#36 – Evan Buliung

Evan Buliung has acted on almost every major stage in Canada, including Canadian Stage (most recently in Chimerica), the Stratford Festival (Pericles, Carousel), the Shaw Festival (Star Chamber, Devil’s Disciple), Western Canada Theatre (Peter and the Star Catcher), Mirvish Productions (Cloud 9, We Will Rock You), and Soulpepper (Long Day’s Journey into Night).

Twitter: @EvanBuliung

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Transcript

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Phil Rickaby
Welcome to Episode 36, or Stageworthy, I’m your host, Phil Rickaby. Stageworthy is a podcast about people in Canadian theatre. On stage really, I might talk one on one with an actor, director, playwright or producer, or I might get a group of people together to talk about a specific aspect of theatre in Canada. If you’d like to be a guest on stage really or just want to drop me a line, you can find stage really on Facebook and Twitter at stage with the pod. And you can find the website at stage with a podcast.com. If you like what you hear, I hope you’ll subscribe on iTunes or Google music or whatever podcast app you use and consider leaving a comment or rating. My guest this week is Evan Buliung. Evan has been seen on TV in almost every genre and on almost every major stage in Canada including Canadian stage, the Stratford Festival, the Shaw festival, Western Canada theatre, Mirvish productions and salt pepper

you so your family is mostly from the US but your family you’re part of the family is to is living in Canada or Yeah, no, we’re strictly from Canada. Branford in Rockford. Yeah. You spent your life in in Brantford.

Evan Buliung
Yeah, I grew up there. Yeah, it was the thriving metropolis of Brantford, Ontario.

Phil Rickaby
What did you get the opportunity to theatre much in Bradford

Evan Buliung
a tonne of opportunity? Yeah, do theatre in Branford? Yeah, Branford was really great and formative, a lot of community theatre, great stuff in high school. I don’t know what the arts are like in high school anymore. But at the time, it was really great. And yeah, I grew up in like theatre Brantford and Paris players and sort of learned the love of it. Yeah, from there. Did

Phil Rickaby
did you? At what point did did you realise it was something that you wanted to do? Like, as a living,

Evan Buliung
I was five, five years old, and still working out in therapy as well as to be an actor. But yeah, I remember being I was five. And I wrote in a little journal that I had that I bought from, you know, when you’re when you do the book fairs at school, that I wanted to be an actor, and I probably seen something or whether it was television, or what I was just like, fascinated by. By theatre, I remember going into a theatre and when the doors closed at the back and the everything’s about to be prepared. There’s a sort of silence and like a real stillness in the room. And I just, I don’t know, I fell in love with that.

Phil Rickaby
And that was like, like, at from age five. And that was like when you said, No, this is what I want to do.

Evan Buliung
Yeah. Yeah. So school kind of became secondary, and somewhat redundant. I don’t want to say it wasn’t fully redundant. I’m sure I learned a lot there. But you know, it was it was challenging, and I didn’t eat very well at school. I just spend most of my days in the theatre.

Phil Rickaby
I can relate. I mean, I know. I have sort of similar thing where you know, my earliest memory after saying that I want to be a policeman or a fireman or an astronaut. Because somewhere from there you went from that to want to be an actor. Yeah. And I don’t quite remember exactly what it was. But I remember sitting in a theatre somewhere and watching some kind of some kind of show. Yeah, there was all kinds of, there’s something about the magic of being in that room, and like having things there and they’re real for the moment. Something about that just sort of made me want to. That’s what I wanted.

Evan Buliung
Yeah, absolutely. I think I wanted to be an archaeologist at one point, but I’m sure that was Indiana Jones.

Phil Rickaby
Archaeologist after Indiana Jones Yeah. When when you were you went to George Brown College and like I did for theatre. Were you looking at other schools when you when it came time to look for theatre school to go to

Evan Buliung
Yeah, I auditioned for Sheridan and I got in there because I loved musical theatre and it’s sort of what I started in and and did mostly outside of the festivals. So I was like, wow, I got to be shared and this is where I want to go and like I was like so pumped to go to share it and then and then I went to the George Brown audition I remember sitting in the in, you know, 530 King Street class, which if you haven’t been to 530 Cakes request it’s not there anymore, but it was a rat infested of love like it was It was an incredible black box space and with holes in the wall everywhere from angry young actors,

Phil Rickaby
I think we all have the home run down.

Evan Buliung
Absolutely. Which is now a condo like everything else. But I remember sitting in the in the theatre with everyone else who was auditioning and Peter Wilde came out onto the stage. And he looked at us all and he said, Look to your left, look to your right. Neither of those people will be working when they get out of this school. And I was like, oh my god, this is where I want to be. Like it just like that kind of passion and, and honesty was I was like, oh, no, I need to be here. Yeah,

Phil Rickaby
I remember I remember is similar. My audition. Were in one of the studios upstairs. And they were like, I think like maybe maybe five, six of us that afternoon. And was Peter wiles. No one wants to speech. Oh, yeah. And that was like the most intimidating thing. But it was like, somebody, I think it was the fact that he was honest about about that, that it’s like, this is what this is what the business is. Yeah. You know, there’s plenty of you know, anything really spoke to me. While you’re at George Brown, did you? Can you think of the things that you took away from from that course? That were formative or important lessons? Yeah,

Evan Buliung
I mean, I went there when I was 18. Right. So it was my first time away from school, or from home. And I think I’ve learned more about moving to Toronto than I did from going to theatre school. To be honest, I got myself into a bunch of trouble. Got into alcohol and drugs and you know, it was the 90s and and raves and all this stuff. So it became I think you were even at a party. I remember you being at a party at my house. We had some you had some crazy times there. So it was sort of the the life experience that really because I figure if you want to act and you know how to act, but when you go into a theatre school, you know, while they strip away a lot I think an actor hold on to their core belief. I like to look at it as like a pilot light that even through all of the morass of craziness that was going on I knew that I wanted to do what I wanted to do you know, so you no of course there’s like, some of the courses drove me crazy. And inevitably I was kicked out and in my third year, I was kicked out of class they kept me to do the shows, which was great. Great fun and I love doing the shows but I yeah, I just a classroom setting was very difficult for me to to focus on was

Phil Rickaby
that in the second half of third year that that happened.

Evan Buliung
In the first I think it was early in the first half it was during just before a vocal mask. Stuff had to go on and I was to present my vocal mask and I refused to basically just because I hadn’t done it. And anyway, I did I put it together, but it was too late by that point. So yeah, yeah.

Phil Rickaby
Did you were you the vocal mask is is a tense and I don’t even know how to describe it anymore. It’s definitely stressful. Did you have success with the previous ones? Or was it?

Evan Buliung
Yeah, I did. My first my first year vocal mask was about addiction, which spoke very, truthfully to me and to what I was sort of experiencing at the time. And then my second year one was with Wayne Boulding. We did ours on Elvis, which kind of transferred the addictions sort of thing into into that. And it was the Wayne though the Elvis one was was people really loved it. We really put a lot of effort into it. And of course, Wayne is no longer with us having passed away recently, which is which was pretty rough.

Phil Rickaby
But for third year, you were just like now, okay,

Evan Buliung
third year, I was going to I was doing one on Superman. From addiction to Elvis to Superman. And, and I hadn’t finished but it was by the time I handed and it was too late and miners had to do like, and, and, you know, I respect that. Yeah, you know, at the time I was kind of devastated. It was a long time ago.

Phil Rickaby
Yeah. It’s one of the things that we Yeah, that were really important when we were in theatre school there now like, yeah, no, I get I get when that happens. Yeah, yeah. What do you finish Theatre School? The next time that I recall hearing your name was in regards to being a part of the we’ll rock you? Was that your next thing? Or did you do other stuff before we will rock?

Evan Buliung
Oh no, I did. I did a bunch of theatre in like grand band and blue water started playing like a lot of play houses around the province. And then I did five years at Stratford and three years at Shaw, and then Lord of the Rings a musical right? And then we all Rocky. So it had kind of I’d had a career leading up to we’ll rock you like you the five years at Stratford were very formative and eye opening. And three years at Shaw, were you. I mean, it was all fantastic. But I got to work with some really seminal people at Stratford. And my first show there was a bill hut and Brian Bedford and Martin Henry and Tom mechanics, Steven were met. And you know, as a 23 year old, I was like, holding on to the proverbial spear and just listening, right? So I often stress that to younger actors, if you’re if you have the chance to be in a room with people that have done this for so long. Just listen. Yeah. And because it is an apprentice craft, which sometimes I think we we lose sight of that it’s like, okay,

Phil Rickaby
let’s do it. Yeah. Yeah. I think you’re right about that. I mean, listening is a really important thing. But I don’t think that that. I don’t recall being told something somewhere like that when I was in theatre school that, you know, we didn’t have the business of acting class and all that stuff. And then nobody said, when you get out and you get your first job when you’re working with with people who’ve been doing it for a while, just pay attention. Yeah, of course. I mean, when we did when I got out of school, I knew every fucking thing. Oh, yeah, of

Evan Buliung
course. We all do. We all do. Yeah, it’s part of the rite of passage.

Phil Rickaby
takes a little while to realise how good you actually know. Yeah. It’s funny. You mentioned Lord of the Rings, because I didn’t know that you are in Lord of the Rings. But I always I think I’m i Miss, I miss order those those things in my mind. And I Oh, I always like Lord of the Rings is one of those things I forget happened. Purposely, I mean, because Lord of the Rings was like this hugely ambitious thing that just didn’t quite do what everybody was hoping it would do. Yeah. What was it like being a part of that at the time that it was playing when it was the next thing and then it didn’t become that thing?

Evan Buliung
It was it was probably one of the darkest periods of my life. I think I was it was one of those things. When I got it. I was like, the I was over the moon. Like, I auditioned for it with a number of other people. And the fact I think the fact that they wanted me to play Aragorn I was like, Oh, my God, like, I never played these parts, right? Like, I’m always the Buddy the friends. Yeah. The funny guy, the sad guy, the kind of like crazy guy. Yeah. And all of a sudden, they want me to play the sort of troubled hero. Oh, my God, and I literally just come from Shaw doing major Barbara playing Charles Lomax, you know? My barber, you left off your uniform. Right into playing Aragorn and it was the first month was just the Battle of Helm’s Deep. That’s what we rehearsed on the revolve, which was a triple revolve with a ELB with 17 elevators on it. And you know, each each elevator had like a pink square, red diamond, blue circles. So we knew where to jump to where. And it was, you know, the director Matthew Ward, just, to his credit, he said, I’m gonna ask you to do something like a Olympic and I was like, okay, and I was 30. And are 31 and I was going home for. But yeah, it became clear. You know, the critics beat us up. It was a big workshop. Really? I mean, it was. Musicals need workshopping. And this This was no different and it was a giant, you know, it’s a giant game thing. Yeah, I’m sure they didn’t put Les Miserables together and for months, yeah. So and it’s just as big if not bigger. So it was, it was an incredible cast of wonderful Canadians and some as a few Brits. But I, you know, by the time we got to opening, we were rehearsing seven hours or seven days a week, all day, every day with no time for rest, recuperation reflection, anything. So it was I went into a very dark place. I know I’m not alone, but I have, you know, my reactive quality, especially at the time was was to sort of React outwards and inwards at the same time, it was just sort of this explosion. When they left to take it to England, I suggested that they hire circus performers to do it and not actors because it was you know, I know it wasn’t taken to heart and I was badly damaged. I didn’t come out of my apartment after it finished for about a month and a half. And I have people that came over and sort of like, took care of me basically, they gave us you know, physically, emotionally spiritually just bankrupt. Yeah. I wish I could, you know, I do look back on it fondly at the people that were in it. I wish I could have handled it better. I wish I could have been stronger. But it just took over. I think it’s the theme of the show. Right? I mean, it comes from it comes from his experiences in World War One like, it’s a dark fucking thing. Yeah. And yeah, it was. It was brutal.

Phil Rickaby
Was it was the brutal I mean, obviously, having that show not and do what was expected of success was brutal. But performing it sounds like it was just as just as difficult.

Evan Buliung
Yeah, it was. I mean, when we opened when we first put it together, it was almost five hours long, right? And sometimes we would do two shows a day. So it was like, it was it was totally insane. Yeah, like it was, you know, they would we would come offstage at the end of the first show and the bags of Swiss chalet just lining the hallways for us to eat. And you know, poor Mike Terrio playing Gollum just sat there and his fucking Gollum rubber costume and and eating chicken and yeah, it was supposed to be successful. And you know, when we when we went to the design presentation, it was gorgeous. And you’re back how can this not work? Yeah, well, storytelling, you know, like, what is the story you’re trying to tell? It doesn’t matter how much shit you throw on the stage.

Phil Rickaby
And so that wasn’t really works out there went from from from first iteration to just straight into into full

Evan Buliung
perform. Well, it was workshopped in England. I shouldn’t say it wasn’t workshopped. I mean, the creative team put it together. They’re fantastic. And they put together Matilda, which is obviously doing extraordinarily well. Yeah. And, you know, in hindsight, in hindsight, like, I love them all very much. I respect them deeply. But it’s, I sometimes it can’t say, you know, the Canadians going over the top. You know, suddenly, Canadians see what I see with the machine guns due to that. Yeah. So it had been worshipped in England. But you know, it’s, it’s just so big. There’s so many stories to tell it.

Phil Rickaby
Yeah. I often wonder, I mean, I didn’t get the opportunity to see but I wonder how do you take those three books? Which were at the time were also the movies? Yeah. And condense that into three hour performance,

Evan Buliung
which is a challenge. Yeah, it is a challenge and Matthew wanted it to be like Shakespeare meets Cirque du Soleil. You know, you’re challenging the theatre Gods a bit. Bye bye. Yeah, it I could see it as a Cirque du Soleil imagery piece and that’s what they had. I mean, the sets were fantastic. They were so stunning. And costumes Rob Rob Howell who designed it was just fucking brilliant. And he was actually one of the most genuinely graceful guys on the team when they when we were when we had the Dora awards he I think he won for design and he was and he was very complimentary to the Canadiens more so than anyone else. Yeah but yeah, I don’t know how you I don’t know how you did we you know, we cut so much juicy started to start cutting and we got it down to about three and a half I think or something. But we’re

Phil Rickaby
good because that show and what happened with it, kind of, in a way changed the face of theatre in Toronto for for a while and way that you We’re still recovering from Yeah. Because Murphy’s productions didn’t really do any self produced stuff for many years after that. So it’s, it’s, it’s it’s really, from from just a production point of view, it’s really kind of disappointing that that show was unable to do what they hoped for to do after you finally came out of your apartment. Was it? Was it hard for you going back into the audition room?

Evan Buliung
Yeah, after that? Yeah, I was pretty much. I remember saying to my agent use get me on a cruise ship or something. She was like, no, no, we’re not gonna we’re not gonna do nothing. It gets cruise ships. But she’s just like, that’s not that’s not your focus. And I was just looking for something that was that was easier to navigate.

I went into a pretty like dark place for a number of months. And I’d actually been sober for quite a number of years at that point. And that fell off briefly, thankfully. Got back onto the train. Yeah, and then it just got back to your point about effecting community. I remember when they the Ontario government donated or donated by Doug gave Lord of the Rings. $3.5 million. That’s an investment. Right. And a lot of people invested in it wound up costing about $50 million, the whole show. It started I think it was budgeted at 29 to 50 million. And I don’t think that they I don’t think they took into consideration our unions here. And as well as the crew unions, like the crew were miraculous. And they were literally working 24 hour shifts right through the night, and setting up and doing all this stuff. Like they they it was a yeoman’s effort on their part, but you know, it cost them a lot of money. Yeah. And, you know, I think perhaps, you know, I tried to look at what the opportunity is, and that and now the merges are are creating their own sort of things that you know, what the Panasonic and such like that, but it it had, it had been a number of years of such successful musical theatre, that it was like the Lord of the Rings, let’s like, let’s tempt fate one more time, and just go like that one step further. And it was a bit like the Titanic. It didn’t it did better in England than it did here. And Kevin Wallace always called it England, its spiritual homeland, which, you know, very well, maybe. But, yeah, everyone got stung across the board. Everyone lost a lot of money. And you know, Ed, was Ed was still alive, then. Yes. David was transitioning into David’s hands. Yeah, I think and so in a way, I think it’s probably a good thing that happened, because what David has been able to do is make some real astute decisions in terms of what they bring in both him and David Musee. And and they’ve been at they’ve been more successful. And I think I think we’ll Rocky was the next it was pretty much the next thing. Yeah. And that’s, and they asked me to come in for that. And I was like, No, I don’t want to do anymore like me. And they’re like, just come in. It’s fun.

Phil Rickaby
Yeah. Was it already running when you came in? No. Yeah. No, it’d been running in England. Right. But you were part of the first cast? Yeah, yeah. I remember. I worked at the Emirates Theatre for a while, a couple years ago. And people, people who were working as actors who still worked, were still working there who worked during We Will Rock You and they would still talk about how crazy the audiences were for that show. Oh, yeah. What was it like performing for for audiences that are drinking in their seats? And there was like a concert.

Evan Buliung
It was it was a total joy, man. I mean, that experience was was it was flipped on its head from the previous one for me. I had the greatest night of my life in that which I’ll get to, but we’ll rock you was. You know, I got to play the silly British villain. It was just he’s just kind of an ass and I love doing that. And, and, you know, I grew up on a hearty feeding of Monty Python and Steve McQueen. So it’s like that kind of mix of genres, but I you know, the audiences went apeshit and some people came and saw it like 1011 12 times. Yeah, I just remember the at the end in the curtain call like they gave the audience glow sticks right? Yeah, kind of as opposed to later, but in the curtain call they’re up there all through them. So we would come up for curtain call in the darkness and all of a sudden, it was like Braveheart man. It was like flaming fucking arrows flying through the air and we all had to like, you’re like she had fucking they’ve just like hundreds of these like hard glow sticks being thrown at us. And you know your dodge, you’re covering your eyes, your eyes poked out but the audience’s went crazy for it. Like, you know, like Ontario loves its classic rock and absolutely, you want to seven so and Queen came, right? They came to hang out with us and play with us. Sort of near the end of my tenure on it’s a it was that’s the greatest time I like that. Brian May Roger Taylor. With Ben Elton came and. And they they came to play for our 100th show. So in they’ve been there for a few days, and they did a sound check and they crank everything up because they’re deaf. And they can’t hear anything. So after they left, they’re like okay, guys, we’re just gonna turn it back down a little bit because of course, they’ve been playing rock the whole time. Yeah, whole life. So. But I I remember coming downstairs into the bowels of the Ed Mirvish Theatre, which was the Canon at the time and I walked into my dressing room and Brian May and Roger Taylor and Ben Elton were standing in my dressing because it was right across from the stage manager office and I was just like, and Brian May you know, there’s a super long Yeah, herring. Hey, man, I just want to say like, I really want to apologise for the sound quality of the show right now. It’s not very loud and like, like, whatever. Like, here, we send my queen posters that are on the wall. And they did and but they were I remember stumbling into his room. At one point, he was in there with his daughter and I was going into warm up and I had to hit high A’s and it was like, just a nightmare. But I walked in, he’s just like, oh, sorry. It’s like, no, no, come on, man. Come on in. So you know, I just want to say like, I’m really excited that you guys are here to think he’s like, Oh, thanks, man. Thank you. And he really started talking. He’s like, So who’s your favourite band? I was like, Radiohead. Radiohead is my favourite and he’s like, Oh, I love those guys. It’s so great. Holy fuck. So we gotta we got out in and he just soundcheck that day and we all the cast just stood around Brian May and he had his guitar and he uses a a silver pound note or whatever shilling as a pic. That’s how he gets that crazy sound by using that and he we’re just like plain fat bottomed girls show must go on play, you know, Killer Queen and he would just like play all these riffs or, and so that night they played with us in in Bohemian Rhapsody. And they came you know, Roger Taylor keeps swinging out on his drums and we’re all singing are rocking it out and then we saying The show must go on, which is not in the show. But I got to sing. I don’t know the bridge right before the guitar solo. So I went out and I sing the Birdman and my soul is painting with the wings and butterfly. And then Susie McNeil sings and, and then Brian May goes into his guitar solo, and I stood back to back with Brian Retton with Brian May and did air guitar. Well. Yeah, it was and it’s on video somewhere. I’ve made me fucking hell as I can’t believe I’m doing Eric guitar. Back to Back. Brian may have queen so yeah, that was the greatest night of my life. Yeah.

Phil Rickaby
Since then, if you’ve been back to Stratford Hinshaw, or since Yep, yeah, yeah. What’s the I mean, you’re older than you were when you went there the first time. What’s the main difference going back to those festivals now than it was? When you first went

Evan Buliung
well within you with any company, there’s challenges in any business and you know, Stratford is a big organisation who shot a bit smaller. But you know, confidence right like I can, I can, but I still have that actor. You know that that never goes away that actor insecurity of like, of course of what’s you know, that you still struggle with it’s like validation. You’re looking for validation, which is some sort of emotional throwback to, you know, whatever has gone on in the past and I still you know, when I see Martha Henry, I still feel like a 23 year old. I remember Simon Bradbury say saying that to me at Shaw, he was like, It’s really difficult. Sometimes I just run into Chris Newton. And I feel like I’m a 19 year old again, like, I just don’t know how. So you still do, right? Like, I’m 41 years old. And I still feel sometimes when I go back there like a little kid. Yeah. And, and it’s something that I’m working on. Like I look at some of the greater people I really admire. They’re like Peter Donaldson who’s no longer with us, those kinds of guys that were just like, stalwarts, you know, and they say, like, no, no, no, you talk to me if you want to, like that kind of thing, right? It’s not it’s not inherently in my bones. I’m it’s, I think, you know, certainly you play different parts. But you also have the experience to bank on like, I can open up a book of Shakespeare and read it and know what I’m reading. Yeah. Like, without a doubt, you know, and it’s, and that’s cool. Like, at one point in my life, I hated Shakespeare. And then another point in my life, I didn’t understand how it worked. And now it’s

Phil Rickaby
Did you mean at that point in your life when you hate Shakespeare? I mean, it’s a big part of the training at George Brown, or at least it was at the time. Yeah. Did you hate it then? Or were you learning to like it? Or? No, I

Evan Buliung
liked it, then. I mean, in high school, I, you know, but it’s, but nobody knows how to teach Shakespeare in high school. Like, it’s so it knows how to

Phil Rickaby
teach Shakespeare in high school. You probably shouldn’t be teaching Shakespeare in high school. He’s not the way that you do.

Evan Buliung
Yeah. Yeah. shouldn’t treat it like literature. No, it isn’t. Usually it needs to be dusted off. And I don’t know that Julius Caesar is the right way to go either. To

Phil Rickaby
teach the kids or like are like, just why are we teaching these ones? Yeah, I can understand Romeo and Juliet, Romeo and Juliet. Right can mean something to a high school student, but why are we teaching them? Why are we teaching them in class? And why are we teaching them?

Evan Buliung
Well, I think I think it’s also I think, I think the fascinating thing with that is it’s a throwback, right? It’s it’s a one point, students understood what was going on in Julius Caesar. But now it’s, it’s the attention span or whatever. Like it’s over the years, we progressively changed the doctrine at schools. And you know, nobody, nobody knows who the fuck Caesar is. Right? Yeah. Especially in school, and they don’t give a fuck about political. If you if you could mirror it with what’s going on in the United States, or what’s going on, even in Canada with Harper. Yeah, that should have been

Phil Rickaby
like, you know, you could probably have some success. Now, if you were to make an album or in between one of those plays and Game of Thrones Absolutely. Might be able to get people to understand better what’s going on. Yeah.

Evan Buliung
And I think I think Anthony Cimolino even put that in his Macbeth notes this year, where he compares it to Game of Thrones. But you know, the wonderful thing about Game of Thrones. Oh, well, I’m thinking not Game of Thrones. I’m thinking of House of Cards. Yes. Oh, my God. Yes. Yeah. Where he compares it to that. But even if you go back further to the Ian Richardson, House of Cards, the original British version, it’s so Shakespearean. And he’s so Machiavellian and such a Richard the Third care like his takes to the camera are much more arch. Yeah. Just because he comes from that world. I guess spacey does too, but Can Game of Thrones, that show

Phil Rickaby
everybody else? It’s funny because I was wondering it. As you were talking about when you meet Martha Henry, you feel like you’re like a 21 year old again. Do you think that that sort of feeling and I think that you know any of us who meets one of those people that we looked up to we will always be that kid that looked up to them? Yeah, but do you think that that helps when you’re dealing with like, the 1920 year olds are coming in now that you sort of can remember how you were when you were just starting out?

Evan Buliung
Um, yeah, I think like I don’t I don’t come across a tonne of them. I’m pretty much a hermit No, I, I I do I try to think back but I also try to like I treat them as peers. I don’t I don’t treat them like I’m like I’m Bill hothead or something right? Like I think some of those guys was a carryover from the old British system of like, you know, I am I am the great I Am and not out of any arrogance per se necessarily, but it’s it’s just the way it was whereas now it’s it’s like no man it’s like inclusionary and it’s like there’s no ageism, there’s no like soy all although I don’t hang out with them on a pure basis. I get to go to the bars and complain about theatre because I couldn’t think of a fresher Hell yeah. But like, but I sometimes maybe forget that that they’re starting out. And and I’m wary of giving advice I’m wary of unless it’s asked to me. Because I don’t want to come. I don’t want to come across this, like, you know what, when I was your because it’s not good, but it can be like if someone has a question. And I think that’s, I think that’s something that’s missing. Sometimes it’s like, what are your questions as a young actor, like? I remember as a young actor going to actors that were older and being like, what is this? And how do you do this? And where do you go with this and like, and really, really asking the deep, hard questions if you want to be an actor. As opposed to I got this, I can handle this.

Phil Rickaby
Yeah. I think that that’s an important that’s an important quality is being able to ask questions, instead of worrying that oh, they I have to act like I know this. Yeah. You know, yeah, that’s not gonna get you anywhere if you don’t actually know it.

Evan Buliung
Know. Exactly. Exactly. Right. And questioning even in rehearsal. I fucking I got myself in so much trouble in summer. So I guess I would, I would say, We’re doing all’s well, that ends well, when Richard manette was directing it. And I was one of the domain brothers and, and parolees, the character is, you know, he’s covered in ribbons and bows, and he’s very flamboyant. And he’s sort of he’s sort of leading Barone down this other path or whatever. He’s, he’s sort of and, and the other guys are around like, and then that becomes the galing of parolees, right where they are the Tricom. And to me, I was like, in a modern sense, this is kind of like a gay bashing. Like, they’re, they’re going after this guy for being flamboyant. And, and so I brought it up in real time. It’s like, this is kind of like a gay bashing. And it was like a dead silence in the room. Like, what? But uh, but it was, it was like, a question that I had, you know, I wasn’t I wasn’t making a comment. Yeah, I think but it’s, but those kinds of things I you know, if it’s, if it’s, if it’s guided towards the whole group and towards the presentation of the piece, as opposed to yourself, then fucking fire away. Yeah. You know, it’s when you start going, I think my character needs shot buck.

Phil Rickaby
I think it’s important to because then you have to know if you’re all playing the right tone in situation like that. Like, how far are we going with this moment?

Evan Buliung
Absolutely. Should we be making the audience uncomfortable? Absolutely. Yeah. Should we be making them question their own beliefs and their own actions? Absolutely. What the fuck is the point of doing theatre? Otherwise?

Phil Rickaby
Yeah. I sometimes think that we don’t, they don’t see enough of that in some of the big houses were very safe. And we’re very, very careful. Don’t want to make people too uncomfortable. Yeah, but not not too much. Yeah. I haven’t seen anything in a big Theatre in a long time. That has made me feel particularly uncomfortable. I’ve seen more that indie films are small. Absolutely.

Evan Buliung
Absolutely. Did you see nearby on the new dryer? nearby? No. This is terrible. At the Harbourfront I didn’t like it was it was a piece out of India about that girl that was raped on a bus with her friend and she died. It was a gang rape and it’s basically six women’s stories out of India, from India except for Pamela son who’s from Canada. Basically their stories of rape and what happened? And I kid you not I’ve never experienced anything like it in the theatre and it was like literally at the end. I was I was so devastated. I turned to the guy beside me. We turned and looked at each other. And, and he just said Hi, my name is Mohammed. I was like, my name is Evan. It was like we just needed to fucking connect with someone. Yeah, and we shook hands and it was just like it was like we just witnessed that didn’t like that kind of theatre. Even like Dean theatre Smith Gilmore do some things where it’s just like there’s no sets nothing just like actors. And it’s devastating.

Phil Rickaby
Yeah. It doesn’t doesn’t have to be doesn’t have to be sex. It doesn’t have to be it doesn’t have to be bad but it’s good to see theatre that the challenge is every now and then. Yeah. When we’re fed a lot of a lot of very safe stuff.

Kind of thing. You did a show at wasn’t with with Ken stage recently. It was the

Evan Buliung
Yes. Try America,

Phil Rickaby
America. that show. I think, if I recall, they were mixed reviews. But yeah, I know the actors in it. Were really passionate about it. Yeah. I didn’t see all the reviews. I know there was there was some stuff there. But that show I think was really important to the people who were performing it. And a lot of audiences, I think, enjoyed it. Did you? Did you get the sense that there was like the mix of responses to it?

Evan Buliung
I thought you said we weren’t gonna talk about I gotta gave you a list of victory we’re gonna talk about no. Yeah, no, there was it was quite a mixed reaction to it. I, I known for about a year that I was that I was going to do it. And I read it. And I really wanted to do it because of the last page of the play. And it’s a big play. Yeah, it’s three hours plus, and I got to the last page, and I just was like, blew me over. And I’d kind of not read my charter to be honest, what what was involved. And it was really hard. It was really difficult. It was you know. It was a big show. It was a big set. It was big lights, it was big expectations. Again, it was it felt somewhat like I remember getting out there for tech and thinking, my shoulders went up. Because I was like, Fuck, this is like Lord of the Rings. Everything’s big. Yeah. And, and I feel lost out here. And there was a few blow ups where I was like, I can’t hear the other goddamn actors on the stage, how can I perform? And? Yeah, reviews were mixed. Right. And, you know, we cut 20 minutes off the show without making cuts of the script. So that was the actors. And we I was so proud of our cast, like, we’re just wonderful people. And, you know, there’s a lot of talk of, and rightly so about diversity in the theatre, and I think that’s going to change everything. Everything for the better. Yeah, different stories, new voices, and probably some more raw experiences than then our usual British experiences, which were fairly, you know, we went all the wars Don’t you know, like, everything’s looking really wrong.

Phil Rickaby
I really, I look forward to the to, like, we’re seeing a bit more diversity, various stages. And as Stratford is making a big, they made a real effort this year to have more diversity. Yep. Stage. And I kind of like theatres being taken to task for having seasons made up of all, all white males. I think that we will only benefit from from more diverse voices on our stages. Yeah. But I think that I mean, it will bring out more audiences. That’s certainly I mean, certainly people go to see themselves on stage. Yeah, a lot of ways. If we’re only talking to to one. One aspect of who we are, then we’re limiting ourselves.

Evan Buliung
Well, in the demographic of schools that go to Stratford charm are mostly non white. Well,

Phil Rickaby
I mean, there’s a lot of there’s a lot of schools, they’re predominantly non white, you have to speak to them as much as we have to speak to everybody.

Evan Buliung
Yeah. And until and until we get to the day when you know, someone looks up on the stage, and they go, whether it’s black, white, yellow, whatever it is, they can go, oh, I identify with this person as being a person. Yes. Yeah. As opposed to what colour they are, then then, then we won’t have to worry about that anymore. But it doesn’t feel like we’re there. We’re in some transitional stage.

Phil Rickaby
transitional stage where I think, for a long time there phrase colorblind casting has been Yeah, it doesn’t. I don’t think it exists as much as we want it to know, because we’re still worried about well, they don’t look like father and daughter. They don’t look like mother and son. Because we can’t cast him because he’s black. We knew she’s white. And I think we have to get away from from all of that. I think that audiences will, will, will accept whatever is presented as long as the actors on stage, believe it. Yeah, you know,

Evan Buliung
yeah, I mean, it doesn’t happen in film, right. There’s whitewashing the film. That’s, that’s

Phil Rickaby
quite extraordinary. That’s a whole other that’s a whole other topic. Absolutely.

Evan Buliung
But they also they’re hiding, you know, they’re hiding in behind large towers. Whereas theatre is ground level shit like there’s there’s nowhere to hide. So it’s, our voices are loud and they’re carried through amongst all of our peers.

Phil Rickaby
Yeah. And also the difference is that the people who are watching are in the in the room. Yeah, they’re there. So their reaction matters. You know? Absolutely. Yeah. So after Chai America, I mean, you were talking earlier, you’re working on a TV show right now. Is there do you know of any other theatre on the horizon for you? Or?

Evan Buliung
No, I’ve given up the theatre. I’ve learned all I can I’ve stopped learning now. There’s possibly some things down the road, but I haven’t signed on to anything. Yeah, it’s I really Yeah. Like after I try America, I was it took it took another like month and a half to kind of come out from underneath that I’m gonna I’m learning. I had a Barbara Gaines, who’s the artistic director of Chicago Shakespeare Theatre said to me, years ago, I was we were doing Macbeth and I was playing my stuff. And she said to me, you have to be careful. I was like, What do you mean? What do you mean? She said, You just you, you’re an actor who has to be a bit more careful about about what you’re doing. And I was kind of, like, half of me was flattered, half of me was concerned, you know, like, what she meant by that. And, you know, the actors that I really looked up to growing up were brand Carver and Steven would met and, and, you know, mcamis and these guys that were able to sort of just especially Brent Yeah, you know, no one can no one can do a Brent Carver does Yeah, like he’s just, he just is he’s an open wound. He’s He’s whatever. He just presents exactly what’s in front of him at the time or what’s inside of him at the time and and I think sometimes I was like, I want to be more like that. I want to be more like that. And and I knew I had it inside of me to do that. But it’s a dangerous thing. Right? Because you take on, which I did in Primerica I took on the characters, foibles and faults as my own. You know, as an actor, you’re going okay, what part of this can I learn about myself? And I really did. And I had one woman stopped me at the stage door of primerica, and she pointed in my face, and she said, I’m so glad you lost. And I was just like, and I couldn’t get out the door, there are people blocking the door? I was like, Oh, give me the fuck away from this woman. What have I done? But I sometimes forget that it’s just a character, right? And so it took it takes a long time to sort of recover from these things. So as I’m getting older, I’m going, well, quality of life is it’s I’m grateful as fuck for the opportunities, but then I do have to be careful about going into these sort of realms.

Phil Rickaby
Yeah, yeah.

Evan Buliung
Or find ritual to sort of let it go. And I’m terribly undisciplined at doing that. So it can

Phil Rickaby
be difficult to let that stuff go. Yeah. Especially when you’re going to dark places and things like that. That’s very difficult to let go of sometimes, especially if you’re doing it for a long period of time, like independent theatre. Most of what I do, like we run for two weeks. Yeah, you know, yeah. So two weeks, I’m done. But then, if the show runs longer, yeah. Like a season, you have to figure out how you’re going to get to, like, not that crap. Oh,

Evan Buliung
absolutely. Yeah, yeah. And I like I just tend to play those parts at Stratford, like Edgar have played twice. And Tom Joad in The Grapes of Wrath, and last year playing Pericles, which was so like, it’s so much sadness, so much sadness, and I actually got pneumonia halfway through the season. And I was out for two weeks. I’ve never I’ve never had pneumonia, don’t get it. It’s fucking terrible. And I was so sick. But it is like, they say sadness lives in the lungs, right? And it just got in there. And it’s fun to see it’s cathartic to play around with that stuff. But it’s also it’s also a bit you’re walking the line. Like I think of Vivian Lee wound up in not compare myself to Lee but like those sorts of actors. They literally died in an insane asylum. Yeah. And she was fucking great.

Phil Rickaby
Yeah. When you’re doing a roll, like like that, and grapes of wrath, and you’re sad all the time, but you’re also playing other roles throughout the season, and how are you a How are you going from one to another? Like, if you’re holding on to the sadness so much, but you have to think or want to play another role? How will you let go of this sadness, but coming back to it?

Evan Buliung
Well, grapes were was tough because I was so angry. I remember I used to snap by the actors on stage. A wonderful guy, Kyle golembo. Remember, I would snap at him on stage. Because we’d get out there and I fucking do it. I felt so bad about it, but we would get out there and they’re all LIKE YOU FUCKING Okies your fucking go back to where you come from, right? And it just constant constant constant and I just would sometimes just be like, ah, and like snap at them right who’s just like so much you know and you’re in your lane you’re researching about migrant workers in Canada and how poorly we fucking treat them here. I keep hearing this shit about Leamington. It’s like, oh, the Heinz ketchup factories closing Oh, yeah, check out what you’re doing to the migrant workers. That city. They didn’t even let their schools come to see The Grapes of Wrath in Leamington. Really, yeah, they wouldn’t let them come because of, obviously the themes of Grapes of Wrath. But you know, you you balance it with with the other show, it’s almost like a joy to like Pericles last year, I got to balance it with doing carousel and Jager and kind of sounds like me doing that kind of thing. So it’s a you know, and to be around the energy of the musical theatre realm as well. It’s so much it’s so uplifting, so it is finding balance. But this Yeah, I don’t know these things leave. Leave leave marks on you. And it’s, it’s a tough job. Don’t do it. Yeah, yeah. Give me a banker man. Like. No, I know. It’s totally

Phil Rickaby
like, Yeah, I mean, the thing is, the thing is the people who do it, do it because they can

Evan Buliung
envision doing anything. No, you really can’t. As Peter told us, yeah, of course. Yeah. He said that to us, like 25 years ago, he can do anything else. Go fucking do it. Yeah. And we were like, I can’t

Phil Rickaby
Yeah, yeah. Then a lot most people did. Yeah, I know, a lot of people that I went to school with it don’t do it anymore.

Evan Buliung
Yeah. You know, and leading happy yeah, useful lives of families and money. And

Phil Rickaby
I do I balance. You know, I’ve got, you know, I have my day job. But I also, I make my own stuff. Yeah. You know, I gave it up for, like, five years, a long time ago, just to, I was like, Well, that’s it. I’m going to be I’m going to work, I’m gonna have a job and do all this stuff. Oh, cool. You know, that’s, after about five years. I was like, I can’t I can’t not be doing this anymore.

Evan Buliung
You know, yeah, you had no other output for like creativity. You

Phil Rickaby
know, I took it all the way I, I just got a job in a call centre was like this is this will be my life now. And then I worked my way up and it would become, I don’t know, I didn’t want to be like a CEO. But I was like, I’m not going to do theatre anymore. I burned out I produced a double bill of some Shakespeare and was really, I throw a whole lot into that. And then by the time it was over, I was like, Wait, nope, I hate myself and I hate home all the work that I’m doing. Yeah, I just stopped doing it for a while. But that’s because we always throw ourselves into what we’re doing. Yeah. With

Evan Buliung
blind abandon. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, I know an actress of famous Canadian actress who she played Desdemona and the actor playing the fellow was like, just terrified her. I mean, this is many many years ago and but terrified her so much to the point where she gave it back like just didn’t act for a year she had to step away from acting for a year just because it was it’s psychologically fucking insane. Yeah.

Phil Rickaby
I often think that we need to do that sometimes. You know, I mean, I know that we have to hold on to and keep playing the part where we also need to take care of each other. Yeah, we’re doing especially when we’re doing the difficult shit. Yeah, I mean to make sure that you know if I’m terrified of you well, we should probably deal with Yeah, we’re still a team here. Yeah. But then sometimes we get caught up in what we’re doing on stage

Evan Buliung
yeah

Phil Rickaby
that’s that’s part of part of the job I guess

Evan Buliung
totally on it needs come from the top down to write like like I love I love those teachers like Michael Moss and and Peter wild stuff that scared me that gave me the honest it’s like, mindless what you’re doing right now is mindless? I’m gonna go have a smoking figure out what the fuck you’re doing wrong. Right. That kind of thing. I appreciate it. I love that movie. Whiplash, just because I was like, I fucking get this. Like, it’s a bit extreme. But I get it. Yeah, yeah. But then you know, there doesn’t need no coddling but from top down directors, artistic directors, whoever to really. Like, you don’t have a crew of the Star Trek, Star Trek entrepreneur. You have a crew of misfits deeply emotional, and sensitive individuals. Yes. And we are not businessman. We are not we are we are artists. Yeah. And and to really sort of take that in and go what how do I how do I talk to these things? Oh separately is is a gift that you know, only a few have.

Unknown Speaker
Yeah

Phil Rickaby
that we’re basically out of time. All right, yeah. Oh, thanks. Thank you so much for talking to me today.

Evan Buliung
It was, ya know, my pleasure. Thank you