Jonna Tamases grew up in Northern California where she honed her comedic skills with several improv and sketch groups before a two-year stint as a clown with the Ringling Bros. Circus. Since moving to LA, she has been in some television shows and movies, including 7th Heaven and Coming Clean. Jonna writes and performs with ACME Comedy Theatre’s Main Company and she is currently working on the movie version of her one-woman show Jonna’s Body, Please Hold. Her one-woman show debuted at the Odyssey Theatre in 2003 and was nominated for two Ovations Awards: Best World Premiere Play and Best Lead Actress in a Play. There is more information about Jonna and her compelling story at https://www.madlively.com/productions/jonnasbody.
I always did acting as long as I can remember. I put shows together in grade school, talent shows, and I was in children’s theatre in grade school, junior high, and high school. I went to a traditional college because it didn’t occur to me that I could be one of the people who does acting for a living. It just wasn’t in there. I kept doing acting part-time through college. When I got out and started working in the field that I had prepared for—film editing—I was also doing acting. There came a point where I had to decide between the two because the schedules are mutually exclusive. If you are a film editor, you work ten to fourteen hours a day straight for a month or three months and then you’re out of a job. So, you can’t take on any acting projects or even audition because you’re in the editing room the whole time. I decided to do acting full-time.
What was your first paid gig?
My first paid acting gig was a live gig, like a convention, playing a pirate I think. “Ahoy! Have another spring roll. Arr!” It was that type of thing. I was living in San Francisco after college and I fell in with a bad improv crowd there. I was doing improv every Saturday night in a little café. I was part of a class and a lot of people were doing convention work: character work at conventions. So, I just took pictures of myself in a lot of different costumes and put it all together in a little brochure and sent it around to the companies that do that kind of thing.
What do you consider your first break?
For me, there has not been one. It’s been incremental and very purposeful. I have not had any sort of divine, miraculous thing happen to me. My journey has been things resulting from my actions and my efforts, not really a lot of surprises. Very slow, steady, incremental progress based on a tremendous amount of effort on my part. I really can see how the whole picture is a result of my effort.
I was doing character work in San Francisco and I was also marketing myself as a roaster at parties. You would hire me to come in character and roast the birthday boy. I was doing all of these different characters that I’d market. As I was doing that, I noticed that my friends who were making the big money were the ones who could walk stilts and juggle. So I thought, “I’ve got to go to clown college so I can make more money as a party character.” I applied to clown college and I made a card that had my picture in the middle of a daisy that I drew and inside it said, “Pick me!” I flew to Nashville to be able to audition live, which was optional, but I wanted them to see me. I got in and then went to clown college for eight weeks and learned all these skills in Baraboo, Wisconsin, at the Circus World Museum, the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Clown College. I had so much fun that when they offered me a contract to the circus at the end of those eight weeks, I threw everything else out the window and said, “I’m joining the circus!”
I knew being offered a contract at the end of clown college was a possibility, but I also knew I was under no obligation to accept it. I didn’t plan to. I was just going to come home with those skills. But, golly, I had so much fun that I joined the circus. I felt like I had really only touched the surface of the whole world of physical comedy—and that’s why I went to clown college, to study physical comedy. I like being able to convey something to an audience without words. I think that’s really special and I like the theatrical challenge that it presents. That was the first time that I sort of did something unplanned. And two years later I married another clown who I’d met and we moved to LA. We had a straight wedding, although we did take one picture with clown noses on.
What do you wish someone had told you at the beginning of your career?
I can’t say there’s anything I wish I knew. I feel like, had I known then what I know now—or what I feel I know now—it would’ve dampened my enthusiasm. I’m actually glad I had all of those years of unbridled naïveté where I was sure that everything I submitted my picture for I would get called in for! “You have my picture. Why wouldn’t you call me in? I gave you my picture! Now you call me. It’s rude not to!” I’m glad I didn’t know then what I know now: that here, in LA, it’s an industry, not an art. It’s a business here. The art is complete second or third fiddle. First it’s an industry, then it’s a club or a clique, and then maybe a little bit of artwork squeaks through. You just have to prepare yourself for being a product and not taking it personally when no one cares to purchase your product at this time. It doesn’t mean it’s bad product!
You know, maybe that’s something I wish I could have been able to wrap my brain around when I started, the not taking it personally, because it hurts. There’s a whole lot of hurt when you don’t get responses. But I don’t know if it’s possible to get that. The enthusiasm sort of blocks out the possibility of hurt. You just have to be the real you all the time and your work is to find the person who wants to buy that product. People think their work is to change the product to fit whoever is buying. That’s the worst thing you can do. You stick with your one product—your real self—and find the right customer.
When I first got to town and I was told I had to sort of put an age range out to describe myself, you know, “mid-thirties noodle type,” I would say, “But I can play eight to eighty! That’s what I’ve been doing in my sketch comedy in San Francisco and my improv. I can play any age. I’m not mid-thirties; I’m whatever you want me to be!” It took a year or so to clue in that you get booked for what you look like, not for what you can do. It makes sense: That’s this business. It’s making entertainment that roughly reflects their vision of reality. It’s not theatrical. It’s different.
What is your favorite thing about being an actor?
The chance to try on a lot of different people, personalities, emotions, life situations, without having to actually experience them. It’s like a life buffet and you can take a little spoonful of “fat, angry librarian” and you can take a little spoonful of “jilted, haggard sea wife” and you can take a little spoonful of “male five-year-old”—whatever you want!
What is your least favorite thing about being an actor?
The begging. The begging for work. It’s supply and demand. If I were more in demand than the supply of me, then I’d have the upper hand. But right now, the roles I want, I have a greater demand for work than there is interest in me. So they have the upper hand. Casting directors, producers, all of those have the upper hand over me. It’s very difficult and I don’t think I’ve learned how to cope with that well. I think, when I come in the room, I come in with an attitude of desperation, which I’m trying to combat.
I went in for Meg Liberman and I could feel the stink of desperation coming off me. It’s so ugly and she doesn’t want to see that. It’s unpleasant for everyone involved. I should’ve just poked my head in the room and said, “Meg, I’m not going to burden you with my panic and anxiety and desperation. So, let’s do this another time when I feel a little better about myself.” I should’ve done that! Instead, I went in and tried to do these dramatic scenes. Meanwhile, she’s drinking her coffee so I’m looking at the bottom of her coffee mug, trying to emote. I’m doing my heartfelt little lines and nothing. That made me feel real good!
I think it takes practice and I’m practicing not being desperate. I think it takes non-attachment to the outcome. And that is very much easier said than done. It takes practice. That’s practice through meditation, religion—whatever—where you simply practice being and celebrating your being rather than focusing on what’s going to happen or what it’s going to mean or what’s going to come of it. I think that’s the important thing.
Any on-set mishaps, missteps, or funny stories you’d like to share?
The first time I performed my one-woman show in a big workshop performance with a big audience, at intermission I came backstage and realized that my fly was down and had been down the entire first act. It turned out to be a beautiful moment because, when the lights came up for the start of the second act, I walked out, center stage, and just reached down and went, “Zzzzip!” and zipped up right in front of the audience. They burst into hysterics because they’d seen, they knew. So I was laughing and they were laughing and I said, “Why didn’t any of you tell me?” They laughed and laughed and we shared a nice bonding moment.
Do you ever feel like giving up?
Yes and no. It’s hard to talk about. I was in therapy about ten years ago or so and the therapist at one point asked me, “What would you do if you weren’t an actress?” I just went, “What?!? What does that mean? That has no meaning to me. These words… I don’t know… I can’t… What?” I do get very depressed sometimes that my career is not where I wish it was right now, but I can’t fathom what else I would do with my life. There’s nothing else I want to do every day except write and perform. I feel that I’m good at it and when I perform, people respond so strongly that I feel like there’s nothing else I have to offer the world that’s as cool as this! This is it. There really isn’t anything else. But it does get deeply frustrating, putting out energy and putting out energy and putting out energy and not getting the response that you want. I wonder: Am I just beating my head against the wall? How long can I continue to do this? I want to be earning an ongoing living forever and ever as an actress in movies and on the stage. That’s what I want!
How do you choose the material you work on?
Most of the material I work on, I create. That’s just an absolute joy because I’m saying things that I want to say about life and the world, not big things but just things. I love just twisting it to make it funny. I love being absurd and playing in an absurd way. Comedy is rich and textured and nuanced to me. I’m drawn toward comedy and I like to play games. My characters tend to do that too.
How do you prepare for a role?
I learn my lines cold! It helps me so much. I absolutely learn my lines. I repeat them over and over and over again. I mostly do it in my head although it’s smarter to do it with someone else if you can. Another way I do it is to transcribe them. I kind of tend toward the David Mamet school of acting—which is not a school, it’s emphatically non-school—but it’s to just say the lines audibly and don’t try and add stuff. The less I add, the better. I’m learning that. You don’t have to do a lot. Since I came from a children’s theatre background, I’d be playful and fun and silly and over-the-top. I had to learn how to channel that energy. Playing big is fun! But simple sells.
What do you do when nothing is happening in your career?
That’s the one cool thing about living in LA. There is always something to pursue. There is always a new path. There is always a new piece of marketing material you can create. There’s a new group you can get involved with. There’s a new casting director you can stalk—I don’t mean stalk, I mean send postcards to on a regular basis in the hopes of being called in for a co-star—for a year. I belong to The Actor’s Network and I love that organization so much. I’m in a power group where a group of us get together monthly and share our successes and what we’re working on. Often times, someone will have a success and they’ll say, “Such-and-such casting director called me in for a co-star role on NYPD Blue and that’s because I’ve been sending them postcards every three weeks for a year and a half!” On the one hand, I’m really happy for them, but on the other hand I’m going, “A year and a half of postcards?” Just the heartache of when you put that stamp on—again—and you go, “Please call me in.” It’s just tough. But you have to detach from that. The point is, there’s always something to be done. There’s a play to audition for, there’s a play to self-produce, there’s agents to attempt to meet, there’s the voiceover world to get into, there’s improv, there’s classes, there’s recitals, there’s open mic nights, anything! There’s tons of things here in LA.
What made you choose Los Angeles?
It was the numbers. I thought: “This is where—by far—the largest percentage of the work is, so I will be here too.” I think a key to keeping ahold of yourself and your sanity and your happiness while pursuing something that can be very discouraging is to have something creative that you control, that comes from you, that is your artwork that you love doing for no other reason than you love doing it. That’s what’s enabled me to keep going because I have that. I have my one-woman show, which I created and produced and have built up from the ground since I started writing it in ’94. I started workshopping it in ’98 and had the official world premiere run at the Odyssey in 2003. That show has been really great and I feel so wonderful about what I’ve created. I also love my work at ACME Comedy Theatre with the sketch comedy company. I simply love performing and writing sketch comedy.
Who are your favorite actors?
I love Jeff Goldblum. He’s so cracked. He’s off-kilter and he’s himself. Meryl Streep blows me away. I know everyone says that but, my God, she reinvents herself. She’s always fresh. No matter how many times you see her, she’s fresh and real. She’s just astonishing. I work with Ed Marques at ACME and he is free and fearless—a genius one-in-a-million clown. Alex Alexander is an inventive actress that I also work with at ACME. She’s a brilliant comedienne with great timing. Charlotte Rampling has quiet depth and vigor. And William H. Macy has amazing range. Everything he does is organic and believable, whether he’s playing a wimp or a tyrant.
This interview was conducted on October 5, 2004, and it originally appeared in Acting Qs: Conversations with Working Actors by Bonnie Gillespie and Blake Robbins, available at Amazon.