Norbert Leo Butz

I remember really getting into 'The Wiz' and an old musical called 'Purlie,' which Melba Moore sang. I liked those roof-raising shows because I connected deeply with the gospel aspects of those musicals.

I've always been drawn more to film. But 'Bloodline,' to me, feels like a 13-hour piece of cinema. And the great thing about Netflix is you get to be almost like an editor. You choose how much of the narrative you want to watch at a time, which makes you complicit in the story.

Sometimes, you don't know what's going to happen to your character until the night before you shoot the scene. So, sometimes, you get a great big surprise at the very last minute, which is scary sometimes. You don't have a whole lot of time to prepare.

It's thrilling to be onstage and to not know, literally, what the next moment is going to bring. To just submit to the not-knowing-ness of it.

I was in the original cast of 'Wicked', and that got a bad review in 'The New York Times,' and it's the most successful thing that's ever been put onstage.

I am the most successful unsuccessful actor in New York. And I guess with that, maybe apparent only to myself, there started to be a very subtle but unmistakable whiff of entitlement, bitterness, jealousy. I was not respecting the work.

Most of my work in New York has been on new musicals. And all through the preview process, they throw you new songs, new lyrics, new choreography, new scripts; you're constantly getting new material. You might get it in the morning and put it in the show at night. It happens every single day, so those muscles are pretty toned.

If you individualize an audience, it helps up the stakes of your responsibility to that audience.