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Allison Stewart: This is All Of It. I'm Allison Stewart live from the WNYC studios in Soho. Thank you for spending part of your day with us. This week is Broadway Week, the biannual celebration of New York City Theater. Participating shows are offering two tickets for the price of one. That's 50% off ticket prices with a minimum purchase of two tickets. It's a great way to expand Broadway accessibility and to checkout a show you've been meaning to see.

Maybe that show is The Collaboration, and you're not alone in wanting to see it because the show's run keeps getting extended, with the latest extension announced just yesterday. The Collaboration stars Paul Bettany and Jeremy Pope as New York city art giant Andy Warhol and Jean-Michel Basquiat and follows them as they enter in an arranged professional marriage neither is sure they want.

50-something Warhol hasn't touched a paintbrush in years, 20-something Basquiat has emerged in the 1980s as a superstar in the making. Both have opinions about art and each other and we watch over a period of three years how their forced union leads to a real relationship and all that entails from admiration to the ability to wound the other. The collaboration had a successful run at the New Vic in the UK, has been filmed, and now has been extended once more through Saturday, February 11th. The show is participating in Broadways Week's two tickets for the price of one deal.

All this week, we are featuring interviews with actors from different shows. Frankly, because Wednesday is matinee day, you really can't get an actor to come on live on the radio when they have to be on stage. We are presenting this encore presentation of an interview we did last month when The Collaboration opened. We spoke with Emmy, Tony, and now Golden Globe nominee, Jeremy Pope, who is a Broadway veteran, and his co-star, celebrated screen actor, Paul Bettany, who is appearing on Broadway for the first time. I began the conversation by asking Paul why he decided to return to the stage for the first time in a major role since the 1990s.

Paul Bettany: I think maybe it was to do with having done-- When we did WandaVision, we did the first episode in front of a live studio audience and I was so terrified. I really tried not to do it but they insisted we shoot it in front of a live studio audience. I came off and I'm so shallow, the moment people started laughing at my jokes, which weren't my jokes, there was somebody else much cleverer than me that had written them. I was just like, "I've wasted my entire life I should have been in a sitcom," so I decided maybe I'd go and give theater a go.

Allison Stewart: You fought live audiences for this guy, right?

Paul Bettany: Yes.

Allison Stewart: In contrast, Jeremy, you broke through on stage and you've, my goodness, have had a really amazing, you've added film and TV to your repertoire. What do you get creatively out of theater that's different from what you get creatively out of TV and film?

Jeremy Pope: The thing with theater is just it's live. There's nothing like the experience you have every night being able to go from beginning to end of your story with your cast and bring in the New York audience. I had done the two shows on Broadway, and frankly, was a little tired.

Allison Stewart: No doubt.

Jeremy Pope: I know that my next time doing the show, or doing a show, I wanted it to be a very specific show because doing theater does take a lot from you. It's like you said, I'm tired. It's like I'm resting because I want to be able to give the best that I can tonight. Our audiences to deserve that and my cast has been so gracious with it.

I love theater, I love the show, I love MTC. MTC is where I have my Broadway debut for Choir Boys. We are back there doing The Collaboration at the Samuel J. Friedman, so it feels like a homecoming. Like you said, it's the last stop of our three trifecta of an experience, so not trying to take any of it for granted but just enjoy it because it is very unique. It has been a beautiful experience thus far.

Allison Stewart: Paul, you had a real challenge because Warhol is so Warhol. It's the hair, it's the stance, it's the work even. What did you know that you wanted to incorporate about him and his physicality, and what did you approach carefully so that it didn't end up being caricature or bumping up against an impression?

Paul Bettany: Well, initially when Denis O'Sullivan, the producer of the film and who's been with us throughout the show, the whole process, he came to me with the idea and I said, "No I don't want to play Andy Warhol." I'm sure that I think there's a reason that he's always played as a cameo, and I think it's really hard to get underneath the carefully curated public persona. Denis didn't give up and he sent me the Andy Warhol Diaries, which I read. I was fascinated to find out that they were dictated and he speaks in these long circuitous sentences.

Then I started asking around. I talked to Anna Wintour, I talked to some people that knew him, Candice Bergen, and they said, "Oh, no. In private, he could be very verbose and acidicly witty." I went, "Wow," because the diaries read more like Truman Capote than my imagining, my first impressions of what an Andy Warhol might be like. Then I guess I try to do a frog in the water with water heating up where you start off with a quite hesitant Andy and then slowly become more fluid with the language, and hopefully, the audience hasn't noticed.

Allison Stewart: What is a detail from your research, Paul, that has really helped you find your Andy?

Paul Bettany: It's not really about a detail so much as the text, of course, that you end up with. Let's be clear, it's my Andy Warhol and it's Anthony's Andy Warhol and it's Armah's Andy Warhol. I guess the place that I really got to was trying to connect with him on fear and as a very bullied child. I think Andy likely was too given him being Andy and that must have been hard in a town like Pittsburgh and in that era.

I think he was so very much afraid that he changed the world. How the world would look without Andy Warhol in terms of design, I think it's hard to really imagine. He changed the world into thinking he was a star and his relevancy was the thing that, in my version, again, keeps him safe. Now, here, in our story, is this young man on the rise, this young artist on the rise who is threatening that relevancy with a neo-expressionism, which may have been terrifying to Andy. That's where we are.

Allison Stewart: Jeremy, you had a different challenge because Jean-Michel Basquiat sadly died at just 27, so there are fewer resources to pull from than for Warhol. Where were you able to draw inspiration for your Basquiat?

Jeremy Pope: I think for me, my way into Basquiat was simply his art. I believe that he had a clear connection from heart and soul and mind to his canvas. I think oftentimes you can look at his canvas and see words, see artists and people that inspired him reflected on his canvas, so that was my way in. I think as mysterious as he was, I think to start there was nice and to just build my own interpretation of Basquiat.

I think the one thing that has been very beneficial to me was his family actually put on an exhibit here in New York King Pleasure exhibit. I was just extremely moved when I went because it was just such a resource. I think this was an exhibit that just didn't represent his art but it represented him as the way that his family saw him as a brother, as a son, as a nephew. I think that gave me a personal in on the soul and the heart of this man.

I found myself when we weren't filming or we weren't working, I would fly and just be in the space and encourage myself to find something new each time. Just taking that energy whether it was Jean's energy or his family, I think it was nuanced and poured with love, and this space was created in love to honor him. That was a big thing that I was able to use as a tool as I was going from doing the play to filming the movie to now being in New York doing it on Broadway.

Allison Stewart: Now that you've both played these men, they're not characters they're real people, what is something, Paul, that you've come to understand or see in Andy Warhol's art that maybe wasn't as clear to you before, you just didn't really notice before?

Paul Bettany: Oh, well, that's interesting. I was a fan of both Andy Warhol's art and Basquiat's art before, and five years ago, I think it was five years ago the Whitney remounted their collaboration. I went to see it and I was really blown way before this project was ever being discussed. I was so blown away by the collaboration, which, of course, initially was a failure for a brief moment and now you can't get one for under $90 million. I was blown away by how well it worked together, the clash of styles and ideas.

I think Andy has very distinct and clear periods in his artwork going from his celebrity and a virile America and soup cans and corporations. Then into the American nightmare with the little race riot and electric chair and then ending up in this portraiture thing for anyone who would pay him. It was very fascinating, but then post that collaboration, for a very brief time, both artists have left in their lives at that point.

I think you can see their influence on each other and a willingness of Andy to take on some really personal things for him, like his religion and his Catholicism. I had never seen that. I had never noticed that in their post-work before really thinking in detail about their collaboration together.

Alison Stewart: There was that great exhibit at the Brooklyn Museum about-

Paul Bettany: I saw it.

Alison Stewart: -about Andy and his Catholicism. How about for you, Jeremy, in terms of looking at Basquiat's work? Something that you've come to understand or appreciate now that you have been with him for a few years?

Jeremy Pope: I think the thing that I think he's gifted me is just this ability to really understand the cost of being an artist. I think we lost John very young and if only he could know just the magnitude of his legacy and of his presence and his touch and his hand on culture and fashion and music, we're seeing it represented very, like what Paul said. You can't really imagine a world without these two artists and the things they left behind. I don't know. I think being with his soul and trying to understand and find my way through and in, I've found better ways at protecting myself.

I feel like artists, we're sensitive about our stuff, sensitive about it, and the industry can be the industry. I don't know. For me, he's just gifted me something personal on the tip of just how do you remain true to your purpose and your art and who you are and what you want to imbue this industry with even if it rubs and it's different than what people are expecting or needing. Then how do you care for yourself and take care of yourself?

While he lived 27 years, I think it wasn't long enough and I wish he had a few more resources of people that could care and love on him and be there for him as the artist, as sensitive as he was. That's been a journey of something that I think he's gifted me, is like the opportunity to go and live in this skin and this experience. Then to take away the things that I want to do as an artist and the things that I need to be aware of as an artist, the cost of being an artist, and how I can maybe have a little bit more longevity in being an artist and still being sensitive and still being protective and still being an open vessel, as he was.

Paul Bettany: Can I say something, Jeremy, that I think I have seen change in you as you've played Basquiat? I think you are incredibly detailed, and as we began this process, you were incredibly detailed and result oriented. You were imagining the result and what it would mean and how it would look. I feel working with you through these three iterations that there have been moments of fear in me that you have allayed by just saying, "Let's let go and do the process and let it move us and not focus so much on the result." That's a very different-- That's something that I've really noticed in you as an artist having gone through this journey.

Alison Stewart: What impact has that had on you as you work, Paul?

Paul Bettany: I don't know. I wasn't thinking about it so much in myself. As Jeremy was talking, I was thinking what a transformation that has been even within him as a gift from Jean-Michel. What has it done for me? It has made me really certain that a year and a half of playing Andy Warhol's enough. This is going to be enough. I'm going to hang up my wigs at the end of this run.

Alison Stewart: That's what he says. You are listening to my interview with Paul Bettany and Jeremy Pope, the stars of the Broadway show, The Collaboration. The play's run has recently been extended through February 11th. We'll have more with Paul and Jeremy after a quick break. This is All Of It.

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You're listening to All Of It on WNYC. I'm Alison Stewart, and we have been listening to my conversation with Jeremy Pope and Paul Bettany, the stars of The Collaboration, a Broadway show, about the unlikely creative partnership between Andy Warhol and Jean-Michel Basquiat in the 1980s. Like Warhol and Basquiat, Paul and Jeremy are friends as well as creative partners. I asked Jeremy how being close with your co-star in real life changes what happens on stage.

Jeremy Pope: Working with Paul is such a gift. I want that on the record, off the record, and written on my tombstone. I think the thing about this, and it being these three iterations is some nights are really tough. Some days are really tough. Playing Jean-Michel can be very tough but there's nothing like the energy exchanged when I'm on stage with Paul. I feel free. I feel like I want to laugh. I feel lifted. I feel taken care of. In a show like ours, that is very specific about these two artists, and can feel, as people want to say, "Was there pressure?" I have never once leaned into that because I've had Paul opposite of me.

The first read through, our first meeting, we hadn't met before, we didn't know each other, we showed up and we were both off book. We were both ready to be like, "We've done that, now let's get into the work." Ever since then, it's been just us to unpack these souls and these hearts. It's even interesting now where, yes, we've done the film. We're doing Broadway, but like last night, fully, I go to his dressing room after the show in between intermission, we're talking about new things that we're finding and playing and trying.

"You do this and I'll do that." It's like, I just feel like that's how it's going to be until we close, until they have to tell us to stop. You know what I mean? That's just the type of artist that he is. When I finish that show and we go to our blackout, he is the first thing that I grab because it's like, "You are my lifeline. You have got me through another day." Even yesterday it was a two-show day, and two-show days are hard but I know that we're in it together and I need him just as much as he needs me.

The love has been so real. It's kept me sane. It's kept me sane in London when I was away from family and friends and we lived across the hall from each other. It's kept me sane when we were in Boston shooting the movie. It's just a gift to have him a part of my life. Then even more just artistically, it's like someone I want to do everything with because of the way that we approach work and the way that we never give up on just excavating what's not on the page and finding the soul and the heart.

I just am blown that Paul hasn't been on stage before now because he's such a giving artist. I find a lot of times artists that give in this way come from theater because we know sometimes you don't have a set, you don't have a costume, it's a black box, and you got to tell the story. I feel him investigating that story every night with me and making clear objectives. I feel lifted, I feel supported, I feel like he's sharpening me as a creative and as an artist, as a storyteller. It's been a dream.

Alison Stewart: For anybody who doesn't think this is real, I got this text from a friend of mine who went backstage to see you guys. My friend said, "So last night I saw your pal, Jeremy Pope, and Paul Bettany backstage. I said, 'Which one of you dumb actors is going to be on my friend Allison's show next week? I think we're seeing it this weekend.' Jeremy said, 'Alison Stewart? Oh, I think we both are. Paul Bettany said, 'What now?'"

[laughter]

Jeremy Pope: That is accurate. That is accurate.

Paul Bettany: Oh, wow. I think I have to reciprocate now. It's been terrible working with Jeremy.

Alison Stewart: No. He's a nightmare from what I've heard.

Paul Bettany: On my [unintelligible 00:19:54]. No, the truth is it was a lot. I started in theater at Royal Shakespeare Company. That was my staple, and then I got into movies, and I'll be honest, movies were my first love and what I always wanted to do. However, 25 years later, I now find myself on stage again. As Jeremy says, sometimes it's hard. All I can tell you is I get out on stage and I might be tired, I might be frightened, I might be whatever, and then Jeremy walks on, and it's as close to the feet. It takes off. It's as close to the feeling of flying in your dreams. I fly in my dreams. I can tell you.

Sometimes it's just plain funny. Yesterday we were doing a kids' matinee with these, frankly, feral teenagers watching us. Both of us knew that it was coming up to the point where I was going to have to initiate taking my shirt off. I have to walk really close to Jeremy and Jerry goes, "Oh, oh." Sure enough, I take my clothes off and it brings the house down. These kids just couldn't cope and they just couldn't cope. Then when Jeremy took his off, they just wolf-whistled, which is really humiliating as a 50-something-year-old actor. Hilarious.

Alison Stewart: Oh my gosh. My guests are Paul Bettany and Jeremy Pope. As you can tell, they don't like each other at all. The name of the play is The Collaboration. In the play though, one thing that happens is the two men do antagonize each other at certain points in the play, and he's obsessed with filming Jean. Jean doesn't really want it. When you're thinking about that, Paul, when you're thinking about why Andy has to keep filming Jean-Michel Basquiat, why does he continue to do it even though clearly Jean does not want it?

Paul Bettany: Well, it's a device in our play, to be able to just you'd be able to discuss things and ask questions. You have to find the reason because the text that Anthony McCarton delivered was great. That was the central problem for me, is, why is he filming him, and why is Jean-Michel allowing it to happen? That was a lot of the clockwork that we started to put together in rehearsal, and indeed, through the play and through the film and has been really strengthened in this iteration. I think that he wants to interrogate him to prove that this figurative, expressionistic art must have felt like a step backwards for somebody who was all about a conceptual art.

Again, on a personal level, Andy in our version is feeling his relevancy slipping away, which is the only thing holding him back from being an eight-year-old, frankly, albino child in Pittsburgh, a gay child in Pittsburgh. That relevancy, I think feels really urgent and life or death for him. That is what he's trying to do. Initially, he is trying to undo Jean. Then I think by the second act, he is blown away by Jean's work. It's impossible to ignore its urgency and the power of the images. I think he wants to know what it is for, he has to solve the puzzle of what is driving this young artist. I think the reasons change.

Alison Stewart: In the very beginning of the play, Jeremy, when Jean appears, he is buoyant and hopeful, and later on the play, it gets darker for very serious reasons. When you think about the joy and the hope that he had early on in his career, what was he hopeful for in the way that you think about Jean-Michael Basquiat?

Jeremy Pope: I think the thing with Jean is he is a light. Any photo, any video, any person that you talked to that knew him, talks about his light and his energy, and he moved through life at ease by choice. I think I'm a very calculated person, want to know, as Paul was saying, but I think Jean just moved in this free space. For some, that's made him unreliable, but I think he moved by spirit. When the spirit is ready to move, that's when he acted. I think he was very much attracted to energy and spirit and just following that. I think, well, we meet Jean, this is right off of the heels of him being on the cover of the New York Times and his star is rising. People are paying attention to him.

One can only imagine what that must have felt like for this Black kid from Brooklyn to finally get the notoriety that he so wanted, that he desired, that he tagged on the streets just to get seen. It was happening and people were starting to pay attention, so there's an ego that happens. Then I think what we also see is there's a bit of an ego death and the pressure of what happens when there are expectations and you need to become reliable, and it goes against moving from spirit because now people are telling you how to move and when to move.

I think those are all the things we see that he has to negotiate, whereas at the top, or before we come to be on the top, he's maybe moving at his pace and his speed and doing what serves him. Then he's put in an environment where, "You need to work with Andy. This is what needs to happen." It's very product-driven. There needs to be a result, and that rubs against his spirit because it's not the way that he approaches art and work in relationships and collaboration.

That's what we see happen, and then he becomes, "Well, let me bring this man back to the central idea of painting. Let me bring you back to what makes me comfortable using mind and body and spirit and reflecting on the canvas," which is these two artists have two different ideas about that at the time. That's our entry point to the play and feeling like it's not going to work because they feel like two different artists, but we end up finding a lot of their ideas and the way that they've had to move through life and look at life are similar. Just their approach at it.

Alison Stewart: Their versions of authenticity are different from each other's, but they each have their own sense of authentic, I think. Paul, last question, because I know you all have to go and you have a show tonight. What would you like people to think about and talk about over drinks after seeing the show?

Paul Bettany: Well, first of all, from this interview, I'd like people to understand that because we've been talking about art and we're talking about pushing people's buttons and the darkness in the play. It's really funny. The play is really witty, and it's really, I think, a surprise for audiences when they come. I don't want to leave this interview with leaving that unsaid. What I would like them to talk about is the author's intentions, and definitely, my experience when I saw their collaboration together, is that two people with seemingly nothing in common can find common ground. It can be extraordinary because of their differences.

That's really what I want them to talk about. Plus just how great I am in it is really the main thing I would like them to be talking about endlessly. Then Jeremy, but mostly me, I would love for that to be the after-dinner.

Jeremy Pope: You're the worst.

Paul Bettany: Fine. I can't keep my mouth shut.

Alison Stewart: That was my conversation with Jeremy Pope and Paul Bettany Stars of the Broadway play, The Collaboration. It has just been extended once again and will run through February 11th. You can get tickets to the show now as part of Broadway's two-for-one deal.

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