Much of the world knows Jane Lynch as Sue Sylvester, the snickering tracksuit-clad cheer coach on Glee yearning to — as the viral meme so eloquently explains — “create an environment that is so toxic” at the fictional William McKinley High School. It’s a role that revealed her acting chops to millions roughly a decade ago, expressed through threatening wisecracks and glass-cutting glares.
But these days, the multi-Emmy winner dresses in dashing shades of red, white, and green, and does all things holly jolly across America on tour. When Vanyaland phoned her earlier this fall, there’s a clear recurring theme in her gleeful responses: Christmas joy, and stockings full of it.
After a year off (like everything, blame COVID-19), Lynch returns to the stage this winter for her “Swingin’ Little Christmas” show alongside actress Kate Flannery (best known as Meredith Palmer on The Office) and Glee vocal arranger Tim Davis. 2021 marks the fourth year of Lynch’s newest holiday tradition, a traveling show where the carolers are also comedians and the Christmas spirit always comes in hot. The tour lights up Boston’s City Winery for two nights next week, December 7 and 8, as well as the Mahaiwe Performing Arts Center in Great Barrington on December 10.
Ahead of Lynch’s three local performances, read on to learn about her artistic transformation from villain to vocalist, her treasured Christmases in Chicago, and her least favorite holiday tune. (Hint: You probably hate it too).
Victoria Wasylak: So, do you feel blessed or cursed to be talking about Christmas music in mid-November?
Jane Lynch: Well, I just did a whole damn Christmas album, I love Christmas music. I love it. There’s no curse. It’s a blessing, baby. It’s my favorite thing in the world. And the guys I play with too, Kate Flannery and our band, we love Christmas, so we’re thrilled.
We’ve been touring with this music for — well, we didn’t do it last year because of COVID — the last four years or something like that.
This show has become your own Christmas tradition over the years. What made you and the whole group feel like now was the right time to bring it back? I know a lot of people are still hesitant to tour or do shows. It’s a very personal thing to consider.
It is. It really is, but we were all of the same mind. As soon as the vaccine came out and it looked pretty good that people were pretty covered, or if you got sick, you hopefully weren’t going to die, we were chomping at the bit to get back at this. So there was no hesitancy at all. We were like, “We’re gonna do it and as long as the people book us and want us to show up, we’ll be there.”
One of the things about this show, COVID or no, is that it’s a real toe-tapper. It’s Christmas, it’s fast-moving, you’ll recognize all of the music. But the wonderful thing about our music and the reason we wanted to make a Christmas album is because our favorite Christmas stuff — and everybody’s favorite Christmas stuff that we play over and over and over again — is music from the late ’50s or early ’60s. You know, the Bing Crosby stuff, the Perry Como, the Rosemary Clooney, The Andrews Sisters, that style of music that’s a little bit on the big band side, kind of jazzy, and swingy. That’s kind of Christmas to America, I think. That’s American Christmas music. That gets the toe tappin’ and it fills the heart with joy.
Have you started rehearsing yet?
Naaaah.
You’re like, “I’ve done this before. Come on.”
In years past, I’ve said, “Just familiarize yourself with your parts,” and everybody knows it. So we’ll probably hit the ground running. Kate Flannery and I, if there’s time, we’ll either meet before that first gig, we’ll hunker down in the hotel room and just go through our funny bits and our lines, and maybe we’ll sing through the songs. And Tim Davis too, [he] sings with us. We might do a little rehearsal that way. Then again, we might not. But this is in our bones. You know, we got it in there… But we might fall apart the first show, but it’ll still be fun.
No, you’ll be good. It’s muscle memory, right?
Exactly, exactly. Muscle memory for sure.
In between songs, what can people expect? Do you interact with Kate a lot? Can people expect a little bit of comedy in there?
Oh yeah. You come for the music and then, of course, Kate can’t help being spontaneous and out of her mind, and I can’t help trying to keep her in tow. It’s mostly about the music, but you’ll be laughing too. [laughs]
Who do you find is coming out to these shows? Are they people who know you from Glee? Are they people who are just general fans of Christmas?
I think it’s really one of those kind of general washes of people. I mean, if you know Glee, you know The Office, and that’s what Kate was in. I think it is just a great excuse to go out to [hear] Christmas music — you recognize our names, I think that gets people out.
I don’t find that it’s from one thing or another, but what’s interesting is that — and you’re probably in this age group — is the kids who were in high school when they watched Glee are now in college or out of college, actually. So there’s a lot of young adults. I realize, “Oh my God, that young adult was a child when Glee came out and they’re having a cocktail. Check their ID.”
People in my age group generally know you best from that show [Glee], so it’s really funny to see you go from Sue to being chipper and so happy. People know you’re acting, but still, sometimes it can be a shock to see: “Wow, you really are delightful in person.”
Thank you for saying that. And I am delightful in person! Yes. Definitely, we have our own little thing going on up on stage. Kate is kind of the wild card and I’m trying to keep everything in control. But yeah, yeah, I’ve heard that before too. I think that people know to suspend their disbelief, as we say in the theater, that I’m not really that person. And Sue is so mean and so dastardly that it’s funny. You know, she’s not dangerous. She’s not like Hannibal Lecter.
I always do what moves me and what feels like fun and this is something that I just love, and I still love playing a mean person. I play kind of a mean person on The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel. I looove doing that. I love dissecting mean, what makes people mean. [laughs]
Do you think you would ever make another Christmas album?
No, I think it’s been done. I don’t think so, unless someone served up a ton of money for it. I think we’ve done it. And we paid for this ourselves. We’re just now starting to collect a little money from it — I think 100 bucks each or something. No, that’s an exaggeration, but we made it ourselves. We did public domain Christmas songs, which means we didn’t have to pay the publishing, they’re in the public domain. We feel like we did it. Yeah, I can’t imagine we would do another one or even another album. I mean, never say never, but I can’t see that.
I think there’s a feeling of satisfaction when you’ve done something right the first time.
Yeah. Why do it again?
But the show keeps going every year. Does it change much from year to year?
Not really. It’s kind of set in stone, but it’s spontaneous. That’s what I love to do. This is my favorite thing in the world, is to set something in parameters and really put it in a box and then bounce around freely within that box. It has a feeling of being really free, but it’s very precise musically, and it’s so precise that we get to have a ton of fun. We know our parts so well that we’re not worried about hitting the right note, we’re not worrying about hitting the punchline from some banter in between because it’s already in our bodies, as you said. It’s like muscle memory. So that’s when you’re really free, is when you’ve got the basics down, the skeletal shape of it and then you just bounce around freely within that.
For any other type of show, doing something similarly every year probably wouldn’t work. But Christmas is such an occasion where you really do the same things every year and there’s such a joy in it.
You really hit on it there, about how it’s about tradition. It’s about doing the same things over and over again every year. And that’s where the comfort comes and the joy is, it’s something that comes back every year. And you know you’re gonna do the exact same thing, but there’s so much joy in it. . . It’s very apt of you to see that, it’s the familiarity that brings the joy.
As an adult, besides this show, what are things that you enjoy doing around Christmastime or things that get you in a good Christmas spirit?
I’m from Chicago, and nobody does Christmas like Chicago. My parents have passed, so I used to go home every year for Christmas, but I [still] go back to the city. What relatives I still have, like my sister and brother, are still there, but their kids are all with me in L.A. I’ll get a hotel room downtown and we will do the same thing: We walk up and down Michigan Avenue, we eat at the Ralph Lauren restaurant in front of a blazing fire. We go to Marshall Fields, which is now called Macy’s, which is a crime. Chicago does Michigan Avenue so beautifully. That means Christmas to me.
Do you feel like you see Christmas differently, or you have a new appreciation for it since making this album and doing these shows?
Yeah, and I think it’s like what you said about the tradition. Now, we’ve been doing this for four years, and I hope it will continue. When you do something three times, I think it becomes a tradition. [laughs] Actually, I think we’re in four or five [years]. I have to count, I’m terrible with math, but we’ve been doing it more than three years, so it feels like a tradition and we all look forward to it.
This year we’re wrapping it up around the 13th, but usually, we wrap it up around the 20th. So we will be home a week before Christmas, which will be nice, but I’m going right into Chicago. As soon as we’re done with the tour, I’m gonna spend a couple days in Chicago. Right to the heart of Christmas.
It’s a little bit harder to book shows right now, but before the pandemic, I think you had 34 tour dates in a season. That is a lot to get into one holiday season.
I think it was two years ago. The biggest scare we had about the whole thing for Tim, Kate, and me was that we would stress our voice or get the flu or something. But now that we wear masks, I haven’t even had a cold. So I’m really, really gonna keep up with this mask thing when I’m on tour. I’m gonna keep myself masked and healthy.
It’s really interesting that neither you nor Kate nor Tim are professionally trained when it comes to singing. Do you feel that you learn a lot from each other because of that?
Yeah, and the being trained thing is not always necessary. All three of us have very good ears for music, and a lot of our stuff is three-part harmony that Tim arranges. Tim was the vocal arranger on Glee. He arranged vocally every song. Tim has taught us a lot because Tim’s harmonies are not easy, they’re all very difficult. They’re like walking on a wire. If you fall off, you ruin the whole song. He’s shown me some really difficult harmonies that now are in my bones, as you said earlier.
My last question might be the most polarizing: What do you think is the most overrated Christmas song and the most underrated Christmas song?
What do I hear that I just have to turn it off? Oh, “Baby, It’s Cold Outside.” It sounds kinda rape-y first of all. It’s like he slipped her a mickey. But it’s really not Christmas. It’s just about a cold night and it’s repetitive.
And I think the underrated one is, “O Holy Night.” I don’t think we hear that enough. I think it’s one of the most gorgeous [songs], it’s devotional. It’s kind of emotional. I get emotional when I hear it, especially that part, “Fall on your knees / Oh hear the angel voices.” Oh my God! It’s so triumphant and it goes right to that deep metaphor of rebirth and the coming of love, and oh, I just love it.
JANE LYNCH — A SWINGIN’ LITTLE CHRISTMAS FEATURING KATE FLANNERY & TIM DAVIS: Tuesday, December 7, and Wednesday, December 8 at City Winery, 80 Beverly St. in Boston, MA :: 6 p.m. doors, 8 p.m. show, $67 to $97 :: Advance tickets
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