00:00Have you been to the Amundsen Theater recently? Because if not, this is your big chance. There
00:05is a show like No Other Than Now going on through December 7th. It's called Paranormal
00:11Activity. And with us today, we have two of the stars, Patrick Huesinger and Cher Alvarez.
00:17Welcome. Thank you both for joining us.
00:19Hello, hello.
00:20Thank you for having us.
00:21So to start with, without giving away too much, tell us what Paranormal Activity is about.
00:28Uh, I'll lead us off.
00:35It centers around a couple, um, who've just moved from Chicago and are trying to escape
00:43their past, uh, as they explore and try to nourish the first year, the end of their first year
00:50of their marriage.
00:52Okay. You know, that first year of marriage is brutal. That's what they always say. And
00:56it's true. Cause you're trying to get used to everything. My mom told me that I'm like,
01:00come on, it should be the easiest. Oh no, no. So this is a good way to start off the play.
01:05I think, um, Cher, what's your character?
01:09I play Lou. Um, just a woman who's simply trying to navigate and manage the opinions of
01:16her husband and her husband's mom. And I think she's just trying to explore the lies from her
01:23past. And she's currently experiencing them in her present day as hauntings. And yeah, just like
01:30being in space with a lot of secrets. I have a lot of, yeah.
01:35Yeah. How about your character, Patrick?
01:37It's almost the exact same phrase. He's, uh, somebody who's trying to navigate the opinions
01:42of his wife and his mother, uh, as it relates to, to their marriage. Um, and also, also a lot
01:51of secrets that slowly get peeled away as the play goes on.
01:56Now I've heard it's terrifying. Is that true?
02:00I think so.
02:03I do.
02:04Special effects or?
02:06I, yeah, the, we worked with Chris Fisher, who is this illusionist master of his craft. And,
02:14but I also think like really going into the writing of it, Levi Holloway really explores,
02:20I mean, I think marriage and any kind of intimate relationship that you choose to share with anybody,
02:25there's horror behind it, especially if you got secrets, you got lies, you know? So
02:31I think there's a real horror and not really knowing the person that you've chosen to share
02:37your life with. Um, but we have some really cool effects that Patrick can get into. Patrick.
02:45Well, I want to, I want to get right after your question there too, which is, yeah, it is very
02:49scary. The audience screams throughout the play. It's one of the rare experiences in my life
02:54as an actor and as an audience member, um, where you hear the audience collectively,
03:00uh, shouting to the stage, uh, the same way that you go when you're at a movie theater and everybody
03:05kind of crunches into each other for safety. It's very exciting. Um, yeah, this, uh, Tony winning
03:11illusionist we have with us, Chris Fisher, who just came off of doing the illusions. If you saw the
03:17Harry Potter plays or stranger things, which was on the West end and now on Broadway or still is on
03:22the West end, uh, the back to the future, two, two, two, which played the Amundsen, he, he designed
03:27all of those illusions. And it's very exciting the way that, as Cher said, our wonderful playwright
03:33has woven this wonderful narrative and plot into the use of these very practical illusion effects,
03:43uh, to try to, you know, scare up some screens from the audience.
03:48Do you recommend a certain age group, you know, like not under 13 or whatever, just because
03:55of the scary factor? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I think it's rated R. Oh, okay. There's like, I think if
04:05you're like 12 and up, sure, maybe just come, it's such an immersive experience. And that's the thing.
04:11It really takes a different kind of theatrical experience that this creative team is putting
04:17forward into the face of the American theater, you know? So it's, I think it's fascinating. And I
04:23think that there's, um, lots of magic that is willing and wanting to be explored. And I think
04:30it's just super cool, but you will get scared. Yeah. We had kids in the audience in Chicago and it
04:36was, you could hear them screaming. I want to go home. No, I'm kidding. Yeah. I think you're,
04:43my friends are going to bring their kids that are, that are 13 and up, but I think I would use
04:47discretion. Cher's right. I think that I would lean more of the rated R for sure for language,
04:52for the kind of some of the, the, the violence, um, and, uh, and subject matter. It can be very
05:00unnerving. Yeah. I think parents appreciate knowing that ahead of time. Yeah. Um, they're
05:06not that cool. Don't bring your little ones and don't bring your sweet innocence too. Yeah. Yeah.
05:10For sure. Easily scared. Right. Um, were there any challenges in playing your characters?
05:16I think for me, it's really, you know, you're doing eight shows a week and it's a matter of,
05:24um, endurance and discipline. Your body doesn't necessarily tend to know what's real or what's
05:30not real. There's neuroscience behind that. So I think for me, it's definitely like, these
05:36are my feelings. These aren't Cher's feelings or these are Lou's feelings. And like, how do
05:40we compartmentalize that? But I think other than that, there's one illusion that takes place every
05:46night and I'm terrified every night that it's going to go wrong, but I just, that's, that's,
05:51that's the most difficult part for me is like, don't freak out. Don't anticipate, be in it and
05:56trust your scene partner. And it's great. Wonderful to work with. So yeah. How about you, Patrick?
06:03Yeah. A couple of the cast members, uh, Shannon Cochran and Kate Fry in our play are, are,
06:07are legends and really masters of their craft. And they always tell Cher and I, Cher is an
06:13extraordinary actor. And I'm, I'm really lucky to be working with the scene partner who, who is so
06:20talented and has such a, uh, uh, handle on her craft. And, and they tell us we're both climbing a
06:26mountain every night. We really are as far as what we're being asked to do. Um, and just as Cher said,
06:32that endurance complex, uh, I worked with a wonderful actor once in New York who told me,
06:37your, your mind knows it's not real, but your body doesn't. And so it does sort of take a tax and
06:44ask a lot of the two of us every single night. And, but it's, but it's very thrilling. I mean,
06:48because it is the very thing that when you look at a script as an actor, you're like, Oh, I hope I
06:52get to do this on stage one day. Um, and we get to do it. It's really fun.
06:57Have either of you performed at the Almondson? This will be my first time. So I'm very,
07:02very excited and beyond grateful to have us. Yeah. It's a great, it's a, it's always a good
07:07audience there. So yeah. Um, I've seen stuff there a lot. Oh, I'm sorry. I see stuff there
07:12a lot. And I, I worked at the Mark Taper Forum. I did a play. Um, I led a play called Bent, uh,
07:20that Moises Kaufman directed there. Um, and was cast in an Almondson play, but had to leave for
07:26another job, uh, just before it opened. So this is my first time too. I'm very excited. The Mark
07:30Taper is kind of cool, isn't it? It's just so different, you know, like intimate. Um, what,
07:36what do you both hope, uh, people leave with the audience? What do you hope they remember or
07:41how do you want them to feel after? I hope people walk away and they,
07:48for me, this journey has been such a reflection on honesty. And so I hope that that's what the
07:57conversation is on the way back to the car of like, you know, you're walking with your partner.
08:01You're just like, do I tell this person all of these things? How do we make this work? So leading
08:08with honesty is, is really, I think that's the paranormal experience that I think we're experiencing
08:13as a collective right now. So yeah. How about you, Patrick? Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I love, I always like
08:20to say that I think the audience is going to walk out the door, uh, thinking about the illusions.
08:24There's so many cool effects that really are like, how did this happen? How did, I don't want to give
08:29anything away, but how was someone over here and then they're over here? Um, it's, it's, that part's
08:35very exciting, but then I think people are going to wake up the next morning and be asking themselves
08:41the lingering questions that the play leaves around, uh, this relationship, um, that leaves
08:47around you as a human being, which is ideally, I think what we want theater to do when we
08:52go see it. Um, and anything else you guys in closing want, um, audiences to know before
08:59they go? Come get spooked with us.
09:03You will actually have a genuinely good time. This is, I think for me, at least, um, experiencing
09:13this play, it's, it's such a different kind of theater and I think it's the new face of
09:21theater and it's just so much fun and it's integrating so many different kinds of facets.
09:25So like, just come get spooked, have a good time. It's, you're going to love it. You're
09:30going to love it. How can you not?
09:31Yeah. It's a real blast. Everybody, you know, the really fun part about it that we've left
09:37out is that it's very funny. I mean, people laugh throughout the play. Um, and the playwright
09:43really and the director use humor as a device to kind of, uh, let the tension release because
09:49we don't want to get you one of those horror situations where you feel so tortured. We really
09:54let you enjoy your experience throughout, um, by, by use of comedy and, and, and humor.
10:00Patrick has a really great grasp on the comedy. He is very, very, very funny.
10:07It sounds like a great show. Thank you, Cher Alvarez and Patrick Huesinger. We appreciate
10:12it and look forward to seeing you. Yeah. In paranormal activity at the Amundsen going on through
10:19December 7th. If you want to find out more, you can go to broadwayinhollywood.com.
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