\n<\/p>\n
Even when Bebe Neuwirth isn\u2019t dancing, she\u2019s dancing.<\/p>\n
\u201cI am a dancer first,\u201d she said in a phone interview from her apartment in Greenwich Village. \u201cI\u2019m a physical performer, and that impulse, that expression doesn\u2019t go away even if I\u2019m standing still and listening to someone.\u201d<\/p>\n
Neuwirth, 65, is a Tony Award nominee for her performance as Fr\u00e4ulein Schneider in \u201cCabaret\u201d and is already a two-time winner for her roles in \u201cSweet Charity\u201d in 1986 and \u201cChicago\u201d in 1997. She has also gained fans for her television work on the Julia Child dramedy \u201cJulia\u201d and the long-running sitcom \u201cCheers.\u201d But it\u2019s theater that keeps calling her back.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve been onstage since I was 7,\u201d she said. \u201cIt\u2019s my home.\u201d<\/p>\n
On a rainy afternoon, Neuwirth discussed her love for the city\u2019s Art Deco buildings, why the Jersey Shore is magical in winter and where to find the best softball in Manhattan. These are edited excerpts from the conversation.<\/p>\n
1<\/p>\n
Some of my first flea markets were at the Rose Bowl, and now I seek them out wherever I am. I go down to the one under the Brooklyn Bridge sometimes. Most of my house is filled with things I\u2019ve collected from flea markets, but I\u2019m always looking.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
2<\/p>\n
For the last four years, off and on, I\u2019ve been going to ceramics studios and throwing clay, hand building clay. I love spending time there. Friendships get made just like they do in ballet class.<\/p>\n
3<\/p>\n
I don\u2019t have one \u2014 though I do have three cats \u2014 so I love walking through a dog park and watching them play and interact. I love big dogs \u2014 German shepherds, Doberman pinschers, huskies, Weimaraners. And I like small dogs who are really big dogs at heart. I love Pomeranians because those tiny little fluff balls are actually huge dogs on the inside \u2014 they crack me up!<\/p>\n
4<\/p>\n
The Broadway theaters and their unions play in this very well-organized league, with playoffs and champions, and it\u2019s a wonderful day in the park with friends and family. I played on a team many years ago, but now I just like to watch.<\/p>\n
5<\/p>\n
Some just look like period buildings from the outside, but then you go into the lobbies, and they have this magnificent stonework and metalwork and gratings and railings. And the aesthetic continues into the elevator. I visited a friend who works on the edge of the diamond district on Fifth Avenue, and I was like \u201cHoly Toledo, this building is amazing.\u201d<\/p>\n
6<\/p>\n
When I turned 50, my husband and I went to a beach on the Jersey Shore on my birthday, which is New Year\u2019s Eve. To be on the beach in a blizzard, with the raging seas and the beach covered in sand and the whipping snowflakes in my face, was paradise.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
7<\/p>\n
Years ago, I went to see a performance by a Butoh company with a good friend of mine, Mimi Quillin, who is also a Fosse dancer \u2014 we danced in \u201cSweet Charity\u201d together. Then we took a Butoh workshop there, which was delightful. They do beautiful things there and bring in fascinating artists.<\/p>\n
8<\/p>\n
I love the feel and the potential of the really old-school ones, which are kind of gone now. There used to be one on the Lower East Side where I could just feel how many artists had walked through there, whether they were struggling with their work on a roll.<\/p>\n
9<\/p>\n
I live close enough that I can sometimes hear the music, cheering and chanting coming over. I like to watch the people and the dogs \u2014 there are so many characters, so many neighborhoods within the park. It\u2019s also a creative place. People haul out a piano and play it underneath the arch for those great acoustics, people tap dance, people will busk. There\u2019s nowhere else like it.<\/p>\n
10<\/p>\n
Standing in a wing feels like my home, physical and spiritual. I love older theaters in particular \u2014 the new ones don\u2019t have as many ghosts.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n