I think now more than ever there's so much available honesty that you can find on the Internet. You can go on to YouTube and find really, really vulnerable, really veritรฉ stuff. It's not even veritรฉ, it's real! It's people confessing very private things. In a world with "It Gets Better" videos where people are trying to keep themselves alive and speak out to other people and are really brave and courageous.
James PonsoldtI was raised by ex-hippies, but I grew up worshipping a television set. I am skeptical of a lot of things, but I was on Myspace and Friendster, and I have a fascination with the new. My wife and I met on Facebook!
James PonsoldtYou just work really hard and scrutinize. What is it called in politics? "Opposition research"? You want to do the detective work on your client so to speak before your opponent can dig it up. We're vetting everything thoroughly.
James PonsoldtWhat I think is great about Pippin, specifically, and I wouldn't make this generalization about all musicals, is that it is about how we tell stories and the way stories are very subjective. How we tell some things and leave other things out in the way The Princess Bride is or The Wizard of Oz is, which both have a framing device.
James PonsoldtAll the more a cheesy musical seems fake, so it requires a level of honesty to be injected or an acknowledgement of that which is fake and fun about musicals, and it isn't necessarily escapist. Like there are great musicals like Once, which feel very almost like a mumblecore musical. I love Once. It's great.
James PonsoldtObviously, this isn't my normal life, traveling to cities and talking to journalists. It's fun. It's really fun. I get to stay in a cool hotel and eat good food and meet cool people, but that's not my normal life. It's pretty pedestrian. I have coffee in the morning, I go for a run, and then I write for as long as I possibly can.
James Ponsoldt