredible pressure of reviews. It's ridiculous that America has one reviewer who seems to matter. I did a play in London, and all six reviewers from the newspapers matter. You get a huge range of opinions. It's fine to trust a reviewer, but it's just one person's opinion, and that person could have had a bad dinner right before the show. Remember, theater is art. If you're interested, come and see it. That's what I like about off-Broadway—they take more chances.
Hello?! What do you think?
Let me sum it up with this: My business manager is not very happy with me right now. I need to bite the bullet and do another sitcom soon. How long has it been since Third Rock ended? Five, six years? Doing off-Broadway plays is not exactly bringing in the money.
Not one bit. Third Rock was extraordinary, and I will never have a part like that again, and never work with people like that again. I'm offered scripts all the time, and you can't even imagine what they are like. I'd be very lucky to find something as good as Third Rock.
The actors, the people we worked with every day, the writers—they wrote such great stuff. It was funny and weird and I can't imagine it being on the air now.
Actually, what I said is that that's what your attitude as an actor has to be. If you're a New York stage actor, you should have the viewpoint that you will take the money and run. I cared too much. NBC kept moving the show around; we changed time slots nine times in six years. I didn't handle it well at that point. We were winning all these Emmys and no one could find us to watch the show. It was too heartbreaking.
I did six years, and God help me, that was enough. I mean, I was playing an alien [laughs]. I constantly had to be "stunned" by what human beings do. How long can you pretend to be shocked by a toothbrush? My feeling was, okay, I get Earth. Now let's get out of here.
To be honest, at some point I've got to get around to seeing Music and Lyrics. I haven't seen it. I hate watching myself on film. It's my own weird thing. However, I remember being on set thinking that this was the funniest stuff ever. I played an insane fan of Hugh Grant—his character was my high school dreamboat—and we had a great time working together. I loved working with Drew Barrymore, too. I don't know how the movie works, but the stuff we did was funny.
There was a time when I was turning into that. I did not like it, and that's why I very specifically downsized my career. When I was out in Los Angeles, around the time I won an Emmy, they started to try to position me as some sort of tabloid person. Paparazzi were following me everywhere, people were going through my garbage, and I did not find dealing with all that worth it. I prefer the way my life is now —it's ideal. Now and then people recognize me and come up to chat. It's lovely. When the paparazzi are very bored, maybe they'll take a picture. But I'm not stalked. My life is mine again. I did that very purposely and quite well, I think. One of the reasons I left Hollywood is that I did not like that life. I see it with Drew and Hugh—especially with Drew, who handles it like a pro. So, yeah, I tasted that life, and I didn't like it.
I'll do anything if it's good. In Hollywood, I'm a teeny, tiny minnow. Here in New York, I've managed to carve out a niche for myself where really good parts get offered to me.
Playing Beatrice in Central Park with Jimmy Smits was great. Talk about a dream.
I don't shift styles when I do Shakespeare —well, I've only done two so far. I was doing American Shakespeare, but it's not like all of a sudden I can turn into Judi Dench. What I love about Shakespeare is that you are taking this ancient language—ancient to us, anyway —and making it real. I think I did that with Beatrice. I wanted to make her a real person. That is the great joy of Shakespeare: You have these gorgeous words and at the same time there's something fascinating about his characters. Every single person onstage has a clear goal in every scene of every play. There's not a lot of chitchat in his plays, It's all essential information.
A Wimbledon tennis game. Every word they say to each other is essential in that he needs to understand how pissed she was or how much she loves him. There's nothing thrown away. That Shakespeare guy knew what he was doing [laughs]. I've come into Shakespeare late in life, and I'm really learning to love him. When [director] George Wolfe asked if I would be interested in playing the maid, Maria, in Twelfth Night, I thought, yeah, I don't have anything else to do. Weirdly, I took to it like a duck to water. That led to Beatrice. So, actors: Don't turn down any small parts. They always go somewhere.
I look at my performance in The Women as a failure. I had just finished Third Rock and I didn't connect my character to who I am. I just didn't get there, but I could fake Sylvia Fowler really well, so that's what I did. I never felt her rage and her despair. Her need. That's the one part I wish I could back and do over. I got lost in the accent and the cigarettes and the costumes of it all, and forgot her. That also made playing her boring after a month. Playing a facade is fun at first. People are laughing, everyone's reacting. But I didn't ever go into what I, Kristen, could relate to with that character. And finding that would have blown it out the window. That didn't happen.
Never. I love playing villains. Love it. If you're playing a villain, you find elements that you understand someplace. It's the Jack Nicholson thing—you love watching him doing what he's doing and at the same time you know that someday he will get his comeuppance. That's why I understand Martha in Scarcity. I think she was raised by wolves, but she's actually, strangely, kind of a good mother for where they're at. Still, she can be incredibly vicious and scary.
Any actor wants to be scary.
Really? With greasy hair and tattoos?
I never think about that.
Oh, I have to find the funny. I have a sense of humor. When I'm playing somebody, I'll find the funny. Most villains are smart people and funny, too. Any great villain is, if you look at it.
Except Darth Vader. I would not want to play Darth Vader [laughs].
I feel very blessed. Originally, I had thought that I would start working about now. I saw myself as an actress like Christine Baranski, who is successful later. But what happened when I was 26 with the series threw me. I did not expect it. And it's been a road that has been up and down and every which way. I feel like I've been dropped out of a chute and I'm still okay. My head's still on. I don't have a needle up my arm. I'm not living under a bridge. I have decent career that I'm really proud of. What else can you ask for?