Deborah Theaker was born in Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan, but spent her formative years in Esterhazy, Saskatchewan (the potash capital of the world), where her dad served as mayor and local mortician. She received her Theatre degree from the University of Saskatchewan in Saskatoon. She joined the cast of Toronto’s famous Second City in the mid-1980s and worked alongside Ryan Stiles, Mike Myers, and Linda Kash, creating original characters and material for the Second City stage, winning a Dora Award (Canada’s equivalent to the Tony) along the way.
Deborah emigrated to the United States in the mid-1990s, earning her green card, and has gone on to appear in countless television shows and feature films, most notably the films of Christopher Guest and Eugene Levy, a fellow Second City alumni. The improvisational skills acquired from those years onstage at Second City have served her well, and Deborah continues to improvise weekly with other alumni in LA just for the pure joy of it. Great improvisers are like jazz musicians. They only get better with age. More information is at https://imdb.com/name/nm0857275.
I had different circumstances than most because George Lucas sponsored me. I was starring in the series that he produced. He and Eugene Levy together helped me get my green card. It’s almost like you have to be big and you have to have big enough allies to really be able to do it. I know so many people who have tried and have been in touch with the right lawyers and stuff and it’s still so hard. You come across the border and you lose all of your credit history. The fact that I owned a house in Canada but couldn’t even get credit cards here for five years is just ridiculous. I was a star in my own country, if there is such a thing. And I came down here and I couldn’t even rent an apartment because my credit history was wiped out. It’s like coming from behind the iron curtain. At the time I came down here the dollar was fifty cents, so the money that I came down with was immediately cut in half.
Our unions aren’t reciprocal—ACTRA and SAG—so I came down with no health coverage suddenly. I was on a wing and a prayer! But it’s the same for everybody that does that. I don’t like to see Canadians who come down without their work papers because, if they get found out, they get deported and they can’t come back. I got offered a play in Oregon and I couldn’t do it because American Equity said, “We want to go through all of our American Equity members before you and the Canadian Equity members join our union.” All my health insurance—everything that I worked for in Canada—did not count here.
Here’s a horror story. I could not get arrested. I had no health coverage, nothing. Tried to get an agent, nothing. I was catering the opening of The Nutty Professor and they said, “We have a really special job for you, Deb.” I’m going, “Oh, no.” They gave me a tray of foaming beakers filled with cocktails. Klump Cocktails, it turns out! And they gave me black, plastic glasses and a lab coat and I was supposed to stand at the door and greet all the people coming to the premiere party. Almost everybody who came, I had worked with or I knew. They never made eye contact with me or smiled at me. The only one who did was Richard L. Brooks from Law & Order. Any time I would wait on Canadians—when I tried to waitress—they would be like, “Oh, my God! What happened?!? You’ve fallen so far!” It was a great lesson in humility.
How did you know it was time to make the big move?
I was working for Second City. At one point, in 1990, they had a Second City in LA. It was Ryan Stiles and Robin Duke. They brought me in as a ringer from Canada to help them write a good show. There was an ACTRA Reciprocal Agreement there, so I could come down then. I didn’t drive, because you don’t need to in Toronto. It’s much like New York. I had a driver’s license when I was sixteen but I’d never been behind the wheel of a car. What was I going to do in LA? So I was doing things like taking cabs places.
The first day I was down here, I did a show—we did a benefit—and I looked out into the audience and there was Christopher Guest, Billy Crystal, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Danny DeVito, Steve Martin, everybody! I got a message the next day that Christopher Guest wanted to meet me and have me meet Norman Lear about a show he was working on. I was like, “Yeah, right, Ryan. Good one.” But it was clear he didn’t know anything about it so I said, “Wow, okay!” And I took buses, which meant it took me three hours to get there. I told them that and they were just killing themselves, laughing. I had running shoes and socks on with a dress, so I could change my shoes. Everybody just thought I was a freak. Oh, and that show never went anywhere. That was a show about Mary Hartman’s daughter grown up. Norman Lear was creating it and Christopher Guest wrote it. Mary Kay Place was directing it. The pilots that don’t go freak me out. All these people are doing this brilliant stuff that never sees the light of day. There’s no rhyme or reason to what gets on the air.
How did you get involved with Second City?
I have a degree in Theatre from the University of Saskatchewan, believe it or not. I got out early and I moved to Toronto with my boyfriend. He wanted to take a Second City class. He paid his money, he got into class, and then he got some other gig, so I went and filled in for him at the class and ended up getting hired. It happened so fast. I started working immediately out of college for Second City in Toronto. My touring company was me and the Kids in the Hall. My boyfriend at the time was Mike Myers. Mike and I got into Second City and they fired all of the Kids in the Hall. They said they had no future and no talent. They were doing a show where they were taking suggestions from the audience. Somebody said, “Nudist colony!” So, they took off all their clothes on the spot and started doing the improv. Fair enough. It was a weird time. But six months later, once I went to the main stage cast, it was Ryan Stiles, Mike Myers, Linda Kash, and me. Comedy is a really small world. It’s so interconnected and incestuous on so many levels. My best friend remains, to this day, Scott Thompson from the Kids in the Hall. We still write together, we still hang out, although, he went back to Canada to try and develop our industry there, produce shows there.
What is the difference between the industry in LA and Canada?
There are economic differences—and of course it’s nice to have socialized medicine and not have to worry about “making your insurance” every year through your union—but I don’t want to get started on a whole “what’s wrong with America” thing. So, here’s what’s different about show business in Canada. Say we’re doing a movie in Canada. I’ll get a call, “Hey, Deb? Can you pick up Joe and those guys? They’re up the street from you grabbin’ two-fours and sandwiches.” That’s a shoot in Canada. Here, it’s like, “Whoa. That limo is for me?” I was talking with Timothy Spall on the set of Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events and he said, “The craft service budget on that movie alone would’ve made ten or fifteen British films.” I was on set going, “I can’t believe this!” Because in Canada, you’re lucky if you have a folding chair. It’s just not the same thing. Of course, things are changing. At one point, there were hundreds of things filming in Vancouver. At the time I was there last year, there were six. All these technicians, the whole film industry, my career at one time was based on working on American shows that came to Toronto. It’s really changed. People who have worked for a decade full-time—like my sister who works as a film editor or my brother who is a great sound guy—are now looking into getting other jobs.
Is your whole family in the industry?
No. My dad is a retired mortician. He was the mayor and local mortician of the village I grew up in in Saskatchewan. I think, though, because we only had one channel, growing up, and they always gave us books and really encouraged our creativity, they ended up with a bunch of art tarts as kids. “Well, there’s nothin’ to do. It’s snowin’ outside. Let’s make up a story!” We had such a creative upbringing that we all went into the arts.
What was your first paid gig?
It was doing a play by Allan Stratton at the Persephone Theatre in Saskatoon called Nurse Jane Goes to Hawaii. I was the ingénue. It’s a really funny play. I wonder why it’s never been done in the States! Hm.
What do you wish someone had told you at the beginning of your career?
I wish I had known how cyclical the business was and how there would be more twists than a bag of pretzels. You never know how many ups and downs there are going to be. If I’d known, then I would’ve been prepared for it psychologically. I also wish I had understood how casting is never personal. I bore grudges for people for years ’cause I started out so young. Then I finally got, “People all have their rightful part.” Thinking casting was personal was like a weight around my neck—like an albatross! I didn’t learn it wasn’t personal until I came to LA, really. I saw, by the sheer volume of actors—a hundred and thirty thousand or however many members of SAG there are—that it can’t be personal. I would see the show, after I had auditioned for it and gotten nasty, discouraging remarks from the casting director, and I’d see who they cast and go, “Oh. They’re perfect.” We don’t have that sheer volume of actors in Canada, so I never quite understood casting. I would be playing every character. I’d do it all. By virtue of the fact that there’s only a few thousand in the country that do acting, you really do do it all. You do everything! Same thing with England.
I wish I had had something to fall back on. Anything! Any kind of marketable skill—which I don’t have—would’ve helped me. I wish I had had a solid something to fall back on during the lean periods—and there were lean periods. I cleaned Scott Thompson’s house. I had never had a non-acting job before. I didn’t know what to do when things were lean here!
I also wish I knew that everybody here has ambitions and is upwardly mobile. You have to be authentic and honest and have integrity in every dealing with everyone on every set that you get to. Every PA I sneered at became a director the next time out. There’s no consistent thing in this business and that’s why you have to be centered in yourself and have a life outside of your business. How many people go out and get rejected so much a week? People might face that kind of rejection in other jobs once every ten years or even every five years. We do it every day all day long. That kind of rejection can be psychologically very wearing. You have to learn to take nothing personally. I have the hide of a rhinoceros now, but I was such a bruised peach when I first came out here.
How do you handle rejection?
I’ve had to practice detachment. It took me until the last two years—and I’m not a young person—to develop that. I don’t know how younger people do it. I’m an artist too, so I have that as an outlet. You have to empower yourself in whatever way that you do it. I write. I’ve pitched shows. I’ve sold options on so many shows. I continue to write and sell stuff all the time, although that’s almost as difficult as acting—writing—because you know how little actually gets made.
What advice would you give to an actor starting out?
You need to have a body of work. The only way you can have a body of work is if you have the financial means to propel yourself forward to amass that body of work. Be willing to invest ten years or five years or three years or whatever you say—set a limit—and find a means to have some other income. This place is so big! And if the roles aren’t there for you, find the means to create them for yourself. Get out there and write them for yourself, if that’s all you can do.
How did you get your first manager?
The weird thing was, I had been nominated for an ACE Award—Best Actress in a Series—down here, for a show that never aired in California. When I came down for that award show, nobody knew who I was. I had a Canadian friend who was in an agency and they were aware, through her, of my body of work. She’s still my manager. For twenty years, I’ve been with her. She was one of our producers of the Second City, years ago, and then emigrated down here. I trusted her judgment because she saw everybody’s development all the way through. Our relationship was always based on the fact that I was never looking for the next best thing. I just wanted to be a working actor. I never wanted to be a star. I’m a character actor, so it’s never going to be about the size of my ass—although, somehow it is about the size of my ass these days. People feel they can tell you anything about what you look like. I once did a pilot and I was playing the mother to this fat kid who is compulsively eating all the time. The first day, I walked in to wardrobe and met the woman for the first time. She looked me up and down and went, “Well, I guess the mom likes cinnamon buns too.” I went off on her!
I’ve been told, “Oh, you’re a big girl,” “Oh, my God,” and, “There’s a real size to you,” all the time. I’m five-foot ten! I’m a milk-fed farm gal from Southeastern Saskatchewan, I’m not going to be a zero or a two or a four! I see all these young girls with terrible body images. I get it all the time and I’m a character actor! So, maybe if I gained fifty pounds, then I’d be “funny fat” or something? I get this every day of my life and it really makes me crazy because it has no bearing. I know my peers don’t get it. Nobody ever says to Eugene Levy, “Maybe you should cut your hair and lose the glasses. If you had contacts you’d work more.” I had a time back there a few years ago when I would get really upset about the aging thing and about my size. And then I went, “Fuck this shit. Screw this shit.” I have to really work at it to get beyond the age and get beyond the size. I’m not a number in either case. In Canada, I’m considered pretty. Here, I’m just fat and old. That’s an American thing. Why doesn’t Judi Dench live in Hollywood? Because she would’ve jumped off the big D in the Hollywood sign because they would’ve told her she had mud clumps for an ass. That’s the nature of LA! Oh, if I had a nickel for every time I lost a show to a model—and I’m a comedian! I know so many anorectics and bulimics that are like forty years old! I’m the first one of my group not to have any face-lifts or anything. It should be against the law to have Botox in your face and go on screen. How can you reflect any emotion when you can’t move your face? I understand the impulse that drives you to that because, even as a comedian and a character actress, every single job I’ve been on, I’ve been insulted to my face by the people I’m working with. It’s always the people behind the scene—not my co-stars—who feel that they have to work on my image. My thing is: “I’m five-foot ten. I’m forty years old. This is who I am.” Only the people that develop that kind of attitude are resilient enough to survive. It’s like a war of attrition. The wily farm stock—the prairie type of people who can take adversity—will make it. This is the new frontier. If you can take all the shit being slung at you and spend six hours in your car, then you’ll be okay in LA.
How do you choose the material you work on?
When I’m writing on my own, I choose the material and the people that I work with, obviously, but in acting, I’m not given the opportunity to make those choices very much. Coming from comedy—and factor in the Canadian thing—everybody I know is really nice. By nature of the work of sketch comedy, I’ve learned that you’re always part of an ensemble. You only succeed if you make everyone else look good and serve the scene.
What is your favorite thing about being an actor?
Getting to do so much character work. That’s the best part about being a character actor, for me. I get to do fantastic stuff. I get to work with my idols. I was in a movie with John Cleese and Rowan Atkinson. I used to love SCTV to such a degree that I would rush home to see it, and then I ended up being friends with all of those people. I was obsessed with This Is Spinal Tap and I’m friends with Harry Shearer and Chris Guest. It just happened that all the things I really loved or that I was obsessed with, work-wise, I ended up working with all those people later on. How many people can say that? I get to live a fantasy life in a way. For all the shit that goes on, I still get to work with and meet all of these people. It’s great. The rest of it all falls by the wayside.
This interview was conducted on January 11, 2005, and it originally appeared in Acting Qs: Conversations with Working Actors by Bonnie Gillespie and Blake Robbins, available at Amazon.