TALK THROUGH IT ◊ EPISODE FOURTEEN
IN THE FIRST INTERVIEW OF THE NEW SEASON, STUART MELTZER SITS DOWN WITH ZOETIC NEWCOMER, LAURA PLYLER, TO DISCUSS HER TIME REHEARSING THE WOLVES.
Stuart: Hi Laura
Laura: Hi Stuart!
Stuart: We are currently sitting in the Knight Concert Hall at the Adrienne Arsht Center. Is this your first time in this space?
Laura: Yes! Other than the first day we toured around, this is my first time,
Stuart: It’s really, really special and I hope that people have a chance to see concerts in here particularly the classical concerts.
Laura: My mom actually was a pianist and she grew up sight reading music and I of course was “handed down that gift” so…
Stuart: Really!
Laura: yep, I graduated with a bachelors of music in music theatre so it’s a thing for me.
Stuart: How long have you been singing?
Laura: I’ve been singing for as long as I can remember, my mom would say that I would harmonize as a toddler in the car seat—which is weird. But she said I would harmonize with the radio all the time.
Stuart: Does your mom still play music?
Laura: yeah, she plays piano here and there—
Stuart: Do you have a piano in the house?
Laura: Oh yeah!
Stuart: What kind of piano?
Laura: well it’s an upright, it’s very old, but it gets the job done, ya know?
Stuart: Oh that’s cool! So welcome to The Wolves! And welcome to Zoetic Stage! This is your first time working at Zoetic.
Laura: Yes! What a blessing!
Stuart: It’s been great having you, I mean your energy, and you’re so funny! I mean you really are. So, what’s your character like in The Wolves?
Laura: Well, my character is #25, she’s the captain of the team. She is kind of the glue that keeps the team going when they get distracted and when they get off course. She brings a very intense energy into the room, she’s very encouraging to all of her team members even though here and there people get on her nerves. There’s so much to be had with her background with her father as a coach and just trying to jostle that kind of pressure. There’s so much pressure put on her as the captain.
Stuart: So, the thing about The Wolves is that it’s a high school indoor soccer team in middle America and one of the things that you shared with us is that your dad—Laura’s dad—it a coach, and you grew up with that! Can you talk more about that?
Laura: You know, growing up with him as the coach—he never coached me, personally—but he was a very, very well renowned baseball coach, as well as football. Those were his sports. I would go to his games all the time! He is a very loud man, which is funny because my character in the show, her dad is known as ‘Screamy Screamy Coach Frank’, and I feel I do get a lot of my projection from my dad because I am very loud too.
Stuart: Did he ever encourage you to go into sports, or he knew that you were more of an artist?
Laura: He tried to, I was definitely more into dance, but we would go out to the field and he would teach me softball,
Stuart: Do you have any brothers or sisters?
Laura: I do, I have an older sister and an older half-brother and half-sister.
Stuart: Are they involved with sports, any of them?
Laura: My half-brother, he’s a really REALLY good ping pong player. We go to his competitions and he was the top ping pong player in the state of Florida.
Stuart: Did he want to do the Olympics?
Laura: He really did try to but he didn’t go quite as far. They actually just came back from Vegas for a competition.
Stuart: Is it quite different rehearsing The Wolves over say, a musical?
Laura: Obviously there should be a lot of focus on text whether for musicals or a plays, but there is so much focus on text in rehearsal.
Stuart: What is the experience the audience is going take-away?
Laura: There is going to be a little bit of a challenge to figure out which story to focus on because there are a lot of overlapping lines. However, I feel like all of those side stories still bring it back to what the scene surrounds itself on and that certain circumstance, so it’s going to be really cool. I suggest they see it more than once, but that’s just my suggestion!
Stuart: Laura thank you so much for sitting with me for a few minutes and talking with me about this. I’m so excited to see your work and I love how much humor you bring to your character, and heart.
Laura: Thanks Stuart!