Meet Casey Long (Pontius the Fish Gutter)
You play multiple characters in multiple historical eras. If you could choose a specific time in history to be born, when would you choose?
As an actor, I should probably say something like the English Renaissance (maybe audition for Shakespeare’s newest play…), or 1950’s America (get to know Arthur Miller and Tennessee Williams), but I think this show has had an effect on me. I would really like to be born in 1 AD, in Jerusalem, and get to know Jesus. I don’t know where my opinions fall on religion (I’m an agnostic, after all), but by all accounts he seems to have been a pretty great human being. I’d like to really see how it all started.
Should Christians or non-Christians come see this play?
Lovers of theater should come see this play. It’s written by one of our greatest living playwrights and it explores deep themes of identity, community, love, death, nationalism, and religion, but it handles them all with wit and honesty.
This play shifts from funny to emotional to funny again on a dime. How do you make those shifts?
Well, I seem to deal a lot more with the emotional than the funny right now. I do get laughs from Trevor on occasion, but it all comes from a place of honesty. When the writing is this good, you don’t have to make funny faces.
This play explores how you are perceived based on your looks versus who you really are. Can you personally relate to this theme?
Heck yeah! Growing up I was what one would call a “nerd.” I took all the honors classes, I was overweight, had braces, bad acne… a real stud. Even joining the football team couldn’t break me out of it. It was actually when I stopped caring what people thought of me, accepted that I am a nerd (still!) and just focused on what I wanted to do with my life that people started actually seeing me for who I was.
If you met your character on the street, would you have a beer together? If not, which character would you share a pint with?
I’d kinda like to take Mary 1 out for a drink…. she’s pretty flirty. But yeah, I would have a drink with all three of my characters — Pontius because the guy probably never had someone to share a drink with in his life, the Foot Soldier because he’ll know everyone in the bar, and P because the man NEEDS a drink!
Do you have a favorite moment in the play?
I have several, and this cast and Trevor keep creating more at every rehearsal. Some of them also involve major plot points, so I can’t tell you about them. The spoiler-free moment I can talk about is in the third part of the show when my character comes back from war. He has this tender, vulnerable moment with his wife, asking her to “remember me to myself.” It’s just this sweet moment of two people trying to figure out how they work together and the resulting tenderness always affects me in a very real way.
What do you connect to in this story?
So much! I can relate to all three of my characters. I know what it’s like to be a hopeless romantic, and all three of my characters are exactly that. They strive for what they consider to be “the perfect life” and it always includes someone to share it with. I also know what it’s like to have my heart broken, to have reality destroy the dream, and to attempt to find the strength to pick up the pieces and move on.
How do you prepare to work on a project like this?
Lots of research! It’s a historical epic, after all. For the first part, I did some research on people with scoliosis (my character has a crooked back), and I think a lot about the first time I had a major crush on a girl. For the second part, I looked into homosexuality in Germany during the rise of the Nazis so that I could understand the innate danger in the air, and the necessity of hiding from it. For the third part, I’ve watched a lot of videos of soldiers returning home from war and PTSD. The only way I can ever really prepare for a show is to do the work at home, memorize my lines, and show up and work on inhabiting these characters completely. To the point that I’m not thinking about the research and the lines anymore and can just live in the moment.
What was your first job in theater?
My first paying job was at Chance Theater back in 1999. My first role though was Santa Claus in my fifth grade holiday show. My mom sewed a big belly into a shirt, and I wore Bermuda shorts. I stole the show!
What excites you about this story and why should people come see it?
This show is so ambitious. The way that Sarah Ruhl approaches these ideas that aren’t easy to talk about — war, love, art, politics, our place in the world — is riveting. As a member of the cast, I love watching my costars act. Everyone is so damned talented in this show, and they are all pushing themselves to be even better. Everyone involved wants to do service to this epic piece of theater so that it will have the fullest possible impact on our audiences.
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