Actress Tammy Blanchard hasn’t forgotten where she came from; that’s because she still lives here.
Last summer, while on the set for the upcoming musical film, Into the Woods in London, Tammy found herself seated at a tableful of movie stars she will share the screen with: Hollywood greats like Meryl Streep and Cate Blanchett.
At one point, Streep turned to Tammy and asked, “Where are you from?”
When Tammy responded, “I’m from Bayonne,” Streep smiled and said, “Now I know why I love you.”
Streep, who was born in Summit and grew up in Bernardsville, bonded with the girl from Bayonne. But unlike Streep, Tammy never left, despite her success as a rising star on stage and screen. “I should have moved to Hollywood and become rich and famous,” Tammy jokes. “But I couldn’t leave Bayonne. This is where I grew up. There is where my family lives.”
Hudson County Kid
Tammy was born in Jersey City in 1976 and moved to Bayonne when she was in second grade.
She attended Mary J Donohoe and briefly Roosevelt elementary schools in Bayonne. “When I was eight or 10, I sang solo ‘Over the Rainbow’ and people liked me,” she says, “and I knew I was going to perform the rest of my life.”
This was a shock even to her because she saw herself as shy, quiet, and insecure. “I couldn’t even raise my hand in class,” she recalls.
Tammy has two brothers, which was more than a little intimidating. Yet somehow, while performing, she found she could project. She got a lot of encouragement from teachers and administrators such as Schools Superintendent Patricia McGeehan.
Luck also played a part, as it often does in Hollywood success stories. After seeing her in a Miss New Jersey Teen pageant when she was 13, one of the judges connected her with a talent agency that specialized in models. She did print ads, the cover of romance novels, and commercials.
Over the Rainbow
Tammy’s breakthrough role came with her portrayal of a teenage Judy Garland in the made-for-TV movie, Life with Judy Garland: Me and My Shadows. This film was a dream come true, partly because she reprised her performance of “Over the Rainbow” from her Bayonne school days, a song made famous by Garland in the classic 1939 film The Wizard of Oz.
Judy Garland was her idol. “She always inspired me, so full of passion and love,” Tammy says. “I learned through my experience with ‘Judy’ and what I saw in her life what not to do in this business—the pills and her vulnerability, her dependence on love and putting her life in other people’s hands.”
Considered remarkably versatile, Tammy learned a lot when working on the soap opera The Guiding Light, where she debuted in 1997, playing a spoiled rich girl. “It was hard, but it was great instruction,” she says. “I would get six pages to learn the night before and had one shot to get it right.” Each scene often required her to do something different, an emotional roller coaster that had her crying in one scene and laughing in another.
Galaxy of Stars
Since 1997, Tammy has worked with a number of stars: with Matt Damon in The Good Shepherd; with a multi-star cast in a docudrama, Living Proof; with Nicole Kidman and Aaron Eckhart in the 2010 film Rabbit Hole; and with Cate Blanchett in the 2013 Woody Allen film Blue Jasmine. In Union Square she was cast against type in a sexually provocative role that she loved, though her mother did not; and she played the lead in Bella, which won top prize at the Toronto Film Festival in 2006.
In addition to The Guiding Light, her TV credits include Law & Order, The Big C, and the movie When Angels Come to Town” with Peter Falk, and she co-starred with Jessica Lange in the TV remake of Sybil.
Tammy says she learned a lot working with Nicole Kidman, Jessica Lange, and Brad Pitt, whom she admires for his ability to adapt to character.
She doesn’t sing a lot in the upcoming Into the Woods, but she says it was a great experience watching composer Stephen Sondheim come onto the set for rehearsals, even writing a new song for Streep and altering other songs to fit the singers. “Sondheim makes the hardest songs to sing, up and down, high and low,” she says.
Tammy says actors learn craft on stage; she grew up doing stage work and has left her mark on the Broadway stage in the revival of Gypsy: A Musical Fable with Bernadette Peters, for which she received a Tony Award nomination and a Theatre World Award. She was also nominated for a 2011 Tony Award for her role in How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying.” She expects to return to the stage.
Future Roles
Tammy came back from California in late summer to film a dramatic thriller that has the flavor of Rosemary’s Baby. She says, “It’s an independent film, but I think it will do well.”
Of all the roles she’s played over the years, Bella sticks with her because it taught her the impact that film can have in the real world.
She plays a waitress working in a Mexican restaurant in New York City. The character is pregnant and is tempted to get an abortion, but partly based on the tragedy of a coworker and the death of a young girl, she changes her mind and decides to give the baby up for adoption.
“It was the only lead I ever had in a movie,” Tammy says. “I heard from more than 300 women who said they kept their babies because of that film. It’s the most amazing thing to me.”
She is striving to get another lead role—in a major motion picture.
“I have another dream to play Ava Gardner,” Tammy says. She finds Gardner and her history fascinating—a real movie star with an element of intrigue, involving another local hero, Frank Sinatra. But as an actress from Bayonne, Tammy can’t escape the ghost of Sandra Dee, who was perceived by earlier generations as “the actress from Bayonne.” When Tammy goes on auditions and mentions she is from Bayonne, casting directors often recall Sandra Dee.
Back in Bayonne
Tammy’s mother, stepfather, brothers, their families, and her friends all live in Bayonne. “I’ve always had a choice to go to California,” she says. “But it’s harder to stay who you are [there] than here where your friends and family are, generation after generation. When you stick with your family, you can’t lose your life to fame. And after all, Bayonne is only two miles from Manhattan.”
Tammy is grateful to her Bayonne schools and teachers. “If I didn’t have that special support, I would never have made it,” she says. “I hope our new mayor will pay attention to our teachers.”
Indeed, in 2012, Bayonne High School pledged to award a scholarship each year to a graduating student in Tammy’s name.
“This is a lovely way to give back to the community and why I can’t leave Bayonne,” Tammy says. “I love Bayonne and living here, and I love this community for being so supportive. This is a dream come true.”—BLP
Tammy Blanchard’s Storied Career
Tammy Blanchard went from teen beauty contestant to Broadway and the silver screen with a host of film credits and awards.
Her TV credits include A Gifted Man, The Good Wife, and made-for-TV movies We Were the Mulvaneys, When Angels Come to Town, Empire State, and Amish Grace.
Life with Judy Garland: Me and My Shadows won a primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Actress in a Mini-Series. She has also been nominated for a Golden Globe, a Satellite Award, and an American Film Institute Award, and she won a 2003 Theatre World Award.
Her film credits include Stealing Harvard, Cadillac Records, The Ramen Girl, Deadline, and Moneyball.