Quotable Quotes: Red Carpet Chat with the Stars of Souvenir

WHAT: Opening night of Broadway's Souvenir, Stephen Temperley's warm comedy about cult figure Florence Foster Jenkins and her accompanist Cosme McMoon

WHERE: Bows at the Lyceum Theatre; party at The Supper Club

WHEN: Thursday, November 10, 2005

"From the time, I guess, I was in high school, maybe earlier, somebody played me the discs. They're still in print. They've never been out of print. They were played for me, and we all sat and laughed, and when I knew there was a play about her. When I read Stephen Temperley's absolutely gorgeous play, I was laughing hysterically, I was crying; I thought, boy, if I can help an audience experience what I'm experiencing just reading this…" —Souvenir star and longtime Broadway diva Judy Kaye, who plays the out-of-tune singer-socialite Florence Foster Jenkins

"When I got the role, [director]Vivian [Matalon] said to me, 'Don't do too much research.' Because there isn't a lot of fact, and what we're doing is a fantasia on it.' There might have been three Cosme McMoons, and we in fact think that 'Cosme McMoon' might have been a pseudonym for three other pianists who didn't want to be professionally associated [with Foster Jenkins]. People are still intrigued by the mystery. Did she know? Did she not know?" —Co-star Donald Corren, who plays Jenkins' patient accompanist Cosme McMoon

"The Lyceum Theatre is so wonderful, and it's so perfect for the play. One of the things I love about this, and this is something I did very deliberately, is we've forgotten what a voice sounds like in a theater. We've forgotten what people's voices sound like. We've forgotten what it sounds like just to sit down and hear an instrument being played. This theater gives us the focus and the scale to do that. There's nothing that gets in the way, which I think is wonderful. I love hearing it." —Souvenir playwright Stephen Temperley, noting the lack of microphones used in the production

"It was said she was happy in her work. Would that all artists could be so happy. I think that's the guiding force, the guiding aspect of her personality, that has helped me through the journey of learning this part and finding her way of singing, and why she sings, and her love of art." —Judy Kaye, on the real woman behind her role

"It's from Cosme's point of view, but if it was about his English teacher at Cornell, it might not be so interesting. The fact that the center of his world, the kernel of his story, is one of the most outrageous people in the world, is just so interesting. That that's the person who taught him about himself: this wild, eccentric woman." —Donald Corren

"I listened to a record, and I thought it was funny for about, oh, two minutes. Then I thought, this is much more strange than anything else. And I tried to write a play and couldn't. Over the years I've tried to write it a couple of times, as a one-woman play, and I couldn't really get anywhere… Then [Matalon] suggested that maybe we could get a mutual friend to play the accompanist. I thought, well that's interesting, and I sat down, and I wrote it in about three weeks." —Stephen Temperley on the creative process behind the script

"I'm so in love with Donald Corren. I feel like he's my little brother. I adore him personally, and what a wonderful colleague on stage. We're having a great time, and I feel like we haven't even scratched the surface yet of our relationship." —Judy Kaye, on her co-star

"I can't imagine getting to do a Broadway show with a better person to work with. We're just on a very similar wavelength. I've just never worked with anyone like her. She's just so straight down the middle—and that implies that it's not exciting, but it's more exciting that way, because she's just such a creative worker." —Donald Corren on co-star Judy Kaye

"Any actor worth his or her salt, I think, is always thinking, 'Am I just making a complete fool of myself?' The play, I think, is about the way we see ourselves, and the way the rest of the world sees us. [Jenkins] had a very large misperception, but she was only crazy in that one area." —Writer Stephen Temperley

"It's fun to sing off-key. Singers, actors, dancers, musicians all pretend, from time to time, at a party, maybe after they've had a couple, that they're bad! The interesting trick is doing it eight times a week. That's where the technique comes in." —Judy Kaye

"I used to play at piano bars, and I've heard people sing like that night after night. Well, never quite like that." —Donald Corren

"Yes, he must have a high tolerance for pain." —Judy Kaye on Donald Corren's ability to listen to her sing off-key for eight shows a week

Interviews by Beth Stevens
Compiled by Lyssa Mandel