Drama Queens, a five-star arts journal focusing on female artists

Janet Aldrich Interview by Jen Bush

Bullet Points is a new work by Larry Daggett. 

A staged presentation of this powerful new musical will take place on:
June 10 @ 7:00 p.m. & June 11 @ 2:00 p.m.

Theatre Row Theatre
as part of the New York New Works Festival
410 West 42nd Street, NYC

Bullet Points tells the story of one woman’s attempt to navigate her thoughts and feelings on both sides of the gun control issue – with the hope that this subject will resonate long enough in the American consciousness that both sides of the debate might begin to find a path toward ending gun violence in schools.  This dark comedy focuses on Sarah, a Florida high school teacher who returns to work on the same day as a school shooting which sends her life spinning in wildly unpredictable directions – both tragic and comic.  “The theme of the show concerns the “us versus them” mentality that cuts our country in half,” says acclaimed composer Larry Daggett, “It’s about learning to listen to people on the opposite side of an issue even if they disagree with your point of view.”

Janet Aldrich, Broadway: Me and My Girl, Lady Jacqueline; Starmites, Maligna; Broadway, Ruby; also Three Musketeers; Annie, and the pre-Broadway tour of Applause as Karen Richards. Off Broadway: Lust, Mistress Dainty; Ben,Virginia and Me, Sophie Tucker – NYMF Outstanding Performance award; also Prime Time Prophet; Comedy of Errors and American Princess. Janet has performed in 7 countries, in 3 different languages, including playing Sally Bowles in Jérôme Savary’s award-winning French production of Cabaret in Paris and throughout Europe. Ms. Aldrich was the first recipient of the Helen Hayes Award for her performance in Forbidden Broadway. She sings jazz, and occasionally performs with the Foggy Minded Boys. Janet is also known as “Glamma”. www.JanetAldrich.ACTOR @Janet_Aldrich

It wasn’t a hard knock artistic life for Janet Aldrich.  She experienced success upon moving to New York and got on two national tours of Annie.  She worked with and interacted with the cream of the crop of the theatrical world.  This very well rounded and talented artist finds comfort in her craft.

 “My name is Janet Aldrich and has been since I joined my first union in 1979 when I moved to New York. A little more than a year later I was on the national tour of Annie as the Star To Be:  that was my first big production contract. I graduated from the University of Miami where I went to college with Ray Liotta, Steven Bauer, and Saundra Santiago. Right out of college, I went to South America as a dancer behind a female impersonator who did Liza Minnelli. After a year of lip-synching, I moved to New York.  The second national tour of Annie was my third Actors Equity contract.”

“It soon became evident that my strength was comedy, belting, and a breath of ability to sing many styles of music from opera to Jazz.  One of my favorite shows was doing Broadway directed by Mr. George Abbott, when he was 99 years old in rep with Boys from Syracuse at Great Lakes Shakespeare. I had just finished doing Forbidden Broadway in Washington DC and won a Helen Hayes award, and meeting Mr. Abbott was truly a highlight of my life. Gerald Friedman of Great Lakes Shakespeare arranged a symposium bringing anyone Mr. Abbott had ever worked with to come speak and lead panels on “Mr. Broadway”. I met all kinds of luminaries like Betty Comden and Adolph Greene, Harold Prince and Mary Rodgers.”

“While performing at Great Lakes Shakespeare, I flew home for an important audition which ultimately sent me to Paris for a year and a half playing Sally Bowles in. Cabaret – in French. The irony is when I was 13 and my world fell apart. When my father left, I went to see the movie Cabaret and absolutely fell in love with the theater. To my adolescent mind, Cabaret represented a time and place where the character Sally Bowles could feel immune from the rest of the world, which was preposterous because the Nazis were rising in Berlin at that time, but she felt safe on stage in the cabaret.  That is how I began in the theater, seeking that safety, that comfort, that family because mine had exploded.”

Ms. Aldrich was drawn to this project because it had a political connection for her, and two sides of an issue will clearly be heard in the piece.  “When Larry Daggett contacted me asking if I would be interested in doing his musical reading for Bullet Points, I emphatically jumped up and down, and said yes! During the pandemic, and actually even before then I had gone to Twitter to find some way to understand how people could support and believe in Donald Trump, which resulted in a series of comedy videos based on tweets by Trump supporters, they were characters I created from the tweets themselves. This is how Ayse attempted to understand those who disagree with me: through comedy.”

“The world has gone nuts. When Kellyanne Conway said that Trump had alternative facts, that blew my mind. Now with AI on the rise I am terrified that all of these “alternative facts“ flooding the Internet for the past 10 years are now feeding AI. I think Trump is a calculating marketing genius who totally pulled the wool over everyone’s head, and that his ultimate plan was to do just this: flood the Internet with dis-information, so that AI could build on it. That’s why when Larry asked me to do this project, I jumped at the chance. I am thrilled to be a part of something that fosters communication between two drastically opposing sides.”

Gun control is a hot button topic.  All the cast members weighed in on the issue with very sound ideas.  “I feel that the gun control issue and particularly the NRA are manifestations of greed, fed by the sensationalism that our media spews 24 hours a day.  When CNN became a 24-hour news station they quickly learned they had to make everything sound urgent, terrifying, breaking order for people to keep watching.  That changed our lives drastically. advertisers have long known that there are only two motivators for sales: going towards pleasure or away from pain, and the 24-hour sensationalist news cycle chose the latter as a strategy to maintain viewership. Everything is “breaking news”; “Three things you must do…”; “a crisis in… “ Actual facts with no opinions or interpretation are virtually impossible to find these days I feel that the NRA jumped on that bandwagon to sell more guns, which has resulted in a higher gun population than there are people in this country, including babies. And the NRA feeds that monster to the politicians by telling them if they can find out what their constituents are truly afraid of, talk about it and vow to fix it, their election is virtually won.”

“The answer is more than buying back guns or making rules that people will get around restricting access to guns: that ship left years ago. It would be so nice if by turning the mental health of our population to a place where they don’t feel they need to be in great fear and induce violence to defend themselves, we could inspire people to melt down their guns.  It would also be wonderful if the press didn’t glorify or even name or show pictures of these mass shooters: refuse to dignify them.  What they call coastal elites cannot any longer ignore or dismiss the cares and fears of the middle of the country. I feel that yelling at them and calling them names and accusing them of being stupid are just as responsible for this divide as those who claim to be Christians and judge everybody who aren’t like them. I feel neither foster listening and that listening is truly the only way to begin to heal this, One can’t listen while blaming. But what can you listen to if the news is feeding you fear-mongering headlines?”

Ms. Aldrich is hoping that Bullet Points will prompt the audience to start conversations about important issues.  Perhaps it will even enact some positive change.  “Comedy and music are two ways to foster communication.  For that, I am very proud to be part of the musical comedy Bullet Points to kick off a new conversation. My reigning question in life is “what’s behind that?” It defines almost everything about me, even my curiosity about the extreme right. “

The sun will always come out for Janet Aldrich as she continues on her path as an artist.  “what is next for me? pursuing what I love to do while searching for what’s behind the next thing. I love humanity. I think it’s fascinating and vastly entertaining and really all we have. I will never stop being curious.”

See Bullet Points and start the conversation.

Bullet Points   

 Staged presentation

June 10 @ 7:00 p.m. & June 11 @ 2:00 p.m.

Theatre Row Theatre

as part of the New York New Works Festival

410 West 42nd Street, NYC