NR: Have you tried to add your own little touches to Percy? It must be hard since you don't do it often.

PF: Yeah, I have. I'm more of a comedian than I am a hero or a singer, so I totally go the route of some of his comedy. As far as my own personal touches, I don't think there's anything specific as much as when you put a different person in a role, then obviously you're going to have differences between people. I think Ron's created the perfect hero type. You watch Ron in that role and it's like watching a superhero. I find that admirable. Then I think about Douglas and the mix of romantic and comedy. So, I think there's something there for everybody. There are personal touches but I wouldn't be able to point them out specifically. Ron and I have never talked about this, but I think the thing I concentrate on the most when I'm in the part is the love for Marguerite. Throughout the entire show you can really tell that he's struggling with all of this love he has for his wife and not being able to give it to her until the footbridge. Then he goes into high gear wanting to make sure that love works out. That's about it. I'm sure there are things if you were to watch it.

NR: Actually, I did see you and I was surprised because I thought you were very similar to Ron's interpretation. I was wondering if you had rehearsed together over the summer.

PF: Well, yeah. The understudies got called in the same time they did. A lot of it is dictated by our director, Bobby (Longbottom) who's asked for a certain feel to the show.

NR: Bryan was very different from Douglas in a lot of ways, but again, he did the role something like forty times. When I saw you, I wondered if Bobby was being stricter now, or if Bryan just got away with things.

PF: I don't think it's a question of being strict as much as Bobby knew, when he started with this cast, that he had a fresh company. Before anybody started doing their own thing, he really set a very solid foundation of where the entire company came from and where the story was being told from. He was very clear about that - what the story was and who was telling it when, so that ensemble member, lead, we all knew where the story was going to go. I thought that was pretty great.

NR: You're Wedding Album, or any of these. How does that come together? Can you take me through the process?

PF: As far as directing?

NR: Yeah. Are you doing several at a time?

PF: Well, I've never done more than one at a time but they sort of bump up back to back. It's very interesting how a new play or musical gets started. You have to find the right people at the right time. It's just like the business. Everything ultimately will come down to timing...and money. I actually saw a reading of A Wedding Album two years ago and it was great. Some friends of mine were in it, and they're in the show now. They knew it was time to do it for people in New York for money. So, like with any new play or new musical, you put your cast together and get your director, and then it's all about press and getting the right people there. It's who knows this person and who knows the producers of this show. You try to find producers that produce things that are similar to the thing you're doing. So, we started looking at a lot of Off Broadway producers thinking that would be the way to go. Once you get the reading up and running, you try to check with people and see how they like it. We actually did have somebody like it so we are going ahead with a very small production of it in February I believe. That's the next step. We'll put up a very scaled down production of it, at a theater here in town for a month, Tuesday through Sunday. That will be the hard sell. That's when we go...instead of putting all of our eggs into one night like that night at The Lambs, we then have a month to bring several producers to it. (Note: Peter has since told me that his production of A Wedding Album will be performed at a New York theater from February 3 - 20. Further details will be posted on The Scarlet Pimpernel Message Board and through the League.)

NR: Will that be open to the public?

PF: Oh, yeah. Absolutely. They want to come and see a typical night. I really think that something like A Wedding Album has really sturdy legs. I think it will sell.

NR: The night I saw it, there were a lot of actors in the audience and it seemed like there were a lot of inside jokes in the show.

PF: There were. Especially in A Wedding Album, there are a lot of theater references.

NR: Is that something that was just there for that night, for that audience, or would they include those jokes for a general audience?

PF: They would put them for a general audience.

NR: Would a general audience get them?

PF: Sometimes yes, sometimes no. What I like about a play like A Wedding Album...somebody came up to me afterwards and said, "I knew there were inside jokes about theater in it, but I felt like there were inside jokes for everybody - married people, anybody who's ever gotten married and planned a wedding, been a part of a wedding, that sort of thing." As much as there were theater jokes, there were also jokes for other people, and you sort of space them along evenly. My fun that night was watching this clump of people laugh at something and two or three seconds later it sort of rippled through the audience as people got it. That's just the best. That's what you hope for. If the audience isn't going to fall out together laughing, then five or six people here or there will get it, and then all of a sudden people start thinking, "What was that?" So, those jokes would definitely be in there for a general audience and it's just luck of the draw. Inside jokes become dangerous when a play's made of them and I don't think that's the case with A Wedding Album.

NR: Do you prefer directing over acting?

PF: Oh, that's a tough question. I did...until I did this show! (laughs)

NR: It helps that this is your Broadway debut.

PF: Yes, exactly, so it's that childhood dream fulfilled. It's playing a swashbuckler who also gets to be a clown.

NR: And you get that audience response that's just for you.

PF: Absolutely. And that single bow...when my parents came I thought they were going to fall over when they saw just me on stage for that final bow.

I think ultimately I will end up doing more directing than performing. If anything, because there's just something indescribably wonderful about starting with a seed of an idea - a thought or a script for a playwright, and having a perfect idea of where I want to go with it, seeing how it could be on stage. And then collaborating with designers and actors and producers and, in the best of all possible worlds, having all of them say, "Yes, I see where you're going, but what if we did this?" Then all of a sudden, I get what I thought I was going to get at the very end, but in a way that looks completely different than I thought, or with people that I didn't know I was going to have. Ultimately it's the collaboration that just turns me on and gets me out of bed every day thinking, "I'm going to work with some great people today and I wonder where we're going to end up at the end." There's nothing like it.

Interview conducted and photographs by Nancy Rosati.