When I played Lady Day, I took Aba onstage with me as a joke. He started singing—in tune!—and the audience loved it. Eartha Kitt, when asked what tricks her poodle did.
When I stopped touring in the early '80s for a few years, it was a mistake looking back. I lost touch with my audience in a way and I think that was a bad career move.
I think that if I would talk on a political subject, if I talk about it, it would divide the audience on that issue. That's not my issue.
The evil of storytelling is you're trying to make the audience complicit in murder - 'Kill the guy! Jump him!' And then once you've done it, it's like, 'I've killed this guy, now what?'
I usually go with roles that I find entertaining. But every once in a while, there comes along a film that has an important social message. As actors, we have a certain responsibility toward our audience.
I don't believe in lobbying only progressives and liberal members of Congress. I don't believe in doing interviews only with those who share my views. I want to reach a wider audience.
The shows at the Hilton are the most exciting shows I've ever done. The stage is huge, but the theater is intimate, so we can have a magnificent production and still connect with the audience.
Bernie Mac is relentless. That's one thing I like about him. He's not PC. He doesn't care what you think. He's going out there to please that audience.
The highest of highs is to have a new routine that you're just breaking in and that's working, and that's - you're one step removed doing a situation comedy because you have a live audience there.
I think it was when I was 12 when I entered a singing competition. I sang my own original song for an audience of 1,000 people.
I mean it allowed me to do that which was fantastic because we really get to see the character mature and deal with some things that are, that I think as an audience member, really pull us in.
You can go from doing something quite silly to something dead serious in the blink of an eye, and if you're making those connections with your audience then they're going to go right along with it.
When I first started in rock, I had a big guy's audience for my early records. I had a very straight image, particularly through the mid '80s.
Australians just don't see that many Australian films, but it's also our responsibility as filmmakers and the responsibility of the funding bodies to remember that audiences want to be entertained, and people are entertained in lots of different ways...
When I sing, I pick out people in the audience and pinpoint on them. So if you feel that I am singing just for you, you may be right!
7th Heaven is quite a hit for them now, and they are hoping to appeal to a very similar audience with our show; skewed slightly older I guess, since it's a 9:00 to 10:00 show.
It was my contention that opera can not only pay for itself if it is well given, but it can also command a much wider audience if given like a play with lots of rehearsals and wonderful singers that fit the role.
Inside of all the makeup and the character and makeup, it's you, and I think that's what the audience is really interested in... you, how you're going to cope with the situation, the obstacles, the troubles that the writer put in front of you.
I know if I stopped hosting 'Wine Library TV,' we'd probably lose 75 percent of our audience, but the remaining 25 percent is still a big number.
It's absolutely physically demanding to play the role of Wolverine. There's a lot of action, and I try to do as much of it as I can because it's better for the audience.
The reason that you dance and sing is to make the audience feel like they're dancing and singing. As long as you're having fun with it and giving it 100 percent, they're gonna feel that.
