Over fifty ferociously imaginative emerging artists are working together to bring our world premiere of Folk Wandering roaring into reality. In advance of our first performance on February 23, we’ll be sharing interviews with each of these artists. These conversations will bring you inside this show’s very unique process of creation, and bring you a bit closer to this brilliant and wild group of emerging artists. Today, we are pleased to bring you a spotlight on Adrian Blake Enscoe, who is playing the role of Bobby Lombardi.
Read the full interview below and get your tickets to performances February 23 – March 18 today!
Pipeline Theatre Company: What first attracted you to Folk Wandering? What made you want to work on this project?
Adrian Blake Enscoe: I loved Backhaus’ way of walking the line between cheeky self-awareness and genuine moments of truth. Love the music from the first bars I heard. Collaboration has always been key for me and it fascinated me that the script and songs balanced so many different voices. And the director: who could be nicer than Andrew Neisler?
PTC: What aspect of the Folk Wandering story do you most relate to?
ABE: I love the idea of trying on old well worn identities of older times to try and somehow understand the idiosyncratic inner lives of those in the past, try to figure what made them do what they did.
Who do I relate to the most: Ominously, the villain. Bobby Lombardi (aka James Dean) is a snake that I see reflections of my less flattering qualities in — the hammy clumsiness, the blindspots for the suffering of those closest to you. Hopefully I’m a bit more self-aware of these flaws…
PTC: If you were to write a tagline for Folk Wandering, what would it be?
ABE: Folk Wandering: untold tales of american loneliness…
PTC: What big dreams have you been chasing recently (or would you like to chase)?
ABE: Escaping the city! Seeing the world! The question I’ve got to ask, though, is: is it something am I chasing or something I’m running away from?
PTC: Two truths and a lie, go:
ABE: 1. I performed in a children’s circus in my younger days where I learned to ride a unicycle, fly trapeze, and walk tightrope.
2. You can see my acting debut in the movie Love Actually, where I played one of the shepherds in the nativity children’s play at the end singing “Catch a Falling Star and Put it in Your Pocket.”
3. Strangely, I have a weird grasp of Russian language (neither of my parents are Russian), to the point of being able to recite several poems from memory. Alexandr Pushkin is my fave.
PTC: Tell us about your character in Folk Wandering.
ABE: Bobby Lombardi is the closest thing in the show to a villain: a portrait a white straight men blind to the plight of any other human being. Everything he does, even suffering, is for the attention. I’m walking a weird line here because he’s a real human character that I can deeply relate to — just steeped in the absurdity of vanity and self-centered-ness amped all the way to 11.
Folk Wandering begins preview performances on February 23, opens on March 4, and runs through March 18. Tickets are now available to all performances. Get your tickets today!
