Laurie Metcalf Reveals Her Pre-Show Ritual for Three Tall Women | Playbill

Broadway News Laurie Metcalf Reveals Her Pre-Show Ritual for Three Tall Women For the Tony winner and Oscar nominee, the play begins long before the house lights go down.

Laurie Metcalf visited daytime hosts Kelly Ripa and Ryan Seacrest to talk about her whirlwind year—earning an Oscar nod for Lady Bird, returning to her Emmy-winning role with the reboot of Roseanne, and coming back to Broadway in Three Tall Women.

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Laurie Metcalf Brigitte Lacombe

The Tony winner shared that she never stops working on a play, even at the most basic level. “I make myself go through all of my lines all by myself,” she says. “I used to do it down on the set. Go through all my lines as the ushers are stuffing programs and the lighting guys are tweaking things. But now I lock myself in my dressing room and I just rapidly go through all the lines. It's just a good mental warm-up.”

FLIP THROUGH PHOTOS OF METCALF AND HER CO-STARS IN THREE TALL WOMEN

It might seem like a lot, but Metcalf says that Edward Albee’s script is a tough one. ”In Three Tall Women the dialogue is very glib and rapid fire ... so if there’s just a little hiccup it's magnified because it’s so noticeable.” Watch the full interview above.

Metcalf won her Tony in 2017 for her work in A Doll's House, Part 2 by Lucas Hnath. She made her Broadway debut in 1995 in My Thing of Love and did not return to the stage until 2008 with November, directed by Joe Mantello (who directs Three Tall Women); the show marked her first Tony nomination. She was in the short-lived revival of Brighton Beach Memoirs before earning a second Tony nomination for The Other Place in 2013. She starred in Misery in 2015—her third nomination.

Hear what Metcalf had to say after her opening night of Three Tall Women on Broadway:

 
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