Interview: For King James Star Chris Perfetti, the Third Time Is the Charm

Chris Perfetti is an off-Broadway stalwart, taking the stage in a wide variety of shows ranging from Stephen Karam’s Sons of the Prophet to Branden Jacobs-Jenkins’s Everybody to Halley Feiffer’s Moscow Moscow Moscow Moscow Moscow Moscow, for which he received an Outer Critics Circle Award. As the pandemic hit, Perfetti decamped for Los Angeles with the arrival of a sweet TV gig, a scene-stealing co-starring role on ABC’s Abbott Elementary.

In between Abbott becoming a hit, Perfetti found time to do three tours of duty in the new Rajiv Joseph two-hander King James, first at Steppenwolf in Chicago, then at Center Theatre Group in Los Angeles, and now, a victory lap at Manhattan Theatre Club in New York City. As this third run comes to an end on June 18, Perfetti looks back at the experience with gratitude and excitement.

This conversation has been condensed and edited for clarity.

You’re coming upon the end of your third time doing King James. Was the third time the charm?
The third incarnation has been, knock on wood, suspiciously seamless. I’m kind of blown away by how fresh and fun it still is to do. I guess it makes sense given that it’s a great play, but I’ve never really had the opportunity to visit something twice, let alone three times. I’m still having a blast.

It is one of Rajiv’s best plays.
I agree. It’s odd to say that because I feel like all of his plays are so different, and they’re all so fabulous, so it’s weird to compare this to his other plays. When people start to study his work in drama schools, I feel like this is going to be the pinnacle of the two-person show that he’s been exploring for a long time. He’s really mastered the two-man show.

I know this has been a long journey for you.
We were about to start just before the world ended, pretty much. I was a week away from flying to Chicago for rehearsals. And then I got this incredible gift which actors don’t usually get, which is, I got to just sort of dream about the play for the next year.

I originally got involved because Anna Shapiro, who was directing it at the time, had seen me in a play in New York. And then, in a year, obviously so much happened. In that time, Glenn Davis, who I had done a reading of the play with, became the artistic director of Steppenwolf, and Anna could no longer direct the play because she was headlong into The Minutes on Broadway, and just by fluke, Kenny Leon happened to be available. In my opinion, Kenny is the perfect director for this play. He’s an exceptional artist and a lifelong basketball fan. The universe conspired to make that happen, I guess. Things aligned.

Is there a discernible difference between the audience reactions in Chicago verses Los Angeles versus New York?
Stark, I would say, on the whole. The play works. It’s a really fun ride no matter where you’re doing it. Like all great plays, it’s very specific, and it’s through that specificity that you get universality. But people react to the references in the play very differently, whether you’re in Chicago or LA or New York, especially the sports references. That really hits differently depending on where you are.

Doing the play in Chicago, it was the first time I had done a play outside of New York and I didn’t really know what to expect. Chicago is an incredible theater town and it did not disappoint. It’s an incredibly welcoming place with a diverse and educated audience. For our purposes, it was the perfect concoction of people who understand theater and people who understand sports. The Midwest was the perfect place to develop this play.

Los Angeles is a gigantic place, and like any major city, there are people who want to see theater, but I still feel like LA is waiting to be invited to the party. Chicago and New York audiences are so vocal. Theater is just much more a part of the culture there. And New York has been the perfect way to end this journey for me. It’s such an intimate space and it’s exactly what New York and off-Broadway can be at their best. I feel so taken care of at that theater and by our audiences.

What has it been like for you to come back to the New York theater scene on your Abbott Elementary hiatus?
It’s great. I’ve always heard horror stories of friends who start working on a TV show but can’t do theater in their time off, and one of the many amazing things about Abbott is that we shoot very quickly. We get a lot of work done in not a lot of time. It’s sort of fate. It just worked out the first time, and it’s worked out each time, that we were done shooting by the time King James came back around.

It doesn’t feel all that strange. I’ve never spent too much time without working on a play, usually a new play. Within the context of Abbott, I guess it feels different. I will say that I’ve never imagined that I would have years in my career where I’m working more than I’m not working. I’ve gotten very used to making use of the downtime. And this past year and the year before have been very busy!