Join host Ryan Paul as he sits down with regional actor and educator Jacob Dresch for an engaging conversation on the Utah Shakespeare Festival's 65th anniversary Anes Theater season. Jacob shares his journey from Poconos community theater to mastering dual roles as Percy/Victor in Mary Shelley's Frankenstein and Will in The Book Club Play. Explore the power of intimate black box theater, the debate over high versus popular culture, and how embracing authentic character flaws creates deeply resonant stage moments.
Key Takeaway 1: The Journey of a Regional Actor & Educator: Jacob Dresch details his path from high school band and community theater to earning a BFA at DeSales University, an MFA at UC Irvine under mentor Phil Thompson, and balancing professional regional acting with university teaching.
Key Takeaway 2: Unpacking The Book Club Play: An inside look at playing Will, exploring documentary camera meta-dynamics in an intimate three-quarter-round space, and defending the value of popular culture alongside classical literature.
Key Takeaway 3: Dual Roles in Mary Shelley's Frankenstein: Examining the memory-play structure of David Catlin's adaptation while navigating the tragic flaws, hubris, and moral complexities of Victor Frankenstein and Percy Bysshe Shelley
Connect with SUU & The Festival:
Reese Whitaker
You are listening to the APEX Hour, hosted by Ryan Paul on KSUU Thunder 91.1. This show allows more personal time with our guests, allowing them to give us their stories and opinions. We will also give you new music to listen to, hoping you enjoy some new sounds and genres. Welcome to this episode of the APEX Hour.
Lauren Bird
Welcome to the APEX Radio Hour, Utah Shakespeare Festival edition. I'm producer Lauren Bird, and I'm here today with Director of APEX and Professor of History Ryan Paul, and our special guest Jacob Dresch. I'll turn it back over to you, Ryan.
Ryan Paul
Thank you, Lauren. We are so excited to have Jacob Dresch here in the studio with us to be part of our our 65th anniversary podcast celebration. Jacob is in, can I call you Jacob? Oh yeah, I should ask. He is in both the Ains show, so he's in Mary Shelley's Frankenstein and the book club play in Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. He plays Percy and Victor Percy Shelley and Victor Frankenstein, and in the book of play, he plays Will, and we'll talk about that. We had a conversation about you knew I was a museum curator at one point, right?
Jacob Dresch
Oh yeah.
Ryan Paul
I should ask. He is in both the Anes show, so he's in Mary Shelley's Frankenstein and The Book Club Play. In Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, he plays Percy and Victor, Percy Shelley and Victor Frankenstein, and in , he plays Will, and we'll talk about that. We had a conversation about, you knew I was a museum curator at one point, right?
Lauren Bird
Yes.
Ryan Paul
So we talked about that portrayal and how we're not all that way.
Jacob Dresch
How distasteful it was.
Ryan Paul
Well, distasteful isn't the right word. But, so thank you for being here, and we're excited because the Anes shows are a little bit different animal than the other festival shows, and we'll talk about that. So, thank you for being here.
Jacob Dresch
Absolutely, thank you for having me.
Ryan Paul
And we should also say that Lauren's mom, Lola Bird, is in the studio. Lola, thanks for being here with us.
Lola Bird
Thank you for having me today.
Ryan Paul
And actually, we just, I just found out that Lauren just saw The Book Club Play moments ago.
Lauren Bird
Yes, it was wonderful.
Ryan Paul
Like it, this is, this is the the power of the Shakespeare Festival acting company, that Jacob just got off stage, toweled off, pretty much right to here.
Jacob Dresch
Took a shower, ate some dinner, and here I am.
Ryan Paul
So there we go. Okay, so let's start with a question that I ask everybody, which is, it's kind of a how do we get to now question. So can you tell me a little bit about who you are, where you came from, where you grew up, that kind of stuff?
Jacob Dresch
Sure. I mean, to quote Jack Nicholson, I'm a bit of a hick actor. I grew up in the Poconos in Pennsylvania, right outside of I went to public school at area, middle and high school. I was born in New Jersey, but I was gone by third grade, so I don't really remember much of it. And yeah, thankfully, I was in the band out there, and I had a few friends who managed to hear me sing and got me to come see their production of Le Miz in high school, and they were like, "Why aren't you doing this?" And I was like, "I didn't know people could do that. That was pretty cool." And they dragged me into what would become my first production at the community theater that summer, my freshman year did Oklahoma, I was Cord Elam, which, if you don't know who that is, it's the guy who's like, "We should put Curly on trial for killing Judd," and everyone's just like, it's already been three hours, "Oh," you know. And then I was hooked, you know. From then on, I, I was just cast a lot, and then you know, it gave me a direction that I, I followed to undergrad, where I got my bachelor's in acting and directing at DeSales University, which is the home of the Pennsylvania Shakespeare Festival. I interned with them all four years. I was just like the interns here. I was out there doing a green show. I was galleyarding. I was doing custom scripts to wink at the season and playing recorder and crumbhorn and being an Elizabethan fella, and running backstage with five minutes to start the, you know next play that evening.
Ryan Paul
To be spear carrier number one
Jacob Dresch
Exactly, yeah, exactly. To be the fop who faints in Cyrano de Bergerac, and you know, I actually had some really good breakout roles there too. In my intern time, I played Octavius Caesar in Antony and Cleopatra. It was around the 2008 financial crisis, so you know, the budgets dropped, helped, help the old interns get some good juicier parts. And then right out of undergrad, I went to grad school and got my MFA in acting at UC Irvine, where Phil Thompson teaches for many, many, many, many years. He was great mentor of mine. He is the, if I may say so, resident speech coach of the outdoor theater Shakespeare stuff for many years here. And gosh, after that, that's just led to, you know, my adult professional career, which has been all over the country, acting at various Shakespeare festivals. I did another four seasons at the Pen Shakes, I did seasons at Orlando Shakespeare Theater, Texas Shakespeare. I did some off Broadway stuff with Red Bull Theater out in New York City in my tenure there. New York wasn't really my, my jam, and then the pandemic happened, and I was thankfully with my parents, sort of taking care of them, because they had a few things happen, and, but everything was okay. And then, you know I came out to Colorado, do Colorado shakes. I've been there for the last five years, making a pretty much a full time living, either as a actor or as a professor of acting at various universities around the country.
Ryan Paul
So is that where you're based now, is in Colorado?
Jacob Dresch
Yes, sir.
Ryan Paul
So what did you play in the band?
Jacob Dresch
Oh, I was the saxophone.
Ryan Paul
Hold on a second.
Jacob Dresch
Yeah.
Ryan Paul
Sir, don't call me. You call me Ryan or, or Fatty or Baldy or whatever. You don't have to call me sir. You listen to me. That's not how we do things here in the. Oh, I like it. I
Jacob Dresch
You listen to me.
Ryan Paul
That's not how we do things here in the studio.
Jacob Dresch
Oh, I like it. I like it.
Ryan Paul
So, what did you play in the band? Saxophone?
Jacob Dresch
Saxophone. Yeah, I started on alto. I eventually went to Bari, and then I was drum major for a couple years, and I also did tenor.
Ryan Paul
So, what did your parents do for a living?
Jacob Dresch
Yeah, that's a good question. I mean, my mom, for a good part of my childhood, was lucky enough to be a stay-at-home mom with me and my and my sister, my only other sibling, and my dad was sort of a he was essentially Michael Scott from The Office. He was like the president of a wing of a printing company of Merrill Lynch.
Ryan Paul
In Pennsylvania.
Jacob Dresch
In, in, in that, that was sort of the New Jersey days. By the time we moved to Pennsylvania, that had sort of fallen apart, and he did a lot of like wonderful, strange, odd jobs. I remember as a kid, we we would go and repair water heaters under people's vacation homes and stuff. Those were some wild David Lynchian, you know, strange adventures as a kid with my dad, and then he also ran his own private boat rental business for a while, and then unfortunately he, he became disabled, and he's been on disability for many, many years now.
Ryan Paul
So he just went from office work to just kind of journeyman,
Jacob Dresch
Yeah, journeyman, yeah, taking care of us. And my mom became, gosh, she spent many, many years as sort of like a vice manager of a, of a vacation, what are they? You know, like hotel motel kind of things, vacated Tanglewood, and then for the last several, like 10 years or so, she's been an optometrist assistant.
Ryan Paul
Wow! And they're still back east.
Jacob Dresch
They actually just recently, a couple years ago, moved out to the springs to be nearer to me in Colorado.
Ryan Paul
Look at that!
Jacob Dresch
They're just, they're about an hour south of me.
Ryan Paul
That's wonderful.
Jacob Dresch
Yeah.
Ryan Paul
So, as a kid, what what's the first thing you remember wanting to be as you grew up.
Jacob Dresch
That's interesting. I that's interesting. I was always sort of, I was a terribly shy child, which now doesn't seem to make any sense to people, but it makes a lot of sense to me. Gosh, the first thing, I probably, I was just so immersed in the video game world, role playing games, Final Fantasy. I was just very, very into those escapist, story driven, character driven. So I probably wanted to be a video game designer without really understanding what that meant.
Ryan Paul
You know, my brother in law is a video game designer, Lauren.
Lauren Bird
Oh, cool.
Jacob Dresch
Oh, nice, Ryan.
Ryan Paul
Well, for him.
Jacob Dresch
Hook me up.
Ryan Paul
What do you need? So, in, you go and you, for whatever reason, gravitate to band, and but you're not taking, in, like high school, you're not doing really drama stuff. You're just doing stuff, and then someone hears you sing. Is that how that plays out?
Jacob Dresch
Yeah, it was essentially like a friend who was in the musical heard me singing in the car or something like that to the musical while we hung out or something, and they were like, "Why didn't you audition?" I was like, "What's auditioning?"
Ryan Paul
And, and then you went to college specifically to become an actor.
Jacob Dresch
Yes.
Ryan Paul
Now, the in, here at the festival, you're, you're in what we would call a straight play, right?
Jacob Dresch
Yeah.
Ryan Paul
Not a musical. Is that, do you do musicals? I mean, have you shifted that, or do you kind of do both?
Jacob Dresch
You know, I did a lot of musicals in my college days, and in my, and in, yeah my graduate school days, I didn't do as many when I got right out of school. It became more of like a special skill or talent. I definitely have gravitated towards Shakespeare, classic comedies, but really genre bending. That's how I keep selling myself. It's just like, I like to do a lot of different stuff, and I have done musicals. I mean, just last year I was the swing at Denver Center for Little Shop of Horrors. I covered the dentist, I covered Seymour, and I covered Mister Mushnik, pretty much everyone but the plant, and I went on for Seymour at least six times.
Ryan Paul
What's the difference between a swing and an understudy?
Jacob Dresch
Ah, I feel like swings, it tends to be you, you cover more tracks, right? I'm the understudy for Bob Cratchit, but I was the swing for Little Shop. Does that make sense?
Ryan Paul
Right, right. So you cover multiple. So they, you could do lots of different things.
Jacob Dresch
Yeah, and I would I would say the definition is rather blurred. The real definition on Broadway is that, like, you are an off-stage, you cover multiple tracks of advanced choreography. That's sort of like a specialized swing.
Ryan Paul
So you show up before the show starts in case anybody's sick, and then when the show starts, you go home.
Jacob Dresch
You tend to, every every place has sort of different rules about how they handle it in terms of like, do you need to be in a certain radius of the theater so that you can be on call, or do you have to be on premises?
Ryan Paul
So in college, you're are you the the go to actor in the drama department, or are you, I mean, you the one that everyone wanted to be
Jacob Dresch
I felt, I felt like, that's an interesting question. I don't know. Maybe. I definitely was getting cast a lot, so much that I felt like they burnt me out a little bit in undergrad. They burnt me out a little bit, but I definitely went to a school that I think was the right size pond for me, where it wasn't so large, it wasn't an NYU where I was just going to get lost and have to self-generate all the time. But I, there were definitely times I didn't get the role I wanted. I didn't get cast as a main character, right? Like I, you know, I had to learn how to do core, the choral roles, the supporting roles, the understudies. And, and the nice thing about DeSales is that even if you were in the show, but especially if you weren't, you were working on the crew. You were doing some kind of thing that made you involved in the show and made you appreciate sort of all facets of the production.
Ryan Paul
So when you when you did this, I mean, when you, I would imagine that the grad, you know, I went to grad school for history, so it's a it's a little different track of what you decide you want to do, right? But when you're in grad school for acting or for theater, is is there a decision you have to make to be, I'm going to go on a musical theater track, I'm going to go on a Shakespeare, a classical track?
Jacob Dresch
Definitely. I could have done a musical theater major. In fact, I I was I almost went to Penn State for that. But yeah, I wanted to, I don't know. I had an interest in the classics and in like real, it sounds so silly now because I realize how legitimately difficult musicals are, and how much you have to be a like terrific classical actor to to embody them really really well. But you know, at the time when I was a young man, 18, I was like, "I want to be legit actor, want to be, I'm gonna be,"
Ryan Paul
But not, not,
Jacob Dresch
A great character.
Ryan Paul
Not, those are the parts that I get. I'm the character, I'm the character.
Jacob Dresch
They're the most interesting ones.
Lauren Bird
They're so fun.
Ryan Paul
They're the part in my life. So in, in this discussion, I mean, I trying to back think about this internal dialogue, right? Between you know, what you decide. I mean, you go to school to be an actor, but do you go to school to say I want to go to New York or I want to be in film and television? Was that ever an option, or do you want to be, as I overtalk my question, or do you want to to be a regional theater, just a working actor? What does that?
Jacob Dresch
I definitely, at the time, saw, especially when I was interning, I saw families that had made their living and were staples in the regional theater community around Philadelphia and New York, and you know, it seemed like a very strong possibility. Today, it's a lot harder. I would say economically, they just lived in a much different given circumstances. But yeah, I definitely think, even if I didn't realize it at the time, there was something romantic to me about the the great yeoman regional theater actor and, you know, like the middle class actor in terms of TV film that definitely felt like an option at the end of my UC Irvine days I was definitely like, going into meetings at Paramount and meeting a producer or a casting director and they're like, "well why don't you want to stay in LA?" And I, my thought was, I like, I wanted to be, you know, a stage actor. I wanted to be on Broadway. I didn't really have a ton of film experience. I didn't necessarily, you know, I feel like I've gotten a little better at this in my older age, but you know, when I was a young 24-year-old, I was pretty Jim Carrey, big, in terms of the acting, and I was just like, I don't know if that's gonna work out very well in terms of TV film. Foolish now, I should have been on you know New Girl or something, doing a clown, but but yeah, so you know, it was a, it was a fork in the road, and I felt like I was like, no, no, no, I feel like I, I got to see what New York is like. It seems like the place that's calling to me. And you know, in the long run, in my five years, I found it wasn't really my tempo. The thing I miss most are, you know, the restaurants, the museums, the Met, opera, and my friends.
Ryan Paul
So, was there if if if a role came up in a musical.
Jacob Dresch
Sure.
Ryan Paul
What what is the, what is the the one that you would say, I would give it all up to do that?
Jacob Dresch
Oh sure. I mean, after doing Little Shop of Horrors, I think The Dentist is a pretty fantastic role. Though I have to say, I had a blast as Seymore. It was, it's a really wonder. That script, that score is so perfect. It's I think it's one of the best, well-made musicals. I mean, the laughs per minute, the heart inside of it, the sort of macabre journey. I'm sure we'll talk a lot about macabre with Frankenstein coming up, but the Macabre and the dark humor and the sort of Lovecraftian temptation of the plant. I just think there's not a bad role in that show. I would do anything in that musical.
Ryan Paul
Well, and I, I like the fact, speaking of that show specifically, if the the milieu in which it is set in, like this kind of '50s sci-fi Cold War. You know, we, we, we don't know what's next, but it's got to be a, you know, got to be flying cars and jetpacks.
Jacob Dresch
Sure.
Ryan Paul
Right
Jacob Dresch
An age of like a new a new hope for everyone.
Ryan Paul
Right, right. It reminds me of that. Do you ever watch The Twilight Zone? Oh, absolutely. There's a fantastic episode called "To Serve Man. Oh, it's terrific! And and that was just a cookbook. Yeah, it's a cookbook. It was just on. You know how like you're flipping, you turn the TV on before you switch to the, and it's just there. I'm still one of those old school people that use Dish Network. Oh yeah, but but I love the Twilight Zone. I used to
Jacob Dresch
Oh, absolutely.
Ryan Paul
There's a fantastic episode called, To Serve Man.
Jacob Dresch
Oh, it's terrific!
Ryan Paul
And, and that was,
Jacob Dresch
It's a cookbook!
Ryan Paul
Yeah, it's a cookbook. It was just on. You know how like you're flipping, you turn the TV on before you switch to the, and it's just there. I'm still one of those old school people that use Dish Network.
Jacob Dresch
Oh yeah.
Ryan Paul
But, but I love the Twilight Zone.
Jacob Dresch
I used to watch the Thanksgiving marathon as a kid all the time on the Sci-Fi Channel and stuff.
Ryan Paul
Yeah, but I saw that To Serve Man. And for those of you don't know, it's, these aliens come and they essentially bring peace and harmony and they teach the world how to be better and and everyone and then come to our planet and then they have this language that this woman is trying to translate and and they're, they're teaching people how to eat new and healthy foods that make them, everyone's so happy and there's such a promise of the future, and there's years long waiting list to get on the UFO. And this woman's, I don't, boyfriend or whatever finally gets his his number to go on the UFO, and just she translates it, and it's a cookbook!
Jacob Dresch
It's a cookbook!
Ryan Paul
Just as he gets on there, and they're cooking humans, Lauren. They're cooking humans.
Lauren Bird
Dang.
Jacob Dresch
It's not to help us, it's to serve us as a meal.
Ryan Paul
It adds a whole new meaning to that. It's just, it's a.
Jacob Dresch
It was their version of .
Ryan Paul
Yeah, Rod Serling is brilliant. But that reminds me of that kind of, of that same kind of stuff. Lola, were you a Twilight Zone? Are you a Twilight Zone fan?
Lola Bird
I haven't seen many episodes.
Jacob Dresch
Oh, I could give you a long list.
Lola Bird
But I'm gonna have to check it out.
Ryan Paul
I could.
Lauren Bird
The episodes I've seen, I watched in AP US History because that's what we did after the AP test. It was awesome.
Ryan Paul
Let me let me, let me get. you watched The Monsters Are On Maple Street.
Jacob Dresch
Oh, fabulous!
Ryan Paul
That's a classic about communism that,
Jacob Dresch
Yeah, like the Red Scare, the nukes are going to drive.
Ryan Paul
I used to show it in my class all the time.
Lauren Bird
Nice.
Jacob Dresch
I loved Here At, was it 10,000 feet? With Will Shatter, the gremlin on the airplane. Fantastic.
Ryan Paul
Yep. Anyway, so we, we digress, but I, I you go to grad school, you make decision. What's the first? This is a two-part question. The first part of the question is, what's your first gig as a paid actor after school?
Jacob Dresch
After school? Because I was definitely doing summers where I was being a paid actor during school. After school, I'm trying to think. I think it might have been Pennsylvania Shakespeare Festival. I had just graduated. I did have an offer to come to Utah Shakespeare Festival, and I turned it down because the I was going to play leads at the Pennsylvania Shakespeare Festival instead of Dromio of Ephesus, I think it was, here as an, as an intern. They were going to hire me as an actor at Pen Shakes finally, and so I went out and did Malcolm in Macbeth in repertory with, oh I forget his name. It's the lead character in Lend Me a Tenor, the nervous neurotic guy who winds up having to pretend to be the opera star.
Ryan Paul
Not the musical, but the play.
Jacob Dresch
The play by Ken Ludwig.
Ryan Paul
You know there's musical,
Jacob Dresch
Right there's a musical adaptation.
Ryan Paul
The festival commissioned one. It didn't, had some issues, but not not the play. But overall, there were some complications, but it went to the West End, and,
Jacob Dresch
Interesting.
Ryan Paul
So we've never done the play.
Jacob Dresch
Heard of it,
Ryan Paul
But you never.
Jacob Dresch
I've never seen.
Ryan Paul
So was there a moment when you said, what was the moment where you said, "I can do this," right? That like, you, you've done the work, you've done the time, and and you just say, yeah, I can make this work. Was there a moment in your life that happened?
Jacob Dresch
Interesting. I feel like it's happened a few times. As an artist, you wind up having like weird peaks and valleys of, of hope and doubt, and I feel like in grad school, I definitely felt like, I've been in school enough, I understand. I not only feel like I can do it, I feel like I can help other people do it better too. That's the main reason I went right right out of undergrad, is I knew on some level, I just had such wonderful mentors in undergrad that I admired them, and I felt it wasn't just a safety net, it was a passion for me. That, like, eventually, I would like to teach at the professorial level. And since I, you know, was at grad school and left, that, that has been my day job, if you will, rather than waiting tables.
Ryan Paul
So,
Jacob Dresch
Cause I have done a lot of adjunct work all around the country.
Ryan Paul
So your summers generally are in the theater, and then you go back and teach classes in Colorado.
Jacob Dresch
Yeah, yeah, yeah. And actually, in Colorado, the acting's been going so well, I haven't been able to teach for the last couple of years, other than the occasional you know private coaching or master class.
Ryan Paul
So, what, as you, as you think about this idea of making it work. When you, when you went to your parents and your parents said, Jacob, what do you want to be when you, and, and you said I, you know, I want to be an actor.
Jacob Dresch
Yeah.
Ryan Paul
What was their?
Jacob Dresch
I would say, you know unlike the stereotypical parents you see on television, they, they were extremely supportive. I think they recognized in me that there was an eccentricity and a, a creative side of me that was very much made, I was becoming a better human the more I did that in my life. I was coming out of my shell. I was becoming more and more myself, and I think they saw that. They nurtured that in me, and in spite of the inevitable obstacles of artistry, right? They helped and supported me, and I definitely would not have been able to make a start of things without their like constant saying yes. Does that make sense?
Ryan Paul
Yeah, it's an interesting statement, though. I mean, when you talk about how most people, not, like you say, the stereotypical is, "I want to be an actor," and it's like, well, you got to have a fallback, and,
Jacob Dresch
Yeah, they definitely, they actually thought like, the getting my education was the good fallback, if you really wanted to. It was like, being serious about that, being a good academic student, not just a dumb actor, and you know, thinking of it in the long term of how do I make that into a professorial career that, you know had a little bit of directing and acting and teaching, you know, sort of in a good balance with each other.
Ryan Paul
What I think is speaks to, it seems to me, to your parents is, is that it was almost the opposite where they said, "Yes, this is good for him."
Jacob Dresch
Yeah.
Ryan Paul
Hes going to be okay.
Jacob Dresch
Yeah.
Ryan Paul
Right, I mean, as parents we worry about,
Jacob Dresch
I think there was a while there they were pretty worried. I think like when they dropped me off in New York City, you know, that was intense for them, and definitely, I don't blame them. My first New York apartment was nightmarish and Dostoevsky-an, and it was wild. But you know, I figured out ways to make that better.
Ryan Paul
Good. Let's take our first break. For those of you who have listened to the podcast or the radio show before, know that we ask our guests to give us a list of five songs of which we choose four to to play instead of commercials. And and we've done this, Lauren and I've done this for a long time. Was this a difficult thing for you?
Jacob Dresch
Absolutely. This was the most horrifying ask I've, I've had in years. No, it was just so difficult. I feel like I, I'm such a, a fool for a ballad, and I was just like I can't send them a bunch of sad musical theater and you know, singer songwriter songs. So I've done my best to choose the, the, some chipper ones.
Ryan Paul
I think these are great, and and first of all, you can send us whatever you want. We've had, we've had,
Lauren Bird
We've had exciting ones.
Ryan Paul
Yeah, yeah, we've had, like Beth Lopes gave us our her Hamlet playlist, which is you know moody to say the least.
Jacob Dresch
I imagine so.
Ryan Paul
So this is great. So the song I want to start with first is a song that that is exactly how you describe, and this song is called Simon Smith and the Amazing Dancing Bear by the incredible Randy Newman.
Jacob Dresch
Randy Newman.
Ryan Paul
Why did you choose this song?
Jacob Dresch
Randy Newman is a great musical hero of mine. I think I have listened to every single one of his songs. That I think, if there was ever a game show where I only heard the first two seconds of any of his tracks, I would be killing that game. I got to meet him years ago after a concert he held in Philadelphia in like, two 2017. He's just a hero of mine. I just think he's the American Kurt Vile. He he writes these wonderfully character driven satirical songs, and I think Simon Smith and the Amazing Dancing Bear is, there's a certain way to think about what it's like to be an actor, and that is Simon Smith and the Amazing Dancing Bear.
Ryan Paul
Okay, this is Simon Smith and the Amazing Dancing Bear by Randy Newman.
Lauren Bird
That was Simon Smith and the Amazing Dancing Bear by Randy Newman. You're listening to the APEX Radio Hour Utah Shakespeare Festival edition. I'll turn it back to you, Ryan.
Ryan Paul
Thank you, Lauren. So we're here with Jacob Dresch, he's the actor, an actor here in the Anes Company. He plays Percy and Victor in Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, and he plays Will and another,
Jacob Dresch
Yes, Frank.
Ryan Paul
Frank
Jacob Dresch
Secret service agent.
Ryan Paul
In, in The Book Club Play, which we'll talk about in a second because I want to talk about Frank in, when I saw it, so, but let's, let me, let's go here. So for those of you who who don't know, the Anes Theater, the, the company in the Anes Theater is a little bit different than the company in the other, in the Randall and the Engelstad. They arrive earlier, they are in rep generally with each other. The Ain shows open a couple weeks, two or three weeks later than that, and they open, and generally, they they're not in rep with anything else, right? That, generally you you all do just the two Anes.
Jacob Dresch
Yeah, it's an interior company.
Ryan Paul
Yeah, is that what they call it?
Jacob Dresch
Yeah, yeah, you know, it's it's insular and isolated from the rest of the company, it's true
Ryan Paul
Which is a, and is performs in a different space.
Jacob Dresch
Yeah.
Ryan Paul
Certainly.
Jacob Dresch
Yeah.
Ryan Paul
If you've never been to a show in the Anes, it is a, black box isn't the right word, but it's a big black box, right? I mean, the seats are interchangeable. You can, we've done different layouts in the Anes, but, but it's intimate, 150 seats.
Jacob Dresch
Yeah, maybe a little over that.
Ryan Paul
Something like that. And so it's, you, you are in the presence, literally, of the acting company.
Jacob Dresch
Yeah, and it's a three quarter round. So you're on three side, three out of the four sides of the actors.
Ryan Paul
Yeah, and it's, it's, it's a beautifully complex, but simple space, that it's amazing to see how people design it and move around in it in, in that way. It is by nature smaller, but also this season, the highest selling plays are the two that you're in, right? I mean, The Book Club Play. I mean, there are people who couldn't get tickets to either of them.
Jacob Dresch
Yeah, we are constantly getting people turned away because we're out of tickets.
Ryan Paul
Out of tickets because it's just a, an amazing collection of plays that John DiAntonio has programmed here. So also, what I want to talk about this, as we talk about these plays, the the back room, backstage space is, I would imagine, significantly different,
Jacob Dresch
It's tight.
Ryan Paul
Than, than other theaters. Can you talk about that?
Jacob Dresch
Sure. I mean, I would say it's it's on par with many black box theaters I've been in around the country, is that like, it is a tight hallway-like space. Where the dressing rooms are, that's always sort of different. In our case it's like, you know, you guys have the lobby, and then we're sort of on the one little side of it. But in terms of the the backstage area, like where you walk in to get your seats, that's our backstage. That little hallway-sized, you know, two-person-wide ramp that continues on the other side, and then we have a little similar crossover behind the great white backdrop, the scrim or the psych.
Ryan Paul
And I, I, which is complicated in the fact that you know, when we orient these shows in the Grove specifically, well, these two specifically, we're very clear that because of the nature of that, late seating is really, really challenging, right? Like if you go, if you have to go out, you may be out for 20 minutes.
Jacob Dresch
Well, and especially with the way these are particularly staged by both directors, is there's a lot of us in the aisles, up the aisle of the stairs on the risers. So I could see, I could imagine different plays where the actors are just on stage the whole time, where you know it wouldn't be quite a problem. Even though, boy, it's such an intimate space. You really do feel when the audience walks in.
Ryan Paul
In this time you've been here, has there ever been a moment where you've turned the corner and there's some old lady sitting there looking at you.
Jacob Dresch
No, I actually think, you know, to our ushers and our house manager's credit, that no, I have not, I have not been. They, they seem to have communicated well with the stage manager in terms of like, what moments, what timing would be best and safest for both the, our performers and our patrons, and they take really good care of us. I haven't had that happen. I occasionally, on the way out, right after curtain call, like see an usher go like, "Good job," you know, but that's probably been the worst of it.
Ryan Paul
So I always, I talk to people about when we when we orient the show that if you've seen like a NFL football game, like the God Cam, how they show the, raise it up and you see the whole state, all the whole field. I, in some ways, wish that we had,
Jacob Dresch
A bird's eye.
Ryan Paul
A bird's eye there in that theater to see what's going on as you run around and, and do those.
Jacob Dresch
Oh, sure, right, to see like everything, everything. That's interesting. I mean, our stage management team up in the booth. That camera that we play as our documentary camera, that really is the stage manager's infrared, so that they can see in, like the blackout chaos, like what's going on, and keep an eye on us on stage. I'm pretty sure there's also a camera in the trap of Frankenstein. So they do have some eyes that the audience never really gets to see.
Ryan Paul
Eyes that see.
Jacob Dresch
Yeah.
Ryan Paul
So, let's talk about your specific casting at the festival. So when, you mentioned that years ago you were an offer was made, and and you had other things to do. Yeah, so it was like
Jacob Dresch
Yeah.
Ryan Paul
So,
Jacob Dresch
It was like 10, 12 years ago.
Ryan Paul
Let's talk about, how do you end up here?
Jacob Dresch
Well, I have many, many friends who work here, who have worked here and work here, who have spoken extremely highly of their experience. They are correct. It has been a wonderful mecca of repertory theater, which is like, my great passion. How do I end up here? I've been knocking on the door for a few years with video submissions and callbacks, and this year was no different. I did, I mean, my goodness, I definitely did an initial whose window closed in about five minutes. I'm glad I got under the wire there. Yeah, they had like thousands of submissions in the span of five to 10 minutes, and then I had a callback for Victor Frankenstein. I'll actually give you the full scoop rather than the edited version. I did a full video callback for Victor Frankenstein and Alex in the book club play, not Will. That seemed like things didn't work out there because then I had a second callback to tape where I was taping The Monster, and then I actually got the no, and then they reached out and asked me, "Could you tape Victor Frankenstein again? Things have sort of moved around." I said, "I already taped it. Do you want me to retape?" And they said, "Actually, we'll just watch that first one you did," and I booked that.
Ryan Paul
And that was it.
Jacob Dresch
Yeah.
Ryan Paul
So when you say a video, this is you, this is a self tape.
Jacob Dresch
Yes, a self.
Ryan Paul
Not like you're on Zoom and he says, John, John and Tanya, you say okay, you know, walk around.
Jacob Dresch
Sometimes I wish they would do it that way because then you could, I don't know. There's a little bit. Self tapes are tough because you're, it's very just, it's just the product. It's very hard to communicate like what it's like to be in a room with you, which is honestly how you spend most of your time together on a job, it's not really doing the acting, it's being a person and being a professional.
Ryan Paul
And I would imagine that in the, so there's, what, six of you? Seven of you, in the?
Jacob Dresch
So there's six.
Ryan Paul
Six of you. You think,
Jacob Dresch
There's five of us in Frankenstein six of us in Book Club.
Ryan Paul
Day one, of course, you don't know, do they tell you who your castmates are before you get out here?
Jacob Dresch
Oh, you find out when they announce it, or through the grapevine. If you know people in the cast already, you can generally, you know, actors, you know, "hey, I just got the offer," or whatever.
Ryan Paul
Did you know anybody in this cast?
Jacob Dresch
Oh yeah, I know Chloe. She's my partner. She plays Jen in Book Club.
Ryan Paul
Yeah, yeah, okay.
Jacob Dresch
And and then I knew Matt Zambrano, who directed Book Club. So you, because he's a Denverite. I love him. I've admired his work for many, many years. In fact, I saw him play Will in the production of Book Club that they did at Arvada Center.
Ryan Paul
Oh, really?
Jacob Dresch
Up in the Denver area, yeah.
Ryan Paul
Did you see him when he was here as an actor? When, did you come?
Jacob Dresch
No, I never. This is my first time truly at the festival. I've never been able to visit. I've,
Ryan Paul
Because you're always working.
Jacob Dresch
Yeah.
Ryan Paul
And I would imagine that's the challenge, it would seem to me, would be you're here in a show, but you still have to think about what happens in November.
Jacob Dresch
Yes.
Ryan Paul
Right?
Ryan Paul
Yes.
Ryan Paul
And how does that wheel?
Jacob Dresch
It is part of the trials and tribulations of being an actor, that whenever you are working on this gig, you are actively auditioning for the next three.
Ryan Paul
With like, you're not, you're creating new self tapes versus like, hey can I just use 10 minutes of Victor Frankenstein and get it squared away?
Jacob Dresch
I wish it sort of worked that way. That would be nice. It would be sort of nice to just pass along to like, hey what do you think about, that, is that in the zone? Yeah. No, you tend to, you make new self tapes or you have, like I will literally have a callback when I return to Denver. I get there October 4. I have it the morning of October 5.
Ryan Paul
Wow.
Jacob Dresch
So that will be for a mid March. So like right now I'm, I've done Jacob Marley at the Denver Center for the past four years. I'm returning to that for my fifth year, and then I have the offer that I've agreed to. I haven't signed anything official, but Orlando Shakespeare Festival with Carolyn, who directed Troilus and Cressida, playing Touchstone for her. Along with Rodney and Walt.
Ryan Paul
Because they, their, their season is a little, their season is not in the summer.
Jacob Dresch
Yeah, their season's great. It's January, it's like mid January through mid March, so that's the, that's the perfect time to
Ryan Paul
So you, you get here in the Anes Company, and you you realize that these are the people in the lifeboat for the next three months.
Jacob Dresch
Yeah.
Ryan Paul
And has that ever? I mean, is that a unique situation in this small lifeboat? Like, have you done stuff like this before?
Jacob Dresch
Oh, absolutely.
Ryan Paul
Just with these,
Jacob Dresch
Absolutely. I've done many, many little, like tiny miniature rep companies that, that do like a little play, or I mean, every play is essentially that. It's just like, okay, these are the people. I hope we get along, and if we don't, I hope I can figure it out, you know? And you, you just try to learn to like, live and play with them, and everything's a little different.
Ryan Paul
And then,
Jacob Dresch
This time it turned out fantastically. These were five and six I would take, I would do many, many, many more plays with these people.
Ryan Paul
And then your parents pick you up from summer camp, and it's, and you go home, right? You're with these people in the woods, and then you go home.
Jacob Dresch
Yeah, yeah. It's a strange little commune you you wind up creating.
Ryan Paul
Okay, let's talk about the, let's do this. Let's talk about the book club play, and then we'll take a break, and then we'll talk about Frank Mary Shelley's Frankenstein.
Jacob Dresch
Excellent.
Ryan Paul
Does that work? Does that order work for you?
Jacob Dresch
Oh, I love it.
Ryan Paul
So, for those that don't know, will you give us the 30 second summary of The Book Club Play?
Jacob Dresch
Of The Book Club Play? Yeah. The Book Club Play is about a book club that essentially gets the very special invasive opportunity of being a part of a groundbreaking documentary by Lars Knudsen, who is a kind of you know, Werner Herzog, shall we say, of of the documentary world, and unfortunately, that is going to drive their group dynamic into some very strange, hilarious escapades, especially when Alex shows up, a new member that disrupts the entire social circle. And yeah, I don't know, drama, hilarity, secrets. They just, they really do change under that strange bug-eyed camera.
Ryan Paul
Yeah, which is a metaphor for theater, right? Because you still are having 150 people,
Jacob Dresch
Yeah.
Ryan Paul
Stare at your intimacy.
Jacob Dresch
Right. They are the camera.
Ryan Paul
Right? They are the camera.
Jacob Dresch
Yeah. There is a meta ness to it that they just, they're just not the same. I don't think those people are the same people they were before the camera. Everyone just starts being a little, and they can't quite keep it up.
Ryan Paul
Yeah, I certainly wasn't the same person, Lauren. I had painful memories.
Jacob Dresch
And it's hilarious. I just think it's a very heart forward dramedy. Almost, it's, it's, it's a sitcom with some real soul to it.
Ryan Paul
Yeah. This is where we need to make a decision because I want to ask you some questions,
Jacob Dresch
Oh, sure.
Ryan Paul
About both of these plays, that would necessitate the fact that one has seen it.
Jacob Dresch
Yeah, sure.
Ryan Paul
So should we do that?
Jacob Dresch
Yeah, I think if we just tell people like, "Hey, content warning."
Ryan Paul
Pause the, fast forward to to whatever time Lauren will put in the timestamp, but we we wanted to have you seen the play Lola?
Lola Bird
Yes, I've seen it twice. It's amazing.
Ryan Paul
Okay, so that we're good then.
Ryan Paul
She loved it so much. She saw it twice.
Ryan Paul
This is how much I care about Lola. Is that, if she said I hadn't seen it, we would completely change the the track of the interview.
Jacob Dresch
Pivot.
Ryan Paul
So we're going to talk about spoilers in the play, of these plays. So if you haven't seen them, either pause or just read the ending of the book before you before you you start. Because here we go.
Lauren Bird
Spoilers for the Book Club Play end at 1 hour 1 minute and 53 seconds.
Ryan Paul
So the the play begins with, with these people who are, five people who are just, had been in each other's lives tangentially, and, and we, we reveal their their backstory. Your character is a museum curator,
Jacob Dresch
Of Greek antiquities.
Ryan Paul
Of Greek antiquities, not stuffy, but, what would you?
Jacob Dresch
Oh, sure.
Ryan Paul
Uptight?
Jacob Dresch
He's definitely in that strange geeky archetype of being a little high strung and particular. He's, which is funny because I also do think he does come off as a little frumpy. Probably because I'm frumpy. So you know,
Ryan Paul
Well, and he doesn't know. It's someone who,
Jacob Dresch
He doesn't know.
Ryan Paul
Thinks he knows who he is.
Jacob Dresch
Yeah, he doesn't know.
Ryan Paul
And maybe he does?
Jacob Dresch
And maybe he does. I know.
Ryan Paul
This is, this is what I want to ask,
Jacob Dresch
Yeah.
Ryan Paul
The big reveal of, of Will is that they kind of hint, someone, Chloe, the character, hints that, that he's, the assumption that he's gay because of he of the stereotypical, I don't know, gayness or whatever.
Jacob Dresch
Yeah, the bow ties, the the Brooks brothers, the talk about, the proclivity for antiquities. I mean, he goes by, you know, the third.
Ryan Paul
Yeah, right.
Jacob Dresch
And I just think, yeah, it was an interesting question, and it was something that, you know, Matt has played the role before, and I felt like he was a great resource at how to find the truth of this guy. And it is, I don't know, it was interesting. We sort of, I had just done The Mousetrap right before this at Arvada Center, where I played Christopher Wren, and you know, when you do that kind of play, there's so much of, it's almost, you almost have to interpret the play as the, through the lens of what kind of red herrings and false leads we want to present to the audience as truthful to like mislead them. And I felt like we talked a little bit in that language of just like, you know, how are we hinting at it without over pushing the envelope so that you definitely can't say for sure this, this, or this? Same thing. Like that scene ends with Ana being like, "He's secretly in love with me."
Ryan Paul
Yeah.
Jacob Dresch
You know, and I feel like then in scene two, we do layer in some interesting behavior that does sort of look like, oh, well right maybe he's just sort of eccentric and he does sort of like miss Ana and it's tragic in that way, and then of course that's not the case and you know, I do think in the playing of, it, it's interesting to have crafted someone who's so in the closet that they're out of the closet?
Ryan Paul
Yeah, like he protests too much. Right? Like,
Jacob Dresch
He protests too much. Exactly, it's a Gertrude theme of the season.
Ryan Paul
Yeah. I mean, I'm wondering, did you, when you went into this in the, in your mind or however you discuss it with yourself or other people, what do you think? Are you, when you play Will, is Will a man who is knows that he's gay, or is, you know, and just kind of holding things back, or does he, is the back of his mind like yes, this is me, but, or, or is it really a true when he had, when we have this revelation, like I am gay, right? Is it, is he saying something that he is just pushed so far back to the mind that it's made forward, or is he really making a real a self realization?
Jacob Dresch
Yeah, it's an interesting question. I feel like my main guiding force is like Karen's wonderful dialogue. I just feel like I have to just, like it's the, it's a little bit of a clown lesson I learned that like, the only thing that's true is the truth right now, and that like if I line up, it's also sort of what I learned from like John Barton's Playing Shakespeare stuff. It's just like, try not to iron out the contradictions. Contradictions are the character, and if you play all of those as earnestly as possible in the moment, when the last contradiction falls into place, it actually all becomes perfectly sensible, or it becomes the character. Like that's the arc is a series, contradictions. And so yeah. In the beginning, if I was to really psychoanalyze it, which I try to avoid doing, though I do love it when I'm an audience member, I do it all the time. I do think he's just so deeply repressed about it, that, and, and finds it on some level embarrassing and inappropriate.
Ryan Paul
Which is interesting to me.
Jacob Dresch
Almost Malvolian, you know, like there's something a little, there's something a little buttoned up about him where he finds that inappropriate.
Ryan Paul
And I think, I think the what's fascinating to me as I think about it is that when that revelation comes out, Ana and Rob are like, "Wow, this is weird to us in some ways." Like this, so they're shocked. But everybody else is like, "Oh yeah, yeah," that, that, that they react differently because their, almost definition of themselves in some way is tied into how Will thinks of them.
Jacob Dresch
Exactly, I think. I think they're also very old friends. I think it has slow burned over many, many, many, many years in a way that none of them were able to quite interpret correctly.
Ryan Paul
Yeah.
Jacob Dresch
Yeah, yeah. And so, and I think the genius of like, gosh, this guy's so repressed that he literally like, "you are gay," and he's like, "I am?" Yeah, it's quite comic, but also sort of beautiful and true, that, gosh, he just really, he had pushed that so far down.
Ryan Paul
Yeah, and I love this moment because it's almost like, you know that Helen Reddy song where it's like, "I am woman." You know, you get to the chorus about "I've been downtrodden and beaten, but I am woman." It's like, "I am here, I am here, I am here!" See me!
Jacob Dresch
Sure.
Ryan Paul
And I love
Jacob Dresch
Yeah, it's a, and I think that's what's beautiful about the play too is that like, the bug-eyed camera alienates them. They start to not be able to be the best, for like, the best versions we can be, right? But in failing to be the best versions, our best selves, our better selves, they actually wind up becoming their true selves. That's maybe a better logline than what what I gave you.
Ryan Paul
Do they become the true selves because of the camera, or because of?
Jacob Dresch
Their inability to keep up the facade in front of the camera.
Ryan Paul
It's so much work.
Jacob Dresch
Yeah.
Ryan Paul
To be in front of the camera.
Jacob Dresch
They can't lie. That nobody can be a liar like that, that, that well, and it winds up actually being like revelatory for them.
Ryan Paul
Yeah.
Jacob Dresch
And they all become their, they actually do become their better selves.
Ryan Paul
Well, two two more things I want to talk about before we take a break, but I, I think that's exactly right. And what I have processed with this play, which, which quite frankly, I saw in dress rehearsal because that's when I have to see him education wise, and then I couldn't get a ticket. Like I haven't been able to get ticket to see it again. So, what I've been thinking about as I've heard other people talk about it is, and, and, and upon having it marinate in my mind, is that each one of these characters walks dangerously, but beautifully close to stereotypical. Does that make sense? Like,
Jacob Dresch
Definitely.
Ryan Paul
Like Will is the stereotypical guy. It's like, oh yes, Rob is the you know the disheveled,
Jacob Dresch
Yeah.
Ryan Paul
Handsome husband.
Jacob Dresch
Yeah, the clueless husband.
Ryan Paul
Right.
Jacob Dresch
Absolutely.
Ryan Paul
Ana is the uptight control freak, and, and, and Jen is the attract, I mean they're all, everyone's attractive, but, but is the,
Jacob Dresch
Chloe's gonna love that.
Ryan Paul
Is the, the ingenue if you will.
Jacob Dresch
Sure.
Ryan Paul
So I, I,
Jacob Dresch
Right, but she doesn't have her stuff together like Ana, right? She's a bit of a mess. She's a little lost.
Ryan Paul
Yeah, yeah, which makes her, I think, more attractive to the men that, that do those things with.
Jacob Dresch
Oh, sure. Well, and she's definitely like, yeah, she has the the the hussy throughline with her. You know, she kisses Rob. She got in that scandal with the senator, definitely the how the homewrecker.
Ryan Paul
So, but but they don't. It easily could fall into that of like, these are just stereotypical people.
Jacob Dresch
Yup.
Ryan Paul
Just these aren't real people. They're just stereotypes. But I think, or archetypes of character.
Jacob Dresch
Yeah.
Ryan Paul
But I think you all, and I would imagine with a less talented cast, that's what it would be.
Jacob Dresch
I think so.
Ryan Paul
But I think you pull it into a different direction, which I think, it's like you're, you're watching to see if that person's going to fall, and that's what's exciting about it. Like, is this just going to end up to be the stereotypical? Like, are these real character, are these just characters, or are they people I should care about?
Jacob Dresch
Yeah, I agree, and I think Matt, again, to his great credit, gave us a north star of heart, love, authenticity, that I think, in less, in, in, in clumsier hands, it could fall into the trap of stereotype.
Ryan Paul
Yeah.
Jacob Dresch
And I think instead those those archetypes are fleshed out and made. They are individualized. I, I believe in in our cast, I think everyone has brought a certain special clown-like, unique take on the, I'll you know, I've seen the play before. It's very different.
Ryan Paul
Yeah.
Jacob Dresch
And I liked the production at Arvada. I also didn't think they they fell into stereotype, but it is a vastly different production.
Ryan Paul
So the other thing I want to talk about before we move on is the character of Alex.
Jacob Dresch
Yes.
Ryan Paul
In the play. So Alex comes in later on. He's the the contemporary literature professor, and, and he comes on, and they have this conversation about, is it Twilight that they talk about first? And um, and you and I had a conversation about Twilight on the way in, and we don't need to, yeah.
Jacob Dresch
Oh Ryan, come on.
Ryan Paul
Let's just say in a relationship, I was, I was Jacob and not Edward, and a similar thing happens.
Jacob Dresch
You were, you were Alex, what happened to Alex.
Ryan Paul
In this show. So, but then they have this brilliant conversation, and I remember during intermission, I stepped out with Stewart Shelley, education director, and Tanya Searle was there, and Michael Barr, and we had this conversation, and I said one of the most relevant points ever made at the festival this season was this line that Alex had about what culture is, right? That, that it's not, that there's this big debate in the play about what does it mean to be literate, what what is literature, what is culture? And Alex gives this really vibrant defense of popular culture and popular literature that matters. And I, and I, I said, this is what I talk about in my history classes, right? Is that that I believe that 500 years from now the Shakespeare of our time will be Matt Graining. It'll be The Simpsons, right? This cultural, and I loved this connection and the words that Alex said, to me resonated deeper than to be or not to be. I mean, this, this
Jacob Dresch
Don't tell Walt.
Ryan Paul
No, I won't. No, but it wasn't Walt. It's just this idea of what, because it's not Walt's words, it's Shakespeare's. But this connection of, it made it relevant and present, and this idea of what it means to really, that popular isn't bad.
Jacob Dresch
Absolutely, I think it's yeah, it's one of the best arguments in the play, without a doubt. That, that a cultured person should be curious. They should be interested. They should listen to Bach and Beyonce. They should be open to all experiences. And I absolutely, it's very difficult to disagree with Alex in that. Though I will say, Ana makes an interesting point that she's talking about enlightenment and that popular culture is entertainment. That is also a difficult argument to cite, sort of poke holes in, and I think they're both right at the same time, which is sort of cool.
Ryan Paul
Yeah.
Jacob Dresch
That you know, yeah.
Ryan Paul
But can you be enlightened and entertained at the same time?
Jacob Dresch
Yeah.
Ryan Paul
And the answer, I think, is well, that's Shakespeare.
Ryan Paul
It's absolutely,
Ryan Paul
You don't have to, you don't have to choose.
Jacob Dresch
Without a doubt you don't have to choose. Yeah, and I agree. I think that's actually where Ana's wrong is, you don't you don't really have to choose. I mean, we just watched, we watched the Age of Innocence, the, the, the movie with Daniel Day Lewis, and I'll tell you, it's wonderfully entertaining and enlightening. It is like the perfect meeting. I thought it was, I was like, "This is more salacious than Twilight. This is very smutty. I love it."
Ryan Paul
That's the one book and movie that I haven't read or seen that you talk about in the play, and and I think that, I mean, Lauren, you just barely you saw this play just moments ago. Tell me about that. What you what did you think about that particular argument?
Lauren Bird
I loved that because as someone that reads a lot of genre fiction, whenever people say that like, it isn't literature, it makes, it frustrates me because there are a lot of books, like fantasy books, that I read where I'm like, I learn so much more about how to treat other people and all, all different things in the world. I learn more from genre fiction than from just like, the books that Ana would suggest, which I've read some of them, but.
Jacob Dresch
I mean, I actually,
Lauren Bird
They hit harder.
Jacob Dresch
I actually think that's what I love so much about my actorly humanities forward education is that, like it was essentially a study in openness. It was just like how can you find Intellectual, emotional, moral, psychological value in as much of life and life's experiences and media as you possibly can. Can you see the value in
Ryan Paul
Yeah, and I, I got to tell you, if I, if I could, and this has never happened, if I could inhabit the body of an actor to say one line in, one of the season, it would be yours after you read the Dan Brown book. "I loved it."
Jacob Dresch
"I loved it."
Ryan Paul
That was that was amazing. So, and I loved it too. I loved the Da Vinci Code.
Jacob Dresch
Again, I just I have to give credits to, kudos to Karen. It's a great script. Like that is in all bold. I'm just like oh, my background, and it was very interesting rehearsing this play, and it's why I'm really glad that Matt was the director. It's, because my instincts and many of our instincts were to try to make it more of, let's say a farce. You know, a Lend Me a Tenor, and I was like, this isn't Lend Me a Tenor. This is a lot more like The Foreigner. It is character driven. We have to be patient and real, and not try to push the funny too hard too soon. The more patient and the more real and the more heart forward we are, the more it will pay off in dividends by act two, right? Like that's where the stuff when Alex comes in is, when life has altered into something that is a little bit more than reality.
Ryan Paul
Yeah, and there's a lot less clan in this than there is in The Foreigner
Jacob Dresch
There's a lot less clan than The Foreigner.
Ryan Paul
So let's, I, I'd want to, before we move on to to Mary Shelley's Frankenstein and our next break,
Ryan Paul
Yeah.
Jacob Dresch
I also want to give a shout out to Frank, your,
Ryan Paul
Oh. Secret Service agent?
Ryan Paul
Secret Service. So the beautiful part about this show, and I always try to think about how to tell people about this so they're not freaked out about it, is that you're watching this film being made, and then at certain times during the play, you're watching the film.
Jacob Dresch
Yeah.
Ryan Paul
Right? And, and I always talk about, like in a documentary, there's a cutaway with a talking head.
Ryan Paul
Yeah.
Ryan Paul
And that's what these are. And you are all tasked with playing these,
Jacob Dresch
Yeah. The cool thing about this version, yeah, the one they did Arvada, and it says so in the script, you can make, you can have a 7, seventh player who plays all the pundits, so like that can be their own its own person, and in this version, we all play the pundits, we all play the talking heads, the interview pieces. And so I really like it because it's clowny, it's actorly, it it shows that, like, it's just like the beauty of the repertory theater, right, is like you get to see the actor do a thing and then do a little foil, a little opposite, a little different kind of little trick, and we get to do that internally in book club, which is really cool.
Ryan Paul
Which I didn't know when, I hadn't read the script before I saw the play. I didn't know anything about it, and, and your character is kind of riffing off Fight Club, right? The rule of Fight Club is that what that is?
Jacob Dresch
That's cool, yeah.
Ryan Paul
So, but, but where I was sitting, and where Frank came out, everybody was just laughing, and and I thought it was funny, but I thought, who is that? Like, is that someone that I should know? Like, are they, is that Michael Bahr out there, or John, or somebody laughing? But it wasn't John because I could see John in the audience. But it's like, is it someone like they're laughing because they know this person and it's out of character? And it only took a minute to realize. I mean, not that's not true. Until I saw the next pundit.
Jacob Dresch
Right.
Ryan Paul
Like, because the the first pundit I think is the book agent,
Jacob Dresch
Yes.
Ryan Paul
Who I didn't recognize, and I'm assuming that's Chloe.
Jacob Dresch
It's Chloe, yeah.
Ryan Paul
I didn't, I didn't.
Jacob Dresch
And I think Chloe has the hardest job of those pundits because you, you as the audience, are learning, what the hell is this?
Jacob Dresch
Yeah.
Jacob Dresch
You really are a little bit just like, okay, I didn't know this was part of the gig, and I think by the time you're halfway through me, you start to realize like, "Oh, we're gonna get get to see the whole cast do like a character?
Ryan Paul
Yes, yeah, yeah. And I just, I just, but I see, you were, so you were on the other side, and the way the lighting was, and it looked like you were wearing some kind of Phantom of the Opera mask or something. I just,
Jacob Dresch
I think it was just the lighting.
Ryan Paul
But it was like,
Jacob Dresch
I wear aviators.
Ryan Paul
Yeah, who is that guy?
Jacob Dresch
Yeah, it was interesting. I used to play him really Dirty Harry "it's just like book club," you know, grit gritted teeth, and eventually I, I just weirdly joked, like, oh, what if he's in a silhouette and he has to be anonymous? Yeah, because he's the only, you know, he's the only guy who doesn't have a last name, and it was this sort of deep throat, you know, like one of those, you know, 24 hour, 48 hours later, like you know, anonymous people. I was like, all right, he's in the Secret Service. He can't like give his identity up. So thankfully Matt, again to his credit, like we recorded that, put a little effect on it, and I lip sync to it every night. That is recorded.
Ryan Paul
That's great. It's great, and,
Jacob Dresch
I love it. It's my little Jim Carrey like dumb show.
Ryan Paul
Yeah, I can't. I, I want to see it again now that I know what's coming. Let's um, let's, we're gonna move on, but let's take our break. And Lauren, I made a mistake. I know it's shocking that I made it here, but I want to, I want to shift and do our second song. This is a song which I had never heard before, which is, you know, I'm not saying that's a shocker, but but it sort of is. That sounds arrogant. I'm sorry, I didn't mean to say it that way. You can edit that out, right?
Jacob Dresch
Leave it in.
Ryan Paul
So this is a song called I Promise You a Happy Ending from Mack and Mabel, which I'd never heard of, I've never heard of that. I listened to it, I listened to it.
Jacob Dresch
It's a deep cut, it's a deep cut.
Ryan Paul
And it's, it's a beautiful song. Can you tell me why you chose this?
Jacob Dresch
I chose it because I recently rediscovered it this summer while I was rehearsing, and I would use it as a vocal warm up. Truly. I love Robert Preston. I, I've definitely, the famous song from this musical is I Won't Send Roses, but this is the finale number where he tells, you know Mabel, played by wonderfully by Bernadette Peters, that he finally loves her. And it's just, it's just a great, great deep cut. It's exactly what I'm talking about, where I'm just in love with the ballad.
Ryan Paul
Okay, this is I Promise You a Happy Ending from Mack and Mabel.
Lauren Bird
That was from Mack and Mabel. You're listening to the APEX Radio Hour Utah Shakespeare Festival edition. I'll turn it back to you, Ryan.
Ryan Paul
Thank you, Lauren. We're here with Jacob Dresch. He's the an actor this season in the Anes Company. He plays Will in The Book Club Play, and he plays Percy and Victor in Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. Those two plays run in rep with the three shows in the Engelstad, Troilus and Cressida, Hamlet, and Twelfth Night, and the three shows in the Randall Theater, which are Something Rotten, See How They Run, and She Loves Me. In a few weeks, we're recording this in the middle of August, and so in two weeks or so, right after Labor Day, the Engelstad shows will close, and See How They Run. And then it'll just be your two shows,
Jacob Dresch
The musicals and us.
Ryan Paul
The musicals running for there, right. And you'll shift, because right now you just do matinees.
Jacob Dresch
Yeah, we're in the full matinee life.
Ryan Paul
And then you go into evening shows, right?
Jacob Dresch
Yeah, and then we'll finally do some evening shows. It's true.
Ryan Paul
So let's talk about Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, which has had a lot of hype about it. And there's, there is certainly, when you think of Frankenstein, you think of the the various movies, you know, the most recent one on Netflix and and certain plays that you've seen, and he kind of gets lumped in. The story gets lumped in with those typical gothic, you know, Dracula, Invisible Man, that kind of stuff. So this is a very different version of that story.
Jacob Dresch
Yes.
Ryan Paul
Can you tell us why?
Jacob Dresch
It's an interesting. I don't know if I can tell you why, maybe to give a new fascination to people who really know the source material, and maybe to give a kind of new lens to people who don't. I really do think David's adaptation is very interesting in that it blends the, the creation event, right? That it was Lord Byron, Percy Bysshe Shelley, Claire, and Mary Shelley at Diodati. You know, on this weird weekend of the, you know the summer without sun or whatever, where they had a little competition to write the best ghost story, and you know what would come out of that is Frankenstein.
Ryan Paul
And what I, what's interesting, what I like about it is, one of the things that I find is compelling is that it actually, it's, I hadn't thought about this, but it's very Book Club Play-ish, where we go from being part of the film and then watching the film.
Jacob Dresch
Yeah, there's a meta element where you see us play multiple roles again. Yeah, you're right.
Ryan Paul
You start out telling the story and then you kind of morph into, but it's not like you morph into the Frankenstein story, and then do all that, and then come out at the end. You constantly,
Jacob Dresch
Back and forth.
Ryan Paul
Back and forth.
Jacob Dresch
Yeah, yeah.
Ryan Paul
Which I think is done brilliant, I will say both of these shows utilize the Anes stage as, stagecraft in ways I've never seen before, which are incredible.
Jacob Dresch
That's excellent, right?
Ryan Paul
So, so in the story, you play, you begin as Percy Bysshe Shelley, who is not necessarily a redeemable character. I mean, he, he's a, I mean, he's a fun loving guy, but over the course of the play, he, you know.
Jacob Dresch
I definitely think. Well, I don't know. I don't know if we get to see enough of Percy for me to definitively say that he's not such a great guy. I think we're maybe be, we're maybe seeing him at a pretty tough time to encounter him. It's sort of a party time. They've just lost a child, and there's a little unspoken rabbit hole grief going on in their relationship. He's still married to Harriet, who in about six months will die, and a month or two after that, he'll marry Mary. So yeah, I don't know. He definitely is a bit of a, there's something untrustworthy and rakish about him, without a doubt, which I think is why he pairs so well as Victor. It's because, boy, they both are admirable, brilliant, shadow people.
Ryan Paul
Yeah, and I wonder if we're, I mean, I know I'm getting too meta here, but, but if we're also seeing this version of Percy through Mary's eyes.
Jacob Dresch
I think,
Ryan Paul
Almost like we're watching Mary tell the story of this night.
Jacob Dresch
I think she's processing some problems that were unanswered in their time together in this recollection. Because I do like that David's play is, you don't realize it on the first view until the very end, that it's a memory play. These are not real. This is not a, this is not happening in real time, and it is not the real way things happened.
Ryan Paul
Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I think it's, when, when we think of stereotype, also, right? When you think, when, when you, when Victor Frankenstein comes out, and of course in, in the book and in the play, it's not, he's not called Frankenstein. It's the creature.
Jacob Dresch
Sure.
Ryan Paul
Right? That's created, and, and there's not the typical, you know, James Whale Frankenstein movie or Young Frankenstein, he's alive. It's alive. I mean, it's not.
Jacob Dresch
I tried to get a little bit of that.
Ryan Paul
I mean, it is. But it's not that.
Jacob Dresch
Yeah.
Ryan Paul
Right? And, and, and Victor Frankenstein is dealing I, I think, and correct me if I'm wrong.
Jacob Dresch
Yeah.
Ryan Paul
But he is processing his whole life isn't, the fact the grief isn't, that he created the creature.
Jacob Dresch
Yeah.
Ryan Paul
The grief is that he walked away. Like, I mean, think how different the whole story would be if, and I think the creature we all sympathize with right? That, who's my dad?
Jacob Dresch
Yeah.
Ryan Paul
You know, who, you created me but who taught me?
Jacob Dresch
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I think, you know, it's interesting. Definitely, I think we all are meant to sympathize with the creature a great deal. Of like, you know, none of us asked to be created, and then we, here we are, and it's hard. There's there's a lot to learn, and there's a lot of mistakes made. And I would say that like, David's rendition of it, that is surprising, is that it is a particularly sympathetic rendition of the creature. He is much more morally gray in in every other version I've ever encountered, and maybe not so morally gray at all. Sometimes he is, he is Cain. He is the evil, vengeful, jealous, bitter, horrid thing that is revenging himself against his creator, and you know that's interesting. But it's also interesting that David sort of rendered this, accidents. He he makes mistakes, and he doesn't mean to do the evil things he does, like kill the brother of Victor, and yeah, it's interesting.
Ryan Paul
Had you seen this, had you seen this production before?
Jacob Dresch
No, no. This was my first encountering of it. I've, I've seen the National version with Benedict Cumberbatch in reperatory, where they sort of switched who played the monster, who was the doctor, and I've seen that adapted North of Denver too. I saw my my dear friend Jeff Parker play the creature. He is wonderful. I really like that script a lot, and he's way more morally. He's he, it is not so easy to say Doctor Frankenstein is the monster in that one. The monster does some pretty bad stuff. Yeah, and then in this one, I, I just feel like the way I saw it in David's adaptation is that like, like all great tragic heroes, he has the best of intentions, right? He is deeply wounded, embittered, concerned. He wants to heal the wound of the death of, the the wrongful death of the mother, right? That Elizabeth's yellow fever kills the mother. And boy, in the book, she's an even better mother than the one we, we briefly get to see. Truly, like Elizabeth is not the only orphan she rescues out of the goodness of her heart. If there was ever a woman to try to bring back from the dead after wrongfully dying for caring for sick children, you know this is this is a great candidate, and I think he's just so desperate to heal the wound. And Elizabeth says it, you know that, like, I gave your mother my yellow fever, I allowed your brother to go off and play and wear the locket, like it's my fault. And all he wants to do is find a way to like make it not her fault. And in doing that, he creates the monster, and then he doesn't take responsibility for that. Because I mean, this is, does he not take responsibility because he is horrified by the appearance of the person he created? I think, I'm a huge fan of like Poe and Lovecraft, and my understanding of it, you know, like a funny way to put it would be that like he's horrified by how ugly it is, but I think there is something Lovecraftian about the monster. There is something, like it becomes self evident that this is Abomination with a capital A. That this is not a creature that should have been allowed to survive and is beyond comprehension when you encounter it. And I think that's what it is. I think Percy's sort of like, "I find it unpretty," is an interesting rakish interpretation of that, but when I'm being Victor, I just like I have to imagine that, just, like I don't know. It's maybe the feeling you get when you see like those super zoomed in, like 10,000 magnified of those like terra grades or something, those horrible worms that can like live in the vacuum of space. There's something of that that he sees in the monster, where he goes like, "That is so not human and not comprehensible that it is unbearable to encounter. I, I can't deal with it."
Ryan Paul
But is there ever a "what have I done?"
Jacob Dresch
Oh, absolutely! I think he's deeply guilty that he did this, and unfortunately, he makes the. This is the part of the hero's journey lesson. You'll forgive me, I'm a Cambellian. I really love the hero's journey stuff. His refusal to, the refusal of the call, he should have been a father to that thing. He should have taken responsibility. I mean, at the very least, he should have destroyed it, right? But instead, he just runs in terror and in weakness.
Ryan Paul
How? And by the way, we should say the creature is played.
Jacob Dresch
Oh.
Ryan Paul
I mean,
Jacob Dresch
Travis.
Ryan Paul
Yeah, I mean, and it's not. It is really a, I, I don't know how to say it, an understated but vibrant,
Ryan Paul
Yeah.
Ryan Paul
Portrayal.
Jacob Dresch
I agree. I was deeply surprised. I thought I, I just think it's wonderful. Well, it's a real pleasure to, and play with him.
Ryan Paul
You know, to be fair, he's not an unattractive.
Jacob Dresch
No, he's a handsome gentleman, and it's hilarious being like, "Oh, vile thing, disgusting monster." What I'm the Frenchman, yeah, it's ridiculous.
Ryan Paul
And then kissing him the next night.
Jacob Dresch
Yeah, yeah, exactly.
Ryan Paul
On the lips.
Jacob Dresch
Yeah.
Ryan Paul
So, how do you prepare for this? Like, I would imagine a character, like you're going to play Victor Frankenstein or Percy. You know, these are are either, someone who was a real person who you can find out about, and someone else who has been ingrained in our literary and popular culture. At, the, the perfect example, the bridge of the book club play, right? The bridge between Age of Innocence and Moby Dick and Twilight and the Da Vinci Code.
Jacob Dresch
Sure, right.
Ryan Paul
So how how do you prepare for that?
Jacob Dresch
You read the book. I'm, I'm rereading the book right now. I have the annotated version by Leslie Klinger, who I love. I I love their annotated versions of the Lovecraft stories that I read. Well, yeah, I've seen many, many movie adaptations. You got to love the Hammer films, you got to love, you know, Young Frankenstein. I also think there's a great. I mean, ultimately, the script is also the guide. Like everything you need to know is the script. Sometimes it doesn't really matter what else there is, because it's just like, that's not what we're doing. We're doing this version, and so I need to just figure out how to make this the best version and personalize this to my taste and experience, and work with Risa to really craft, the director, to really you know, craft a journey and an arc and a logic. But I would also say like, a huge inspiration for me is like, I'm a huge, a massive fan of John Hurt, Peter O'Toole, Richard Burton, that kind of that certain brand of heightened British Mad Men and rakes and sort of the British bad boys. And and there is, I mean, David has also written so much. It's a love letter to Shakespeare, and so you know, it's a little bit of a love letter to Shakespearean actors is what I'm hoping. I'm, I'm, it's certainly a love letter to the Shakespearean actors I admire, and a certain level of style and a certain brand of macabre, lightning struck madness that I like to play around with, but then Risa, also like Matt, tethering us to buying in, this is not a genre play. Turn away from the melodrama. Try to make it real. Don't try to do the turnaways and the, you know, right? We are in intimate. What is interesting is that, like the melodrama is there no matter what. You can find the reality of it.
Ryan Paul
Like the, not like the "I'm ready for my close up, Mr. DeMille."
Jacob Dresch
Exactly.
Ryan Paul
Kind of stuff.
Jacob Dresch
Yeah, and trying to, and trying to find, I really felt like she urged us to find, to thread the needle.
Ryan Paul
So, do you think that, in, in your experience with this play, that, that people resonate more with the Percy character, or resonate more with Victor?
Jacob Dresch
I feel like we see so much more of Victor than Percy. That's a good question. I really don't know.
Ryan Paul
I mean, because there,
Jacob Dresch
You guys tell me you've seen the show.
Ryan Paul
There are distinctions, right?
Jacob Dresch
Yeah.
Ryan Paul
I mean, it's not like like that, what's that song from Jekyll and Hyde? Confrontation.
Jacob Dresch
That song's so good.
Ryan Paul
Where he does like one side and then the other side.
Jacob Dresch
Fantastic. I love Jekyll and Hyde.
Ryan Paul
So I, I saw it with,
Jacob Dresch
Noah.
Ryan Paul
Chuck Wagner. You know Chuck Wagner from,
Jacob Dresch
Really?
Ryan Paul
From, do you remember that Into the Woods that was on PBS, and he was one of the princes.
Jacob Dresch
Absolutely.
Ryan Paul
He was on the, he was Jekyll, and he, he, he, because he's that guy, he stayed, like he comes out after the show, like he'll wait like for 20 minutes. And like people will say, you know, like the if you come out, they say just wait a minute, and 20, after the big crowds go, he'll come out and comes wearing this electric blue suit with the Superman pin on.
Jacob Dresch
Fantastic.
Ryan Paul
Boy, he's a handsome man too.
Ryan Paul
Yeah, yeah.
Ryan Paul
But anyway, it's that that idea of this immediate transformation, right? It's not like you, you, you somehow shift. You, there's a more subtle thing, I think that you do.
Jacob Dresch
I agree. I agree. I, I mean, it was something we talked about. It was definitely something we talked about in the rehearsal hall. Risa, me, and Stephen, our vocal coach, and just trying to make them distinct. I think they maybe wanted it a touch more distinct, but I actually thought part of what makes David's play interesting is that they're actually not that different. There is a blur, there is a blur. I feel like where we really landed was we really were trying to make distinct younger Victor and sort of a little bit of, maybe not necessarily like I'm a little boy kind of voice, but some mastery journey that happens, particularly in the the first act where we see him sort of go from sweet kid to young man, and at a university to madman in the storm raising the dead, right? That, that can't be the same guy. Yeah, the difference between Percy and Victor, I think it's pretty subtle. But though the more I play it, the more I feel like sometimes it's just a little bit of an attitude. Victor's a little more styled and macabre, and Percy feels a little. I definitely will say I, I try to make Percy subtly a little more URP, where he goes "Bean." You know, this is been a most one-sided competition indeed." There's something sort of foppish about him, where Victor is just like, "Yes, I appear to have been spit out upon your shores." You know, it's just a little bit, a little bit more relaxed, a little bit gravelier. Percy's a little higher.
Ryan Paul
It's like one is more English and one is more German, right? I mean, with different experiences, but I, I just really think it's interesting as it as it bleeds out and and these that fiction becomes reality and reality becomes fiction and we're just kind of it's like almost watching it in, remember those old shows where it would say, okay now we go into the dream sequence.
Jacob Dresch
Oh sure, sure.
Ryan Paul
Like it's almost like you're watching through that. There's always this, it seems to me this kind of mist between what's real and what's not.
Jacob Dresch
Yeah.
Ryan Paul
Like am I really watching Victor or is this Percy, or how does this play out?
Jacob Dresch
It's funny you say that. I mean, I, David has a very interesting stage direction in the beginning of the play that we meet them through like a gauzy fabric, that like, we are seeing them sort of like through the mist of history, and it sort of lifts at one point. So yeah, I definitely think that's like a vibe that we're going for. That there is a kind of spooky, misty storytelling meta ghost story thing.
Ryan Paul
So in this production, do you feel that the message, one of the messages, is this kind of we've met the enemy and it is us? Like, is it really this idea that that Victor is the the monster, or, or is that a little more clouded?
Jacob Dresch
I think, I do think in this version, it's it's pretty clear that Victor's the monster. The monster's not as evil as he is in the book. The monster is a little Paradise Lost. To quote another one from from Book Club, is that like he is like Satan. He's the, he's the, he's the cast off son, and he's he's going to have his revenge for that and become this sort of Machiavel, and in this version he's more of a lost child, and I think it definitely does make Victor. He's, I mean, I think you know, one of the universal lessons that this play talks about, that I think a lot of plays talk about and maybe even Book Club Play. It's like, you don't get away with lies. Lying is not. Lying, you don't know where the dominoes will fall in terms of how the the house of cards of your lies and your omissions and your pretense. Also, the hubris of perfection. Looking to be perfect at something is, that's not good. I think we should be real worried when he's just like, "I saw perfection." You're just like, "Oh."
Ryan Paul
So, is, is Percy Mary's creature? Is Mary Doctor Frankenstein? And and she, by the end of the play, Percy is the creature she has created.
Jacob Dresch
Yeah, I mean, that's interesting. That's interesting. I do think you know there is something she's trying, at least in this version, there's something she's trying to, how the Percy was the genius, right? Who didn't get a chance to like, achieve his potential. Like you know, he died too soon. I mean, he really does drown at, not even, at barely 30. They had six years together, and she really would, you're going to get to talk to Emily about all this, but she really did hold his heart for the rest of her life. She never married anyone. I remember there was some famous story of someone trying to court her, and she was just like, "Well, after being married to one genius, you don't really need to marry another." You know, like she did. You know, you can't settle for anything less, and she really did hold that out. She just adored him, and I think there was, in this play she's trying to. It's like many of the stories and anecdotes we hear about genius and the mercurial nature of their personalities and how imperfect they are as humans, even if they are geniuses in creative or athletic or you know different fields, and I think she's trying to reconcile what it is to be an imperfect genius in Victor.
Ryan Paul
There you go. There's there's your there's your play, imperfect genius.
Jacob Dresch
Imperfect Genius: A Life in the Theatre.
Ryan Paul
Life in theater. We let's take our our last break, and this is a song that I have heard and I love, and I'm glad you chose it. This is a song called Twilight Time by the Platters.
Jacob Dresch
Yes.
Ryan Paul
Why did you choose this song?
Jacob Dresch
Well I'm, I'm a bit of a nostalgia junkie. I just love the sound of that era. There's a kind of, there is a kind of spooky macabre in that era that I just adore. I mean, the Fallout video games and TV series have captured the kind of like wry, venomous, ironic humor in a lot of those songs, but there's also a beautiful romanticism that I really enjoy. I'm a big fan of The King in Yellow, which is another Edgar Allan Poe, Lovecraft styled short story about a play that if you read it, you go mad, and it's inspired a lot of fiction. And I just feel like this was iconic of my King in Yellow playlist, a kind of romanticism that you can fall in love with and can almost drive you mad.
Ryan Paul
Okay, this is Twilight Time by the Platters.
Lauren Bird
That was Twilight Time by the Platters. You're listening to the APEX Radio Hour Utah Shakespeare Festival edition. I'll turn it back to you, Ryan.
Ryan Paul
Thank you, Lauren. We've been talking with Jacob Dresch. He's the actor here who brings to life Percy Shelley and Victor Frankenstein in Mary Shelley's Frankenstein and Will in The Book Club Play. So this is the moment where we talk about what's bringing us joy. But before we do that, let me ask you this. You had an opportunity to choose four or five songs that we chose. What is Will's walk-up song, and then what is Victor's walk-up song?
Jacob Dresch
Absolutely, yeah. Will's walk-up song I couldn't actually like send you because it's just a YouTube video, but it is literally a mashup of YMCA and Wrecking Ball. It is brilliant. Look it up. It is totally Will's groove. I love it. I shared it with my cast. I was like, "This is the Will theme." Yeah, Victor. Victor is probably just my King in Yellow playlist. I feel like I just want to get into that macabre, angel of death, romantic mood, and so I would probably say like Brenda Lee, If You Love Me.
Ryan Paul
Wow.
Jacob Dresch
I love it. I just love it. It's just, it's you, romantic.
Ryan Paul
You say like, you said like, "you put the lotion on its skin." Puts the lotion on its skin.
Jacob Dresch
Not Buffalo.
Ryan Paul
Love it. You're gonna love it.
Jacob Dresch
You're gonna love it. Yeah.
Ryan Paul
There we go.
Jacob Dresch
Yeah, Brenda Lee If You Love Me, it's a great song about it, it's a like. Oh, it's like it's that fallout, Don't They Know It's the End of the World? You know, it's got that same kind of tragic romanticism. I love.
Ryan Paul
Well, thank you for that, and thank you for being here. And what's, next time I and when I see Frankenstein again, Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, and I'll be thinking about that. "Put this lotion on the skin."
Jacob Dresch
Yeah.
Ryan Paul
Come on, creature, put the lotion on your skin.
Jacob Dresch
It would be magnificent.
Ryan Paul
You seen that movie? Silence of the Lambs?
Jacob Dresch
Silence of the Lambs?
Lauren Bird
I have not.
Jacob Dresch
Oh, it's a great one. It's one of the greats. Well,
Ryan Paul
Well, not with her mom here. Maybe we shouldn't.
Jacob Dresch
You should see it too. It's great.
Ryan Paul
It is. I, I am not, It's not my genre. Well, but it is.
Lauren Bird
It looks fascinating.
Ryan Paul
It is a great, powerful.
Jacob Dresch
The cinematography.
Ryan Paul
Is a beautiful.
Jacob Dresch
The use of the actors into the camera as, the camera as the other character in that film, magnificent.
Ryan Paul
So I mean, it's, you know it's rated for, it's rated for a reason, but.
Jacob Dresch
Oh, definitely it is not for the faint of heart.
Ryan Paul
No, no.
Jacob Dresch
But it's quite the thrill.
Ryan Paul
Fantastic. It's beautifully written too. Yeah, yeah. All right, let's let's switch and talk about what's bringing us joy. Yeah, right. So again, those of you who've listened just before know that we talk about at the very end what's bringing us joy. Everyone in the studio gets to participate. So Jacob Dresch, what are you currently watching, reading, listening to, or playing that is bringing you joy?
Jacob Dresch
Yeah, yeah.
Ryan Paul
All right. Let's, let's switch and talk about what's bringing us joy.
Jacob Dresch
Yeah.
Ryan Paul
Right? So again, those of you who've listened to us before know that we talk about, at the very end what's bringing us joy. Everyone in the studio gets to participate. So Jacob Dresch, what are you currently watching, reading, listening to, or playing that is bringing you joy?
Jacob Dresch
Yeah, I mean, gosh, there's so much. It's, it's, it's a wonderful life being an actor in the in the theater and, and having so much theater happening around you. I mean, one of the things bringing me joy is all the other shows. Getting to see all you know, old friends, new friends do great work, do, do new, new wonderful directed adaptations of the Shakespeare canon that I, I've grown to love so much. I just saw Troilus and Cressida the other week. We're going to Hamlet tonight. Just I just love that. Me and Chloe are, in terms of shows right now, we're watching The Other Two. It's a Lorne Michaels produced sort of sitcom about two loser siblings, whose youngest brother becomes the next Justin Bieber, it's very, very funny. We really enjoy that for a good laugh. Reality TV show, watching that Dallas Cowboys cheerleader documentary, working our way through that wild, wild.
Ryan Paul
Crazy world, isn't it?
Jacob Dresch
Very interesting parallels to just, you know, those women are tremendous athletes and artists, and it took them far too long getting paid enough for the things that they do. Gosh, what else? I'm a huge and avid board game collector. That's a weird thing about me. I'm a board game hobbyist, so I've been playing lots of board games with my cast mates.
Ryan Paul
Lauren looked at me because I am as well.
Jacob Dresch
You are?
Ryan Paul
I am.
Jacob Dresch
Oh man.
Ryan Paul
As a matter of fact, I have a weekly game night. I mean, I am a,
Jacob Dresch
A weekly game night.
Ryan Paul
Well, it's with other people, but,
Jacob Dresch
Of course.
Ryan Paul
Stewart Shelley and his, we have we do a weekly or monthly game night.
Jacob Dresch
Oh, I love it.
Ryan Paul
So yes, I have a huge.
Jacob Dresch
Yeah, me and Chloe are playing a lot of Castles of Burgundy with our cast mates. We've exposed them to a lot of different party games on my end. I, I'm just gonna. I could talk forever. I want to.
Ryan Paul
Have you played Magical Athlete?
Jacob Dresch
No, I've had. It's been hard to find.
Ryan Paul
I have a copy. You want to borrow it?
Jacob Dresch
Yes.
Ryan Paul
I love, Magical Athlete and Hot Streak, Hot Streak two are my favorite.
Jacob Dresch
Yep, got those. Love them.
Ryan Paul
But my favorite is Betrayal at a House on the Hill.
Jacob Dresch
Yeah.
Ryan Paul
And I can't find as many people to play it with me anymore.
Ryan Paul
Oh, it's classic.
Ryan Paul
I love that game. I could play that game again and again.
Jacob Dresch
Absolutely, absolutely.
Ryan Paul
So there you go.
Ryan Paul
Young Sherlock, do you remember what was the, what was it? Young Sherlock Holmes. Was that the the produced Spielberg movie the, back in, the very first use of CGI?
Lauren Bird
Oh wow.
Jacob Dresch
Oh, I don't know.
Ryan Paul
I have to look that up. It was a, when I was younger. I was the 80s. It was, he should, we should look that up. I think it was called Young Sherlock Holmes. You don't have to look it up now, but Spielberg didn't direct it; he produced it.
Jacob Dresch
Sure.
Ryan Paul
I think. But it was a, it's a fantastic. But it's one of the first uses of CGI, where like a stained glass window of a knight comes to life.
Lauren Bird
Oh, mom and I watched that at like midnight one time when we were in Arizona.
Ryan Paul
That was what it was, Young Sherlock Holmes, right?
Lauren Bird
Yeah, yeah.
Jacob Dresch
Nice.
Ryan Paul
I wonder if it holds up. Anyway, sorry.
Lauren Bird
It was fun.
Ryan Paul
Lauren Bird. What are you currently watching, reading, listening to, or playing that is bringing you joy?
Lauren Bird
Because I wanted to watch it, and my parents hadn't seen it yet, we've been rewatching Artful Dodger season two. It's one of my favorite shows. It's kind of a continuation of Oliver Twist following the Artful Dodger, where he's become a surgeon in Australia, and there's so much like genre mashup, and it leans into my morbid curiosity, and I just love it so much. And the characters are amazing, and the yearning. It's so good.
Ryan Paul
Well, if you like morbid curiosity and yearning, you're going to love Silence of the Lambs.
Lauren Bird
Duly noted. What about you, Ryan? What are you currently watching, reading, listening to, or playing that's bringing you joy?
Ryan Paul
I just finished a book I got a colleague of mine. We talked about doing a class on road trips, and so he's been, we've been thinking about road trips, and there's a book that just came out called This Land Is Your Land by Beverly Gage. She's a pretty well-known historian, won a Pulitzer Prize for a book on J. Edgar Hoover. But this is where she doesn't go as a historian, but goes as a tourist, and travels to various spots in America and talks about the history of their spots and then how we tell the story. I'm a big believer that how we tell the story is more important sometimes than the story itself, and it says more about the people of the day than it does about the past. It's just a really brilliant travel narrative of our country's past that, again, talks about how horrible and crazy things we've done, but that America still is a country of hope and understanding. That full story is amazing, and that is what's bringing me joy.
Lauren Bird
Cool, cool.
Ryan Paul
Thank you very much, Jacob, for being here. We appreciate the opportunity to talk with you, he is cast as Victor Frankenstein and Percy in Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. He's Will in The Book Club Play. Both are the hot tickets at the festival, so book your tickets soon because you know they're, almost every performance sells out. I think we, people asking for those tickets. They're, in the Anes show right now they're just doing matinees, but in a few weeks they'll shift to some evening performances once the Engelstad closes. So those two plays are running in rep with the Engelstad shows Twelfth Night, Toilus and Cressida, and Hamlet, and in the Randall Theater, Something Rotten, See How They Run, and She Loves Me. If you want to hear more information about those shows, read the education guides or see actor bios, you can visit those sites or buy tickets at bard.org. If you're interested in hearing more of Lauren's brilliant commentary in the podcast and others, you can find the APEX Hour at SUU wherever you get your podcasts. So we're going to leave with a song that you chose called Mr. Blue Sky by Electric Light Orchestra, not the Electric Light Orchestra, but Electric Light Orchestra. Why'd you choose this one?
Jacob Dresch
It's just, gosh, every time I hear it, just puts a smile on my face. I just think it's such a bop. There you go. Good vibes, baby.
Ryan Paul
It is the Twilight and Da Vinci Code,
Jacob Dresch
Yes.
Ryan Paul
Of, of our lives.
Jacob Dresch
Exactly, exactly. It's how Will feels when he's finally out.
Ryan Paul
All right, okay. Thank you all for being here. Thank you again, Jacob. Thank you, Laura. Thank you, Lola. Thank you, Lauren. And of course, in the words of the great American poet Bill Withers, "I wish you well." This is Mr. Blue Sky by Electric Light Orchestra.