Michelle Azar is “embarrassed … and maybe proud now” to acknowledge that she was not particularly familiar with her subject’s story before she began playing the late Supreme Court justice in the one-woman play “All Things Equal: The Life and Trials of Ruth Bader Ginsburg.”
“Like everyone else, I really knew about her later in life — ‘Who’s this woman with these strong, black glasses who looks so mad and dissenting?’” Azar says from her home in Los Angeles. “I did not know anything about her as a young person. I did not know anything about the work she’d done in creative problem solutioning to make men understand that women, instead of being put on a pedestal, want to be treated as equal and given equal opportunities.”
A couple years of “All Things Equal,” however, has given Azar more knowledge — and appreciation for Ginsburg’s great accomplishments and legacy, even before she was appointed to the Supreme Court by 1993 by then-President Bill Clinton, serving until her death on Sept. 18, 2020, at the age of 87.
“It was the play for sure,” the actress says. “The audition came in and my manager just said, ‘I have a feeling about this …’ And, y’know, I’m never going to say ‘no’ to an audition.
“When I investigated and understood this laser beam-focused, dog with a bone quality about her saying, ‘Wait a minute; something’s not right. Just because society says this doesn’t mean I’ve got to stick to that version. What if …?’
“One of my favorite quotes of hers is: ‘Fight for things you care about, but do so in a way other people will join you.’ Nowadays, when people are fighting for what they care about and people are joining in a way that’s not peaceful or civilized, that means so much more to me.”
‘All Things Equal: The Life and Trials of Ruth Bader Ginsburg’ comes to Detroit
Azar’s journey to “All Things Equal” began in her native Chicago, where as the daughter of an Israeli immigrant father, she was raised in kibbutz culture, attending Camp Tavor in Three Rivers and met scores of other campers from around the Detroit metro area.
“I grew up being told women are wonderful, everybody’s equal, you can go to college and pursue what you want — but you’ll probably get married out of college and have a family,” remembers Azar, whose mother had a Ph.D. in psychology and worked full-time. “The patriarchy was clear. That was definitely a cloud I worked under.”
She was nevertheless drawn to music, dance and theater while growing up, singing in the Lyric Opera of Chicago’s children’s choir before she “got serious about ‘straight’ acting’ and attended New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts. That led to a role playing Janis Joplin for two years in the musical “Beehive” before heading to Israel and then to Los Angeles, where she and her husband, a rabbi, raised two daughters. The eldest graduated from the University of Michigan’s musical theater program last year.
On the West Coast, Azar, who’s also a yoga instructor, helped start a theater company, Neurotic Young Urbanites. She’s won several Ovation awards there, along with a 2016 Stage Raw prize as Best Actress in “My Barking Dog” at the Boston Court Theatre. Azar also has acted in productions of “Bella Lost in Yonkers, “Bong, Boeing” and “Bronco Billy,” while her TV and film resume includes roles in “NCIS: Los Angeles,” “Criminal Minds,” “The Magicians,” “Senior Moment” and more.
Azar was immediately intrigued by Rupert Holmes’ script for “All Things Equal,” struck by the fact that it was written by a man, but also by a kind of musicality Holmes — who had a No. 1 hit in 1979 with “Escape (The Pina Colada Song)” and also wrote “The Mystery of Edwin Drood” — and director Laley Lippard employ in the production.
“(Ginsburg) always said if she had another life, she’d like to be an opera singer; she loved opera, but she couldn’t sing,” Azar says. “But there is this musicality to this (show) which I think Ruth herself would love, and that comes from Rupert, because of his musicality, as well as his fierce comic timing. He felt Ruth was really funny, and she really was. That helps it move like a musical even though nobody’s singing.”
Portraying Ginsburg has brought Azar face to face with some of those who knew her — though none of her children or grandchildren, yet, for any other Supreme Court justices. Ginsburg’s sister-in-law and one of her assistants have come to see the show, as has NPR Supreme Court correspondent Nina Totenberg. “(Totenberg) said it made her real sad in all the best ways,” Azar recalls. “It made her feel like she missed Ruth even more.”
Ultimately, Azar hopes, “All Things Equal” is helping to give audiences a more complete picture of Ginsburg in the same way it has for her.
“What Laley and Rupert and I discussed was, ‘OK, what is the intention of this piece, in this moment,” Azar explains. “It’s to instill in every single person in the audience that it’s not about this cause or that cause, or you have to be politically savvy. It’s what can you do right now that keeps YOU connected and creates something that you want to do.
“That creates the balance and energy and harmony — all of it working towards making all things equal.”
“All Things Equal: The Life and Trials of Ruth Bader Ginsburg” is at Detroit’s Fisher Theatre, 3011 W. Grand Blvd., at 7:30 p.m. Saturday, April 13. 313-872-1000 or broadwayindetroit.com.
