Stage Whisper
Whisper in the Wings Episode 552
(upbeat music) - Welcome back everyone to a fabulous new Whisper in the Wings from Stage Whisper. Today we are bringing you another production that played recently the share at the New York City Fringe Festival. That is having a fabulous run off Broadway at a wonderful venue. And we're so excited to be welcoming back the creator and performer, Jude Tredder-Wolf. She's here to talk to us about her show, "Baster", which is playing July 6th and 7th at Playhouse 46. You can get your tickets and more information by visiting playhouse46.org. We had such a great time. Not only speaking with Jude before the festival this spring, but getting to see her show, it's such a wonderful show, very funny and very timely too. And you're gonna laugh and you're gonna learn as well, which is a great thing to do with the show. So why don't we go ahead and welcome in our wonderful guests and welcome back our guests. Jude, so good to see you again. Welcome back to Whisper in the Wings from Stage Whisper. - Well, thank you so much for having me. Thank you for this new conversation that we're going to have. We had one pre-show. That was a fun one with my director who was in that conversation. Lola's boyfriend's show. Lauren was in that conversation and now it's just you and me. So that's a very much of an honor, so thank you. And thank you so much for coming to see the show. And that you want to talk about it again, it really means a lot. - Oh, it's all my pleasure. I really enjoyed your show. I had a great time just listening to your thoughts. I was sitting there and I thought, I didn't realize how much about this. I was going to agree with it. And I just love your storytelling too. It's so captivating. So why don't we start by having you share with our listeners, remind them a little bit about what your show faster is about? - Faster is about two primary themes kind of interweaving around the primary theme of change and how change impacts our brain and ourself and basically why it's so hard. Why change is so challenging and stressful? But I'm using two parts of many. One is I'm a mental health professional, so change is pretty much my bread and butter. I've thought about it, continue to think about it, learn about it for the last, you know, over 30 years. And the other is that I'm married to someone whose approach to change is completely opposite to mine. And so I've observed from close up, making decisions, planning a life, doing all the problem solving with somebody who approaches things from a completely opposite perspective. And that has informed my thinking about how change is as a process, why it's more stressful for some people than for other people. And I wrote this show because the pace of change in the world is picking up speed in a way that's never happened to human beings ever before. And so we need to really pick up the pace of our pace of change. And it's not easy for human beings to do that. So I'm using stories about my husband and I and how different we are, and to kind of explore this idea of how we change, do we change, and how we might pick up the pace to change our brains so that we can manage the change that's coming at us instead of the change managing us. - I love that. And listeners, as you can hear, I mean, this is why the show is so great. It's so relatable. But I'm curious to know with all of these ideas and such that you're covering it faster, where did you come up with the idea to create and perform this show? - I have been creating, okay, two things. One, my working with all kinds of people in the corporate world, the mental health world, individuals, trying to change their lives, as I said, all that the idea of change and how we change has been something that I think about a lot. And I wrote a book, it's not a famous book or you would know about it. But I did write a book in 2008 called "Creative Thinking for the Speed of Life" when it was about how the speed of life in 2008 was picking up to that was almost 20 years ago. And how creative experiences help speed up our thinking and help speed up our capacities, our emotional capacities. So the idea and change is very stressful. Change any kind of change is stressful. Even a good change is stressful. It can trigger a sense of alarm. And even a fun change can trigger a sense of, oh my gosh, what's that, a disorientation. So that's something that I've just studied in my whole life. But I also noticed that when I do all these trainings with different folks that a lot of people just don't realize that. And so like their job changes and they get really angry and that's not their fault. Things change in the economy and people's jobs go away or suddenly they're reassigned and there's no warning. Relationships change because technology, everything changes everything else, all this interrelationships. So that's been my life, my professional life. But then I also live another part of my life making money, telling stories and training people about telling stories about their own life. And the personal is the universal. If you're able to do it well, if you're able to tell a true story in a way that is effective, a person listening feels like that story is also about them. And I've always made fun of my husband and me together. I'm not making fun of him. I'm making fun of, I'm making comedy out of us because there's a lot of weird tension between someone like my husband who's very methodical, very cautious, can't be pressured into doing anything before he's ready to be doing it. And I'm ready to be doing things way too fast. Like I'm just like, I'll say, I'll say, let's try the road not taken. He'll say, there's a reason people aren't going down that road. That's him and he's got to research it and make a spreadsheet and a file and a book with all the documentation. Well, you know, and I just can't be bothered with any of that. So there are these weird tensions between us. We love each other a lot and it showed me how much love can really bridge those differences between people because you could get into a big fight about things or you could love each other through it and we've changed each other. So the idea of interweaving those two themes came from telling a lot of stories about him and I and realizing that change was at the heart of those stories. Like the way people think about change, the way people approach change, some of it is inherent to your personality and some of it you learn. And some of it you have to develop, you have to try, put an effort in. And as an improviser is the third kind of leg of the stool creating this show, improv made me so much of a better partner. And I've been training as an improviser for a very long time. But improv is about supporting your partner, receiving what's happening, saying yes to it, noticing everything. And instead of imposing your will on a scene, the way you create together in real time as an improviser is to say yes to what's happening and then add to it. So if I went into my relationship with my husband or a client or anybody whose pace of change was very different than mine or who's thinking about change was very different than mine and I said my way is the right way. You should do it my way, you're wasting time, you're slowing me down. That's not being a very good partner. And so in learning to be an improviser and learning to say yes to things, whether I like it or not or whether I agree with it or not, changed me and made me more open, more expanded. And then I translated that into training therapists and training other people in the art of the yes. And all of that comes around to, I wanna do a show that pulls those three themes together. I wanted to do a show that pulled my book that no one read because maybe 100 people read my book. Let's just say, I don't know how many copies of my book I sold, it wasn't very many. But I wanted to take those ideas and make them fun instead of make them so serious. And so that's why I use the comedy angle in the show to talk about what I think is a pretty serious topic but comedy is the way to talk about things. It's the most creative way to talk about things when you think about it, right? It's the way to take a new angle, look at things with a different perspective, twist it, subvert it. So that's my long-winded answer to how I came up with the show. - I love it, that is fantastic. And I think you nailed it on the head regarding comedy and dealing with hard issues. It's a great way to disarm people, to put them at ease, to really just find a way in to discuss that, get their guard down. And again, praising your show. I think if you do a great job of that and you use not only your humor but your personal stories to get us to relax and to ease in. And then all of a sudden the show is over and you're like, how did she get that message through to me? I wasn't ready for that, but it's here now and it's because we're laughing and we're enjoying and we're sharing it and then before you know it, boom, these ideas are with us. So I love that you mentioned that. That is really wonderful. - I'm curious to know, it has been about what, three months since the French Festival or two months. What has it been like developing this current iteration of your show that's opening in a couple of days? - Well, I had some insights at performing the show. That version of the show was a good experience for the French that was where I took a show that was almost 90 minutes when I did it last fall when I was just workshopping everything and throwing everything into it. And then I shortened it a lot for the French because they just, I just wanted it at that one hour. And now I have a little bit more time. Again, I've added maybe 10 minutes, not a lot of time. I'm just expanding some of the stories that where I feel some details could be richer, some worlds that I'm introducing people were sort of dropping into the world where I meet my husband, the world where I do some corporate trainings. There's some other moments that I've just listened to it and my directors who's ambokner and I discussed as well. She helped me pick out where we could flesh things out and make them a little bit more vivid for a listener because I do have the time, a little more breathing time with these shows this weekend, the July 6th and 7th. So I mean, I don't have to stick to one hour. I can add a little bit of time so I don't have to rush it. And that's been, but I'm really sticking to that, mostly that same arc. It's just adding some richness to the scenes that's changed. - That is wonderful. That was in the back of my mind too. I was wondering, I was like, "It's a room for the show to grow." Or, you know, "When do we get to see the 90 minute version?" You know, so that is fabulous. Now we've talked a lot about a lot of the ideas that you touch on in the show, but I would love to know, is there a particular message or thought you hope that audiences will walk away with? - What I would love people to walk away with, not that I'm telling you what to take away with, I'm just saying what I hope people might think about is that you can grow your brain, that you are capable of expansion and change. And it can be fun, that change can be really interesting and fascinating, and that there are things in you that are fun and interesting that you can expand on. And that doing that is going to make all of this stress that we're going through. That makes us all feel like the sense of urgency all the time, that people feel a sense of suspicion and urgency is a lot of what the dread and anxiety that I hear from people so much, in the last few years particularly, that we can do something about that and that it can be fun. It doesn't have to be so dreadful working it through. It can actually be fun and interesting and creative. And also if you're in a relationship with somebody who's very different than you, it can be a gift. - I love that, what a fantastic idea. And a great lead into my final question for this first part, which is who are you hoping to have access to this upcoming run of faster? - I'm promoting it of course to everybody in the world. I'm promoting it to mental health professionals, to my colleagues in the social work world and the music therapy world and creative arts therapy world in the improv world. So I would love for people in the world of change makers, people who help people shape their lives to access it so that we could talk about creative ways to help people manage change and think about it in a way that is more hopeful and less angsty. So that's a lot of people, but I mean, I want everyone to come and see it and laugh and feel like they can relate to it. But I do hope to get people in mental health and people that deal with change to check it out. (upbeat music) For the second part of our interview, we love giving our listeners a chance to get to know our guests a little bit better. Pick your brains, if you will. And I'm excited that we have a little bit more time this time around to do so because I want to start with my favorite first question. And that is, what are who inspires you? What playwrights, composers or shows have inspired you in the past or just some of your favorites? - Oh my gosh, we don't have enough time for all my inspirations, but I will give you my top five. Okay, my first inspiration to do anything solo in terms of storytelling was Spalding Gray. Not everybody knows who Spalding Gray is that's younger, but he was a Broadway success in the solo storytelling world. He did movies, Swimming to Cambodia, Grey's Anatomy, and they're all him talking about his life and they're very philosophical. I have his journals, I've read his journals, I've read all of his essays. I mean, I very much was inspired by Spalding Gray before I was got into any of this. I just loved watching him. And then when I got into storytelling for the stage through training in this way, I realized, oh, some of these stories that I could do long form and I thought of him. And in fact, his stories would often be used in classes as a model, like they take a 10 minute piece of a monologue, but he was the original monologist that made this kind of like, oh, this is an art form that people can actually like and succeed at. And it really wasn't a thing that before him, but more currently, 'cause he's been gone a while, but more currently, I love Mike for Big Lea. And I've seen every one of his solo shows. I used to go to his solo shows when they were just workshopped in the Montreal Comedy Festival version and then there'd be another version somewhere here in the city. And most recently he did a show called The Old Man in the Pool that was at Lincoln Center. And that show, I related to in terms of my creation a faster because if anybody has seen the show, they understand that he's talking about his own health. The show is about his own journey of self-care. And it starts out with him getting some news about his health and working through all of the layers of resistance to doing something about it that I was very honest, hilarious. And it goes down a lot of rabbit holes, like Mike for Big Lea does, all the storytelling rabbit holes and then comes out with a transformational ending that's also hilarious and also enlightening and empowering, very honest. So his authenticity, I've always appreciated and used the idea that he could talk about really anything in his life, his marriage, not wanting to have a child. One of his show called The New One was about they didn't wanna be a dad. That was on Broadway a few years ago, about 10 years ago, I think. He didn't wanna be a dad, his wife wanted to have, finally wanted to have a child and then he ends up having a child. And what that journey was like, very honest, not easy to talk about these things. So he's always been an inspiration. I listened to his podcast religiously. It's called Working It Out, highly recommend. So Mike for Big Lea, I love Tignotaro is another person whose personal traumas. I mean, she's been through, she was diagnosed with cancer the same week that her mother hit her head and fell into a coma and ended up dying at the same time she got broken up with all in the same span of 10 days, many years ago in her life. And she wrote comedy on the spot almost. She wrote comedy while she was doing chemo, while she was going through all of this, she was doing shows and came out of it, a very different person, but all throughout, she talked about it on stage in a way that was hilarious, heartbreaking, honest, authentic. And that's to me what we're seeking with good solid storytelling on stage is to be authentic, to entertain, to also take people on some kind of a journey that is transformational, that we've, something we've gone through so maybe we could listen to that and say, oh, I don't have to go through that hell that she went through to get the lesson that she got. I also love Neil Brennan. He has a podcast called "Blox" and he has a show on Netflix called "Blox". I've never seen him live, but his show is about trauma and dysfunction and growing up in a very, very, very difficult dysfunctional alcoholic family. And his traumas, he is very open and honest about. So obviously I'm very drawn to comedians and storytellers that talk about health and mental health. This is what inspires me because everybody has struggles and relationships and everybody lives in a body and has to deal with their body and has to deal with their brain. And so these folks that are so honest and authentic have empowered me and also inspired me and of course, make me laugh all the time. Those are the three that pop up as my top three of four, accounting building gray. - I think that is a wonderful list of inspiration. I love a lot of those people. Tell me, what is your favorite part about working in the theater? - Oh, everyone paying attention to me, obviously. But don't bump. I think there has to be an element of that to be totally honest. There has to be an element of wanting to grab people's attention and get laughs and get feelings generated because I've always done it and I've always loved doing it. So one of the things I have to say, that feeling of getting a rolling laugh where somebody gets it and then the laugh just continues is so addictive. And I do a lot of training of all different kinds and especially in healthcare. And I could be doing a training at eight in the morning and it's a show. It's a show. And if I can get those people at eight o'clock in the morning and some training center in the basement of an administrative building in a mental health facility, if I can get that rolling laugh from those people that I feel like a queen, I feel like that is a big win. So it's the challenge of engaging people's minds and hearts so that they all get on the same page at the same moment, something hits their brain and they laugh or feel together. I love the idea that I could be part of that. So the challenge of course is you're putting yourself out there and it doesn't always work. There are times when it epically does not work. So all the self-doubts rise up and all the sense of what is wrong with me? Why did I put myself? Why did I ever think that this was a good idea? Also is just as strong as the compelling desire to succeed. And that battle, that inner battle of I wanna do it, I wanna let me try it this way. Let me see if I can change it this way and can I win this group over in this moment even? But mostly building up to it or creating for the theater is always in this battle of are you kidding? Are you out of your mind? Go home, put Netflix on. Someone else did the work. You don't have to do this. They're almost equal in how strong those forces are. So when the force within me of wanting to try something out and get out there and do it, when it wins out over all the self-doubt and that force of wanting to protect myself, I feel such a sense of accomplishment and satisfaction. I will go for that feeling. And there can be a lot of failure involved with that, but I'm aiming for something that when it is achieved is so amazing to feel. And then to relate to people, it's a privilege to have people listen to me. I mean, I think any performer knows that people giving your attention is probably the most honoring anyone can do for another person, is to give them your attention. And here's a group of people that have given me their attention and I want to honor that I reward that and reward them in some way by making them laugh, by making them forget about their problems for a while or think about their problems in a different way. Like comedy does for me. So what I find compelling about theater is all of that, but I guess it all boils down to I get people's attention. I come from a very large family sidebar or addendum to what I just said. I come from a family of eight kids and my oldest siblings are 12, 15 years older than me. So I was toward the end of this very large family and I did shows all the time. I did a Mother's Day show, a Father's Day show, Fourth of July show, Christmas show, Thanksgiving show. I had themes for all my shows and I think back and I think yes, it was in me to want to do this kind of thing at all since I can remember, but I also think it was a way of being in this blur of people, this large family that always we always had. And I had 42 first cousins and it was just a bunch of people and kids around, but it was a way to stand out was to do shows. And I still think there's a part of me that's doing that for that reason. That's my personal one. - I love that though, that's wonderful. We now arrived at my favorite question to ask guests and of course that is, what is your favorite theater memory? - Oh my gosh, I have so many. Well, Angels in America, when I saw Angels, I have many, I'm thinking about New York City. When I, the first time I can't, sorry, forget the Angels in America, I'll return to it. The first time I ever came to New York City and I was in college. And my best friend was an artist, an actress who moved to New York City ahead of me, one year ahead of me, she was my roommate and she had an apartment on West 73rd Street and I came and stayed with her for a month. And we went to TKTS and bought half price tickets 'cause we were college students and poor. And I saw children of a lesser God for the first time. I ever saw a Broadway show as children of a lesser God. In the nosebleed section and I was so transported by this story and by seeing a Broadway play, a story unfold in front of me. And I'd seen many plays in my life. That play made me think about the world in a different way. And the next night we saw a chorus line and that's the most, probably the most theater story there is because these people, the characters are on their last legs, kind of like for real, they're dancers and they're desperate for this job because they may not get another one or they are aging out of their profession. And the reality of what it takes to be in theater swept over me, the power of it and then the music of it. And then that song, "What I Did for Love" has impacted maybe everything I've ever done in my life since. Am I doing this for love? Or am I doing this because the world thinks I should do it? Or am I doing this because of fear? Or am I doing this for love? And that song actually guided choices that I made that seemed crazy to other people, but I knew that I was doing it for love. And that's enough for me. Now, I'm also the, let's go down the road and not take in kind of person. So sometimes they don't work out, but I'm okay if I'm doing it for love. And that song is really what inspired, inspired seeing that song on Broadway was a life-changing experience. Then we saw the music man with Dick Van Dyke, who I was loved Dick Van Dyke, but it was the two, "Children of a Lesser God" and "A Chorus Line" that were sort of bending time in space for me as a 22-year-old girl from Wisconsin saying how theater, seeing how theater could open up your world, and that I wanted to do things for love. - I love, love those memories right there. Oh my gosh, that is incredible. Some wonderful pieces that you mentioned there. Well, as we wrap things up, I would love to know, do you have any of the projects or productions coming on the pipeline that we might be able to plug for you? - Oh, thank you so much for asking. I'm performing faster in some festivals and different things, but I'm in a comedy contest called "Ladies of Laughter" that is happening on August 2nd out here on Long Island at Governor's Comedy Club. That's five minutes of stand up that I'm hoping Long Island people at least will show up to. And I also do a storytelling show on Long Island. Only people on Long Island are gonna be able to access this, but I do a monthly show called "Mostly True Things" on Long Island, and sometimes we do it in Manhattan as well. And it's mostlytruthings.com, check it out. If you see a show coming to New York City and you're in New York City, come, it is so much fun. It's a game wrapped in storytelling show, and we have improv and music, and it's a full evening of all the things. - That sounds like so much fun. Oh, so we've definitely got to keep tabs on you for this and many other things. So that is a great lead into my final question, which is if our listeners would like more information about faster or about you, maybe they'd like to reach out to you. How can they do so? - Thank you for asking that too. Well, I have a website, JewTraderWolf.com, J-U-D-E-T-R-E-D-E-R-W-O-L-L-F.com. That's my performing website. I have a website, lifestage.me, that has different trainings that I offer, articles that I write, events that I'm doing. If anybody wants a training in storytelling or improv, it's all there, or you could find me on that, you can contact me from that website. And then of course, the show, mostlytruthings.com, you can see, that's the storytelling show. So I have three websites. And also, Instagram is a fun way. It's lifestage_inc, is my Instagram handle. I post a lot of information and of things I'm doing, but also just information about storytelling, about improv, about creativity, about faster, life-changing, faster. Just, I post a lot of things about these topics on my Instagram page. So you could follow me there, and I'll follow you back. - Wonderful. Well, Jude, thank you so much for taking the time to speak with me today, for sharing more about your fabulous show faster. It's so good, and I really hope I get to come out and see it again. I loved it the first time. I'm sure I'm gonna love it the second. So thank you for your time today. - Thank you so, so much for having me in your fun, great questions. They were wonderful, rich questions, and I appreciate that. - Thank you. My guest today has been the incredible creator and performer, Jude Trader Wolf, whose upcoming show, Faster, is playing July 6th and 7th at Playhouse 46, and you can get your tickets and more information by visiting playhouse46.org. We also have some contact information for her, as well as her company, that we'll be posting on our episode description, as well as on our social media posts, but right now, you better run, get your tickets right now. It's a very limited run, and you will not want to miss it. So head to playhouse46.org, and get your tickets now for Faster, playing July 6th and 7th. So until next time, I'm Andrew Cortez, reminding you to turn off your cell phones, unwrap your candies, and keep talking about the theater. - In a stage whisper? - Thank you. (upbeat music) (upbeat music) - If you like what you hear, please leave a five star review, like and subscribe. - You can also find us on Facebook and Instagram @stagewhisperpod. - And feel free to reach out to us with your comments and personal stories at stagewhisperpod@gmail.com. - And be sure to check out our website for all things stage whisper and theater. You'll be able to find merchandise, tours, tickets, and more. Simply visit stagewhisperpod.com. Our theme song is Maniac by Jazar. Other music on this episode provided by Jazar and Billy Murray. You can also become a patron of our show by logging on to patreon.com/stagewhisperpod. There you will find all the information about our backstage pass as well as our tip jar. Thank you so much for your generosity. We could not do this show without you. ♪ I'm away from Peros where I don't care ♪ ♪ Anywhere will your town make me there? ♪