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Video: LEFT ON TENTH Is a True Story About Second Chances
Sep 13, 2024
In this video, Watch as Susan Stroman, Peter Francis James, and Kate MacCluggage chat more about what Left on Tenth is all about and why audiences will be delighted by the world that Delia Ephron has created for the theatre with the new romantic comedy starring Peter Gallagher and Julianna Margulies.
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When I go to the theater, if I can take something away from that live performance
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that's going to make me change in some way or give me a little strength
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or give me a little bit more information to change my life
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then that's the most perfect piece of theater. I'm very excited about Left on Tenth because it kind of came out of nowhere
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And it moved rather quickly. I mean, we did have a workshop of it, but usually, well, you know, when I do shows, they usually
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take about five years. And we did a workshop this year, and all of a sudden we're going to Broadway
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So I'm very excited about it. It's a rom-com, and it's a slice of life, and it's magical, and it's sort of, I mean, it's
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very New York. It's sort of anything can happen and does. And it's all very work-a-day pedestrian
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And it's huge and magical and you never could believe that these confluences could exist together
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Friends who know me well say, okay, I haven't heard you talk about a show like this in 20 years
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I mean, I'm just nuts to do it. It's the first place since, and I can remember, sort of 2006, where I went
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people need to see this. People really need this play. And I mean, it's delightful, it's funny, but it has real
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real, real, real beautiful, beautiful meat on the bones. I mean, it's just, and it's all fillet
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It's so fast. It's, it's just beautiful. So I'm, we're pretty thrilled
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The story is about totality or the total life. And in that totality, you have your highs and lows
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And those people that have that rich life they have lived both highs and lows And for what she has written it is absolutely totality And what wonderful is that she Delia Ephraim and her husband Peter go to the eclipse
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and see totality. So we have that idea in the play about what totality is. And for people now, I think
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And when they think it's not going to happen for them, it shows them an example of someone who took a chance, not only on love, but also took a chance on their health, took a chance on their life
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And we're brave enough to do that. That's the thing. One has to be brave enough to take that chance, and you must take that chance
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And this play shows that. It is more of an adult story, and it is about second chances, second chances in love
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and in life, and in health, and what's better than having a second chance
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And I love those stories, so there it was in front of me
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So I very much was attracted in wanting to tell this story. So we started to work on it
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And our lovely casting director, Tara Rubin, said, you know, why don't we read it out loud
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And she got Juliana Margulies and Peter Gallagher for us. And come on, the chemistry was so strong
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And right away, they fell in love. And the reading went really
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We did like two readings. And we had Kate and Peter Francis James
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And, of course, they play all the different characters in Delia's life, which I love that actors get to do that
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I love it when actors get to play all these characters. So it just seemed like this could be really possible
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So I asked Darrell I said if I could just get a workshop of this I think it would help us understand because it written a little cinematically And I would need a workshop to help us turn it into a theater animal if you will
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And she gave us a wonderful workshop. And at the end of that workshop, Daryl Roth was thrilled
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Dalia was thrilled and I was thrilled. So off we went to Broadway
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Somebody said, Susan Stroman, and I said, yes. I said, you have an offer
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And I said, yes, yes, yes, please, please, please, love to do that. So we were just reading it at that point
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And then when I read it, it was quite wonderful, and I wondered what she wanted me to play in it
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To find out it was everything that Peter Gallagher isn't doing. So at last count, I was at 14 characters
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which for me as an actor is an unbelievable delight. I love that. The theatricality of the pieces is something I didn't mention
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I mean, it's just in the simplest kind of way, it has a beautiful theatricality to it
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It's so easy, so easy, where there's just this fluidity. And it's everyone in Delia's world, no matter how brief, but even something like the cable guy
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that just touched her life for a second. But they're all there
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And that's it. Everyone who's touched her, you know, appears, and that can be a waiter
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It can be, you know, it's a... New Yorkers will really recognize that, you know
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Some of the most important people in the world work at the dry cleaner, where you walk in
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and go, I have this tonight, and they go, come back in two hours. You know, you're like, oh
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So it's just full of that kind of, I'm almost going to say like rampant love, but expressed
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in these absolutely beautiful, commonplace, everyday ways. That really for me kind of it very that what exciting It kind of different but you recognize everything You know it really fun taking one character on a long journey
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One of the things that I think is delicious about what Delia has done with this script is that we get to play some of the same characters over and over and over as Delia goes on her journey
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So we kind of get a little bit of both worlds. We get to play the one-offs and the people around New York, but we also get to play sort of her
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core people over the journey as well. So it's fabulous. The story of this play is so lovely
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It's lovely to be in that world. Sometimes you're in an important play, but it's a difficult play to live in
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This is a play that I think is both important. And it also feels wonderful to be in it
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and be with these people. And I guess that's sort of what I hope people take from it too
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I think it's a life-affirming play. It's a play that will make you want to call your love
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or your best girlfriend or your parents or whoever it is you really care about
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It's got that kind of, this is what it's all about. What do you hope audiences take away with after leaving this beautiful play
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Well, actor left on 10th. I feel like, you know, it would be wonderful if the audience went away
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And if someone in that audience was not quite brave enough to take a chance on something
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relationship or or something else, you know, in their life, that perhaps the play would give
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them the strength and the bravery to go forward. And I feel like when I go to the theater
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if I can take something away from that live performance that's going to make me change in
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some way or give me a little strength or give me a little bit more information to change
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my life and that's the most perfect piece of theater
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