Quick Wit: Josh Hamilton

Josh Hamilton has racked up an impressive list of credits since his star-making turn as a young turk in Jonathan Marc Sherman’s Women and Wallace at Playwrights Horizons. We’ve watched him come of age in such exciting fare as SubUrbia, The Cider House Rules, and This is Our Youth. He is a co-founder of Malaparte Theater Company and a company member of the Drama Dept., for whom he did a stint in As Bees in Honey Drown. In The Waverly Gallery, now at the Promenade Theatre on the Upper West Side, Hamilton once again gets to exercise his considerable acting chops in another play by Lonergan play–this time as Daniel Fine, an young urban man dealing with the mental deterioration of his grandmother. Hamilton lives in Brooklyn Heights. Recently, I stole a few minutes to test his wit.

When you were a kid, is this where you thought you’d be in the year 2000?

Yes.

Who’s your personal hero?

The writer Andre Dubus.

What role would you like to play that you will never get to play?

Annie.

What’s your favorite four-letter word?

Tofu.

What’s the most embarrassing thing that every happened to you onstage?

Just being on it, sometimes.

What’s your best theatrical memory?

Watching my father, Dan, in Godspell at the Promenade when I was about three.

What is your pet peeve?

Chain stores.

If you could wake up in the morning with a skill that you don’t already
possess, what would it be?

To be multi-lingual.

What did you do on the night of December 31, 1999?

Had dinner at Kenny Lonergan’s.

What is your favorite sound?

My dog sighing in her sleep.

What’s the last movie you saw?

The Filth and The Fury.

The last play…?

Family Week.

If you were an acting teacher, what pearl of wisdom would you share with your
students?

Sweat.

What was your favorite childhood game?

Dodge ball.

What gets you really choked up?

The Yearling.

Do you prefer morning or night?

Night.

Intimate gathering or wild party?

Wild, intimate gathering.

Boxers or briefs?

Neither.