“It’s hard being a Barbie doll all the time.”
― Alice Ripley
“I love having a basement.”
― Alice Ripley
“Everyone has some sort of connection to mental illness.”
― Alice Ripley
“I’m kind of a double middle child.”
― Alice Ripley
“Teachers want to teach you theory, and that’s fine, but when it comes to rock and roll, you only need three chords. There’s something comforting about that.”
― Alice Ripley
“’Tommy’ was my first Broadway show. Long Pause. I don’t know how you can surpass the excitement or get more excited or feel more on top of the world than when you are sitting in a room singing The Who, and Pete Townshend is sitting there tapping his foot.”
― Alice Ripley
“For me, in the audition, the song that you choose should make you cry. It doesn’t matter why: it could be because you’re happy, but it gives you that feeling that you’re overflowing.”
― Alice Ripley
“My Mickey Mouse ears were given to me by a dear friend. They remind me of how I need to be silly.”
― Alice Ripley
“Nothing is hanging on my walls.”
― Alice Ripley
“When everything kind of hit the fan, my dad married Jo Anne, and suddenly there were five kids from the Ripleys and five kids from the Doughertys. Then my dad and Joanne had a baby. I usually have to make a diagram.”
― Alice Ripley
“Now, I come from a long line of narcissists. And I also have no kids – by choice – but I understand not being a mother and the pain that comes from that.”
― Alice Ripley
“I’m drawn to raw material and raw emotions.”
― Alice Ripley
“Uzo Aduba over at ‘Godspell’ is doing an even more entertaining Donald Trump than Donald Trump’s Donald Trump.”
― Alice Ripley
“I have a soft spot for vintage movie houses covered in goo; what can I say?”
― Alice Ripley
“All day I wait for my job, which I do at night, and once I get there, I walk a tightrope, jump through hoops, and take breathtaking dives.”
― Alice Ripley
“I was always a big fan of ‘Pippin’ and ‘Godspell,’ even before I heard ‘Meadowlark.’”
― Alice Ripley
“Oh my God, I love Max von Essen.”
― Alice Ripley
“I love D.C. I love working there.”
― Alice Ripley
“Writing is the place where I can do it all and get away with it. You can’t do that in the theatre.”
― Alice Ripley
“The road’s a tough life, but I said ‘yes,’ because as a kid growing up in Ohio, I never had a chance to see a Tony-winning actress in a role she won the Tony for.”
― Alice Ripley
“George Hearn taught me that you learn that there are roles that are Tony roles and roles that are not.”
― Alice Ripley
“My mother is always the most vulnerable person in any room, and so I definitely have that part of her inside me.”
― Alice Ripley
“I’m like a prize fighter. When I’m not on stage, every action that I take has to be focused on my next performance.”
― Alice Ripley
“I’m a strong follower of hydrotherapy.”
― Alice Ripley
“’Next to Normal’ has challenged me as an actor because of how complex Diana is. And that’s got me hungry for another character like that in a non-singing role because it would be interesting to express that same intensity in a different way.”
― Alice Ripley
“As a teen, ‘Thunder Road’ was always in my head.”
― Alice Ripley
“It’s heartbreaking to see theater people be forced to accept the business side of show business.”
― Alice Ripley
“When I did ‘Rocky Horror,’ I didn’t want to meet the audience afterward, because they’d been having a good time yelling names at me all night, and I didn’t really want to tell them that I didn’t have such a good time being yelled at all night.”
― Alice Ripley
“You’ve got to chop back the performance like a rose bush. That’s when it’s beautiful.”
― Alice Ripley
“I don’t honestly have the time or energy to support anybody else’s cause but my own, which is self-expression. So I guess, if I had a cause, it would be education.”
― Alice Ripley
“Leisure time is when I’m not at the Booth Theater.”
― Alice Ripley
“I grew up in Ohio. I was born in a suburb of Oakland, but I grew up in Ohio.”
― Alice Ripley
“I didn’t see any Broadway till I was in my late twenties.”
― Alice Ripley
“My favorite thing as a performing artist is to get a pile of raw material from a writer who says, ‘Will you help me make this real?’ There’s nothing like starting from scratch.”
― Alice Ripley
“Norm Lewis, who plays Jake in ‘Side Show,’ and I had a song together in ‘Tommy,’ and I understudied Mrs. Walker.”
― Alice Ripley
“I don’t really talk about ‘Next to Normal’ that much anymore.”
― Alice Ripley
“Tom Kitt aside – he’s in his own category with me, of course – Stephen Sondheim is one of my all-time favorite composers.”
― Alice Ripley
“If there were a song from ‘West Side Story’ that I would do, it would be ‘Something’s Coming,’ but in a sense that put it in the right key for me and then do that one.”
― Alice Ripley
“I think I enjoy Sondheim so much because of the lyrics. The lyrics, the cornucopia of options.”
― Alice Ripley
“When the decades pass and you’re working in this business, the audiences get older with you. That’s the nice part about it. They’re so supportive and so loving.”
― Alice Ripley
“I was in the original cast of ‘Sunset Boulevard.’ I played Betty. But I wasn’t on the cast album.”
― Alice Ripley
“I’ve always been drawn to raw material.”
― Alice Ripley
“Sometimes, you find the play; sometimes, the play finds you.”
― Alice Ripley
“I did grow up in a small town. I grew up in a lot of different places. But I consider my home to be Cleveland.”
― Alice Ripley
“When I was a kid, I wanted to be an actor in classics like Shaw and Shakespeare and Chekov and Ibsen.”
― Alice Ripley
“I wasn’t a musical-theater kid. We went to plays at school and took field trips to see Shakespeare. And that really sparked that fire for me, and so that’s still going, and I haven’t given up on it.”
― Alice Ripley
“I would love to play Mary in ‘Long Day’s Journey Into Night’ or ‘Virginia Woolf’ or a comedy – just, like, a slapstick comedy.”
― Alice Ripley
“What made me so brave? Maybe it was being the middle kid of 11, and we all had to share one bathroom. New underwear? I never discovered that until I got into college.”
― Alice Ripley
“I was 14. I went to see a production of ‘Jacques Brel is Alive and Well and Living in Paris,’ and when they got to that final song, ‘If We Only Have Love,’ it was like the top of my head had blown off.”
― Alice Ripley
“I love every minute of my work.”
― Alice Ripley
“I had to go off by myself to try and discover what my talent really was.”
― Alice Ripley
“Part of the frustration of being bipolar is people don’t understand what it feels like.”
― Alice Ripley
“It’s nice to be in a smaller room. I like the big arenas as well, but at my core, I’m a live performer, so it’s nice to be able to feel the warmth of everybody in the room.”
― Alice Ripley
“I’ve been committed to personal growth since I was a teenager, and I’m a believer in the idea that your thought is the only thing that matters.”
― Alice Ripley
“’American Psycho’ reminds me of my track in ‘Tommy,’ my first Broadway show. It’s similar conceptually and has that rock n’ roll streak.”
― Alice Ripley
“Don’t get me wrong: I love having my own song and being the center of attention, but I also love being part of the group and making the show work in a more anonymous way.”
― Alice Ripley
“Facebook and Twitter and Instagram are excellent ways to keep in touch with the audience and maintain your image an actor.”
― Alice Ripley
“I would say that Cynthia Nixon is somebody I admire, and Toni Collette as well. Those women – their work inspires me, whatever they do.”
― Alice Ripley
“I’ve always looked to that play, ‘Virginia Woolf,’ for a cue – as far as any cue I might need as an actor for inspiration or as a writer.”
― Alice Ripley
“’Next To Normal’ is rock music. It’s a rock opera. That, definitely, has a place in popular music.”
― Alice Ripley
“I take a lot of naps.”
― Alice Ripley
“I play the guitar every day.”
― Alice Ripley
“I am always talking to students and telling them how you have to practice every day because you can’t wait for someone to hire you. You need something you do for yourself, something that feeds your creative life.”
― Alice Ripley
“There were eleven kids, and we all shared a bathroom. It was enough to drive us all insane.”
― Alice Ripley
“Chrissie Hynde’s from Ohio, and so am I. If there’s a Cleveland sound, that’s what it is.”
― Alice Ripley
“When you’re 20 and you’re in acting school and your teachers tell you that 95 percent of actors are unemployed for twenty years, you think it doesn’t apply to you. But it does take twenty years to become real, because that’s what you have to do to be an interesting actor.”
― Alice Ripley
“I just think Brian d’Arcy James is a dream come true. I’ve known of him ever since I saw him in ‘Titanic,’ and I fell crazy in love with him at that moment.”
― Alice Ripley
“I’m kind of a dork at being able to dress myself.”
― Alice Ripley
“I come from the Midwest, from the suburbs – growing up hanging out at the mall and looking at the corn fields across the street. I kind of was embarrassed by it for a long time. Then I decided, ‘Hey, if everyone else can embrace their homeland and where they’re from, I can do the same!’”
― Alice Ripley
“You always kind of feel like you’re rolling the dice as an actor.”
― Alice Ripley
“’Closure’ is the word used for a loss that’s not acknowledged – and the habit this causes, physically and mentally, for anybody who is participating in that.”
― Alice Ripley
“Any kind of grieving that is not allowed causes a break. In our culture, grieving in public is not encouraged, but in other cultures, it is done publicly. Some cultures have walls where people can cry. We don’t have that. We have theatre where there’s always the chance for you to face things within yourself.”
― Alice Ripley
“I have learned that music comes in all shapes and sizes.”
― Alice Ripley
“As long as a tune has the power to move me, I’m a lifelong fan.”
― Alice Ripley
“I have fallen deeply in love with songs – musical theatre songs included – over the years, and this experience has taught me to hear and honor the writer’s voice in my soul.”
― Alice Ripley
“There is genuine healing in a beautifully crafted musical theatre song, like Stephen Sondheim’s ‘Losing My Mind,’ or a pop music gem like Joni Mitchell’s ‘Help Me.’”
― Alice Ripley
“The musicals on Broadway have not necessarily been true musical theater. I’m speaking generally, of course: I saw ‘Spring Awakening,’ and I was completely inspired by that.”
― Alice Ripley
“I love New York City. I really do. I ‘heart’ New York.”
― Alice Ripley
“I’ve always been inspired by Patti LuPone.”
― Alice Ripley
“I sometimes write songs on the piano, even though I don’t actually play the piano. I always hire someone to play for me whenever I decide to sing a song I have written on the piano. My song ‘Rosa’ is one.”
― Alice Ripley
“The audience fills me back up, definitely.”
― Alice Ripley
“George Benson’s ‘This Masquerade’ is my favorite version of Leon Russell’s blue gem.”
― Alice Ripley
“The selections on ‘Daily Practice’ are all what I consider standard rock songs that have been absolutely essential to keeping me alive.”
― Alice Ripley
“Springsteen’s ‘Thunder Road’ and Carole King’s ‘It’s Too Late’ are examples of why I am a singer/songwriter. I practice these songs every day. The melodies are timeless in the rock world, the lyrics are words that I need to say, and they need to be heard again.”
― Alice Ripley
“Knowing there is a capable back-up willing to give it a try always makes you feel better.”
― Alice Ripley
“My favourite roller coaster is the Millennium Force at Cedar Point in Ohio.”
― Alice Ripley
“When you’re an actor, you do get involved with your characters – your emotional life is tied up with theirs, and so is your physical life.”
― Alice Ripley
“Making music has saved my life.”
― Alice Ripley
“I cry at Kodak commercials.”
― Alice Ripley
“David Mamet gives me great heart. When I ask myself, ‘I don’t know if I can do this again,’ Mamet would say, ‘Oh yes, you can.’”
― Alice Ripley
“When it comes to your creative life and what it’s going to take, you will do a disservice to everybody if you just dabble.”
― Alice Ripley
“The really good stuff- the ‘Hamiltons’ – comes out after decades of writing and being committed.”
― Alice Ripley
“Sometimes you’re the only one who thinks you have a good idea.”
― Alice Ripley
“Sometimes a job comes to you, and you didn’t ask for it. Your work in the past hires you, and that’s nice.”
― Alice Ripley
“With a lot of contemporary musicals, the songs are like a calling card: the action stops for them.”
― Alice Ripley
“Parents are destined to sin against their kids; it’s inevitable. As is narcissism and the human condition. Everyone has their ego and their ambitions. Life happens in between.”
― Alice Ripley
“A likable character isn’t one who does nothing wrong.”
― Alice Ripley
“At the end of ‘Next to Normal,’ you can see the light. ‘There will be light.’ That’s the reason the show exists. Those are the last four words.”
― Alice Ripley
“When ‘Next to Normal’ won the Pulitzer, that was the moment I felt the show was being defined. There’s a certain confidence that comes with being selected.”
― Alice Ripley
“I take musical theater seriously.”
― Alice Ripley
Leave a Reply