Carol Mayo Jenkins Knoxnews.com Interview 2013

Editor’s Note: The News Sentinel continues its monthly question-and-answer series profiling area artists with actress Carol Mayo Jenkins. Tonight the Knoxville native receives the Clarence Brown Theatre Society Achievement Award. The award from the Clarence Brown Theatre advisory board recognizes professional excellence associated with the University of Tennessee theater’s mission.

Jenkins trained at the Central School of Speech and Drama in London and was one of the founders of the Drama Centre of London theater school. In the United States she joined the American Conservatory Theatre in San Francisco and debuted on Broadway as Natasha in Chekhov’s “Three Sisters.” Other Broadway appearances include “Oedipus Rex” with Knoxville native John Cullum and”First Monday in October” with Henry Fonda. She may be best known for her television role as English teacher Elizabeth Sherwood in the award-winning 1980s show “Fame.” Jenkins toured the United States, Lithuania, and Russia playing Martha in “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf “ directed by the show playwright Edward Albee. She now lives in Knoxville and is a resident artist at Clarence Brown.

When did you realize you wanted to be an actor?

“I think basically I was just a big show-off. My dream was to be a dancer, and I started ballet with Miss Annie McGee when I was about 4. But I also took acting lessons with Emily Faust and more dance with Suzanne Moore. But I was never very good at dance, and it hurt, so the turning point was when I was in my first play “The Petrified Forest” with John Cullum in the Carousel Theatre. I loved every minute of it but I also knew that Johnny had something I didn’t have. That would have been a great blazing talent but what I saw was his total ease and his imaginative ability to BE that character and BE in that world and take me and the audience with him. I wanted more than anything to be able to do that so I figured I’d better go learn how. Johnny does that quite naturally; for me it’s a lifetime’s work.”

You’ve livedw in London, San Francisco, Los Angeles and toured in countries that include Russia and Lithuania. What drew you back to your native East Tennessee?

“Mainly to be with my mother because it was time. But the decision was made much easier by the fact that I am able to work here — teach at the university and work in the Clarence Brown Theatre.”

If you could live anywhere else but Knoxville, where would it be?

“No idea. I love East Tennessee — I love the mountains and the water. It is home and I feel safe here.”

Pick your top three favorite roles and tell us why you remember them fondly.

“Oh, that’s really hard. One was certainly Martha in ‘Who’s Afraid of Virginia Wolfe’ because I was directed by Edward Albee whom I love dearly...,I spent almost two years with Martha. She is a big part of my life. I loved all my Shakespeare roles... Olivia, Beatrice, Regan, Helena... perhaps Lady Macbeth the most. I love playing fighters maybe because I’m not much of one myself. Oh, and Ruth in ‘Collected Stories’ by Donald Margulies, which I did in California a few years ago.... complex, difficult lady.”

If there was one part you wish you’d gotten, what is it?

“They are legion. I was never an ingénue... too tall or something. But Cleopatra? Hedda Gabler? Ranyevskaya? Don’t get me started!”

It’s been a long day and you need some comfort food. What’s on your plate?

“Pasta, any kind of pasta.”

What can always make you smile?

“My mother’s smile.”

What movie do you never tire of watching?

“Oh it’s such a cliché but, yes, ‘Gone With The Wind.’”

Finish this sentence: “If I wasn’t an actress, I’d be working as ”

“My second ambition was to be an international reporter. I wanted to travel the world and talk to people and perhaps get differing cultures to understand each other. I didn’t know of her when I was young, but really I wanted to be (the late Italian journalist) Oriana Fallaci. I never would have had her courage or intellect, but it was a dream.”

What’s the best advice you can give an aspiring actress today?

“(It’s) impossible to pass on just one thought. And who am I to give advice? I think we must all find our own way, especially in the arts. With my students the best I can do is focus on each of them as individuals, give them what I know, demand that they take risks, and wish them the very best of luck.”