Beth Grant & Mary Chieffo
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In Conversation with Beth Grant & Mary Chieffo
Intro & Photography by Nolwen Cifuentes
With a career spanning over four decades and an impressive 241 IMDB credits to her name, Beth Grant has a long history of playing character roles in iconic films like Speed, No Country for Old Men, Amsterdam, and Donnie Darko. Her television credits include The Mindy Project, Dollface, Dexter, and of course, as Dwight Schrute’s babysitter in The Office’s unforgettable Dinner Party episode. Alongside her equally accomplished actor husband, Michael Chieffo, Beth has witnessed the industry's evolution firsthand. In this conversation, Beth and her daughter, Mary Chieffo, who has carved her own path as an actress with notable roles including L'Rell in Star Trek: Discovery, delve into the generational shifts within the entertainment industry, discussing topics ranging from the change of residual structures to the introduction of self-tapes.
Beth: I was born in Alabama, and raised in Georgia, North Carolina. My mother was, I wouldn't say exactly a Southern Belle as is personified in the media, but she was certainly a very Southern woman. She was a liberal Democrat in the South, which I've always been very proud of. She was an egalitarian and supported civil rights and the ERA. She was an activist!
She wanted to be a movie star when she was a little girl. Going to the movies was everything to that generation. She'd been too afraid to pursue it herself. She encouraged me to sing and dance, and put on shows for the relatives. I had this handsome uncle, who was an all-American football player. He came home from the Navy and she'd taught me this song to sing to him. He was in his uniform and he squatted down listening to me. I finished the song and all the relatives applauded. He was smiling and I was hooked. From that point on, people would say, what do you want to do when you grow up? And I’d say, “I want to be a movie star.”
Mary: I always like to tell this story when people ask me how I got into acting, especially being the child of actors. Up until fourth grade, I truly thought that everyone was an actor. In my mind, the whole world was just pretending to be all of these professions. My friend's mom was a lawyer, but to me, that was like when my mom would audition to be a lawyer. She’d be in her suit and would ask me, “Do I look like a lawyer?” And then she'd go off and audition.
Beth: One of my first TV roles was on the pilot for B.J. And The Bear. I had previously been a producing intern at Universal. I heard about a part in the pilot being produced by one of my friends there. I called and asked if I could audition, and he said, “Can you get here right now?” I happened to call at the right moment. I got there in about five minutes and I got that part. I was 27 and got my SAG card with that role. On the set, I didn't know any better, I kept coming up with ideas, and colorful lines that suited my character, a small role of a waitress. I kept going over to the director, Bruce Bilson, asking, “Could I say this instead of this?” He liked my ideas and instructed me to let the script supervisor know.
The third time, the Scripty nicely reminded me that Glen Larson had put a lot of effort into crafting those lines. He was teasing me. I was working from my experience in theater and my acting classes where you get to work and massage things. I just didn't know any better. But they liked it.
I have a tremendous respect for writers. I was out picketing early for the writers because if it ain't on the page, it ain't on the stage. Writers are everything to me. I like writers who work with you and give actors respect and allow us to collaborate. Most writers that I've worked with are very actor-friendly. When I was on The Mindy Project, Ike Barinholtz and his partner, David Stassen, or Mindy Kaling would come over and give us a line as we were shooting, they called them “Alts” for alternatives. They were always so brilliant and made it so much fun. It really felt like we were all electric. The cameras would still be rolling sometimes and they would come up and whisper in my ear. It is just so much fun when you're all on the same wavelength.
Mary: What we're currently fighting for on the SAG side, but obviously the same for the writers in the WGA is being able to be working creatives who are properly paid for their time and energy. As a child of two working actors, I’ve seen how my parents were able to build a full life together. And that was through residuals from commercials, TV, and film. When I came along, they were able to support me and create such an incredible childhood, teenhood, and adulthood. That all came from things that were put in place by SAG, which I took for granted. When I graduated college and got my first big job, there were protections that I had from SAG that hadn't existed until they were won in previous strikes.
Beth: The wonderful actor Tim Dekay, from White Collar and other films, was at our house for a party right after we first moved in. He said, “Do you just look around and realize that acting bought this?” I never forgot that. It’s not that it's all fancy, believe me. But it’s our home. Sometimes, I just pinch myself that it all worked out. It's just crazy. My husband and I are just two nutty character actors, with very unlikely success stories. There is no way we could have done it without residuals, without our unions to protect us. I doubt we’d have had the courage to even have a child.
To have the good life that we have is just remarkable to us. Every once in a while, we look at each other and our favorite expression is “Phew, thank God.” Thanks to unions, we have pensions and we've had health care.
We always had residuals, but it was a different business formula back then, and that was on network television. I was on the first episode of Friends. I made a lot of money, God bless, on that one episode. We would get residuals when they replayed our episodes. You would get paid the first time it aired, that was your salary. The first time it ran on the network, you got almost the full amount of whatever you initially made. You could make a living, you could make enough money to have your insurance and contribute to pension and welfare. Today, all of that is gone. I had a series a few years ago. We did six seasons and it has been streaming. I've made some money, and I’m grateful, but it is not enough to earn a living. It's something and I'm not complaining. I'm glad to get whatever I get. But it just isn't that same formula.
From left to right: Mary Chieffo, Beth Grant, Michael Chieffo, Madi Goff
Beth: To paraphrase Fran Drescher, the business formula changed, and they got greedy with streaming. They got into competition with each other. Everybody had to have a streaming service and they didn't think it through, no thought-out business plan. If it's true that they haven't been able to make enough profit to satisfy their stockholders, that's on them. They do have enough money to pay for private jets and executive salaries. It's just not right. I was raised by a mother who taught me, that you trickle up, you don't trickle down. The powers that be rarely let it trickle down unless they are forced to do so.
We had a nice situation for a while. In the 80s, that was the whole thing with cable and DVDs, right? DVDs were a whole new formula, and we trusted them. We trusted them that as things developed with new technology, we’d continue to get a fair piece of the pie. And with streaming it hasn't been the case.
Mary: I’ve seen some people comparing the percentages where in the pie, you could cut it out and they'd [AMPTP] be fine, and we'd be fine.
Beth: It's funny to me when I see some of the comments on Instagram when I post pictures from the strike and they say, “Yeah, you rich people.” Most actors can’t even make enough to get their insurance. Most of us don't even come close to being able to earn a living. I've been very lucky my last 30 years. We had residuals coming in. You could be a day player. You could guest star, you could costar, and you could still earn a decent living. That's all anybody's asking for.
And my God, the money we spend on acting classes, working for free on student films and shorts, college, and singing classes and dance classes, and small theater productions and promotion. I could go on. Sometimes I spend more getting the job than the job pays. We are skilled laborers.
Mary: Sometimes people say, “Well, you got paid this large amount for one job.” But the percentage of getting that job in comparison to the number of auditions, the acting classes, headshots, agency and manager fees, staying in physical shape, or whatever it is, that money gets so spread out. That’s why the residuals are so essential to an actor’s daily survival.
On that point, I’m also excited that when it comes to auditions, part of the negotiation is about self-tapes and modifying protections around them. The way the self-tape process escalated during the pandemic was unprecedented. Essentially, I’ve learned that some of the negotiations around auditions and self-tapes are fewer pages for a first audition with a larger turnaround time, which I am a huge fan of. Sometimes, you could get up to twelve or more pages for an initial audition due the very next day. That’s hard mentally as an actor knowing that they're going to like my interpretation or not in the first ten seconds and I still have to cram all of those sides in my brain. That kind of stress does not create the most liberated or inspired performances, in my opinion.
Of course, as an actor wanting to get the job you want to be able to do a substantial scene and show that you have a strong interpretation of the character. And in the best-case scenario, an audition should be a collaboration and conversation about how your character fits into the story. The creative mentality around the audition process could be more open in that way. Also, I’ve observed when it comes to being memorized or not, that mentality has really shifted. I remember my mom almost always holding her sides for auditions, even if you did really have it memorized and you'd worked on it enough, holding your sides was an indication that you were there to collaborate. Whereas, now, a lot of people say, if there's a flutter of a paper, it shows that you're not ready.
Beth: An audition should be part of the process, where you show them your ideas and then work together on them.
It's funny because I got one of my big jobs from a self-tape, but it was before anyone was doing self-tapes. That was for No Country for Old Men. I had met with the brilliant Coen brothers but hadn't heard anything for a couple of months. I figured I didn't get it.
One weekend I was scheduled to take Mary and her soccer friends out of town where they would be meeting the Women’s World Soccer champs. That Friday, the Coen brothers casting director called and wanted me to come in on Saturday to meet with them. It was tough but I had to say I couldn’t go. There are some things I would change in a minute, but this was important. I had to take these girls to this. My husband, Michael, had the idea to put me on tape. He made cue cards for me. Mary read the lines off-camera and Michael recorded it on our VHS recorder. We left and Michael was so nervous about it. He wanted me to get it so badly. He knew how much I wanted it. He drove to the Paramount lot and somehow got through the gate, walked in, and put it right on the Coen brothers’ desk. He didn't trust anybody to deliver that tape. He wanted to make sure they got it. And then, lo and behold, I got the offer on Monday.
In the old days, in rare cases, you could send in self-tapes. We didn't have any special lighting or anything, it was just sitting in the living room. That's part of the problem now that they expect more specifics.
Mary: Yeah. Even if the casting director tells you that it doesn't have to look great, there’s been a precedent that’s happening because actors and reps are looking at the tapes before they are sent off. Of course, you want it to look good. You want to be well represented. I remember going to in-person auditions and being like, “Are you sure this lighting is okay?” You're in a room, it's fluorescent light, and there’s no way that this is representing the way I’d look on screen.
There have been things that I've enjoyed about the self-tape process. One, if you come into a room, your nerves are up, and you don't give the reading that you wanted to, then you just beat yourself up all the way home. Whereas with the self-tape, you do get the luxury of creating your own space. That's definitely what I try to embrace now, treating it as a sacred theatrical space.
But often, especially when it's new material, you don't know what the director really wants. There are so many different ways to do a scene and you don't always know when the emotion is going to come. I like the aspect of self-tapes that allows me to explore multiple takes and start from whatever emotion I might have found at the end of the scene.
I recently made the choice for an interim-approved project to go to the Zoom audition because I wanted to do these sides with the team and meet the director. Whereas with another project, it might be such an emotional thing, and I’d want to create my own little cavern and really go to that place and take the whole day to do the tape. I think that's important too, to be offered that choice. And why I think it is so helpful to everyone involved in the audition process to have at least 48-hour turnarounds for self-tapes. The amount of time that a typical theatrical self-tape takes me to prepare from reading the script, memorizing lines, character work, picking out my costume, setting up my space, and then working on the scene with whatever kind soul has volunteered to read with me, can easily total over 24 hours.
Mary: I think at the core of what we are recognizing in this moment, too, is how artists are so easily taken advantage of because we love our craft so much.
Beth: We're not in it for the money, none of us, ever. Maybe some people, but I haven't met them or worked with them. We all just love to do what we do. We love to create.
Mary: It's a mental shift of knowing that you can simultaneously love what you do and ask for what you deserve. That's part of my package as an artist, is that I love creating my art. If someone's hired me to do a job, and they are excited about what I'm bringing to the table, and I'm excited about what I'm bringing to their table, then we are creative collaborators and I'm going to ask for a certain standard of treatment that is respectful to both sides.
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