Latest / Kyle Meredith With... / Sabrina Impacciatore on The Paper, Carrying the Weight of The Office, and Doing the Worm

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Sabrina Impacciatore on The Paper, Carrying the Weight of The Office, and Doing the Worm · Kyle Meredith With...

• 0:00
  [SPEAKER_00]: It's easy to hear your favorite artist on WFPK from wherever you are.
• 0:03
  [SPEAKER_00]: Listen on your smart speaker, live stream from our website at WFPK.org from Louisville Public Media.
• 0:25
  [SPEAKER_02]: And it will come to another edition of Kyle Meredith with.
• 0:28
  [SPEAKER_02]: It's the interview series presented by WFPK and WFPK.org.
• 0:32
  [SPEAKER_02]: Consequence and the consequence podcast network.
• 0:36
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• 0:58
  [SPEAKER_02]: We've had some great guests here lately, Lizzie Hale, Leadingerva, Hellstorm, Drop by, Wayne Coin of the Flaming Lips,
• 1:05
  [SPEAKER_02]: The cast of Alien Earth, out now in FX, including Timothy Oliveand, Sidney Chandler, David Rizdall, and director Noah Holly.
• 1:14
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  [SPEAKER_02]: Her film, it's never over Jeff Buckley now out.
• 1:32
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• 1:34
  [SPEAKER_02]: That's just an example of what you get when you subscribe to the Kyle Meredith with podcast.
• 1:39
  [SPEAKER_02]: That's me, Kyle Meredith today talking with Sabrina impatchitory.
• 1:45
  [SPEAKER_02]: The Italian actress has been stealing scenes for decades, but U.S.
• 1:48
  [SPEAKER_02]: audiences probably know her best as the chainsmoking no nonsense hotel manager Valentina from the White Lotus season two.
• 1:57
  [SPEAKER_02]: The role that earned her an immunomination made her the patron saint of deadpan irals.
• 2:02
  [SPEAKER_02]: Before that, she built a career on Italian cinema and TV, known for playing quirky, fiery, often unpredictable characters.
• 2:11
  [SPEAKER_02]: She's also a longtime theater actor, stand up comedian, meaning her resume runs from Prestige drama to sketch comedy without breaking a sweat.
• 2:19
  [SPEAKER_02]: Basically, the rare performer who can pivot from high art to slapstick,
• 2:24
  [SPEAKER_02]: while still managing to look like she's judging you the whole time.
• 2:27
  [SPEAKER_02]: And we get all of that in her new character on the paper.
• 2:34
  [SPEAKER_02]: This is the spinoff of the office, the new sequel series.
• 2:38
  [SPEAKER_02]: And Sabrina and I are gonna dig into the pressure of stepping into one of TV's most beloved universes.
• 2:43
  [SPEAKER_02]: She'll tell me about the shaky nerves of table reads, and how her character, Esmeralda, was born out of survival instincts and innocence.
• 2:52
  [SPEAKER_02]: Sabrina is also going to share the wild story of how she accidentally convinced the showrunners to make her do the worm without knowing it was an eighties break dance move.
• 3:03
  [SPEAKER_02]: The bloody knees that followed and how her comedy and tragedy feel her acting choices.
• 3:08
  [SPEAKER_02]: All that's and more as we talk about the paper out now on peacock.
• 3:13
  [SPEAKER_02]: It's Kyle Meredith with Sabrina impatchatory.
• 3:17
  [SPEAKER_02]: I'm great.
• 3:18
  [SPEAKER_02]: It's pleasure to meet you and to congratulate you on what a fantastic first season here in the paper.
• 3:24
  [SPEAKER_03]: Wow, thank you so much.
• 3:28
  [SPEAKER_02]: I got to watch the episodes and it really is like, I'm sure you understand the weight some people are putting on to this.
• 3:38
  [SPEAKER_02]: I mean, when you have a spin off of one of the most beloved shows in history, it's like, can they do it?
• 3:44
  [SPEAKER_02]: And I gotta tell you, it's been such a pleasure watching you all pull this off.
• 3:47
  [SPEAKER_04]: oh my god that's the best thing you could tell ever you could say ever because you can imagine how anxious I was, how scared, how scared I instilled because it's still unreal and
• 4:03
  [SPEAKER_04]: You should have seen me doing the table reads, you know that every week, every Tuesday there was a table read and the script was arriving in that right moment on the table and I had to read in front of one hundred people and my legs on the table were shaking like this and most of the time I had no idea what was going on because of the language.
• 4:28
  [SPEAKER_04]: I didn't understand what was going on.
• 4:32
  [SPEAKER_04]: Oh my god, it was terrible.
• 4:34
  [SPEAKER_04]: It was terrifying, but then I can't believe I made it somehow.
• 4:37
  [SPEAKER_02]: Well, that's even more impressive because I'm just, when you were saying that, I'm thinking of some of my favorite bits from this season, like the, the body switch auditions with your sum when you're up.
• 4:49
  [SPEAKER_02]: They're shaking, you know, for being struck by lightning.
• 4:52
  [SPEAKER_02]: And the mad dance moves that you had in a catfish episode like these.
• 4:56
  [SPEAKER_04]: Oh my god, you watch this.
• 4:58
  [SPEAKER_04]: All right, I can't let you start about, I didn't watch the show.
• 5:01
  [SPEAKER_04]: So I know I hear about the show.
• 5:03
  [SPEAKER_04]: So because I'm the worst enemy of myself,
• 5:07
  [SPEAKER_04]: I had just to say a line.
• 5:09
  [SPEAKER_04]: The line was.
• 5:11
  [SPEAKER_04]: And I'm not going to do the warm while your girls look at me.
• 5:15
  [SPEAKER_04]: That was just a line.
• 5:17
  [SPEAKER_04]: But because I'm a stupid person, I went to Greg and Michael and I said, guys, why don't we shoot the warm?
• 5:25
  [SPEAKER_04]: I didn't have an idea what was that.
• 5:26
  [SPEAKER_04]: I thought the warm.
• 5:27
  [SPEAKER_04]: Maybe it's just something like that.
• 5:30
  [SPEAKER_04]: Oh no.
• 5:31
  [SPEAKER_04]: They said, what a great idea.
• 5:33
  [SPEAKER_04]: Let's shoot the warm.
• 5:35
  [SPEAKER_04]: And then,
• 5:36
  [SPEAKER_04]: I understood that a worm is a break dance move from the ages.
• 5:41
  [SPEAKER_04]: And so, because I had to shoot the after, I had no idea how to shoot it.
• 5:47
  [SPEAKER_04]: They call the choreographer to teach me how to do the worm.
• 5:51
  [SPEAKER_04]: It was the biggest disaster of my life.
• 5:53
  [SPEAKER_04]: For one hour, trying to do the worm, I couldn't.
• 5:55
  [SPEAKER_04]: All night long, I did the worm in my bed.
• 5:59
  [SPEAKER_04]: With tutorial on YouTube, and I did the sleep.
• 6:02
  [SPEAKER_04]: I was the worm all night long.
• 6:05
  [SPEAKER_04]: The day after I was so excited to do the warm, so excited.
• 6:10
  [SPEAKER_04]: I arrived on stage, everybody was there.
• 6:13
  [SPEAKER_04]: They said, okay, let's start and I did the best warm in the history of worms.
• 6:21
  [SPEAKER_02]: I'm telling you, I believe that.
• 6:22
  [SPEAKER_02]: I saw it.
• 6:23
  [SPEAKER_02]: It's on top.
• 6:24
  [SPEAKER_04]: No, you didn't see it.
• 6:25
  [SPEAKER_04]: You know why?
• 6:27
  [SPEAKER_02]: Why?
• 6:28
  [SPEAKER_04]: Because after I did that and I had all the blood on my knees, the director said, okay, that was a good rehearsal.
• 6:37
  [SPEAKER_04]: Now let's shoot it.
• 6:39
  [SPEAKER_04]: Okay?
• 6:39
  [SPEAKER_04]: This is what happened in my life.
• 6:41
  [SPEAKER_04]: So what's in the show?
• 6:43
  [SPEAKER_04]: It's actually after.
• 6:46
  [SPEAKER_04]: And I had bloody knees.
• 6:49
  [SPEAKER_04]: And so I couldn't be a proper world.
• 6:53
  [SPEAKER_02]: That's a commitment.
• 6:54
  [SPEAKER_02]: Listen, I'm telling you, it was still, it's so serve the moments as it needed to do.
• 7:00
  [SPEAKER_03]: Thank you.
• 7:01
  [SPEAKER_03]: Thank you so much.
• 7:03
  [SPEAKER_02]: And we'll be right back right after this.
• 7:06
  [SPEAKER_02]: Welcome back.
• 7:07
  [SPEAKER_02]: It's Kyle Meredith with Sabrina impatchitore.
• 7:11
  [SPEAKER_02]: Like you've been doing this for a while, and I mean, is this a different lane of comedy for you?
• 7:16
  [SPEAKER_02]: Were you comfortable in this outside of the language barrier, I guess?
• 7:20
  [SPEAKER_02]: Like how was the rest of it, the comedy aspect for you?
• 7:24
  [SPEAKER_04]: So I have to be honest, I was born as a comedian in Italy.
• 7:28
  [SPEAKER_04]: I was very, very young.
• 7:30
  [SPEAKER_04]: I didn't know that I was able to be a comedian.
• 7:34
  [SPEAKER_04]: It's some directors told me you have a huge comedy talent, but I had no idea what we're talking about, completely no idea.
• 7:44
  [SPEAKER_04]: But for many years, I've been working as a comedian writing my own sketches,
• 7:51
  [SPEAKER_04]: and inventing characters.
• 7:54
  [SPEAKER_04]: So I think somehow the paper was like the right thing at this point of my life.
• 8:05
  [SPEAKER_04]: And so it felt also, I have to say, very natural, very, very natural.
• 8:11
  [SPEAKER_04]: Everything was happening, apart from the language barrier, then once I told to myself, Sabina, just go wild, just go wild.
• 8:20
  [SPEAKER_04]: I went wild and it worked somehow and Greg and Michael, they were so happy, they were giving me so much freedom, so much trust, they trusted me.
• 8:32
  [SPEAKER_04]: I couldn't believe they trusted me.
• 8:39
  [SPEAKER_04]: I think that I would love to do some drama because I'm also a very dramatic person.
• 8:48
  [SPEAKER_04]: I think the sense of comedy is born from a deep sense of tragedy.
• 8:53
  [SPEAKER_02]: Okay.
• 8:53
  [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, well, right.
• 8:54
  [SPEAKER_02]: I mean, that's, that's the two faces, right?
• 8:56
  [SPEAKER_02]: That's, uh, yeah.
• 8:59
  [SPEAKER_02]: What's, it's so interesting, then because, yeah, I mean, I've heard a little bit about your audition when you were talking with, uh, with Jenna and Angela on their podcast and everything.
• 9:07
  [SPEAKER_02]: But the, the actual cast and then this character, it, it, it does feel so fully formed.
• 9:14
  [SPEAKER_02]: Did you all create it as you went?
• 9:17
  [SPEAKER_02]: Is it anywhere close to what they had maybe at the beginning or, or do you know?
• 9:24
  [SPEAKER_04]: I think that the first Eugene's duration I had it from the sides, because they sent me eleven pages of monologues.
• 9:35
  [SPEAKER_04]: It was crazy.
• 9:37
  [SPEAKER_04]: It was so crazy that I did not remember not even one line during the audition.
• 9:42
  [SPEAKER_04]: It was too much.
• 9:43
  [SPEAKER_04]: And I only had twenty-four hours to learn everything and you know.
• 9:47
  [SPEAKER_02]: On a plane, on top of that.
• 9:49
  [SPEAKER_04]: On a plane, on top of some flying and being really unfaddled.
• 9:55
  [SPEAKER_04]: And so that was the first inspiration.
• 10:00
  [SPEAKER_04]: That was a very strong key.
• 10:03
  [SPEAKER_04]: When I'm inspired, I wake up in the nighttime with ideas.
• 10:08
  [SPEAKER_04]: And so it was like a tornado of things and Greg and Michael they asked me for things.
• 10:14
  [SPEAKER_04]: They won when they were like very tricky because they told me, Sabrina, today is just a task for camera, for makeup and hair.
• 10:24
  [SPEAKER_04]: I said, okay, as they won, I can deal with this.
• 10:28
  [SPEAKER_04]: I arrived on fat with makeup in here and they said, okay, sit there.
• 10:33
  [SPEAKER_04]: That's your office, sit there.
• 10:36
  [SPEAKER_04]: I sat there, like a little kid.
• 10:38
  [SPEAKER_04]: That's excited.
• 10:40
  [SPEAKER_04]: And then Greg sat on the right side and Michael on the left side and they started to shoot many questions.
• 10:50
  [SPEAKER_04]: Like, one hundred questions, two Esmeralda.
• 10:56
  [SPEAKER_04]: And I had no idea.
• 10:58
  [SPEAKER_04]: And I had to survive, exactly like Esmeralda does.
• 11:02
  [SPEAKER_04]: And I started to answer many bullshit.
• 11:04
  [SPEAKER_04]: Lot of bullshit.
• 11:05
  [SPEAKER_04]: But they were having so much fun.
• 11:06
  [SPEAKER_04]: They were laughing.
• 11:07
  [SPEAKER_04]: They were laughing.
• 11:08
  [SPEAKER_04]: So I felt encouraged to be even more silly.
• 11:12
  [SPEAKER_04]: And this is how Esmeralda was born in front of us, in front of us.
• 11:18
  [SPEAKER_04]: Thank to their input, and then it was a really big work in process.
• 11:29
  [SPEAKER_04]: It started from, because I thought, I think that secretly, as Muralda would like to become a star.
• 11:36
  [SPEAKER_04]: So let's start with hairs that can remember the idea of a star from the fifties, like a guild da.
• 11:45
  [SPEAKER_04]: here, nails as a weapon, like she's manipulative, she's going to do that, to use every gun she has to manipulate people.
• 11:56
  [SPEAKER_04]: And so that was like the little start, but then, then every day, day by day, the character was growing.
• 12:09
  [SPEAKER_04]: I really felt that when you work with geniuses, you can really explore every possibility because you feel that you are in the safest hands.
• 12:22
  [SPEAKER_04]: And I felt finally, finally, you know, I'm meeting the people of my life.
• 12:30
  [SPEAKER_02]: And we'll be right back right after this.
• 12:32
  [SPEAKER_02]: Welcome back.
• 12:33
  [SPEAKER_02]: It's Kyle Meredith with Sabrina in Patchatory.
• 12:37
  [SPEAKER_02]: What's the phone watching you all get to that point to me?
• 12:40
  [SPEAKER_02]: You're talking about developing the character day by day, but we also get that in a bit over the course of the whole season too, which happens within the show.
• 12:47
  [SPEAKER_02]: I mean, the more time you spend reach out, I mean, I think you can see that in the original series with the office, you know, just to see you all do that.
• 12:54
  [SPEAKER_02]: But I love that you're saying that because
• 12:56
  [SPEAKER_02]: because as you said before it's like she's all about survival by any means necessary and knowing that it was born from that moment you know but I love that from any means necessary she will survive like what a great jumping off point to have with any character
• 13:13
  [SPEAKER_04]: Yes.
• 13:14
  [SPEAKER_04]: To be honest, it's very refreshing also, because I found that this very good reason, not surviving, surviving.
• 13:25
  [SPEAKER_04]: So how can you blame her if she's nasty, if she's bossy, if she's manipulative, if she's a monster, she's horrible,
• 13:35
  [SPEAKER_04]: I loved to, I proposed that to them.
• 13:38
  [SPEAKER_04]: I said, guys, is it okay if I put an element of innocence in her?
• 13:43
  [SPEAKER_04]: There must be something like little kid.
• 13:46
  [SPEAKER_04]: They can be super nasty.
• 13:48
  [SPEAKER_04]: They can be very manipulative.
• 13:50
  [SPEAKER_04]: But they are kids.
• 13:52
  [SPEAKER_04]: They are innocent.
• 13:54
  [SPEAKER_04]: And so I think that somehow this gives
• 13:58
  [SPEAKER_04]: something that everybody can recognize in people, this quality of being bad and nice at the same time and being nasty, but with a good reason to be, and it's refreshing.
• 14:16
  [SPEAKER_02]: And not that she reminds me of Michael Scott, but that innocence, that was one of his, that character's big traits as well.
• 14:25
  [SPEAKER_02]: Did you all, I mean, again, you're coming from a universe was that ever part of the conversation about the feel or any kind of connection of the original.
• 14:36
  [SPEAKER_04]: Never.
• 14:36
  [SPEAKER_02]: Never.
• 14:37
  [SPEAKER_04]: Never ever.
• 14:39
  [SPEAKER_04]: I think the only connections was that there was Greg there.
• 14:45
  [SPEAKER_04]: Greg was there and then men, all the directors, ten different directors were coming from the real office.
• 14:53
  [SPEAKER_04]: And then Oscar was there.
• 14:54
  [SPEAKER_04]: So we had these references like this.
• 14:59
  [SPEAKER_04]: Okay.
• 15:00
  [SPEAKER_04]: And it was like, create
• 15:03
  [SPEAKER_04]: an environment, and then the office was there, guys.
• 15:06
  [SPEAKER_04]: The office, that is a big character.
• 15:10
  [SPEAKER_04]: And so, you just as an actor, if you are, let's say good enough, you believe in the situation, you follow the flow.
• 15:20
  [SPEAKER_04]: There was a spirit there, you could feel the spirit, you could feel a soul.
• 15:25
  [SPEAKER_04]: And so you just go with the flow, you're just tuned, you're tuned.
• 15:30
  [SPEAKER_04]: And every day you were creating this bubble that is a parallel life to real life.
• 15:37
  [SPEAKER_04]: And it looked surreal.
• 15:39
  [SPEAKER_02]: I mean, it's great though, not having that weight, you know, that you have to represent something.
• 15:44
  [SPEAKER_04]: No, no, no, no, no, I spent a spectacally.
• 15:47
  [SPEAKER_04]: The weight was there.
• 15:48
  [SPEAKER_04]: The weight was always there.
• 15:52
  [SPEAKER_04]: It was like, actually, like, doing squats, you know.
• 15:59
  [SPEAKER_04]: But I use the big weight.
• 16:03
  [SPEAKER_04]: The big weight is giving pressure, but from that good pressure, from that fear, you give your best.
• 16:13
  [SPEAKER_02]: You know, well, again, I've seen this season.
• 16:16
  [SPEAKER_02]: I will, I will back you up again.
• 16:17
  [SPEAKER_03]: I didn't see this season, so I trust you.
• 16:21
  [SPEAKER_02]: And which is funny too, because as I, as I also remember, you never had it seen the original season until all of this, right?
• 16:28
  [SPEAKER_02]: Like that's.
• 16:29
  [SPEAKER_04]: I spent the until the audition.
• 16:32
  [SPEAKER_02]: Right.
• 16:33
  [SPEAKER_02]: Like what a great vantage point I think that is because it's a different vantage point than I'm sure so many of the other actors had.
• 16:41
  [SPEAKER_04]: Alora, thank you for saying that.
• 16:46
  [SPEAKER_04]: Not really, to be honest, I think I had a few obstacles.
• 16:50
  [SPEAKER_04]: I think I was this little wild horse, let's say pony, little pony that had to run through these obstacles and so
• 17:05
  [SPEAKER_04]: But again, when you find, if you have an instinct and you find something that looks like gold powder, gold dust, you just get crazy.
• 17:18
  [SPEAKER_04]: It's like to be a child in a candy shop or in a lunar park.
• 17:24
  [SPEAKER_04]: It's almost like,
• 17:28
  [SPEAKER_04]: Somehow, I think that at this moment of my life, I was ready to be in this big lunar park and to be able to enjoy everything and to ride every crazy thing.
• 17:44
  [SPEAKER_04]: And it's fascinating, actually it's fascinating, because it's a way not to get drugs.
• 17:54
  [SPEAKER_04]: I don't use drugs because I play actor.
• 17:58
  [SPEAKER_04]: If not, I would use, I think, men.
• 18:01
  [SPEAKER_04]: So choose acting, no drugs.
• 18:06
  [SPEAKER_04]: Choose the paper, not drugs.
• 18:11
  [SPEAKER_02]: I can't think of a better way to do this now.
• 18:15
  [SPEAKER_04]: I don't know if you heard the sound.
• 18:18
  [SPEAKER_04]: So he went like this slowly, but she did.
• 18:23
  [SPEAKER_04]: So seriously, if he's alive, I'm alive too.
• 18:29
  [SPEAKER_02]: Congratulations on this.
• 18:30
  [SPEAKER_02]: I love this season so much.
• 18:32
  [SPEAKER_02]: It's been such a pleasure to talk about it.
• 18:34
  [SPEAKER_02]: And for that PSA right at the ending, I appreciate that as well.
• 18:37
  [SPEAKER_02]: It's a brilliant.
• 18:37
  [SPEAKER_02]: Thank you so much.
• 18:38
  [SPEAKER_02]: My thanks to Sabrina, the paper, out now on Peacock.
• 18:43
  [SPEAKER_02]: Thanks to you for checking out the episode.
• 18:44
  [SPEAKER_02]: Hit that subscribe button before you get out of here.
• 18:46
  [SPEAKER_02]: You're going to get new interviews just like this one every single week, Spotify, Apple podcast, NPR, WFPK.org, consequence, YouTube for the video versions, anywhere you get your podcasts from.
• 18:58
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• 19:00
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• 19:03
  [SPEAKER_02]: Those always help out so much.
• 19:06
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• 19:10
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  [SPEAKER_02]: That does it for another edition.
• 20:01
  [SPEAKER_02]: I'm Kyle Meredith.
• 20:02
  [SPEAKER_02]: I'll see you next time.
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  [SPEAKER_00]: It's easy to hear your favorite artist on WFPK from wherever you are.
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