Camryn Manheim : The Joe D Show Episode 25

Camryn Manheim, known for her Emmy-winning role on “The Practice” and the solo show she wrote and starred in, “Wake Up, I’m Fat,” joins the podcast to talk about her Broadway debut in “Spring Awakening.”

The Deaf West revival of Duncan Sheik and Steven Sater’s musical features hearing and non-hearing actors. Manheim is fluent in American Sign Language, a skill she’s used in her career — like “Law & Order” — and real-life — like when she helped a stranger in a car wreck.

Produced by: Joe Dziemianowicz

Music by: Jerry Korman

Edited by: Frank Posillico

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TRANSCRIPT FOR EPISODE:

Joe Dziemianowicz: Welcome back to the Joe D show. We’re joined today by Camryn Manheim.

Camryn Manheim: Hi Joe, thank you so much for having me on.

JD: Thanks for letting me share your dressing room! We know Camryn from her Emmy-winning work on “The Practice,” as well as other shows like “Ghost Whisperer.” And now she's making her Broadway debut in Deaf West's revival of Spring Awakening. Talk about the production, Camryn, it comes to Broadway from Los Angeles.

CM: It comes via Los Angeles. It was the “little show that could” in downtown LA about a year ago, brought to life by an amazing group of merry pranksters and incredibly talented people. It's headed up by Michael Arden, who I have been a long admirer of from “Big River” and “Hunchback [of Notre Dame].” He’s amazing. But he had a vision for the show that was so spectacular, and since the lay really is about the miscommunication and repression of what it must've been like to live in Germany in the late 1800s, and how without communication between adults and children, all hell can break loose. He added the elements of having deaf children being completely unable to get information about their own physical awakening and it really adds an amazing level. For anyone who has ever seen the show “Spring Awakening,” on its own, it is one of the most brilliant pieces of musical work and book work, and the direction... I saw it on Broadway years ago when Michael Mayer directed it with Lea Michele, Jonathan Groff, and John Gallagher Jr. who have gone onto huge stardom in part due to this amazing musical. And it’s hard to redo it again only six years after it closed on Broadway, that's really unheard of, to redo it. But I think when Ken Davenport saw this production in downtown LA, with a cast of 20 unknown kids, half of them were deaf, half of them were hearing, they came from all around the world to do the show, he said, “You know, this added layer of having deaf kids be so unaware of what was happening in the world added something.” And it got reinvented. It takes nothing away from the show that everyone saw, which was genius, but it’s another reinvention of this play, and it is spectacular. When I saw it, I was jealous that I wasn’t in it. That's always the mark of when I know, I'm like “Grr, why wasn't I in this!” And when it moved to Broadway and they invited me to come, it has been a privilege and honor to work with this cast, this crew, and come with this magical production that no one has ever seen anything like before.

JD: It also comes with your fluency in American Sign Language. I was talking to one of your castmates, Ali Stroker, who says that she's conversational in ASL, meanwhile you're very fluent. Talk to listeners about how that came about, originally it came about because your own failure at Spanish and German, and French in high school, and it's a great message to anyone who thinks that failing can't lead to something very positive.

CM: Well it actually ties in really well in the play, because in the play, one of the boys fails a class and his whole life changes. My parents are Jewish professors and being an academic was very important. My brother went to Harvard and my sister is a teacher and married a department head at Temple University. So it was very important that I went onto school. Just getting a Master's Degree wasn't even enough, you got to get PHD's in my family. But I couldn't pass a language, so I was having trouble getting into college. So I had to go to a community college to pick up language. I went to Cabrillo Community College. I always joke and say in my family that if you go to a community college, you can't be buried in a Jewish cemetery. Like that is such a big deal, it was so offensive to my parents. But truthfully, Cabrillo was an amazing college, and I took sign language. I took two semesters of sign language so that I could go onto university, study theatre, and never look back. I took those two semesters, I went on my mer...