Along with some very fashionable real ones, multi-hyphenated artist Alan Cumming wears a lot of figurative hats. The novelist, memoirist, film and stage actor has also starred in several broadcast and streaming shows where he gets to say the word “murder” in a variety of accents. He’s been nominated for multiple Emmys, won a best actor Tony Award for Cabaret and a best musical Tony as a producer of A Strange Loop. He co-owns the thriving New York alternative performance venue, Club Cumming. Yet, with all the ways audiences can access Cumming’s work, he still strives to bring the performances to us, touring several cabaret and concert shows over the years.
When I had the chance to speak to Cumming before his big Texas journey, I had to ask what is the touring allure. His immediate answer was love.
“There’s really something fun about arriving in a city, doing your show, connecting with an audience. It’s always nice to feel the different energies of different place” he says with genuine cheer. “And then to go out on the town, or explore a place, it’s like dropping down in a parachute into somewhere, a sort of show biz parachute. You do your stuff and then you get whisked off again the next day. I really love it. It’s a nice way to explore America and explore different parts of the country.”
When I asked how he can keep two different touring shows plus all his other current creative projects organized in his head, he says the trick is focus.
“I have lots of things going on, and you have to be very in the moment and focus on that one thing. Then you change over to do something else, focus on that. You kind of just stay in the moment. That’s the best way to be, in life and in work.”
For all the cabaret and concert shows he’s created Cumming says it’s not one song or story he begins with but a subject that he wants to explore, usually something that touches his own life.
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Allan Cumming in Alan Cumming Is Not Acting His Age. Photo by Danny Kahn and courtesy of the artist.
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Allan Cumming in Alan Cumming Is Not Acting His Age. Photo by Danny Kahn and courtesy of the artist.
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Allan Cumming in Alan Cumming Is Not Acting His Age. Photo by Danny Kahn and courtesy of the artist.
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Allan Cumming in Alan Cumming Is Not Acting His Age. Photo by Danny Kahn and courtesy of the artist.
“I was fascinated by the notion of us getting older and why we’ve decided that’s absolutely the worst thing that can happen to us, when in fact of course it’s going to. Every second of your life, you’re aging.”
With that theme in mind he then began putting together a song list about time and getting older.
“Then there’s usually a deadline, and I’ve got to get my shit together. So I work with my musical director to get the songs in order first and then I weave my stories in and out of them.”
Like many writers, Cumming begins to understand what his own thoughts are on a subject as he puts the piece together and then brings it to early audiences where it continues to evolve.
“You come round to what the real point of the show is for you through both writing and also the early performances of it.”
What he’s learned is that this show goes back to something that h always tries to do with his work, not to judge but instead to inspire people to be who they want to be.
Cumming seems to always have a multitude of projects going at any one time, and in between the creation of Not Acting His Age and fully touring the show, he practiced that age-defying philosophy by co-creating and starring in a dance theater piece Burn about Scottish poet Robert Burn. When I asked if either show had informed the other, he said yes.
“That’s a real example of what my show’s about. At age 57, I decided to basically become a dancer and to do this solo show.,” he says with humor, adding. “I’d always danced in things, but I’d never done anything like this. But I thought, why not. And people let me.”
Perhaps the secret to not acting your age and thriving is also having the wisdom to know we might have to pay for those age-rebellious acts but still going for it. He says the recovery time after Burn was longer than it would have been if he was a little younger.
Those body aches eventually stopped with Burn’s closing, but listening to Cumming it is obvious for that show and perhaps this latest cabaret creation, the rewards of continuing to do live performances at any age is worth the price.
After finishing doing the Cabaret revival in 2015, he says he remembers thinking, “I’ll never be asked to do anything like this, I’ll never be this fit again. I’ll never be asked to dance again. But I thought I’ve got one more thing in me. So I put that out to the universe to manifest. I’m very like that. I go into things with an open heart. And usually it’s all worked out. Like I say about not acting your age: stay curious, stay open to the possibility of life.”
-TARRA GAINES
