[MADtv] Spencer Kayden

[Miss Information]

Full Name: Spencer Lemon Kayden [news]
Date of Birth: 1971
Place of Birth: Costa Mesa, CA
Height / Weight: <unknown> / <unknown>
Seasons on MADtv: 10 (2005)

Recurring Characters:

• <none>

Celebrity Impressions:

• <none>

Biography:
Wowing audiences and critics alike as the innocent-yet-knowing Little Sally in Broadway's Urinetown, the clever new musical that is described as "an appalling notion fully realized." Kayden is the only cast member who has been with the musical since it first exploded on the scene at the 1999 New York Fringe Festival. She stayed with it when the show moved to a limited off-Broadway run and when it opened on Broadway. Kayden grew up in Orange County, California and went on to study drama at Northwestern University in Chicago. She moved to New York in 1993. Kayden decided to give up on acting because it was starting to exhaust her. Eventually, Kayden made the discovery that acting was indeed an important pursuit. She performed in several gigs downtown including writing, directing and performing in Too Much Light Makes the Baby Go Blind and Gilda Defying Gravity, a one-woman show about Gilda Radner. Making the switch from downtown artist to Broadway baby was a wild ride for Kayden. First of all, she had to audition for a part that she'd been doing for a while. Then there's the guilt of being the sole holdover from the Fringe. But ultimately, Kayden has warmed to the idea of being a Broadway performer. Though Kayden is enjoying life on the Great White Way (especially perks like being able to afford sending her laundry out), she is quick to acknowledge and praise the original Urinetown at the Fringe Festival.

Where are they now?
Unknown at this time.

Television - Starring Roles:

• <none at this time>

Television - Guest Roles:

• Blue's Clues: <various episodes> - Mrs. Pepper

Film - Starring Roles:

• <none at this time>

Film - Supporting Roles:

• Blue's ABC Time (1998) - Mrs. Pepper
• Blue's Big Musical Movie (2000) - Mrs. Pepper
• Pipe Dream (2002) - Waitress
• Trance (1998) - Druid

Other Credits:

• Broadway: Funny Girl, Urinetown

Fun Facts:

• Spencer's brother is film director/writer/producer/cinematographer Michael Almereyda, who is best known for his modern day screen adaption of Hamlet.
• Spencer was a background singer for the band "Either Country".

Famous Catch-Phrases:

• <none at this time>

Memorable Quotes:

• <none at this time>

Pertinent Links:

• <none at this time>

Special Thanks:

• ef_7 - Title Banner

Sources:

• Planet MADtv
• Broadway.com
• IMDb

__________________________________________________

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[Dark Monarch]

Originally posted by blackwind
Discuss.

Sure... uh... who is this?

[MysterE]

Originally posted by Mark Mitchell


Sure... uh... who is this?

https://www.planetmadtv.com/forum/sh...&threadid=5867

[edit]There, I added a news link in the main post. [/edit]

[Scorpiogrrl4405]

miscellaneous *shtuff* I found on Spencer:


SPENCER KAYDEN

received Outer Critics Circle, Clarence Derwent and Theatre World Awards and Tony, Lortel and Drama Desk noms. for Urinetown. She recently appeared in "EGG the Arts Show" on PBS and Alfred Uhry's Edgardo Mine. With the Neo-Futurists she performed 30 plays in 60 minutes in Too Much Light Makes the Baby Go Blind, and has improvised with Burn Manhattan, Centralia, Boom Chicago and others. Spencer is the voice of Mrs. Pepper on Nickelodeon's "Blue's Clues."

________________________________________________

[Dark Monarch]

Originally posted by Scorpiogrrl2003
miscellaneous *shtuff* I found on Spencer:


SPENCER KAYDEN

received Outer Critics Circle, Clarence Derwent and Theatre World Awards and Tony, Lortel and Drama Desk noms. for Urinetown. She recently appeared in "EGG the Arts Show" on PBS and Alfred Uhry's Edgardo Mine. With the Neo-Futurists she performed 30 plays in 60 minutes in Too Much Light Makes the Baby Go Blind, and has improvised with Burn Manhattan, Centralia, Boom Chicago and others. Spencer is the voice of Mrs. Pepper on Nickelodeon's "Blue's Clues."

________________________________________________

Interesting... very interesting. Got a pic?

[MysterE]

Originally posted by Mark Mitchell


Interesting... very interesting. Got a pic?

There's now a temporary pic in the top of each new castmembers' thread now.

[Dartanian]

MADtv's newest cast member, Spencer Kayden, has begun shooting on MADtv.

- MADtv Informer.

Hopefully she'll show up soon. I think this is the first time I've actually 'seen' a new castmembers work before they start on MADtv. Mrs. Pepper on Blues Clues is too cool.

[Cat_Named_CeCe]

I think this is the first time I've actually 'seen' a new castmembers work before they start on MADtv. Mrs. Pepper on Blues Clues is too cool.

LOL - but I don't think that her role as Mrs. Pepper is any indication of how she'll be on MADtv.

You're right, though. Mrs. Pepper does rock.

[Pizzotty]

Originally posted by Cat_Named_CeCe
LOL - but I don't think that her role as Mrs. Pepper is any indication of how she'll be on MADtv.

You're right, though. Mrs. Pepper does rock.

Announcer: And please welcome one of our newest castmembers. Spencer Kayden. She played Mrs. Peppers from Blues Clues.

Knowing Mad tv they probably would introduce her like that just for laughs.

[Dark Monarch]

I'm in love.


L-U-S-T... Love

[theimperial2002]

Does anyone know the exact date for when she starts?

[MJB12]

Can I get a good HQ cap of her featured billboard from the opening credits from this past week's episode for her TV Tome biography?

[elscorcho]

it's not the best considering it's at an odd angle...but that's not my fault

[Dartanian]

Urinetown New York Post Interview with Spencer Kayden

Goin' to "TOWN"
by Chip Defaa

January 20, 2002 -- Before she ever auditioned for the part of Little Sally in "Urinetown, the Musical," Spencer Kayden showed producers a flash of the deadpan humor she would bring to the stage.

On her resume under the "special skills" section, the 33-year-old star and likely Tony nominee had listed baking bundt cakes.

Kayden doesn't exactly take acting seriously. Consider that when she got the part last year, she didn't have an agent and was not yet a member of Actors' Equity.

And while the quirky hit musical was building a following on its way to Broadway, the star still called herself a journalist: Kayden remained working full-time as a senior editor at a Scholastic Inc. magazine as recently as June.

"I had a wonderful job at Storyworks, working with amazing people, and I was making a contribution to kids. Our readers were third- to fifth-graders," noted Kayden.

It was only when Kayden's boss at the publication, Storyworks editor Lauren Tarshis, told her she was too talented a performer to remain at a desk job that Kayden quit and committed to the stage.

"It's scary to admit what you really want," said Kayden, a native of Southern California who now lives in the East Village with Grandpa Wallace, her Weimaraner/beagle mix.

"If you weren't obtaining a great deal of commercial success acting, it eased things to rationalize that acting wasn't really your primary interest."

Kayden, who grew up in Costa Mesa, Calif., envisioned a career as a classicist. Her interest in Latin, which her own high school did not offer, was so strong that she took classes in it at another high school and, later, at a community college.

But she always loved performing, too, once playing a Munchkin in a school production of "The Wizard of Oz." And in her dressing room now, she proudly displays a card from her high school drama teacher, Barbara Van Holt, who wrote, after seeing "Urinetown": "So glad you found some fellow travelers who share your unique satiric bent."

At Northwestern University, Kayden got heavily involved in improv and sketch comedy. One college friend, Ayun Halliday, eventually married another friend of hers, writer Greg Kotis, who a decade later did the book and lyrics for "Urinetown."

"So I've known Greg for over 10 years," said Kayden. "The 'voice' of 'Urinetown' is very familiar to me. That tone - dark but hopeful - is very Greg Kotis to me. And he knows me well. He wrote the role for me. I'm lucky I have really smart friends who wrote an incredible show."

After working in comedy in Chicago - she and Kotis were in the celebrated Neo- Futurists troupe - she came to New York.

She soon found herself in "Urinetown," a dark comedy about greed, corruption and love in a city with a water shortage so severe that people must pay for the privilege to relieve themselves.

The show was a hit of the 1999 Fringe Festival; Kayden became the only cast member retained for its subsequent off-Broadway and Broadway productions.

How do her current fellow castmates size her up?

Said cast member Rick Crom: "She's quietly outrageous. She comes from an improv background, as do I. In 'Urinetown,' we'll improvise little scenes with each other, just for ourselves.

"We have a little game we play at one point when we're supposed to be speaking to each other but the audience can't really hear us. We come up with different Yiddish phrases every night; we have to do research to find 'em!"

"I love Spencer," said her understudy, Erin Hill. "She's cool. She's never cutesy on stage. Cutesy makes me puke. She's funny, and real."

And how has success changed Kayden's life?

"Now I can send my laundry out," she quipped.

[Vancomelady]

She looks like Tammy Pascitelli

[crushonmary]

Originally posted by Vancomelady
She looks like Tammy Pascitelli

she also looks like Valerie Bertinelli, imo.

[Dartanian]

I wonder why she hasn't appeared yet. Very odd. I hope they actually air her sketches.

[Caffeine King]

Originally posted by Jim_Cockhurtz
I wonder why she hasn't appeared yet. Very odd. I hope they actually air her sketches.

She did (once.) She did an original character

She played Gerty, one of Muriel's friends in a 7 AM Condo Report sketch.

I liked the character I thought it was very funny.

I hope they air some more of her sketches though so that we can get a better idea of what she has to bring to MADtv (if that makes any sense) and to see if she has potential.

I hope they bring both Spencer & Crista back next season

[Dartanian]

Oops, yeah, I forgot about that. She had like one line, I'd hardly call that a debut sketch. Plus, that was 3 episodes ago, and it doesn't seem like she'll be appearing in this weeks episode, although I hope she does. There's only 8 episodes left in this season. We all thought that Keegan had a relatively small number of episodes for a normal featured player last year, and it seems like she's going to have even less. I dunno... I'm starting to get the feeling that she's been cut even before she's had a real appearance.

[Caffeine King]

Originally posted by Jim_Cockhurtz
Oops, yeah, I forgot about that. She had like one line, I'd hardly call that a debut sketch. Plus, that was 3 episodes ago, and it doesn't seem like she'll be appearing in this weeks episode, although I hope she does. There's only 8 episodes left in this season. We all thought that Keegan had a relatively small number of episodes for a normal featured player last year, and it seems like she's going to have even less. I dunno... I'm starting to get the feeling that she's been cut even before she's had a real appearance.

I agree.

Well it was more then one line (obviously) but I get what you're saying.

The sketches that she's listed under in the upcoming sketches thread doesn't even seem like something that would leave a mark with people.

One of them is "9/11 Marriage" you might as well just have Nicole or Stephnie play in that sketch. I'm assuming that it would be just the same and that the sketch will be a typical husband & wife sketch. Nothing spectacular......does that make any sense?