PACIFIC OVERTURES was originally written by John Weidman as a drama. The production team had been holding coast to coast and overseas auditions for over a year. It was then announced that the play was going to be a musical and the audition process started all over again.
I asked my agent to get in touch with casting director Joanna Merlin who brought me in for an interview. She said that Hal was looking for an all Asian cast. I fibbed and told her that my mother was Filipino. She told me to prepare a song of my choice and brought me in to audition for the production team. I had been in Sondheim’s “Do I Hear A Waltz” on broadway and hoped that he remembered my work in the show. I chose the song “Feeling Good” because the lyrics (“Bird flying high, you know how I fee, Sun in the sky, you know how I feel, Breeze drifting by you know how I feel…….) brought to mind a Japanese wood-cut. I wore a black sport jacket and turned the lapels in, so that it looked like a Mandarin collar. The audition went really well and for the first time in my career, I was told on the spot that I got the job and that rehearsals would start in a week. I was the last person cast in the show and am so grateful to have been “part of the event”.
I grew up in Chicago, am an Aquarian and am enjoying a life filled with challenging and wonderful roles on the Broadway stage, Regional Theatre, TV, Radio and Film.
Started my career working in Bob Simpson Revues at the Edgewater Beach and Del Prado Hotels in Chicago. Moved to NYC and landed my first Broadway show playing the role of Vito DiRossi in Richard Rodgers/Steven Sondheim/Arthur Laurents’ Do I Hear A Waltz?. Next came George M!, Via Galactica (oh, the stories one can tell about this one week space odyssey disaster with music by Galt MacDermot and directed by Sir Peter Hall), 42nd Street, Sunset Blvd., The Scarlet Pimpernel and Pacific Overtures, originating the Sondheim songs Someone in a Tree and - extolling the merits of “Detente” - Please Hello.
Toured with shows like Camelot (Mordred), J.C. Superstar (Herod), 42nd Street (Andy Lee - 3 years and over 1000 performances throughout the U.S.A.,Toronto & Tokyo) and Guys and Dolls (2 years as Harry the Horse). Kind of makes my head swim when I think of all of the cities we played for sometimes six months and other times just one night.
Over the years, I’ve had the good fortune to study acting with Mary Tarcai, Uta Hagen, Herbert Berghof and Bobby Lewis; voice with Keith Davis, Amelia Haas and Denes Striny; dance and movement with Edna McRae, Luigi and Anna Sokolow. I’m deeply indebted to all of them for giving me the knowledge to create and maintain the craft.
Being in NYC - and being in the the right place at the right time - gave me the opportunity to audition for Jerome Robbins’ American Theater Lab, and asked to be one of the original members of the group. We had a rigorous schedule of daily classes which included improvisational and experimental theatre games (think Grotowski). Gregg Lawrence writes about our American Theater Lab in his book Dance with Demons: The Life of Jerome Robbins.
And what actor doesn't consider a few years in Los Angeles? While living there, Equity Waiver Theatre was in full flower and my motto was “suit up, show up, and say yes.” This resulted with my becoming a six-time recipient of the Drama-Logue Critics Award. What a blast it was working with Ray Bradbury and Jose Feliciano creating the role of Villanazul in The Wonderful Ice Cream Suit at The Pasadena Playhouse, to also work with George Rose in the L.A. premiere of Drood !, to play the wacky Tristan Tzara in Travesties, Jigger in Carousel, Tom in That Championship Season and several roles in The Great American Playwrights Show (10 short plays, 10 different roles), which we took on a six city tour after it’s run at the Odyssey Theater.
Regional Theatre thrives around the country and it’s been great playing diverse roles in Plaza Suite, Jekyll & Hyde, Breaking Legs, Nine, Annie Get Your Gun, Singin’ in the Rain, The Sea Gull, Tovarich (doing a duet Charleston number with Ginger Rogers), Hello Dolly - with both Ann Miller & Betty Grable -, Romeo & Juliet, Kiss Me Kate (yeah,another gangster role), the King in The King and I, and last but certainly not least playing the role of Barnum for three months, walking the high wire while singing (as we crossed the Bermuda Triangle) aboard the S. S. Norway in the 700 seat Saga Theater.
So many other shows and stories have happened through the years. Most recently I played yet another bad guy. This was a Casa Manana - Dallas Theater Center co-production of the play To Kill A Mockingbird. The role of Bob Ewell is now one of my favorite characters. He’s a lean, mean, lyin, drunken, creep. Who, me ??? The cast was brilliant and our director Wendy Dann is one of the best.
Most recently Writer/director Zachary Volker cast me in the role of Lou Mullin - a wacko con man - in his short film called Club Magic Moment, which has been showing at film festivals throughout the country.
Scrapbooks and my theatre memorabilia are a part of the Newberry Library’s archives.
James Dybas Papers: Newberry Library - Chicago, IL
http://mms.newberry.org/detail.asp?id=814&alpha=D
