Theater veteran Paul Myrvold manages day job and acting
Gilroy resident Paul Myrvold is no stranger to the stage. He
started acting at Willow Glen High and majored in drama at San Jose
State University. He has acted in dozens of plays, including taking
the stage as Don Quixote/Miguel de Cervantes six times, most
recently with The Western Stage in Salinas in 2002.
Theater veteran Paul Myrvold manages day job and acting
Gilroy resident Paul Myrvold is no stranger to the stage. He started acting at Willow Glen High and majored in drama at San Jose State University. He has acted in dozens of plays, including taking the stage as Don Quixote/Miguel de Cervantes six times, most recently with The Western Stage in Salinas in 2002.
His latest incarnation is as Caldwell B. Cladwell, the villain in “Urinetown: The Musical.” In Urinetown, water is so scarce the Cladwell has come up with a scheme to charge people to use a private lavatory. But citizens revolt when they realize they deserve the right to pee for free.
Myrvold shared his history with acting, balancing his stage career with his day job and writing film reviews with the Pinnacle.
Q: Tell us about your show “Urinetown: The Musical.”
A: “Urinetown: The Musical” came out of nowhere to storm first Off -Off Broadway, then Off Broadway and then took Tony awards on Broadway and ran for over two years. It’s just about the perfect musical with a smart serio-comic script that cunningly satirizes the social, political, cultural and ecological conditions of today. It is as current as tomorrow. And while making you laugh it also stimulates you to think.
Q: In “Urinetown,” you play villain Caldwell B. Cladwell. What is the most challenging or fun part of playing a villain?
A: Well, it’s always fun to play a villain and Cladwell is an over the top “mwah-hah-hah” type of villain. Yet, as I play him, he is complex. He’s street thug with a veneer of polish, a pure romantic who has rejected love, a pathetically doting father, and a sociopathic, contemptuous greed hog with total disdain for others. Cross Mussolini with Ken Lay and add a dash of Mack The Knife and voilá-Caldwell B. Cladwell.
Q: How did you get started working in theater?
A: I took a drama class at Willow Glen High and fell in total love with the theatre. I did several nice roles and it was as I was painting age lines on my mug trying to make my 17 year-old face look forty for the role of Sandor the Bookie in “Bells Are Ringing” that I realized, ‘This is what I want to do with my life.’ Next fall I was a drama major at San Jose State University.
Q: What has been your favorite show or role throughout your career?
A: No doubt there. I have played the role of Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes six times over the past 35 years most recently at Saint Mary’s College in Moraga (1997), Gavilan College (1999) and The Western Stage (2002)
Q: How do you balance your full-time job with performing in theater productions?
A: It isn’t so much balancing as time management. Since I usually rise at 5 a.m. to teach welding to juvenile offenders at William F. James Boys Ranch and usually rehearsal and performances are in the evening, my bedtime is close to midnight. A two-hour afternoon nap is essential. And my over-burdened wife, Sylvia, loyally picks up the slack. It’s not easy.
Q: You write film reviews for “Out and About” magazine. How do you choose what films to review?
A: I keep a close ear to the ground about upcoming films and only go to films I think will interest both my readers and me. Any one can find their own way to the latest big time blockbusters but sometimes need the smaller, most interesting films, like “Brick,” for example, pointed out. Haven’t heard of it? Check it out. I only write about films I like.
Q: Do you view films and theater productions differently?
A: Suffice it say that both are temporal arts that tell a story, either fiction or documentary or a blend of both over a unit of time. For a critic, the performance is (with everything that goes along with it – the script, the score, the production values and much more) the focus. The reviewer must say how well or poorly that job is done in an entertaining way that holds the readers’ attention. It’s more similar than different.
Urinetown: The Musical
Playing at the San Jose Stage Company, 490 South First St., San Jose. For more information, visit www.sanjosestage.com or call 408-283-7142
Upcoming performances:
Saturday, July 1 at 8 p.m.
Sunday, July 2 at 2 p.m.
Tickets are $33 – $45.
