Back to One
A podcast about acting -- just the work. by Peter Rinaldi
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Back to One, Episode 125: Katherine Waterston
Katherine Waterston is one of our most brilliant and committed actors. She brings superstar power to indies like Queen of Earth and State Like Sleep, and a captivating authenticity to franchises like Fantastic Beasts and Alien. It was Inherent Vice that first brought her to my attention. In this episode, she talks about why she was “a pig in shit” making that film, why having lots and lots of time to live with a script is ideal for her, becoming comfortable being uncomfortable, the “best feeling I can experience without breaking the law,” and her exciting new multi-part project The… Read more
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Back to One, Episode 124: Rosalind Chao
When one has the opportunity to listen to an actor with the amount of experience as Rosalind Chao has, one must seize it. From the legendary final episode of M.A.S.H to Black-ish, from The Joy Luck Club to Disney’s eagerly anticipated live action Mulan, Chao has seen it all! On this episode, the once “professional guest star” opens up about how she’s happier when working and happiest on a happy set. She talks about why it’s important to get to the fitting early in her process, adding years to her age to get her first job, learning from Peggy Feury,… Read more
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Back to One, Episode 123: Ramy Youssef
Ramy Youssef won the Golden Globe for lead actor in a comedy series for his work in Ramy, the Hulu series he co-created. The second season came out in May, and the struggles of being a devout young Muslim man in America that fueled the first season, deepen, grow and expand out to peripheral characters in the second, highlighted by the addition of Mahershala Ali as Ramy’s wise and loving sheikh. Youssef directed more episodes this season (he’s nominated for an Emmy for directing as well as acting). We talk about that and the overall collaborative effort at work behind… Read more
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Back to One, Episode 122: Niamh Algar
Irish actor Niamh Algar has been making her mark in the UK of late portraying women dealing with their intense pasts, like Dinah in Shane Meadows’ The Virtues and Ursula in Calm With Horses (which just opened in the States as The Shadow of Violence). The intensity continues with her latest project, Raised By Wolves, Ridley Scott’s sci-fi series for HBO MAX (which drops on September 3th). In this episode, she talks about following her gut, why she asks questions early, adapting to the director, the importance of not taking yourself too seriously, and much more. Back To One can… Read more
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Back to One, Episode 121: Kevin Alejandro
Kevin Alejandro is finishing his fifth season playing Detective Dan Espinoza on Netflix’s Lucifer. He’s also graced your small screen in such series as The Returned, Southland, and True Blood. In 2017 he graduated from the Warner Brothers television director’s workshop and directed an episode of Lucifer. Since then he started his own production company and has turned into a multi-hyphenate, churning out award winning shorts, including the absolutely hilarious Adult Night. He’s back in the director’s chair on Lucifer’s fifth season (part 1), which drops August 21st on Netflix. On this episode, he talks about how the need to… Read more
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Back to One, Episode 120: Paapa Essiedu
The brilliant young British actor Paapa Essiedu speaks about the work with wisdom that belies his years. He plays Kwame on Michaela Coel’s groundbreaking new HBO series I May Destroy You. In 2016, his Hamlet at the Royal Shakespeare Company received great acclaim. In this episode he compares those two characters, who are each facing defining moments in their lives, and talks about the “conscious unconsciousness” necessary to embody them. He discusses the various ways curiosity is useful, and why it’s so important to immerse yourself in the world of the story. Plus lots more! Back To One can be… Read more
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Back to One, Episode 119: Stacy Martin
Part of Stacy Martin’s performance, in her wonderful new film Archive, involves essentially playing robots at various stages of development. She talks about the challenge that posed for her as an actor, and how director Gavin Rothery’s complete command of his vision helped her process. She takes me back to her days at the Actors’ Temple in London, and how an intensive workshop there changed her life and prepared her for the remarkable experience of her first film, Lars von Trier’s Nymphomaniac. She shares an important bit of direction that Lars gave her that blows my mind. We swap stories… Read more
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Back to One, Episode 118: Mireille Enos
Mireille Enos made a splash on Broadway in Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf, then her big break in television came with The Killing, where she played Sarah Linden to much acclaim for four seasons. World War Z opposite Brad Pitt followed, and now the second season of the action-drama hit series Hanna premiered on Amazon this month. Enos talks about how exceptional writing helps multi-season work, learning about story-craft from Tom Stoppard, the importance of being open to intuition, and how empathy helps you build yourself as an actor. Plus much more! Back To One can be found wherever you… Read more
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Back to One, Episode 117: Cristin Milioti
She claims she doesn’t know how to talk about her process, but on this episode, Cristin Milioti eloquently lifts the hood and let’s us peek in on the engine fueling her incredibly varied work, across all genres on the stage and screen, like the Broadway musical Once, How I Met Your Mother, The Wolf of Wall Street, the USS Callister episode of Black Mirror, this year’s Modern Love and the huge Sundance hit Palm Springs, which just dropped on Hulu and in drive-ins across the nation. She talks about feeling protective of her characters, why it’s necessary to let go… Read more
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Back to One, Episode 116: Ron Cephas Jones
Ron Cephas Jones won a Emmy for his work on the hit series This Is Us. His latest series, Truth Be Told, just got picked up for a second season on Apple TV. In this episode, he takes us back to his early days at LAByrinth Theater in New York City, starring in Stephen Adly Guirgis’ Jesus Hopped The A Train, and explains how Philip Seymour Hoffman, who was directing, forever changed his approach to work. He also talks about the importance of collaboration for the actor, why the script never leaves him in the days leading up to production,… Read more
