I first became aware of Actress & Singer Linda Purl when she joined Season 3 of the 6-time Emmy Award winning series After Forever.

From being on so many hit TV shows including Happy Days, Matlock, The Office, The Bold and the Beautiful & over 45 made-for-TV movies, I can't believe how long it has taken me to get into Linda's orbit.

Currently, Linda is juggling multiple projects. She is finishing up her run in Theatre Winter Haven's production of Love Quest, alongside her partner, Actor Patrick Duffy, she is gearing up for her new cabaret show, Tunes & Tales: Adventures in Survival, on November 10 at The Green Room 42 & Linda is getting ready to self publish her new book, A Peek Behind the Curtain - An Actress’ Life on the Road.

In this interview, Linda answered my call to share:

• What made now the right time to premiere her new cabaret show
• One adventure that helped her survive a challenging time in her life
• What she likes about working with her partner, Patrick Duffy
• How she keeps her energy up with everything she has on her plate
• So much more

Connect with Linda: Website, Facebook, Instagram

TV, Broadway and cabaret star Linda Purl returns to The Green Room 42 with an unforgettable new show made just for this moment. Tunes and Tales celebrates great jazz and pop standards with Purl’s storyteller’s passion and humor, asking the question, “How can our adventures help us survive?”. Acclaimed Music Director Tedd Firth leads an all-star jazz trio in this fresh, surprising evening.

Tunes & Tales will play The Green Room 42 in NYC on Monday, November 10 at 7pm EST. Click Here for tickets!

1. You are getting ready to premiere your new cabaret show, Tunes & Tales at The Green Room 42 on November 10. What made now the right time to share this show? Yes! Yippee! Excited. Thank you for asking…our subtitle is Adventures in Survival and we chose that because in changing times, make that these changing times, I for one am on a constant hunt for ways to hold steady. Swapping life stories, sharing music and tales of adventures we have survived help me a lot.

2. What do you think will surprise audiences about this show? Oh goodness, I couldn’t guess and that is part of the adventure with any performance. You put it out there and Lord only knows what will land on any given audience member in that moment.

Tedd Firth, my MD, is always full of musical surprises and his charts on this show will be no exception I am confident to say. Add the luminary talents of David Finck on bass and Ray Marchica on drums and we’re bound to have a good time.

We do take liberties with known tunes…shake them up with new tempos, interjecting a verse from one song into another sort of thing. Never randomly I will say…when we take those liberties, they are inspired by the story we want to tell.

Linda Purl & Tedd Firth
Orinda Theater, CA
Photo Courtesy of Linda Purl's social media

3. Since the show is called Tunes & Tales, what was the first song & story that made you go, "This is the start of my next cabaret show?” Love that question. Funny...it wasn’t so much a particular song this time that started us off, but rather a small collection of feels…all of them energized, with momentum.

No wait...I actually lie. "Spring Will Be a Little Late This Year " was the first tune we committed to. It has a tale to tell and one heck of a gorgeous tune.

4. Press notes state that this show asks the question, "How can our adventures help us survive?" My question to you is, what is one adventure of yours that helped you survive a difficult time in your life? Parachuting. The gods smiled on me when I used to do that…say that because the stupidest thing anyone can do is jump out of a perfectly good airplane. I liked to do it in my 20's and survived without incident. What on earth was I thinking?

Anyway, it taught me some version of self-reliance because believe me when you’re up there just you and your chute…no one can save you but you. There are myriad better ways to learn this.

Linda Purl & Patrick Duffy
Photo Courtesy of Linda Purl's social media

5. In addition to preparing for upcoming cabaret show, Tunes & Tales, you are also co-starring alongside your partner, Patrick Duffy in Theatre Winter Haven's production of Love Quest. What is the best part about working on a show about love with your real-life partner & what challenges does it present?Steve McGraw and Mary MacGuire wrote a solid, outrageously funny play so it is a great pleasure to be doing it with Patrick. Steve’s wife, Nancy McGraw, so well-known in cabaret circuits and beyond is here with us too…so what a jolly time all together.

Patrick and I have been so very lucky to work a lot together...both on stage and in film. We get to take advantage on stage of the wellspring of trust between us, the knowing and our own life shorthand. I cannot tell you how privileged we both feel to be doing what we love and to be doing it together.

6. If the projects above are not enough, you are also writing & self-publishing a book about your experience as an American actress working in the UK. With all you have going on, how do you keep your energy up & find some "me time" amongst your busy schedule? Ha ha. I’m Yankee born...and then grew up in Japan...in what the author Malcolm Gladwell terms “rice paddy culture.” He differentiates between a farming culture whose life rhythms are influenced by distinct seasons of planting, waiting, harvest and a culture that grows rice as one that never rests.

At all seasons they plant, grow and harvest simultaneously. He theorized that this constant activity profoundly influenced the storied rice growing communities' work ethic. So, between the two, I think I am project oriented.

"Me time" is a must…Patrick and I both have a long morning ritual…coffees, our individual 'spiritual practices' I’ll call them here and I roll around on the floor...get, or try anyway, to get the kinks out.

Linda Purl, Patrick Duffy (far right) & Friends
Marylebone Theatre in London, England
Photo Courtesy of Linda Purl's social media

7. What have you discovered about the writing & self-publishing process that you didn't know beforehand? We are all so fortunate to be living in an age where we have autonomy in so many areas. Cabaret is one. Pull your smarty pants talented team together, create a show, call a club or clubs and at some point, one of the clubs will give you a date or three. You don’t have to sit around in other words for the phone to ring.

Publishing a book is another area of autonomy if you want it. I have no allusions of becoming a writer, so I had/have no illusions of a publisher taking me on. The book…and thank you for asking about it…is called A Peek Behind the Curtain - An Actress’ Life on the Road.

It covers a 7-month tour Patrick and I got to do bouncing all over England with a play under the auspices of the gone too soon, great British theatre impresario, Bill Kenwright. Hilarity ensued, and every moment of it was a dream come true. A right proper fairy tale adventure.

8. Without giving too much away from your book, what was the defining moment of your experience working overseas as an American actress that made you realize you had to write a book about this? Again...it was gradual. The production was fraught with challenges...Covid, a disastrous storm, complications resulting from the Ukraine War even, and yet with the great British carry on spirit the show did in fact go on.

I took to writing a daily journal as I was sure we wouldn’t remember it all or even believe we had actually had those experiences. Believe me...it’s an indulgence to be self-publishing it, but I hope some folks might buy it on Amazon and get a good giggle. It comes out Nov 14.

Linda Purl & Kevin Spirtas, After Forever Season 3
Photo Courtesy of After Forever's social media

9. I can't do an interview with you and not make reference to one of my favorite streaming series, After Forever, where you played Dr. Evelyn Myer, who was helping Kevin Spirtas' character, Brian, move through his grief of losing his partner Jason (played by Mitchell Anderson). With so much loss going on in the world today, what are some things that have helped you move through your own grief of losing a loved one? Bless you for mentioning this. I am so filled with admiration for Kevin and his entire team for creating a series of such meaning. So glad I get to be a tiny part of it.

Oh goodness…loss aplenty in today’s world. It’s part of a longer conversation, but suffice to say I believe in a continuum. Having had the extreme privilege of being bedside when three souls have passed...my experience in those moments has had much more to do with transition than an end.

I had a recent experience of an Irish friend passing of late. A few nights later I awoke at 4am and he was on my mind. To the best of my ability, I started to pray for his continuing journey. I then heard a short string of odd unknown words in my mind that sounded like Gaelic... a language I do not speak at all, but one my deceased friend did speak fluently.

As I was dozing back off, I thought to ask an AI site what the words or words that sounded like what I had heard meant in Gaelic? This is what came up on my cell phone screen: “May you be well little one. Live in the Knowing. I am living in the knowing.” OK...this is woo woo but it is what happened. Kind of fun.

10. What is something we didn't get to talk about that you'd like my audience to know about you? Thank you! Patrick and I started a sourdough bread company in my garage in Colorado four years ago called Duffy’s Dough.

Kroger incredibly kindly has taken us on and over the next year they’re rolling us out in their stores across the country. They do all the work which is great and we get a small royalty.

Our mission is to give all our profits away to food scarcity efforts in the US. With the truly heartbreaking federal budget cuts of support for the needy I’m glad, very glad, we can play a teeny tiny part in meeting a crucial need.

Linda Purl, Photo Credit: James Cornfield

More on Linda Purl:

Linda Purl is known to millions for her running roles on multiple, iconic television series. Besides being Richie Cunningham’s girlfriend, Fonzie’s fiancée on Happy Days, Matlock’s daughter Charlene Matlock, Pam’s Mom/Steve Carell’s girlfriend on The Office, she has starred in over 45 made-for-TV movies. She is currently recurring on The Bold and the Beautiful. 

Theatre credits (partial listing) Broadway: The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, Getting and Spending. Off Broadway, The Baby Dance.

Regional theatres: Long Wharf, Actors Theatre of Louisville, The Old Globe, Mark Taper Forum, South Coast Repertory, Santa Fe Opera, Cleveland Playhouse, Laguna Playhouse, The Lensic Santa Fe, Berkeley Rep, Williamstown Theatre Festival (six seasons); Theatre Princesse Grace, Monaco; Imperial Theatre, Tokyo, Japan, Grand Opera House Belfast.

Partial film: Bender, Mighty Joe Young, Leo and Loree; Sundays.

Linda currently tours with The Year of Magical Thinking and in concert.

Solo albums include Alone Together, Out of the World, Midnight Caravan, Up Jumped Spring. Taking a Chance, and most recently, This Could Be the Start.

Past concert venues include Birdland, 54 Below, Jazz at Lincoln Center, Catalina Jazz Club, Naples Philharmonic, Princess Grace Theatre (Monaco), Crazy Coqs (London), Colorado Springs Philharmonic, Club Raye (Paris) and Satin Doll (Tokyo).