How to be a Broadway Princess and Find your Prince Charming with Ashley Chiu

Please welcome, Broadway’s Sleeping Beauty, Ashley Chiu! Ashley is one of the principle princesses in Once Upon a One More Time, currently at the Marriott Marquis here in New York. Today we chat about her journey to broadway including her very intentional approach to creating a balanced career, an extremely impressive COVID pivot, and finding her muggle prince charming. 

Find Ashley on IG and TikTok @ashleychiuchiu

Theme Music Composed by Rachel Dean and Orchestrated by Katie Coleman

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Transcript

 Hello and welcome to How to Succeed in Theater by Sacrificing Everything. I'm your host, Katie Coleman. All sacrifices discussed in this podcast were fully consensual and a hundred percent worth it because we love what we do, right guys. Right.

Hi all! I’m so excited to bring you this conversation with Broadway’s Sleeping Beauty, Ashley Chiu! Ashley is one of the principle princesses in Once Upon a One More Time, currently at the Marriot Marquis here in New York. I loved chatting with her about her journey to broadway including her very intentional approach to creating a balanced career, an extremely impressive COVID pivot, and finding her muggle prince charming. I’m so impressed with her thoughtfulness and level headedness, and I think you’ll really love hearing what she has to say. Here’s Ashley!

[00:00:00] Katie: How are you doing? Is it a busy week?  

[00:00:03] Ashley: Um, it's always a busy week. It's like we opened, it's like I had family in town then and my sister is still staying with me through tomorrow, so I haven't finished the preview schedule and started the, just on the show schedule. 'cause I'm still so like, Social and with family and friends. 

Right. And it's summertime, so everyone's coming out to see the show and wants to get dinner and brunch. Yeah. And it's like, I'm not quite, I don't know  

[00:00:32] Katie: how to answer that question,  

[00:00:34] Ashley: you know? Yeah.  

[00:00:36] Katie: I find that that is kind of how it goes in this life is like every week is different, but maybe now that you're in a long running. 

Broadway show, it'll be more consistent once you get onto that schedule. Hopeful. Knock on lid. Yeah. Well that's true. I won't jinx it. Um, I really loved your, you did a Instagram post recently about, like tonight is for little Ashley, and I thought that was so cute and I wanted to hear a little bit more about that. 

[00:01:09] Ashley: Sure. It just in so many ways, like so many of the people close to me just look at me and they're like, Of all the ways for you to make your Broadway debut, you're not woman number four, dancing in the background. Like we all know you have the skills, but for you to be in a role where you're, yeah, princess, like, you know, I've always been a little, I like to play that role, you know, in the friend group or you know, at home and the oldest daughter. 

So, you know, like I, there's a lot that has fed into the idea of Princess Ashley over the years. And then, you know, I grew up doing so much ballet. I was always playing a princess. My first solo ever for ballet was from Sleeping Beauty. Uh, and I wore a pink tutu. And I had a tiara. And like the fact that my first role on Broadway is the same, I'm from, you know, I'm playing Sleeping Beauty. 

I'm wearing a pink tutu. I'm wearing a tiara. It's just  

[00:02:04] Katie: right. Ah, so cute. I mean  

[00:02:07] Ashley: it, so many things feel like they're aligning. Like I played Al Woods in high school, so like pink is always a color that's associated with me being on stage. Um, so in so many ways, like little Ashley became big Ashley, and it feels just like who I am. 

It all feels like a part of me. And the, the stuff I get to do on stage every night feels like a part of me. It's not, yeah, not reaching like a lot of Right. Yeah, a lot of this is me. So it's really  

[00:02:39] Katie: fun. So, and how did you get involved in the project? Like how were you cast in this role? That's so perfectly for you. 

[00:02:46] Ashley: I went to, I didn't know what, um, I didn't know what the project was. I knew it was the Britney Spears musical and I was like, Ugh. Another jukebox musical. Like why? Yeah. Digital musicals anymore. And I just, and I sang like my 32 bars. I didn't, I don't even remember thinking I did that great. I was like, uh, you know, that wasn't my best run at this song. 

I've sung a million times. What  

[00:03:13] Katie: song did you sing? 'cause I feel like, For Britney Spear Spears musical. It's hard to decide what to sing.  

[00:03:19] Ashley: I have a Meghan trainer song. Okay. That I sing. Yeah, that makes sense. That's my pop song. Yeah. So I sing it and I was like, I didn't do that. Great. But then, It wasn't even about 'cause I, I didn't know what the project was or who they were looking for. 

And then the casting director, Paul Hart brought me in for Sleeping Beauty. And they had some sides they had written. And I remember reading the sides and just putting it back down because I was like, I know exactly who this is. I don't need to sit here and pine over this and like, Mine, the text for hours and hours. 

It just, I just knew what I was  

[00:03:56] Katie: gonna do with it and yeah. And  

[00:03:59] Ashley: it obviously worked out. And when was that? I. That was December of 2019. We went into rehearsal. Oh,  

[00:04:08] Katie: I remember that. Oh my gosh. Oh, what a world. What a world,  

[00:04:13] Ashley: right. Well, 12 days into rehearsal, um, obviously covid hit. So it's been a really long journey. 

[00:04:22] Katie: Yeah. Thank God it survived. I, I was supposed to do a show in like fall of 2020 that just never. Came to fruit fruition. It just, I have no idea what's going on with that  

[00:04:36] Ashley: show,  

[00:04:37] Katie: but I think most others have recovered. And during Covid, you went back to California, right? And helped your mom with the project?  

[00:04:46] Ashley: I did. 

So we went home and obviously the news was on all day and it was just awful. It was just awful things being on the tv. Um, my, my mom's mother used to own a sewing factory in San Francisco, and so my mom included all of my grandmother's sewing machines and she sewed us ballet skirts and costumes and all these things throughout the year. 

She has my dad, my dad's pants, you know? Um, yeah, and we just kinda looked at each other and we were like, Can we do anything to help? You know, I saw people I knew who were like, we've had Covid and we've now gotten over Covid. Can we donate blood? Or if we're immune, can we go like, hold the hand of people, right? 

Who are like literally having their last days. What can we as a community, as people who care about others around us do? And we started to see that everyone was required to now wear a mask, but nobody knew where to get a mask. And my mom with all my sewing skills was like, I can sew these, but I, I don't know how to get them to people. 

And I was like, I dunno how to sew them. But I do know how to make a Facebook group and email people and compile lists and I'm sure there are a lot of other, like, semi retirees like my mom. Yeah. These skills and who, um, wanna contribute but can't, can't find a way to do that. So we made a little local community Facebook group at. 

Hundreds of members, and we were, oh my goodness. People were sewing masks and then I was finding facilities that needed them. They were reaching out to me. I was reaching out to them. And then there were people who were like, I can drive, just, just get me out of the house. I'll drive anywhere to pick up masks and drop them off anywhere. 

So everyone just offered whatever skills they had and, and we made do, and we got, I mean, thousands, I think like 30,000 units of p p e. Some of them were hands, oh my gosh, three D laser printed. Face shields, people were sewing gown. Wow. And um, like nursing scrub caps. And we were just sending them to whatever nursing homes, hospitals, clinics, yeah. 

Could use them.  

[00:06:49] Katie: That's so incredible. How was the pipeline to getting that stuff, to all those places?  

[00:06:54] Ashley: It was, some of it was really like cottage people pipeline, you know, just Yeah. People in their homes. There was a guy connected with, who was the head of some kind of robotic fabrication program at local community colleges, so they had access to more facilities where they could like weigh fabrics or weigh materials and sort of almost industrially. 

Produce things. Uhhuh when air quote. Yeah. Um, so we could just process things faster. And they had access to warehouse space where we could be sorting. And then this woman in Sacramento, two hours away from the bay where we're from. Yeah. Opened up an entire warehouse. She owned a fabric and they went up there with a big truck and brought down, I mean, a warehouse. 

Oh my gosh. Full of fabric because. We were running out of fabric at that point. Everyone was going through their homen and so we were using like industrial rotor cutting blades to cut the fabric into the exact dimension you needed to make the mask just to like mm-hmm. Make things faster. And then we were sending mask making kits to all the people who were sewing and then picking up the finished kit and you know, bringing it to wherever. 

Um, so I connected with a lot of people that had other resources. I connected with a lot of people who were. Doing things at home. Um, it was a really, it was a community centered and focused sort of pipeline. And that was I, yeah, part  

[00:08:21] Katie: about it. That is so special. I'm really impressed by that. Thank you. I maybe we'll come back to once one, one more time. 

You had suggested a really fun topic that I'm excited to talk about, which is how you, how you proposed it is how would you find and date a muggle when you work in theater? And I idea and I told one friend and she was like, oh my gosh, I cannot wait to hear what she has to say about that. So yes. So you have found your prince. 

Charming.  

[00:08:51] Ashley: I have family Prince Charming. I think, um, it's sort of, it's dating a muggle, but I think generally I, I consider myself like a muggle first and an actor second. Oh. So I, you know, I grew up with doing a lot of academic things and theater was my, my. Side thing. Right? Right. And so when I went to college, I had a lot of trouble focusing on the acting class and I kept freaking out about my writing the essay class or my other, you know, all these academic classes. 

And it took me almost a full year, the whole freshman year of college before professor said, But are you here to learn how to write essays or are you here to learn to be an actor? And so I've always had a struggle with like the mogul life versus the actor life. And I  

[00:09:40] Katie: think it's a struggle for all of us. 

[00:09:42] Ashley: Right? Which is why I wanted to bring it up. 'cause it's more than just, I think, dating a muggle, but sort of the pull between being able to. Sustain a life as an actor, emotionally? Financially. Physically, and having to, and even for me, wanting to sustain some semblance of a life outside of the actor world in the muggle world. 

Absolutely. Yeah. So I found that like dating a muggle is part of that for me. But there's many parts of being a muggle. I don't mean to be condescending, it's they're not non magical beings. They are magical beings. They're just not. Actors.  

[00:10:20] Katie: Oh yeah, that's a good point. Like what's the term for that? Like non theater people or, I don't even know. 

We can stick with muggle. That's, that makes it easier.  

[00:10:31] Ashley: Yeah. It's just, you know, we have to, as artists, it can be really hard to sustain a life only surrounded by other artists. Especially because, you know, in school I'm always told you're an artist because you're reflecting life and, and part of my struggle has always been like, Engaging with enough of life to be able to understand it well enough to reflect it when I go back and do my art. 

So I have found myself bouncing between the MGO world and the. Theater world or the art world, like back and forth. And I did, you know, in Covid obviously we all kind of had to return to the MGO world. Yeah. And we've all come back to the actor world. So the, just the journey of navigating both dating, being a part of that is, I think really interesting. 

It's something I, I like to talk about.  

[00:11:19] Katie: It is interesting and challenging and I think we're always all forever figuring that out. I mean, for me, for, for many years back in the Bay Area, when I was first starting out doing theater, I just was. Only I did only theater for maybe 10 years or something, and that just was entirely my life. 

Those are the only people that I hung out with, and it really did check a lot of boxes. I mean, it's very social. You're not at home at night by yourself wondering what to do or like, where's my partner, or who are my friends? You're at rehearsal and you're socializing and you're with fun people and it's bouncing from project to project, and it was really a thrilling. 

Life. However, financially it wasn't really sustainable or I just felt like o okay, this is great for for my twenties, but it's ultimately not a sustainable like adult life. It's also interesting to then get to like a higher level where maybe financially it's more fulfilling, but it's the same show every night. 

The same people. So it's like checks off a few less boxes and like reality sets in the older that you get. Yeah,  

[00:12:31] Ashley: that's definitely tough because I, the difference between, I found the mugga world and, and the theater world is like, you know, with theater you, there's a novelty to it. You go show to show. Yeah. 

But like you said, doing a long running show, hopefully knock on wood, um, you lose some of the novelty of what you were doing. That was the exciting part of. Moving through that world. Yeah. Um, but the same can be said of, of the MGO world. 'cause I went and worked at a law firm during the pandemic, and I still work with them and I still go in and visit the office every few weeks. 

Oh. Um, which is, that's what I mean. Like, I, I've been caught up in both worlds for a long time. Yeah. And I'm learning to live a life and build a life that involves both. But in some ways, like so many times I'm sitting on my couch as an actor and I crave the stability of what I had. When I was working at the law firm. 

Yeah. Like part of the joy of being in once upon one more time right now is that I, I get to sing and dance and do all the things I love to do. I also have routine in my life because I'm going somewhere regularly. Every day I have a warmup I have to do. I have a job I have to do. I finish the job I have to do, and I go home. 

Like there's a regular part of that. And when I'm not regulated in such a way as an actor, I do crave and miss that and I. Have also experienced that in the MGO world, and in some ways miss that because financially it's much more stable and you have somewhere to be from nine to five and you're sitting at a desk and you're socializing in a certain way. 

'cause that was mm-hmm. Many times when I've been an unemployed actor, that's. For me, the hardest part is I sit there all day and I have no one to socialize with. But when I'm at the law firm, you know, they're, I'm not saying they're all my best friends because they are my colleagues, right? But there's a social element to I need you and you need me, and we need to communicate about how we can utilize each other's to get where we need to get. 

And there's a fulfilling nature of like, Collaborating together to do something, even if it's not building a four-part harmony, but you have to talk to each other and then there's tension and conflict and you work through it and then you achieve something together. And there just, there's actually more time in my life as an actor where I've been unemployed and lonely and sitting on my couch and sad to the point where like I very much see the benefit of being in the Mogo world because they have stability, financial, emotional, even career stability to. 

Right. You know, to have an environment where you're surrounded by peers, where you're getting a paycheck and where you're, you're doing something every day where you feel like you're working  

[00:15:08] Katie: hard. So when you had the job at the law firm, which it sounds like you still do, you still do a little bit of work for them? 

Were you longing to be in theater? Of course. Like a grass is always greener kind of situation.  

[00:15:21] Ashley: Yeah. Yeah. I think that's a little bit of human nature. Grass is always greener.  

[00:15:24] Katie: I mean, no, nothing to feel bad about. I'm living  

[00:15:27] Ashley: the dream right now, like, you know, singing and dancing every night on Broadway. And then I come home and my whole body, I, I've been waking up recently being like making the joke that I sound like a haunted house. 

My whole body's just like, and I wake up and everything is  

[00:15:43] Katie: creaking.  

[00:15:44] Ashley: Oh no. Yeah. And I'm hungry all the time. I'm eating everything all the time. My body is like consuming so much energy and food and like, The law firm, it was much more peaceful. I would just sit there and type away. Um, so there's grass is always greener. 

Yeah. There's pros and cons to both. And I have found that I kind of need a little bit of both. And as an actor, you never settle into an version of, this is my new normal, or this is my pattern or schedule for very long. 'cause like we said earlier, like every week is different. Yeah. But. To have the balance of both. 

I definitely enjoy.  

[00:16:26] Katie: Yeah, that's. Nice. So how did you meet your partner?  

[00:16:30] Ashley: My partner. Okay. I met him on Hinge. Okay, cool. Yeah. Um, I had always made a rule for myself, and this is just my own personal preference, but I never wanted to date someone in the industry. Yes. I. Get attached and I'm like, breakups are hard no matter what. 

And I just didn't want to be going through a breakup or not going through a breakup. But to see my exes anywhere, I just, when they're my exes, they are, I. I don't see them again. I don't, yeah. You know, we're, we've chosen not to be in each other's lives. I don't need to see you and I certainly don't need to see you where I'm most vulnerable, like auditioning for a job. 

I don't need you to be behind the table. I don't need to be reading opposite you. For us to be romantic leads, like, oh gosh, I just, I just don't need to see you if you're my ex.  

[00:17:20] Katie: That is smart, very smart. Um, and I just,  

[00:17:22] Ashley: I. Obviously cares so much about this career as an actor and it's something I love so deeply. 

So I just, I didn't wanna make that any harder for myself Yeah. Than I needed to. So I had always made the rule that I was not dating someone in the industry. I've been very good about following that rule. Um, good. And I met, you know, my current guy on Hinge.  

[00:17:46] Katie: And what was happening in your life? What was your work life balance at that point when you guys met? 

I  

[00:17:51] Ashley: got out of school in 2018 and went through a breakup with my college boyfriend, which took some time. Yeah. And like I think in a lot of ways breaking up with him was also me making space for what I knew was going to be like a hard, ugly time in my life. The time where I'm coming out of school and figuring out how to be. 

An actor, an adult, a functioning human without like, you know, we grow up, we go to school every day, we have somewhere to be. And I knew that it was just gonna be ugly because I was not just not gonna have somewhere to be, but trying to be an actor, which was the hardest. Place to find, somewhere to be all the time. 

I knew I was gonna be auditioning every day and getting rejected every day, and I, for some reason, didn't think that my college boyfriend was gonna handle that. So I made the choice and broke up with him and, and entered that. Year or so of my life and it was as ugly as I thought it was gonna be. 'cause I had to fail many, many times before I could get something right and understand how to book things and understand like who I was enough to bring that into the room. 

I needed to have the space to do that. Yeah. So that was like late 2018 and between 2018 and 2019, I started keeping a log of all the auditions I was going on. Okay. And I think I really like sat myself down at the end of 2018, looking into 2019 and said, what do I really want? And I said, I wanna be on Broadway. 

That is what I want, and what do I think it's gonna take? And I made myself a spreadsheet of basically goals, weekly goals, singing X number of times a week, dancing X number of times a week. I put it as sweating. I worked at Lululemon at the time, so they had a lot of language around sweat and community, and so I was like, I'm going to sweat. 

Yeah. You know, four times a week, which could mean dance class, which could mean going to the elliptical, it could mean doing yoga. And so I had this long list of like weekly and monthly items I was checking off and if I Cool. I gave myself a point for everything, and part of that included going on dates and going to auditions and like generally I was trying to find, to create the picture I wanted of my life and work towards that in, in every direction. 

It was very type A of me,  

[00:20:13] Katie: you know, I think that's really admirable. Actually, and I now I'm like, oh man, I think I need to be more like that. One of the lovely people that I interviewed, um, a few episodes ago, which I'm not sure what order all the episodes are gonna go in, but she was talking about how to define success and not. 

Defining success by other people's standards. Like for example, if you wanna be on Broadway, but then like that's just because that's someone else's idea of what success is, but not that that's actually the life that you want. So she recommends like, write down the life that you want. In terms of like, how much money do you want to make and why, and like what do you want to be able to spend that money on and what kind of an impact do you want to have in this world? 

And does success mean performing in front of a thousand people or does it mean just like lighting up somebody's face? Like what does that really mean to you? And it sounds like you were doing exactly that and. That's so cool, especially like so early out of college and it also sounds like it was probably a pretty wild ride for you. 

2018 is what you're talking about. And then 2019 booking a Broadway show and then 2020 and then here we are. So, so curious to hear more. I think that's how life works.  

It's  

[00:21:25] Ashley: always kind of a wild ride, but you know, sometimes you really. 2018, I left school. I finished my first job, which was a national tour, and I broke up with my boyfriend. 

So there were a lot of highs and there were a lot of lows. And I feel like the second half of 2018, I was going through that recovering from a breakup. Trying to understand what it was really gonna take. Well, you know, audition season is like January through April, so I was like, how do I get myself ready for this audition season? 

What do I like mentally and emotionally need to discipline myself and get in that space? And so I spent really the second half of 2018 being like, how do I get where I wanna go? What do I want to, what, where do I wanna go? Right, like you said. Yeah. And so I ended up with this really crazy type a spreadsheet. 

I just, and I went with it and I went on 96 or 98, something like that, auditions in 2019. Uh Oh wow. But that's what it ended up being, right? Yeah. Like. Practicing that much. And I would count like auditions or a dance. Like I have very heavy dance audition as, you know, one of my four sweat episodes of the week. 

Yeah. Um, so they, they meshed together, you know, but it was me being like, if this is really what I want, if what I think I want is to be on Broadway, I need to know that I've given it every effort I could. 'cause I'm not gonna have the energy to push this kind of effort forward. Definitely, I'm going to really try and say, you know, 2019, let's give it a go and this is how I think I'm potentially gonna get there is this spreadsheet right? 

And I went on 96 auditions and in November of 2019 and, and you know, that whole journey of 97 auditions, it's like I just learned a million things, you know? And so I just went to everything like that was, I had a part-time job at Lululemon and the other part-time job was going to every audition possible, because that's what I amazing wanted. 

I had that clarity. By November, I went to an E C C for once upon one more time, and by mid-December I had booked it. I do think like that sort of scary, annoying amount of discipline that I had with that spreadsheet helped me with that. Yeah. And to answer your, the question you asked all that time ago Yeah. 

About where I was in my life when I met my partner, my career partner was, I was at that point where like November, 2019, about 11 months into this whole. Here's a spreadsheet, here's the discipline, here's the goals that you think you wanna achieve, and here's how you think you're gonna do it. 11 months into adhering to that, I sort of started to loosen my grip on, on things. 

I was like, you know, I've, out of these 90 auditions, booked like two of them. Yeah. Oh, wow. And I was like, it's really not in my control. You know what I mean? I started to understand that and I started to be able to loosen my grip on things. And around the same time that I went into the audition room for once Upon one more time, like a couple weeks later, I went on my first date with Matt. 

And I think the whole, where was I in my life? Answer is really like I was at a place where I was understanding I was in this for. Hopefully the long haul. I was relaxing into it. I was understanding what my skills were because I had gone into the room 90 times and failed 88 of those times failed. I don't know about failed, but, but like learned something that wasn't me booking the job and. 

Begun to understand that this was the life I had chosen, these were the things I wanted. And to begin to own and accept that about myself because like I said, I broke up with my college boyfriend. 'cause I didn't want him to see that I was gonna struggle with this. Oh wow. Yeah. And after I struggled with it for 11 months, I accepted that this was going to be a part of my life. 

Yeah, yeah. And I think at the moment I was beginning to accept that. The right project came along, I was in the right head space. Mm-hmm. And the right guy came along.  

[00:25:24] Katie: It sounds like it went from a struggle to an acceptance of a reality. That's not actually a struggle, it's just what the job is, is auditioning and not booking roles most of the time. 

And so finding that acceptance, which, which like I think you would've found had you booked a job or not. Right. So had you been dating a lot before you met him?  

[00:25:48] Ashley: I think 2019 with the whole spreadsheet. Part of it included this aspect of dating because I was like, all right, I am young. I'm in the world now. 

I'm out of school. Like we're gonna date, like adults, not like we're in college anymore. And so I did date a lot.  

[00:26:04] Katie: It's interesting too, the, the concept of like spending so much of your time auditioning and then so much of your time dating because those are two kind of similar things, but also very different in the way you want to approach them. And was that at all confusing?  

[00:26:18] Ashley: It was in some ways. 

Uh, I started hard in January. I was. Going to all these auditions, going on dates here and there. To be clear, I did not go on 90 dates. I, it was not equivalent. Yes, good. But by June audition season was over and I hadn't really booked a lot and I was not feeling great about that. And I think that reflected in the dating, like I started putting sort of a disproportionate amount of energy into. 

Because I was, you know, auditions were slowing down and there was less chance to show off who I was and my worth. And so I think sort of around that time I was dating guys that it felt like I was starting to attribute my worth to, in a way that I hadn't been. In the first half of the year. So yeah, when auditions slowed down, I focused more on the dating and then I went away and did like a job in the summer and it felt like I had been reset, like I felt like my value was seen. 

I felt like I was hurt. I had done a job, I had gotten back on stage. I had tended to the inner child and, and done all the things that. I liked to do and by the time I came back to the city after this quick job, I had like another, like I did a couple jobs in a row where I felt like my value was seen and I felt worthy, and getting back into dating in the fall, I felt better. 

I. I felt more confident. I felt just better. So then I started to do better on both fronts and I, I think it's, yeah, I think a lot of it's tied to self-worth.  

[00:27:53] Katie: Yeah. Yeah. Like maybe not a coincidence. I can totally relate to times in my life when I've been successful in my career. And then what results is other things go right too. 

Right. And it makes the harder times harder if you're in a place where you don't feel valuable in your career. How do you feel valuable in  

[00:28:12] Ashley: life? Oh yeah. And I think that's something we all struggled with during the pandemic, you know? Oh yeah. And that's kind of, I think, why. The whole idea of like being a muggle, dating a muggle, when I cannot find value in myself as an actor, and that happens all the time. 

I really do go back to the law firm or you know, things outside of the acting world where I'm reminded of my value and that keeps me going. I don't think I did it intentionally in the pandemic. I did it out of necessity. I needed a job I needed, yeah, to financially support myself. And so I went to work at the law firm. 

But what it gave me was a feeling of self worth, of confidence, of knowing that I had value outside of the thing. You know? So artists, we like to tie ourselves to the thing we love, and we'll do it because we love it, not because it fills up our bank accounts. Oh gosh. And like when you have, when you enter into relationship based on. 

Your own personal desire, you're not always feeling your own cup of self worth. Mm-hmm. And out of necessity in the pandemic, I had to go find a place to do that. Yeah. And so that's why I think like being a muggle or a non magical being, Is a strange way to describe it because it really does add so much value and I think it's always a great option when you're feeling stuck, like return to something outside of this world. 

[00:29:41] Katie: Were you together during the pandemic?  

[00:29:42] Ashley: We were, and I did some more learning because the tendency I had with my college boyfriend, I was like, this is gonna be ugly. I can't have you see this. Right. Started turning into like, I have a job now. 'cause I was starting once upon one more time. 

And I, I've been dating you for a few months, but we're not in any way serious. I don't know if I want this to be serious. He is eight years older than me, and when we met I was 23, so like 23, dating at 31. It's a little like, are we serious? Like, I'm so young and you're right, you're, you know, he's finishing residency, like maybe he's looking to get married, I'm not. 

Right.  

[00:30:22] Katie: Like at different places in your life.  

[00:30:24] Ashley: Right. So there was a lot of like, are we, are we not? And I started doing the thing I did to my college boyfriend, which is like, I have to do things for my career. I'm gonna take this show out of town and hopefully bring it to Broadway in the summer. And like I started to do a little pushing and I, I started to kind of try to get him out of the picture. 

And to his credit, he clung on. He was like, we should really talk about this. We should figure this out. And. Then the pandemic happened. Wow. And so in so many ways, the pandemic was horrible for so many people. And at the same time, I think everyone had some kind of silver lining out of it, something they learned. 

And for me, I think it was him, because the pandemic slowed me down enough to sit down and talk to him. I, I mean, things were moving so fast. It was like, I need to get out of New York right now. Yeah. And we were in the middle of this, are we? Or are we not? Conversation. Oh, wow. And I called him and he came over and I said, I have to go home. 

Yeah. I don't know what we are or what we aren't, but like, let's just keep dating. You know, we set certain boundaries about how we were gonna keep dating as we didn't know what was happening. And while I was gonna move to the other side of the country for an indefinite amount of time, and then, Being apart. 

We were FaceTiming every day and then four months into the pandemic, I came back to New York. And of course, like FaceTiming every day, he's, he's a doctor and he was working on the front lines of Covid. Oh my gosh. He was in New York working at a Covid Center hospital. I mean, horrible things. Wow. Watching the last moments of so many people's lives, he, there was a. 

Oh my God. A man that had like seven children and he held the iPad for him to FaceTime his family for the last time. So he was going through a horrible time. You know, you, it's hard to compare. I was losing the show of my dreams. Sure. The opportunity of my dreams. We were both going through this horrible time. 

But because we had chosen to keep dating and because we respected and liked each other's people, we continued to FaceTime and in so many ways got each other through those four months. Right. I'm sure. Yeah. And then I came back to go on a vacation with him to Maine. We were like, you know, it's still the pandemic. 

We need to go somewhere far away. It had been long enough that we were like, we need to figure out if we're together or not. Yeah. So definitely I flew to New York to go to, to take an eight hour car ride to Maine with him, and we were gonna do like a weekend away, and I never went back to California.  

[00:33:00] Katie: Oh my God. 

Yeah, well, there you go. Yeah. And  

[00:33:03] Ashley: then it was like fall of 2020 and I was like, I don't have anything. I mean, I have my family in California, but you know, early twenties you don't really wanna be living with your parents anymore. And of course we had finished the mask project, like we had sort of finished the thing. 

So I was like, it's kind of time to settle into this. Noon, normal, new, normal  

[00:33:24] Katie: if there is such a thing,  

[00:33:26] Ashley: right? And I was like the, you know, the only thing I could do in the Bay Area is maybe babysit. Like I had a lot of cousins that were like, please take care of our children. Like I have to go to work and, yeah. 

I was like, I could be a babysitter in New York or in San Francisco. But then I was like, I can be babysitter in New York. And I had a roommate here and I, the only real like thing things I had were like potentially my roommate was staying and Matt, my, my boyfriend now and I was like, we'd just gone to Maine. 

And I was like, I think I need to just rebuild a life in New York. And I think he might be the start of that. I had a very  

[00:34:04] Katie: similar situation actually where I was like, you did in California when I needed, I needed to be. But then it, there was a time when it became a choice, like, okay, do I settle here until the industry comes back? 

Or do I go back to New York where I know I want to be and just figure it out? 'cause I'm gonna have to figure it out. Somewhere. Mm-hmm. And I had this light, I was actually looking for apartments in like the Bay Area with a friend, and then I kind of had this light bulb moment like, wait, I, the only thing I know is that I want to be in New York, so why am I not just going there? 

Right. If I have to figure this  

[00:34:36] Ashley: out, it's just in that moment, it felt like there was so little reason to actually be there. Like we, I knew I wanted to be here in New York, but I didn't. Right. I had this guy that I was dating that I went to Maine with, that I did for a few months before the pandemic, but like there was no job. 

I had the same amount of job prospects in SSF as I did in New York. Yeah, same. Yeah. Which was like, I don't have a ton of hard skills. Like I could be a babysitter, I could be someone's office assistant, but I was like, well, I'm gonna do either of those sort of jobs, I don't care a ton about. Maybe I should do it somewhere where I, you know, I don't at least feeling like I'm standing on my own two feet and not Yeah, my parents' couch. 

So I came back to New York, you know, I was like, I need to find something, anything. So I applied to jobs all day, every day for about a month and. And was lucky enough to work at this law firm. Wow. Yeah. So  

[00:35:28] Katie: then like, what was that like once you started working at the law firm and he was still working in the front lines, I assume He is a  

[00:35:34] Ashley: psychiatrist and he was, he made all these jokes that he was like, you know, it's bad when a psychiatrist is intubating you because that is not what psychiatrists do. 

That  

[00:35:45] Katie: was the reality. Oh, I didn't know that.  

[00:35:47] Ashley: Oh my gosh, yes. And he was like, when. He was either in his final year of residency or in his year of fellowship. So he was like, I had just done medical training like a year or two  

[00:35:59] Katie: ago. So he knew, you know, he had those skills fresh in his mind. Right. So, so they're like,  

[00:36:04] Ashley: you're up. 

Right. Well, he also felt like he was a young, healthy, able-bodied. Not a father, you know, like there were other people he's working with who had families to protect and he has such a big heart. So I really, I'm, and that's what I mean about the pandemic, having blessings in disguise. Like he learned so much about me watching me do this mask making, you know, going home, having literally nothing. 

And then all of a sudden a Facebook group with all these cute little, you know, retirees who are sewing all day and night. And he learned that I had that kind of spirit and that kind of tenacity and that kind of like fortitude to build something out of nothing. So cool. And I similarly learned that about him because he was so generous in giving with, I mean, his own body, like willing to put himself right. 

In harm's way when bodies were piling up in Central Park at that time. Yeah, it was  

[00:36:55] Katie: crazy. What a scary time. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I actually, real estate was my covid job. Mm-hmm. When I first started it was just so many people moving. 

It was crazy. It was crazy and like so fun. And talk about finding your value and being like, oh my God, I have something else to give to the world that I'm really good at. And I just had no imposter syndrome body either. I was like, I know I can be good at real estate. And then I was at first, and then it got a lot harder once we ran out of apartments. 

I was like, oh, okay. Right. So it's still something that I do in the background, and I'm really grateful to have that. But finding that balance is like, I just have to find the right fit with that. So. That's  

[00:37:36] Ashley: the, well, that's the thing I learned about the M job is like, it doesn't have to be a passion. 

It can be something that fills you and that you, you know, see value in that brings value to your life. That's so true. It's not a passion in the same way as you have about music. You know, it's just not the same. That's  

[00:37:53] Katie: a really good thing to hear right now, because I feel like I'm in this position where , Like how you were saying with the spreadsheets and stuff, like, what do I want my life to look like? 

 I always thought, yeah, music director on Broadway, but that, that's a really, really hard job to get, first of all. And then it's a hard job to have. Mm-hmm. And if I want work-life balance, what do I want that to look like? And it's hard not to feel like it's either or. And so you're, you're definitely an inspiration of , it can be both and it may be. 

It should  

[00:38:24] Ashley: be both. I kind of think it should be both. Yeah. I, that's what I think one of my main takeaways was from Covid, like the boyfriend stuff and the relationship stuff, but also like it can be both that's part of why I think I stay at the law firm now is like they, both sides, like you said, are equally important and grateful to have both because they, they make you more grateful for the other side. Right.  

Part of the fear of being an actor, I have found, it just was like, like I said, I love Muggles, my boyfriend, but a lot of my close friends are also non-theater people, and I'm 27 now, so I look around at them and during the pandemic I was really, it was impossible not to compare myself to them because I was like, okay, I'm like 24 and I have no hard skills. 

What, what do, what do all my friends have? And they were a year or two into their first job or into their second job. Mm-hmm. Where they were building things. And I've always said like I was so jealous of them 'cause it felt like they have a job, they have another job, and they're collecting these bricks. 

Every internship, every job they have, every promotion is a brick. Brick. And they are having bricks that stack on top of each other to build a wall. And then they build another wall and next thing you know, they've built themselves a life and a home. Yeah, I felt like as an actor, I had one brick over here and one brick over there, and they didn't stack and, but you know what I mean, right. 

One day you're woman number four in a regional production, and then literally the next gig you have, you're on Broadway, and then after that gig you're gonna go back to being woman number two. And, and so it felt like my bricks weren't stacking, and I looked at my friends and felt like, what? How? But they're gonna end up with. 

Homes and money and like the ability to support themselves and am I going to end up with that? And being able to have one foot in the muggle world at my law firm feels like, yeah, I have a certain amount of experience where if I decided today to throw my hands up with the acting, I would be able to find my way into an operations or tech software sort of. 

Scroll somewhere and would still have a block that feels like it stacks. And because I have that sort of feeling of a safety net, I think I am allowing myself to run farther with the acting, which feels like this crazy dream where I don't know where it's gonna go. You know what I mean? Yeah. So they feed each other, having both feeds each other. 

You cannot  

[00:40:55] Katie: take risks unless you have stability.  

[00:40:57] Ashley: Yeah.  

[00:40:58] Katie: Yeah. And that sounds like you have that great balance. I. Yeah. And then maybe you'll have stability in theater  

[00:41:06] Ashley: too. I would love that. It's really hard to find people  

[00:41:11] Katie: who have that. We never Right. We never know. Um, yeah. Yeah. I think most people don't, you know, most people who make it on Broadway aren't on Broadway. 

Their whole careers. That's not how  

[00:41:20] Ashley: that looks. Right. Which is why, you know, I like building a life with someone who's not doing that because in a lot of ways, like he feels stable to me. In, in this, in a similar  

[00:41:31] Katie: vein. . Oh yeah. Okay. So then you got the call that the show was gonna actually happen. 

What was that like? Um, I started  

[00:41:39] Ashley: working the law firm like. August or September of 2020 out of there by July 4th, 2021. So it was 11 months of just put my head down, do this job survive while the world slowly repairs itself? By July of 2021, I knew the show was coming and I think I knew it was happening, and we were gonna start rehearsals in October. 

I think I was like, I need to get back in shape.  

[00:42:05] Katie: It's just a total different  

[00:42:07] Ashley: lifestyle. So different, I mean, I'm sitting in a chair with a headset on answering calls and typing all day long and I was like, I need to figure out if I can move my body and if I can sing and, and so much of like, I started in July. 

Like if you look at where I was at the end of 2019, I was feeling good. I had done some jobs, I was so excited and that's what brought me into the room at the right energy to book. Once upon one more time, by the time it came time to actually do once, one more time, I was in such a different mental space. 

I just, I didn't know if I had. Any of the physical or spiritual fortitude to do it right. And I think that all goes back to like self-worth and like how much the pandemic really crushed us. Mm-hmm. Spiritually as artists, once I started moving my body and singing a little bit, like it was all right there. 

It had always been right there. Yeah. Which is the, the craziest part, like it, I did ballet for 10, 15 years. Like that doesn't go away. That past, you know, like I might not have the same turnout or whatever, but like it's all there.  

[00:43:12] Katie: Yeah. I feel like that's a trap that we fall into sometimes where we think, you know, p practice makes perfect and that's how we're trained is like you practice every day or you, you just have to do it every day, but it is. 

Really cool to, to take a break and then see how much it still lives in you. And you're like, okay, I can relax. Like I, this is in my body. It's okay.  

[00:43:33] Ashley: Yeah. And we were still doing a show in the time of covid, like October through. December of 2020 when we were actually doing the show in dc Um, the covid levels were higher in DC than they were in New York, and nobody went home for Christmas. 

And everyone kind of like made, I remember a lot of people made huge sacrifices. I had a ticket home for one day, like I was gonna fly there. Have Christmas dinner and fly right back. Oh my God. And everyone was gonna do that. You know, I was going the farthest from DC to California, but like people were, one girl was gonna drive to Michigan. 

From DC Oh my God. You know, in a day in, you know, we had 72 hours to do all this, and yeah, COVID levels were so high that people just, nobody went. Like, one girl went to New Jersey and nobody else went anywhere. So did you guys spend Christmas together? We spent Christmas together. It was me and one other girl, but everyone then was even so scared because people in our company were testing positive for Covid, so it. 

Felt like we couldn't be with anyone. And I spent Christmas of 2021 with one girl. Yeah, yep. With one of our swings, who's like my show bestie. We're in the dressing room together now at the Marquis. Oh, that's nice. I mean, it was the saddest,  

[00:44:58] Katie: were you in performances at  

[00:44:59] Ashley: that time? Yeah, we were in performances. 

Yeah. And they had finagled the schedule so that we had the day before, the day of and the day after off. So. Oh, that's nice. Which is what made it possible for people to go home.  

And I remember that final show we played before Christmas. Everyone was like, I really hope we didn't just play our last show, really. You know what I mean? Like the fear was so palpable but that's what Covid created was like just a big gaping hole for. Self-worth and confidence and value to be like sucked out of you. It just created so much fear and that DC run was very much tied up in that, unfortunately.  

[00:45:37] Katie: Right. Did the show, when did the show come back after your DC run? 

We finished  

[00:45:42] Ashley: the first week of January in 2022. And waited all year. Oh my God. For the  

[00:45:50] Katie: call. Oh no. So like you just  

[00:45:52] Ashley: didn't know. We had no idea. For a year. For  

[00:45:56] Katie: a year. So did you go back and work at the law firm? Oh  

[00:45:59] Ashley: yeah. 2022 is one of those. Times when I was just like truly an unemployed actor for almost the entire year. 

And I made all of the only thing that sustained me was working at the law firm. Yeah. So like I, I do feel like I'm still at the point in my life where I have to have both to sustain me emotionally and financially because I wouldn't have a lot going on. And I honestly wasn't going on that many auditions 'cause I wanted to go to Broadway with this project. 

I didn't wanna, you know, fall down some other rabbit hole. Oh.  

[00:46:29] Katie: In a way that's kind of a nice. I don't know. Maybe I see it as a nice position, but I'm sure it was very frustrating at times. But like you didn't feel like you had to audition. You weren't doing that hustle because you were like, I think this thing's gonna happen, which I'm sure was really stressful. 

And then you had this other job. So, so in a way it was better than when you were doing those 90th auditions in  

[00:46:55] Ashley: 2019? Yeah, I was, I guess at this point had new agents, so I was auditioning for a lot of film and tv, so, oh, it was, yeah. You've done a lot  

[00:47:02] Katie: of film and tv. I saw that in your resume. Yeah. That's very cool. 

[00:47:05] Ashley: 2022 was the year of learning how to do a self tape, learning how to read a pilot, learning how to audition in that medium. Yeah. And I booked a couple jobs there and I learned a couple things there, by December of 2022, I finally got the call that we were Wow.  

[00:47:25] Katie: Going to Broadway. So, oh my gosh. 

Um, we should sort of wrap up. I mean, I will just have to have you back 'cause this is awesome. But if you have, okay. Like, what advice do you have for sustaining a relationship when you were working in theater for dating a muggle? Oh my gosh.  

[00:47:44] Ashley: Um, communication. I have learned one of my tendencies is to take out my anger, my frustration, my disappointment or whatever about how my career is going on, my partner. 

So learning to communicate what I'm feeling in the career side of my life as an actor and being able to separate that from the relationship side and lean on the relationship side to support me through whatever I'm going through on the career side. Um, It was an important thing for me to learn and I just, I think because we take careers so personally, actors in general, people in the industry, um, it's just an important thing to keep an eye on because that can damage your relationship, you know? 

[00:48:31] Katie: Yeah, absolutely.  

[00:48:32] Ashley: That'd be one. Um, okay. Something I still struggle with, so this isn't something I really have an answer on, but so much of being an actor is the ebb and flow of, now you have all this free time, but you don't know when the free time's gonna end. 'cause you don't know when the job will be. 

And I. Spent so much of that free time waiting for the next job in a state of anxiety and panic.  

[00:48:55] Katie: Yep. Not just enjoying  

[00:48:57] Ashley: the time. Right. And then when the job does come along, I'm so focused on me, I'm so focused on the job that mm-hmm. If my two states are jobless and focused on me and having a job and focused on me, when am I focused on my partner? 

[00:49:12] Katie: Oh, interesting.  

[00:49:14] Ashley: So I have learned to let go a little bit and you know, when I know I don't have a job for a little bit like. I do say yes to that trip with my partner. I do say, yeah, let's make that plan. It's, it's so hard for me to plan because the spreadsheet, like, I love planning, I love making, yeah.  

[00:49:36] Katie: A list, a spreadsheet. 

Absolutely.  

[00:49:37] Ashley: A list, a spreadsheet. Putting things on the calendar. So when I have nothing on the calendar and I'm waiting for the job to come to fill the calendar, I don't put my partner on the calendar. Mm-hmm. And that has been a lesson I've learned and I'm still learning. He is so supportive and leans into what I'm doing and what I need, and I have to slow down and, and do the same for  

[00:49:58] Katie: him. Right. Absolutely. I I always wanna ask how can our community support you right now? Both find you and support you. Right now you're in a unique position in like supporting role. 

Is it a supporting role? Is that what we call it?  

[00:50:12] Ashley: We were, um, on ensemble contracts and listed as like featured ensemble and equity came to see the show and actually reclassified four of us and myself included as principals.  

[00:50:25] Katie: Oh, wow.  

[00:50:26] Ashley: Which is exciting.  

[00:50:30] Katie: So exciting. Oh my goodness. I'm just so excited for you for all of the things. 

So yeah, principal role and a Broadway show. How can our community support you right now? Well come see  

[00:50:41] Ashley: you once upon one more time. We're at the very marquee, eight shows a week. Um,  

[00:50:46] Katie: it is a really fun show, I have to say. I really enjoyed it. Thank you. Thanks. Yeah. Then how do we find you? You're on Instagram, I think you're  

[00:50:57] Ashley: on TikTok. 

I am on TikTok. I'm not,  

[00:51:01] Katie: but you should tell everyone. Oh my God. I'm on Instagram and  

[00:51:05] Ashley: TikTok at Ashley Cchu, um, which is my last name, spelled twice. C h I u. We'll put it in the show notes. Cool. Yeah. Come find me on social media.  

[00:51:17] Katie: Awesome. Okay. Thank you so much for your time today. And Of course that was a  

[00:51:21] Ashley: really great conversation and um, I know to hear it  

[00:51:24] Katie: back. 
 

Yeah. All right. Thank you again. Have a great show tonight. Thank you. 

Talk soon. Okay. Bye. Bye.