Sitting Down with Jonathan Crombie
by Karen McKevitt, Editor-in-Chief

From teen heartthrob Gilbert Blythe on KQED pledge drive staple Anne of Green Gables to neurotic playwright Lionel Train on the theatre-skewering cult hit Slings & Arrows, Jonathan Crombie is most well-known to American audiences through these Canadian TV shows. But his long love affair with the theatre brought him to The Drowsy Chaperone. We sat down with him (on the phone) for an interview.

How did you get involved in The Drowsy Chaperone?

I'm old friends with Bob Martin and Lisa Lambert; we have a sketch group together, Skippy's Rangers. We all went to the same high school.

I was there for Bob Martin's bachelor party. Instead of lap dancers we decided to put on a musical because we're all very square. I was working out of town, but I came in and put on a papier mache hat and played a chef. It was just the Drowsy Chaperone play itself; there was no Man in Chair at that point. After that we put it in a fringe show, and that's when Bob came aboard and started the framing device of Man in Chair. I played a gangster. It got a Variety review, and after that it had some more development in Toronto, and that's when some New York people came and saw it.

When Bob was leaving the Broadway role, there was a four-week gap between him and John Glover, and one of the producers had seen Slings & Arrows, which is something that Bob had written and I was in and said, "What about that guy in Slings & Arrows?" So Bob called me and I tried out for the part and got it. After John Glover left I came back and filled in before Bob Saget joined.

What is challenging for you about the role of the Man in Chair?

I love the fourth wall. I like getting into the theme. I've done a lot of sketch comedy, but even in our group I'm very much a character actor as opposed to some of the others that can do stand-up really well. I don't. In the show my scene partner is 2,000 people in the audience, so it's been a real educational experience for me to let go of the idea of crafting a part and carving it out. There are things that are set, but depending on their reaction or what they go for or what they don't go for, I get a feel of them and allow them to inform the way the show goes and the way I respond to them as well.

When I watched Bob Martin play the part before I filled in, I was really impressed with him. He allowed the humanist to come through, not by trying to create the character for everyone to see but just allowing himself to be open as a person on stage that the audience could listen to and get information from.

In some places and cities the audiences are quieter and more polite. There's a whole section in the show about porno, where I try to equate musical theatre to pornography, and there are times when it kicks and people just love it, and there are times when it's dead silence. You can almost hear the backs going up in the audience when I mention the word. When it goes I can just fly with that section. If there's no reaction, I have to put that into how I do the section.

The character hasn't listened to this album in a long long time, so I have to respond newly to the way the people are doing it on stage too, as opposed to having set reactions to watching the numbers. Before I started The Drowsy Chaperone I was at the Stratford Festival for about four or five years doing Shakespeare, so going from that to this was a change. But my heart is still always in sketch comedy. It's my favorite thing in the world. I grew up watching the Show of Shows reruns, Dick Van Dyke reruns and Carol Burnett stuff, and it's always been my favorite.

I got into television early, and then I got a call from Stratford to try out, and that started my love affair with theatre. I'd never studied theatre or acting or anything. When I got to Stratford they said that we'd be using a folio, and I was the only person in the young company that had no idea what they were talking about. I had to shyly ask people what the hell that was. The challenge was invigorating. I had played young teenage roles in television, and all of a sudden--albeit I was in the young company so I was given a little bit of slack--I was taking on some pretty major roles from the get-go. Film, TV and theatre are very collaborative. But with film the collaboration isn't always hands-on with each other. What I love about being in theatre is creating a network of people where you could challenge yourself, make mistakes and feel comfortable in a really creative atmosphere that allows you to try to bring out the best in yourself, support each other and allow support to come from the people you work with. I really enjoy that whole ethic.

Are there going to be any Skippy's Rangers performances in the future?

If I have my way, yes. I'm the one who's like, "Listen, we've got a repertoire of 200 sketches and songs that they've never seen in New York or anywhere in the States, so let's start doing some stuff."

How did you get involved with Slings & Arrows?

Bob Martin, Susan Coyne and Mark McKinney were the writers, and I was at Stratford with Susan Coyne, and the show is loosely based on the Stratford experience. I knew a lot of what some of the characters seemed to be based on. Basically I just went in for an audition.

Your character wasn't especially sympathetic.

I guess not. That's what people say, but I thought he was fine. I don't think it was that he was so unsympathetic; I think Anna [Susan Coyne's character] is so ridiculously sympathetic that he didn't have a chance. If you made her unhappy, you were unsympathetic.

How was working on the show?

It was really fun. It wasn't a huge part, and we did our stuff in a couple of weeks. But Susan was really great to work with, and the director was like, "Let's get it done, let's get it done," which is the way I like to work. A lot of scenes were done in one take. In the States people recognize me from Anne of Green Gables and Slings & Arrows; I didn't think Slings & Arrows would be so popular here, and with Anne of Green Gables, I thought you guys were Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm!

I understand you hadn't seen much of the States before this tour.

This is my big introduction. I have a disposable camera with 27 exposures, and we're going to 27 cities. I have one photo in each city, so I spend my two weeks trying to find the best photo I can take. I've got a month in San Francisco, so I've got a lot of options.

What do you think you'll--

I'm not going to say. I'm not going to chain myself to anything. We just came from Houston, and I really wanted to get the old mission control center, the "Houston, we have a problem." I couldn't make it, so I had to go for the Astrodome.