When you’re on TV, you come into people’s homes. In theater and film, they go to you – to the temple of the cinema or theater. And it’s very different.
I’ve actually found – especially doing my cabaret show – I’m connecting with people in a way I haven’t connected with them. I’ve found that when you’re open and honest, people respond to that, whatever you’re being open and honest about.
You could then, when you lay that as the groundwork, say, “Here I am. This is what I think. I come in peace.” Then you’re able to push out, to be able to talk about more things. And that’s been a really heartening thing about my life, actually.
If you are a cabaret artist and you are mostly singing other people’s songs, you’re asking them to rethink a song, listen to it in a different way. The most impact you can have while asking them to re-listen to a song is if it’s a song they know very well.
If the president of the country is not actually saying something, allowing equality to happen, how could you expect to counsel kids not to bully other kids?
For example, Americans seem reluctant to take on Shakespeare because you don’t think you’re very good at it – which is rubbish. You’re missing out here.
It just seems to me that it’s hypocritical for us as a culture to say, “Bullying is a terrible thing,” when really, they are just reflecting what the society is doing.
