✍️ Paul, Unscripted
A note from Paul, in his own words.
🦜 June came SOARING in like a parrot with my win for Outstanding Lead Performance in a Play (Midsize) in Featherbaby at the Elliot Norton Awards.
In general, comedic roles aren’t recognized as often as dramatic ones, so I feel especially honored and seen for my work in theater over the past year. Comedy is hard work, and it’s taken my entire career to try to hone it and tame it.
Of course, I wanted to become an actor to perform, period — not be a comedian. So my goal in any role is to portray truth… even if that role is a swearing, pooping parrot.
I hope you’ll also find comedy and truth going hand in hand in my current production of The Mystery of Irma Vep at Central Square Theater in Cambridge. The show is exquisitely funny, yes, but there’s also a strong undercurrent of sadness. Ludlum wrote it as an act of defiance — a celebration of queer joy in the face of loss.
If you let it all in, the experience will be quite an impactful one.
Peace and love,
Paul
✨ The Headliner
Onstage, onscreen, and what’s coming up.
🌈 Celebrate Pride Month with Queer Monster Play Irma Vep
📸 Photo credit: Maggie Hall Photography
Image Description: Production photo from The Mystery of Irma Vep at Central Square Theater. At L: Actor Gabriel Graetz as Lord Edgar Hillcrest. He wears an elaborate black and gold brocaded robe with matching cap and and small spectacles. At R: Paul Melendy as groundskeeper Nicodemus Underwood, wearing a tattered brown overcoat with an orange plaid scarf and hat. Lord Edgar wraps an arm around Nicodemus and gestures upward. Nicodemus looks straight out with an alarmed expression. They stand in front of a plain wall and window illuminated with bright pink lighting.
👯♂️ A queer camp classic: This Pride Month, Central Square Theater is staging The Mystery of Irma Vep: A Penny Dreadful, starring Paul and Gabriel Graetz. Written by Charles Ludlum a few years before he died of AIDS, it infuses comedy into a world of mysterious deaths at the hands of a monstrous external force — a world that must have felt all too familiar to him. Irma Vep is a work of both queer resistance and queer joy, and Paul is delighted to be part of it.
👗 Phantom threads: How do you approach dressing two actors who need to rapidly switch parts between a noblewoman, a manservant, a mummy, a werewolf, and more? The Boston Globe’s Christopher Wallenberg spoke with costumer Seth Bodie, Paul, and other members of the production team to get a peek behind the curtain at the costumes this lightning-fast show requires. Read the article.
🗣️ Critics agree: Irma Vep “slays,” raves Chris Vognar of the Globe. David Greenham of The Arts Fuse praises Paul as “a force of addled nature,” while Jacquinn Sinclair of WBUR highlights Paul’s performance as Lady Enid for both its humor and its vulnerability.
📍 When and where: Open now and extended through June 28 at Central Square Theater. Paul doesn’t recommend for kids under 13 (monsters, LOTS of raunchy humor).
🧚🏽Up Next: A Midsummer Night’s Dream on Boston Common
📸 Photo credit: T Charles Erickson
Image description: Production photo from Commonwealth Shakespeare Company’s 2007 production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, featuring Fred Sullivan (L) as Bottom and Paul Melendy (R) as Flute. The two are performing in the play-within-a-play of Pyramus and Thisbe at the end of Midsummer. Sullivan is wearing a blue tarp fitted with duct tape to look like the heroic Pyramus, and a shirtless Melendy as Flute is wearing green and purple balloons for breasts and a blue tarp gown. The two lean close together to speak through a blue tarp “wall.”
🫏 A DREAM role: Paul has performed in A Midsummer Night's Dream with Commonwealth Shakespeare Company three times before — as Flute and Starveling, some of the "mechanicals" or laborers (check out that throwback photo above from the 2007 production!). This time, he returns to the CSC stage in a truly bucket-list role as another of the mechanicals, Nick Bottom, who gets partially transformed into a donkey by Puck. A fairy queen falls in love with him anyway. Donkey head and all.
🎭 Free Shakespeare for all: Commonwealth Shakespeare Company's mission is to make high-quality theater accessible by removing barriers. Midsummer is their annual outdoor production on Boston Common — free to everyone.
📍 When and where: July 22-August 9, free on Boston Common. Sure to bring you plenty of hees and haws.
👏 The Applause Line
Press mentions and recent highlights—standing ovations optional.
🏆 Paul Wins the Elliot Norton for Outstanding Lead Performance in a Play (Midsize)
📸 Photo credit: Nile Scott Studios
Image description: Paul celebrates his win at the Elliot Norton Awards afterparty. At L: Paul in a cream short-sleeve sweater with a green collar and red parrot print. At center: Chris Ehlers, theater critic and Vice President of the BTCA, in a black henley and black jacket. At R: Boston actor Janis Hudson in a strapless teal satin dress. The three are smiling at the camera and posing with their arms around each other. Behind them are a crowd of other attendees and a partially visible display reading “THE HUNTINGTON.”
On June 1, Paul won the Elliot Norton Award for Outstanding Lead Performance in a Play (Midsize) for his work in Featherbaby at Greater Boston Stage Company. The award, now in its 43rd year, is presented by the Boston Theater Critics Association (BTCA) at their annual ceremony and is the highest honor in Boston-area theater.
What made it especially remarkable: Paul was nominated twice in the same category, for Featherbaby and for The Garbologists at Gloucester Stage Company.
Congratulations to all this year's nominees, and a big thank you to the BTCA for the recognition and for their ongoing work celebrating Boston theater year-round.
If you know someone who might enjoy this, feel free to pass it along.
Curtain down. Thanks for being here.