Rosemary was a little nervous about going onstage, but she went on with us. I saw her at a party, and a couple of months later they called me about doing the act.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
I went on an audition. I walked in the room, and it was Leslie Mann with Judd Apatow. It was intimidating.
I started out doing my mother's nightclub act, and I had stage fright.
Instead of acting in court, I decided to act onstage.
I've been performing since I was a child; my mother would have to pull me aside and tell me that I wasn't onstage. I was a cheerleader, president of choir, and in the school play.
I had two starts, really. The first was going to the Italia Conti stage school, aged 15. I'd gone to sing, but one day I found myself doing an improvisation and thought, 'Oh God, I quite like this acting thing.' The second start was meeting Mike Leigh when I was 22. He showed me I could play people that weren't like me.
I was a very good girl for a long time, that's what really drew me to acting. The stage was the perfect place to be outrageous, to be sad, to be angry, to be all these different things.
I had met a young lady who wanted to be in the theater. It was Judy Holliday. She had somehow fallen down the steps of the Village Vanguard, which still exists today.
I was not naturally meant to be on stage. I hated being in the spotlight; I was scared.
My first-ever date on my first tour, the sound completely cut out. So I had to go on and just shout loudly to the audience.
Anybody that goes to the theater, I think we're all misfits, so we ended up on stage or in the audience.