INTERVIEW: Joe Tapper on the personal, professional journey to ‘The White Chip’
Photo: Joe Tapper stars in the off-Broadway play The White Chip. Photo courtesy of Matthew Murphy / Provided by Print Shop PR with permission.
For actor Joe Tapper, performing in Sean Daniels’ The White Chip is an important milestone in his personal and professional life. The show, which he previously performed off-Broadway before the pandemic, centers on the character of Steven (Tapper), who is having great success in the world of theater, but is also struggling with alcoholism.
For Tapper, this central character hits home, in more ways than one. The actor has been open about his own struggles and his continued recovery. This truth, which he shares with audiences on a nightly basis, has helped bring Steven to life on stage in an authentic manner.
“I am very outward with my recovery and my sobriety, and I wear it very proudly,” Tapper said in a recent phone interview. “I read the play in one afternoon … and I fell in love with it. And I called my representation, and I said, ‘Hey, I think I may have to create a problem here,’ because I had another job at that time that was going to be a conflict. … Some calls were made, and I did the audition. Then the dominoes fell in my favor, and I got to do a production in 2019 off-Broadway. It went really well, and we were going to do it again in the year 2020. But this thing happened where the world turned upside down, and now we’re finally getting to do this again. And I have just a tremendous amount of gratitude for that.”
For Tapper, who appeared on Broadway in You Can’t Take It With You, the show works so well because it’s hilarious. Daniels, the playwright, makes sure the humor is not lost when following Steven on stage. Tapper said that instinct to laugh is true to life.
“When I go to an AA meeting, I am just overwhelmed with laughter sometimes,” he said. “It’s so funny, and everyone is so open. … Sometimes life can be really sad, but if we can grab some humor out of it and laugh at ourselves, then you can find joy through the dark times.”
Tapper added: “Truly my hope is if it’s one person through the whole seven weeks of this run, if one person who is struggling feels that they can have hope and courage to seek support and community, that they will. That’s truly my hope through this, that one person can feel seen and that they’re not alone. That’s the thing that I love. The recovery community and theatrical community intertwine. We all need to gather. We need to gather for theater. We need to gather for recovery.”
The White Chip has many champions who are hoping to bring Daniels’ vision and Tapper’s acting to a wider audience. Joining Tapper on stage are Crystal Dickinson and Jason Tam, and Sheryl Kaller (Next Fall and Mothers & Sons) directs the production. The producing team includes Jason Biggs, John Larroquette, Hank Azaria, Ryan Hampton, The Recovery Project and Annaleigh Ashford, who is married to Tapper in real life.
“The 12th step is the idea that to keep your sobriety you have to give it away, give that message out and live it,” Tapper said. “That’s what this is for me. I get to do this, and the story recovers and repairs every night. So, yeah, there are some tricky, tough moments, but it always repairs nightly. I find great refuge in that. It helps me. By me telling this story, it helps keep me sober.”
By John Soltes / Publisher / John@HollywoodSoapbox.com
The White Chip, starring Joe Tapper, continues through March 9 at The Susan & Ronald Frankel Theater in The Robert W. Wilson MCC Theater Space. Click here for more information and tickets.
