Tramell Tillman

I Survived Theatre School

Intro: Boz is done taking care of people and also she booked a national commercial. Did Gina use the word fatuous correctly?
Let Me Run This By You: Tread documentary, tales of revenge.
Interview: We talk to Severance's Tramell Tillman about the University of Tennessee, ongoing racial disparities in conservatories, wanting to be an orthopedic surgeon and trying advertising before realizing he was meant to be an actor, Xavier University of Louisiana, Hunters with Al Pacino, Howard University, graduating Summa Cum Laude from Jackson State University, Alpha Phi Alpha fraternity, Dr. Mark G. Hendersen, mentors, Jed Diamond, The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee, micro and macro racial aggressions, The Great Society at Lincoln Center, Brian Cox, the unknown harrowing adventures that sometimes accompany auditions and callbacks, making Ben Stiller laugh, Dan Erickson, being self-possessed, Rachel Tenner, Tigran Babadjanian, having the biggest break of your life two months before a global pandemic, Sarah Edwards, Doug Ellin's Ramble On pilot with Kevin Dillon, Kevin Connolly of Entourage.
FULL TRANSCRIPT (unedited):
2 (10s):
And I'm Gina Pulice

1 (11s):
We went to theater school together. We survived it, but we didn't quite understand.

2 (15s):
At 20 years later, we're digging deep talking to our guests about their experiences and trying to make sense of it all.

1 (21s):
We survived theater school and you will too. Are we famous yet?

3 (35s):
Tell us

1 (37s):
I, and she'll never listen to this. So I had like this really hard thing with my sister in terms of, oh, it's just hard. Family stuff is hard. You know, I am just really working hard in therapy to work through some of the trauma that I experienced. And some of it is directly related to things that my sister did. And I'm not saying I didn't do shit either. I'm not saying that I am saying that I don't want to go to Chicago for two to four, my niece's graduation. And I told her, and my niece is like, don't come, I'm moving there in two months. Don't I'm

3 (1m 14s):
Thinking she's coming

1 (1m 15s):
To LA. My sister wanted me there for her, but here's the thing in order for that to happen, you have to have, as we know, emotional shit in the bank for someone to want to come and do the thing for you, when the person graduating doesn't want you there or doesn't care. And it's not enough, I don't have it in me. And I, and I just said that cause, and I said, if you want to talk, she said, you know, it's been on my heart to it's all texts. It's never a call, but on my heart to tell you that I'm really sad that you're not coming. And I said, oh, we're opening the door to what's on our heart. Okay, great. I had been working through all this shit in therapy. And if you want to talk about it, great, if not, but just suffice it to say, it's not a good time for me to come.

1 (2m 0s):
I am dumb taking care of people. I just, I love California. I will get on a plane for certain things. If you needed me to get on a plane, I would be on a plane in two seconds. If you Sasha and Chrissy needed me, I would go on a plane. But I am not because there's stuff in the bank account of love and life. I get it. I trust it. I have been taken care of. And so I am willing now to take care of back, but you, I I'm. So I'm just so like, yeah, I'm done. I'm done trying to take care of people that have, that have done no caretaking. Like I can't, I'm not going to do it

3 (2m 38s):
To get

1 (2m 39s):
It's that how life is. So she, she, she did not write back. She did not write back and that's okay. That is okay. Like I, you know, it's interesting. It's like, oh, people want to talk about feelings. Oh, wait, I could sit. I love talking about feelings. Let's go. But what I'm not gonna do is pretend.

3 (2m 56s):
Yeah. And honestly, like, without really knowing whether this is true, I just feel like sometimes when people say things like it's been on my heart, I just feel like you're just aping something that you heard, somebody else say you don't even really know what that means. Like if you really took a minute to look at what's on your heart, you know, you might, instead of it just being like, I'm disappointed in something you did, you would really be trying to

1 (3m 20s):
Figure out why

3 (3m 21s):
The dynamic that led to this situation

1 (3m 24s):
Anyway. So I just have to do what I have to do, you know? So, okay. So the, the, the commercial was really fun. So part of the,

3 (3m 35s):
I think, believe that was fun. Like, you know, that's the thing that you don't really expect us to be as fun,

1 (3m 40s):
Super fun. And I'll tell you why it is completely not about as we know the thing that's happening. It is about what is happening inside of us while we're doing the thing. And I really well, first of all, you know, to be very transparent, like there's no lines. So my phobia is about forgetting lines and being ashamed and then wanting to die and having the whole production throw like pitchforks at me. Right? Like that is my, so there's no lights. So I know that that's not going to happen. So like, I'm starting from a better place. And then my, you know, it's, it's an early call, which is great for me. Cause then you don't sit around and think, and everyone was lovely.

1 (4m 20s):
Like everyone, because I was reflecting back to my theater school time. Right. And my first job out of theater school was working on early edition. Oh no. ER was the first one, I think an E R was a nightmare for me, because of all the things we talk about on this podcast, I was insecure. I was a jerk because I was insecure, but mostly I was just straight up so insecure that everything I did was tinge with a horrible, like feeling right. And that comes through like, no people feel that shit. Right. So even if you hide it, so I don't have that now. Oh, I might have, if we hadn't done this podcast and I might have, if there were a lot of lines and like, I was really felt pressure, but what I felt was like, oh, I, I, it was my first experience in a long time of feeling like I am a part of a...