DALLAS — Every so often, usually in bars, Tina Parker says curious people will come up and ask if they have met her before.
“They say ‘I think I might know you’ and I ask them if they go to the (Kitchen Dog) Theater,” said Parker with a laugh.
It would make perfect sense seeing as how Parker is the co-artistic director and company manager for the Dallas stage production she joined in 1993 shortly after she graduated from SMU as a theatre major.
But Parker knows that's probably not it. She knows exactly why people find her face so familiar.
“I ask them if they watch the show and they gasp!”
The show she is referring to is AMC’s "Breaking Bad" where Parker played the part of Francesca, the frustrated yet loyal assistant to attorney Saul Goodman. It's a role she reprised for the show’s prequel "Better Call Saul" which just wrapped up its 7-year run. Between the two shows, Parker played Francesca for the better part of 12 years in a role she didn't even think she would get.
“I thought it would be some blonde, buttoned-up secretary type and I am obviously not that,” she recalls.
But Parker felt she had a good audition on tape and although she didn't hear back right away, she eventually received a call from her agent asking her if she could be on a plane in 3 hours.
“I went home and threw everything in a bag and that is how 'Breaking Bad' came about.”
From listening to insider podcasts, Parker said she heard the shows’ producer Vince Gilligan was not seeing what he wanted from most of the audition tapes which came from actresses who fit the typical secretary look Parker thought would be cast.
“Then he saw a tape and said, 'That is what I want,’ and it was me.”
Though "Breaking Bad" and Better "Call Saul" are why most people might recognize her, the Kitchen Dog Theater is still her baby. The production, which currently performs at the Kim Dawson Theater off Stemmons Freeway in Dallas, will begin its 32nd season this fall.
“We are committed to doing new plays,” Parker said. “Stuff that is fresh from New York. Stuff you would not get to see otherwise.”
The small, 90-seat venue is perfect for the type of performances Parker believes make the Kitchen Dog special.
“These are really intimate, actor-driven stories at the Kitchen dog,” she said. “We really want the audience to be part of the event. They are an essential component of a performance.”
And who knows? You might even see the next television star before they get their big break.