Being a working mother is one of the world’s hardest tasks. When a mom’s job is being a Broadway star, the challenges and rewards are unique. In honor of Mother’s Day, TheaterMania spoke with six remarkable women about how they balance their professional and personal lives, what they learned from their own mothers, and how they plan to celebrate on May 13.
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Victoria Clark won a Tony for playing overprotective mother Margaret Johnson in The Light in the Piazza and recently received acclaim for her portrayal of unhappy mom Sally Durant Plummer in Follies at City Center. Off-stage, she’s a single parent, raising her 12-year-old son Tommy.
TM: How do you balance motherhood and your career?
VC: With great difficulty. Being a mom makes me a much better actress. There’s no question about that. I used to do shows for Tommy when he was in a high chair. I’d reenact moments from theatrical history. He had a nonplussed expression, waiting for it to be over.
TM: What was the best advice or example that you were given by your own mother?
VC: “Keep everything in perspective.” “Laugh at things, if you can.” “Don’t take things too seriously.”
TM: What are your plans to celebrate Mother’s Day this year?
VC: I’m going to be singing “God Bless America” at Shea Stadium. After that, Tommy is playing a big soccer game on Randall’s Island. That’s my life as a mother — all about sports. We both get to support each other.
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Janine LaManna gets to “Show Off” her talents as bride-to-be Janet Van De Graaff in the hit Broadway musical The Drowsy Chaperone. She has spent the last year learning her real-life part as mom to Mia McDermott.
TM: How do you balance motherhood and your career?
JL: My limited experience has shown me that I now have half the brain capacity that I normally have. Focusing on anything but bottles, feedings, and diapers is a challenge. When you book a job, remembering lines takes more effort than ever. Now that I’m bringing an infant to the theater, I find myself with a nursery set rather than a martini set. Instead of warming up with [voice teacher] Joan Lader, I warm up with the Wiggles
TM: What was the best advice or example that you were given by your own mother?
JL: “Be happy. And if you’re not, fake it, and it will become real soon enough.”
TM: How do you plan to celebrate Mother’s Day this year?
JL: Since my daughter is not old enough to make something with popsicle sticks, and my husband [U.S. Army Captain Mike McDermott] is serving in Iraq, I will just grab Mia, kiss her all day, and thank my lucky stars that she has come into my life. Then I’ll call my mom and thank her for being the best mom I could ever have.
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Tshidi Manye has been playing Rafiki in The Lion King on Broadway for the past three years. She has an 11-year-old son, Mpho (pronounced EM-mmm-poe).
TM: How do you balance motherhood and your career?
TM: It has to do with love. If you love what you’re doing, it will always find its way. My son has to eat, he has to go to college, and stuff like that. I’m a single mother. I love my son and my job. I’ve got to make them both work.
TM: What was the best advice or example that you were given by your own mother?
TM: I was actually raised by my father and older brothers in Johannesburg, South Africa. My dad was working at the jewelry store, but he made sure that my brothers would wake up my younger sisters and me, cook for us, and make sure we’d go to school. It was a very loving family. My dad never had enough money, but whatever we needed, he made sure we would get it.
TM: How do you plan to celebrate Mother’s Day this year?
TM: We are one big family at the theatre. Some of the guys will bring roses; some mothers will bring cakes. One Mother’s Day, when I was doing the show in Toronto, my son made me toasted cheese, which I love. He never forgets my birthday, and he never forgets Mother’s Day.
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Michele Pawk played Carol Burnett’s rather dysfunctional mother in Hollywood Arms, which earned her a Tony Award for Best Featured Actress in a Play. She recently received raves for her performance as the childless Lottie in the Transport Group’s production of William Inge’s The Dark at the Top of the Stairs. Pawk and her husband, actor John Dossett have a seven-year-old son named Jack.
TM: How do you balance motherhood and your career?
MP: My husband is an amazing partner. We try, if at all possible, not to be working at the same time. We do the baby dance — though Jack’s not a baby anymore.
TM: What was the best advice or example that you were given by your own mother?
MP: My mother led by example. She was very, very active in our lives, was always there when we came home from school, and always wanted to know what happened that day. She took us back and forth to lessons and games.
TM: What are your plans to celebrate Mother’s Day this year?
MP: I hope that my husband, my boy, and I have a picnic in the backyard. If it’s nice, I’d love to be outdoors.
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Rebecca Luker has received an Outer Critics Circle Award nomination for her work as Mrs. Banks, the mother of two boisterous children in Mary Poppins. In real life, she is the stepmother of husband Danny Burstein’s two sons, 14-year-old Alex and 11-year-old Zachary.
TM: How do you balance motherhood and your career?
RL: It’s probably a little bit easier for stepmothers to balance it, because we’re not 24–hour parents, for whom my respect has gone up greatly. Still, it can be a challenge, picking up the kids, dropping them off, figuring out vacations. They live about two-and-a-half hours away, and we only have them on weekends — our busiest times. So they spend some time with their dad at Drowsy Chaperone [in which Burstein plays Latin lover Aldolpho] and some time at Mary Poppins. I share a floor with the kids in the cast, and they are about the same ages as Alex and Zachary. They all get along well and play video games.
TM: What was the best advice or example that you were given by your own mother?
RL: My mom had four children and also worked. Somehow, she found time to clean the house and get all of us ready and into the car for church, or whatever. I always admired her organizational skills. I’m sort of that way.
TM: How do you plan to celebrate Mother’s Day this year?
RL: The kids will be with their real mom. After our matinees, Danny and I will probably drive up to our lake house in the Poconos.
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Two-time Tony Award nominee Carolee Carmello has spent much of her recent time on Broadway as Donna Sheridan, the free-spirited mom in Mamma Mia! She and her husband, actor Gregg Edelman, have two children: 11-year-old Zoe and six-year-old Ethan.
TM: How do you balance motherhood and your career?
CC: It’s a lot of sleep deprivation There aren’t enough hours in the day to do everything, so something’s gotta give. For me, it’s usually sleep. I go to sleep about 1am and get up around 7am to get the kids ready for school.
TM: What was the best advice or example that you were given by your own mother?
CC: I think the best thing my mother taught me is that your kids are the most important thing in your life. I always felt that with her — that we came first. She had four kids, so she had it twice as hard as I have.
TM: How do you plan to celebrate Mother’s Day this year?
CC: Well, it’s a little different than most years, since I’ll be in Virginia, giving my last performance in Saving Aimee [as evangelist Aimee Semple McPherson]. I’ll talk to my kids on the phone, and then I’ll be home on Monday. I guess we’ll have a belated mini-celebration.
