alan cumming:the great escape

[abitoftap]

Posted: 1/25/11 at 5:06pm

From an interview with The Guardian:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/culture/2011/jan/24/alan-cumming-dare

One high-profile job that would likely have been miserable to make is the Broadway musical Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark, also directed by Taymor, which Cumming quit last April. It has since become mired in stories of spiralling costs, injured actors and delays. While most celebrities would make tactfully bland comments about how they wish the play nothing but the best, Cumming – perhaps because of his levity about career-climbing – goes deliciously off-message.

"My GOD, that was a lucky escape. Jesus Christ! Talk about dodging a bullet there!" he says, eyes wide.

So why did he quit? "Because it just ****ed me about. It kept getting delayed and delayed, and so I was like, 'OK, time to move on.'" But surely it must have been awkward with Taymor, considering you were also working with her on The Tempest? "Yeah, it was a bit awkward. She wasn't best pleased when I quit. But the thing about Julie is that she's very blinkered about her work, and then things go into the ether. So the next time I saw her for The Tempest, it was like it never happened."

[hotjohn]

Posted: 1/25/11 at 6:16pm

I met him after his one-off performance at the Highline Ballroom last year. He struck me as very down-to-earth, humble and friendly. He certainly went up in my estimation after that encounter.

[theatremom2]

Posted: 1/25/11 at 6:21pm

I attended a reading at CSC with Cumming in it, don't remember the title. The talk back with the two actors and the playwright, all Scottish, was far more interesting then the play itself. Cumming was charming and very open about his life in Scotland. (I have a Scottish Deerhound puppy so I felt a connection.) I would happily attend anything he was in, especially if Sorkin wrote it

[FindingNamo]

Posted: 1/25/11 at 9:10pm

The section where he criticizes Richard Chamberlin and Rupert Everett for telling actors not to come out because "that's telling them their work is more important than their life" is pretty excellent.