Interview: Get to Know KIMBERLY AKIMBO's Alli Mauzey & Why Victoria Clark Says She's an 'Inspiration'

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During the second act of Kimberly Akimbo, eagle-eyed fans may notice that Alli Mauzey, playing the character of Pattie, switches the leg brace she is wearing from one leg to the other between scenes. The move is missed by the vast majority of the audience and it's possible some who do catch it may think it an accident. But for Mauzey it has meaning. It saves her hips, but it also adds another layer to the character: Pattie, already established as a hypochondriac, is so much of one that she could easily forget which leg the brace belongs on.

It was Mauzey's idea, the type of idea much easier to implement when originating a role, something Mauzey hasn't done on Broadway since her Theatre World Award-winning performance as Lenora in Cry-Baby 15 years ago. In the interim she has worked fairly consistently--New York Times reviews have praised her "lungs of steal" and "offbeat comic timing"--but in Kimberly Akimbo she has gotten to do what she likes to do most, truly shape a role.

"Originating a role is the best," she said in a recent interview. "It's the dream. It's when I get to be my most creative."

Though on paper this particular role might not be a dream role. Without giving too much away, Mauzey's character isn't traditionally sympathetic. Mauzey--physically limited by two arm casts and a fake pregnancy belly the entire show--plays the mother of Kimberly, a teenager stricken with a fictional aging disease that makes Kimberly appear 72 and will prematurely take her life. Pattie is a pregnant, paranoid, narcissistic hypochondriac who loves her first-born daughter, but not exactly in the way one would hope. Yet you don't hate her.

"Alli is able to find remarkably steady ground in her portrayal as a grieving mother who covers up her own fear and grief with obsession, humor, denial and egotism," lauded Victoria Clark, who plays the titular character in the acclaimed musical. "What is clearly underneath all of that is a soul deeply yearning for more time with her child. I don't know how she does it every night, but she simultaneously breaks my heart and then repairs it with her ingenuity, wit and uncanny sense of humor. Her private moments of singing are exquisite, particularly 'Father Time,' which I am privileged to listen to from under the covers in Kim's bed across the stage. Every night it's a revelation."

Pattie is a departure from the perkier characters Mauzey has tackled. The Anaheim Hills, California native--who in high school struggled with whether to try for a professional soccer career or an acting career--was a recent NYU graduate when she made her Broadway debut in 2003 as one of the nicest kids in town, Brenda in Hairpsray. She still considers it a career highlight, though she has had many larger roles since, including her next one, Glinda in Wicked. Wicked would be her on-again-off-again home for several years, though it wasn't clear that would be the case during her first short stint as a standby. She would soon leave for Cry-Baby.

It is hard to remember knowing what we know now, but anticipation for Cry-Baby was high. Launched after Hairspray was already a hit, it was thought that the next John Waters movie-turned-musical would be the same. And throughout the development process, word was that Mauzey, playing the off-kilter Lenora since the first reading, was the standout.

"I got to be so creative during that time," she said. "I was on cloud nine in a lot of ways."

Much of what made the eccentric, erratic character so memorable was touches she added. Lenora talking to her imaginary friends was a Mauzey contribution. Her character's signature song, "Screw Loose," also sounded the way it did because of her. Composer Adam Schlesinger, a Broadway neophyte, did not write sheet music for the piece, so the cast was learning the music by ear, based on a demo. The version of "Screw Loose" on the demo was all in one octave and really low. With approval, she modified it.

"I worked on it with my voice teacher out in LA and we were talking about the character and we were both like: 'It needs to go somewhere. It's Broadway,'" she explained. "So I just scooped up. I just switched from one note up to the next note up an octave, so that's why all that high belty stuff is in it. On some level it's vocally exciting, but it is also great for that character, who has a screw loose. It sounds insane."

"I found her to always be game for anything in our comedy science experiment," said Christopher J. Hanke, whose number with Mauzey was a highlight of Cry-Baby's second act. "What about this joke? What about slapping each other across the face? Let's pop up from behind the bushes a beat later tonight! She was up for it all. Her mind was always churning with ideas while being always open to others."

However, Cry-Baby ended up to be one of those shows where people are so focused on analyzing the problems with the show itself that the actors get somewhat lost. Mauzey won a San Diego Theatre Critics Circle Award for her performance during the musical's tryout at La Jolla Playhouse, a Theatre World Award when it was on Broadway and performed her solo on Regis and Kelly and elsewhere. But, despite some positive attributes, Cry-Baby was not truly a launching pad for anyone. It closed in a few months. (It was not even recorded until years later; a recording Mauzey calls "bittersweet" because only the original principals were asked to participate.)

Luckily, Mauzey had Wicked to cushion the blow. Over the years, she played Glinda on tour, in San Francisco and on Broadway. She said it was a "slow burn" to make it her own, citing screaming into a pillow during "Popular" as a particularly Alli touch.

"I felt like I was being Alli at midnight not going on a ton of sleep at college," she explained. "I didn't get to watch myself, nor do I care to look at any bootleg copies, but I'm really proud of that performance. In a lot of ways, it fit me like a glove because I get to be silly and funny, but oftentimes those roles don't always get to sing really awesome soprano stuff. And that has always been my wheelhouse of singing. So, I was able to bring equally both of those things to that role."

Mauzey received acclaim for her performance. And, for years, she kept leaving to do other gigs and returning to the land of Oz, proving she was clearly well-liked by the team. Actually, Mauzey is one of those people whom others go out of their way to say nice things about on both professional and personal levels. Clark, a Tony Award-winning veteran, stated she relies on Mauzey's "steady gaze and fearless portrayal as inspiration and fuel." There is no shortage of laudatory quotes about her.

"Alli Mauzey is a beautiful stealth bomber," praised Julia Murney, who costarred with Mauzey in Wicked and has performed with her in concerts around the country. "She's so ridiculously funny that there were times when I would have to look away from her when we did Wicked together so that I wouldn't crack up onstage. She makes comedic choices that are so out of the box and make you never want to look at the box again. And if that isn't enough, then she gives you the one-two punch, with the most sky high, clarion soprano that is seemingly effortless. She holds the last note of 'I Could Have Danced All Night' clear into the next day. Her voice is so facile, it makes me mad."

The types of people who receive such universal praise are often those that drink the Kool-Aid, the ones that are so overwhelmingly positive about everything it's impossible to ding them. But that is not who Mauzey is. Although she has a positive attitude, she also has a sense of realism about her projects and a critical eye as to her own work on them.

When asked about Red Eye of Love, a bizarre off-Broadway musical she starred in that is noticeably absent from her Playbill bio, she praised working with costar Josh Grisetti and director Ted Sperling (who also directed her in the New York Philharmonic Show Boat), but couldn't think of much else good to say.

"Honestly, it was one of those things that I genuinely wanted to start the show as Alli and go speak to the audience and let them know what they were getting into, and tell them if they would like to exit now, I genuinely would not be offended," she laughed. "That's exactly how I felt--I felt like I owed some apologies."

On her stint replacing Jennifer Simard as Ernestina in the hit revival of Hello, Dolly!, she lauded the company and production, but still isn't sure she was the right fit for the role.

Although it may be that she is her own toughest critic. Of her first Encores! engagement in It's a Bird... It's a Plane... It's Superman, in which she had the score's best-known song, "You've Got Possibilities," she said she felt "insecure" and "under-rehearsed." She still received positive notices.

"A sheer delight to work with, Alli has a terrific sense of humor and her laughter in rehearsals was infectious," stated Superman director John Rando. "She seemed to do it all so effortlessly; from the first notes she sang of the song 'You've Got Possibilities,' I realized it was a perfect marriage of actress with material."

Now a mother of a six-year-old son, with all the early morning and after-school chaos that entails, Mauzey is thrilled to be originating a role again. Mauzey has been with Kimberly Akimbo since a fall 2019 workshop that was supposed to precede a 2020 Atlantic Theater Company engagement.

"That was like a glimmer of hope for me during the pandemic," she said. "I gave up my lease in New York and I was living in California for six months and then in North Carolina near my husband's family. I didn't want to not be in New York, but there was nothing going on. When Atlantic kept it in their season, as everything got postponed, I was like: 'Okay. This is going to get me and my family back to New York and back on our feet.' So the weight of Kimberly Akimbo for me on a personal level was kind of deep in that way."

On a lighter note, the experience is joyful. Mauzey enjoys vocal warm-ups on empty (or almost empty) subway cars on the trip in from Queens. She raved about how fun it is "to curse those beautiful curse words that David Lindsay-Abaire has given" her, how she has "full trust in" director Jessica Stone and how well the company gets along.

Plus, she is "pinching [herself] because [she's] actually on a Jeanine Tesori cast recording." This is true even though the score does not showcase her full vocal range. Her solos--all in the first act--consist of a humorous talk-sing song, its brief reprise and a heartbreaking lullaby, "Father Time."

"I told Vicki Clark at some point, I thought it was bizarre I didn't have anything vocally demanding," Mauzey said. "She was like: 'Live it up!' But I felt like an imposter or something. Honestly, though, I gave in to the show. I think the show, as a whole, stands on its own."

And Mauzey adores the show. She knows not everyone loves her character, but she sees the humanity in Pattie.

"I've been searching and craving for something messier and unpolished, maybe even something that isn't so pretty," she said. "I've played a lot of likable characters. This feels more like real life. Pattie is struggling and isn't doing it gracefully. As a parent myself, what Pattie is going through with her child is my own biggest fear in life. I can't say I would handle it gracefully either. My heart breaks for her as a mother."

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