I hope you all are staying safe. For me, I’ve been very blessed all things considered. For those of you are wondering, my production of Bonnie and Clyde has been pushed back. Because we don’t have traditional stadium style seating, we were able to find a way to still put on the show and do so safely. (More information below)
Anyway, a big shout out to my roomie and best friend Hallie (who is a saint for having not killed me through all this). Sometimes we get into discussions about various actors, famous people, etc. from Missouri, so I thought “Why not do something like this for Broadway?
Welcome back to Memoirs of a Theatre Kid for the final post of the year, but also the decade.
My gif-courtes of Giphy.com
Navigating through the social medias this month, I couldn’t help but notice a trend of reviewing/reminiscing through the two thousand tens, aka the first decade where I was old enough to be cognizant of the world and its goings on from start to finish. I thought to myself, “What theatre-related thing of the past ten years can I write about on Memoirs of a Theatre Kid?”
Eventually, I decided I’d dive into the ten winners of the highly sought-after “Best Musical” Tony award from 2010-2019, and what the original cast and creative team of each show has gone on to do since their respective wins. (Obviously it would be impossible to chart ever accomplishment and accolade from every individual who mounted these musicals, but I tried to squeeze in the bigger ones with a somewhat logical and well-transitioned narrative).
So travel back to me to the start of the decade…when your humble author was an underclassman in high school, Obama was in his first term of office, and Toy Story 3 was released.
I apologize for the month gap in posts. For those of you who know me personally (which I’m guessing is my entire readership) you can probably guess the reason behind this gap…namely an F-3 tornado that hit my apartment complex and had my roommate and myself (as well as our fur babies) displaced for a month.
Courtesy of giphy.com
I’m happy to report all animals and humans are healthy and well, and we’re moved into a new place and are slowly but surely getting our lives back together and reestablishing a sense of normalcy. For me, part of that is getting back to writing. But since I am still in the middle of a thousand boxes that need to be unpacked and a massive to-do list, I’m keeping it simple this month by continuing with my theatrical travels series. (Should you care to hear more about us getting our lives together after the tornado, check out this video interview we did with KMIZ on the fourth of July, and this interview I did with News Tribune about being separated and reunited with my kitty Gavin in the after math of the tornado).
For this post I decided I’d focus on places where theatre enthusiasts can travel to view props, costumes, and other notable memorabilia from Broadway musicals and plays, as well as well as their film adaptations and other movie musicals.
Courtesy of giphy.com
(I should probably clarify the difference I mean between adaptations of musicals/plays verses movie movie musicals. I would classify adaptations as any works that began as a stage show that was than adapted for the screen, such as Hello Dolly,The Crucible etc. But when I refer to “movie musicals”, I mean any musical that was initially created in cinema such as La La Land,Singin’ in the Rain, etc.)
This didn’t leave me quite as wide a berth as my first post in the theatrical travels series, so I didn’t follow quite such a strict set of criteria this time around. While costumes, props, and filming locations were the primary focus for this post, if any of the selected locations also had items/features that tied in to a musical/play based upon historical events, I decided to include those as a historical bonus if you’re like me and can’t get enough of those real life tie-ins between the stage and real life.
The last time I sat down and watched all of The Tony Awards live from start to finish was 2008.
To give you some perspective of how long that’s been, that was the year Lin Manuel Miranda’s other hit In the Heights swept, the year Patti LuPone took home Tony number two, and the year the original cast of Rent returned to tribute the show before it closed later that year.
It was the year Obama was elected the first African-American president, and the Mac Book Air was first sold by Apple.
It was the year my older sister Carolyn graduated high school and went to college, the year we moved out of tiny, rural Owensville to Jefferson City.
As a theatre-loving kid who had to travel at least half an hour to participate in community theatre, the Tonys were a breath of fresh air, and a celebration. It was the one time a year I could sit in the comfort of my own living room, our cats purring at my side, and see an enormous theatre full of people who loved the theatre just as much as I did, and the people who were making it happen.
The HD closeups and behind the sceans closeups brought pro theatre to me in a way that was so immediate and personal. Other than that, it was pretty much either the YouTube clips on our decrepit computer that would freeze up, or the very back rows of the big theatre houses in Saint Louis when we could afford it.
I saw the beauty and magic of this world that I wanted to be a part of. Most of all, I wanted a community like one of the Broadway folk.
And 2008 was the year it all started to happen for me. I moved to Jefferson City, and had a myriad of local theatres, lessons, and shows to see at my finger tips. The first few years were a rough transition, trying to establish myself and get into shows. Milestones such as my first character shoes, first real head shots, and first time doing a real musical within a short drive of my house. By the time my senior year rolled around, I was hopping from show to show, doing work on and offstage in every capacity I could. Most of all, I finally had a community of like-minded people who shared a love of putting on shows.
There was one downside though: Never in that time did I get to watch the Tonys live, because I always had either a performance or tech rehearsal turing them!
Of course, I still had friends texting me updates, watched the show online the next day, and once or twice I even made it home just in time to catch the tail-end, but it was never quite the same. Don’t get me wrong, it was more than worth it to get to do what I love with the people I love, but it still kind of sucked.
This year,the 70th annual Tonys hosted by James Corden, I actually got to sit down and watch live. I had a show, yes, but the timing worked out that I would finish my last show of Rock of Ages, a matinee, the day of, and make it home to watch live that evening. (And after doing five shows in six days, I desperately needed a night on the couch with a bottle of wine).
That wasn’t the only reason I was excited, though. My Broadway crush, Aaron Tveit was presenting.
Hamilton, a new found favorite,was sure to sweep. (Some were calling it the Hamiltonys.)
Mostly though, this was the first time I had seen any of the nominated shows before the big night. Specifically, School of Rock and the Deaf West revival of Spring Awakening. Not to mention that unlike in 2008, I literally lost count of how many of the presenters/nominees/performers I had seen perform and or met.
I had initially woken up that morning full of excitement, ready for one last show, and then Tony night.
Sadly, that day was also met with a degree of solemn sadness when I logged onto social media and began reading of the devastating shooting in Orlando.
I’m not going to express my specific opinion on the delicate issues that a horrific event such as this stirs up, but I will say this: Like so many others I was shocked, horrified, saddened, but mostly just mind-boggled as to how anyone could commit such an act. But largely, I felt overwhelmed with guilt and conflict.
Why guilt? Well, because this had started out as a happy day, but was now colored by tragedy. Because I was still here, and those 50 victims were not. But mostly, I still wanted to participate in and enjoy my pre-planned activities, and felt guilty for still wanting to do so in wake of a major tragedy.
Well, of course as every performer knows, “the show must go on”, and surrounded by the crazy talented cast, crew, and band we rocked Jefferson City one last time, several of us going on in honor of those lost. Throughout the course of the show, I got word of the Tonys dedicating their show to the victims, Lin Manuel-Miranda’s choice not to use guns in Hamilton’s Tony performance, and the various ways other members of the Broadway community would pay tribute.
The theatre community is a resilient one, people have been saying it’s dying for years, yet it keeps renewing and rejuvenating, growing all that much more. I like to think it’s because such a huge part of our jobs is rolling with the punches and embracing insanity. Maybe that’s why we’ve always responded so well to crisis. The incident that comes to mind is the September 11 attacks, and this commercial:
On one hand, theatre and the arts and general can serve as an escape from pain. If you’re an artist, it’s a place to channel pain. But most importantly,the arts help us feel and make us more emotionally whole beyond the walls of the theatre building.
So with that in mind, I spent the night watching the 60th Annual Tony Awards. (But not before pregaming with the red carpet live stream, the Hamilton portion of 60 Minutes, and some wine).
So, I’ve decided to talk about some of my favorite moments from the night.
At the top of the evening, James Corden launched into what was by far my favorite part of the night: the opening number titled “This Could be You”. It was with this song he so beautifully, hilariously, and truthfully celebrated the childhood of those kids like me, and the magical experience of attending shows and falling madly in love, wanting nothing more than to be a part of it. I had so many flashbacks of performing to my cast albums in my room for the enjoyment of my stuffed animals. The passion that so many time as a kid nobody understood, or that put me at the target of torment from kids at school. Let me tell you, if small Deborah had seen that, she would have felt SO MUCH less alone. (And gotten every single musical reference too.)
What was also so great was ending the number with all the musical acting nominees. My favorite Tony openers are the ones that celebrate all the nominated shows, and theatre as a whole, which this did in a way I hadn’t seen since 2013 with Neil Patrick Harris.
It was also then that I was stuck by the diversity I saw onstage before me in the nominees, which definitely made me smile. (Oscars with diversity indeed!)
All kidding aside, can we talk a minute about the diversity in this year’s Broadway season? We had Hamilton, Color Purple, On Your Feet, and Shuffle Along with a cast of mostly POC (people of color) actors. We had Allegiance and Amazing Grace which also had a mostly POC cast as well as tackling some of the worst instances of racial inequality in America. We had Waitress, which had Broadway’s first all female creative team and mostly female leads. We had Deaf West’s Spring Awakening with a cast of mostly deaf/hard of hearing actors and Broadway’s first actress in a wheelchair. I’m barely scratching the surface here but you get the idea. I’m not saying theatre is a perfect utopia of equality, we, and the entertainment industry as a whole have a LONG way to go in terms of inclusiveness. But looking at this year’s Tony nominees compared to, say, this year’s Oscar nominees…..yeah, Broadway has some great things going on. I hope this trend continues.
(On a side note it still kills me that Allegiance closed so early and thus was not nominated for anything but that’s a different topic for a different post)
Well from there, the one and only Andrew Lloyd Webber introduced his new, Tony-nominated show School of Rock. As I said, it was one of the shows I had the privilege of seeing during my trip to NYC. Truth be told,when I heard that film was going to be a musical, I was a tad skeptical at first, simply because I tend to grow weary of the whole “every movie needs to be a musical” trend.
But my last day in NYC, I found myself with standing room tickets for the show anyway, and I thought “Well, at the very least I’ll get to see Sierra Boggess and Luca Padovan and can brag about seeing a new Webber show with the OBC.”
…And I found myself LOVING it. This story translated well to the stage. The creative team didn’t fall into the age-old trap of simply putting the movie onstage. The best adapted musicals (which, let’s be real, is 99% of them) are the ones that take the best things, and the essence of the source material, and transfer it to the stage accordingly. I literally had no complaints, except perhaps that those kids are so stupid talented and made me feel inferior. (Seriously, they haven’t hit puberty and star on Broadway, triple threats PLUS playing rock instruments live). Funny, touching, kick-ass rock music, superb cast, and I got to see it all. Okay, so it’s not going to change the face of musical theatre of cure diseases, but it still worked well as a show and made my last night in NYC a great one. And the stage door was awesome, met so many cool people.
Were this not the Hamiltonys, I feel like this show would have fared much better at the Tonys. But at least we got an AWESOME Tony performance. I’m glad that this show is still doing well despite the Hamilton takeover. (For the record, I do not in any way blame Lin-Manuel Miranda or anyone involved with Hamilton for the other shows being overlooked or closing.) But hey, like they say in the video-“We’re not here to win…we’re here to rock!”
Upon the conclusion of School of Rock, I was ecstatic to see that James Corden incorporated the #Ham4Ham inspired live show outside the theatre.
For those of you unfamiliar, the lottery for Hamilton always draws a lot of people, so Lin had the idea to do a little live show outside the theatre for the lottery entrees, sometimes people from the cast, sometimes from special guests, and it’s pretty cool. I got to experience the last one of 2015, when Lin brought in the three sisters from Fiddler on the Roof, singing a parody of “Matchmaker” saying why they should be the next Schuyler Sisters.
So yeah, they pretty much did the same thing at the Tonys, with the various casts of the nominated shows, kicking if off with the nominated composers….including freaking Webber on the tambourine…(Never in a million years did I ever think I’d type that sentence.)
Back from commercial break my Bway crush, Mr. Aaron Kyle Tveit (who actually had his name pronounced correctly)….
….got to present a Tony to my girl, Renee Elise Goldsberry!
Adored her speech, it was one of my favs. (Although I don’t understand why they played “Room Where it Happens” when she went up rather than “Satisfied”) Loved her talking about being able to be an actress and a mom. Not to mention I love emotional Tony speeches. (Plus her dress was AWESOME!) Seeing the reaction of all her Hamilton compadres also gave me warm fuzzies. Especially Lin…freaking Lin…
Closely followed was Shuffle Along‘s performance. Truly incredible, I think it’s so cool how it was transformed for this season to the point where it was considered a new musical rather than a revival. Let me tell you…watching Audra McDonald on TV, it still blows my mind that I met this freaking woman by accident on my way to the Lincoln Center and wished her a happy new year.
Onto “Best Featured Actor in a Musical”…oh my that was a nail biter for me. Surely it was going to go to one of the Hamilton guys, but which one? It was also super surreal knowing I had met those three in NYC.
Ultimately, I’m so happy it went to Daveed. I loved his speech, and his overall reaction to winning. I love that Hamilton brought him to the Broadway scene when he most likely would not have otherwise, not coming from a theatre background. Plus he’s just a spectacular human being. Plus, how sweet was that story with his parents? I dig the mental picture of him in rainbow tights with his dad back in pre school.
Two awesome revivals performed next, She Loves Me and Fiddler on the Roof.
I literally love every single person who performed with She Loves Me: Jane “Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt” Krakowski, Gavin “My Cat is Named After You” Creel, Zachary “Y0u Broke My Smolder” Levi, and Laura “Hilarious Woman” Benanti.
And of course Fiddler…..with a clip of high school Josh Groban as Tevye…..
Bright Star’s performance was a real treat for me, seeing as Carmen Cusack was my third Elphaba in Wicked. In fact, there were a lot of Wicked alums up for awards: Jayne Houdyshell, Saycon Sengbloh, Megan Hilty….it was pretty great. So sad that Bright Star is closing soon. (And of course, who doesn’t love Steve Martin?)
And friggin TheColor Purple, man……
Well, I think this gif of Aaron Tveit’s reaction to this performance mirrors mine perfectly…
Plus, me crying, remembering the time I met Heather Headley
And then…..Spring a freak a Wakening……
This freaking show…where do I even start….??????
So it’s no secret that Spring Awakening has been one of my all time favorite shows for many years now, especially after having been in it.
So when I heard about Deaf West’s production of it, I was definitely interested, and everything I saw from it blew me away. But when I fount out it was heading to Broadway, that REALLY got my attention. I didn’t think it would return to Broadway for another decade, yet there we were.
I was in a rough patch when DWSA (Deaf West Spring Awakening) came to Broadway, so I distracted myself by falling in love with the show/cast on social media, and became desperate to see it. Its website advertised selling discount tickets on tix4students.com, an AMAZING website that I highly recommend for all college students. Between that site, my parents moving closer to NYC, and picking up more hours at work, I began to realize that the crazy idea of going to New York over Christmas was actually within the realm of possibility. Essentially, DWSA was the reason the trip even happened, and for that reason among many others I’m supremely grateful for this show.
But that’s not all. By far, DWSA was the best thing I saw in NYC, and totally changed the way I look at that show, and so much more. I’ve become much more aware of, and an advocate for inclusion in theatre and elsewhere, and of #DeafTalent, #ASL (American Sign Language) and the like. Not to mention that literally everything about the show was so well done, mind blowing, and transformative.
The DWSA stage door was also one of the most incredible stage door experiences of my life. I took it upon myself to learn some ASL to communicate with the deaf/hard of hearing actors in the show, with some help from Andy Mientus’s vlog as featured here.
At 7:42, Andy and cast member Josh Castille teach us some stage door signs:
And here at 6:02, Andy and Josh explain sign names and what everyone’s are.
I literally practiced signing for weeks…and I’ll never forget greeting Josh with his sign name because his jaw just DROPPED. I explained that I learned it from the vlog, and was just so happy and amazed that I took the initiative, and scooped me up in a great big hug. It was pretty remarkable.
Despite being nominated for three Tonys (though it deserved much more, especially for choreography, I mean seriously the ASL incorporation was remarkable), the show closed back in January and needed a Kickstarter campaign to be able to perform at the Tonys….which it did! (I wasn’t able to give much, but I did chip in since this show means so much to me).
I cried all the way through the performance, thinking of how this revolutionary show went from a 90 seat theatre to Broadway, and was now bringing ASL to the world on prime time TV.
And hey Tonys…if you can’t give Michael Arden a Tony for directing/conceptualizing this life-changing show, the least you could have done was show the right person when he’s announced as a nominee….geez….
And of course Hamilton‘s performance, introduced by none other than the current US president/first lady themselves. You know, whether or not you like Obama’s politics, you have to admit his musical theatre priorities are on point. They love Hamilton, they’ve had so many casts of Broadway shows at the White House, and he awarded Stephen Sondheim the Presidential Medal of Freedom-the highest honor a US civilian can receive! Need I say more?
Were this not the year of Hamilton, I feel like Waitress could have made a killing at the Tonys. I seriously just have so many feelings about this show. Broadway’s first musical with an all female creative team, Jessie Mueller ripping everyone’s heart out, pie….I mean what’s not to love?
Just like the last time I got to watch the Tonys live, there was a tribute to a long running show. This time, it was Chicago.
Fun fact-Bebe Neuwirth was one of the first major Broadway stars that I ever met-at fifteen I might add! I waited for her after The Addams Family pre-Broadway run, aptly enough, in the city of Chicago.
This transitioned well into the 2016 award for Best Revival that went to The Color Purple. Obviously I was rooting for Spring Awakening, but Color Purple was also incredibly deserving. In a way, I was expecting it, since Tonys tend to favor still-running shows since winning a Tony usually means higher ticket sales. Ultimately, the fact that a show that began with a Kickstarter campaign in a tiny theatre made it to the Tonys on another Kickstarter campaign, and the fact that ASL and that much deaf talent was featured on prime time TV is awesome and worth celebrating on its own.
As always, the “In Memoriam” portion struck a chord with me, especially David Bowie and Kyle Jean Baptiste. But truly, the simple string ensemble playing “Seasons of Love” was supremely powerful. Yes, I know, it’s an over-used musical theatre song for that sort of occasion.
But this Tony Awards was full of full circle moments for me from the last time I watched in 2008. Lin Manuel Miranda sweeping both times, Laura Benanti, Danny Burnstein, and Christopher Fitzgerald being up for awards, realizing the sheer number of Broadway royalty I had seen since the last time…and the incorporation of Jonathan Larson’s songs that have haunted me since my pre-teen years.
I couldn’t help but think about him, and his work that much like Hamilton was completely written by one genius man, changed the game, and took a handful of awards (including the Pulitzer) with it.
Twenty years later we still sing Jonathan’s songs, and I know twenty years later we’ll still be singing Lin’s. I look forward to the day when The Tonys use “Who Lives, Who Dies, Who Tells Your Story” for the “In Memoriam” section. But hopefully Lin will still be around to hear it.
From there, Leslie Odom Jr. and Cynthia Erivo take home their well deserved Tonys for Best Leading Actor/Actress in a Musical, making history in the process. Between them, Daveed, and Renee, this was the first time in Tony history that all four recipients of acting awards for a musical were people of color. How awesome is that? And those speeches….simply inspired.
And of course the inevitable happened: Hamilton won. Like I’m pretty sure Barbara Streisand didn’t even open the envelope.
Like seriously, they should have just had two Tonys: the Hamiltonys and the “Second Best to Hamilton” Tonys.
But all kidding aside, I would like to say this:
Yes, Hamilton is pretty freaking great. And with a lot of hard work and about ten break downs I was able to procure tickets to the Chicago production and I’m so excited I can hardly stand it.
But it is not the only good show ut there, despite what all the main stream media will try to tell you. There is so much great theatre out there that is worth your time. Whether it’s local amateaur theatre, workshops, regional, tours, it would be a shame to miss out on the experience of live theatre.
Go, see a play, read scripts, support up and coming shows in development, encourage your children to check out what theatre has to offer, maybe even try to be part of the show yourself in some capacity. I truly believe there is a place for everyone in theatre whether onstage or off, and I truly believe there is a show out there for everyone that they can connect to and take something from. As our dear friend James Corden said, “This could be where you belong”.
All I can say is that for one little girl…
….it certainly was…
I leave you with the closing number from the Tonys, where the Schuyler Sisters sum it up pretty well with “Look around, look around at how lucky we are to be alive right now”.
As always, thanks for reading. See you next time.
In the meantime, peace out, girl scouts. Stay classy.
memoirsofatheatrekid 