'None of the Above' actors Halley Feiffer and Adam Green

What do you get when you take an overpriveleged Upper East Side high school senior and pair her with the the expensive grad student SAT tutor her father has hired? If you throw in heaping doses of witty dialogue and plot twists, and play Britney Spears in the background, you get the fantastic off-Broadway two-person play None of the Above (formerly playing at Theatre Row's Lion Theatre). Its stars Halley Feiffer and Adam Green are certainly worthy of notice as well. They did Election Day together before starting work on None of the Above, and Halley is going to be in the upcoming film Margot at the Wedding, while Adam is in charge of a "news comedy" videoblog called LunchBox. I caught up with Adam and Halley over coffee, where we discussed Charlemagne, corsets, the word "vajayjay"... and some more serious topics (sort of).

So when I came to see None Of The Above, the first thing that surprised me was how natural it seemed, which is something you don't see in a lot of shows anymore: how it didn't seem like you're acting and just like you're existing.
HALLEY FEIFFER: Well, I'm glad it seemed that way.
ADAM GREEN: Yeah. Because for the most part, a lot of the time it feels like it's just [Halley] and me in [her] room.
HF: Yeah.
AG: Which is really nice when that happens.
HF: Yeah. That's something that I've always felt really strongly about is trying to seem natural, because I hate acting that seems like acting. When I was a little kid and acting I was really obsessive about that, and people would think I was forgetting my lines because I would like try to seem too natural. So sort of wedding that with also, you do need to have a theatricality on the stage.
AG: It's funny—we ran into Lois Smith, who's an older actress—she's a wonderful actress—we ran into her a couple of weeks ago, and I have a friend who was in a show with her, and a lot of the times my friend said it sounded like she was forgetting her lines but she was just, completely, just having a conversation, and it was so realistic, it was like the character she was playing was just out of it. Well, here's the thing, I mean we're lucky that we're doing this play that's natural. I don't think doing complete conversational realism would work in Beckett, but it's a nice way to do that, to just have a conversation.
HF: And I'm glad it seems like that to you as an audience member because some of the dialogue in this is rather stylized and heightened, and it's been difficult—sometimes I'm worried that it doesn't seem natural, so I'm glad it does.

Well, it seems like the roles came to you naturally, like they were easy to get into.
HF: Mine wasn't so easy, but I'm glad it seemed that way, because my background is very different from this character's background, although maybe not that different, I mean I'm from Manhattan, but… that in and of itself is like such a different world from the rest of the world, but I mean my parents aren't anything like the parents in this family, and the girls who were like this girl on the outside in my high school, I really wanted to kill them, so I was worried that I wouldn't be convincing as this character—but when you have three weeks of rehearsal for seven hours a day and it's just you working all the time, and it's only two people in the play and we're onstage for the whole time, I found my character just through… as many hours; you have to find something.
AG: Yeah. And usually I mean with plays, what you're saying for, you know, seven hours a day for three weeks, I mean it gets to inform what you're doing and how you find the characters.
HF: Yeah. But I don't think that we did anything like before the scenes, I mean, to do that.
AG: No, I mean it's not like we were playing Charlemagne.
HF: What's that?
AG: …What's Charlemagne?
HF: Yeah.
AG: Holy Roman emperor?
HF: Oh, sorry! Oh, I thought that was a theatre game, sorry! Like, "We never played any rounds of Charlemagne, we didn't get that kooky!"
AG: I was good in Charlemagne though.
HF: What?
AG: No. Forget it. You're having none of me this morning, are you? You hate me. I get it.
HF: I don't hate you, I'm so tired! We had to go out last night.
AG: We didn't have to; we wanted to. And it was fun.
HF: Yeah, it was fun but I'm so tired!
AG: But anyway we used things from our past, and—like we both went to private schools in New York…

And you were both in Election Day together, so you already sort of had a rapport going.
HF: Yeah, that really helped. There was an article in last week's Backstage magazine about pairs in theatre, and they talk about Claire Danes and Jefferson Mayes in Pygmalion right now, and then another one was us, and one thing that was quoted that I said is that I've never done two plays back to back with another actor, and it was really helpful because we got along really well, and we had a nice dynamic onstage and offstage got along as friends, and it's so helpful, that we already hit the ground running—no pun intended!—for this show.
AG: Yeah. It's weird, I mean, the more you do a play the further away in the recesses of your memory the previous one got, and so we kind of forget how our characters Adam and Theo were really like. There's one similarity in this play, that Halley's character will say something crazy and my character will be like, "What?" [Halley laughs] So that dynamic is the same but ultimately these characters have replaced those in my mind.
HF: Yeah. That's sort of sad, because our characters were fun.
AG: It is sad. But that's what theatre and acting is, constantly saying goodbye to people you're close to, both onstage and off.
HF: That's really true.

Was it a coincidence that you both ended up in this play together or were you seen together and then brought into it?
HF: No, I was a part of this for like four years—I did a reading of this play four years ago, when I was a freshman in college, just because a friend of mine recommended me to the playwright, Jenny Lyn Bader, and then they called me a couple months ago or half a year ago and they said, "Oh, we're doing a production off-Broadway in the fall; we'd love for you to come meet with the producer," and the producer liked me so I got the part. And then I was doing Election Day, and they were like, "Could you think of anyone who you think might be good?" And we were sort of brainstorming and I thought of a bunch of young actors and then the director came to see Election Day and I was like, "Oh, wait! Adam! Good!" And it hadn't even occurred to me because I was thinking of actors I had known for years… and then he came in and auditioned and they really liked him, and then he came for a callback and I was reading with people for the callback so we had this nice chemistry and as soon as he left the room the producer was like flipping out: "I want him!" And we were like, "Alright, we still have like eight more people, stop talking like that." So it was nice that they liked him right away, and I was glad because I wanted to work with him again.
AG: Yeah. I mean, that obviously helped because auditions were going on during Election Day, so I walked in and we had a camaraderie already.
HF: Yeah, but the producer thought that we had cheated, like we'd practiced with each other beforehand, but not at all.
AG: The producer thought a lot of things!
HF: Well, that's just because we're such good actors!
AG: Yeah!

To make a generalization, do you prefer being in lighter modern things as opposed to period pieces?
AG: I think the best period pieces are the ones that you can relate to.
HF: Well, I think it's important to make every play you do fun and also meaningful, but this play and Election Day were very much comedies, especially Election Day which was a farce basically, and I've only known [Adam] for a couple months but I think both of us have done really serious stuff as well as comedy, and I didn't think I could do comedy—like when I was cast in Election Day, I was like, "Shit! I don't know if I can do this!" And then I found out that I really loved doing it. I like doing both but I feel like now I'm ready to do something more serious, having done just broad comedy for a while, and I am doing this little show in Boston so I'm excited about that.
AG: Which is modern as well.
HF: Yeah, but I'm going to play it like it's the 1500s.
AG: That's a good idea.
HF: I hope they're okay with that!
AG: You have your corset?
HF: Of course I have my corset! What, do you think going to show up without a corset? [everyone laughs]
AG: Yeah. But on my part I've done three present-day plays in a row, and before that I did one play in the 1940s… I want to do Beowulf! You know what, I want to do Beowulf! Yeah.
HF: Are you kidding or serious?
AG: I don't know! I am not sure.
HF: Do you want to be Beowulf!?
AG: No! I want to be one of the knights in the background, "Ah, where's my shank bone?"
HF: In the mead-hall?
AG: Yeah, in the mead-hall. No. That movie [the upcoming Beowulf] looks awful.
HF: I know and I'm so disappointed because I love Beowulf. I wrote like twelve college essays on it because I didn't read any of the other books I'm supposed to read, so I was like, "I shall do Beowulf again!" That was the one thing I read!
AG: From second to fourth grade I did a book report on The Phantom Tollbooth every year.
HF: My dad [author and artist Jules Feiffer] illustrated that.
AG: Get the hell out! Norton Juster [author of The Phantom Tollbooth]!? Really?
HF: Wait, you didn't know my dad illustrated The Phantom Tollbooth!?
AG: No, not the edition I remember. Wow.
HF: You didn't know my dad illustrated The Phantom Tollbooth?
AG: I should have brought him in, in fourth grade!
HF: "Not the version I had?" What do you mean, the version—?
AG: Wait, let's get back to the story! We'll talk about this later! "Not in the car, Halley!" Um… I mean, there is fun and excitement to be had from every play and I don't really think I'm more pro-modern; I mean, I would do Shakespeare… I dunno.

Although if you would do Shakespeare, what roles…?
AG: God. There are like twenty roles I want to do.
HF: I've never done Shakespeare.
AG: You've never done Shakespeare!?
HF: Well, once I did Midsummer Night's Dream, and I was Peter Quince, the head of the mechanicals.
AG: Peter Quince is the part that Shakespeare wrote for himself. And I played Peter Quince in my sophomore year of college.
HF: Hey! We both played Peter Quince!
AG: That's very weird.
HF: That is so weird!
AG: But what are the best Shakespearian parts? Petruchio… Falstaff… Caliban…
HF: I would want to be… Gertrude maybe, but I'm too young for that. I would rather do Chekhov—I know that's different but as far as classical theatre I really love Chekhov. I did Three Sisters…
AG: You were? Who were you?
HF: Natasha.
AG: Really? I wouldn't cast you as Natasha.
HF: I can do anything, Adam!
AG: Really?
HF: Yeah!
AG: Juggle.
HF: Okay, not anything, ha-ha… I know, I was surprised I was cast as Natasha, but it was really fun. I was really mean; I got to scream at my best friend, she was Olga… I made her cry… Anyway!

Halley, you just graduated from Wesleyan last year; Adam, I know you went to Harvard…
AG: Yeah, I went to Harvard undergrad, and NYU grad.

Ah. Well, Halley, I know that you just graduated last year, and it seems like you were working on different projects throughout college, so was it easier to transition from college to post-college?
HF: I have not found the transition from college to life post-college very bad, yet. But I'm just waiting for the other shoe to drop! Most of my friends are having a hard time with the transition and I think I'm lucky that I just had employment, in something I loved doing, almost right after college, which is really very lucky, and I think that's mostly because I started acting when I was young; I just knew I wanted to do that, so that sort of helped me get a leg up—which is an expression I find sort of disgusting! You don't find that kind of disgusting?
AG: I thought it was just a guy climbing a ladder.
HF: 'Get a leg up'… I don't know, I think of it as a little pornographic, I don't know.
AG: By the way, 'vajayjay' is on the cover of the [New York Times'] Sunday Styles section.
HF: That's inappropriate.

I have that in my bag, actually!
AG: No, it's not inappropriate; that's what the article's all about! It's how based on its first appearance in Grey's Anatomy in early 2003, Oprah Winfrey has mainstreamed it; so it's now like an accepted term because it's gone over… it's kind of… [I hand Halley the Styles section]
HF: Wow! I'm so glad you have it, Keely, I want to read this. Cool, thanks; that's crazy!
AG: Right. But—Halley's situation also fairly unique, though. I don't know many people who got out of college and soon after ended up in off-Broadway theatre in New York. Usually it's either go to L.A. and do some small things out there, or off-off-Broadway.
HF: Right. Well—I did my first off-Broadway play last year; I got cast in SubUrbia at Second Stage, and so I took the semester off to do that. So I worked a little throughout college, but it worked out really well and I got to graduate on time, and I did three movies during college but one was during the summer and for the other two I was able to take a week or so off and make up all my work too so that worked out really well. So I haven't found the transition that hard, but then once I'm unemployed—which isn't going to be for a couple months—then I think I'm going to have a nervous breakdown, so that'll be hard, but then I'll figure that out too, so…

Are you jealous of her, Adam, or was it just as easy for you?
AG: It was not as easy for me. Am I jealous of her? God, no. [Halley laughs] I mean, yes, I kind of wish I had that kind of success right out of college, but I took two years off between college and grad school and I think that time off was very necessary for me to develop as a human being, or homo sapiens as the kids say, but I needed to figure out things.

Right. And Halley, your role in SubUrbia was a very different role from what you've done lately, and that was sort of your 'transition role' from out of college.
HF: Yeah, maybe! See, that role I felt really comfortable with, because that's the role that I was used to playing… it's funny, I was always cast as this nervous, awkward, sort of weird girl in everything, pretty much—not weird, but sort of a nervous and awkward and not very attractive and kind of sad person—and so I felt right at home in that role, with this girl who's really awkwardly shy and then kills herself—I was like, "Great, of course, yes!"—so I felt at home in that, so then when I got cast in Election Day, which was totally different for me and totally different from the roles I had been used to playing, I was really surprised and really excited and nervous, and that was really helpful for me because now I feel like I can do things that aren't the nervous, awkward, stuttering girl. And this role's totally different from that, too.

And then, Adam, has LunchBox been kind of a side project? How did you start with that?
AG: A buddy of mine is a political journalist, and he started up a kind of independent New York political website a few years ago with a guy who ran for city council, and they were looking to do a videocast about New York City politics and they wanted it to be funny and short, so they wanted somebody politically inclined but also who had experience in front of the camera, so they hired me to do it and I was just doing New York politics and then some grant money ran out but I said, "You know what, I really like doing this, I'm going to go national with it and just do it like once or twice a week," because I was doing it every day for about five months or so—which was fine because I'd do a show at night and I would do this in the morning. So that was kind of a strange hermetic existence for me, nobody but a camera and an audience for a 24-hour period. But it's fine—I mean… [LunchBox] is on YouTube; it's got a fan base; it's very ghetto—in the sense that it's very, very low-budget, not like shantytowns—but, yeah, it's a fun little hobby.

As far as future projects… this ends in November, and Halley, you mentioned that you had something after it?
HF: Yeah, it's a show called Third, it's Wendy Wasserstein's last play and they're doing a production of it at the Huntington Theatre Company in Boston, and it's a college girl whose mother, whom the show's about, teaches at a college which is modeled after Wesleyan, and that opens December 3rd.

That's really cool, that it's set at a college that's modeled after the college where you went.
HF: Yeah, I know, I think it's funny. It's supposed to be a combination of Amherst and Wesleyan if I remember correctly because I was lucky enough to do a reading of it when Wendy Wasserstein was there, and we talked about it… so I'm excited about that, and I've also got a movie that's coming out in November, Margot At the Wedding.
AG: For me, December is when I spend time with my girlfriend, whom I have not really seen for the last couple of months because she is down in DC doing a show and she's about to go to Minneapolis to do a show, so she and I are going on vacation and I'm going to spend some time with her in Minneapolis. December is my time!

So you both seem to be mostly concentrated in theatre and just dabbling in film…
HF: Yeah, when people ask me that—I'm not really making career decisions; basically any part that I get that I like, I'll take, so it's not like I'm trying to do theatre or trying to do film; I really love doing both.

Just kind of making it up as you go along?
HF: Yeah! Yes. Pretty much.
AG: The first couple of years, you're kind of at the whims of the profession instead of the other way around.

So, there's so much in both theatre and in movies that's not as much original as it is an adaptation of a book or some other movie or play; when it comes to being in an adaptation how does that compare?
HF: I don't know if I have been in an adaptation of anything…
AG: I was in two last year. I did The Heart is a Lonely Hunter and The Chosen, and that is really fun because usually adaptations are done off of good things, and those are two fantastic books with universal themes and you can go to them for source material for building your character and building the story when making it into a play, so that you're informed of what you're doing, because there's so much at your fingertips that you can bring to life.
And I would guess doing something like that would be different from doing an adaptation from the stage or screen to the other medium because then there's already a portrayal of it.
HF: Yeah.
AG: Well… Dirty Dancing, which—you went out for that, right?
HF: I couldn't make the audition; I was in college and then I realized, "Huh, I can't sing or dance so I'm probably not going to get cast in this."
AG: I don't think they wanted somebody who could sing or dance that well.
HF: Oh, well then—Eleanor Bergstein was a friend of mine, so that's why I was going to do it, and I just thought—she liked me as a person but I didn't know if I could do it.
AG: Oh. So—Dirty Dancing, they've been trying to bring that to Broadway for the last four years or so, they've had a lot of out-of-town tryouts, and apparently the producers want the girl playing the Jennifer Grey part to do an exact Jennifer Grey interpretation.
HF: Really?
AG: Yeah, that's what I've heard. And that doesn't sound like fun at all.

Yeah. Well, also, when you're transferring mediums it's so hard to live up to that, rather than putting a completely different spin on the role. I guess the best example would be the character of Edna in Hairspray, which has been completely reinvented each time.
HF: Yeah. I loved John Travolta [who played Edna in the recent movie].
AG: Really? I didn't see it.
HF: Loved it. Yeah, why are you surprised?
AG: Ah—I guess I'm not really surprised. I just can't imagine anybody but Divine [from the 1988 movie] playing that part.
HF: I thought he was great!

I loved him too, but my friend was so disappointed. We walked out of the theatre and she said, "I don't know, I think I was expecting Travolta to be a little more like Harvey Fierstein [who originated the role onstage]…"
HF: Oh! That's so funny. Yeah, I loved him.

So, both of you grew up in New York; coming back here as a performer, does that make it easier to settle back into life here?
AG: It's a lot less scary to move back to New York when your parents are here, rather than coming here with nobody and no place to stay.

Right. Yeah, and rent's rising, everybody's getting priced out, and New York has always been the artist's haven, but it's getting more expensive…
AG: It's a catch-22: you have to live in New York if you are an artist, but it isn't possible to live in New York if you are an artist—except for the top 20 percent. But artists are personal creatures, you know, they find little places to burrow and make a home.
HF: I live with my parents right now; I don't know how long that's going to last, though…

Speaking of which, are you into the whole New York music thing? You know, artists nobody's ever heard of, or…?
HF: I don't think either of us are really in that…
AG: Seriously, I haven't listened to a new band until they're retro. I listen to the Velvet Underground and rap—early 90s rap. That's about it. Who should we listen to?

I don't know, I listen to the Monkees! And Blondie.
HF: I like Blondie.
AG: Okay, my friend and I were arguing about this. Bands of the last ten years, 1997 to 2007—I'm using 1997 because that's when Napster and essentially music sharing was created—of the last decade, what are bands that twenty years from now we'll be listening to?

That's a really, really good question!
AG: For example a couple of years ago everybody was talking about Coldplay, and then Coldplay was never heard from again.
HF: Yeah, I feel kind of bad for Gwyneth Paltrow who married that guy from Coldplay because it's like, "That's not cool at all any more!"
AG: It's Chris Martin, by the way. But I mean—the Shins, the Strokes—
HF: I love the Shins.
AG: But nobody's going to be listening to Britney Spears in twenty years.
HF: Yeah they will!
AG: Seriously, twenty years from now? Christina Aguilera I think has longevity, but I don't think many others do.

Christina Aguilera has a really different image with each record, though.
HF: No, Christina Aguilera, I don't understand the appeal. I don't think she's that great.
AG: I think she has a great voice. I think she has a great voice and I think she does interesting songs.
HF: You are ridiculous!
AG: No, I am not ridiculous!
HF: She doesn't have a great voice, but she can belt…
AG: Sting himself said that Christina Aguilera has one of the best voices around.
HF: Oh, and Sting is really, you know... the be-all and end-all…
AG: Ha, you said 'be'! And you were talking about Sting!
HF: You are ridiculous!
AG: Stop calling me ridiculous!
HF: Um… Sting said that about Christina Aguilera—I don't think in twenty years, though…
AG: I mean, every time a new CD comes out it's like, "Oh, you've gotta get this new Arctic Monkeys, this new Arctic Fire CD!" And then it's like—
HF: Yeah, then it's over. I think Modest Mouse will still be around.
AG: Modest Mouse, yeah… you think Wilco?
HF: Yeah, Wilco… maybe the Flaming Lips…
AG: I'm trying to think if they precede 1997, though.
HF: Well, they're still making music now, so…
AG: Yeah. But no, I wouldn't include Madonna in a record store twenty years from now.
HF: But what about Britney Spears' really big hits? Like—
AG: 'Hit Me Baby One More Time'? Nobody's going to be listening to that!

Well, what if she shaves her head again? Then everybody's going to go back to her songs!
AG: Well, there's also an article about Tila Tequila in [the Sunday Styles section], and 'celebrities'… you know… anything to stay on the cover of a magazine.
HF: That is a good question about the music though.

I would think nothing now, but definitely nineties bands.
AG: Pearl Jam, Nirvana... Not the Spice Girls. Did you hear that Spice Girls reunion concert sold out in like 30 seconds!?
HF: Yeah, I couldn't believe that!
AG: I mean, it's ridiculous. They're not even a band; they're five women who corporate executives write music for, and they all have a different personality.
HF: Yeah, it's crazy. On PerezHilton.com they were like "Listen to this single and guess how much if any Posh Spice, Victoria, is singing!" And I went, "Ah!" It didn't occur to me that they were really singing; I didn't even think of them really as singers. I'm like, "Oh yeah, she sings!?" I think of her as somebody who gets her hair dyed and walks around…
AG: And she has a bad VH1 show.
HF: No she doesn't; it was canceled!
AG: Ha ha!
HF: It was not bad at all. It was really good. Adam, sweetheart, it makes you sound really ignorant when you talk about things that—
AG: It makes me sound ignorant when I mock the Posh Spice reality program on VH1? That makes me sound ignorant?
HF: Yeah!
AG: Explain.
HF: I will explain: you didn't see it! It's really—
AG: It got canceled!
HF: Oh, like VH1 viewers really—it got canceled because it wasn't making fun of her, because she was smart! I know it sounds crazy, but it's not crazy, she was smarter than the show!
AG: I'm sorry, I was watching Meet the Press when it was on!

Well, please tell me that neither of you ever watched Flavor of Love.
HF: I hate that show…
AG: No, I don't watch that… though Flava Flav really intrigues me as this man who somehow went from crazy, crazy rap star to a level of celebrity that doesn't even make any sense.

And now Tila Tequila has her own… one of those! So besides reality TV…
HF: I love Monk.

I love that show! My favorite is Psych; my second favorite is Monk.
HF: Psych is good!?

It's amazing!
HF: I don't believe you. Really? I think that guy looks like such an idiot!

It's so good, though.
HF: Oh, alright, then I'll watch it; I just think that guy looks really dumb, so I don't watch it… I guess that's kind of like how Adam judged the Victoria Beckham show… Alright, I guess I'll check out Psych, then. I have this thing where I get really devoted to a TV show and I feel like I'm cheating on it if I'm watching a TV show and I feel like I can't cheat on Monk with Psych… I feel like Monk wouldn't like that; that's why I only watch Monk… and Law and Order. That's all.

Adam, you?
AG: I don't watch Psych. I watch the Office, British and American—and Chuck, which is actually pretty good.

So, that's it as far as questions… thank you so much!
HF: Not at all!
AG: Have a good one!

None of the Above is no longer playing off-Broadway; to learn more about either actor, check out Halley Feiffer's IMDb page or Adam Green's videoblog LunchBox.