Kiss Me, Kate Star Wayne Brady on How August Wilson Launched His Improv Career

For years, improvisational expert Wayne Brady has been crafting musical homages to retired lunch ladies, female body builders, and more on Whose Line Is It Anyway?, the television show that launched his comedic career. But his busy TV schedule, which now includes a regular seat on the newly revamped version of the improv comedy show and a gig as host of the CBS game show Let's Make a Deal, has made his ventures into the world of musical theater few and far between. Aside from a three-month stint in 2004 as Billy Flynn in Broadway's Chicago and a short run as Tom Collins in a 2010 production of Rent at the Hollywood Bowl, theater has not been on Brady's docket — that is, until director Sheldon Epps came calling.

"We'd been trying to work together for a few years now," the actor said. "This was just an opportunity that I didn't want to miss."

While continuing his regular shooting schedule, Brady has carved out time to star as Fred Graham in Epps' revamped production of the classic Cole Porter musical Kiss Me, Kate at Pasadena Playhouse. Featuring a primarily African-American cast, the production gives a nod to the black theater troupes of the 1930s, with Fred at the helm of one that happens to be mounting a musical production of Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew, titled Swingin' the Shrew. Adding a conversation with TheaterMania into his hectic agenda, Brady discussed his own experiences as an African-American performer while also sharing the way an onstage calamity inspired his future vocation.

Sheldon Epps is tipping his hat to troupes of African-American performers with this production. Can you elaborate a little more on this new interpretation of the musical?
What's great is, the fact that it's a primarily African-American or black cast doesn't change the show. I think that some people may go, Oh, well, this is the black version of "Kiss Me, Kate." It isn't the black version of Kiss Me, Kate. It's the version of Kiss Me, Kate that is set during a period of time where you can have black theater companies doing classical pieces like The Hot Mikado and Voodoo Macbeth. These companies existed, and they were relegated to the sidelines of art because of the way our country was at that time. These people were more than capable of delivering the Shakespearean prose. They were incredibly intelligent, highly theatrical, and highly passionate.

Sheldon has said that African-American entertainers like Paul Robeson and Eartha Kitt were some of the production's influences. Did these artists have any influence on you personally as a performer?
They didn't necessarily influence me, but they opened the door for me and kicked it wide open for every other man and woman of color that needed to find a place onstage. It was the notion at the time that maybe a black person wasn't smart enough to do Shakespeare, wasn't cultured enough to dance ballet, couldn't sing opera. So in that manner, yes, I've been influenced by them.

I would imagine improv is great training for any kind of live theater.
That's why I started doing improvisation in the first place. When I was a kid, I was in a production of Fences playing the son. At one point I forgot my line, and I went up so hard that there was no saving it. All I could hear was the blood rushing in my ears, and I just was so lost that I left the stage and left the guy that was playing my dad holding the bag. Later on, I was doing a short film, and I was talking with one of the people that I was involved in the short film with, and she said, "Hey, you're pretty funny" — and I never thought of myself as a funny person — and she said, "My husband and I are teaching an improv workshop." I started taking class with her, and from that one class, I joined the company, and that's where I actually got started. It became a tool in my back pocket.

Does having that tool help you relax when you're onstage?
Being onstage is stressful enough sometimes. Anytime I step onstage, I feel like I'm about to puke. And that's after twenty-odd years of doing it now. To either hear someone say, "…and now, Wayne Brady!" or to know that your cue is coming up onstage, it's just such that thing of, Oh boy, I really hope this isn't the one where I completely suck. That's why it's great to have that weapon in your back pocket. As nervous as I am, something good will happen.