On today’s edition, we’ll be talking to an amazing actress who is doing the near impossible. She is taking on the role of one iconic woman, Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, in the new play, which now in its fourth season, All Things Equal: The Life and Trials of Ruth Bader Ginsburg, which will be in Baltimore, Charm City, for the very first time at the M&T Bank Exchange, September 16th through the 18th.
Over the course of 90 engaging and humorous minutes, the production imagines Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, better known as RBG, welcoming a friend of the family into her Supreme Court chambers, the narrative unfolds as a warm, revealing heart-to-heart about her extraordinary journey and personal trial.
Our guest today is an award-winning actress, singer, writer, and producer with an established presence on stages in both New York and Los Angeles, which is a very good narrative on its own. Now in her fourth season of this production, which has gotten rave reviews and standing ovations, and she is also the creator of an original solo show called From Baghdad to Brooklyn, which explores themes and cultural identity that continues to tour nationally.
My friends, I’m in the presence of a Supreme Court justice here, a very good actress. Let’s welcome to Snapshots Michelle Azar.
(Editor’s note: This interview has been edited for length. It was one of the best interviews of the year)
Michelle, welcome to SNAPSHOTS!
Thank you. I’m happy to be here. This is wonderful, and what an introduction. I’m going to save that for those mornings you wake up a little frogging.
Well, I’m so glad to hear, and my voice, as people say, it’s a radio voice. And it’s amazing to know that this is your first time in Charm City, and yet you were here in D.C. not too long ago. So, how does it feel to have the very first show in Charm City?
It feels very, very auspicious. It truly does. In fact, I’m glad you brought up DC because I think in March, we sort of bookend some of this tour. I actually think this this tour goes through April, but we do spend some time in D.C., so it feels like very beautiful to start off in Baltimore, and then go away, and then come back and bookend in D.C.
Actually, now that I think about it, I’ve never been to Baltimore. I remember my college, one of my college roommates at NYU was from Baltimore, and it was like, what is that exotic land? But it feels close to where it happens, it feels close to this. Yeah. So, tell me more about Baltimore that I should know.
Well, I’m from Prince George’s County. I know from Baltimore from my personal experiences visiting there, it’s home of the Star-Spangled Banner at Fort McHenry. I always tell anyone who comes to the DMV, if you’re going to come here, especially Baltimore. You gotta try the crab cakes. You cannot leave here without trying our Maryland crab. That is an unwritten rule.
Done. I will be there on Tuesday. You got it.
It’s crazy to believe that you stepped into this role four years ago, and I had a feeling that the weight of portraying such one iconic woman is so immense and so daunting. And how were you able to make it work for you directly?
It’s a really beautifully asked question, the way you did, because I’m picturing how small a frame, she carried in that huge robe behind that huge desk next to all those both huge minds as well as like bodied people they were very much larger than her. I just loved that juxtaposition so when I first got the audition and I was thinking, “well, I don’t feel like I understand the connection.” But my manager, who has known me since I was like 18 years old, said “I just have a hunch about something,” and she was right because I do have this sort of same scrappy “I’m gonna get it done” attitude. I’m not exactly sure how, but give me the give me the robe, and I’ll adjust. I’ll figure it out.
And so that metaphor really became something that I could hook into. And during every moment of the learning of the lions, which was daunting in and of itself, I don’t know about you, but I’ve never memorized like the encyclopedia or a legal text. It just wasn’t the same as memorizing sides to go do an episode of you know NCIS, which I love doing. But that’s a very different memorization task for an actor to have, and everybody was in on the job. My mom, my sisters, you know every single person I could enlist. My manager was running lives with me before rehearsal.
But Nina Totenberg, when she was talking to me about her, you know, they were very good friends, and she wrote that beautiful book, Dinners with Ruth. She said that Ruth would hide in the bathroom and study because she also wanted to feel like she was just one of the gals, one of the people. But she knew that her mind was thirsting for more, for either because that’s how she studied with her beloved mom who died when she was in high school, or because she just had that thirst for knowledge. I feel very much that same way.
I just feel dedicated to the task of knowledge, and so in that way, when I got off my worries about how you become this icon, and just identify that we are all these icons truly inside. It’s just if we if we’re given the opportunity or if we create the opportunities to engage in that kind of you know exercise of the mind, I really believe that, and I think that that’s another reason why our show works because I think that’s what we’re trying to underlying everything, all the 90 minutes of words, is that each and every single person in our audience, and hopefully listening to your show, knows that there is something inside them that they can investigate, go 100,000% with, and be that in the world.
You’re absolutely right. And it’s great to know that your show is in its fourth season. What excites you of taking on this play and this role across the country and giving people a piece of RBG that he never seen before?
Yeah, I think sort of we’re building up to this question, aren’t we? I think what excites me most is the idea that we can keep hearing the voice of reason, keep hearing a voice of dignity, yes, and keep hearing a voice that also went through it and thinks it through creatively, and from the place of collegiality. She first and foremost knows that, and I speak about her in the in the present tense. I just realized she knows that she was appointed to be a moderating and unifying presence on the court. She wasn’t there to be the dissenter. She was there to sort of creatively think through all the different opposing factors.
So that’s why I say that you listen to me for ninety minutes. I’ll sit in the in the lobby with you until they kick us out, and I will really hear your story, and we can we can see what else we can come up with. Who knows? Maybe we’re a movement in and of itself. Like I really drink the Kool Aid, and I really mean it. I feel like we are we are keep hearing a bag of goods that is not necessarily the end of it, not on one side or the other side. I can’t say each side’s going to get what they want. Every side, every person’s going to ever feel completely comfortable with the you know the thing at hand.
The times have changed since the play started back in 2022 to where we are right now, Have you noticed changes in the audiences who are receptive to the show based on what’s happening in the world around them?
Oh my gosh, it’s been such a ride. Several things. We incubated this in this beautiful little theater in St. Petersburg, Florida. So, you know we’re not trying to hide anything in the title. Most of the people that would come were wearing RBG clothes, and you know we’re definitely clear where they stand. But there were several people in the front row. They would always sit in the front rows and say, “Ah, I can’t stand the abortion thing,” and they’d leave.
Now I talk about abortion in the last I would say 15 minutes of the play. I giggle to myself, always thinking, “Like you stayed through all of this background, all of the reasoning behind it, but you can’t just give 10 more minutes and stick through why she thought abortion was important.” It’s about a question of equality, not about who’s going to live? Who’s going to die? It’s a question about person making equal decisions as a male who cannot have a baby. But that’s the question.
So anyway, cut to now after Roe versus Wade has been moved. So when I talk about there’s this beautiful line. It says, “but I suppose Roe versus Wade is the law of the land,” and I’ll tell you, there is a hush that comes over the crowd. It’s chilling and I want to stop and cry with the audience in that moment. I just really want to stop, come off the stage, and we’ll just have a sit and get a few minutes grab. But what happens instead? I move on to explain something else, and then there had been a line. So, I suppose that the Supreme Court has managed to keep its head above the tides of politics. I’ll tell you, I said right. I said that in I think it was Detroit, boisterous, boisterous pep rally type audience. They booed and they weren’t doing her.
I went back to Rupert Holmes, the beautiful writer, and I said, “Here’s what happened in Detroit. What you want to do?” And he said, “Let’s pause on that line for a second. Let’s take that out for a moment because let’s not dissipate the moment with too much. You know, so much has gone on since her death, and so much has changed, and so now I’m fascinated. What’s going to happen when I say we talk about the so many of the voting restrictions being changed and gerrymandering or equal voting and not being able to change. You know, districts and the lines of districts for voting. Yes. So I’m really eager to hear what’s going to happen when I talk about that area.
What made you want to become an actress, jump into this craft, and create such iconic role and this amazing career?
Oh, it’s gonna sound cliche, but it was one of those moments. Like I’m five years old, and I decided to you know put on the album of Winnie the Pooh in front of my whole family and make them listen and watch me, and I was like, “Ooh, that felt good. And then, in sixth grade, I noticed that I was always a straight-A student, but I was much more interested in sitting in my chair and learning my lines for You’re a Good Man Charlie Brown.
There’s a beautiful Hebrew word. The phrase is called ruach hochma – the spirit of wisdom, the spirit of the heart. That we all carry around. There’s going to be hopefully a moment for us, it doesn’t have to be a big moment, but a small moment of that person being like, “Ooh, what just happened? Oh, that felt good, you know. People. So, it was certainly maybe it’s a little bit of like being in front and being able to engage, but it’s about imparting something that’s inside me, so that we can be in like a recipient. Energetic field, I love like you. I love the study of something, so I love figuring out what makes a human being tick and then putting it in my soul and my body and releasing that. So, it really was early, early on for me. I expressed it as a singer, I expected as a dancer.
You can see Michelle in All Things Equal: The Life and Trials of Ruth Bader Ginsburg as part of the Hippodrome Broadway Series at the M&T Bank Exchange, September 16-18th. Tickets are available thru Ticketmaster. Click HERE to purchase them.
To follow Michelle, you can go to her
- Website – https://michelleazar.com/
- Instagram – @michelleazar
To find out if the show is coming to a city near you, follow their Instagram
- Instagram – @allthingsequalrbg
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