Creative couple Constance Zaytoun and Marc Stuart Weitz are serving up a delectable new comedy-meets-cooking series, Constance Cooks, with heaps of laughter and a side of reality. Constance, originally from North Carolina, obtained her BA from UNC-Chapel Hill, before going on to receive her MA from NYU, and PhD from CUNY Graduate Center. Recently, Constance has garnered rave reviews for her performance in the Off-Broadway production of Paula Vogel’s And Baby Makes Seven.
Marc, Constance’s counterpart both on screen and off, graduated from the University of Pennsylvania, before earning an MFA in Acting at the American Conservatory Theater. Those familiar with Marc will recognize him as the founder of the NY Indie Theatre Film Festival, and the Producing Director for the award-winning New Ohio Theatre. Together,
this talented duo has created the perfect recipe for comedy with Constance Cooks. The series combines a 5-star worthy cast, award-winning indie director Rosalie Tenseth and Emmy-winning producer and culinary producer David Domedion, delivering a refreshing twist on the modern day sitcom.
The series has been gaining momentum on the festival circuit since debuting the pilot episode and winning ‘Best Pilot’ at the 2018 NYC Web Fest. It also earned 3rd place for ‘Best Comedy’ at the New York Women in Film & Television (NYWIFT) Online Shorts Festival, presented in partnership with GoIndieTV and is now airing on their website and Roku channel. Up next, the pilot episode will screen at the New York Indie Theatre Film Festival (NYITFF) at the New Ohio Theatre, followed by the world premiere of the “Edible Arrangements” episode as part of the Winter Film Festival.
How did you each get into the business and then come together as a team?
Constance Zaytoun (CZ): Both Marc and I have acted since college. I moved to NYC to be surrounded by theatre, but I didn’t think I could pursue the work full-time, so I took on a bunch of corporate jobs. I ran away from acting so much that I got a PhD in Theatre Studies so I could still be close to the theatre. Once I graduated (it took 10 years!), I realized it was now or never if I was going to commit to acting, and so I jumped in full-time and treated it like a business, as well as an art. And I couldn’t be happier.
Marc got his MFA in Acting from ACT and after working as an actor for several years after school, he started to direct and produce. We first came together when we produced Moby Pomerance’s new play for the NY Fringe Festival. Marc directed. I acted. We worked well as a team and the production did quite well, too.
Marc Stuart Weitz (MSW): And we haven’t stopped working together.
What made you want to create your own projects?
Constance Zaytoun (CZ): We’d been toying with this idea for many years, but the format we had been thinking of was too difficult to self-produce and get off the ground. And then we had one of those “ah-hah” moments when we realized the structure of the show was actually “meta.” Instead of creating a cooking show in which I interview NY artists and cook their favorite foods, it’s a show about a woman who wants to make that show, but she’s not sure she knows how or if she’s too late in her life to make it happen.
Marc Stuart Weitz (MSW): I also think Constance and I push each other to make work. She calls me out on my stuff, and I call her out on hers. Without each other, we’d be a couple of bums.
Constance Zaytoun (CZ): Or trying to grow carrots in Indiana.
Marc Stuart Weitz (MSW): Wait, what? Do they even grow carrots in Indiana?
Constance Zaytoun (CZ): We’d try.
Briefly explain your new web series Constance Cooks?
Marc Stuart Weitz (MSW): Constance Cooks is kind of like a modern-day Mary Tyler Moore Show crossed with Julia Child, by way of Sex and the City! Our hero, Constance, is a 40 year-old professor with a cooking problem. Rather than stay in academia to pay off her loans, she slings cocktails and dreams of creating her own cooking show where she interviews New York artists.
Each episode starts with her describing a recipe she’s going to make, but then you see all the trials she goes through to make it. She’s just a little too old, or not hip enough, or out-of-step, or whatever. By the end of the episode, however, she’s discovered a better recipe as a result of her age and experience. So she succeeds, but with a twist that surprises her and keeps her moving toward her goal. And then after the narrative portion of the episode, we actually include a time-lapse demonstration of the recipe so you can make it, too!
Where did you find the inspiration for this idea?
Marc Stuart Weitz (MSW): This is very much inspired by Constance’s real life. While she was writing her dissertation, she used to interview artists in her home and cook them dinner. And she really does love to cook for friends and entertain them in our tiny apartment. Oh, and she really is un-hip to current pop culture! She’s the youngest of 9 kids, and there’s a big age gap between her and the next oldest sibling, so she’s more tied to the 70’s than she is to Gen X. And don’t get me started on how clueless she is about Millennials!
Constance Zaytoun (CZ): Hey!
Marc Stuart Weitz (MSW): I’m just kidding. Sort of. That moment in the pilot where she doesn’t know who Taylor Swift is really happened.
Constance Zaytoun (CZ): That’s true.
What were the first steps you took to make it happen?
Constance Zaytoun (CZ): We did some preliminary toying around in the kitchen with a friend filming, but really, the first major step we took was Marc’s idea. He suggested we take one week off from our other jobs and literally pay ourselves to write for the week. We locked ourselves in our apartment and wrote the first drafts of the first three episodes. It was incredible. There was writing. There was yelling. There was cracking each other up.
Marc Stuart Weitz (MSW): There was drinking –
Constance Zaytoun (CZ): I do make a great cocktail!
Marc Stuart Weitz (MSW): She does.
Constance Zaytoun (CZ): But every time I thought we hit a wall, we would shift our flow and do something else and then suddenly, the answer appeared. It was pretty amazing to me as a first-time writer collaborating in this genre.
Anything you wish you could “do-over” on the project?
Constance Zaytoun (CZ): Honestly, not really. Are there shots I wish we had? Is there some clarification in the script I wish we gave? Are there some “getting everyone on the same page” moments I wish we had made happen? Of course! But there’s no way I could have anticipated any of the “do-over” moments, and I’m most grateful to have learned from the experience we had and the crew who joined us. I know it’s a cliché, but Marc and I really came to understand the shape of our show in post-production, and a lot of the “slips” from production are getting reconfigured into something that makes the show better!
How do you balance both acting and creating?
Marc Stuart Weitz (MSW): Our life is really just one big balancing act. It’s about all the things we have to balance to do what we want to do and support ourselves. We are actors, we’re creators, we’re producers –
Constance Zaytoun (CZ): We’ve got thrival jobs –
Marc Stuart Weitz (MSW): Um, yeah – that’s what she calls survival jobs.
Constance Zaytoun (CZ): I learned that from an industry coach I admire, who’s a friend, and it’s more positive.
Marc Stuart Weitz (MSW): It takes a lot of balancing to be an artist in New York. And it takes being okay with times when you’re not creating, too. I try not to let the downtime make me think we’ll never work again.
Constance Zaytoun (CZ): In fact I learned how to rethink what “downtime” is and it isn’t really that at all. It’s perhaps quiet time or introspective. It’s the time I take for mindset work or planning. When I’m not auditioning or on a gig or creating our work, I’m doing some of the most important work for me as an artist. And what’s really important for us in this “balance” is finding time to take an entire day for ourselves to go out and enjoy the City.
Any tips for other actors looking to create their own projects?
Marc Stuart Weitz (MSW): Just do it!
Constance Zaytoun (CZ): Yes. And…I think there’s more, too. Finding a community in this business that has similar goals to your own is so important. It’s a lot like actors graduating and then forming their own theatre company with their peeps—
Marc Stuart Weitz (MSW): Peeps? Really?
Constance Zaytoun (CZ): Yes. Peeps. It’s what the kids say these days.
Marc Stuart Weitz (MSW): *groan*
Constance Zaytoun (CZ): Anyway, friends create work and learn the business together. The film/TV side of the business (for actors) may seem more isolating, but creating your own work, due to the accessible resources and platforms available now, is very much like what theatre artists have always done. Marc and I could not have done this without the community of fierce artists who consulted with us, advised us, and ultimately collaborated and worked with us. And I met many of them because of the peer groups of which I’m a member.
Marc Stuart Weitz (MSW): arc: Totally. And then just do it!
What do you want to see change about the business?
Constance Zaytoun (CZ): I hope we continue to progress toward more women showrunners, directors, producers, and content-creators. And one day, parity isn’t something for which we still need to fight. Also I hope we continue to pay artists a living wage instead of finding ways to get around valuing their work!
Who are your creative idols and what do you love about their work?
Marc Stuart Weitz (MSW): Well, I’m starting to see my–
Constance Zaytoun (CZ): Peeps?
Marc Stuart Weitz (MSW): — colleagues I know who started at the bottom, and just kept working at it for 10 years or more, and are now coming into their own. I really admire their putting in the work with no promise it would lead to something.
Constance Zaytoun (CZ): For me, Larry Gelbart from M*A*S*H is a big idol of mine. As is Mary Tyler Moore. And Bob Newhart. And Marlo Thomas.
Marc Stuart Weitz (MSW): See! I told you she identified with the 70’s!
Constance Zaytoun (CZ): Truth. What I love about these folks is how they were pioneers, particularly as it pertains to women. Marlo Thomas’s That Girl preceded The Mary Tyler Moore Show as a single woman pursuing her career. Mary continued that trend, and her character aged to almost 40 before the show ended, and she still wasn’t married. Bob and Emily Hartley worked through life and their careers with humor and without kids. And since Mary Richards and Emily Hartley were last seen in 1977 and ‘78, women on TV are written mostly as mothers or women with successful careers – who then adopt children & become mothers. And a lot of the women I know are neither. So I’m interested in exploring that situation again.
Truth. What I love about these folks is how they were pioneers, particularly as it pertains to women. Marlo Thomas’s That Girl preceded The Mary Tyler Moore Show as a single woman pursuing her career. Mary continued that trend, and her character aged to almost 40 before the show ended, and she still wasn’t married. Bob and Emily Hartley worked through life and their careers with humor and without kids. And since Mary Richards and Emily Hartley were last seen in 1977 and ‘78, women on TV are written mostly as mothers or women with successful careers – who then adopt children & become mothers. And a lot of the women I know are neither. So I’m interested in exploring that situation again.
And back to Marc’s point. It’s true. Artists who keep plugging away and persevere in this business are my idols, too. Doing the work is everything.
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