I thought ‘Benson’ was going to be more of an ensemble show. But it was called ‘Benson’ for a reason.
The less people that are on the stage, there’s more drama. You start living the music with each individual. When you see a band with ten people on stage, just a huge ensemble, you don’t know who’s doing what.
It’s a lot harder to do an ensemble because your energy is going in so many different places, and you have to cover everybody. You have to sort of split your attention.
But back to your question, it was a wonderful experience with the Art Ensemble, and I keep in contact and sort of follow what’s going on, but it was also very important to make this step, you may say this leap of faith.
I love working with ensemble groups of actors.
Atlanta was a welcoming presence for a lot of artists; they called it ‘the Mecca of the South.’ I got to see the Negro Ensemble Company, Cicely Tyson, Geraldine Page, Ruby Dee, all onstage.
I like movies because I’ve been getting leads, and TV is more about ensemble casts.
When you have an ensemble where characters pair off so easily, it becomes extremely isolating in the story world. You can end up with two actors who have not seen each other face to face all season long.
What attracted to me about it was the cast. Working on ‘New Girl’ – I like working with an ensemble.
I was very pleased you know, and I was afraid that I might stick out, but I didn’t. My happiest thing about that picture is that I proved that American actors can speak as well and also fit in with an ensemble like that.
Working on ‘Downton Abbey’ is amazing, but there’s an ensemble cast of between 18 and 21 actors. With ‘Love Life,’ there are two couples and a few other key characters. As a smaller unit, you’ve got to take more responsibility – at the same time, you can have more ownership of the direction it’s going in.
I like being the lead but I like being in an ensemble. There are different challenges and dilemmas with both. If you’re carrying a film, there’s a certain weight, but there are a lot of scenes to explore the character. When you’re in an ensemble, you have to convey the entire character in a limited number of scenes.
When you’re working with an ensemble, I think you really need different energies because you don’t have much time with each character to make them feel real. You want strong personalities that are very different.
We opened a theater in 2006 called Loft Ensemble in Sherman Oaks. And we write our own plays and do goofy characters and pack a whopping 20 people per night to watch our work.
In New York theater, you always talk about wanting a great ensemble of actors.
‘Bhuj’ has a strong ensemble and I play a Sikh fighter pilot in it.
Well, it’s more of a sane life to be part of an ensemble! I find that the work can be more specific too and I have to really make sure I know where I am in the story because I’m not in every scene.
‘BUMP’ deals with all the joys and trauma that comes with a woman’s changing body and the struggles of going through labor. It’s a beautiful ensemble cast of wonderful people, and I get emotional just being part of the process.
It’s almost impossible to get a movie all together when there are two main cast members, let alone an ensemble cast with everyone’s schedules. It’s crazy if it works out.
I’ve done a lot of pictures that are ensemble, and I’ve not always liked the people I was working with, but that doesn’t make any difference because you do the job, and often it turns out to be a great ensemble even if you didn’t particularly really like anybody.
I’m an actor first and foremost. My producing credentials are just to say, ‘Yeah, I love this story and now let’s bring the people, the ensemble together,’ and I get out of the way. I have no desire to check on schedules and shooting schedules and money and stuff like that.
All my voice training comes from choir and small ensemble singing.
I love ‘Shameless’ as a fan. But I love lots of television. And as an ensemble, I have never seen a group of people put on screen what ‘Shameless’ – the ‘Shameless’ cast as an ensemble and as individuals – in decades.
The quality of instruction is very high at the Silverlake Conservatory of Music. It’s not about being a rock star. It’s about the fundamentals of music, theory and technique on a particular instrument, and playing in an ensemble or private setting.
Joe and I have always been drawn to ensemble storytelling. We like the idea of telling stories from multiple characters’ points of view and thinking about the story from multiple characters’ points of view.
It is not easy to make an ensemble film – if there is one person with the wrong attitude, you are jacked.
The Batiste family is a large musical family in Louisiana, out in New Orleans. People go to New Orleans, and if they go to any club, four days out of the week I guarantee you that you will find a Batiste playing in the ensemble.
When I was in college, the Roots, the sui generis ensemble from Philadelphia encompassing all manner of black music, played a show on campus.
Personality-wise, I’m much more suited to be in a band and part of an ensemble than I am to lead. I never have been comfortable with the leading thing.
I hadn’t done just a straight-out comedy in a long time, just letting an ensemble do really good character acting, having them carry the movie as in my earlier pictures.
I think typically you’d start in a supporting role or an ensemble role, or maybe even an off-Broadway role. So to come into a lead role on Broadway, especially taking over a role that has been played by two phenomenal actors in the past, that is some large shoes to fill.
And then ‘Wanderlust,’ Ken Marino and David Wain wrote the funniest – they’re amazing. That was one of my most favorite creative experiences; we’re all up at that commune, a small group of people. Everyone was funnier than the next. It was an amazing ensemble feeling. Everyone gave and took in the best way.
Peter Hall was just organizing the Royal Shakespeare Company. It was going to be an ensemble, it was going to be in repertory, it was going to have a home in London as well as in the Midlands, and all of those things were happening at that time.
It’s more fun in a way to do ensemble scenes, where you know your background, you know the scene, but you can’t prepare because someone else is going to say something that is going to lead you off.
When I’m on stage, I feel very much at home – within a theater, within an ensemble – so this entire process is something I feel very attuned with.
If you’ve only got one horn playing, I still want the sense of ensemble.
I kind of feel like every time I do a film, it is me and an entire male ensemble cast.
When I moved to New York, I wanted to be in the ensemble of ‘Hairspray.’ That was my goal.
My happiest times in the theater are when I do ensemble pieces. I really got into theater because of that closeness.
There was a great ensemble in ‘The Great Fire,’ and it was great not having the same parade of actors.
I’d love to have my own TV show, in the way that Julianna Margulies has ‘The Good Wife,’ or a lovely ensemble show, like ‘Six Feet Under.’
I think that, ultimately, there are so many characters in G.I. Joe that even all the iterations – the comics and the different cartoons and everything – have been a big ensemble. Lots of crossing storylines and stuff.
At its core, ‘Heroes’ is an ensemble character drama with genre elements.
I would be an actress for the rest of my life just because it’s really relaxing. Writing is hard work, and stand-up is so stressful before you get on stage, but acting is a complete ensemble experience.
I was never really interested in an operatic post, but I took on the Bastille because it seemed a unique opportunity to build an opera ensemble from scratch, and to deal with all the disciplines that go into opera – the music, the staging and the singing – in an interrelated way.
I really want to bring ensemble playing back to the forefront – not just for me, but for everyone in jazz. When you have a group, a true co-op group, you can really heighten the possibilities of all the treasures of jazz.
Yeah, I love doing ensemble pieces. You get to meet so many new people and make new friends.
I’ve been singing with Roomful of Teeth since the beginning in 2009, and it’s a really mind-blowingly wonderful vocal ensemble. Very brave and very creative, and they’re some of my closest friends.
I don’t care how inventive you are; once you introduce strings into the ensemble for a horror film, you’re entering into a world where a tradition has been thoroughly established. So it’s repeated use over the years is like, ‘Oh God, another film with strings, another spooky movie with strings.’
Not with the Rochester Philharmonic, but I formed my own orchestra, made up of musicians from the Eastman School, where I’m on the faculty now, direct the Jazz Ensemble and teach improvisation classes.
I would act whether or not I was paid. I would be involved in ensemble groups. I would have the desire to tell stories.
The best decision I made at NYU was joining the Shakespeare ensemble. It literally led to everything I did after that. It gave me the kind of confidence I really needed.
I love ensemble work. I love making pieces and building things together.
