Stage Whisper
Whisper in the Wings Episode 546
(upbeat music) - Welcome back in everyone to a fabulous new Whisper and the Wings from Stage Whisper. We have such a wonderful guest joining us today. We have the writer, producer, and performer of today's piece, James Rana joining us. He's here to talk about his upcoming film, Stray's, which the debut and the premiere and the screenings of these are to be announced, but you want to stay tuned. And we are so excited about this piece. I'm personally really excited about the show being a former Uber and Lyft driver. I've got a little bit of a skin in the game with this piece. So let's go ahead and welcome on our guest who can tell us more about it. - James, welcome to Whisper and the Wings from Stage Whisper. - Oh, thank you so much. It's a real pleasure to be a guest. - It is an honor to have you here. I'm so excited to speak to you about this show. You've got this fantastic career behind you already with such great works as the Bands Visit National Tour, among others. And now you've got this fabulous new film, Stray's. Can you, can we start by having you tell us a little bit about this? - Well, there's that idea that I hold dear to me not to give up on dreams. And I wrote a story 13 years ago, my career was, careers have their ups and downs. And I had a lot of downs or I just had a lot of things were just getting so still and stale. And I started writing more and more. And I'm so glad I sat down and I wrote a little short screenplay, 13 years ago. And it was the day in the life of an immigrant who drives people throughout the city. He's alone. He doesn't have his family with him. They're back home. He sends them everything. And he leads a very quiet life. He feels invisible. And it's just a beautiful thing that happens to him in the course of one day that happens to be his birthday. And I sent the script out to a few screenwriting festivals. This is like 13 years ago. Things were very different with everything that was online. And I would get a little message of saying, hey, you are a semi-finalist. I was like, wow, wow, this little thing did well. But I didn't have any money. I was like, how am I going to make this into a film? And I never stopped thinking about it. I always would go back to it, tweak it. And seven years ago, things changed when I got cast on Broadway, the band's visit. And I thought, here is my chance. I have a good Broadway income coming in. And I'm going to save my film money. And I'm going to make this little film. We had a pandemic. That was difficult. I went on tour. I'm on a tour again right now with the kite runner. But I said, as I'm getting older, if I don't do this, I'll never forgive myself. And we did it. We made the film. I love all of that. Yes. So I want to snowball off that a little bit. And I'd love to know what inspired you to write this story, to pen this, and bring it to fruition in the film? Well, first of all, it's a little under 13 minutes, 12 and 1/2 minutes film. And I think there may be one or two full minutes of dialogue. There's a lot of dialogue through sounds, through physicality, through faith, through expressions, through stillness. I grew up on silent films. I love them. I still study them whenever I can. So I grew up watching Chaplain Keaton, Jacques Taty, that little French film, The Red Balloon, which is a masterpiece. I think about that. I grew up in an immigrant household. And my father came here. He was born in India when he was a little child. The partition happened right after God on this assassination. And they walked across the border into what is now known as Pakistan. My mother's not an immigrant born and raised in America. And growing up, they started sponsoring my uncles to come here with the idea of giving a better life for their families. And they came here. They worked hard jobs. They lived in little rooms. And when I was a little boy and they were so happy to see me and spend time with me, especially by Uncle Shamsill, who's-- he left us over 20 years ago, but still. And they just loved playing with me and holding me. And I didn't realize it's-- they weren't able to do that with their own children. And there was a great deal of loneliness, I realized now. And it took a while, but they were able to bring over their families. And their lives were complete. And their children had grown up here. And they have children. And they're thriving. And I'm so proud of them. But I never forgot that. And then I see so many immigrants who are here. And they're working so hard. They're trying. People come to this country trying to have a better life, trying to give a better life to their families. And I see these people. They're so tired. And they're working constantly, doing whatever they can. And I think sometimes they feel invisible, but they're not. And this little film is also for them. That is so wonderful. Oh my gosh, that's so wonderful. Thank you. So I want to dive more into the process, if you will, of creating this. And I want to know, what has it been like developing this film? I would never have been able to do this without three people. Jane Coteley R., Catherine Ann Taylor, and/or Shriver. Jane and Catherine Ann produced this film with me. Or came in, and he directed and edited the film. I did not know what to do. I had been putting money away. And I was like, if I don't do this, what am I? And people say, oh, we hear of all these low budget films. These people are calling this a no budget. But at the same time, this was almost everything that I had saved up. And I had money saved in the bank, not a lot at all. They came on board, they embraced the script. Everyone, everyone that worked on this film, that gave me their time, something about the story, touched them, and they wanted to tell the story. And so this process has been pre-production was hard. It was a learning curve as it is for everyone. I didn't go to film school. I've worked on a lot of films. I know a lot of filmmakers. But learning how to start up a production company, I had to build a bank account. I had to get a license with a city of New York, which was very difficult. They were very helpful, but it was challenging. Everything, but things did come together. When we filmed it, it was pouring rain some of the days. And I was so depressed, and it wasn't supposed to. And yet, we didn't give up. And I am truly, truly grateful for every single person. This entire experience has all been about people taking a risk on me. Because for some reason, they like the script. They like me, but it touched them. And I think they all wanted to get on the train and tell the beautiful story, because there's just so much sadness in this world. Beautiful. I love that. I would love to know what this story, that I think a lot, a lot of people can relate to. What is the message or thought you hope that audiences will take away from it? Well, I say the most important thing is I would love to see an audience come out of a screening. And I'm very hoping we're going to have some screenings. This is a festival short. So we've submitted to so many festivals for waiting to hear on them. It's a very different film, because it's not edgy. It's not depressing. It's not disturbing. It's not action. It's not romantic comedy. It's a lovely piece of meditation. It's like a poem. It's something beautiful, but funny, uplifting. I hope it'll bring a smile to people's faces. I hope there'll be moments when they just break out laughing. I hope that they're touched. I hope maybe they'll look at people a little differently. Maybe start, aside from looking with their eyes, looking with their heart as well. So I hope they'll be able to say, I just saw something lovely, and I'd like to see more beautiful things in the world. There's so much depressing thing. You open a newspaper, you watch the news. There's so much tragedy. And there's nothing really I can do about that. But I don't want to tell any more tragic stories. I just want to bring some piece. And I love this. I love the fact that people from our cast and crew, it just, across the board, you know, we, with age, gender, race, faith, everyone came together because they also wanted to tell a beautiful story. - So wonderful. I love, and I could not, I love that, and I could not agree more with you. That leads to my final question for this first part, which is, who do you hope have access to your film strays? - Well, once again, you know, hopefully, you know, this is starting off in the festivals. We're really aimed at the festivals, and we're going to hope that it goes somewhere from there with the distributor. I'm really hoping, and I said this before today, I said, this is for an audience for people with souls. I hope that it'll touch them. I hope that they won't be too bored with it, because, you know, I hope they'll just go on this little journey in the day of a life of an Uber driver who meets up with a little cat, and all these interesting individuals who come and go in his car, and now he just tries to get through the day, and I really hope, what I love about this is the fact that intentionally making a silent film, you know, we didn't want to go too slapstick at all. There are moments of comedy. One of the reasons is that I travel so much in the theater. That's how I make my living. I work as an actor in the theater, I travel, I tour. And it's a wonderful blessing. It also gets very lonely at times. And I've had days. I'm, I was working in Northern California last spring, as I was getting ready to start making this film, and there were days I was alone, and I would go hours right in top, 'cause I had no one to talk to. You know, I didn't have anyone on the phone to talk to. Occasionally I would talk to my parents, which is always wonderful, but I would spend hours alone. So sometimes I think there's a great deal of loneliness, and that's something that every human being has experienced. And some people like to be alone, but I don't know. I don't know, I think too much of it can be very hard. I think we, a lot of us experience that during the pandemic. I think that people seeing this film, and I really hope that the festivals will embrace it. I'm really hoping that they will, because then people can come to these screenings and see our little story, and hopefully it'll make their life a little better for the day. (gentle music) - Well, from the second part of our interview, we love doing our listeners a chance to get to know our guests a little bit better. Pull the curtain back, if you will, and I would love to know, what or who inspires you, what playwrights, composers, or shows in the past have inspired you, or are just some of your favorites? - Well, so many things, things that are created out of passion and out of love have a great deal of inspiration for me. You know, I was part of the band's visit on Broadway then I did the tour, and I'll never forget in 2008, I was not working, I was frustrated. I didn't know what I was doing, I had very little in the bank, and I remember going into a little movie theater, and I saw the film of the band's visit, it'd just come to the United States from Israel, and I had seen posters throughout the city, and it had done well in all these major festivals, and I sat and I saw this beautiful, simple, stunning little story, and it really touched me. It was so beautiful, I remember sitting in the audience at the end and I thought, oh, I wish I could do something as beautiful as that someday. But then who knew? Nine years later, I could have given up in those nine years, I had every opportunity to just walk away from this, everything, and I didn't. And I got to become friends with a gentleman named Aaron Colerin, who wrote and directed the film, the band's visit, he's an amazing person. And over the late summer, I emailed him a few times, and I said, we're making this film, I'm finally doing it, and I'm scared. And he wrote back, and he's like, it's good to be scared, I get scared. And he says, but I want you to make your film and love it. So that has had a huge inspiration to me. You know, there's so many beautiful things that there's so many great stories that I've seen. I like to give as much different types of theater and film a wonderful opportunity, you know, to give it a chance, even if it was like, oh, I hate that idea of it, that's not really for me, what does that mean? You know, I'm already judging something. So I'm trying to put myself out there. You know, I find myself going more and more to films because they're more at our access at times. You know, as I said, the silent films always touch me, watching a chaplain, you know, everyone should see a chaplain. There's something beautiful about that. I'd say some of our great contemporary artists, you know, Wes Anderson, I love Wes Anderson, people always tell me that I look like a character in a, you know, Wes Anderson movie, which I take as a great compliment. I'm right now doing a piece, I had the great opportunity to be part of the Broadway tour of The Kite Runner. And that is a beautiful, I mean, I just, I recently reread the story. I actually read it for the first time in the last few months because I stayed away from it for so long because I didn't want to be depressed. And that was so wrong with me because it was such a beautiful, tragic, stunning piece of literature. Each page came alive in my mind. And so that, and I'm doing this beautiful story. And also I just want to say, you know, with all the shows happening, I always go every year, I go to the circus because I train to be a clown early on. I studied circus and I went to go see Big Apple Circus this year brought in from Germany, the circus run Kali. And it was so much out of a Fellini film. It was so beautiful. It was a stunning piece of circus and theater. And I went twice. I said, I have to go back, I have to get it. I wanted to get a better seat. I wanted to experience this from, you know, different angle and really full out. And it was just, it was beautiful, it was poetry. And so that inspires me. That's what I'm trying to do. That is an incredible list of inspirations. - Thank you. - I support that answer. Oh my gosh, yes. Let me ask you, what is your favorite part about working in the theater and in the arts in general? - I love the fact that I get to sometimes stretch myself. I get to challenge myself. I love the opportunity that, you know, it's all about doing. It's an exercise, it's a muscle. And, you know, I working with a lot of wonderful young actors and they're very, very kind to me. And they're very, you know, some of them, you know, are very respectful of me or they say very lovely things about my work. And I just say, it's just, I've just been doing it for so long. It's all about doing it. The other big thing for me is, and this is my major reminder before every show. And I still always get nervous as I'm in the wings. I still feel my heart racing, which scares me as I'm getting older. But in my hands, my palms are sweating and everything is that I have to remind myself that I could think only about myself, but it's not about me. This is about the audience. It's not about me. This is their experience. And they deserve the full experience. - I love those ideas. Oh my gosh, I could just sit here all day. And listen to you, dare I say, philosophize or just pontificate on the arts and that. These are brilliant ideas. And I hope younger artists hear these and really take the heart because these are wonderful. And it leads to my favorite question to ask guests, which is what is your favorite theater memory? - Oh, wow. I'm gonna say, you know, I've been, I've been fortunate to do quite a bit of wonderful theater and to see so much theater. And there's something magical about that. I'm gonna say two. I'm gonna say two. The first one was the very first, well, actually I'll say a couple, three. I'm gonna say three. Is it okay if I say three? All right. The very first Broadway show I saw was, and I came a little later, I think it was maybe like 12 or 30. I know kids would go in a lot to their parents and I added my sister and my mother. I went with them to go see 42nd Street on Broadway. This is in the '80s. And there was something wonderful. And I was taken by that story. I was taken by the moments by everyone on that stage. It was, it got a 12 year old's attention. And I loved it. The other one was, there was a lovely little theater off, a little off off Broadway theater company, downtown for many years. They had a large bed of falling called the Jean-Coupto Repertory. And lovely people. And I remember my aunt 'cause it was downtown and my aunt lived at the Lower East Side. And sometimes she would take us to see shows there. And I saw lovely actors and what was wonderful was 'cause this was a company, I would see these people doing different plays. And that really struck me. And that was a very, very wonderful thing. Then finally, I'd say how the arts really, there's that health benefit. The arts, you know, laughter is a cure. Laughter with how moments. And I remember going about a few years ago, several years back, seeing on Broadway a gentleman's guide to love and murder. And just laughing out loud 'cause it was so wonderful. It was just Jefferson May's and that company. And I needed that. And that got me. And I thought, oh, this is a gift. This is a gift. I mean, sometimes I see shows, I think, or films. And I'm like, oh, these people are so good, I can never do what they're doing, or I'll never be that good, or I immediately just start judging myself, you know? But no, that's just a waste of energy. And I need to remember all the beauty and the joy it brings me. 'Cause there's so much, you know, 'cause I don't need any more to be depressed about. I don't want any more things to be upset about. I need to laugh. And those are things that make me laugh and bring me joy and hope. I love those memories. Thank you so much for sharing those. It was wonderful. As we wrap things up here, I would love to know, do you have any other projects or productions coming on the pipeline that we might be able to plug for you? - Yeah, yeah, I've been fortunate. We're waiting, you know, first of all, you know, because I work as an actor, my whole life is auditions. I am on a podcast series. I'm in this audio series that we did this a long time ago. It's on Broadway podcast network. It's called Twits, a steampunk distraction. And this was, these were a series of stories written by my dear friend, Tom Allen Robbins, who's finishing up the run of a beautiful noise. And he wrote this comedy and the style of a PG Woodhouse and it's very funny, but it's like a futuristic rim world and you have a young aristocrat voiced by my dear friend Michael Urey and his sidekick voiced by Christian Borrell. And I have a small, I have a small recurring role as a member of their private club and it has a wonderful group of great Broadway, you know, legends that I just love working with Mary Tester, my dear friend Stephen DeRosa, Rachel York, Deakin Matthews, all these people. And we did this a long time ago. We were reading these on Zoom during the pandemic and then Broadway podcast got involved and said, hey, let's listen to a series, an audio series. So there's slowly being, we voiced these a long time ago and they've been fully edited and cleaned. And so those are running right now. I have that, I'm finishing up the tour of the kind, I run it, we end June 30th. I work with a wonderful theater in Kate Macold, Eastlin Theatre and they do a lot of, I've been with them on and off for many years, I'm gonna be putting together something for Halloween. I have also written another short and it's a lovely, I know it's a very lovely, beautiful little piece. And you'll never hear me praise myself. I don't do that because I don't wanna do that. But however, I will say, oh, this is lovely, I've done something beautiful. And I actually wrote this for my producer Jane 'cause Jane is a really wonderful actor and not enough people get to see her act. And that's not right because she's just too wonderful. And I wrote this for her and I'm really hoping to make this little piece. And I'm hoping that maybe with strays, if strays get seen enough, I might be able to convince people to help me to make something else. And I really need to focus on strays. And another thing that I did, as I was doing the band's visit, as I closed it on Broadway and I was doing the tour, I journaled everything. And I hired an editor and I turned that journal into a book and we're trying to get it published. There's been interest from smaller publishers, but there's a few that I really have my eye on. And this is really a book for young theater artists or lovers of the theater, it's written in diary form. And it includes everything from touring the country to what it was when I was performing on March 12th, 2020. And I was told that we're the next morning, March 13th, we need to shut down for a little bit. And I kept on writing during the pandemic and then what it was like to return to the theater and everything we went through. So, and I'm not giving up on that. I'm not giving up on that book. So I'm hoping that book does, that some publishers do embrace it. - I am hoping so too. I would love to read that. - Thank you. - And you're on the inside. But it sounds like you've got several irons in the fire that we need to keep tabs on. And at least my final question, which is, we have our listeners like more information about strays or about you, maybe they like to reach out to you. How can they do so? - Well, right now, we are building, we're now building the social media for strays. So we have websites coming out. I have a website called jamesrana.com. My last name is R-A-N-A. So jamesrana.com. And we'll be adding things on that and we'll be telling people where to go with strays. It's a little difficult right now. I mean, when I say it's challenging because this was, strays was pretty much fully funded by me because some people did donate and I'm truly grateful to them. But it's like every time there's a new thing that we want to do, it's an expense that I have to find to figure it out, how am I going to pay for it to end day? I can literally tell you, so many of my clothes are threadbare, I have not bought new clothes. It's like my jackets. If I go to screenings, I will have like holes in my, in the lining of my jackets because I'm, or my socks have holes because I've gone through all my money. And I, you know, I'm like, I'm not giving up. It's like, oh, and I work in the theater, so that's hard. But at least I try. At least I tried. So to answer your question, jamesrana.com and yes, the website's going up, strays is on IMDB and you'll be seeing more, much more. And I'm really hoping, I'm just really hoping and praying that festivals will embrace this little story. - I have no doubt that they will. This is wonderful to hear. James, thank you so much for taking the time to speak with me today, for sharing your beautiful shorts. I cannot wait to see a premiere. I'm so excited. I know we're going to hear the premiere day any day now because I have no doubt that festivals are going to welcome this open arms and if they don't, they're foolish because it's a brilliant and uplifting story that you are bringing and it's something that audiences need. So thank you so much for your time today. - Thank you so much. And thank you to everyone listening. - My guest today has been the incredible writer, producer and performer, James Rana, who stopped by to talk about his new short film, Strays. It's having its premiere and other presentations coming up very soon. So stay tuned for that. We have some contact information for James, which we'll be posting on our episode description as well as on our social media posts. And you're going to want to follow James. He tabs on not only what he's going to be doing as an actor and an artist, but also, so you can keep tabs about this film. We cannot wait to see it ourselves. It's a beautiful story. Again, the film is called Strays, coming to a theater near you. - 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) - If you like what you hear, please leave a five star review, like and subscribe. - You can also find us on Facebook and Instagram at 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 Jazzar. Other music on this episode provided by Jazzar 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. 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