Shebrew in the City
Shebrew in the City is a podcast exploring all things Jewish. Combining interviews and informational episodes, join Nicole Kelly as she discusses her journey with motherhood, spirituality, and everything from Hanukkah to the Holocaust. Giving a voice to modern Jews and spreading love and joy, whether you're Jewish, Jew-ish, or not anything resembling Jewish at all, there's something here for everyone.
Shebrew in the City
"Everything Was Ragtime" - An Interview with Actor Dara Bloomfield
Have you every been curious about what it is like to be a child actor on Broadway? In this captivating conversation with actor Dara Bloomfield, we explore stories of her Jewish upbringing, her journey from being a child actor in the Original Broadway Production of Ragtime: The Musical, to becoming a producer, and a mother. We journey alongside Dara as she shares her experiences, from growing up on Long Island to her intriguing interest in having an adult Bat Mitzvah.
Traveling back to the 90s, we go behind the scenes of Broadway, shedding light on the challenges, triumphs, and unique experiences of a child performer. Dara shares captivating anecdotes about her audition for Ragtime, the dynamics of the acting world, and the personal growth that comes from a life on stage. We also delve into Dara's transition into adulthood, revisiting cherished shows, and unraveling the emotional journey that comes with it.
In the final act, Dara opens up about the various roles she plays off-stage. As a producer, she shares her pride in founding "Growing Up Broadway" and her involvement in the Joe Iconis musical "Broadway Bounty Hunter". As a mother, she talks about the influence of becoming a parent has on her Jewish perspective and aspirations for her sons. Join us as we connect with Dara Bloomfield, filled with compelling stories, heartfelt discussions, and the joy of musical theater.
Today's episode of Shebrew in the City is brought to you by Top Dog Tours. Whether you are visiting Toronto, Boston, Philadelphia or New York City, we've got something for everybody. Visit us at topdogtours. com to book your tour today and follow us on social media for any special offers and discounts. Due to an equipment malfunction, about 16 minutes into the interview the audio gets a little jumbled. We tried our best to fix it, but please bear with us as we figure out how all this equipment works. We hope you enjoy the episode. Hi, I'm Nicole Kelly and this is Shebrew in the City, and today I am talking with Dara Bloomfield, who is a performer and actor who has a very unique Broadway debut story which I think is very relevant to Judaism and Broadway in general. So how are you doing today, Dara?
Dara Bloomfield:I'm good. How are you?
Nicole Kelly:I'm good, I'm a little tired, but that's, I guess, par for the course when you have a toddler.
Dara Bloomfield:I have two. I think my son's the same, almost the same age as your daughter, I guess.
Nicole Kelly:So I always like to start off by asking my guests about their Jewish upbringing. Where you're from, you know how religious were you. What was your denomination, if any? Did you have a Batmitzva, all of that good stuff.
Dara Bloomfield:Right. So I grew up on Long Island, more specifically in Jericho, which is very Jewish. I, from like 14, probably actually from like the age of like 12 and a half to about 14, I was going to like four Barbat Mitzvahs a weekend. That's anyway. It was pretty nuts. It's now geared more towards kids, but when I was a kid it was geared towards the parents. Okay, so it was a lot of black tie at country clubs.
Nicole Kelly:Hmm.
Dara Bloomfield:It was, it was um, it was something, but it was like mini weddings.
Nicole Kelly:Oh, my goodness.
Dara Bloomfield:Yeah, so I grew up in a really heavily Jewish neighborhood, with all my friends, for the most part, were Jewish we, um but I would describe my family as Jewish. We weren't necessarily religious, but my parents were very traditional, so we follow a lot of the traditions of Judaism and and, like, for example, all my sisters and my cousins were all named for people who have passed, which is why, like, my cousin and I have the same initials Okay, um, but we, we didn't go to synagogue and and we went. I actually didn't even have a Barbat Mitzvah, had a big 13th birthday party instead, which is kind of a story within itself.
Nicole Kelly:But did your 13th birthday have a theme at least? Yes, yes, it did. It was music Okay. Like.
Dara Bloomfield:I went, I, I, I, I, I, I bucked to the Broadway theme I, I, just I. I thought I was too cool for it, so we went for the generic music.
Nicole Kelly:Okay, I love it. I love it. So, still, they had a big 13th birthday party, even though you didn't have a Barbat Mitzvah. Yeah, is that something that you would be interested in doing as an adult, cause I know there's adult bani Mitzvahs they're very popular nowadays.
Dara Bloomfield:Yeah, actually, you know it's funny. I was trying to talk about my dad awhile ago and I was kind of just half joking but half serious, like I was. I think for my 36th birthday I would do it. I mean, our wedding was actually way more religious than that. We thought we were going to have it. We had a Katuba, we had a rabbi and our, our hope was really, really special. My aunt, my sisters and I actually crocheted it and we used it as something that my grandma had made and she and as part of it and it was a massive project that took like a year but and we finished it at one o'clock in the morning the night before the wedding. Very close call, yes, very close call. And my sisters actually were joking that during the Katuba signing they were like why are we in the production of For the Run Through?
Nicole Kelly:Why did your wedding end up being more religious than you thought it would be? Is it something from your husband's family, or is it just something I?
Dara Bloomfield:think it was just something that kind of just evolved, like we just both kind of decided that we were going to do it, we're going to do it. I don't want to say right, but we were going to do it in a more traditional sense, like we we we definitely just were like, well, let's just do it. If we're going to do it, let's do this. And it wasn't fully like you know, it was before. It was on a Saturday night before sunset. Our rabbi was awesome and we love her and she actually did her son's baby naming. We didn't do a brisk, so we kind of make our own traditions.
Nicole Kelly:Okay, I feel like that's the thing that a lot of people these days tend to do. If they don't really identify as very religious or unaffiliated with the synagogue, they kind of pick and choose what they're comfortable with and things like that. So I feel like that's way more common than I even thought kind of before.
Dara Bloomfield:Me too. Yeah, Cause my son was born in like the heavy midst of COVID and we didn't feel comfortable having a brisk. And we, we, we reached out to the rabbi who did our wedding and we said, listen, we want to still do a baby naming Is that a thing? And she's like absolutely, she's like that's what a lot of people are doing.
Nicole Kelly:We actually had our daughter's naming. I think she was nine months old. She was born in May and we didn't do it till January the following year and there was actually like a resurgence of COVID at that time. So, everybody was wearing a mask. It was a whole. It was a whole thing we did.
Nicole Kelly:We were actually yeah, we did our son's baby naming on zoom I mean that zoom makes things a lot easier nowadays as far as, like people being able to connect with each other. We definitely had some people cause we did it in California who our friends in New York were on zoom watching it, so I think it makes it easier for a lots of people to participate in celebrations that they might not be able to.
Dara Bloomfield:Oh yeah, it was great. Like you know, my sister and her husband live in Miami and we had family in Massachusetts and we had family in Connecticut and it was great that everybody was kind of able to join and not necessarily have to be in New York.
Nicole Kelly:So I really want to delve into your relationship with the musical ragtime. But first I am curious about how you became interested in performing, because you started professionally performing at such a young age. How did that start?
Dara Bloomfield:I always loved it. I was the kid who walked around with like the mini tape recorder and sang karaoke. I loved all. My mom was really big into showing me movie musicals and so I was into Greece and Annie and all those like introductory, like movie musicals.
Nicole Kelly:Which is very appropriate for children.
Dara Bloomfield:Oh, 100%. But like you know, I remember my mom tried showing me Rocky Har when I was like seven.
Nicole Kelly:Oh, my goodness.
Dara Bloomfield:And I just was like nope.
Nicole Kelly:It's a little much, I think, even for some adults. So definitely as a child, I can imagine being confused and overwhelmed.
Dara Bloomfield:I was like I don't like this one. But I grew up in like a very like you know. My aunt worked in theater, my mom worked in entertainment, my dad loves like movies, so for us it was just kind of normal. And then when I was five I saw cats and by the time we got to memory I was sold.
Nicole Kelly:Was that your first Broadway show?
Dara Bloomfield:No, actually my first Broadway show was Peter Pan and I was like way too young to go see it. It was probably about like two and a half. Kathy Rigby, Peter.
Nicole Kelly:Pan.
Dara Bloomfield:Yep and I loved it, the Mary Martin Peter Pan.
Dara Bloomfield:Um my dad, I like to sit up on the seat and started screaming at the light yelling tank over and over. I was like two and a half and my mom was like I think we're too young for this, um. So at that point Broadway did not have age limits. We um, my mom held off again and then we went to go see cats and by the time we got to memory I was like that that's what I want to do. And my mom and my dad knew I can sing. They signed me up for voice lessons and I went in for the Broadway revival of Annie as just an open call and I made it all the way to the end, right before they had this big like casting session publicity thing at Macy's. I made it right before that cut and at that point my mom was like, oh Okay, let's see what happens. And I just kept auditioning after that. So Ragtime was about two years into me heavily auditioning.
Nicole Kelly:Okay, so you had some experience at this point. It wasn't really your first professional audition.
Dara Bloomfield:No, I thought by the time Ragtime rolled around I would gotten close, but not gotten anything for about three or four shows.
Nicole Kelly:Okay, okay, can you walk me through what the audition process for Ragtime was like? Did you audition for the production when it like the original call, or was this a replacement call or how it was?
Dara Bloomfield:a replacement call. So Leah outgrew the role the girl who was understanding her at the time was going to. They were going to start alternating, so two little girls would go on for for X amount of shows and that the understudy was going on vacation. So they needed to hire somebody who was going to ultimately take over but also be a replacement understudy for when the girl who was who was already cast was going on vacation. So I remember going to the audition in it was the Ford Center, Now it's the Lyric Theater, but there's a rehearsal studio actually on the top floor and, yeah, it's a massive space and they did the audition there. Originally. That was the first audition was there. Then they called my manager back and asked me to come back in for a callback but to wear a dress.
Nicole Kelly:What were you wearing at the initial audition?
Dara Bloomfield:I used to wear like I had this lucky pair of overalls I wore for everything, so it was just, it was a pair of overalls and they were like we need her in a dress. So I remember my mom hunting down like this weirdly perfect purple dress with a pair of boots that just worked beautifully for it. And I remember going into the second audition, which I think was at Chelsea Studios, and I just remember looking around and like I was the only brown hair, brown eyed girl there, which was weird but considering the fact, like the other little girls were, we look similar. And I just remember my mom actually turning around to me and being like one of these things is not like the other.
Nicole Kelly:That's really funny because it is a very, very Jewish roles, I know.
Dara Bloomfield:I know.
Nicole Kelly:Okay, to be specific, an Ashkenazi Jewish role, because you can there's not like a way to look Jewish but this is specifically an Ashkenazi Jewish immigrant child.
Dara Bloomfield:Interestingly enough, like I know, leah identifies as Jewish, but the girl who I ended up sharing the role with was not Jewish.
Nicole Kelly:What did she? What was she if she wasn't Jewish?
Dara Bloomfield:She I don't remember exactly what she and I she identified as just Christian, but her parents were very religious. It was also like the late 90s where, like I remember, I went in for the Kenny Rogers musical spectacular. That was a thing and I even missed a callback for an act for another show because they this was like the final push and I was told through my manager the reason why I didn't get it was because I was too Jewish looking.
Nicole Kelly:I mean, you got a lot of a time where they could just be blatantly racist a little bit, yeah, and they can be like she looked too Jewish Now now not naming any specific national tours or shows you don't need to be Jewish at all to play a role, so it's the exact opposite. So it's good you know back and forth. Exactly so so you had your second audition in your perfect dress.
Dara Bloomfield:Yeah, and I went in, I sang and I'll never forget Frank Lottie's face when I hit a high note and it just was like, oh my God, this, this kid, and, and I walked out and I didn't even think anything of it and because you know kid logic and kid time, I have no idea how much time passed between that second audition and when my, it could have been an hour, it could have been three years, you know yeah, exactly, I could have been weak.
Dara Bloomfield:I had no idea that my manager called my mom, told her that I booked it and I had. My mom was actually waiting for my dad to come home from work to tell me my mom was in a another room taking the phone call. And I just happened to walk in to get something and I overheard and I was like no way.
Nicole Kelly:That's very cool that she wanted to wait to include your dad, but that in true kid form. You heard something that you weren't supposed to hear. Did you pretend you?
Dara Bloomfield:weren't here. No, no, no. I mean I walked in as if my mom was like there was no way to pretend like I didn't hear it.
Nicole Kelly:That's so interesting that it was only the initial audition and the first callback, because I feel like now, not that little girl's like the lead lead character for Ragton, but I know leads for Broadway shows. Sometimes you go through even like they used to do Frankie Valley camp, like you will have one-on-one sessions with the assistant director and the musical director and it's kind of a crazy process.
Dara Bloomfield:Oh my God, that was. We actually had to sign a waiver because they did so many callbacks for that.
Nicole Kelly:That's a lot of Roger Hammerstein.
Dara Bloomfield:And they, by the time for the end, for all the kids, like they had a stand in this little black box theater while they called out like you know, like you, you stand back, you step forward, you step back to get the look of the kids. And I made it all the way to the end and the only reason why I didn't get it was because the little girl who did get it her brother had gotten one of the boys.
Nicole Kelly:So they were not doing things.
Dara Bloomfield:Exactly, and she was blonde, I was Brunette. It just came down to like basically semantics of that.
Nicole Kelly:I mean I tell guests when I give tours all the time that it's such arbitrary, ridiculous reasons that people don't book roles that have nothing to do with their talent or them. There was a director in Los Angeles who has since passed away that did not like the dress I wore the first time he saw me audition and subsequently never called me back, or he's like she didn't look like her headshot so in his mind he had decided that I was not acceptable to even call back. So it's very strange reasons you don't book things.
Dara Bloomfield:Oh yeah, I mean, I got so far for that and it was heartbreaking, like it was so heartbreaking Especially as a little kid, because you don't really know the brand that it wasn't yeah.
Dara Bloomfield:I mean, and you kind of do, because you've been through the process before Like it's always like that. It's always, you know, a matter of who do you look like, especially when you're playing someone's daughter or sister, like they kind of have to like take that into account. So that was the audition before Ragtime for me, and so getting that was amazing, and I think also they're under a time crunch. They just needed to replace somebody to because there was there was a deadline, like the scroll was going on vacation.
Nicole Kelly:You kind of looked out with the not having the months long process, making it super stressful, not that you know what do you?
Dara Bloomfield:know, you said no, I wouldn't and I so that, like I said, like I said I was like I got close on like three shows and one of them was Les Mis and they kept telling me for months, like you're next, you're next, you're next and I would go in. I was literally just saying one line of cast on a cloud and measure me, and then they'd be like I was full.
Nicole Kelly:Yeah, they were just basically making sure that you would be fitting the costumes and Exactly and the coolest was.
Dara Bloomfield:I asked and they didn't realize how cool this was until I was older. I auditioned in the Imperial, like on the stick, like in the Imperial theater, like they sent me to see the show, they sent me to audition in the theater. I saw I was like, oh my God, this is like I thought it was, I don't know. Like at the time I was kind of a little bit like I'm like I'm not sure on about it, but like now it's like that was really awesome, like I had a very like funny girl experience.
Nicole Kelly:For those of you not familiar with Broadway, auditions don't typically audition in the theater, so you audition in smaller rehearsal spaces, which is not at all like performing in the theater, and they really don't even, I think nowadays have people's final callbacks on stage, which I think is weird, because you'd want to see how they fill the space. I think they used to do this this was very common, where they have even open calls in theaters, but they don't do that anymore.
Dara Bloomfield:Yeah, no, this so it was. It was really cool and I actually ended up getting the phone call from my manager like the same week I booked Ragtime that I got my name sending away parents how to make the decision.
Nicole Kelly:So can you walk me through what a typical day was like for you as a child working on Broadway? Did you go to regular school? Did you only go to the theater sometimes because you were alternating the role? How did that work?
Dara Bloomfield:So I was at the theater every day for every show and I went to school, except I missed a lot. I performed on Wednesday afternoon, so I would go to school for like maybe two hours, if that Actually the year that I did Ragtime. It was interesting the New York state had just implemented like new standardized testing for fourth graders, and so my teachers were really concerned that my test scores wouldn't be great because I was missing so much school. So they put me in a couple of different supports and they basically like listen, homework, stupid, but make sure that you do these worksheets for this, for this testing.
Nicole Kelly:I feel like all the children of the 90s. It was very standardized testing focused. I think that's why a lot of us probably did good on SATs and ACDs and things like that because we had been trained since we were very small children to do very well on standardized tests.
Dara Bloomfield:Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. So like for us, it was like I was like you know what Did the standardized testing? I aced it Like it was fine. I read a lot of books, I read a lot. It was. You know, we made it work and that's exactly just. It was completely abnormal for a year and a half, but I wouldn't have tried to experience for anything else.
Nicole Kelly:So, for those of you that aren't familiar with the story of Ragtime, there are multiple groups of people they follow. One is this Waspy upper class family and we have the African American group and we have a Jewish Ashkenazi immigrant father and his little girl and that is the part that Vera played. Do you think that doing Ragtime kind of connected you a little bit more with your Judaism, made you more aware of your heritage? Is this something that you looked into? Did any research about?
Dara Bloomfield:So it was my family's story, at least part of it, my mom's side of the family. They came right into the United States around the same exact time as Ragtime. So my mom, my dad and took me to Ellis Island, which is where a big part of the story takes place, at least the little girl story. So I went to Ellis Island, my mom bought me books upon books about immigrants and you know I did a little bit more research into my own family and about their living situation and I did. It was hands on and it was fun, but I did do a lot of research for a 10 year old on what it was like to be in that and then, through that, just learning about my family story, it definitely impacted me a lot.
Nicole Kelly:Did you, as a child, have your own dressing room or did you share with some of the adults?
Dara Bloomfield:Oh no, kids have to have their own dressing room. So we actually had two. Technically we had one that was the little girl dressing room, and then we had the kids room that was in between the men women's ensemble. It was like our place to hang out when we weren't on stage, but I hung out in the green room anyway. Technically it wasn't supposed to, but I was there all the time.
Nicole Kelly:Was this before the era of child guardians? Because I know, actually know some people who that's literally their job is. They are guardians for children on Broadway.
Dara Bloomfield:No, no, we had one, but it was definitely a lot less, because a good friend of mine is a child guardian. I tell her all the things that we did and she was like I'd be fired the first day.
Nicole Kelly:It was the 90s.
Dara Bloomfield:Exactly, it was the 90s, I mean I find myself putting that a lot lately.
Nicole Kelly:It was the 90s, it was the 90s, no one cared.
Dara Bloomfield:I mean the ragtime set was there was this massive catwalk that would get lowered and raised and serve different functions. But I used to love going up there and doing my homework, which is hilarious because my son this weekend we went to a function at his preschool and there's a sky trampoline and he booked it onto the sky trampoline and I freaked out. So the fact that I would sit on this catwalk above a Broadway stage and do my homework without even thinking about it, they would literally be like Dary, you got to get down.
Nicole Kelly:They're like oh okay, they're like this is some major safety hazard. Let's get you down for a minute.
Dara Bloomfield:No, no, no, no, no. We have to use this. So come down. Well, you can go back up. I would go and do my homework up there. I used to bring my books and read with a mag light towards the end of act two before the bow. We just ran the place.
Nicole Kelly:I've done a lot of shows with kids because I've done fiddlers 1,700 times. So I feel like the kids do kind of just kind of run around and do whatever they want. The cast has kind of embraces them and goes oh, they're so cute.
Dara Bloomfield:I distinctly remember that at the time there was talk of they're doing a revival. Do you know the play the bad seed at all.
Nicole Kelly:Of course I know the play the bad seed because I love all things macabre and my family is my father especially really big on TCM and vintage drama. So it's yes, I probably too early of an age watched the bad seed.
Dara Bloomfield:Okay. So there was talk of they're doing a bad seed revival and everybody heard about it and immediately was like this is your role, like this I don't know if that's a good thing, I don't know, but they're exactly. But like they were, like this is, this is for you. So I had like three people buy me the play. I sat in the green room playing cards. We bet for candy Memorizing the movie. I don't even know Like we were treated like many adults.
Nicole Kelly:I think that a lot of children involved with performing in early age. My husband did a lot of professional theater as a very young kid. They end up acting and being treated like many adults and I think that does affect their growth and maturity level a little bit, oh, 100% Very adult world and literally like having a job in fourth grade.
Dara Bloomfield:I didn't. I didn't catch up to the rest of my friends until college, when it was like a more even playing field but I was ordering my own food, I was writing checks for my voice lessons, obviously not signing them, but like I was feeling them out in the car. You know, I was doing things that like for my friends seemed completely foreign but for me was completely normal and we were many adults. I'll never forget I went to a.
Dara Bloomfield:My mom had friends who were having like a 25th anniversary party and one of them was an agent. So there was a lot of actors there and the only way my parents can go to the party because I was in the show was if I went. So I was able to go this party and I walk over to this table and Marin Maisie is there and I didn't work with Marin for very long. I maybe overlapped with her for about two weeks, but of course you know, being me and 10 and thinking that I, you know, rule the place walked over to pull up a chair, start having conversation and my mom was like I am so sorry, but I was a very, not just 10, year old, but she could have not have been any like sweeter or more gracious, I feel like don't you're precocious of noxious?
Nicole Kelly:I was also a very precocious child who had a very big vocabulary and talked like an adult. So I think you can see precocious instead of obnoxious. But I think you know to you have to really adapt and it does take a certain type of child to thrive in a performing situation because it's a hard and adult. So I think it takes a very specific type of child to be able to function in that that world. It's really difficult.
Dara Bloomfield:It really is. And another story that my family likes to tell is my first musical, my first like full production musical that I ever did, and I was little right before I did. Right time was your good man, charlie Brown, where my acting teacher added the role of Sally.
Dara Bloomfield:for me, this was before the revival that this was before the revival, so there was no my new philosophy. There was nothing. So like he just he basically took the girl who played Patty couldn't sing, so he basically just gave me all Patty singing lines. It was completely off, like not a real thing, like wrote in a scene for me here and there and made me Sally. And then your good man, charlie Brown, opened our Broadway and we went to go see it and I'm by the stage door and my mom had known Anthony Rapp from when she worked said something, anthony Rapp, he came over and then he started introducing the entire cast and at that point I had fell in love with Christian Chenoweth because she was like she was phenomenal.
Dara Bloomfield:She's Christian Chenoweth and she's signing my play bill and I just look at her. I'm like you know, I originated Sally Brown and it's like you know, small acting class production of your good man, charlie Brown, and she thought it was really fun, but that's what I'm saying precocious, exactly Because her and then, like through a weird, even weirder connection, her acting teacher from college was in ragtime with me.
Nicole Kelly:Oh, okay.
Dara Bloomfield:So it was kind of like she you know, as soon as someone is like my mom's, like I'm sorry, but she does this too Like she was in ragtime and so like we had that. And then I ended up at the opening night party for your good man, Charlie Brown, and I was looking for a Sally doll for my dressing room and I think Roger Bart had a Sally doll and she made him trade me for whatever doll I had.
Nicole Kelly:They were giving. They had dolls.
Dara Bloomfield:They were giving out like stuffed animals, yeah dolls Gotcha, gotcha. And I wanted the Sally one and I think she was like she. She spotted me, she was like you're original Sally.
Nicole Kelly:So she remembered. She remembered that's so cute. Earlier this year you participated in the ragtime reunion concerts. What was it like revisiting this material now that you're an adult, now that you're a mother? You know, now that you've kind of had a lived experience.
Dara Bloomfield:It was so special I would, so I did it. I was 22, 23 weeks pregnant, which was an experience within itself, yeah, and that was after we did a full week in Disney the week before.
Nicole Kelly:Oh that sounds exhausting, without having to do rehearsal for a show.
Dara Bloomfield:The show was completely different. This should like to me. It took on a completely different meaning. It took on a completely different the. Everything about it was different. I understood so much more than I did when I was 10. And not because I was an adult, because I wasn't adult. Actually, I should say that because I wasn't adult. I had two kids. So watching mother's story, I get it, I completely understand, especially as a mom to a little boy. Watching Tata's story, I understand the sacrifices and everything that it was just the whole, the whole experience was just. It can't even put into words how special that was.
Nicole Kelly:What was it like reconnecting with some of the performers you had worked with in your as a kid? As an adult, did they treat you differently. What was that like?
Dara Bloomfield:Yes and no. So I was still a little kid to them, which is kind of funny because, like I said, I was 22 weeks pregnant. I have a two year old, I'm 34, like you know, I'm an adult. I'm probably older than they were when they did the show and it was still like kind of like reverted back a little bit to I was. They just couldn't get over the fact that I wasn't 10.
Nicole Kelly:Yeah, I feel like that's a very common thing. I think sometimes people you're kind of stuck in their head in how they first met you, even with people in my life like my great aunt is 86. And I still think of her as in her fifties because that's kind of like when I was a kid, you know, and she was very active. So it's difficult, I think, both ways to kind of readjust your relationship with some people.
Dara Bloomfield:Oh yeah, but it was, it was awesome and I went from playing little girl and then in the like, when we did this in the ensemble and it was, it was roles I've never done before, songs I've never sang before, and I kind of had to, like you know, got kind of thrown into it and everyone was so helpful and trying to, you know, fit me in trying to figure out where I went, you know, telling me who's whose place I was in instead of that person, and that was really cool.
Nicole Kelly:I love that they did the reunion concert. I think ragtime in general is just a very emotional show. My husband tears up every time he hears the opening and I love the music so much. So I think that you know, especially with everything that's kind of been going on in the world, it was a really appropriate time to do that.
Dara Bloomfield:It was the best time for that to happen. I'm not an emotional person typically, I'm just I can hold myself. But the there's a segment within the show they call the Lawrence mass section to kind of give a little bit of background on it. It's it's where Tata and this little girl are in Lawrence, massachusetts. There's a strike which then leads into the night, the Golden Spoke Union Square, which then leads into Tata having to put his daughter on a train because the he just can't support her the way that he needs to support her and she freaks out and there's a riot that breaks out and and it leads into this beautiful song called Blighting.
Nicole Kelly:At Union Square. Scythe, scythe Scythe. I hate to have got name America. Scythe Scythe, scythe Scythe. Don't cry, don't be afraid. I'm here we're together. Look, look what I made for you. See the silhouettes. It's a little book of silhouettes.
Dara Bloomfield:When you flip the pages, so that whole section is short hand term. It's the Lawrence Mass Sequence. The second that the BUM BUM, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum. I lost it during the Strix Pope. I completely bawled and like everyone's like around me and I'm like crying, laughing because I'm like laughing at myself, forgetting like why am I like feeling this way? But like I, I'm like hysterically crying, and it for a lot of different reasons.
Dara Bloomfield:One that was like the emotion, the most work I did in the show as an actor, because it was. I was on stage for the entirety of it. Also, it was scarred. I didn't realize how traumatizing that was until I had to revisit it because it's a terrifying thing for a child. The choreography for it is a little girl gets passed around a person to person and I and I think subconsciously I never memorized who I was going to. So that way it was. I was scared when I got on the train and had to scream for my father to come get me and cry and like, like every show, I did that and it was. It was really emotional, it just was I lost it.
Nicole Kelly:I think that's a testament to good theater that sometimes it surprises you how emotional you can get in response to certain things. Like, even if you obviously didn't do the show for a year and a half, I feel like there have been moments where I've seen plays or musicals and I'm just shocked by how emotional I get and I think that's a testament to the power of good theater. Is that you're actually? I was saying to my husband you know we were talking about. I don't remember which bad show we were talking about, but I you know. I think good theater you leave the theater changed. You leave a changed person and I think you know most people I talk to love ragtime because it has changed the way that they viewed something where they feel changed by the story. They can relate to it in some way.
Dara Bloomfield:I have a playlist I play for my son every night and glidings like one of the top songs on there and I love that song to begin with and it just took on a completely different meaning after having my son and after being a mom and and I lost it. I was like I was and like everyone's sitting there, like this poor, like like I'm like crying, laughing.
Nicole Kelly:I'm fine. I feel like when I was pregnant, that was my excuse for everything and be like I'm tired, I'm pregnant. I'm crying, I'm pregnant. I need to go for a walk. I'm pregnant.
Dara Bloomfield:It was so special and I'm so I'm so happy that I was able to do it and that I was a part of it and it was. It was an unbelievable experience.
Nicole Kelly:So how was the transition from child actor to adult actor?
Dara Bloomfield:I, that's a tough, that's a loaded question.
Nicole Kelly:That's a very loaded question. I know. You know we talk, we can talk about that in general, but what would? What advice would you give for performers who are in the process of making that transition?
Dara Bloomfield:That's a. I'm trying to think how to word it. It's not what you ever going to expect. To not have any expectations. You're starting from brand new and, like I think the mistake I made was I rested on my laurels too much. Interesting as opposed to trying to you know who I was a 10 and who I was at you know. Let's just say 21 when I graduated from college, or 23, I wasn't the same and I and that was the mistake I made was not realizing that difference, not just disembracing that.
Nicole Kelly:I think that's hard to do, even sometimes transitioning as an adult, because I am very much a character actress and I did a lot of like dance, track fiddler, ingenue work, and now that I'm kind of the age where I'm aging into roles, I'm right for, you know, I'll be like I can sing that song and I'm like, oh wait, I'm almost 40. I can do that now. So I feel like even as an adult actor, sometimes those transitions can be difficult and it's very emotional. I took a class with a casting director and there was a young woman she was about to graduate high school, uh who had done I think five or six Broadway shows.
Nicole Kelly:At this point I was very familiar with the casting director and at one point got very emotional talking about even her journey as an 18 year old and her difficulty with everyone seeing her as like 11 or 12. And she had to leave the room. At one point she got so emotional and she wasn't even really starting her career as an adult actor yet. She but she was, I think, starting to realize that, like you said, she would have to completely start over, which, when an actor for over a decade, you know, or more that's that sounds exhausting to me.
Dara Bloomfield:It is and it's like and and you know what? Also, I was such a little snob. I was like things should be done this way and I wasn't flexible and I went in there with this expectation that it would be just as easy, but it's not completely different, and so like and that, and I think that's that's where a lot of you know my, my friends, who, who, who did this as adults and as kids and then as adults. That's the trap.
Nicole Kelly:I think that's good advice. Speaking of children who are actors in 2017, you started growing up Broadway. Can you tell us a little bit about what that is and what the inspiration was for that?
Dara Bloomfield:Sure, so at that point I was not. I was auditioning, but I wasn't really getting anywhere and I was so tired of not performing anywhere and I was actually singing back to before in the shower.
Nicole Kelly:And.
Dara Bloomfield:I'm like, wow, I'm old enough now to play mother, which is weird. But I was like you know what? There was a lot of shows in the late nineties with kids in them, and now we're all old enough to play adults. So I thought I had this idea for a cabaret where, like what if you took the kid actors who were in a show and then they were singing the roles that they were right for now? And so I pitched it. It got accepted.
Nicole Kelly:I'm at 54 below and are those of you that don't know, 54 below is a very, very prestigious cabaret space here in New York City. Yeah.
Dara Bloomfield:And and and they took the idea and they ran with it and I was able to get in contact with with some of my friends who I know had from from when I was working and they were working at the same time Also some new people, and it just kind of evolved from there and it took on kind of a little bit of life and so on.
Nicole Kelly:I know some of the the concerts that were done after that initial concert had people who were child actors currently, yeah.
Dara Bloomfield:So then I decided to expand because I was like, what else can I do? And I was like there's a lot of kids on Broadway right now. So so it was. Then I incorporated, you know, the, the, the newer generation into it, and which was really fun. And we, we, I had a show where I would pair an adult and a kid together and they would do a song, and then I had one where kids was singing adult songs, adults was singing kids songs, and it was it's a it's a really fun community.
Nicole Kelly:What was it like working with child actors now that you're an adult? Did you find that they were kind of like how you used to be when you were younger?
Dara Bloomfield:Slightly different. They're less nerdy.
Nicole Kelly:They're less nerdy.
Dara Bloomfield:They're so much less nerdy. They're so much cooler than we were.
Nicole Kelly:I feel like there's so much more opportunity to be nerdy now because of the internet and you can really deep dive.
Dara Bloomfield:Well, there were two, so there are two types of kids. There were the kids who were just as nerdy as us, and I love them, I love all of them because they're all so great. But, like all the adults, we would be talking about how many cast albums we'd listen to and what age were we when we like discovered hair, or when we discovered this and they were like what's hair?
Nicole Kelly:And we're like what. You need an education that is. That is very important to theater education. I got to shout out to my sister who's obsessed with hair Her dog's name is Burger. I love it. That most recent revival I think she's taught me four or five times. I went and saw it with her twice.
Dara Bloomfield:I see it's funny. It's like my sisters will say like I have two sisters and both of them will say that they don't like Broadway shows, but yet they will quote it. My sister's just in my way.
Nicole Kelly:She's like I'm not a theater person, but then she. There are certain shows that she knows a lot about and I think you know we used to have, we used to go see basically every show that came through the Pantages in Los Angeles and she's seen, I think, a lot more Broadway shows in New York than she probably realizes. Sidebar back to talking about being a kid on Broadway. They had those Broadway kid albums in the nineties. Did you audition?
Dara Bloomfield:for it. I auditioned for it. Okay Cause I know I didn't get into it, but I did audition for it.
Nicole Kelly:So it wasn't actually kids. Was it kids who were on Broadway? Yeah, On. Broadway and then auditioned for it.
Dara Bloomfield:Yeah.
Nicole Kelly:Gotcha, gotcha, gotcha In 2019,. You were one of the producers on the Joe Iconis musical Broadway bounty hunter. How did you get involved with that project Through?
Dara Bloomfield:my shows in 54 below. I was producing them and Jen Tepper, who is the programming director at Broadway 54 below was was Lee producer on that and she brought me on as a co-producer so and that was an amazing experience to be a part of, and I'm, and it's, it's. I took lessons from that into my own work, and then I had my son, and then the pandemic, and then I had my second son. So we're still trying to figure out my footing and all this now, but definitely would love to get into producing and it's a that's. The other advice I would give too is like it's, acting is not the only job. I think that once you're involved in the industry, as we like to call it.
Nicole Kelly:You know, a lot of people end up doing other things in the industries. They, they realize they hate auditioning, but they like performing, but unfortunately you have to audition to perform, unless you're a big, big, big star. So they start doing other things. They get involved in the industry. So they start doing other things. They get involved with photography or producing or directing or writing. So you know, there are, like you said, a lot of different ways that you can still be involved without actually being on stage or in front of the camera.
Dara Bloomfield:Exactly.
Nicole Kelly:You keep talking about your sons. How has becoming a mother changed how you feel about being Jewish, and what traditions do you hope to pass on to them?
Dara Bloomfield:Actually doing the runtime concert and then having my second son and, in between, my mom, um, my mom was diagnosed with breast cancer around probably almost 10 years ago. She passed away about two weeks before my son was born. Like I said, we were never religious but we were always traditional. So having my sons having the honor of naming them after people who have passed, especially my youngest, who's knee after my mom, um kind of brought that home and I, you know, my husband and I will joke around and we'll talk about their bar mitzvahs and like what we, what we think of their bar mitzvahs, but some might look like.
Nicole Kelly:So that's something you're definitely going to encourage them to do, even if you didn't have a hot mitzvah.
Dara Bloomfield:Yeah, I would love. I would love for them to both be bar mitzvah.
Nicole Kelly:I love that you've not necessarily become more religious, but are encouraging them to find their Jewishness as well. Are they? You plan on sending them to Hebrew school?
Dara Bloomfield:Yeah, we found this amazing rabbi who her version of Hebrew school is a little bit different, where it's she calls it like kitchen table in Hebrew school, where, like it's not done like formal classroom, it's done like kind of like more hands on, and we my husband, I really like that idea and so like that's something we're hoping that they'll get involved with and things like that and and and. It's just, it's still, it's an important part. It's an important part of who they are. It's an important part of who we are. It's who who are, what our families are Like. It's just, it's just important for me to for them to know the tradition, even if they don't aren't religious or whatever they decide to do. Just just carrying those traditions on it to me is more important.
Nicole Kelly:If you either of your sons wanted at an early age to become actors one, would you let them do that? And two, do you think that your experiences would change how you handled it, maybe differently than what your parents did?
Dara Bloomfield:If they told me that they wanted to do it around the same time I did it, it was probably around the best age. My parents handled it really well. I have to give them a lot of credit. They always let me be a kid first, they always let me make them, they let me drive the boat. In a way they never pushed me to to do anything that I didn't want to do.
Nicole Kelly:Anti-stage moms.
Dara Bloomfield:Yeah, and my mom, my mom was still like like you have to have, you have to push your kid. Like if this is what they want to do, like you, you kind of have to do it. But but my mom was not, um, mama Rose.
Nicole Kelly:Gotcha.
Dara Bloomfield:She was, she was. She wasn't doing it for her own sake, she was doing it for mine.
Nicole Kelly:Perfect I I think that's. I think I see, even at auditions or shows I've done, there's a lot of parents that are very it's obviously they're. They're kind of living vicariously through their kids.
Dara Bloomfield:Exactly, and my mom and my dad were never like that and they always encouraged us to, to, to embrace, like embrace what we loved.
Nicole Kelly:It's in the blood. Sometimes you can't, you can't, uh, defer them from making that choice. I feel like you know our daughter is a character. She loves to dance and she is already trying to belt, even though she has no idea what she's doing and she's two and a half. But I feel like you know my, my concern with her pursuing performing at a young age would be like it's hard enough for me, for my own self, with the rejection, but then having to watch her child getting rejected, I think would be a million times harder. So, like I think, I selfishly don't want her to do it as a kid.
Dara Bloomfield:So I don't have to go to the house. It's not easy. My mom was very pragmatic and so was my dad, so like they kind of had this rule where it was like you can cry for her like one day, and that's it.
Nicole Kelly:See, I'm not pragmatic. I feel like if my daughter didn't get a role, I'd probably be crying for a week longer than she would.
Dara Bloomfield:Um my mom was very much like you didn't get it. Oh well, let's go get ice cream.
Nicole Kelly:My husband's very much like that. I feel like I'd get very upset about specific shows that I didn't get and he was always very able to easily move on and I'm kind of jealous of that.
Dara Bloomfield:I had a hard time moving on but my mom was like very encouraging of me to to be like you know what, it's okay, we're still. You still have, you still have a home, you still get fed, you still get clothes, Like you're good.
Nicole Kelly:Of all the shows that you because it sounds like you got to the last part of the audition process for quite a few shows what is the one that you wish you had been able to do?
Dara Bloomfield:I think Les Mis selfishly, because I just love that show Um. The other one was probably Jean Eyre.
Nicole Kelly:Oh, okay.
Dara Bloomfield:I got very far for Jean Eyre.
Nicole Kelly:I guess I didn't really tell many children shows there were in the nineties. There were a lot of shows with children. Um, I want to these aren't on the questions that I had listed but, um, I want to, if you're comfortable, to talk a little bit about your mom. Sure, um, my just kind of a full disclosure of my history with breast cancer in general. My mom, um, when I was 23, uh, was diagnosed with breast cancer, but a very rare form called inflammatory breast cancer. So there is no lump, it's basically in the tissue and usually by the time it's discovered it's stage three. So she was given 10% chance of survival. Uh, and miraculously, is actually still here with us. And pretty much every other woman in my family has had breast cancer. My grandmother had it twice, my great aunt had it, my grandmother's sister died from it. Yeah, I feel like it's a very Jewish thing.
Dara Bloomfield:Yeah, I got, I got I hate to use this word I got lucky. So when my mom was diagnosed initially, she did the genetic testing and she tested positive for BRCA. So which men all got tested? And I'm double negative. So I am at community risk. It's a little bit of a morbid joke that we hit the genetic lottery Jackpot with the Ashkenazi Jews.
Nicole Kelly:No, that's a very thing. You said that your mother passed away two weeks before your youngest was born and you named him after her. What would you tell your, your sons about your mother?
Dara Bloomfield:They're both. Their birthdays are in March, and so we went to Disney for my mom's birthday and for my, my son's birthday and we have pictures. I mean, my mom was my son's best friend. He, he loved for weeks. It my son is. He says a speech delay, so he's not really talking yet, but he would go to my dad's house and he would like count the people he would. He would hurt us into one room and look for my mom like he knew something was very different. We talk about my mom all time. My husband, I am, and she was a nut. She was crazy, but she was crazy in like the best way humanly possible. She was fun, she loved, you know, she, she encouraged us to do whatever we wanted to do and what we loved and and and she was just. She was just the coolest mom. I was really lucky.
Nicole Kelly:I love that you say that you're lucky. I feel like we should all feel lucky that we get the parents that we get. Unfortunately, not everybody does, but I love them. People have good relationships with their parents. I think it only strengthens your Relationship with your own children because you had such a good model.
Dara Bloomfield:My mom was this type of person who, like we, like my dad, we get so frustrated because, between the three of us, my poor mom is on the phone and like probably like 20 out of 24 hours a day, because we were constantly calling each other, even like all time.
Nicole Kelly:I feel like my sister and I both talked to my mom at least One today, if not more when she used to work at her old company. I feel like we just call her at work and bug her because she was able to talk, so we just kind of shoot the shit even though she was at work.
Dara Bloomfield:We would joke around that, like my, my dad would just be like oh my god, get off the phone, like my mom would always. I would call my mom and I'd be like mom and she'd be like you're, you just told me that like she was. Joke, that I would tell her, like she knew, when I went to the bathroom. I mean because I would just call her for everything.
Nicole Kelly:It's great that you had such a good relationship with her. Now that you've um had your second child and hopefully are having a little more time, is there a project you'd be interested in producing like a show? If you were able to produce your dream Broadway show or project, what would that be?
Dara Bloomfield:Yes, the breakfast club. Oh, the breakfast club a play version of the breakfast club.
Nicole Kelly:What about? The breakfast club speaks to you.
Dara Bloomfield:So, like I said, I grew up in a very Artsy family and my mom, my dad, both love movies and film and TV. I watched everything and when I was about 12, my mom showed me the breakfast club and I was like, wait, this would be an amazing play. So for like the past 20 something years in between, like doing stuff, like working on how it would work and like kind of Like adapted it and it's a lot trickier than then. Just there's a lot that goes into illegally, so I'm still trying to figure it out how, how to get that, but I would love to do that.
Nicole Kelly:You know, I I have a friend who went to NYU for grad school in composing and I guess a question they would always ask when you're writing a musical is does it sing, does it need to sing? And I think, to be honest, there's a lot of musicals that I've seen or heard about I'm like this didn't need to sing.
Dara Bloomfield:Oh, no, no, no, like, like you know what, if it like I love John Hughes movies, pretty in pink, that could sing that, that could, that could. That could be an amazing. That could work as a musical 16 candles 100% could work as a musical breakfast club. Nope.
Nicole Kelly:Yeah, no, I feel that I feel like I love Good adaptations of movie musicals. I'm a big fan of the musical legally blonde. It's a good one. I think they did that was. That is a. That is an example of well done adaptation movie musical. But I feel like sometimes they kind of Miss the point on the movie musical hairspray, hairspray.
Dara Bloomfield:To me, hairspray was amazing. My sister and I were obsessed with it. My sister, for her 13th birthday, almost did a hairspray theme 13th birthday party because she loved it so much and I actually I don't know if I love the musical or the original movie more.
Nicole Kelly:They're very different. Yes, I love the campiness of the original movie and I like how over the top ridiculous it is, but I also feel like hairspray the musical Was one of the was really when I was starting to get into musical theater. So it was one of like three rotating CDs I had in my car back when we used to have CDs and cars Very long time ago, and I also feel like I really love the choreography of hairspray.
Dara Bloomfield:Oh my god. Yeah, it was. It was awesome. I mean, the whole show was great, but we my sister used to. We would joke that she has this a weird ability to like memorize things and my sister like memorized the entirety of hairspray. I went to like a one-man version of it.
Nicole Kelly:Um, and so we just rest. Your family is a little bit theatrical too.
Dara Bloomfield:Yeah, but like they'll never admit to it. That's what's so funny about it. Like they'll never admit it. But my, my, my youngest sister, who's like the most, like I hate musicals and yet was like you should. You should Show Cades my oldest. Like you should put on a year with frog and toad for Cade, because it's the best show.
Nicole Kelly:That's a deep dive for somebody who says they don't like musical theater.
Dara Bloomfield:So like.
Nicole Kelly:That's really. That's really funny. Is there anything else that you want to talk about in regards to ragtime, like any cool stories you have about working with anybody or any like Interesting performances, like where something went wrong or something that was really.
Dara Bloomfield:I'm trying to think like no, I mean, we just like it was such a great experience, like and I didn't realize how wonderful it was until I was a lot older um, but I think the funniest was for and this wasn't even in the original run, this was actually at the um and for the reunion concert. So like Audra McDonald just swooped in like two days before and like nailed it, like she like it was a week long rehearsal and she just showed up like on Friday and Saturday and the no Saturday and Sunday, I'm sorry. And then, like the show was one day, so she didn't like come in until like two days before, and just you know nailed it.
Dara Bloomfield:but I asked my husband if he can bring the, my son up, um, so he can meet people, but because the way that everything was working out it, we really didn't get enough time. And so I'm standing in the hallway with my husband and my son and Audra McDonald Comes running by to go because we're switching rooms, and she goes oh my god, is this your baby? And I was like, yeah, she goes.
Nicole Kelly:Hi, kate, I'm auntie Audra and I'm like, oh my god, and I was like kade kade like he has no idea what a momentum experience this is exactly. Um, I love that she's such a good person. I staged her in London. We saw the last performance of lady day there and I was. I was like this is one of the only times I've staged or, but she seems like a lovely human being on top of being so she is, she's an amazing human being.
Dara Bloomfield:Brian Stokes, michael, is an amazing person. Um, peter Friedman, my husband actually worked on succession and when, um, my husband was telling me who was in the cast the first season and he said Peter Friedman, I was like wait, he was the original uh Tata on ragtime. And so they got to talking and my, my husband mentioned my wife did ragtime. It's like wait, who was your wife? And and so for four seasons it was you know he. He was constantly, you know, like, how's Darryl doing things like that? It, that show just had an amazing amount of of human beings in it who were just unbelievable.
Nicole Kelly:Maybe that's why it's so special, because there were such amazing people involved, which I can oh yeah, if I is not always the case when you do a show.
Dara Bloomfield:No, I mean michael rupert was my, was one of my tatas and and I still talked to him.
Nicole Kelly:Oh, that's so sweet.
Dara Bloomfield:And he gave me like he gave me a tiffani necklace for the closing and I wore my necklace to the um for the reunion concert and he, he, he's the. It just was a really special show with a lot of special people, um, and, and it was, it was, it was just like the world's nicest people too.
Nicole Kelly:So, as an adult performer, do you have a dream role? If you were able to play any role as an adult now, what?
Dara Bloomfield:oh god, no, that's. I love that question. I hate that question because there's so many.
Nicole Kelly:Um, you can, you can give a few, you don't have to.
Dara Bloomfield:I love cinderella and into the woods I would love to do epony or fantine um and lee miss, uh, for sentimental reasons, bell and be be in the beast. It's hard. It's such a hard question. It's like whenever anyone asks me, my favorite show is I can't give them an answer because I have too many.
Nicole Kelly:We usually see we have a rotating top five favorite shows, depending on what's going on in the world and how we're feeling at the moment.
Dara Bloomfield:I always give the answer of who's the composer and um what's. You know what era.
Nicole Kelly:Yes, it's. It's really hard to narrow it down, so we're going to jump into uh, what I call the actor studio questions is a ripoff of james linton and the actor studio, so these are just going to be short form answers. You don't need to kind of wax poetic. What is your favorite yiddish word?
Dara Bloomfield:gunneth.
Nicole Kelly:Hmm, can you tell our listeners what that means?
Dara Bloomfield:The way my dad explains this like a little troll creature.
Nicole Kelly:What is your favorite jewish holiday?
Dara Bloomfield:Uh, let's go with hanukkah.
Nicole Kelly:If you were to have a bat mitzvah today, what would the theme be?
Dara Bloomfield:Uh, obscure musicals.
Nicole Kelly:I feel like that would be my husband's theme as well. What profession other than your own would you want to attempt?
Dara Bloomfield:Um, I used to joke that I didn't know if I wanted to be clary starling from silence of the lambs or dirty foster.
Nicole Kelly:If heaven is real and god is there to welcome you, what would you like to hear them say?
Dara Bloomfield:Uh, your mom is ready to go to the mall.
Nicole Kelly:Oh, I love that. So thank you so much for joining me. Dara is amazing hearing about your experiences with ragtime and what you've obviously been doing since then. So if you're interested in following Dara on instagram, it is Dara page bloomfield. Thank you so much for joining me.
Dara Bloomfield:Thank you for having me.
Nicole Kelly:If you like what you hear and want to hear more of it, you can subscribe and also follow me on instagram, at shebrewinthecity, to see what my life is like day to day. I'm also on patreon if you'd like to have access to some special episodes and offers.
