Let’s say you’re an actor who’s starred on Broadway. You’ve starred in London’s West End.  You’ve written and starred in a pair of one-man shows in New York.  What’s next? Well, if you’re Perry Ojeda, it’s a career move west.  The Michigan-born, now Los Angeles-based actor is about to star in the West Coast premiere of Is He Dead?, Mark Twain’s 1898 cross-dressing comedy which finally got produced—on Broadway in the Fall of 2007.  We were excited to catch up with the handsome leading man to find out about Is He Dead? and other projects he’s got on the burner.

Hi Perry.  What was it that inspired a Michigan boy to pursue a career in musical theater? Did you get exposed to it at an early age?

One of the greatest gifts to me as a child was the Public Library in Adrian, the small farm town in Southern Michigan where I grew up.  They had a complete collection of the “Best Plays” series beginning in 1899. I would read each one from cover to cover, one from each season. What a theater geek I was, even back then!

How old were you at that time?

I was maybe 10 or 11 when I discovered them. When the series included a musical, I would ask the librarians for a copy of the cast recording and I’d sit with the script synopsis and add the songs in when they called for it. I can’t tell you how many musicals I got to know this way.  Dozens? Hundreds?  I also ran to the library every Friday and Sunday to read the Arts and Theater section of the New York Times.  I’d read every review, pour over every advertisement. I literally pictured myself in all the shows I read about and listened to and studied. This was back in the days of vinyl and 8-tracks. I’d check out the cast recordings from the library and painstakingly copy everything I could onto cassette tapes for myself, sometimes by simply holding the tape recorder to the speakers.  I’m sure I owe my favorite composers hundreds of dollars in piracy fees.

A lot of other musical theater fans, including this one, can relate! Let’s move ahead to your more recent achievements.  I know that you’ve performed in theaters all across the country, from Washington D.C to Cleveland to San Diego to San Jose to Sacramento to Connecticut’s Goodspeed Opera.  What’s it been like to “see the USA” while performing in musical theater? 

I’ve loved and hated traveling my whole life.  Seeing new places and making new friends is a wonderful, gratifying experience. And it’s true, I’ve seen all 50 States, most of Canada and Central America, all of the Caribbean and a good portion of Europe as an actor. 

Wow! But where does the “hated” part come in?

The sad part is, I fall in love with the people I meet and the places I go!  It breaks my heart to leave!  I can honestly say that I’ve truly loved everywhere I’ve seen—from the prairies to the coast lines, from the Magic Kingdom to Broadway and everywhere in between.  I really have enjoyed it all. The secret I think is to try to see the “sites to see” wherever I go. I remember playing in Shepherdstown, West Virginia a few years back. I had no idea I could find Civil War battlefields so fascinating, but I did—and I got to learn a hell of a lot about Walt Whitman.

                  
               Perry dancing in Broadway’s On The Town
               and posing with its lyricists-book writers
               Betty Comden and Adolph Green

You’ve also appeared on Broadway, where you were directed by George C. Wolfe and Jack O’Brien, Tony winners both of them. What is it that great directors like Wolfe and O’Brien bring to a project that other directors may not?

When I’ve worked with “big” directors, the only real difference that I can see between them and others I’ve worked with is they have the supreme confidence to ask for and be open to even the smallest contributor’s ideas.  Maybe that’s how they got “big.” I don’t know.  When I’ve worked with very successful people at the top of their game, no matter who they are, I always feel a rush of energy emanating from them. It’s like everyone wants to be around them. I hope people feel the same way about me someday.

    
   Perry (c.) in Dolly West’s Kitchen and with its playwright Frank McGuinness

I’d venture to say that many already do, Perry.  Anyway, getting back to your career, between those two Broadway gigs you flew over to London’s West End where you created a major role in Dolly West’s Kitchen.  Curtain Up called you “a scene stealer, radiating charm.”  How did this particular bit of casting—and the trip to London—come about?

Around the time I was doing On The Town on Broadway, I was also doing a solo show called The Trick at several downtown theaters including La Mama, Dixon Place and eventually a one-night-only event at New York Theater Workshop.  I wrote it myself and it was directed by my dear friend and long time collaborator, Karen Azenberg. Patrick Mason, the Artistic Director of The Abbey, the National Theater of Ireland, was in town looking for two Americans to play soldiers, one gay and one straight, in this new Frank McGuinness World War Two drama. Since I had just played a WWII sailor on Broadway ... and The Trick was, well, very gay ... I guess the casting director Barry Moss thought it was a good fit, so I got the part. Later, while performing Dolly West’s Kitchen at the Abbey, the cast was asked to take the play to London with the possibility of coming to Broadway. Though New York never happened, our London run was pretty successful.  Our leading lady, Pauline Flanagan won an Olivier award for her performance in Frank’s play.

Were there any other London experiences that particularly stand out?

While in London I had the extraordinary experience of working with Emma Thompson and Mike Nichols on the film Wit. Also, I met Kevin Spacey as he had just purchased the Old Vic where were performing at the play.  It was a very special time and the cast and production team were and are very dear friends. Pauline passed on two years after we closed the play and it’s a loss we all feel greatly.  Frank McGuiness is often in New York and I’m able to stay very close to him and his partner Philip.
 
I’m glad to hear that. Perry, you have dozens of commercials on your résumé.  As an actor, how do you approach doing a TV commercial as opposed to other forms of acting?

I wish I knew. Like everything, I just try to bring recognizable human behavior and specificity to all my work, and just pray for good luck to smile on me.  When I was cast in a Spanish-language Olive Garden spot (and I’m not a fluent Spanish speaker!) I basically just found myself having a real connection with the girl with whom I happened to be auditioning. I just adored her! I guess that read on camera ... ‘cause I got the part and that spot has been running and running. I’m now in year five!
 
                  
                   Perry looking trick-worthy in The Trick

For anyone who’s somehow missed that commercial over the past five years, it’s also available to watch on your website.  There’s also a clip there from The Trick, one of two one-man shows you’ve written and starred in. You’ve already mentioned The Trick, about a gay actor’s experience with life and love.  There was also Pride, in which you played 13 different contemporary characters, most of them of the LGBT persuasion. What prompted you to “take your career in your own hands” in this way?

What can I say?  I’m pushy and I don’t always like to be told what to do.  I remember complaining to my college friend Andrew Lippa when I first moved to New York ... I said something like, “I can’t find any work that I really love and that I really want to do,” and he said, “Well, write it yourself.” That’s certainly advice he kept for himself!  He’s a very successful composer and writer. Well, I was about 23 or 24 at the time and I had always written ... and always wanted to write. I guess that little bit of encouragement was all I needed. I hope that my web series HA! will turn into more writing/performance projects for me!  I love it!
 
How do you feel about the prevailing “wisdom” that a character actor can maybe be out in his career but not a leading man type (which you most definitely are)?

I believe the only thing I have to offer as a performing artist that’s truly my own is my point of view and my life experience.  I was raised Mormon.  I am Latino, Mexican-American.  I am gay. This is my experience and it colors how I look at the world. It is that specificity through which I believe I can find universality and community. I have to be an actor, it’s a drive I have.  If I could do something else, I would have long before now. I’m 41 this year.  I think whatever commercial success I’ve had as an actor has been because I’ve been willing to talk about my experience and who I am. I don’t see how I could be who I am without it.  But, I do see that everyone must make their own choice about coming out. It is a personal choice. (But I hope they choose “out.”)
 
How long have you been Southern California-based?

I’ve just moved to Los Angeles, though it’s been many years in the planning. In fact, I bought a car for the move about five years ago and my car just sat in a parking lot in Queens. Now I’m here and I plan to stay. I’d love to find a safe haven to produce my plays here in Southern California, but finding somewhere that’s a good match for me and my writing will take time too.  I love it here!  I feel so embraced by the community—and it’s always sunny and warm!

                
                 Perry and “her” admirers in Is He Dead?

Next up for you is the lead in ICT’s West Coast premiere of Is He Dead?, a “new” play by Mark Twain.  Can you tell us something about the play and your role in it? 

I saw Is He Dead? on its opening night on Broadway last season and I thought, when I saw Norbert Leo Butz traipsing across the stage in a dress, “He’s having so much FUN! I want to have that much fun!” So when I learned that ICT was doing the West Coast Premiere, I jumped at the chance to work on this role.  The comedy is the only play that Mark Twain wrote and is a scathing satire on art, artists, and the economy and business of being a commercial artist. A funny, funny play and VERY appropriate for the L.A. entertainment industry crowd. I love the cast ... and ICT has such a stellar reputation in the Southern California theater community.  I think this will be a top-notch production.
 

                                                                                                           Perry and Bruce Vilanch

You’ve already mentioned HA!, your upcoming web series about a young man who joins an “ex-gay” 14-step group. You not only appear in HA!, but you’ve also written and created it. What inspired you to write the show?

HA! actually came out of one of the characters I developed for a solo piece I did a few years back called Pride, which I subsequently made into a play.  Then I took the play to the internet. I wanted to voice my comments and concerns about the “ex-gay” movement among Evangelical Christians. I hope in a funny and ... scathing way. 

Why do the show on the Internet?

These days the Internet is the best way to reach the most people.  Also, because of the higher profile, I managed to get some AMAZING people involved, Bruce Vilanch, Charles Shaughnessy, Scott Nevins, Ryan Hill ... great, great people!  I hope if we get enough attention, we can find more money and make this 16-episode series longer and with a bigger budget, perhaps for TV!

It would seem that you see yourself as both an actor and an activist.  Is this true? 

I don’t know if I’m an activist, but I certainly have a point of view. I’ve seen so much progress in the creation of a healthy self-image for LGBT folks, WAY more than when I was a little gay boy in South Eastern Michigan in the 70s and 80s. Now there are Gay-Straight Alliances in high schools.  There are healthy images of same-gender couple everywhere you look.

How does HA! fit into the current battle for equal rights for LGBT Americans?

HA! is about how when people deny who they are, it’s destructive not just to them, but to the world at large. It leads to terrible things like Prop 8 here in California, and sometimes much worse acts of prejudice and violence. As I said before, recognizing that really we’re all much more alike than we are different, relating the specificity of our lives to create universality, to create community ... that’s what I hope for and am working for.
 
With the enormous variety of work you’ve done over the past few years, what projects, goals, or dreams remain yet to fulfill?

It looks like I’ll have a children’s book series coming up soon. (Cross your fingers!)  I have some ideas for some more plays that I’d like to see performed—I have two that I’m shopping around at the moment—and I have only about a hundred ideas for TV shows that I want to try out. Oh, and I do want to become fluent in Spanish before I die!

I’m excited that Southern California audiences will be getting a chance to see you in your first local stage appearance, and can’t wait to be there on Opening Night! Thanks, Perry.

Thanks so much!  I’m so flattered that you’re interested.  Please make sure you say hello in person!

Will do! The Desais always throw a great Opening Night reception, so I’ll see you there!

www.PerryOjeda.com

www.HAtheSeries.com

Photo credits: Shashin Desai, Francine Daveta, Grant Rosen