This transcript was automatically generated and might contain errors.

[0:00] Jeryl Brunner: From Shakespeare to Schwartz, from Fosse to Alvin Ailey, from Sondheim to Borellis, from McNally to Fay, it happened to the greats, it still happens every day. When lightning strikes, it's the moment you know, when lightning strikes, where you're meant to go. You can stand and shout, you're eager, do whatever you'd like, you'll never forget the moment when lightning strikes.

[0:25] Jeryl Brunner: Hi, this is Jeryl Brunner, and you're listening to When Lightning Strikes!, where we talk about the tingly mic drop moments that led you to becoming an artist. Eugene Pack is an Emmy-nominated writer and winner of the Drama Desk Award for creating the hit international comedy, Celebrity Autobiography, the beloved show where stars act out other celebrity memoirs live on stage, has run on and off Broadway. Eugene's short original comedies are now featured on a unique podcast called the Pack Podcast. Just a few of the stars who have performed on the podcast have included Sarah Jessica Parker, Blair Underwood, Matthew Broderick, Stockard Channing, Marissa Tomei, Annette Bening, Brian Stokes Mitchell, Martin Short, Renée Fleming, Dick Cavett, and on and on and on.

A compelling work of art, says Variety about the plays, which is listened to in 100 countries and also raises money for the Actors Fund. As acting legend Eva Marie Saint, who has performed in three of Eugene's plays, says, "Eugene's work is so honest. I've lived long enough to know what's honest and what isn't, and Eugene's plays are." Here's an excerpt from Eugene's play, Jenny and Mrs. Brown, with Eva Marie Saint and Sarah Jessica Parker.

[2:09] Eva Marie Saint: Oh my God, happy birthday. Oh, do we have time for cake and a candle? Oh my gosh, I had no idea.

[2:18] Sarah Jessica Parker: How would you know? Oh, happy birthday, Mrs. Brown.

[2:23] Eva Marie Saint: I just turned 96.

[2:29] Sarah Jessica Parker: What? No.

[2:45] Eva Marie Saint: 96 is the new 80. Isn't that the word on the street?

[2:53] Jeryl Brunner: Welcome, Eugene.

[2:55] Eugene Pack: Thank you, Jeryl. I'm such a big admirer of your podcast here. I love all your interviews, so it's thrilling for me to be on your show as a guest.

[3:04] Jeryl Brunner: Well, it's such a joy to have you and incredibly inspiring, and I am such a super fan of your work.

[3:12] Eugene Pack: Thank you.

[3:13] Jeryl Brunner: So let's talk about the Pack Podcast. What do you adore?

[3:19] Eugene Pack: The Pack Podcast has really been an amazing opportunity for, first of all, for me to share my short comedies with people all around the world. And when a couple of years ago, we were doing all of my one acts live on stage in Los Angeles, and we'd attract these great crowds, and it was really fun and exciting rotating cast. And then when live theater couldn't continue, we thought, how can we continue? So we thought, what about putting these all on a podcast and getting cast members, wonderful people from all around the world to participate? Because there was no limit at this point. And I thought, what an opportunity. So what's happened over the last couple of years is that we now have the Pack Podcast, which is this collection of all these plays for people to enjoy little short bites, seven minutes, 10 minutes with rotating cast, which we can get into in a moment that can reach everyone and really entertain people and at the same time, raise money for the Actors Fund.

[4:34] Jeryl Brunner: Wow. They're so phenomenal. I love these plays so much, and they're delicious in every way. It's a feast. And can you talk about how you can write film noir and romantic comedies and kind of Twilight Zone-y pieces, and you go into different genres? You have plays that take place in England. I love that.

[5:01] Eugene Pack: Yes. Thank you. So many different things inspire stories. So you'll be watching, you could be watching a film noir movie, and then that will trigger something in me saying, oh, I'd love to do something in this genre. I have a story idea. I can pair it with film noir, or perhaps you're inspired by a song or there's some lyric in your mind that can also spark a story. And when no one is telling you what to do, if you're your own producer, and I produced this, of course, along with Dale Ray Fell and Jennifer Hegarty, who put together this extraordinary website, the whole design of this too, which is fantastic at thepackpodcast.org, so really grateful for all of that. When you can do whatever you want to do and have complete creative freedom in writing and casting, then you can let your mind go and explore all these genres. It could be Twilight Zone-y, it could be romantic comedy. It's so much fun and it's so creative.

[6:20] Jeryl Brunner: What I love is how you get with your pieces, you get on the roller coaster, you strap yourself in, you don't know where you're going to go, and it could be a dry cleaner. And all of a sudden, there's an exchange between the person dropping off their clothes and the person who works there, and it's other magic. And I always say, your characters give each other gifts. Tell me more about where you find your inspiration. I know you said you could be watching something, especially those pieces where someone's in a bagel shop. Are these inspired by experiences that happen to you sometimes?

[7:04] Eugene Pack: Yes, they are. All of the little pieces that I write are inspired by my life and real life and observations, even more so than, of course, watching other works of art. I get inspiration from different exchanges between people that I'm talking to every day because what attracts me to writing, what excites me about writing is to reinterpret different conversations that I've had or observations where I'll see something and I'll think, wow, what's going on? What are they talking about? And then that sparks my imagination and that can feed into a piece that I'm working on and writing. So I get a lot of inspiration from ordinary conversations, people, random conversations. I feel like everyone has something to offer you. And if you're open to that, amazing things can happen. Incredible, unforgettable conversations can happen with different people. And I attempt to get that into what I'm writing.

[8:14] Jeryl Brunner: And your casts are so phenomenal. I mean, I read a sampling of the actors that you have. I mean, you've had so dozens and dozens of actors on the podcast. Can you talk about your casting process and how that happens when you hear you've written something and you say, OK, I've got to cast it? And what happens?

[8:30] Eugene Pack: I have so many different pieces and I'll look at them and I'll think, who would be my ideal dream person to actually interpret and read these roles? And in some cases, I know the people I've worked with them. They've appeared in other readings, shows that I've been a part of. I'll reach out to them. I'll reach out to people that they work with and find out if they're available, if they're game to do something like this. The way we put it together is real run and gun. We do it. We only have about 40 minutes with people. It's all recorded on Zoom and we edit it from there. It's a very small group that works on this. So we have to get people that are willing to do that. And also there's a component, as I said, that the Actors Fund, you can donate to the Actors Fund.

So it's something good that they're doing too. And hopefully these roles speak to them. They have a fun time doing it and they get to work with people that they might not have ever gotten to work with and want to work with. Or we reunite people.

[9:51] Jeryl Brunner: Yeah. Can you talk about reuniting people? I love this.

[9:58] Eugene Pack: Yes. It was such an incredible experience to reunite, for example, Marsha Mason and James Caan. They starred in two movies together and they hadn't seen each other or, of course, acted together in a really long time. And I thought, oh, wouldn't this be fun to bring, to have Marsha Mason and James Caan do a short piece of mine together? And then we brought in Ralph Macchio, who was terrific with them. And that combination of actors, they had a good time and I certainly had a wonderful time directing and working with them in this very short, short session. It was a thrill. It was really a thrill to put that together.

[10:38] Jeryl Brunner: Can you talk about that piece?

[10:43] Eugene Pack: That piece, Marsha Mason and James Caan did a piece called The House of Louis, where they're the parents of Ralph Macchio. Ralph Macchio takes his son to the Louis Armstrong Museum and the son steals or takes a salt and pepper shaker that once belonged to Louis Armstrong in his kitchen. And they discover that as they're all having dinner later that night. And it's a sweet story with a twist ending. And that's the piece that James Caan, Marsha Mason, and Ralph Macchio did. All these are available at any time at the website, thepackpodcast.org. And there's almost, at this point, a hundred pieces that we've done. And it keeps going, keep adding. Once every couple of weeks, we put new ones up. They're so entertaining and they make you cry sometimes, but always make you laugh, always make you think.

[11:38] Jeryl Brunner: I love the story of how you got Eva Marie Saint on The Pack Podcast. Can you talk about that? Because she's 97 years old.

[11:46] Eugene Pack: Eva Marie Saint, yes. One of my pieces has the character of a teacher that happens to be 96, 97 years old. So I'm putting this together. I'm thinking, who would be an ideal person, a dream person to do this? I had seen that Eva Marie Saint was at this big benefit in LA. There she was at this Turner Classic Movies event. And I thought, I wonder if she would be up for participating in this. And the truth is, is that I contacted some of her, the people that represent her. And they were not that excited at first on the phone. They said, why does she need to do this? I'm not sure if this is really up her alley to do this audio play. And I said, please, let's really, can we try? I didn't want to give up.

I was determined. Then I contacted somebody else. I did not give up. And they said, listen, we'll send her the material. We'll see. Because to me, Eva Marie Saint doesn't get better than that. She's 96, 97 years old. And she's, she's smart. She's wonderful. She's a legend. And lo and behold, she read it. She connected with this character, because she used to be a teacher and the character was a teacher. And she said, I would love to do it. And then she wound up doing two other pieces as well, which was so thrilling.

[13:16] Jeryl Brunner: Yeah, it's so extraordinary. And they're all very different. And she, one of the pieces she was in was with the first piece with was with Sarah Jessica Parker.

[13:24] Eugene Pack: Right. And then the subsequent pieces were, yeah, she did a piece with Sarah Jessica Parker. Then the next piece she did was with Annette Bening and Matthew Broderick. And then the third piece called the bus, the bus ride was with Marissa Tomei and Tate Donovan and Caroline Aaron. It's so extraordinary. And I love how you have a core group of actors, almost like a company in a way, right? Who does a lot of your shows, a lot of the plays, like George Wendt and a number of actors.

[14:01] Eugene Pack: Yes. One of the offshoots of this whole experience has been creating this weekly, also

[14:13] Eugene Pack: The idea of creating a community has always been so important to me and bringing all these great artists together. I learned so much from them, and they're so talented. To have them do the words that I write, put their spin on it, their artistry, what they bring to it is so, so exciting. I really do feel like when you say it's a company of performers, that they really enjoy working with each other. It's always new. It's always new people getting involved. It's a wonderful ensemble. And again, you don't rehearse, right? You get together with your plays and you read them, right?

[14:59] Jeryl Brunner: That's right. There's no, right now there's no, won't really do this. Of course, there'll be more rehearsals yet at this point, right now, there are no rehearsals. People bring their A game. They're really prepared. They jump in and then they are acting, doing it all in the moment, and really, really exciting things come out of that. Can you talk about how the Actors Fund has benefited from the Pack Podcast? Cause that's such a wonderful element.

[15:30] Eugene Pack: Yes, such a wonderful element. Thank you that we, when we first started putting this podcast together, we of course felt it was very important. What's behind this and how, when people listen to this, what can they do? We felt that it was important to align ourselves with a place like the Actors Fund that you can listen to these podcasts, these episodes go on our website, link up with the Actors Fund and donate whatever you can do. This podcast, these plays can reach people all around the world. We're hoping and encouraging people to donate to the cause. The Actors Fund is there to help out all different artists. They do tireless work in reaching people and helping people, especially through these times that we have right now. It's very important.

[16:34] Jeryl Brunner: Yeah. And it's not only, it's not just actors. It's people who work behind the camera, people, customers, you're all more, everyone in the arts basically, right?

[16:50] Eugene Pack: That's right. The Actors Fund reaches out to all different people within the industry and even beyond the industry a bit. And if you don't know about them and you're listening, let's say to our podcast, you can click onto their site. We link up with them. You can find out more. So our, one of our goals is of course, is to enlighten people about the Actors Fund. Please give something to them. If you like what you're hearing on our podcast, donate to the Actors Fund. So we're linked up to them. We really believe in what they do, and it's so important.

[17:28] Jeryl Brunner: Your plays are so rich and inspiring, and I love your writing. Can you talk about your lightning strikes moment when you knew you had to be an artist? You're also an actor; you perform in Celebrity Autobiography.

[17:44] Eugene Pack: Today, I, the one thing that I love, I really love bringing these plays and my work to people and entertaining people, enlightening them. I love bringing all these actors together. It really gives me a lot of joy and excitement. That's really what I'm all about. And I was thinking that when I was a kid, our neighbors would have all these tapes of crazy things like the Little Rascals. I don't know if you ever heard of the Little Rascals. This is from, let's say the 1930s. And I would see, they would show me these little fun tapes of the Little Rascals and them watching these little kids put on these crazy shows and sing and dance and get the neighborhood involved and make their own clubhouses. That to me, I thought, I want to do something like that.

[18:37] Eugene Pack: And then there was a show called Zoom that people would show me the videotapes of this show that was back in the 70s that had a young cast making things, singing, acting, putting on sketches. And I thought, oh, that to me, to do something like that and make your own show, be really creative was so inspiring to me. And I thought, I want to do that. And then I would do that. I would get people from our neighborhood in New York and put on shows and sell fake tickets, of course, and find little areas in the neighborhood to put on shows. And I guess those were the first site-specific shows where we do it in somebody's driveway. To me, that was so much fun. And of course, eventually, I went to see a lot of theater and was so inspired by different performances as well.

[19:35] Jeryl Brunner: I didn't know about the Zoom. That's so, in Massapequa Park, you were on Zoom where you grew up in Long Island?

[19:41] Eugene Pack: Not, when I say Zoom, I don't mean, of course, Zoom as we know it today. There was a children's TV series on PBS called Zoom. And that where they were really putting on, these kids were of all different ages, were putting on their own shows on TV. And I wanted to bring that excitement and creativity to my life. I would organize shows all the time in our neighborhood, in backyards and front yards and bring people from the community to see it at the little clubs, beach clubs, and parks. So I feel like I'm still doing that today because I'm gathering incredible people.

[20:26] Jeryl Brunner: Yeah, I kind of remember the theme song, wasn't it?

[20:31] Eugene Pack: I want to hear you sing it.

[20:33] Jeryl Brunner: Boston, my own, two, one, three, four. Yeah, I remember Zoom. And what's so funny, full circle, is that you have a series of plays because sometimes your plays go into series where the main character is auditioning for Zoom.

[20:52] Eugene Pack: Yes, and I'm working now on writing this epic project that has to do with the children's Zoom series. And of course, I keep saying that Zoom, when we think of Zoom today, it's completely different. And can you talk about Kelly and that show? Because I just adore that play.

[21:14] Eugene Pack: One of our podcast ongoing series that we do is a character named Kelly Cavney. Kelly Cavney has her own little cooking show, a vegan cooking show, where she combines her love of vegan cooking and Broadway shows. So she riffs on different subjects like Annie Get Your Bun or Yam Yankees or Hello Collie, like Hello Cauliflower. And we learn about these, we learn these vegan dishes and we also get to sing some show tunes. And she has all these guests that are not really showbiz types, that are local people from Chesterfield, Missouri, where she interviews them. So it's really a blast to do that.

[22:04] Jeryl Brunner: It's really charming. And I just love Kelly and all of her friends and how earnest and how passionate they are. What are some of the song titles?

[22:15] Eugene Pack: Some of the song titles that we do in the show is, let's say, it's Hello Collie we have before the puree passes by. Which is a riff, of course, on before the parade passes by.

[22:32] Jeryl Brunner: Yeah. And what's the turkey one that you do?

[22:39] Eugene Pack: Oh, yeah. And recently we had Meatless in St. Louis. It's a vegan riff on, of course, meet me in St. Louis and have yourself a very vegan Christmas and how can I ignore the soy next door?

[22:53] Jeryl Brunner: Can you talk about one of the first plays that you ever saw that really, that really?

[22:59] Eugene Pack: You know what I loved? I'll never forget. And I've gotten to work with him, and he's an incredible person, Matthew Broderick in Neil Simon's Brighton Beach Memoirs. So I remember he was the way that Matthew Broderick came out on stage and everyone was absolutely falling over their seats with laughter and making that house feel like when a performer is out there and has them, of course, in the palm of their hand, everyone's laughing, having such a great time, not thinking about anything except what they're seeing on stage. So much fun, so delightful, so charming. That's something that really sticks out. And I thought, oh, to capture something like that, to make people feel good and it's heartwarming and it's funny and such great energy on stage from this young actor, I thought, wow, I want to do something like that.

[23:59] Jeryl Brunner: It was fantastic. Heart-thumping, as you say.

[24:04] Eugene Pack: Or no, it was heart-thumping.

[24:07] Jeryl Brunner: And I love the full circle-ness of it, that now he's, he often performs in the past.

[24:19] Eugene Pack: He's got, he's, he, Matthew Broderick has, I love the way he does my material. It's such an honor, so great to work with him. And he's done a bunch of these podcasts and episodes.

[24:33] Jeryl Brunner: Do you want to talk about Celebrity Autobiography and how that came to be?

[24:38] Eugene Pack: It's such a wonderful story. Celebrity Autobiography is a show that I created where performers act out on stage, actual excerpts from real celebrity autobiographies. It started out years ago in LA. We thought, oh, couldn't this be a fun idea if you got up on stage and read these excerpts? You can't believe that they wrote them. For example, it was all inspired by me coming across the autobiography of Vanna White, which is called Vanna Speaks. I pulled it off of the shelf. I thought, what did Vanna White, how did she fill up this whole book or memoir? What did she write about? Came across a chapter where she talks about how challenging it is to flip the panels on the Wheel of Fortune. She writes about it so dramatically. I had to hold my belt on national TV. It fell out of the loop, and I just kept holding onto it and flipping those panels. And I thought, if you had someone read this out loud in front of an audience, could that be a show or inspire a show?

[25:54] Eugene Pack: I gathered all these great comedians and actors one night and I said, let's pull different memoirs, put them on stage, see what happens. And it was really clear that this could be a show. And over the years, we had celebrities on stage reading other celebrity memoirs that brought it to a whole different level. It started as a small idea. We did it in a bookshop in LA. And then many years later, we did it on Broadway for a limited engagement. So having that whole experience and knowing that, wow, these ideas that you have can really manifest into something really big and exciting. We wound up taking Celebrity Autobiography all around the world. We did it at the Sydney Opera House in London. And it's still going on. It's still happening.

[26:46] Jeryl Brunner: And what's incredible also is that here it went from being an idea in your head, just let's try this. And then what I heard that 100, suddenly it got a following in LA, 100 people showed up. And then more. And then you brought it to New York and to the Triad where it's run, right, for over a decade. And then went to Broadway.

[27:20] Eugene Pack: Yes, yes. It's a really, it's a good example of if you have an idea, go for it and don't let anyone talk you out of it. Try it, put it out there, see what happens and keep doing it and developing it. And that has been such an interesting experience. And it's still going on. It's still evolving after all this time.

[27:49] Jeryl Brunner: Well, Eugene, it's such a pleasure to have you. Thank you so much for coming on the show.

[27:55] Eugene Pack: Thank you, Jeryl, for having me on the show.

[27:59] Jeryl Brunner: Thanks so much, Eugene. Have a great day.

[28:05] Eugene Pack: Thank you.