Kelly Carlin will turn to Brooke Adams and Tony Shalhoub — award-winning theater and film actors, comedic powerhouses and married couple of 33 years — to discuss the urgency of comedy today and its power to connect American audiences.
Carlin will close the Chautauqua Lecture Series’ Week Two theme “Comedy Now: A Week Curated by Lewis Black” in discussion with Adams and Shalhoub at 10:45 a.m. today in the Amphitheater.
Adams is known for her work in “Invasion of the Body Snatchers,” “Days in Heaven” and “The Dead Zone.” She also produced and starred in the film “Made-Up,” written by her sister Lynne Adams, and starred in several on- and off-Broadway productions throughout her career. In 1993, Adams retired from acting to revive her passion for painting.
In 2024, Adams returned to the stage in an off-Broadway performance of Sandra Tsing Loh’s comedy Madwomen of the West to star alongside Caroline Aaron, Adams’ longtime friend. While the production reminded Adams of the fun in acting, when asked by the The Guardian in 2024 if she regretted stepping away from acting, Adams said, “No, I had other things — the kids, painting. I thought, ‘I don’t want to go back to square one.’ It would have meant finding an agent, which is a horrible thing, then finding work.”
Instead, Adams dedicates herself to portraiture painting, channeling creativity into a different art form that shares similarities with acting.
“Painting people is very much like acting,” Adams writes on her art website, “You look at the face and body and try to capture them so that the person inside is revealed. In acting, you can either find the feelings first and then let those feelings inform the way you move, the way you sound and your facial expressions, or you can get the voice, body language and expression first … That may be why painting people feels natural to me.”
Shalhoub, Adams’ husband, is a Golden Globe-, Tony- and four-time Emmy Award-winning actor known for his role as the titular character in the television series “Monk,” which he returned to in 2023 for Peacock’s “Mr. Monk’s Last Case: A Monk Movie,” for which he received a Best Male Actor in a Television Movie or Limited Series nomination from the Screen Actors Guild and a Best Movie Made for Television nomination from the Critics’ Choice Awards. In addition to Broadway roles, such as The Band’s Visit and The Price, Shalhoub has acted in the film “Flamin’ Hot” and the television series “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel.”
Adams and Shalhoub met on the set of the theater production The Heidi Chronicles in 1990. They have since appeared on screen together several times since they married in 1992.
Shalhoub recalled the shift in his life marked by meeting Adams in a 2020 interview with Martha’s Vineyard Arts & Ideas.
“My main focus had been on my work, and that took priority over everything,” Shalhoub said. “But then, when I met Brooke, I realized, no, it didn’t have to be that way. The work could be in its place, and I could also have my life, a relationship, children. I needed to be more well-rounded.”
The conversation with Adams and Shalhoub will be moderated by Carlin — a storyteller, author, psychologist and television producer. In 2023, Carlin won an Emmy Award for her work as executive producer on the show “George Carlin’s American Dream.”
She moderated Chautauqua’s first-ever comedy-themed week in 2017 and discussed the impact of AI on the arts last summer on the Amp stage. In her return to the lecture platform today, Carlin said that she wants to not only entertain audiences but encourage them to consider the impact of comedy on culture.
“Comedy is a powerful tool and can be used as a powerful weapon, I suppose,” said Carlin.
Carlin highlighted that while comedy can bring audiences together in a moment of shared humanity, it can just as easily be used as a weapon to bully others and exacerbate divides.
In a time of intense political division and the rise of cancel culture, Carlin said that she frequently encounters comedians faced with the question: “Can you talk about anything you want to talk about?”
“And I’d say most professional, competent, comedians would say, ‘Yeah, I can talk about anything I want because it’s not about what we talk about,’ ” Carlin said. “ ‘It’s how we talk about it.’ ”
Carlin said she is curious to ask the couple about their experience in different eras of comedy, particularly since Shalhoub brings experience from three distinct decades of comedy television: the 1990 television series “Wings,” the 2000s hit “Monk” and the recent Emmy Award-winning streaming series “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel.”
“I want to talk to him and Brooke about their reflections and understanding of possibly how comedy has changed in these decades,” she said. “What’s tolerable? What isn’t? What’s needed by the culture, and how is it reflecting on the culture differently in each of those decades?”
Carlin also said she wants to ask the couple, who have worked on several projects together, about the role of humor in relationships and married life.
“And then paralleling that a bit with the fact that I’ve always believed that America really needs marriage counseling … how can America use humor to bridge the divide or to keep the connection going?” Carlin said.
She looks forward to examining the role of comedy in bridging the gap between the cultural and political divides plaguing the United States. In a conversation examining comedy as a bridge across divide, Carlin looks forward to an insightful conversation with Adams and Shalhoub.
“They’re both dramatic and comedic actors, so they’re the only people like that on stage this week. I hope we get a little glimpse (of) their craft and their art form and the different media that they work in,” Carlin said. “… I’m sure we’ll have some good laughs, and it’ll be a warm and fun morning.”
