Queer Voices
Queer Voices
October 19th Queer Voices: Mark Ivy of LITTLE SHOP OF HORRORS a PODCAST EXCLUSIVE!
Ever wonder how a choir-loving kid who enjoys being a goofball transforms into a theater powerhouse and roller skates with Beyonce? Join Brett Cullum for a podcast exclusive with Mark Ivy, a cherished talent in the Houston theater scene and a local legend. From his humble beginnings inspired by "Little Shop of Horrors" to the thrill of donning Mr. Mushnik's apron, Mark takes us on a journey full of laughter, challenges, and theatrical magic. You'll hear about his adventures on stage, his real-life struggles with cooking and laundry, and his unexpected foray into a Beyoncé music video, turning the spotlight on the lively and ever-evolving world of Houston's theater community.
Get ready to experience the excitement of "Little Shop of Horrors" like never before with its Halloween-perfect run at Theatre Under the Stars on the biggest stage in town. Mark shares his thoughts on the distinct experience of transitioning roles within this iconic musical, embracing the quirks of Mr. Mushnik and the affectionate nickname "Mr. Daddy." We also explore the art of auditioning, the importance of nurturing local theater ties, and the opportunities that recorded auditions bring.
If you don't love Mark Ivy as much as we do after this interview, we may have to send you a carnivorous plant!
Buy tickets for Little Shop here:
https://www.tuts.com/shows/little-shop-of-horrors-2?gad_source=1&gclid=Cj0KCQjwsc24BhDPARIsAFXqAB3JkYBrXh_sjfcp_eYSnS-eDaGSYnXcq26Lr1pr9I9LS64MPPxCg54aAsJQEALw_wcB&gclsrc=aw.ds
Queer Voices airs in Houston Texas on 90.1FM KPFT and is heard as a podcast here. Queer Voices hopes to entertain as well as illuminate LGBTQ issues in Houston and beyond. Check out our socials at:
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https://www.instagram.com/queervoices90.1kpft/
Hey, there, it is Brett Cullum, and today I am joined by a Houston treasure, an acting legend and a wonderful singer it's Mark Ivey. Now Mark has been seen in almost every Houston venue. I can think of the Alley Stages, even Tut's Underground, if you remember that he's done many iconic musicals, such as Xanadu, next to Normal, seussical, cinderella and the Little Mermaid. He's also done some pretty dramatic work, such as the play Rabbit Hole and Shakespeare's Twelfth Night, and he's also known for doing wild comedies like Sheer Madness. So Mark is about to appear in what I suspect is his third go-round with Little Shop of Horrors. He is one of the stars of this year's October production from Theatre Under the Stars, running October 22nd through November 3rd at the Hobby Center. So welcome to Queer Voices, mark Ivey.
Speaker 2:Hello. Wow, that introduction made me feel like Meryl Streep.
Speaker 1:You are Meryl Streep of Houston, basically. And speaking of Meryl, let's start off a little left field first. I've been thinking about this this week for some reason, about this parasocial phenomenon of how many people see actors on stage and several shows and they feel like they know them right, and I've always had this strange crush on you because you are so funny, you are so sweet on stage. I always walk out of the theater thinking, man, I would love this guy to be my best friend. Do you find that people in Houston just think that they know you and they say hi and you, like, have no clue who they are and you're just like what? Oh, hi.
Speaker 2:I do. I get a range of different interactions in the outer world. I will say Most of it nine times out of 10, is very positive. Sometimes people do feel like they've been with me for a little longer than they probably have, but it's honestly, at least for me. I love being recognized because of work that I've done or making people laugh or something like that, so it's usually a very positive interaction.
Speaker 1:Let me ask you this, because I I'm always curious about this what do you think would surprise those people about Mark Ivey in the real world as opposed to on stage?
Speaker 2:Oh, maybe that I'm like really bad at laundry or something I'm always, I'm always playing catch up with laundry, or maybe that I'm a I love to eat but I'm a horrible cook, but I can order really, really, really good, like really well, like on the phone. Oh my god, I'm your, I'm your, I'm your go-to guy.
Speaker 1:I can relate to all of these. I'm fine, all right, so first tell me how you got into acting. I know that's something that you've been doing since you were very young and you obviously went to the Tutts, humphrey School and Houston and all that it was.
Speaker 2:It was. It was kind of a natural pipeline for me. I started off in choir when I was pretty young, probably like in third or fourth grade. I always loved singing and, with my cousins and I and my brother, we always like putting on shows and like our family homes watching saturday night live. It was actually a production of Little Shop that I saw in Galveston.
Speaker 2:I like had the distinct memory of turning to my mom and being like I can do this, this is what I want to do. I was talking about the urchins in the top like corner and like these beautiful red dresses and come on, come on, but I, I, I Little Shop definitely gave me the bug. Come on, but I, I, I Little Shop definitely gave me the bug to like be like, oh, I should just combine my interests together of singing and being a goofball and kind of pursue that craft. So, yeah, I went to, I went to Humphrey School. I'm a Humphrey School alumni and it was there that they my teachers, Rosie Curtis and Charles Swan, Shea Rogers they were like they really encouraged me to look further into it and applying to Sam Houston for their program. The rest is history really.
Speaker 1:It definitely is. You've been around here for a while. How many times have you done Little Shop of Horrors before this? It's two.
Speaker 2:I've done it twice. This is my third go at it.
Speaker 1:So I've done Seymour, seymour, and now I'm mr mushnik yeah, exactly this time you are mr mushnik, which is a big switch for you, just because I saw both productions with you as seymour. So how do you feel about switching that up so dramatically? I mean, you're going from, like this one role to this, really the father figure of the show.
Speaker 2:I won't lie to you, I was very nervous when I first got the, the offer for it. I was like can I do this? Do I? Is it in my body? Do I? Do I look old enough or more seasoned enough? I should say, well, it's not the right word. But I am a character actor through and through and it has been a very fun challenge to do and I, with the support of my director, melissa Rain Anderson, and the wonderful cast, I feel like it's actually more of a natural fit for me than I ever suspected. I feel like I'm coming home and being like just grumpy, my partner's like really questioning what's going on, but it's. It's actually really fun to actually be a grumpy greedy father figure, as you said, as opposed to, like you know, helming the ship. Seymour's got a rough show, so it's actually nice to take it off like to be like oh yeah, that's good yeah, but one thing I'm always wondering about how are they aging you up a little bit?
Speaker 1:how are you approaching that for this one?
Speaker 2:you know we're gonna let the wig do a lot of work. No, I'm just kidding, but I, I will. I will probably have a wig and and or putting like this like spray my hair. Of course, makeup always helps, but I, I also do tend to read a little bit older on stage whenever, when you know when I'm. Of course, makeup always helps, but I, I also do tend to read a little bit older on stage whenever, when you know when I'm. Of course, I'm always costumed beautifully at tots and so that they always, like you know, all those elements coming together help the character, the actual realized. And you know, I don't think that anyone will go like, oh, he's actually 36 or whatever, like I think they'll.
Speaker 1:I think I read older well, and I love the fact that you embrace that title of character actor I cannot tell you how many people get insulted when I ask them how they feel about being a character actor and they're like I'm not a character actor I love the title.
Speaker 2:I some of the some of the best actors out there are character actors, so I take the the moniker with with pride.
Speaker 1:So any chance? I mean, you mentioned that when you were growing up you were first kind of attracted to the urchins, so is there any chance that maybe later you'll take on the dentist, maybe you'll be the plant one day. Maybe, like, switch it up, do audrey I'm any parts that you would love to show.
Speaker 2:I I would play a trash can, a little shop of horrors. That's how much I love the show. I don't there is no limit to who I want to play and who I want to do. I just I love everything about the show, the music, the story, it's just everything about it is. To me it's just like a perfect camping musical. So I mean, yeah, I would love to take him to a dentist. Just wait to see our dentist. He's one of a kind and a master class, and, speaking of character work, it's fantastic. So, yeah, I still want to play it all. I'm not done yet, so I've got a few more little shops in me for sure.
Speaker 1:I'm waiting for you to take over the planner, audrey. That's really on my bingo scorecard for Mark. Maybe. So we'll get touched to do it in another couple of years and you'll take over that role. But what do you think it is about Little Shop that makes it so appealing to both audiences and theaters? I mean, it's kind of a phenomenon.
Speaker 2:I mean, I think everyone can kind of see themselves in it and like what you would do for love, what you would do if, if you have fame and money, just kind of like force fed to you and and and how you respond to those those new kind of triggers and stuff like that. So I think I think people see themselves in it a little bit, maybe more than they care to admit. And then it's, I think, because it's so bizarre and because it's so out of this world. It's just, it's uniquely different in terms of the musical theater canon or movie canons. It's giant talking green plant that eats people to grow. So if you can't find the humor in that, I don't, I don't know what to tell you yeah, it's so wild to think that it came from a roger corman b movie that was just shot in black and white and and just kind of seemed like a throwaway, and then alan menken really turned it into something just beyond that.
Speaker 1:I I think that for me it the message of the show is kind of like being careful what you actually wish for, and and it almost makes it like this fairy tale gone wrong. And this to me kind of makes sense because, let's face it, mark Ivey, you sort of exist best as an actor in fairy tale worlds like cinderella and all of that kind of stuff. I mean, you just have that personality exactly. Tell me a little bit about what is going to make this production unique for tuts?
Speaker 2:I have a suspicion, but oh my gosh, it is just. First of all, the talent is out of this world. The local, the local actors mix well with with of our out-of-town folk. It is just like the perfect cast and I think that even though it's a little shop, it's going to feel like a really big, grand musical Because of the music, because of the lights, because of everything going on. The puppets, my guys, the puppets. It's my favorite, so it should be everyone's favorite. I don't know, it's incredible.
Speaker 1:It's one that so should be everyone's favorite. I don't know it's. It's incredible. It's one that I got really excited about when Dan was on and he was talking about the entire season and we talked about Little Shop. But I was a little bit scared, I have to say. I felt a little hard palpitation because I'm so used to Little Shop being in a smaller, more intimate space than the Hobby Center. The Hobby Center is one of those things I mean center. The hobby center is one of those things I mean my gosh big shows, big splashy musicals. So how do you feel about translating this kind of intimate show to this wide technicolor, big screen version?
Speaker 2:I think it lends itself to to the, to the show, to the play. I think that you know, because the stakes are so high, all of our reactions are going to be so big and like it's almost you, even if you're in the last row, you will feel us, you will feel the tension because we are in such a big, broad world. So I think, I think they marry each other in a in a nice way that you know. Of course, that hobby center, you know it can feel big, but I think with just everyone's performances and stuff like that, everyone will be like sucked in and zoomed in and I I don't find, I don't think it'll be a problem. Little shop, big, big drama, that's your tagline yes, and big songs and big big plants and they can be so much bigger.
Speaker 1:at the Hobby Center they can be bigger.
Speaker 2:Exactly, exactly.
Speaker 1:Well, I'm talking with Mark Ivey, who's currently starring in obviously, little Shop of Horrors. We're talking about plants and music and all of that. You seem to work a lot here in Houston, and you have for many years.
Speaker 2:How do you get roles the same way that everyone does. Usually a season, a theater season, is announced and they usually have kind of like around the same time, around the same time, general auditions, so you kind of see what you're good for in everyone's lineup. Every once in a while I'll reach out and be like I think I'm good for this specific show. When can I, am I available to audition for you or come to a callback for you or submit for you? I am lucky and privileged enough to where, like I know and I've worked with a lot of the theaters before, so they will always send out feelers for their general season lineup and stuff like that.
Speaker 2:But yeah, it's that's the one part of the career that never seems to get easier. I always, even I have to always tell myself that these people love you, they, they want you in the room, they are rooting for you. They're not rooting for you to do like a bad job or like forget your lines, or this, that and the other. So I try to keep a fun attitude about it whenever I'm in the room or whenever I'm in the callback room or gosh the. You know, ever since the pandemic, the, the recorded auditions. I am not a technical person. I I always go to like a friend's house, like theresa's and roman or john ryan del bosque, and we, we like, we always do our like auditions together, just because it's better to have a team of people to record this mug. But but yeah, I just.
Speaker 2:I try to keep great relationships with all the theaters in town. I'm proud to be a Houston native. I'm proud that I've like, stayed here and given back to the community that raised me. So that's how I like to think that I continue to get work.
Speaker 1:Well, you're certainly a favorite of not only Tuts but so many theaters here in Houston, so it's always a joy to see you here. But do you ever work outside of our city, or do you do tours or anything like that?
Speaker 2:No, I never have, and it's not that I don't want to, I really would. You know, especially in the last couple years. You know I was talking crap about about recorded auditions, but like that has been so helpful since the pandemic is that you are able to do recorded auditions. But like that has been so helpful since the pandemic is that you are able to do recorded auditions and send them out to a lot of regional theaters and or auditions that you can't make, and that is that is a goal of mine in the next couple of years is to start doing more regional work elsewhere. I would love to start getting my name out in the wild, more so than just Houston. I'm also real, always proud of myself, and then I love working in Houston and having like a full year of work and then being able to kind of pick and choose what I can and can't do.
Speaker 1:One thing in your bio that leaps out at me is that it says that you were in a Beyonce video for the song Below. How in the world did you get that gig? How did you get that?
Speaker 2:how did you get that? So I know todrick hall from my first, my first boyfriend. He went to high school with him, and so I met him a long, long, long time ago and he was in town and he was he's known for like putting together a lot of like flash mob videos when he like first started. He's he's gone on to do a wonderful career since then. But he was hired, I think, by beyonce's crew to like kind of choreograph, a kind of like flash mob experience for her band and stuff like that or her dancers I think that's what they wanted the theme to be.
Speaker 2:And he texted me and he was like hey, are you available tomorrow for for this music video? And I want to like ask you to be like pass you off as like my assistant or something like that. And I was like sure, but I had read on twitter through the grapevine, that beyonce was in town like recording something. So I was like this wouldn't by any chance happen to be with a certain queen pop star, would it? And he was like you should just come.
Speaker 1:So I waited all day.
Speaker 2:I was there for 12 hours. At a certain point, one of her assistants came up and they were like I don't think you're supposed to be here right now. And I was like you're right, let me go away for a little bit. And then we started roller skating. That's when I figured out that I wasn't a really good roller skater, even though I'd already been cast in xanadu and you can't see me in video. But I was paid and I can tell you exactly where I was outside of the frame. So maybe that'll be the start to my one man show is where me pointing out exactly where I was outside of the video. But that's where I was there.
Speaker 1:I was afraid that I missed you in a bikini, like doing the skating choreography.
Speaker 2:No, no, no, no, no there's a big group shot in the beginning and I'm always like there I am. Oh, you missed me. Ah dang, but the bikini was on.
Speaker 1:It's still cool to be in the room where it happened, so there you are exactly, and she's a phenomenal roller skater, probably phenomenal everything but. And talking about the merging of two houston legends like mark ivy and beyonce there you go, you, my gosh.
Speaker 2:you can't see, but my head is inflating right now.
Speaker 1:Okay, well, let's break some hearts here. You are in a relationship. Tell me about it. How long have you been with your partner?
Speaker 2:I've been with Jacob. It'll be seven years in December. It's been a wonderful, blissful seven years, he would say.
Speaker 1:He would say I would say as well, yes of course I would say for sure.
Speaker 2:He is just the smartest, sweetest and most supportive individual anyone could ask for, especially someone who has such a wild career like I do, because nothing to do with theater but he loves it, he supports it and I I really appreciate that yeah, how does he handle your, your kind of local fame?
Speaker 1:I mean, it would be weird because, like we're saying about the parasocial relationship, if you go out, you get recognized. People know you and they probably don't recognize Jacob as much except for from your Instagram account yeah, they, they, they.
Speaker 2:I think, you know, and he's definitely more introverted to my extrovert. I think he's mostly, I think he's proud, like, I think he's proud of the compliments because he agrees with them. I think he loves he loves to see me perform and that I've always followed my dreams and that I've succeeded in following those dreams. And so I think he, whenever the, whenever those interactions happen, I think he really is proud. And and also because he, you know, he's a part of that support, because of him pulling extra hours whenever I am in, like rehearsals or technical rehearsals, taking care of our pets or taking care of the house, making sure that, you know, laundry and food is taken care of, you know, I want him to feel those accomplishments just as much as I I do, because he is definitely a part of that. So, yeah, I think he's, I think he's proud of me.
Speaker 2:I know he's proud of me. You know I think it's tough straight gay, whatever I know he's proud of me.
Speaker 1:You know I think it's tough. Straight, gay, whatever you are yeah, I always feel like if you're in a show, your spouse, your partner, becomes like what I call a theater widow, because you're never there. Yeah, I mean, you're literally in rehearsals or doing something for the show almost 24, seven and, spoiler alert, we do a lot of rehearsals at night. Right, the performances are at night and they're on weekends and you know they ruin your whole life for the entire run, exactly.
Speaker 2:I've missed a lot of birthdays. I've missed a lot of important family events this, that or the other you know.
Speaker 2:That's why I always love a touch schedule too, because we do have daytime rehearsals and I feel like I'm able to do really good work in the morning and then, like you know, see Jacob at night and like be like, can we go to dinner? Or, like you know, last night we went to the supermarket and it was we love doing that, you know. Just like, just like walking around the aisles and spending time with each other. His love language is definitely time spent and mine is, you know, gifts.
Speaker 1:So he was just, it was wonderful, but, like you're exactly right, when it gets, into the thick of it, like when it comes to like tech next week, like bye, like I'll see you in a week or two. How long do you have to prepare for a Tuts musical, like what do you think? From start to finish? What is the timeline, like it usually from?
Speaker 2:start to finish.
Speaker 2:It's all in like four weeks.
Speaker 2:You usually have a week and a half to two weeks of rehearsal and then, like now, we have like kind of like a week-long half tech half, like adding in all the elements week, and then that, and then it goes right into the weekend where you have like some final dresses with everything and then it goes right into performances.
Speaker 2:Honestly, we are in a really great shape for little shop, I think, because it's a smaller cast and a shorter show and compared to other things that we are, we're already doing runs and where we've had like repetitions on everything. So now we're getting in a really good spot because of course the show is very tech heavy with all the elements of the puppets and stuff like that. So we're in, we're gearing up to be in really good shape for our tech week so that we can focus on that to bring the whole show together. It's like I always compare it to roller coasters and like once you get on the roller coaster you can't really get off until the end. So it's like we started on October 1st. We're not getting off until November 3rd.
Speaker 1:Well, you're a veteran of this show. Third time that you've done Little Shop. What do you think is the hardest aspect of Little Shop? What do you think is the key to getting it right?
Speaker 2:I think it's definitely the marriage Between camp and reality. Yes, this is a wild show that we're talking about, but these are true feelings and intentions and, you know, the love is there, the wants are there, the greed is there, but it's also a giant plant, and you know Aliens and the music, but I definitely think it's the. It's the marriage between writing the line of reality versus bizarro world that the story takes place in well, mark ivy.
Speaker 1:This is the show that I've been most excited about from tuts for this season. When they announced it, I was just like just squeal and my inner geek went crazy. So theater under the stars, little shop of horrors running, appropriately enough, october 22nd through november 3rd, right there in the halloween slot which is wonderful. I cannot recommend it enough, of course. I've seen you in it several times. I'm going to be so excited to see you playing mr mushnik this time yeah which is gonna be wild. There'll be new experience for me because I'm so.
Speaker 2:Your seymour is so ingrained into my brain I play a good mr daddy, as seymour calls me, does he really? Oh, the actor does yeah, it's not in the script right?
Speaker 1:no, it's in the script.
Speaker 2:Oh, don't you. How did I forget?
Speaker 1:this a little, all right well, maybe that'll be your new nickname from now on.
Speaker 2:So there you go exactly your character, actor name thank you so much thank you brett.
