Transcript
Speaker: Hey friends, welcome back to Artists of the Way.
Speaker: I'm John, the host.
Speaker: Today, we have more guests than I've ever had in a podcast episode ever.
Speaker: We've got four cast members from the cast of 12 Angry Men at Master Arts Theater coming to chat with us about their show, their experience, making it themselves as artists and just what's been special about this process for both themselves as artists and their faith.
Speaker: Got a lot of different people with different experiences in theater, different...
Speaker: walks of faith life and different faith journeys um they say a lot of really rich stuff i hardly talk at all in this episode because they just they took the questions they ran with it they said a lot of really beautiful rich things so i am so excited to share this episode with you guys thanks for joining us so how are you guys doing how's your opening weekend going
Speaker: Pretty well so far, I've got to add.
Speaker: Yeah, it's opening night.
Speaker: We had about 50% crowd, but it w as a good crowd.
Speaker: They reacted well.
Speaker: They laughed when they were supposed to, and cried when they were supposed to, that kind of thing.
Speaker: Perfect.
Speaker: Last night, it was pretty much full, I think.
Speaker: Oh, nice.
Speaker: That was it.
Speaker: That's awesome.
Speaker: That was a good crowd, too.
Speaker: That's sweet.
Speaker: Yeah, I've got to get a mishap so far.
Speaker: No major mishaps.
Speaker: That's good.
Speaker: They're coming.
Speaker: Don't worry.
Speaker: None that the audience would have seen.
Speaker: Let's put it that way.
Speaker: There we go.
Speaker: We would know, but they won't.
Speaker: Yep.
Speaker: So I know a couple of you guys, others of you I don't know as well.
Speaker: I wanted to just start us off.
Speaker: There's a couple questions that I always ask at the start.
Speaker: So first, I just want to ask how God is using art in your life.
Speaker: And we can start with Ron and then go to Tripp and Mike and then Timothy.
Speaker: Okay, that's great.
Speaker: I'll give you a little bit, a short, brief history first, and then I'll tell you.
Speaker: I was a member of Central Christian Church, Disciples of Christ, for 60 years or so, since the late 60s.
Speaker: And towards 2020 in that area, our membership declined, people were getting older.
Speaker: We had trouble with leadership and there just wasn't any.
Speaker: So we ended up, there were like four or five of us that met for over a year weekly to try to decide how we can get this church going again, revitalizing.
Speaker: Finally, we decided we couldn't.
Speaker: So we ended up closing the church.
Speaker: And then my wife and I joined Cascade Christian Church, which is one of our denomination in Cascade.
Speaker: And we started over there.
Speaker: Now at Central,
Speaker: I was the choir director for 50 years.
Speaker: I was the head of the worship team for a long, long time.
Speaker: I substituted in the pulpit once in a while, those kind of things, and chair of the board, so on, so on, so forth.
Speaker: And we got into, and I thought, after that year and a half of meetings once a week, and they were Zoom meetings because we were in the middle of a pandemic.
Speaker: I thought, I don't want to do this anymore.
Speaker: I want to go to church.
Speaker: I want to worship.
Speaker: And, you know, I'm going to go home after that.
Speaker: But, you know, I get there and they found out.
Speaker: I knew the pastor over there really well.
Speaker: She knew me also.
Speaker: And so she said that she wanted me to, like, take charge of the worship team.
Speaker: Well, I really don't want to get this involved anymore.
Speaker: So anyway, I pulled back some old ideas and thoughts and so on and so forth.
Speaker: So how God is using art in my life right now, this is how.
Speaker: Way back when, I decided that one of the things that we can do to enhance every service, if it's a Monday, Thursday service or special Good Fridays or whatever it might be, we could add some
Speaker: some uh a skit or drama of some kind in there somewhere and enhance the whole service and make it even better yeah they didn't do any of that at cascade okay they didn't have a choir at cascade there's a big church there's like 400 members or something so they didn't have a choir they didn't have any of that stuff and i found myself getting back into okay let's do a short skit here see what happens and sure enough
Speaker: There's the art that comes back again, and God's using me to help enhance those services as well.
Speaker: And I'm back in up to here.
Speaker: I didn't want to get quite that involved, but here I am doing that.
Speaker: That's how God is using art in my life right now.
Speaker: That's awesome.
Speaker: Cool.
Speaker: Tripp, what about you?
Speaker: Well, for me, I'm not originally from Grand Rapids, so I'm originally from Memphis, Tennessee.
Speaker: And we've lived here about three years, and I did most of my theater in Memphis.
Speaker: And so a lot of that time, I didn't give my life to Christ until 13 years ago.
Speaker: And so most of the shows that I were doing definitely did not please the Lord.
Speaker: That's for sure.
Speaker: So...
Speaker: Now that I have been walking with him, it's choosing the scripts that I want to do that I believe can honor him.
Speaker: The story with the role that I have now as the guard, I'm going to lay it all out there.
Speaker: So it was great because I was so excited about when 12 Angry Men, when the auditions came out, because this is a show that I've always wanted to do.
Speaker: I love the movie, Henry Fonda.
Speaker: It's just a classic.
Speaker: And so I thought, you know what?
Speaker: That show I want to be in.
Speaker: And so I pray.
Speaker: I said, Lord, this is for you.
Speaker: This is whatever you want to do.
Speaker: If you want me to be in the show, that's fantastic.
Speaker: If you don't want me to be in it, that's fine, too.
Speaker: I will be I'll be OK either way.
Speaker: And I laid it in his hands.
Speaker: So I went.
Speaker: I auditioned.
Speaker: I got the phone call from Liesl and she said, we'd like to offer you a role.
Speaker: I was excited.
Speaker: I said, all right, what role?
Speaker: She said, we want to offer you the part of the guard.
Speaker: And there was a pause.
Speaker: This is the pride in me that's starting to come out.
Speaker: And so she said, I knew exactly what that role was, but I paused and I asked her, what does that role do?
Speaker: Because I had to give time to think whether or not I was going to accept the role or not.
Speaker: And so she said, oh, she told me what the guard did.
Speaker: And then all of a sudden the Holy Spirit was like, take the role.
Speaker: Take the role.
Speaker: And so I took the role.
Speaker: And it didn't mean I was very excited at first.
Speaker: Because I was actually, my wife saw how frustrated I was.
Speaker: I was frustrated over a role until the Lord said, look, I thought you gave me
Speaker: I thought you handed over the reins for me to choose your role because I was expecting one of the jurors or I was expecting nothing.
Speaker: I was not expecting the role of the guard.
Speaker: And he said, I thought you gave that up to me because I choose your role.
Speaker: He said, the Lord said, what are you content in the role that you get or the role or are you content in me?
Speaker: And that just realized,
Speaker: That right there said it all because I said, you know what?
Speaker: You're right, Lord.
Speaker: I am content in you.
Speaker: And from that moment, when he finally revealed that my content at that moment was not in him, that it was actually in the role that I was getting.
Speaker: But once I realized that, it clicked.
Speaker: And I've had more fun in this role than I thought I would.
Speaker: So it's been great.
Speaker: So he's...
Speaker: Teaching me a lot of things, teaching me definitely about contentment and developing new friendships in the theater world in Grand Rapids.
Speaker: That's an excellent correlation to our life as Christians as well, is that we need to be content in the role that God gives us in our life.
Speaker: And not just in theater because he chooses where we are.
Speaker: And we need to accept that and do the best with what we've been given.
Speaker: Amen.
Speaker: Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker: That's super cool.
Speaker: I've definitely experienced that myself.
Speaker: I remember there was one year where it was my senior year and I just decided theater was what I wanted to do.
Speaker: And God was like, great, that means you should go to Bible school.
Speaker: And I was like, what?
Speaker: And like that entire year, I just wasn't getting roles.
Speaker: And I was doing a lot of behind the scenes stuff, but my brother was like getting a bunch of leads.
Speaker: And it was like, well, I've been doing this acting thing longer than him and he's getting all these leads.
Speaker: And God was just like,
Speaker: dude, if you just, I just want you to give this to me and trust me with this.
Speaker: And then I'll, I'll take it from here, but you need to trust me with this and make me the thing.
Speaker: And he's, he's totally blessed through that, but it's, it's just interesting how even things that are good and that we might be like, Oh, I'm doing this for God.
Speaker: Sometimes there's a little bit more of ourself in there than we think there is.
Speaker: Yep.
Speaker: That's awesome.
Speaker: Michael, what about you?
Speaker: So people who know me would not really associate me with art in any way.
Speaker: Okay, let me just put that out there to begin with.
Speaker: But God's given me an opportunity to participate at the South Christian High School with their theater company, doing sound and lights and tech.
Speaker: And I started doing that for the traditional parent reasons.
Speaker: My kids were in it and they needed help.
Speaker: So I do that.
Speaker: But it's really turned into my opportunity to build up kids at a very critical time in their lives, high school times, and provide a program that can bring them together and just help them find their own way through high school.
Speaker: So for me, it's just that opportunity to have a place where my talents can be used best to serve him through others.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah, that's awesome.
Speaker: I know for me, the people that led theater in high school for me were incredibly formative, both for my spiritual life and my artistic life.
Speaker: So that's really important.
Speaker: That's awesome.
Speaker: Cool.
Speaker: Tim, what about you?
Speaker: I guess my experience is a little bit similar to Ron's.
Speaker: We're in the middle of transitioning from a church that
Speaker: we attempted to, you know, get involved and do some of the art, art type things, but it was a, it was a church that has three services and it was, you know, 20 minutes away.
Speaker: And so to get involved, you know, would mean, you know, like a six, seven hour stint and because we only have one vehicle, it makes it hard.
Speaker: And
Speaker: So we've always been involved in the art type things.
Speaker: I like to be up on the praise team and just use the different creative skills that I think that God has given to me.
Speaker: Mm-hmm.
Speaker: That's awesome.
Speaker: So my second question I normally ask is basically the rest of our conversation.
Speaker: Because normally I'll ask, what are you working on?
Speaker: And then I'll move on to whatever subject we've decided to talk about.
Speaker: But we've decided to talk about what you guys are working on.
Speaker: So that works really well.
Speaker: What are some ways, we chatted a little bit, Tripp, with some ways that the show's kind of intersected with your life and some things God's doing there.
Speaker: Ron, is there any ways in which, as you've been approaching the role of your juror or just interacting with everybody else in this show, that God's been using the show or it's intersected with things in your life in some interesting ways?
Speaker: That's an interesting question.
Speaker: I thought about that when I read it.
Speaker: your list here.
Speaker: And God interacts with my life in so many ways.
Speaker: It's hard to isolate something.
Speaker: It's a theater only, you know?
Speaker: But this particular show, you know, I grew up in that era.
Speaker: I was in high school when this all happened.
Speaker: And I know what that prejudice is like.
Speaker: I saw it firsthand.
Speaker: It was all over.
Speaker: And it was...
Speaker: at that point it was almost accepted.
Speaker: I mean, it was just the way of life.
Speaker: That's what everything was.
Speaker: Uh, and, uh, this show kind of brought me back into that.
Speaker: Once again, see what it was really like and think to myself, um,
Speaker: Through this whole process of the show and watching all the actors fulfill their roles in such a way that it made me think, you know, there's still prejudice in this world today.
Speaker: It's still here.
Speaker: It's still prevalent.
Speaker: And there must be some way that I can help combat that somehow.
Speaker: And I'm.
Speaker: Don't know how yet, but I have the feeling that God's going to lead me somewhere that I can use all this information I've gathered from the show and do something with that for current life.
Speaker: I think maybe we started a choir at my church, at my new church anyway.
Speaker: They hadn't had a choir in years and years.
Speaker: So we did a big Christmas concert, the first one they've had in 10 years anyway, last fall or last December.
Speaker: We'll do another one this year.
Speaker: And I'm thinking, you know, there's got to be more that I can do because I know this prejudice is still out there.
Speaker: And I'm not sure what that's going to be yet, but I think I'm picking up on some ideas, some thoughts and so on just from being in this show and seeing, reminding me what it was like way back in the fifties.
Speaker: I do remember that.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah, that's, that's profound.
Speaker: It's interesting the way that the art that we work on God uses to prod certain things and seems like he's kind of laying groundwork there for some new stuff.
Speaker: And that's, that's cool.
Speaker: Yeah, Mike, why don't we jump to you?
Speaker: What about you?
Speaker: Is there anything in the show that's kind of hit your life hard or intersected in some way?
Speaker: Definitely this show has had me thinking a lot about justice.
Speaker: Ron mentioned the racial component to this show, and one of our jurors is definitely a racist juror.
Speaker: That's what's interfering with his ability to provide justice to the accused.
Speaker: But when you watch the show, you'll see that every juror brings a different obstacle to justice.
Speaker: Another juror's relationship with his son is his obstacle to justice.
Speaker: Tim's character's impatience.
Speaker: He doesn't care.
Speaker: He wants to go home.
Speaker: That's his obstacle to justice.
Speaker: My character's obstacle is fear.
Speaker: Fear against the majority.
Speaker: All of these different things are happening.
Speaker: And as we've been doing rehearsals and as we've been in the script, it's just been really neat to identify the different obstacle to justice.
Speaker: And when you start thinking about how many obstacles to justice that there are, it really, it affects how you go through your daily life.
Speaker: You have to go, okay, okay.
Speaker: What am I bringing into this situation that might be an obstacle to doing the right thing?
Speaker: And of course, we all agree that there's this wonderful resource we have to help us overcome these things.
Speaker: And that's God whom we should rely on both his wisdom and his promptings to kind of change our perspective.
Speaker: Yeah, that's beautiful too.
Speaker: Man, I love that.
Speaker: I'm like, I don't have to say anything.
Speaker: I can just sit back and let you guys just go on.
Speaker: You're saying such rich things.
Speaker: Tim, what about you?
Speaker: Well, I guess not so much in the show itself, but just I've found that it's, I guess, intersecting in my life in terms of
Speaker: the different actors that we deal with, because I know that not every single one of the actors that has been cast is a Christian or a believer.
Speaker: And so it's a big thing to think about while you're there and how you're acting and what you're saying is a witness to those people as well.
Speaker: And how you interact with them and choose to let everything around you affect you can have an influence on them as well.
Speaker: Yeah, that's one of the things I love about the art and theater in general is it does really bring together people from all different walks of life and people who would not step like 50 feet within a church all of a sudden or now.
Speaker: getting in really an intimate space with other Christians.
Speaker: And it's a beautiful opportunity.
Speaker: I've seen God use that in some really cool ways.
Speaker: So that is really exciting that you get to do that there.
Speaker: What about the story have you kind of latched onto here of 12 Angry Men for all you guys?
Speaker: Is there something in your character where it's just, this is a special moment that I love?
Speaker: Or is there...
Speaker: something ringing through.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Just what, what's what, when you're going through the show, you're just like, Oh, this is, this is the reason I'm in this show and trip, we can start with you.
Speaker: For me, it's, it's kind of like, I've had the joy of just sitting back and watching each character develop.
Speaker: And it's been, it's been a real joy to see the uniqueness of, of each character and their little, uh,
Speaker: characteristics.
Speaker: But what jumps out really is not judging on outside appearances.
Speaker: I'm married to a Vietnamese woman who has had her fair share of racial things thrown at her.
Speaker: So I've heard more of her story.
Speaker: I've never been through that myself.
Speaker: And just hearing her story and knowing that a lot of times, even today, we judge on outside appearances.
Speaker: And I'm just, I'm thankful that God does not look at us that way, that he examines the heart.
Speaker: He looks on the heart.
Speaker: I was just reading a story this morning about this evil King Jehoaz, who said he did evil inside the king.
Speaker: And so...
Speaker: And he finally cries out to the Lord, and the Lord sends a deliverer and delivers them over and saves them, and then they go back to what they were doing previously.
Speaker: Even knowing that he was going to do that.
Speaker: He still loves us.
Speaker: And I don't want I'm not going to give away the show, whether the kid's guilty or not guilty, but some of them look at this kid, where he's from, his background, his face, and just decide right then and there that he's guilty.
Speaker: And so I'm thankful that the Lord didn't do that with me or with us, that he's just because of my background.
Speaker: He says, no, we're all guilty.
Speaker: All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.
Speaker: But he offers redemption and he offers forgiveness.
Speaker: And I'm so thankful for that.
Speaker: And that's what speaks to me mostly in this show.
Speaker: That's awesome.
Speaker: I love generalizing that even beyond just the idea of our own sin and redemption too.
Speaker: Because I think if you've lived with the story long enough, at times it can become rote like, yeah, I suck, but God loves me anyways.
Speaker: But even then bringing that broader to like, okay, the things that you think about in your friends that they probably see in you,
Speaker: Like, you know, we all have those things where, or maybe not all of us, but, you know, many of us have things where it's like, oh, there's this thing that I'm just sure my friends hate about me, you know, and they love me through that, but they probably just hate this about me and it's awful.
Speaker: And just the idea that God doesn't look at that and then think, oh, this is my little son or daughter that, you know, is...
Speaker: the overeater, this is my overeater, son or daughter, or my one who struggles with depression all the time and won't do anything, or my one that's overactive and bossy and is going to say all the wrong things.
Speaker: He just is like, oh no, that's this person whom I love.
Speaker: And he loves through that.
Speaker: It's not even just that he set aside our sin.
Speaker: It's all of what we categorize ourselves as through the outside appearance.
Speaker: he gets straight to the heart and is like, no, I love this person.
Speaker: I love that.
Speaker: That's great.
Speaker: Ron, what about you?
Speaker: What in this story stuck out to you?
Speaker: A couple of things.
Speaker: I wanted to mention also that there's a new song out entitled
Speaker: God loves you and I'm trying.
Speaker: I think it's a great title.
Speaker: I think one of the things that stand out with me that actually fits my life really well is the fact that I'm an old guy.
Speaker: And, uh,
Speaker: the one spiel that I have in the middle about describing the other old man in a way that I really can understand that, and I really am that guy kind of a thing, except that I've always been in the forefront, being a choir director, and, you know, all this kind of thing, but
Speaker: never in the background to me, but it's just, it's one of those things that that particular portion of the script is going to stick with me for a long time.
Speaker: It's really important because
Speaker: The person I'm describing in there, even though I say I am that man, the person I'm describing in there is not unlike a lot of people today.
Speaker: They just don't, they're never at the forefront.
Speaker: They've forgotten about, pushed to the side.
Speaker: There's a lot of people like that.
Speaker: And some of them end up homeless and some of them end up in just not so good environment and so on.
Speaker: They get in trouble and so on.
Speaker: And it's all because they basically feel that society has rejected them.
Speaker: And this little speech that I give kind of brings that out.
Speaker: And that's the one that's going to stick with me more than anything else.
Speaker: An ability to really express my true feelings about that, which I'm doing in this case.
Speaker: And it's just...
Speaker: It's one I probably won't forget that for a long time.
Speaker: It is so true today.
Speaker: There's so many people like that.
Speaker: It's fall through the cracks.
Speaker: That's just too bad.
Speaker: That's true.
Speaker: I worked at Mel Trotter for a few months during COVID doing security.
Speaker: And just some of the people and the stories I saw there just broke my heart.
Speaker: And people that we had a gentleman who, I don't know if he'd always lived that way, but had gotten to the point of being, you know,
Speaker: pretty much just nonverbal and just kind of shuffling around.
Speaker: And it was like, man, we don't even know if this guy has any family still, but he did at some point.
Speaker: And society often just forgets about him.
Speaker: And we were trying to get him in adult protective services.
Speaker: And that was just going so slow.
Speaker: Which is part of why I think for us Christians, it's important.
Speaker: Like Jesus says, we should care for the widow and the orphan and those forgotten because they're there and they're in our backyards.
Speaker: And a lot of times they're not as flashy as like a refugee crisis or a civil rights movement, but they have just as much hurt and value as people.
Speaker: That's, yeah, heavy.
Speaker: Mike, what about you?
Speaker: What's sticking out for you?
Speaker: Well, there are so many good moments in this show.
Speaker: It's really hard to narrow down one.
Speaker: My character is a bit of the comic relief in the show, which is kind of nice because we're dealing with some heavy stuff.
Speaker: It's nice to give the audience a break now and again.
Speaker: So I look forward to many of the small little gags that we do that can let the audience react.
Speaker: release.
Speaker: Of course, everyone likes making people laugh.
Speaker: I definitely enjoy the balance.
Speaker: It's very similar to Kill a Mockingbird came through Grand Rapids not too long ago.
Speaker: I went to it expecting this really heavy show and I was surprised at how much I laughed and how appropriate it was to have laughter up against the serious.
Speaker: I think we're doing the same thing and it's really good.
Speaker: That's awesome.
Speaker: I love shows that do that for so many reasons.
Speaker: I feel like
Speaker: A, this is my slightly evil director side.
Speaker: I'm like, if I know something really sad is coming and I get the audience to laugh, then they're letting their guard down so I can hit them with a bunch even harder.
Speaker: But I do think it just, it lends to a more truthful, lifelike experience, right?
Speaker: There's a place for the super deep, heavy, depressive shows that are like just two hours of sadness being vomited on stage.
Speaker: But...
Speaker: We go through these hills and valleys of joy and sorrow, and the joy usually makes the sorrow harder, and the sorrow usually makes the joy even brighter.
Speaker: So I love that balance.
Speaker: That's awesome.
Speaker: Tim, what about you?
Speaker: I think the line that stands out to me, again, is one of Ron's lines, that it takes a great deal of courage to stand alone.
Speaker: And even when you believe in something so deeply,
Speaker: And I mean, that's actually the line, the phrase that we chose to have on our show shirt because of how important that is.
Speaker: And it's...
Speaker: It's difficult.
Speaker: Even when you know what's right, it is still difficult to stand alone.
Speaker: But the importance of us standing alone or standing for what is right is so important, especially as the world continues to crumble around us to stand and show God's light, to show what is right is just so important.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah, that is such a powerful image, that first juror.
Speaker: It's like, I don't know, I think we've got it wrong, maybe.
Speaker: Because I don't know if I would do that.
Speaker: And a lot of times it's so hard, even if you know what's right, and you're like, okay, I want to stand, then how do you do that is even another question.
Speaker: But then that's where hopefully God comes in and can help kind of give us that strength to stand and give us that
Speaker: that prodding and that foundation.
Speaker: That's a great line.
Speaker: That's awesome.
Speaker: I think too much.
Speaker: I, I, I end up like my character and end up being a coward and not standing up and not, not saying what's important.
Speaker: Does your character do that because of,
Speaker: fear of something or because of not knowing exactly like what what do you I've almost put on my director hat now of like asking character questions but what what is it in the character that prompts the nothing that he does in those moments it's it's a matter of not having any good basis to stand on
Speaker: Like the backstory that I gave my character is that his mother died when he was young and he had kind of a shakester of a father.
Speaker: And so he didn't really have any good qualities to look on and nothing positive to base his life on.
Speaker: And so he often stands behind other people and waits for them to make a decision.
Speaker: and then follows along with them.
Speaker: And that's kind of how I act in the show.
Speaker: I end up, you know, everybody else is voting guilty.
Speaker: And, you know, we're blaming other people.
Speaker: And, you know, I'll just get right on board until I, well, yeah, we won't give away anything.
Speaker: Anybody that might be listening that doesn't know the show.
Speaker: So we'll leave it at that.
Speaker: You have to come and see the show now, right?
Speaker: There we go.
Speaker: I am just so excited just hearing the snippets from you guys.
Speaker: I just, I love shows that are just a bunch of people in a room and the actors just get to make those characters and bounce off of each other.
Speaker: I'm so excited to just come and see all of you guys playing together and stuff.
Speaker: Has that been exciting as you've like discovered these characters to just...
Speaker: see the different ways they end up bouncing off each other and the ways that that changes from rehearsal to rehearsal.
Speaker: Well, to answer that question, John, yeah.
Speaker: I mean, you know what?
Speaker: Again, I mentioned this earlier, but just from the start of the practices until opening night, even last night, it's just each of these guys, Ron, Mike, Tim, I mean, everybody else, it's just each character has grown significantly.
Speaker: And the more you're in the script, the better you're going to start.
Speaker: Once you get the script out of your hand, you start to dive into your character.
Speaker: And so it's been, for these three guys on the screen, it's been a joy to watch.
Speaker: And you can just point out, okay, I don't like this guy.
Speaker: I don't like this guy.
Speaker: Oh, this guy's good.
Speaker: You know, Mike gets all the laughs.
Speaker: So, I mean...
Speaker: Audiences love Mike, but they love the whole crew together because they work so well together.
Speaker: It's just one big friends and family core.
Speaker: If a cast works well together, the audience is going to love it.
Speaker: Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker: Is there anything that's surprised you guys as you've delved into the characters, where something about that character's just caught you off guard?
Speaker: Ron, we could go to you for that.
Speaker: Just as you've been, because I mean, it's all written out there, but as you've delved into the emotions or thinking through something, has something just like clicked and been like, oh, I was not, I didn't see that at first or I didn't kind of expect that.
Speaker: And then it just sidelined you.
Speaker: This is not so easy.
Speaker: That's one of my lines too.
Speaker: Oh, yeah.
Speaker: I really didn't know what to expect.
Speaker: I read, I read through the script, of course, and when we did our read through and so on, um, I started to get an idea of what this guy was like.
Speaker: And it wasn't really until we were having into rehearsals that, um,
Speaker: My first thought, we had to build a backstory, and I was dead wrong about it.
Speaker: And until we got into it and started getting away from the book a little bit, I started to realize this guy has a different background because he's on the opposite side of prejudice.
Speaker: And he can recognize it by the way to other people.
Speaker: And he must have been involved in something when he was younger.
Speaker: And I made it so that he kind of befriended in grade school and in junior high, the custodian who was an African-American guy and very kind to him.
Speaker: And they had a relationship.
Speaker: and it was a great relationship now it comes into the adult stage and finds those people wait a minute i knew one of those people personally it was a great guy that kind of thing i came around i didn't really realize that until we got into some of their other rehearsals and i saw what some of the other actors were doing with their part and by the way t im i really appreciate one of your lines
Speaker: memorable for me.
Speaker: You kept telling me they wanted to have attention and those kind of things.
Speaker: But then one of them says, well, maybe I was right after all.
Speaker: Maybe that is what he's like kind of a thing.
Speaker: Yeah, I can see that now.
Speaker: That kind of a come around.
Speaker: And I saw that come around to reality in a lot of the actors in their part too.
Speaker: And they play it so well.
Speaker: They really do.
Speaker: But it's kind of...
Speaker: That kind of sticks out in my mind about the character that I played.
Speaker: Yeah, I was surprised at my own evaluation of that as we got later into the story.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Mike, how about you?
Speaker: Is there something in delving into your character that surprised you?
Speaker: Well, one thing I should say first is this is a weird show.
Speaker: Our characters don't even have names, right?
Speaker: I'm two.
Speaker: You're talking to two, seven, and nine.
Speaker: Okay, that's how much the script gives you about your character.
Speaker: And guard.
Speaker: Boom, that's where you start.
Speaker: So you really do, you have to comb through your lines and you have to figure out
Speaker: what makes sense to this guy and on top of that you're not really having conversations with people you're having arguments it is it is a show of arguments back and forth arguing so finding the emotional center of your character it's like wow this this is really challenging but um i was fortunate that my character is a bit of a waffler he kind of goes back and forth on his attitude versus um not guilty and guilty
Speaker: which allowed me to just kind of try to find what is he thinking?
Speaker: Why is he here?
Speaker: Why is he moving?
Speaker: Why does he move back?
Speaker: Which actually gave the character a little bit of depth for me because I had to find those reasons.
Speaker: And it was a fun journey finding those reasons.
Speaker: My kids tell me I probably put more thought into Juror Number Two than has ever been put into Juror Number Two in the history of this film because that's what I do.
Speaker: But you nail it every night.
Speaker: I'm not sure if I was surprised at anything that I found, but I really enjoyed the journey.
Speaker: That's awesome.
Speaker: I love the thought that you're putting into that, though.
Speaker: The iceberg that's underneath the character that the audience doesn't see is everything to that character.
Speaker: It affects everything that the character does.
Speaker: Mm-hmm.
Speaker: Absolutely.
Speaker: And that, that why question that you're asking anytime I'm, I'm talking about acting or thinking about acting or directing, it's like, it, everything ends up boiling down to the why, like, I think you can distill everything to like, looking at the moment or the line, or the action and being like, why?
Speaker: So I love, I love the, the thought and care that's being put into that.
Speaker: That's awesome.
Speaker: Tim, what about you?
Speaker: Is anything surprised to you?
Speaker: Not specifically, but it has been kind of a surprising journey, I guess.
Speaker: When I went into this and auditioned, I had watched the 1980-something movie, the one with Jack Lemmon in it.
Speaker: And I was watching it, and I thought, man...
Speaker: If there's one character I just don't want to play, that'd be number seven, Tony Danza's character.
Speaker: I just don't like that character.
Speaker: I don't identify as that character at all.
Speaker: And then I got the call from Liesl and said, yeah, we'd like you to be juror number seven.
Speaker: And heart fell a little bit.
Speaker: I had already decided, you know what?
Speaker: I'm going to take any role that I'm offered because I just love doing it.
Speaker: And I took it and it was, it has been a surprising transition to see he's not just this impatient guy that just wants to leave and is, there's, there's a lot to the character and I've been able to make it my own, but just to be able to see how he's thinking underneath and,
Speaker: interacting with the other characters and honestly looking at all the other characters, I don't, I think this one was the best fit for me and I've actually really enjoyed doing it.
Speaker: I wouldn't want to be any other character.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Tripp, what about you?
Speaker: What surprised you in playing the role of the guard?
Speaker: How much I would enjoy it.
Speaker: That really has been a surprise, but yeah, the rehearsal that we had to dive deeper into our characters, you really, even the guard, you know, the backstory of the guard, why does he do the things that he does?
Speaker: And, you know, I got to just, you know, the tail end kind of reveal that.
Speaker: kind of what he was thinking throughout the entire process because the guard has been in the court those past weeks or whatever it was listening to the entire case.
Speaker: And so he also has some judgment as well and what he thinks.
Speaker: And so I get to reveal slightly about what was going on in my mind toward the end of the show, which is good.
Speaker: So it's been a lot of fun.
Speaker: That's sweet.
Speaker: Do you guys have...
Speaker: A favorite experience behind the scenes, a funny story or a sweet moment in rehearsal or something.
Speaker: We can start with you, Ron.
Speaker: Oh, let's see here.
Speaker: Well, I guess there are several that...
Speaker: we make them a mistake or put out something wrong or it comes out different than it should be.
Speaker: There's always those things and we chuckle about those and go back over it again kind of a thing.
Speaker: I can't think of anything necessarily that I would remember as memorable as far as being funny is concerned.
Speaker: I suppose a couple of times when...
Speaker: When Stephen gives one of those lines about he doesn't even speak good English...
Speaker: I started thinking about that.
Speaker: The first time he said that, it didn't register anything.
Speaker: Mike, the same way, some of the things that he said, too, didn't really register as we went through it.
Speaker: But as we got into the play, and that came out, I'm thinking, this is really funny.
Speaker: I chuckled at those as well.
Speaker: But it's just...
Speaker: There was nothing strange that happened that I could think of that would make me think it was really funny at this point.
Speaker: We had some funny stories down in the green room, however, down in where the actors go.
Speaker: There were a lot of funny stories down there the way everybody told.
Speaker: That's always a good time, too.
Speaker: Yeah, that's awesome.
Speaker: Mike, what about you?
Speaker: Something really stuck out in the process of making this as memorable or a sweet moment or a funny moment.
Speaker: Well, I think the funniest thing for me is something that no one else got to see, which was my reaction to being cast.
Speaker: This is my first show.
Speaker: I'm 53 years old.
Speaker: This is my first audition, my first show.
Speaker: And the night I auditioned, there were three guys named Mike auditioning.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: Which is fine.
Speaker: It caused a little confusion about scheduling and stuff.
Speaker: Which Mike?
Speaker: That Mike.
Speaker: We were doing all this kind of stuff.
Speaker: And so I get home and I get the offer text that says, we'd like to offer you the part of juror number two.
Speaker: Now, juror number two in the movie was played by John Fielder, who voiced Piglet.
Speaker: Mm-hmm.
Speaker: I am 6'4", okay?
Speaker: And I am playing this meek, timid little man.
Speaker: And I thought they sent it to the wrong mic, right?
Speaker: That's clearly what happened.
Speaker: The confusion about which mic was... So I'm expecting to go into the first rehearsal going, why are you here?
Speaker: Like, you're not supposed to...
Speaker: But it actually turns out that Lorna did cast me as juror number two.
Speaker: I think she likes the dichotomy of this 6'4", big, meek man on stage.
Speaker: And I wasn't too sure about it at first, but I've really enjoyed it.
Speaker: So that is my best moment from the show is that surprise.
Speaker: And to anybody listening right now who has not come to see the show, you need to come see this six foot four man.
Speaker: The absolute most timid person that I have ever seen in my life.
Speaker: It's amazing.
Speaker: That's awesome.
Speaker: Tim, what about you?
Speaker: Well, one of the ones that kind of stands out to me is Mike's son is in this role, is in this cast as well.
Speaker: He's playing Juror number six.
Speaker: And we have a couple of interactions between him and I. And Mike must have just raised his son to be a wonderful, happy person.
Speaker: Because here we are in a courtroom with angry men.
Speaker: And this young person can't help but
Speaker: crack a smile at every single thing that's going on so I'm three inches away from his face at one point yelling at the top of my lungs and there he is smiling during rehearsals Lorna has begun to charge him 10 cents for every time that he smiles when he's not supposed to that's awesome that makes me laugh that's great Tripp what about you?
Speaker: You know, I was thinking about the same thing because I had a conversation with Josh about that note that Lorna had given him about smiling.
Speaker: I said, you know, I have been given that same note multiple times in my shows.
Speaker: In the importance of being earnest, it's a sad, at one point there's a sad part in it.
Speaker: I was playing the role of earnest and I just had this perpetual, it looks like I'm smiling.
Speaker: My director said, Tripp, stop smiling.
Speaker: You're supposed to be at a funeral.
Speaker: I said, I don't think I am smiling.
Speaker: And then one director on a death of a salesman, for some reason, something just made me start laughing.
Speaker: My director said, trip, this is not a comedy.
Speaker: And so I couldn't, I couldn't stop laughing.
Speaker: So he just said, all right, everybody go home.
Speaker: Trip's done.
Speaker: You have resting, smiling face.
Speaker: So I get, I get, I get Josh.
Speaker: that's great um why do you guys think people should come see this show if they haven't yet or if they were on the fence about getting tickets why should they come and see 12 angry men ron we can throw that to you to start well first of all um
Speaker: It's live theater.
Speaker: And I think I would rather go to live theater than movies.
Speaker: Movies have the opportunity of digital manipulation, all kinds of computer stuff.
Speaker: And sets can be built without being a set built kind of, you know, merge things together.
Speaker: But live theater, there's no such thing as a retake.
Speaker: You know, you can't get through that.
Speaker: And plus the fact that it is so real, when the actors are really good at it, it becomes real.
Speaker: And you can understand that stuff.
Speaker: And I think this particular play epitomizes that as well.
Speaker: These actors, all of us, all 12, 13, 13,
Speaker: Everybody is so good at what they do.
Speaker: They have developed that role so well that there is no mistaking that they are that person.
Speaker: And people should come and see that show and watch that happen and watch their attitudes morph into something that you didn't expect when it all started.
Speaker: It was 11 to 1 Guilty.
Speaker: It ended up 11 to 1.
Speaker: Well, I'm not going to say that.
Speaker: But anyway, you come and see that show and watch that happen.
Speaker: And through the hour and a half or two hours, the hour long it is, everybody morphs into something completely different than what they start out with.
Speaker: It's an amazing, amazing capture of that identity thing.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: That's awesome.
Speaker: Mike, how about you?
Speaker: Well, I think if you never go to live theater, you should definitely go to this for a new experience.
Speaker: And if you go to a lot of live theater, you should definitely go to this because you're going to be very close to the action, right?
Speaker: If you've ever gone to a bigger production, you've gone downtown, gone to DeVos, and you sit in the balcony or the upper mezzanine and you see shapes moving around.
Speaker: Um...
Speaker: This show, you are going to see faces.
Speaker: You're going to see when one actor just glances with his eyes over to somebody else.
Speaker: You're going to be able to see that.
Speaker: And it's a very different experience that I think everyone should do at least once because it just draws you in so much more.
Speaker: It's a great show.
Speaker: It's a powerful show.
Speaker: it will make you think and it will make you laugh and you're just going to see something that maybe you're not used to seeing that's awesome sweet tim what about you well mike kind of kind of took mine on that one but it's kind of a combination of what ron and mike says that is that yes you're you're right there it's you you're close to be able to see that to see them but
Speaker: The room itself is small in the first place, but the way that Lorna has designed the set with chairs on both sides of the table, you almost feel like you are right there in that deliberation room with those characters.
Speaker: And those little looks back and forth, like Mike was saying, is you can see those.
Speaker: You feel like you're interacting with the characters just sitting there watching them.
Speaker: And like Ron was saying, each and every single person, including Maddie, who plays the accused, who doesn't have a single line in the show, we've seen what she can do.
Speaker: And just the look on her face as the accused, the despair and the discouragement of being accused of murder,
Speaker: is just amazing.
Speaker: Every single one of the people that are playing in this just do an amazing job.
Speaker: And the music and the costumes and the lighting, the directing, everything is just
Speaker: perfect in my opinion that's great trip how about you it is it's a classic uh if you love classics if you love uh the courtroom drama type scene uh even if you don't go with somebody who does because you'll i promise you you'll you'll love this show there's not a bad seat in the house and it just keeps you engaged some shows will kind of have a high and then kind of linger off and get
Speaker: A little bored, and then it brings you back in, but this is constant.
Speaker: This is constant bickering and conversation and a couple jokes, but it just, it will, the two hours flies by.
Speaker: It's a fantastic directed show.
Speaker: That's awesome.
Speaker: Cool.
Speaker: So for the last question here, one of the things I like to do with the podcast and the website is I try and build out some resources for people who are wanting to grow either in their art or in their faith.
Speaker: Because I know throughout my life, I've needed that.
Speaker: So just having this resource page for people.
Speaker: Something I care about.
Speaker: So free to you guys.
Speaker: Do you have a resource that you would recommend to people if they're wanting to either grow as artists or deepen their Christian faith?
Speaker: And Ron, we can start with you again.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: Just keep putting you on the hot seat.
Speaker: Well, there's actually a couple of things.
Speaker: First of all, the best way to expand your love for anything is to get involved with it.
Speaker: And I would recommend if somebody wants to explore art in any of its forms, many forms, music, performance, you know, drawing, whatever it might be,
Speaker: You need to get involved in it.
Speaker: And I would recommend highly that you get involved in your church work.
Speaker: If your church doesn't have a drama group, start one.
Speaker: And get some things going with that.
Speaker: You will learn more by doing that than anything else.
Speaker: The other thing that I would recommend is Master Arts.
Speaker: has a number of classes that they have for acting, for script writing, for other things as well.
Speaker: And they are excellent.
Speaker: They're people who have been there, have done that, can teach you so well.
Speaker: If you want to explore some of this, come and take one of those classes.
Speaker: That's how I got started with Master Arts.
Speaker: I got a note from Chris McDonald, one of the original founders,
Speaker: at church, basically.
Speaker: And I had already been doing skits and so on at church to come to see an acting class and so on.
Speaker: So I went through that and I thought, well, I'll just go see what it's like.
Speaker: First time I was ever there and that was in 04.
Speaker: And I just fell in love with it.
Speaker: And I got offers for street theater and improv and, you know, I auditioned for the next play coming up and I got involved in it.
Speaker: I was able to expand my love for the theater at that point in time.
Speaker: But take that back with you also, wherever you go, just keep working at it and working at it.
Speaker: God will guide you into that.
Speaker: But you have to initiate a few things yourself.
Speaker: Yeah, love that.
Speaker: Mike, how about for you?
Speaker: Something to grow as an artist or to deepen your Christian faith?
Speaker: Uh, honestly, if CS Lewis wrote it, I think you should read it.
Speaker: Uh, and, uh, my favorite is probably the problem of pain.
Speaker: I think that's a really interesting, um, set of essays on trying to figure out how can God be good in such a broken world?
Speaker: Uh, I recommend it highly.
Speaker: Awesome.
Speaker: Tim, what about you?
Speaker: Well, especially in terms of the arts or learning a new art or something like that, I would recommend, honestly, going to YouTube and looking up videos on certain things, whatever you might be interested in.
Speaker: I know that there's a lot of people out there that have a hard time getting involved in something art, especially if there's other people involved, like stage, because they...
Speaker: they don't want to get involved and fail in front of other people.
Speaker: If you go to YouTube, there are hundreds upon thousands of videos that can teach you to do anything from something broad to something very specific, whether it is painting or acting or how to change your voice or...
Speaker: puppetry or you know anything that you can think of it's out there and that gives you a chance to to practice it maybe to experiment a little bit and then might give you the confidence to get out and try it in front of other people that's awesome yeah i know i relied on that a lot growing up so youtube's a great resource trip what about for you
Speaker: I'm going to tackle both of those things.
Speaker: First, in the arts, there's a great book called Drama in the Ministry that helps you.
Speaker: If you start a drama ministry, it actually helps you to start that and what it takes and how you hold auditions, I guess you could say, and all that kind of thing.
Speaker: But there's also a show that I found a few years ago.
Speaker: It's probably 15 years old now, but it's on Tubi.
Speaker: It's called Seventh Street Theater.
Speaker: I don't know if you've ever seen it or not, but it is actually is literally a show based around a group of four or five people.
Speaker: And it's a Christian theater called Seventh Street Theater.
Speaker: And the whole show takes place as they're writing a show.
Speaker: They direct, they write, and they perform what they wrote each weekend.
Speaker: So they have these...
Speaker: this performance.
Speaker: And so sometimes they'll, they'll do one skit or they'll do two, but it's a, you should look it up because it's a, it's actually fantastic.
Speaker: And something that every time I watch, I was like, gosh, I want to do that so badly.
Speaker: But to strengthen your faith, definitely dive into the word of God.
Speaker: Don't stop reading the word.
Speaker: That is where, that's where comfort comes from.
Speaker: That's where joy comes from is his word.
Speaker: So that's key, number one right there.
Speaker: But if you want to know how to answer critics, if you're out sharing the gospel, I'm an evangelist at heart.
Speaker: And if you want to share your faith and want to know how to share your faith, More Than a Carpenter is a great book by Josh McDowell.
Speaker: You can also go to Ray Comfort's, his Evidence Bible.
Speaker: I've got, it's called the Evidence Bible.
Speaker: And in the Evidence Bible, it's got the 100 most commonly asked questions from atheists.
Speaker: and how you relate to other religions and denomination, whatever it is, it's in there.
Speaker: So it'll definitely help strengthen your faith.
Speaker: Nice.
Speaker: That's awesome.
Speaker: Cool.
Speaker: Well, thank you guys for taking some time to sit down and chat with me.
Speaker: I am so excited about this show.
Speaker: I can't wait to come see it.
Speaker: And just, I love Lorna and her direction and hearing you guys talk about it.
Speaker: It's just making me even more excited.
Speaker: So yeah.
Speaker: Thank you, John, for having us too.
Speaker: Thank you.
Speaker: Thank you so much.
Speaker: Of course, you guys break a leg this weekend.
Speaker: I'm excited to come see it.
Speaker: It'll be great.
Speaker: Appreciate it.
Speaker: Thank you.
