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  • - You grew up in Amish country.

  • - I did. - What was that like?

  • - It was pretty crazy. - Yeah?

  • - My house growing up was in between two Amish fields.

  • - Like, like how much land between--

  • To me, it sounds like Utopia.

  • It sounds like just land and not that many cars and--

  • - Yeah, it was very idyllic.

  • There was Amish buggies on the road.

  • And my dad's side of the family is Mennonite,

  • and so my grandmother had Mennonite women that would work in her garden,

  • and I would drive them home.

  • - Now what do they dress like?

  • What do the Mennonites dress like?

  • Like the Amish?

  • - Mennonites are sort of like watered-down Amish.

  • So Mennonites, they, uh--

  • they wear sort of just normal, like, plain clothes, jeans and sneakers and stuff.

  • But the Amish are full-on,

  • you know, coverings and everything.

  • - Right. - Yeah.

  • - Wow. - Yeah.

  • - And so you, uh--

  • So lots of land and animals and stuff like that?

  • - Yeah, my dad actually trains and races horses for a living.

  • And so-- - There?

  • - Yeah, yeah, in Amish country.

  • - Wow.

  • - And races around Pennsylvania and New York,

  • and so I grew up, yeah, around a lot of animals.

  • - And you had goats.

  • - We had goats, and we didn't just have any--

  • any, like, regular kind of goats.

  • We had fainting goats.

  • - Have y'all heard of--

  • Do you know what fainting goats are?

  • - Yeah? There's some fans.

  • - It's such a strange thing.

  • - It is. It really is strange.

  • When you--when, like, they're scared by an animal running by or a person,

  • they freeze and fall over.

  • I don't know why.

  • - It's the weirdest thing.

  • - It's really weird.

  • - And how long do they stay down?

  • - They stay down for, I would say, a good, like, 30 seconds, maybe more.

  • - Wow. - Yeah.

  • - That's just the weirdest thing.

  • - It is the weirdest--

  • - I mean, possums play dead, which is very clever.

  • - Yeah.

  • - To avoid getting eaten by their predator.

  • And for-- But to be that, like--

  • Oh!

  • - I know. I know.

  • It seems like the opposite reaction you'd want to have to a predator.

  • - Yeah, you'd want to run as fast as--

  • Then you'd give them a chance to eat you for 30 seconds.

  • - Exactly. - It's really dangerous.

  • - Yeah. - Oh, man.

  • And so your parents, they were not Amish or Mennonite?

  • - My dad was Mennonite. He grew up Mennonite, yeah.

  • - Okay, but they were-- And is that--

  • Forgive me for my ignorance. - That's okay.

  • - But can you listen to music and watch TV and stuff?

  • - Mennonites, it's a little like "Footloose."

  • There's no--

  • In that there's no, like-- You're not allowed to--

  • It's, like, just sort of conservative.

  • There's no dancing. That kinda thing.

  • It's sort of like very humble,

  • very, like, plain folks.

  • - So you can listen to music. You just can't dance to it?

  • Can you listen to music?

  • - You can definitely listen to church music.

  • Yeah.

  • - So were they supportive of you becoming an actor?

  • - Yeah, actually I did a show in New York

  • called "Spring Awakening." - Mm-hmm.

  • - And my mom, before she'd even seen the show,

  • brought a busload of people from our hometown in Lancaster

  • to come see "Spring Awakening."

  • And--and for those of you who haven't seen it,

  • it's a show about young people

  • having their sexual awakening.

  • And so we called them

  • "The Mennonite Bus" coming up to see the show,

  • and my parents-- I did it with Lea Michele.

  • We had, like, a simulated sex scene,

  • and they were horrified.

  • But by the end of the show,

  • it was the loudest applause we'd ever gotten for a performance.

  • They were incredibly supportive.

  • And then my mom brought up five more bus trips after that.

  • - Wow. - Who'd figure.

  • - Well, I bet they were excited by that for sure.

  • "You gotta see what they're doing."

  • - Exactly.

  • - "We're doing it wrong."

  • So...

  • But--but didn't you warn them?

  • Didn't you tell them what the play was about?

  • - I did.

  • Yeah, I did,

  • but I was a little nervous to give them all of the specifics.

  • And she'd sort of organized the bus trip without kind of telling me.

  • - Well, then it's her own fault. - Exactly.

- You grew up in Amish country.

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