PRHMUSIC&ART
Artist Spotlight:
ZACHARY JAMES
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by Brenda Hillegas photo by Matt Madison-Clark
Philadelphia resident Zachary James has appeared across the globe in many of the world’s opera houses. The stage and screen actor’s credits also include South Pacific and The Addams Family on Broadway and television hits like 30 Rock and the recent Murphy Brown reboot. This September, for Opera Philadelphia, Zachary sang the role of The Cook in Sergei Prokofiev’s The Love for Three Oranges. Up next, he will be making his Metropolitan
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Opera debut as The Scribe in Akhnaten, an opera written by the American composer Philip Glass that focuses on the life and religious convictions of the Egyptian pharaoh Akhnaten. The opera will broadcast live around the world this November. RowHome sat down for a Q&A with Zachary to find out more about his background in opera, his favorite Philly spots and learning how to juggle for his role in Akhnaten!
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Q: Where did opera begin for you? What made you say “this is what I want to do”?
a: Gosh. It was a total fluke. I was studying musical theatre and not loving it as much as I thought I would and my voice teacher said we were going to switch gears to opera. I was about to drop out of school and she changed my course. Q: What is your background in opera? Where did you study?
a: I studied at Ithaca College and got a musical theatre degree, but focused on opera privately. I’m glad in the end that I studied theatre as I got intense acting, movement and dance training which is not included in conservatory voice programs. It’s occasionally tough because I didn’t get the diction, language and music theory training of many of my opera colleagues but I got a leg up in the performance practice arena and have ended up having a versatile career in many genres. Q: What has been your favorite stage and/ or TV role to date?
a: I haven’t done a ton of TV but I got to play a federal agent named Carl on 30 Rock opposite Steve Martin and Tina Fey. Zero complaints there. I also recently played the head
| ROWHOME MAGAZINE | October / November / December 2019
Secret Serviceman to Mike Pence on Murphy Brown. Murphy was my FAVORITE show as a kid so it was pretty surreal to be a part of the final episode of that series. Playing Lurch in the original cast of The Addams Family on Broadway was also a huge moment that I’ll take with me forever.
Q: Tell us about Akhnaten, which plays at the Metropolitan Opera. What’s the storyline of the show and tell us a bit about your role?
a: Akhnaten is about the great controversial pharaoh who declared Egypt a monotheistic society. This is pre-Moses, so the idea of one god only was pretty radical. People hated him and wiped him out of history until he was discovered again through artifacts relatively recently. The show follows the rise and fall gohomephilly.com