‘Chicago’ opens Saenger’s Broadway in NO season

Roz Ryan has enjoyed a storied career, garnering experience on Broadway stages, TV and the big screen. She’s even found a niche doing voices for a slate of cartoon characters.

All the appearances – in smoky Detroit nightclubs, on stages across the globe and on movie sets – have brought her to this moment: touring as Matron “Mama” Morton in the touring production of “Chicago.”

“Any time they say a show’s international, my hand goes up,” Ryan said in a phone interview. The actress/singer has seen approximately three-quarters of the world. “It’s on my bucket list – to see as much as I can.”

And with more performances of “Chicago” than any other leading actress in the show’s 18-year run, Ryan is well on her way to her goal.

Described by many as a natural performer, Ryan came to her career choice early. At age 16, singing “Baby, Baby, Sweet Baby” at the Fox Theatre in Detroit with her cousins lending backup voices, she won a WKHB talent show. The deal included a Motown recording contract, which she turned down. She kept the $500 prize.

“I was still in school. I wasn’t ready,” Ryan recalls. “It scared me.”

But she did parlay the contest win into regular gigs at various Detroit nightclubs. A student by day, she learned at the footlights of legends: Sarah Vaughn, Lena Horne and Betty Carter.

“It kind of clinched what I wanted to do,” she said.

That’s not to say there weren’t detours on the way to singing the classics.

“On the way, I had to do disco and rock ‘n’ roll. I had to do what I had to do to get to the next level,” Ryan said, even if it meant playing the 20 Grand one night and, two weeks later, opening for George Clinton and Parliament Funkadelic.

Versatility would become her calling card.

At a friend’s urging, Ryan found herself on Broadway in “Ain’t Misbehavin’” in 1979. The experience proved to be “surreal, and a bit scary,” she said. At the end of the show’s run, she returned to Detroit.

But opportunity continued to knock. Soon Ryan was California-bound, landing the role of Thelma in “Amen.” The late Sherman Hemsley and Clifton Davis co-starred in the show.

“Before that, I had never thought about acting,” she said. “I’d never even considered it.”

Her only acting experience had been landing the role of Effie White in “Dreamgirls.”

Hemsley, upon learning Ryan had never had acting lessons, was the first to tell her she was a natural.

A piano teacher later echoed the sentiment. “He told me not to learn to read music,” Ryan said. “He said I had a total bionic ear.”

TV proved to be a lucrative venture. Ryan landed roles in “Good News,” “All About the Andersons,” “JAG” and “Let’s Stay Together.”

In between, she landed her first movie role as one of the Peter Sisters in “The Cotton Club,” a Francis Ford Coppola flick about the famous Harlem nightclub.

“I still remember meeting with Francis in the silver fish trailer [his quarters on the set] and him talking about knowing the Peter Sisters and how wonderful they were.

“Just watching the rehearsals … some of that stuff was like an out-of-body experience,” Ryan said.

She’s landed a number of roles in big screen flicks since those early days, appearing in “Devine Intervention,” “Nikita Blues,” “Waiting For Forever,” “I Think I Love My Wife” and “The Invention of Lying.”

“I’ve been very fortunate,” she said. “Some of the things I didn’t choose. Some chose me.”

Following one’s passion does have a price, Ryan notes. 

“The industry ate up 2.8 husbands,” she explained. “The difficulties were there [in the marriages] but I would never give up on my professional career. I had the drive for performing even as the marriages failed.”

Today, she finds solace in her grandchildren’s faces. It’s a nod to them that she’s pursued cartoon voice work. She’s the voice behind Thalia in Disney’s “Hercules,” Bubbie the Blue Beluga Whale on “The Misadventures of FlapJack” and Ms. Fitzpatrick on “Kick Buttowski.”

“That’s my reward, having children recognize my voice,” Ryan said. “That does something to me every time.”

She described an encounter with a young boy in an airport who recognized her voice. “He exclaimed, ‘You’re Bubbie!’” she said. “It was so cool.”

This month’s visit to New Orleans marks the second time Ryan has been to the Big Easy. The first was a whirlwind trip in 2004 during Jazz Fest.

“This will be my first time back since the storm,” she said. “I’m so excited about visiting people, enjoying the food and going to some of the clubs and hanging out on Bourbon Street.”

And she’s jazzed about this touring production.

“Mama Morton is a hustler and I’m pretty much a ham,” Ryan said of the role. “But she’s all about power. I like to think I am in charge of some things, but she ties it all together and manages to nurture and take care of the girls.”

‘Chicago’ is the universal tale of fame, fortune and jazz. The musical is set in Prohibition-era Chicago. John Kander wrote the music, Fred Ebb the lyrics and Ebb and Bob Fosse penned the book.

It’s one more stop on Ryan’s travelogue. One more place to mark on her bucket list.

“My grandmother loved to travel. I got it from her,” she said. “I don’t know what’s next for me, but I’ll take it.”

Roz Ryan plays Matron “Mama” Morton in “Chicago,” which opens the latest Broadway in New Orleans season at the Saenger Theatre. Ryan has played more performances of the production than any other leading actress in the show’s historic 18-year run.

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