Adam LeFevre
Q & A with Adam LeFevre, who starred as 'Herman Kline' in Josh Koenigsberg's Herman Kline's Midlife Crisis, directed by Zane Birdwell, which played at Theatre Row's Beckett Theater from 7 Aug - 3 Sep 2011.
Birthday?
August 11
Place of birth?
Albany, New York.
You now live in?
New Paltz, New York.
Did you go to training school, if so which one?
Trained at the National Theater Institute in Waterford, Connecticut.
As an actor, do you have a preference for stage, tv or film?
Love performing on camera, but the stage remains the actor's preeminent place and most fundamental home.
Your first stage performance was?
My first stage performance was as Joseph in a church Christmas pageant when I was 7. It was a shitty part. Mary, the angel, and the narrator has all the lines, and poor Joseph had to stand by silently ill-at-ease, which, according to my mother, I did very well.
Career highlight to date?
My next job.
What roles would you most like to play?
Blanche Dubois in "Streetcar...". I believe I could reveal heart-breaking depths of self-delusion as yet unplumbed.
What's the best advice you have ever received?
"Be bold (which means sometimes be bad) but never ever ever be boring."
What has been your most embarrassing moment on stage?
Splitting my red spandex outfit from my as halfway up my back during the "megamix" finale in Mamma Mia on Broadway.
What is the most annoying part about your job?
Being constantly in the position of having to solicit work. This can lead to what I call "the wallflower syndrome". An actor who simply sits passively waiting to be "asked to dance" dissipates his or her creative energy and can ultimately end up wallowing in victim-mode. This is why I accept a little arrogance as a sign of a healthy actor.
Briefly tell us how you become involved with Herman Kline's Midlife Crisis?
My old friend Kenny Lonergan proposed me to play Herman to playwright Josh Koenigsberg, who studied with Kenny at Columbia.
Briefly tell us about the character you play in Herman Kline's Midlife Crisis?
Herman Kline is an emergency room physician 30 years into a marriage and a career both of which feel to him to have become stagnate and moribund. A medical diagnosis and a bizarre unforseen event precipitate the "mid-life" crisis of the title.
If you had not become a performer, what might you have done instead?
I may well have become a doctor. I'd have loved to be a professional baseball player, but I was flummoxed by a big league quality breaking ball.
Who are your favorite actors/actresses?
I have too many "favorite" actors and actresses to enumerate.
What was the last Broadway show you saw?
Spiderman and I send immense "props" to some very intrepid and hard-working actors.
What was the last book you read?
Cloud Atlas, by David Mitchell.
What was the last film you saw, and name some of your favorite movies?
Last movie seen; honestly? (gulp) Hangover II. Favorite Movies; many, but certainly Mean Streets and Babette's Feast.
Favorite holiday destinations?
North Shore, Cape Ann in Massachussets, Rockport, Glouchester, Marblehead.
Do you have any superstitions?
Everything ominous about the "Scottish play" I entirely buy into. I could tell you stories that would straighten your hair if its curly, and curl it if its straight.
Do you have any hobbies?
Never really been a hobbiest. My favorite way to waste time is doing crossword puzzles.
What are your future plans?
I just feel very privileged and lucky to a fellow-traveler, and part of the fellowship of the theater.
Questions by Alan Bird
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