Heléne Yorke: On Eating Flamin' Hot Cheetos in Her Underwear

Bullets Babe Heléne Yorke on Woody Allen, Professional Idiots and Eating Flamin' Hot Cheetos in Her Underwear

By Beth Stevens

Age: “Eleven-ish.”

Hometown: Los Angeles, California

Current Role: Aspiring actress Olive Neal, a ditzy, talent-free mob moll hellbent on being a star, in Bullets Over Broadway.

Stage and Screen Cred: Marty (replacement) in Grease on Broadway, Walmartopia and What's That Smell: The Music of Jacob Sterling off-Broadway. Jane on Showtime’s Masters of Sex.

“I wasn’t a nerd or a recluse, but I didn’t grow up too fast. Does it sound like I’m bragging about myself when I say that I had a childhood?”

“Andrew Keenan-Bolger was my college roommate for two years. Instead of going to tap class, we’d be in our underwear eating Flamin' Hot Cheetos on our futon watching Paula Deen for hours.”

"I’ll never forget the first moment I stepped on a Broadway stage. It was in Grease, and I knew it was momentous. My parents were there, and I got into a cab with them afterward and started crying."

"Woody was at my callback. When I was in the waiting room, the energy of the actors in there was palpable. There was a sense that people knew they were about to go in for a living legend. It was a bit of a trip."

"I’ve always been an idiot, so doing voices and being a goof has always been a part of who I am. I didn’t find [Olive’s] voice; it just sort of was. That’s sounds so actor-y, it makes me want to barf a little. I’m so dumb, and now I’m a professional idiot. Bonus!"

"As a human being I'm a grounded person, but this character is not. It’s easy to get Chihuahua-style over-excited, so staying at a normal frequency is essential. I'm trying to pace myself."

High Maintenance // Rachel

from Janky Clown Productions

Bullets shoots from the hip

It’s a perilous business covering entertainment. I nearly choked to death at a Bafta dinner recently, and on Wednesday I thought I might die laughing as I watched the great musical Bullets Over Broadway that Woody Allen and Susan Stroman are putting together at the St James Theatre. 
It’s based on Allen’s 1994 picture about a struggling Twenties playwright forced to cast a gangster’s moll — whose theatrical roles until then have been limited to ‘wiggling’ at risqué revues — in order to get his play staged on Broadway.
Zach Braff plays David Shayne, the rather precious writer, with Helene Yorke as Olive Neal the ‘wiggler’.

One of my favourite moments involved Helene Yorke (pictured with Zach Braff and Lenny Wolpe) singing a deliciously salacious old vaudeville song called I Want A Hot Dog For My Roll

Stroman explained that Marin Mazzie, who plays diva Helen Sinclair, was off with a flu bug the day I went, but I’m hoping to catch her before I leave town. 

The show is in previews and still being tinkered with, but I got the general idea — and I had a ball. 
One of my favourite moments involved Ms Yorke singing a deliciously salacious old vaudeville song called I Want A Hot Dog For My Roll. ‘I want a Hot Dog without bread, you see,’ pouts the wiggling Olive. Performed by Ms Yorke and choreographed by Stroman, it made me laugh so much I thought my heart was going to cease functioning.
I keep hearing that the musical has been polarising audiences — I have no answer for that. Some supposedly funny shows leave me stony-faced, but not this one. For me, Bullets fires on all cylinders.
Stroman’s heading back to London in the autumn to usher the Young Vic’s landmark, Olivier-nominated Kander and Ebb musical The Scotsboro Boys into the Garrick Theatre in the West End.