#first show I ever saw was sound of music but not on broadway

[corroded-hellfire]

Attend the Tale - Eddie Munson x Reader

Summary: Eddie proclaims to theatre nerd!reader that musicals are too happy for him. You then tell him the tale of Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street

Note: This is partially because Gaten is currently in the show on broadway, yes, but also because it is one of my favorite musicals of all time and I myself am a huge theatre nerd.

Warnings: spoilers for Sweeney Todd, which has dark themes including bloody violence, murder, and cannibalism.

Words: 2.3k

Hawkins High School likes conventional. It likes when things make sense. For instance, it made sense when Chrissy Cunningham was nominated for Prom Queen, and Jason Carver for Prom King. It made sense that Nancy Wheeler was on track to give the valedictorian speech at graduation at the end of the year. What didn’t make sense—at least from an outsider's perspective—is you and Eddie.

Eddie Munson was all metal, band t-shirts, chunky silver rings, long wild mane, and tattoos. You are not metal. You are costumes, makeup, rehearsing lines and practicing songs for an audition. A theatre nerd, essentially. At night, Eddie blasts Metallica in his room, while you’re playing Andrew Lloyd Webber and attempting to hit the high notes in Wishing You Were Somehow Here Again. The two of you looked like opposite sides of the spectrum. But in reality, you were two sides of the same coin. Both passionate about the music that moves you, embodying the looks of your respective niches. 

When you met, there was an initial clash between the two of you over use of the drama room. Yes, it was used for Hellfire meetings, but it was the drama room and Eddie shouldn’t have thrown a fuss if you had to come in and grab a costume that had been left in there earlier. Once the original ire cooled, the two of you found you gelled together quite nicely. Only someone else who has that deep appreciation for music can understand what it’s like to feel the music in your very soul, in every beat of your heart, and every breath you take. 

Though there wasn’t a crossover appeal with each other’s music, both you and Eddie could appreciate and respect the other’s taste. Eddie would blast metal in the van on the way home from school, so you’d come to learn some of the songs and point out your favorites to your boyfriend. When the two of you were at your house, a Sondheim or a Rodgers & Hammerstein record would be playing in the background as you makeout on your bed. 

Eddie had seen you in the last musical Hawkins High had put on—Into the Woods. The dark take on multiple fairy tales had drawn Eddie in more than he thought it would. Obviously, he had only gone to see you—dragging Dustin along because the curly haired boy was the only one willing to accompany him—but he ended up being honestly impressed by the talent and hard work it takes to put on a show. Hearing you sing as Cinderella had almost moved Eddie to tears, something he would never admit to a soul. But Dustin had noticed and told you when Eddie had gone to the bathroom after the show. You recognized the same dedication and effort in Eddie when you saw him performing with Corroded Coffin.

After you begged Eddie to play The Sound of Music cassette you just bought while you’re driving around one weekend, he comes up with a thought that astounds you.

“You know, musicals are just too happy for me. Everything is always okay in the end, and everyone sings and dances and it’s happily ever after.”

You’re staring at him for a good minute before he notices. He raises an eyebrow at you in question.

“That is so not true!”

“Babe,” Eddie says, knocking the rings of his right hand against the van’s radio. “We’re literally listening to a show that has singing nuns and nazis. And guess what? Everything ends tied up with a bow.”

“First of all,” you say, flopping back in your seat with a huff. “This is based on a true story. So, sorry that the real Von Trapp family escaped the nazis. Secondly, there are plenty of dark musicals. You saw Into the Woods!”

“Yeah, it was dark for fairy tales. I listen to metal. The witch cursing a family doesn’t quite cut it as ‘dark’ for me.”

“West Side Story? It’s tragic!”

“Tragedy and darkness aren’t really the same thing,” Eddie says with a shrug. “I mean, they can be. But they literally have gangs prancing down the street. Sad story, sure. But I wouldn’t say dark.”

You purse your lips in the way that Eddie finds adorable as you look out the window. A cheery song about favorite things playing isn’t helping you come up with any dark musicals.

“Aha! Phantom of the Opera,” you say, turning towards Eddie. “Kidnapping, murder, disfigured character. Dark enough for you?”

“Eh,” Eddie says with a shrug. “The opera part kinda cancels it out for me.”

Just as Eddie’s pulling into your driveway, your face lights up with an idea. Eddie notices it as he pulls the keys out of the ignition, the jingling of them breaking you out of your mini trance.

“Sweeney Todd.”

“Who?” Eddie asks.

“Sweeney Todd!” you repeat, as if just hearing it again will make everything clear to Eddie. Both of you get out of the car and you fumble to get your house keys out of your bag. “The Demon Barber of Fleet Street.”

“Did we switch subjects, or…? Should I know this Todd dude?” Eddie asks as he follows you inside. He kicks his shoes off next to the door just as you do, and you toss your bag onto the closest chair.

“It’s a Stephen Sondheim musical,” you say. “Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street.”

“A demon barber?” Eddie asks with a laugh. 

Spinning away from him and his dismissive chuckle, you stroll over to your collections of records. Nimble fingers pick through them until you find the one you’re looking for. Eddie just watches as you move to the record player and load up the album. The opening notes start slow at first, then gaining volume, with a haunting quality to the melody. It sounds eerily like music you would hear at a funeral. Then a piercing noise—a scream? a scrape? —slices through the air, startling Eddie. He won’t let you know it just yet, but this already has him intrigued. 

Attend the tale of Sweeney Todd

His skin was pale and his eye was odd

He shaved the faces of gentlemen

Who never thereafter were heard of again

“Hmm,” Eddie hums, a smile curling on his lips. “Okay, you’ve got my attention.”

“It’s bloody and gory,” you say, jumping onto your couch. Eddie chuckles as he watches your socked feet move over the gray overstuffed cushions. You hold your hands out in front of you, fingers splayed as you begin to summarize the show in a melodramatic voice. “Sweeney Todd—who is actually named Benjamin Barker—returns to London after being wronged by a judge many years ago. Judge Turpin stole his wife and daughter. Like, literally stole. Not like he seduced her or something, he straight up took her and had her husband sent away.”

Eddie wrinkles up his nose and crosses his arms over his chest. “That’s creepy as hell.”

“Oh, that’s nothing,” you say with a devious smile. As you continue on with the tale, the music playing in the background, you keep walking across the couch, jumping to the adjacent couch as well when you come to the edge. Eddie watches you, an adoring look in his eyes. “So, Sweeney stays with this lady, Mrs. Lovett, who has a pie shop. And he starts up as a barber again, with the goal of getting the judge to come in so he can…” You run your finger across your neck, imitating the slitting of your throat. 

“Does he stick the bastard?” Eddie asks, jumping up on the couch you just vacated. 

“Hold on, hold on,” you say, shooting him a smirk. “This other dude comes in and recognizes Sweeney back from when he was Barker, so Sweeney kills him. When he and Mrs. Lovett are trying to figure out what to do with the body, she comes up with an idea! But is it too much? Never, for this twisted pair!”

Eddie laughs as he listens and watches. Your eyes are wide, a crazed look there as you describe the warped tale. Even if he wasn’t genuinely enjoying this debauched plot, he would’ve been thoroughly amused by your performance. 

“They decide to get rid of the body by grinding him up and putting him in the meat pies!”  

“Ugh,” Eddie groans, face full of disgust. “That’s morbid.”

“Told ya,” you say with a proud smirk. “But they don’t stop there. Every man who comes to Sweeney’s shop becomes the new flavor of the day. And the people love the meat pies. They keep selling out of them.”

“Okay, okay,” Eddie says, holding his hands up in front of him. “I concede. This is a dark musical.”

“Thank you,” you say, offering him a dramatic bow. “The dead bodies do not just come out tap dancing or some other cliche, cheesy shit you accuse musicals of. Although now that I’m thinking about that, it would’ve been cool.”  

“So, how’s it end?” Eddie asks, jumping over to the couch you’re on.

“Oh, no, no, no,” you say, shaking your head and backing a step away from him. “You’ll have to listen. Wait! See! They’re about to tell you.” You hold your finger to your lips, telling Eddie to be silent so he can hear the final lyrics of the song.

Attend the tale of Sweeney Todd

He served a dark and a vengeful god

What happened then, well, that's the play

And he wouldn't want us to give it away

Not Sweeney

Not Sweeney Todd

The demon barber of Fleet street

Eddie steps forward and tugs on your waist until you’re flush up against him. “You seem to really enjoy this creepy shit.”

“I haven’t even told you the rest,” you say, cupping his face in your hands. “There’s the judge wanting to marry the daughter he stole as well. A beggar woman who goes around asking men if they wanna fuck her. And then there’s Antony and Toby who are precious boys.”

“Jesus,” Eddie says with a laugh. “Might just have to borrow this record.”

“I thought you’d like it,” you say, a satisfied smirk on your lips. “I know my boyfriend’s taste.”

“Yes, you do,” he mumbles as he leans in and presses his lips against yours. The two of you share lazy kisses for a few minutes, just standing there on your couch in the middle of your living room. When you finally break for air, Eddie rests his forehead against yours and lets out a small laugh. “Who would’ve thought I’d find a girlfriend who can match my theatrics?”

“I think I outdo your theatrics, thank you very much,” you say. “In private, anyway. I know I can be my true, authentic weird self with you.”

“I love your weird self,” Eddie says, hands roaming down to your ass. 

“And I love you.”

Eddie grins and presses a few more kisses to your mouth. 

“Are there any duets in the show?” Eddie asks. “Could learn it and we could sing it together.”

The way your eyes light up at his words has his heart stuttering in his chest. He’d never admit it, but he’d memorize all of Sondheim’s compositions if you wanted him to. Anything for you. 

“Yeah,” you say, voice the quietest it’s been this whole time. Before continuing, you clear your throat and blink your eyes a few times. “My favorite song from it is a duet. It’s the one where they decide to put the men into the pies. It’s called A Little Priest.”

You quickly hop off the couch and stop the record. Carefully, you turn it over and place it back down. Your eyes scan the track list printed on the record’s jacket to find the right spot. Placing the needle back down, a surge of pride flows through you as you hear it start playing exactly where you want it to. 

Seems a downright shame…

Turning back towards Eddie, you try to emulate Mrs. Lovett. Kind of crazy, but even crazier for the man in front of her. That part you have down perfectly. The fond look Eddie is giving you makes your tummy all fuzzy and your head all light. Knowing that not only can you be completely and unabashedly yourself around Eddie, but that he actually loves you like that still boggles your mind. 

The song is funny, filled with puns and jokes, and you sing through the lyrics with ease. As the long song comes to its end, you step up on the coffee table and use it as your stage. Closing your eyes, you throw your arms in the air dramatically as if you’re riding a roller coaster. 

We'll not discriminate great from small! 

No, we'll serve anyone, 

Meaning anyone, 

And to anyone

At all!

Eddie claps as you finish belting the last note, and your face warms at his praise. A shy giggle escapes you as you curtsy on top of the table. Your boyfriend hops down from the couch and wraps both of his arms around your legs. He flops backwards so he’s lying on the couch, pulling you along so you’re on top of him. 

“You’re so damn cute,” Eddie says.

“Takes one to know one, Munson,” you say, finger coming up to boop the tip of his nose. 

“I feel like I’m gonna have to take you to Broadway as a graduation gift,” Eddie muses.

“Baby,” you whine, shaking your head. “You don’t have to do that.”

“You don’t wanna take a trip with me?” he asks, jutting out his bottom lip in his most adorable pout. The big cow eyes only add to it. 

“Of course I do,” you say. “Not letting you buy me a trip for graduation, though!”

“Fine,” Eddie says with a sigh. “What if it’s a gift for both of us? We go up together over the summer? Huh?” He grins and tucks a piece of hair behind your ear. “You, me, whatever shows you want, then a nice big hotel bed at night. I won’t pay for everything, I promise.”

A giggle bubbles out of you and you rest your head in the crook of Eddie’s neck. “Sounds perfect, Eddie.” 

“I love you, my little theatre nerd.”

“I love you, my adorable metal head.”

[eerna]

i’ve been back on my hadestown bullshit (listening to the album on repeat) and you make such good points about the lyrics being dumbed down and how it does a disservice to the narrative and characters. it’s such an artful, creative show that constantly adapts and changes so why not take some risks with lyrics that may take a few times to sink in? that’s the beauty of listening to it through many times. i catch something new that just punches me in the gut each time (also love your hadestown art it’s so good)

Thank youuu glad you like my stuff :3 Yeah!! I think ultimately it comes down to two things, confidence and Broadway requirements. Anais Mitchell isn't hiding how much she struggled writing the show and balancing between artsy, well crafted, and understandable. She also stated many things have been cut because the show was too long for Broadway and they were required to trim it. To both I say, HUH?? First off, Anais Mitchell honed her craft to perfection. No other musical ever managed to drive me to tears with moodsetting "oohs". She wrote a godly love song that sounds like a godly love song. She deserves all the confidence in the WORLD. But she also never hid that Hadestown is a very personal story influenced by her experience as a free artist, so on the other hand, I totally get that no amount of success can ever truly heal your inner critic, and she will always keep trying to adjust her work. As for the second point, I know at least some of the dumbing down is because the audiences complained. I saw Hadestown live 5 years after seeing a bootleg of it, and in those 5 years they added so many cheap jokes and dishonest tension breaks it is Crazy. But I DID notice in older bootlegs that people laughed at inappropriate times, they seemed like they expected something funny to be happening in every scene because they went to a musical and so picked some really weird spots, which doesn't happen in any of the recordings of the new jokey edition. So in dumbing itself down, the musical mamaged to become more understandable to the audience at large. In fact, even after all the changes, at the theater I overheard people talking in the pause, and they agreed the show is "too confusing" and "they can't tell what exactly is happening and if it is real or not". I can imagine that is a frustrating experience when you paid a good chunk of money to see a show, but also bro, google is Right There. Most people just don't have the will to sit down and listen to a pretty piece of media multiple times to figure it out! And sadly shows can't survive only on those who do! To bring this long ramble to a close, we are right back to art existing under capitalism and how one can't simply make GOOD art, they need to make PROFITABLE art, and that is pretty sucky

[vintage-tech]

If you're of a certain age, you remember the ads for the compilation albums by Ronco and K-Tel -- "20 original hits by the original stars" was always the tagline -- but there were other companies out there putting out mixtapes on vinyl, like Sessions, and then there is this two-record collections by a company called I & M Teleproducts which has 23 releases listed in Discogs.com -- several of which are Lawrence Welk, but many of which are contemporary collections.

Dreamin' is from 1979 and I approve of the tracklist. While Ronco was putting Wild Cherry's "Play That Funky Music" and Barry Manilow on the same record, or K-Tel was mining the latter half of the Top 100 with Forgotten Charting Singles By Major Artists, I & M was attempting to stay a bit more on-topic and contained mostly music that neither of the bigger names had tapped but you knew. And being a two-record set, you felt like you got twice as much tunage when actually you didn't (21 songs) but there was a better chance of higher quality sound due to the uncompressed groove on the vinyl. It's up to personal opinion whether the line "21 original hits by 18 original artists" sounds impressive, especially since the songs by those repeated artists have been pretty much forgotten.

Here's the track list and you do know many of them:

A1 Samantha Sang– Emotion A2 Dan Hill– Sometimes When We Touch A3 Gladys Knight & The Pips– Best Thing That Ever Happened To Me A4 David Soul– Don't Give Up On Us A5 Paul Anka– The Times Of Your Life B1 Kenny Nolan– I Like Dreamin' B2 Gladys Knight & The Pips– The Way We Were B3 Atlanta Rhythm Section– So Into You B4 Mary MacGregor– Torn Between Two Lovers B5 Jessi Colter– I'm Not Lisa C1 Peter McCann– Do You Wanna Make Love C2 Eric Carmen– All By Myself C3 Jennifer Warnes– Right Time Of The Night C4 LeBlanc & Carr– Falling C5 England Dan & John Ford Coley– Nights Are Forever Without You C6 Daryl Hall & John Oates– She's Gone D1 Roberta Flack– The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face D2 Paul Anka– There's Nothing Stronger Than Our Love D3 Dorothy Moore– Misty Blue D4 The Spinners– They Just Can't Stop It (The Games People Play) D5 Gladys Knight & The Pips– So Sad The Song

Trivia: The Bee Gees wrote "Emotion" though didn't record it themselves for many years. David Soul was Hutch on the TV show Starsky & Hutch. Many of us can't help but think of Kodak film ads in regard to "The Times Of Your Life". Peter McCann technically makes two appearances on this list because he also wrote "Right Time Of The Night". "The Way We Were" is a Barbra Streisand cover from a 1973 movie by the same name, and the spoken introduction to the Gladys Knight song is "Try To Remember" from the long-running 1960 Broadway musical The Fantasticks.

[theriverbeyond]

if you don’t mind, could you please elaborate on your ideas for a tlt stage musical? i too am musical theatre scum and this idea totally took me by surprise- your ideas for it are so fun and creative 😭 i am dying to know more about how you would arrange gideon as a musical (songs, motifs, just general tidbits of any kind) for entirely selfish reasons- it feeds the little worm in the back of my mind that wants to imagine everything as a musical.

thank you!! i did theater lighting for like, 6 years (and regular theater tech for a few more years before that) so i am just envisioning it... it could be so cool especially if they lean into the more rock musical visual style. there was this one specific local community theater production of next to normal I saw once in a theater that could seat maybe 100 people, that just went balls to the ball with ridiculous atmospheric lighting and just.. visceral acting/singing etc and I have been thinking about it ever since. hugely influential on my personal tastes. the broadway next 2 normal wishes it could capture even one shred of the intimate intensity and i have been chasing that specific high ever since.

for a gtn stage musical i have a few scattered ideas, in no particular order:

a "getting ready for canaan house"/gideon's rapier training montage & group song -- specifically, this would feature all the house heirs and specifically the real dulcinea. she would, of course, be played by a different actress for the whole rest of the play, but the audience wouldn't know because after that scene her face is never clearly shown. OR, in the first "getting ready" montage, you only see her back. regardless, the show would pull the ol' switcheroo. also this would be a fun scene where we get a glimpse of all the cav/necro pairs. there would be colored lighting corresponding to house colors

i think act 1 ending with the pool scene would be cool thematically (a shift in the gideon and harrow relationship) and leave the opportunity for an act 1 closing ballad (whose tune is then of course repeated when gideon dies). i don't think there is quite enough post-pool scene material for the acts to then be totally balanced, but, luckily this musical exists in the brain only and therefore i can do whatever i want forever <3 also the big battle scenes could be enough to fill the meat of the 2nd act

I think all the duels should be songs or at least done to music. Specifically i think the marta v. cam duel should be cam & marta dueling in the middle while palamades and judith stand to the side each lit with toplight in their corresponding colors (blue-gray and red). they would sing dueling verses of an "i am" song that reveal their own relationships with their cavalier and personal motives etc. maybe naberius gets his own pompous little verse

The fight against the lab 2 construct should be a song monologue thing and after harrow and gideon win, the tune changes to some kind of little victory thing etc but when they stumble across abigail & mangus' bodies the music just. stops.

I think it would be cool if the musical really leaned into the horror of things that are unseen. Like, gideon (and the audience by proxy) being frozen on stage while palamades confronts camilla. the explosion is either silhouetted on the scrim or done entirely offstage.

Ianthe only ever gets directly lit after she has become a lyctor. She still doesn't really get a song-- she tries to monologue it, but the music doesnt get going for her.

The avulsion trial would be a song sung by Dulcinea, that sounds sweet on first pass and is absolutely sinister when looking back. i am not a songwriter which means I can simply imagine it being awesome

the final gideon and harrow scene would be like. yelling and shouting. great big puppets used as the construct. gideon falls on a rail and then everything goes totally black. silence, or maybe crying. harrow screams gideon’s name. then lights up on gideon standing behind harrow, holding the sword together, under a narrow beam light. they fight cytherea together and say the wedding vows and everyone in the audience bursts into tears. gideon slowly exists the stage and by the end of the fight harrow is standing alone

gideon and harrow should have complimentary instrumental themes. after gideon sacrifices herself, the themes combine into one theme. this could be cool if this theoretical musical had a theoretical htn sequel, bc the same instrumental theme could come back *minus* the gideon part

there should be visually symbolic rails or other sorts of death flags for gideon the entire show.

camilla does a backflip

fog machine

"dulcie's theme" will be a sweet & soft instrumental track that plays when she's on stage that goes to a minor key and becomes dramatic and sinister when cytherea's identity is revealed

lighting would play a big role in symbolizing soul siphoning. I am personally envisioning this musical as having like highly saturated and emotional lighting (bc that is the kinda stuff that was fun for me when i did it lmao)or w/e SO that when soul siphoning happens everything can gray out and desaturate. it would look so cool. also, there should be a "the river" or something theme instrumental that plays whenever siphoning occurs, especially at the end when silas siphons colum vs ianthe.

the gideon v. coronabeth scene (right before everything goes to shit) would be a reprise of the song that happens when gideon duels naberius, and also, it would NOT be included on the official soundtrack

also for a theoretical sequel htn musical, the mattias nonius v. wake battle would start out with just ortus and then harrow takes over and then abigail adds to it, overlapping, and then mattias and wake have like an dueling chorus like the argument in le mis.

when gideon comes back, the harrow actress and gideon actress are both on stage at the same time. the harrow actress does all the body things that gideon-in-harrow does, wheras the gideon body is the one talking/singing. the music in the river bubble is all minor key or otherwise symbolized as wrong. mercymorn gets her own song of course. in the AU river scenes, gideon is there but we never see her face. the gideon actress could play The Body (with a costume change of course), so there is ambiguity on what is going on and who the body is just as in the books. idk i havent thought as much about post-gtn musical ideas but i think it would be very weird and experimental

would absolutely love to hear other people's ideas on this also!!

[eddie-redmayne-italian-blog]

Life Is a Cabaret! The Shimmering Kander and Ebb Classic Heads Back to Broadway Starring Eddie Redmayne

BY ADRIENNE MILLER

PHOTOGRAPHY BY JULIEN MARTINEZ LECLERC

STYLED BY HARRY LAMBERT

March 5, 2024

When I was 15 years old, I saw Cabaret for the first time, at a community theater in northeast Ohio. Though I considered myself sophisticated in important ways (I recall that I was wearing a wide-leg Donna Karan bodysuit that evening), my experience as a theatergoer was then limited to The Sound of Music and Ice Capades: Let’s Celebrate. I wonder if my parents, who had season tickets to the theater, knew that the show wasn’t exactly “family” entertainment. Set in 1931 Berlin as it careens toward the abyss, Cabaret depicts alternating stories. There’s the doomed romance between a fledgling novelist named Clifford Bradshaw and a young singer of supreme charisma (and mediocre talent) named Sally Bowles. And then there’s the seedy nightclub, the Kit Kat Club, which is populated with a highly sexualized cast of misfits and overseen by a ghoulish Master of Ceremonies. The show’s ethos—the glamour and terror, the irreverence, the campiness, the unreality—shaped my taste forever, and I knew that I had just experienced one of the greatest works of art ever created. I would never look at theater, or life, in the same way again.

Over three decades later, I’ve seen more stage productions of Cabaret than any other show, including a revival starring the original Emcee, Joel Grey; I’ve seen the Bob Fosse film version over 50 times. I’ve pretty much always got one of Fred Ebb’s sardonic lyrics jangling around in my head. Today, it’s “You’ll never turn the vinegar to jam, mein Herr,” and I couldn’t agree more.

Youthful exposure to Cabaret also turned out to be a life-changing event for the star of the new production opening this month on Broadway, Eddie Redmayne. “Weirdly, when I was 15, it was the first thing that made me believe in this whole process,” he says. Redmayne was a student at Eton when he first played the Emcee; he had never seen Cabaret when he was cast. On this late-autumn evening, Redmayne is speaking to me from Budapest, where he is shooting a TV series. “It reaffirmed my love for the theater,” he says of his first experience. “It made me believe that this profession, were I ever to have the opportunity to pursue it, was something that I wanted to do.”

Now, as he prepares for the transfer of the smash-hit 2021 London production of Cabaret (in which he also starred), Redmayne is reflecting on the power and durability of the John Kander and Fred Ebb masterpiece. “The show was just so intriguing and intoxicating,” he says, adding that the character of the Emcee posed many questions when he portrayed him for the first time, but provided scant answers. A few years later, when he was an art-history student at Cambridge, he again tackled the part of the Emcee at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe. At a dingy performance space called the Underbelly, he did two shows a night, the audiences getting rowdier and more intoxicated throughout the evening. He’d get up the following afternoon and stand along Edinburgh’s Royal Mile handing out flyers for the show, dressed in latex. “There was just a sort of general debauchery that lived in the experience,” he says. When his parents came one night, they were alarmed to find that their son had turned into a “pale, lacking-in-vitamin-D skeleton.”

Flash forward 15 years. The Underbelly cofounders and directors, Charlie Wood and Ed Bartlam, would approach Redmayne—now with an Academy Award for The Theory of Everything and a Tony for Red under his belt—with the idea of again playing the Emcee. Redmayne was eager to return to the role, but many questions remained—principally, who might direct it. In 2019 he happened to have been seated in front of the visionary young director Rebecca Frecknall at the last performance of her West End production of Tennessee Williams’s Summer and Smoke. It was an emotional evening for Frecknall, who’d been working on the project on and off for a decade. She and Redmayne were introduced, but “I had mascara down my face and probably didn’t make a very coherent first impression,” she tells me from London, where her new show, The House of Bernarda Alba, has just opened at the National Theatre.

Redmayne was astonished by the depth and delicacy of understanding that Frecknall brought to Summer and Smoke, a romance with the classic Williams themes of loneliness, self-delusion, and unrequited love. A few months later, Redmayne asked Frecknall if she’d consider directing a revival of Cabaret. “I said, ‘Of course I’ll do it, but you’ll never get the rights,’ ” she recalls. Those rights were held up with another production but were shortly thereafter released, and Frecknall went to work assembling her creative team—among them musical supervisor Jennifer Whyte, choreographer Julia Cheng, and set and costume designer Tom Scutt. Frecknall’s transcendent production of Cabaret opened on the West End at the tail end of the pandemic and succeeded in reinventing the show anew, winning seven Olivier Awards, including one for Redmayne and one for Frecknall as best director.

When Cabaret begins its run in April at the August Wilson Theatre, starring Redmayne, Gayle Rankin, Bebe Neuwirth, and Ato Blankson-​Wood, it will be just the second major production of the show directed by a woman. (Gillian Lynne directed the 1986 London revival.) In Frecknall’s version, Sally emerges as the beating heart of the show. “I find that most of my work has a female protagonist,” says Frecknall, who has also directed radical new interpretations of A Street­car Named Desire, Chekhov’s Three Sisters, and Romeo and Juliet. “And I have a different connection to Sally,” she says. “I was really drawn to how young she was…and how she uses that sexuality and how other people prey on that as well.” The role of Sally Bowles, originated in this production by Jessie Buckley, who also won an Olivier for her performance, will be played this spring by the brilliant Scottish actor Gayle Rankin.

“When I first met with Gayle, I was blown away by her passion and fearlessness,” says Frecknall. “She’s a real stage animal and brings a rawness and wit to her work, which will shine through. She’s going to be a bold, brutal, and brilliant Bowles.” Redmayne also praises Rankin for the depth of emotion she brings to the part, and for the vulnerable and volcanic quality of her interpretation.

Rankin arrives at a candlelit West Village restaurant on a chilly winter evening in a sumptuous furry white coat that would put Sally Bowles to shame. Her platinum hair is pulled back from her face and her dark blue eyes project a wry intelligence. Rankin lives near the restaurant and mentions that she has recently joined a nearby gym—not that she’s going to have much time for workouts in the coming months. Over small seafood plates (of her shrimp cocktail, she shrugs and concedes, “It’s a weird order, but okay”), she shares her own rich history with Cabaret.

She grew up in a small Scottish village, watching Old Hollywood movies with her mother and grandmother. At 15, she left home to attend a musical theater school in Glasgow; on her 16th birthday, she visited New York for the first time with her family. “It sounds like a cheesy, made-up story,” she says, but when she and her parents took a tour of the city on a double-decker bus, they passed by the Juilliard School. “I thought,” she says, “ ‘I am going to go there.’ ” The following year, she and her father flew from Glasgow to New York for her audition. She would become the first Scottish drama student to attend the institution.

At Juilliard, there’s an annual cabaret night, in which all third-year drama students perform songs. Rankin sang “Don’t Rain on My Parade” from Funny Girl, but she recalls her acute sense that she could have chosen a number from Cabaret. “I think I secretly always wanted to be that girl,” she says of the classmate who did perform those songs.

A couple of years after she graduated Juilliard in 2011, Rankin’s agents approached her with an opportunity to audition for Sam Mendes’s 2014 revival of his celebrated 1998 Broadway version (first staged in London in 1993), with Alan Cumming reprising his Emcee role. She was cast as Fräulein Kost—an accordionist sex worker who is revealed as a Nazi—playing opposite a revolving cast of Sallys, including Michelle Williams and Emma Stone.

Rankin has recently emerged as a fierce presence in films and in television (The Greatest Showman and two HBO series—Perry Mason and the upcoming season of House of the Dragon), but then “it kind of came across my desk this summer to throw my hat in the ring for Sally.” How does Rankin make sense of this fascinating, mystifying character? “Everything is so sort of up for grabs…. People feel as if they have a claim over her or know who she is. And the real truth is, only Sally gets to know who Sally is.” She has been rereading Christopher Isherwood’s 1939 semi-autobiographical novel Goodbye to Berlin—the inspiration for the show—in which the English writer sets the dying days of the Weimar Republic against his relationship with the young singer Sally Bowles. (In 1951, the playwright and director John Van Druten adapted the book for the stage with I Am a Camera; in 1963, Broadway director-producer extraordinaire Harold Prince saw that the play could be musicalized and hired Joe Masteroff for the libretto and the songwriting team of Kander and Ebb.) Isherwood based Sally—somewhat—on Jean Ross, a British flapper and chanteuse who later became a well-regarded film critic, war correspondent, political thinker, and Communist. (He gave the character the last name of writer and composer Paul Bowles.) For the rest of her life, Ross maintained (correctly) that Isherwood’s portrayal of her diminished her reputation as an activist and as an intellectual.

“Ross wanted so badly to write to Isherwood,” says Rankin, “and to condemn him: ‘You slandered my name. You said all these things about me that weren’t true.’ And as far as she got in the letter was ‘Dear Christopher.’ ” As Rankin builds the character, it’s this notion of the real Sally—not the fictive version constructed by Isherwood—that she finds so captivating, and heartbreaking.

The upending of Sally as an “object” is another core conceit behind the production. “I felt that other productions I’d seen had this slightly stereotypical male-gaze idea,” Frecknall says. She views Sally’s musical numbers as describing different facets of female identity. “Don’t Tell Mama” deals with the fetishization of youth and virginity, and in Frecknall’s production, Sally, disturbingly, appears in a sexy Little Bo Peep costume; “Mein Herr,” a song about manipulation, control, and female sexual desire, is in conversation with the cliché of the strong, “dominant” woman. “I think Sally’s very clever at being able to play an identity, and also play it against you,” she adds. The character “has secrets to tell us,” Rankin says. “Important things to share with us. And I think that’s the umbilical cord between her and the Emcee.”

Although Sally and the Emcee share the stage for less than five minutes, the Emcee’s musical numbers can be seen as a kind of meta-commentary about Sally’s actions. “What interested me was the idea that the Emcee was a character created by Hal Prince and Joel Grey,” says Redmayne, referring to the actor who portrayed the Emcee in the original 1966 production. “He doesn’t exist in the book Goodbye to Berlin and was their conceit to connect the story of Sally Bowles.” Rankin believes that there is a kind of mystical bond between the two characters. “As to whether or not he’s a higher power, or higher being, he does have an access to a higher knowledge,” Rankin suggests. “I think Sally feels that too.”

And who is the Emcee? A supernatural being? Puppeteer or puppet? There are no clues in the text. Prince conceived of the character as a metaphor representing Berlin itself. “The idea of him as an abstraction,” Redmayne says, “and so purposely intangible, meant that I actually found a new way of working.” Redmayne built the character from the ground up, starting with big, broad gestures that would be gradually refined. The “very fierce, ferocious intensity” of Herbert von Karajan, the famously dictatorial Austrian conductor of the Berlin Philharmonic and a Nazi party member, served as a particularly fertile inspiration.

Historically, the role of Emcee has been coded as gay, and embodied, in most prominent productions, by gay actors. Frecknall’s production had to address what it meant to cast Redmayne, a straight white male actor, in the role. “Tom [Scutt] and I felt very clearly that, well, it’s not going to be the Emcee’s tragedy,” Frecknall says. A person like Redmayne—given his class, ethnicity, and sexuality—would emerge from the catastrophe unscathed. Redmayne concurs: “As the walls of fascism begin to close in, he has the privilege to be able to shape-shift his way out of it.” The character’s journey is from Shakespearean fool to Shakespearean king.

In Hal Prince’s 1966 production, Grey’s delicate, meticulous performance as the cane-twirling Emcee is pure nihilism—as a representation of Germany’s conscience. In the later Mendes iteration, the Emcee emerges as the central victim: In that production’s chilling last scene, Alan Cumming’s louche Emcee removes a black trench coat to reveal a concentration camp uniform; a burst of bright white light follows, from, presumably, a firing squad. But in Frecknall’s version, the Emcee is exposed not as a victim of the system, but as the chief perpetrator. The show, she notes, “becomes the ensemble’s tragedy.”

“I was really intent that we cast it very queer and inclusive,” says Tom Scutt, Cabaret’s multitalented set and costume designer. We are sitting on a black banquette in the lobby of his hotel, across the street from Lincoln Center, where he’s working on Georges Bizet’s Carmen. To mount a revival of Cabaret in 2024, Scutt contends that “there’s no other way. That was really at the headline of our mission.”

There are two casts in the show: the main company and the prologue cast, which provides pre-curtain entertainment. In general, the members of the prologue cast don’t come from traditional musical-theater backgrounds, but from the worlds of street dance and hip-hop—“dancehall, voguing, and ballroom scene,” Scutt notes—and in the London production, some of the prologue performers have been promoted to the main cast. “There is something deeply, deeply moving about how we’ve managed to navigate the usual slipstream of employment.”

Part of Scutt’s intention with Cabaret has been to “smudge and diffuse’’ the audience’s preconceived notions. Inclusive casting is one mode for change; iconography is another. In this case, that has meant no bowler hats, no bentwood chairs, no fishnet stockings. The aesthetic is less Bob Fosse and more Stanley Kubrick. “We started off in a place of ritual,” he says. “I really wanted the place to feel as if you’ve come into some sort of Eyes Wide Shut temple.”

Scutt has reimagined the 1,250-seat August Wilson Theatre as an intimate club—warrens of labyrinthine new corridors and passageways, three new bars, and an auditorium reinvented as a theater-in-the-round. Boris Aronson, the set designer of the show’s iconic original 1966 production, suspended a mirror on the stage in which the audience members would see their own reflections—a metaphor that forced the audience to examine its own complicity; but in Scutt’s design, the audience members must look at one another. Access to the building is through a side entrance; as soon as you arrive, you’ve already lost your bearings.

In many ways, it’s remarkable that such a weird and complex work of art masquerading as a garishly entertaining variety show has had such longevity. Scutt has an explanation about why this piece—created by a group of brilliant Jewish men about the rise of antisemitism and hate, about the dangers of apathy—​continues to speak to us so profoundly almost 60 years after its Broadway debut.

“I can’t really think of anything else, truly, that has the same breadth of feeling in its bones,” Scutt suggests. “I honestly can’t think of another musical that does so much.” As grave, and as tragically relevant, as the messages of Cabaret are, he and the members of the company have found refuge in theater. Both Scutt and Frecknall grew up singing in their churches as children; theater is to them a secular church, a space where human beings can congregate and share healing. “It was made with such pain and such love,” Scutt says. “Which is absolutely the piece.” 

In this story: hair, Matt Mulhall; makeup, Niamh Quinn. Produced by Farago Projects. Set Design: Afra Zamara.

[meilas]

Socks' Ultimate Phantoms list

Phantoms

Franc D'Ambrosio - Yes. Brings all the sad noises and I am here for it. Nice voice. Excellent acting and facial expressions. Very expressive eyes. Is a cinnamon roll irl. Gary Mauer - Best voice ever. 10/10 would believe this man was an angel. Greg Mills - Looks like a cinnamon roll, will kill you. I never thought tongue action could be sexy but here we are. Ted Keegan - Looks like a cinnamon roll, is a cinnamon roll. Surprisingly sexy. Killian Donnelly - Looks like a cinnamon roll. I can't explain why I like him, but I do. Christopher Carl - I've only heard audio of him but I like him based on how he sobbed on the golden angel. Jeremy Stolle - Nice voice. Acting is too subtle. Peter Karrie - I love how he takes certain notes up a step, just to show that he can. Slightly nasally, but tolerable. Davis Gaines - tbh all I remember really is him slowly rocking his hips while he was sprawled on the portcullis and I now judge all phantoms on a metric of how good their pants look. 9/10 his pants. Peter Joback - I absolutely hated him when he sang in English. I liked him a little better when he did the show in Swedish. James Hume - Unmemorable. Michael Nicholson - Excellent acting choices. Was thinking about him for two weeks after watching. I just really like the production in German, okay? Earl Carpenter - Better in his earlier runs. Good acting choices. Simon Pryce - Very deep voice. Stands nicely. Scott Davies - He looked like fun and I wanted to like him. Noped out of that one pretty quick. Too much vibrato. Anthony Crivello - From the Vegas boot! I actually don't remember too much about him. But I know I liked the boot! Ben Crawford - Tended to have really weird pronunciation toward the end of his run. He was decent when I saw him right after the Broadway reopening. The most remarkable thing he did was to belly slide all the way across the stage during STYDI. Other than that, I recall nothing specific. Thiago Arancam - Remarkable only in the fact that he is boring. Uwe Kroger - The boob-stroking guy. I remember nothing else. Cooper Grodin - Entertaining in the fact that his acting is so wooden. Nice voice when he's not doing blocking at the same time. Good pants. It helps that he never skips leg day. Laird Mackintosh - I think he was good? I honestly don't remember. Geronimo Rauch - I remember I liked him! Norm Lewis - Nice voice, a little boring. Sorry Norm. John Owen-Jones - Hands. Michael Crawford - Absolutely not. I do not understand what anyone sees in him. His voice sounds like it's about to snap any second, and he is very unsexy. David Shannon - Yes. Absolutely yes. Excellent acting choices and nice voice. Does sad very well. Deserved better. Saulo Vasconcelos - All I can recall is @wheel-of-fish spamming the chat with "hands" all night and that's all anyone really needs to know about his Phantom. Ethan Freeman - Looks like a goddamn stick insect during Final Lair and I am here for it. Looks like Tony Shaloub. Bronson Norris Murphy - Technically only was the Phantom in Love Never Dies. RIP. He deserved better. Anyway. His voice is a little deeper than Franc's or Gary's. I wish he had gotten a chance to play the Phantom in POTO proper. I am very curious as to how he would have played it. Looks like a cinnamon roll, is a burnt cinnamon roll. Ramin Karimloo - He was my intro to POTO on stage. I liked his performance enough that I went looking for more clips of the musical, and found the Saturday Streams. Eiji Akutagawa - Ah yes. The self-groping Phantom. That's all I can remember about him. Josh Piterman - Does sad very well. Gerard Butler - My first-first Phantom. I still like him. There's something about his voice that I do actually like, and it annoys me very much when people go "he can't sing" yes he can, everyone has the ability to sing. Just shut up and let me enjoy what I like in peace. Hugh Panaro - Great voice, excellent acting. Funny. Fun to watch. Reminds me of Franc, in that they're both innocent/childish. Hugh is more childish and angry. Looks like he could kill you, and he might, it depends on his mood.

PART TWO

[weirdthoughtsandideas]

Mean Girls 2024 reviewed by this random girl with weird thoughts

(Although I think my thoughts for this aren’t that weird).

Spoilers!

THE GAY ENERGY. THE QUEER GIRLS ENERGY. How many girls are smitten with Regina?? Cady had heart eyes the first time she saw her, GRETCHEN is… oh my gosh. Plus all the random girls in school.

I feel like lots won’t bring this up cause sadly Rise of the pink ladies were not that well marketed (PLEASE WATCH IT AND WATCH IT NOW!!), but when I saw ARI NORTATOMASO in the classroom I was like CYNTHIA’S DESCENDANT ??!! >:0

CANON LESBIAN JANIS!!!!! Finally!! But I am not sure how I feel about just giving her this random girl as her date to the spring fling.

I kinda wish to get more scenes with Cady and Janis. Idk personally ever since I read this chatfic from 2018 where they got together over this conversation I’ve kinda had a thing for them

(I’m not joking when I say this fic has been a huge inspo for me to start writing fics of my own. Like. Thank you person who wrote it. You’ve orphaned your account now but this fic will always be in my memory)

I’m not saying I needed them to be gfs in the movie just that I wanted some more moments :>

So the movie lacks a lot of the iconic moments from the 2004 film, but it’s supposed to be an adaptation of the musical anyway. Also if they just said every iconic line again it would just feel like an exact copy of the movie and that wasn’t the point.

Cady’s songs lack a bit for me. In the musical, she sang so loudly and expressed so much, but she sings so… quietly… here. I guess it’s a sort of choice for her character, and maybe this worked better for the movie format - musicals become different on stage and in movies, you can’t always be as theatrical on film as you can on stage. But, I just didn’t feel her emotions at all in the same way.

REGINA AND JANIS’ SONGS, THO? YEA. THEY SLAYED. I do feel sad they cut Gretchen and Karen’s parts out of Meet the plastics. Also that they cut Damian’s songs… Stop is literally such an important song because it gives advice not only to Cady but also to everyone watching?? I remember hearing it in 2018 and I personally felt like it could help me to not send too many texts to people, because when people didn’t answer I got nervous and sent even more. But then… some songs maybe don’t work as well in movie format, I don’t know.

Also because Janis is canonically gay now, I’d rather be me is officially a queer anthem!!!!! 😁😁

Not sure how I feel about changing ”Janis is a space dyke” to ”Janis is a pyro-les”. It doesn’t sound as good in the song lol. But, in the musical, Janis’ sexuality was more ”up to interpretation” and so got called that because when asked if she was a lesbian, she replied ”I AM A SPACE ALIEN AND I HAVE FOUR BUTTS”. An incredibly funny line and really had the early 2010s random humor going for it. But, when wanting to make her explicitly gay, they needed something better, and I understand that.

Now, many people see Regina as a closeted lesbian herself. I get it, since she has no chemistry with any boy and it seems like she just dates them for publicity. No boys except for Damian have personalities (did Shane even have a line?? He was just. There.) But, I am a bit insecure. Because at times it seems like she was one of those homophobic girls in middle school. I’m just gonna go from this movie alone, as I feel like in the Broadway show and in the 2004 movie that’s other kinds of discussion (the 2004 movie especially feels more like she actually was homophobic tbh). In the 2024 movie, Janis came out to Regina, and Regina put a rainbow pin on her stuffed animal as an ”ally”. Also Regina and Janis kissed. Regina did it to see how her boyfriend reacted, and it was at the expense of Janis. Regina then had her stuffed animal with a pride pin talk in a mocking voice and it was clear this was to make fun of Janis. Janis then got so mad over this that she set Regina’s backpack on fire (ok Ámbar Smith whatever works for you). From this story, I am a bit unsure if this came from a place of Regina maybe wanting to tease her boyfriend and then it got out of hand, or maybe she was curious about kissing Janis but she was like 12 and repressed those feelings. Because she supposedly wore a Pride pin as an ”ally”, that’s much more than what a homophobic would do - but, her bullying of Janis definitely contributed to homophobia. Regina is a mean girl, so we should not excuse her actions even though she is slaying. Closeted lesbian or not, she did some homopbic and harmful things.

Regina in this movie sometimes felt like she was just doing a bunch of things without care. In some ways, I think Regina is just living on some sort of cloud and there was all this anger inside of her and she didn’t know what, and it’s possible she just does not know how to handle all the popularity because she’s like 16. So she hides behind a lot of layers and just does stuff for the thrill of it, maybe trying to get some sort of enjoyment in life, but nothing is enough. And eventually she snaps and watches the world burn. Maybe this is why all the songs she has in the movie, including the ones that originally had more singers, only had her singing now. Showing that, even when she is around people, she is alone… (yes, the other girls sing in world burn but they don’t sing to her in the same way) and she has not found her real place in the world and she acts like she knows it all but she doesn’t really. And everyone keeps telling her how great her life is. If her life is so great, why does she feel so unsatisfied?

They didn’t ruin Revenge Party which I appreciate. I also loved that they added the deleted lines from the musical. I wish that Cady has more power in her voice when she shouted ”ONE CANDY CANE PLEASE” but oh well.

The way they all reported on the incidents at North Shore high like it was national news… like, my schools has meme accounts and stuff, but never that we reported on the stuff like it was celebrity gossip lmao. Then again I don’t even live in America so idk what’s going on over there.

I do like how Janis and Damian are the narrators. It’s possible a lot of things that happened was their overexaggerated retellings of what actually happened. Maybe this is just them telling freshmen about tales everyone tells them as they start high school.

School buses keep being the top 10 scariest jumpscares. Laughed out loud tho that instead of focusing on Cady and Regina’s argument, they just argued in the backround and then Janis finished up her song as Regina just gets hit by the bus in the background

I’ll probably have more to say in the future.

[4rainynite]

Sweeney Todd on Broadway

During my birthday trip to New York, I was lucky to see not one, but two Broadway shows! My second one was Sweeney Todd! 

Words could not describe how excited I was to see this show. When I first found out it was coming back to Broadway and watching it on 2023 Tony Awards I was like: I have to see this show!

The opening was hauntingly beautiful! The choreography during ' The Ballad Of Sweeney Todd' was a mixture of the cast scurrying and cowering like rats trying to flee from an unknown evil and rocking back and forth like on a boat. Their voices giving hints of something wicked was upon the play of the Demon of Fleet Stret. And when Josh appeared on stage the audience (including myself) cheered so loudly we didn't even hear him sing his part, so we all shut up so we could hear his beautiful voice.

We all died laughing during 'The Worst Pies in London', ' A Little Priest' & 'By the Sea'. Annaleigh was a delight from her pie making (which would cause a health inspector to burn the pie shop down) Homer Simpson run, and seagull sounds she gave Mrs. Lovett the perfect blend of humor and humor and Lady Macbeth. Josh as Sweeney Todd was just so -AAAHHH! He played his role aa dark and troubled character so well. Sweeney was an innocent man who lost everything only to return and it's all destroyed because of someone else's envy for his lifestyle. Now, he's back and he wants revenge and dragging everyone to heck with him! Gaten, who is famous for his role in Stranger Things played on Tobias's loyalty to Mrs. Lovett's very well. I almost cried during 'Not While I'm Around' that's how good he was! Jeanna was an impressive Begger Woman, who knew Sweeney and Mrs. Lovett were up to some mischief. Daniel and Maria portrayal as the lovebirds Anthony and Johanna in a cruel world was both sweet and yet you feared for their safety. Jamie and John as Judge Turpin and Beadle Bamford did a good job of making the audience love to hate them, I couldn't wait for Sweeney to slash them and for Mrs. Lovett to turn them into pies only to be feed to rats for starting the whole chain of events.

One of the best scenes in the musical is when Sweeney slashes his victims with the fake blood coming out and then slide down into the basement - it looked like fun (the slide part, not the slash throat part) and the effect used when Mrs. Lovett opening the oven and how it looked like she was opening the gates of heck - props to whoever came up with that idea and special effects.

I really enjoyed the show from beginning to end. I really hope the next time I go to New York I'll get to see it again!

After, the show I waited by the stage door, hoping to get Josh, Annaleigh, Gaten, Daniel, Maria, and etc. autographs. As soon as Josh & Annaleigh came out the floodgates opened! Fans screamed, shouted, and cried for the two leads. I was so close to them yet so far away. Sadly, I didn't get to them in time. And strangely I was okay with it; I was spending my birthday month in New York the place I always wanted to go, saw two Broadway shows in one day, and my fam came with me. I had a good time!

Until, my godmother came up and told me she got their autographs for me (best auntie ever)!

Like I said before: I was spending my birthday month in New York the place I always wanted to go, saw two Broadway shows in one day, and my fam came with me. I had a good time!

[flagbridge]

Shows I saw in 2023: Ragtime at the Signature Theater

My 50th musical ever!

I’ve lost track of how many of these posts I’ve done this year, but this is the finale for the DC edition of my shows this year. If you do a long weekend in DC, I can guarantee that you can fill it with as many shows as you’d see in New York.

At the moment, there are currently six musicals running in DC and the close suburbs: Frozen & Girl from North Country (Kennedy Center), Ragtime (Signature Arlington), Swept Away (Arena Stage), Fiddler on the Roof (Olney Maryland), and A Christmas Carol (Fords). As You Like it at Shakespeare Theater Company also apparently features a lot of the Beatles and The National is currently dark until mid-January when Annie will be in town.

I’d never seen Ragtime and I was transfixed the entire time (when I really started looking at my watch there was one song left). I took a singing-inclined young person in my life to see their first musical and in this person’s words it was, even at three hours long, “super awesome.” I had chills throughout the performance and having a 16-piece orchestra in such a small space, where you are frequently next to the actors because of how every theater entrance was used as a part of the stage—ends up feeling immersive.

I have few critiques of the production itself, although having never seen the musical I found it WAY too long, and I think there are songs in both acts that could have been cut and kept the momentum. The baseball song in act 2, for example, while fun, is totally unnecessary, and just ends up prolonging the show.

Longtime Elphaba Teal Wicks was a delight as Mother, but this is a true ensemble performance (and yes, we had an understudy for Tahteh, with a swing rolling into Houdini’s spot, so my understudy appreciation continues)

What I especially noticed listening to the soundtrack afterwards was how similar it often sounds to its contemporary (both in years the originals ran on Broadway and in era depicted) Titanic.

It runs through early January. Recommend the trip! The rest of my shows this year will be in New York. I’ve got at least three on the slate!

[withallthingslove]

The Phantom of the Opera Broadway Thoughts/Review - March 9, 2023

This marked my fifth time seeing Phantom on Broadway, and I went with my friend who was seeing it for the first time. The Phantom was Ben Crawford, Raoul was Paul A. Schaefer, and Christine was played by both Emilie Kouatchou and Kanisha Marie Feliciano. Kanisha replaced Emilie during Il Muto. 

compared to when I saw it in December, the audience was not as loud during songs and was more enthralled/not taking a breath

From the start, Paul’s Raoul seemed stronger than the last time I saw him. It was also a vocally strong performance all around for everyone. 

While going down to the lair during the title song, Ben’s Phantom caressed Christine’s arm as she passed him at the end of the travelator

During STYDI, Emilie and Ben had a lot of tension when she decided to hand his mask back. And the way Ben hovered over her before grabbing her arm made me sjdjsk

Ben and Emilie were not seen coming up the trap door after the lair and the part where the ballerinas would spot the Phantom and Christine was cut. Instead the ballerinas just screamed after Magical Lasso and exited instead of pointing toward the Phantom and Christine so something felt off there

Kanisha came on during Il Muto instead of Emilie and it was my first time ever seeing an emergency cover happen in a show. During Il Muto I thought Kanisha’s confusion played well, but in All I Ask of You she seemed a bit overwhelmed. Paul really took over All I Ask of You and increased his energy in a really reassuring way.

When Ben appeared in the angel my friend went “oh fuck oh fuck” so it’s cool how surprising the angel still is to people who haven’t seen it

Ben also timed his hand coming up over the angel to the music so well it made it feel really gothic and creepy

Nehal Joshi as Andre really brought a ton of physical comedy and had dialed it up a bunch since I saw it in December. He walked through the ballerinas performing in Hannibal and bumped into more ballerinas during Il Muto. He also was more exaggerated with Firmin. 

Ok so we have to talk about Paul in act II... the first time I have seen him have consistent stage presence all the way through. He had so many cute moments with Kanisha and was appearing so protective instead of just standing there. I can’t even begin to recount the number of little reassuring touches he did that just added so much to his relationship with Christine. My friend commented that she thought she would be bored of Raoul based on the beginning but was obsessed with him in act II so she also noticed it

Kanisha has such a beautiful voice, but I think it took until Wishing for her to settle into the character. Her Wishing was really beautiful!

When Ben appeared in the graveyard my friend went “not this fucker again.” 

It was the best Wandering Child trio I’ve seen (and I do not like the trio in the song I prefer how it used to be from years ago). But the trio actually worked here. It was really cool to see Ben’s characterization change with Kanisha compared to how he would be with Emilie. With Kanisha he was immediately more paternal with her and this made the lyrics “wandering child” and “fathering gaze” that much more impactful.

Paul was bringING it during Wandering Child and since Kanisha and Ben were too, the sequence of Christine walking in a trance to the Phantom to Raoul stopping her, to the Phantom yelling at them while Chrisitne tries to stop Raoul while Raoul tries to protect Chrisitne just all ~ came together ~ 

Ben sounded really good in PONR. The new blocking I think this time I interpreted that Christine was just trying to force the Phantom to finish the choreography and then once she unveiled it as him she was maybe going to try and find a way to help the situation without the Phantom needing to die. And then he proposed to her and she was SHOCKED

During the final lair Ben was a bit more scary and physical than when I saw him in December and this made Paul louder and more protective. Kanisha’s “tears of hate” line was very defiant.

After the kiss for a second it looked like Kanisha’s Christine maybe felt something for the Phantom but a bit unclear on what that feeling was. She definitely stopped hating him after the kiss though and was looking at him almost perplexed and even after he let Roaul go, she still seemed to be trying to figure out what he was doing and what she felt

Ben broke my heart because when Christine came back to return the ring he leapt up and seemed to be thinking she was going to stay. Then Kanisha took a huge step back and stiffly outstretched her arm and it dawned on him that she wasn’t staying. 

He sang “I love you” once, and once she left he said it again but more in a pitiful way to himself. So he wasn’t trying to convince her to stay like he did when I saw him with Emilie. 

I don’t get the 100% vibe that Ben’s Phantom goes after Kanisha’s Christine. He seems to have sadly accepted it and I see more of like a 25% he considers trying to find her but doesn’t go through with it

I cried multiple times during the show and when I got home I sobbed at the thought of that being my last time seeing Phantom, so I bought one more ticket for April. My credit card and friends and family are probably unsurprised yet exasperated, but I think need one more time to say goodbye. This show in particular was pretty much perfect vocally, and it was so cool to compare the different acting interpretations and how they changed once Kanisha came onstage. 

But it was super chaotic and a roller coaster of emotions from hoping Emilie is OK, wondering what happened, being disappointed Emilie wasn’t on anymore, loving that I got to see Kanisha, and then being disappointed I couldn’t have seen Kanisha at the beginning while still wishing I got to see Emilie all the way through. By the time Ben was singing at the end of the Final Lair, I realized my emotions had been so all over the place and I had so much adrenaline that I didn’t get to use the show the way I originally intended and hadn’t been able to just sit back and appreciate it one last time.

So I guess I’m going back again

[sammysdewysensitiveeyes]

Kinda fascinated by that trend in the 80′s and 90′s of taking movies and turning them into kids cartoons, whether the original movie was actually child-friendly or not.  So you wound up with stuff like:

The Real Ghostbusters

I feel like this must have been the success that started the trend, because this show ran for several seasons.  I watched this cartoon before I ever saw the 2 movies.  It makes sense, I think.  A comedic series about ghost hunters using laser packs fits neatly into a weekly cartoon series.  The first movie is mostly okay for kids, despite some scary imagery and that one dream sequence of Ray getting a ghost blowjob.  The second movie is even more child-friendly, despite Vigo the Carpathian being fucking terrifying.  I was a big fan of all Ghostbuster-related stuff as a child.

Beetlejuice

This was another franchise where I saw the cartoon before the movie.  When I finally got around to the movie, I surprised that lovable scamp Beetlejuice was actually the villain.  But hey, even in the movie he’s just kind of a funny guy.  We’ll just pretend that him trying to force-marry Lydia didn’t happen.  In the cartoon, they are platonic buddies who hang out together in the Netherworld, Beetlejuice usually pulling some kind of sleazy scheme.  I can understand making him the star, he’s the most interesting part of the movie, and he makes a more fun companion for Lydia than the dead couple in the movie.  (Although I liked them, they were nice.)  I watched this one, too, not as devotedly as Ghostbusters. 

Police Academy

The movies were just dumb, slapstick comedy, so okay, I kinda get it.  I remember seeing most of the movies as a kid, although my Dad thought the first and second were “too adult” for us kids.  (I’m guessing they must have gone down a rating and gotten more family friendly starting from 3 onward.)  Whatever critics might say, the movies made money, and they already had a wacky, cartoon ensemble cast assembled.  But I just think of the Simpsons here: “Why do you think I took you to see all those Police Academy movies?  Because they were funny?!  Well, I didn’t hear anybody laughing, did you?!”  I admit, I did watch this as a kid, though.   

Attack of the Killer Tomatoes

On the one hand, the idea of fighting mutant tomatoes, and the “Tomato Task Force,” including a scuba diver, a cowboy, a gymnast and a guy dressed like a WWII pilot, plus a teenage boy and a girl who is secretly a mutated tomato all sound like a recipe for a successful cartoon.  On the other hand, the movies themselves, both Attack of the Killer Tomatoes and Return of the Killer Tomatoes (where most of the characters come from) were not exactly box office hits, more cult films.  I will say, I thought Return of the Killer Tomatoes is actually pretty funny.  It doesn’t just break the fourth wall, it kicks down the fourth wall and stomps on it.  At one point, they run out of money to complete the film and have to get brand sponsorship, so you see all the generic food items suddenly become Snickers and cans of Coke that the actors conspicuously hold up to the camera.  The cartoon wasn’t that clever, from what I remember. 

Little Shop of Horrors

I mean.....the plant eats people.  I know it was a hit musical and there was a movie with Rick Moranis that had a much happier ending than the Broadway version, but.....the plant eats people, and Seymour is a murderer.  I guess they were trying for another Beetlejuice by making the colorful movie villain into a mostly harmless protagonist.  I don’t think he ate people in the cartoon.  I didn’t really watch this one.  The musical is a banger, though, you should all listen to the soundtrack.

Robocop

Hey, you know that ultra-violent and bloody action movie about corporate greed and corruption and crime and the militarization of the police force?  Let’s turn that into a kid’s cartoon.  It’ll be perfect.  I will say, though, kids did watch the original movie.  I remember watching the first part of it at a friend’s birthday party, when I was way too young to see that scene in the executive boardroom where that one guy gets shot dozens of times by a malfunctioning robot.  That’ll live in my memory forever.

Toxic Crusaders

Okay, I really want to know who greenlit this one.  Because the movie this was based on, the Toxic Avenger, was NOT remotely child-friendly, and more of a cult movie than a box office hit.  At least Robocop was popular, and older kids might conceivably enjoy it.  The Toxic Avenger was a campy B-movie satire with gruesome violence, as the hero, Toxie, murdered people in horrible ways.  It made even less money at the box office than Return of the Killer Tomatoes.  I can only guess that some executive thought a cleaned-up version of the movie would attract kids who liked Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, with it’s weird mutated group of heroes.  Kind of like how, after the success of X-Men: TAS, every conceivable super-hero team was getting a cartoon, so we got short-lived stuff like UltraForce and Wild C.A.T.S.  At any rate, in the cartoon, Toxie and his mutated friends fought for environmentalism and cleaned up pollution, and for some reason their enemies were aliens instead of corporate polluters.  I think I watched like one episode of this.  If nothing else, I admire the dedication to taking a Troma movie and making it wholesome and kid-friendly.

And there were so many more.  Ace Ventura: Pet Detective, Bill and Ted, Rambo, if it was remotely popular as a movie, and they thought they could market it to kids, it got a cartoon.  As far as I know, they’re not doing that as much any more.  Maybe because all the action movies these days are Marvel and DC, which already are comic-book adaptations and have had multiple cartoons.  Otherwise, I can only assume that the same people who adapted The Toxic Avenger would be giving us The Conjuring, Midsommer and Wolf of Wall Street cartoon series.  You know, for the kids.  Or maybe a Hereditary cartoon featuring the adventures of Charlie and her best friend Paimon, a mischievous demon, as they have magical adventures with her older brother Peter and learn important lessons.

[bisexual-horror-fan]

lets give you some amber self indulgence. for research purposes. all of these questions of course imagine a why at the end of, but don't feel like you have to elaborate.

five colors you think are representative of amber?

what are some symbols that represent her in her mind?

what are her five comfort songs?

what would her perfect bedroom look like?

her favorite scent?

what fills her with the most nostalgia?

what's a moment she wishes she could change but knows it has to be?

if she got three wishes, what would she wish for?

besides being a blorbos, an oc, and all around amazing character, what does she mean to you?

i love you so much and i can't wait to see the answers!

Oh man this is so fucking exciting! What a great ask! I am so excited to go off on this, to just really delve into some interesting questions about Amber! So thanks up top for asking this! Now let’s get into it!  Amber rambles under the cut!

Five colours you think are representative of Amber?

So the first two are obvious, red and green, the same colours as a certain guy’s sweater. Red is so obviously her colour overall, she looks amazing in red, clothes or nails or lipstick, it just suits her so well and green, well Amber has always loved the colour green. Long before him. She would sit in the backyard of her family’s home often, would love to read in her mother’s garden, she loves flowers and trees and plant life of all kinds, green brings calm and it looks fantastic on her too, she comes alive in green. Orange, bright and bold, fiery and the colour of her hair. I also think that a frosty sort of blue one that makes you think of winter fits her, reminds you of her eyes and of the big sky where her office building and apartment building stretches into. And the last one is white, like the blouses she wears to work often, of the bed sheets she regularly gets blood stains out of.

What are some symbols that represent her in her mind?

Things that represent her, hmmm! Let me think, when I think of herrrr. I think of the smell of smoke and whiskey served neat, of pretty but sharp manicures. I think of laughing so hard you snort and of a girl who is one of the nicest people you’ve ever met while drunk in a club bathroom. I think of the sound of heels on concrete and self confidence and high rise apartments. I think of strong coffee and sweet pastries and fashion forward business wear. I think of doing things you shouldn’t, having fun secrets, even if they are only with yourself. 

What are her five comfort songs?

Amber loves musicals, she got the love of them from her mother, one of the few things that they had in common and bonded over, a safe topic for the pair of them to this day. The first musical she was shown was The Wizard Of Oz and corny as it may be, and as much as she doesn’t spread it around, Somewhere Over The Rainbow means a fuck ton to her and really loves that song. Especially when she started to hate her hometown and desperately wanted out, a better place, a place she could be herself finally. She still listens to it sometimes now that she IS in that better place, living how she wants. 

Her favourite song, in her favourite musical is from Chicago, We Both Reached For The Gun, she loves the patter of it, the energy, she thinks it is irreplaceable in the musical theatre canon as a whole. Chicago was the first show she ever saw on an actual Broadway stage and was smitten. Get a few drinks in and ask her about Chicago and you’ll be treated to her going off about her thoughts, feelings, Roxy Hart herself and that Bob Fosse’s choreography needs more credit. 

When that break happened, that long two year break where she was away from Freddy, over that time the song Cry by MIKA was like a pseudo break up song because she didn’t know IF he was ever coming back, if this was it. She cried a lot to that song, poured over it, and now it has taken on a different meaning now that he IS back and everything is fine, it doesn’t hurt to listen to it.

She loves the song Fantasy by Mariah Carrey more than she probably should, listens to it often when getting ready to go out, ever since getting with a certain someone, it has taken on more meaning, clearly. Mostly it is a fun song that makes her feel really good.

Sweet Relief by Kimbra makes her want to dance like nothing else, the amount of times she has worked out on her pole to that song is like, too many to count. If she is feeling down, this is the go-to, the fix her mood song.

What would her perfect bedroom look like?

This is a good one! I think honestly, probably a mix of her current bedroom and the playroom she sees Freddy in. She loves her bedroom’s big windows, the walk-in closet, her vanity, laid out with her jewellery and makeup, the hardwood floors and the reading corner. She loves the bed in the playroom the best, it is like a conversation pit you might see in the 70s but a bed, big, circular, built into the ground, pillows and blankets and impossibly soft, she feels so relaxed there, more so than anywhere else. If she could have the colour scheme of the playroom, lots of shades of red and white, the bed and the other parts of her room she adores, it would be perfect.

Her favourite scent?

She loves this one type of candle that is made at a little shop in her hometown, she stocks up whenever she goes back. The candle is Pink Grapefruit, it is sweet and citrusy and has surprising depth, she loves it.

What fills her with the most nostalgia?

Hearing the music from an ice cream truck. It reminds her of hot sticky summer days, eating sweet treats in the garden and reading, reminds her of rewards she bought herself after tough soccer games and swim practices and meets. It reminds her of the better parts of her childhood, when everything was easy and simpler and she had no complaints about her family or where she lived.

What's a moment she wishes she could change but knows it has to be?

Amber almost got a full swim scholarship in high school. Almost. She missed the meet the scouts were supposed to be at, through no fault of her own, the bus broke down, she was extremely upset about it at the time. She got a loan and went to college on her own terms and as much as she wishes she could have done that meet, and kicked ass and won her scholarship. Looking back on it going to college on her own merit was better, able to focus on herself and not be tied down by any vestiges of her past, there was massive pressure from her family to be a lot of things, a good athlete was one, shirking that when she went to college was definitely better for her in the long run. 

If she got three wishes, what would she wish for?

Now this is a good question. Amber has so much of what she wants already but let’s drill down into this. Number one, she would wish to know if her sister is REALLY happy with her station in life or if she wants a life more like Amber, more freedom, not so tied down. Number two, she would wish for the uncanny ability to get tickets to whatever she wants, concerts, movies, shows, plays, whatever, she hates ever feeling like she misses out on something. And last, there is this vintage cream Valentino skirt she is obsessed with and feels a hole in her closet without it and would literally kill to have one in her size. 

Okay, okay and the big one! What does Amber mean to me?

So again, I have said that I started The Man Of My Dreams on a whim, I didn’t know what Amber looked like at first, she didn’t have a name until chapter three of the story for fucksake. I figured her out along the way and fell in love with her in a big way, for how she is, what she did for me. TMOMD was the first fic I ever wrote, because of it I found this community and my passion for writing, because of it I met so many wonderful people like you, Bug! And whoever else is reading this. I made amazing friends, have pushed myself a lot creatively, experienced so much happiness and more that I never would have, without this funky little red-headed porn protagonist. And as much as I say that, we all know she is more than that, a lot, lot more than that.

Amber means a lot to me because well she is the kind of person I think I am and continually strive to be! Someone who is enthusiastic, funny, unapologetic, thoroughly herself and full of love and self confidence, kindness and willing to help others and of course, unflinching and unashamed in her sexuality and body. Being able to write a character like her and have so many people just love her, see her, identify with her or call her things like sweet or warm, it means so much! I love that I wrote a bunch of porn with some feelings and people fell for her. It makes me feel good, like I did something really right, I am glad she can be so much for so many people because she is so much in so many ways to me. 

How she views and feels about sex is very similar to myself as well and this is just reminding me I need to do a big post talking about that already, maybe soon!

Thank you again so much for this Bug, I loved thinking so hard about this and going in so hard on it! Hope you like the Amber rambling. I love you!

[tending-the-hearth]

What the big about between the lines? Why is it so important? I’m just curious?

"between the lines" is one of my FAVORITE musicals of all time, and it is also one of my absolute favorite books i've ever read.

the musical is based off of the book written by jodi picoult and her daughter, and was in production during 2019, stopped bc of the pandemic, and got to premiere off-broadway last year! sadly, their run was cut short (still no clue why and i'm still bitter about it), and their cast album was finally FINALLY released yesterday!

it's about a girl named Delilah who falls in love with Prince Oliver, the protagonist of the fairy tale she's become obsessed with reading. it's a really beautiful show with amazing music that i recommend to absolutely everyone (i listened to "leaps and bounds" in my car yesterday and was just fully crying)

for me, personally, "between the lines" is a book that was always really important to me. my mom and i read it together, and the story itself was always really close to my heart. i connect a LOT with Delilah, and when i went to see the musical (i bought a ticket so fast when they went on sale lmao) as soon as the first song started and i saw Arielle Jacobs on stage, i was so ridiculously emotional. it sounds super cheesy, but i saw myself on stage. the costume Arielle wears as Delilah, that's something i ABSOLUTELY wore in high school. the glasses, the way her hair was styled, her mannerisms, it all just flung me straight back to my own junior year.

just... the cast is so unbelievably phenomenal, Jake David Smith was the MOST adorable Oliver, i've already gushed about Arielle so much, and Wren Rivera stole ever scene they were in as Jules/Ondine. "Allie McAndrews" is one of the best songs of the show BECAUSE of Wren

i made a very sappy emotional post on instagram about how much the show meant to me, and Arielle liked + commented on it and the BTL instagram reposted it, so that also adds to how much i love the show lmao

so, for me, "between the lines" is important because, as a book, it got me through some tough times. As a musical, it let me see a version of myself on stage in a role that i've fallen in love with.

yeah and this show just deserved so much better and i hope one day we get a broadway run or a tour of it because i love it more than anything

[sophiaannecarusos]

Sophia Anne Caruso Interviewed for Nylon Magazine

I: First of all, tell me about the song and it’s sound. It reminds me of a very specific, breezy time in indie, circa Chairlift and She & Him.

S: That's exactly what it is. My co-writer Nick Littlemore’s  band [Empire of the Sun] was super popular during that time. It's different from other stuff that I've put out. And then I think it's a different vibe. It's meant to feel like more pop than the other stuff, but still not quite pop. It's been sitting in Dropbox for years now.  I'll write stuff, and then it sits there until I'm ready to finish it. It'll be half finished, but not mix the master. I'll be like, "I’m just not ready to pull you out."

I: How do you eventually decide when a song is ready?

S: I wanted to put out another song  And I want to tour. This is such a summery song, but I don't want to wait ‘til next summer to put this out. I was inspired to pull it out again because I had a similar situation to when I wrote it.

I: What type of situation is that, and how does it play into the song?

S: It's told from this perspective of a child, and that's why it has that shouting section. It feels like a temper tantrum. In a childlike sense, it's about shitty friends. And then, she says, "My heart is in your hands. And why'd you do a thing like that?"

It was really fun because I always want to scream sing, and in the music I don't really write that kind of stuff for myself. But in shows, I've done that, and I just was like, "I want to have a temper tantrum." And so we decided that there was just going to be a breakdown, and I sang it. It's 10, 15 takes layered on top of each other, SO it sounds like a bunch of kids yelling. But it's meant to be upbeat and happy too. It's not just a pouting song. I say that any song that you can punch the air to has the recipe of pop songs.

I: Is this song an indication of what an eventual album might sound like?

S: My thing with albums is that every song I have is so different. I have enough stuff to release an album or more, but it's just every song is so different, and I feel albums tell an overall story, to me, or a lot of really great songs on albums get lost in the mix. Whereas, just dropping stuff individually, we can linger for a while.  Everything means something else, so it doesn't need to be clumped together.

I: Do you feel more of a pressure to define who you are, personally, as a musician, since you are known from musical theater?

S: A little bit. I don't like the idea of limiting myself to one style. I feel like a lot of pop singers all sound the same. All of it all sounds the same. They use the same recipe, or they take somebody else's song, and they just rearrange the lyrics. I can make pop music. I can make rock music. I can make any music. . I can sing pretty. I can sing ugly. If I wanted to label myself as one sound, I would drop an album, but now I'm just doing whatever I want.

I: What musicians do you find yourself returning to over and over again?

S: I have an infinite fascination with Bjork. There's also a band called Life Without Buildings that I love. They dropped one album from 2000, I think, and that's all you ever heard of them. They're a little bit obscure but so good. It's a punk girl band. Everything's spoken and weird. I love that. The Sugarcubes, I love. Tori Amos and Fiona Apple.

I: How are you managing both rehearsals and your own music, plus now promo for the new movie? Is that beginning to ramp up?

S: I actually just saw the billboard in Times Square. Somebody had mentioned to me there is going to be a Times Square thing, but I didn't know it was going to be now and that big.

I: When did you first audition and then film?

S: We filmed last year, for four and a half months in Ireland. It was amazing. All the young cast was in the same hotel, which is like a castle on a hill. It really felt like we were living in the world [of the film].

Before that, [director] Paul Fieg had seen me in my show on Broadway. He wanted to meet me, so my manager set up a sort of general meeting  where we were going to talk about the kind of stuff we want to do and experience, whatever type of work I want to do. And I was like, "So what you got? Do you have anything that would be a good fit, that we can do together?" And he was like, “actually yeah.” So I made a tape. I actually originally auditioned for Agatha (played now by Sofia Wylie) and then obviously I ended up as Sophie.

I: How was then actually shooting with him?

S: Paul just knows how to talk to actors. I completely trusted him. There was never a moment where I was like, “Hmm, I’m not sure how this is going to turn out.” He always has a positive attitude — and in a three-piece suit. Even during night shoots, when we're in a swamp. He was wearing his three-piece suit and a Rolex and got in the water. And I was like, "Don't get it wet!” And he’s just like, "No, it's waterproof."

I: Meanwhile, you’re in a full corset.

S: A lot of corsets. So many that when I was watching the film I was like, “I don’t even remember wearing that one.” But I got to keep one of them.

I: Have you worn it since?

S: Oh, yeah. I also let my friend borrow it.Her top broke and we were going to the re-opening of Slave Play, and I was like, "Just wear my corset.

I: Okay, at least it wasn’t like... out to a dive bar.

S: Oh no. I treasure the corset. The corset's not going to a dive bar.

I: For your first major film, this movie is huge and you are one of the co-leads — did the experience live up to what you hoped for?

S: I love making films. It's my favorite. I love doing plays. I love to paint. I love poetry. I'm always up to something, but I love making movies. That's my main thing.

[eddie-redmayne-italian-blog]

Eddie Redmayne on the staying power of Broadway’s ‘Cabaret’

By Kousha Navidar and Jordan Lauf Published May 19, 2024 at 7:01 a.m. ET

In the revival of "Cabaret," Broadway's August Wilson Theatre has been completely transformed into a Weimar Germany-era cabaret club – with the audience surrounding a small, circular stage.

After entering through an alley, you emerge in a space full of dancers, musicians, drinks and debauchery – and that's all before the musical even begins.

“There was a real desire for the audience to not feel they're coming to the theater,” said director Rebecca Frecknall.

Eddie Redmayne, who was nominated for a Tony award for his performance, plays the role of the Emcee, in which he contorts his body and voice to become a strange creature of hedonism.

“Of all characters that I've ever played, I find him the most enigmatic,” said Redmayne. “That's what's so thrilling.”

The Emcee guides us through the story of Sally Bowles, played by Tony nominee Gayle Rankin. Bowles, a British cabaret singer, thinks her life might be on the upswing after meeting an American writer named Cliff. But with Nazism on the rise, the time for carefree revelry is soon ending, whether Sally wants to admit it or not.

Longtime fans and newcomers to "Cabaret" are likely to find something to delight and surprise them in this new version of the show. It’s been nominated for nine Tony awards, including Best Musical Revival.

Kousha Navidar spoke to Redmayne, Rankin and Frecknall about the play, their creative process, clowning and more on a recent episode of WNYC's "All of It." An edited version of their conversation is below.

Eddie, your first exposure to "Cabaret" was when you first tackled the role of the Emcee when you were a kid. Is that right?

Eddie Redmayne: That is, as strange as it sounds. I think I was about 14 or 15 and we did it at school and I didn't know the show. I watched the film and was completely blown away by it. Ever since, I've been a massive "Cabaret" fan. I obviously saw Joel Grey's performance in the movie and went and saw Alan Cumming's version with Emma Stone, which Gayle was also in here a decade ago on Broadway.

There's something about the character of the Emcee that he doesn't exist in Isherwood's book that "Cabaret" is based on. He was a creation by Harold Prince, the director and Joel Grey. There's this abstract quality to him that is so riveting for actors, I think because he's impossible to pin down really.

While I was watching your performance, I was wondering how you considered the Emcee – as either a person or as a symbol or as a metaphor or something else?

Redmayne: Well, it was in discussion with Rebecca and Tom Scutt, our designer. One of the ideas we liked was that he's almost conjured the evening. The set has a beautiful simplicity to it, almost of a music box or a toy box. He brings these characters in and it's almost like he's the puppeteer.

Across the evening, he shape shifts. Every time he comes on stage, he looks different, whether it's a clown, a skeletal figure. The idea that he goes from puppeteer to conductor as the fascism creeps into the piece – that was something that we were looking for, but that it manifests itself in shifts, in voice and physicality. We played into the abstraction of him.

Rebecca, how early on in the process did you know you wanted this to be an immersive theater experience, that you really wanted to transform the place into the Kit Kat Club?

Rebecca Frecknall: I think when Eddie and I first talked about doing it maybe four or five years ago. [Laughter.] A long time ago, there was a real desire for the audience to not feel they're coming to the theater.

We were really keen to create something that people who are maybe not traditional theatergoers – or feel theater is not for them or feel intimidated by that – could come and experience the piece in a slightly different way.

We were first of all talking about found spaces or real club spaces or what we could do. Then actually, this was the one production where the pandemic actually worked in our favor because The Playhouse Theater in London ended up standing empty for a couple of years over that time, and so The Playhouse became our site that we could respond to and we could change.

We were incredibly lucky that the people at the August Wilson Theatre and Jordan Roth were excited to have us reimagine it there for that space because "Cabaret" is so much about the complicity of the audience.

Is that part of the reason why you made that choice to have the audience in the round, all enveloping the actors?

Frecknall: Yes. In the original Broadway production, the set had a mirror in the back wall, which you see again in the film. It's showing the audience themselves and showing us mob complicity and mob mentality and what that means.

There's a song that the iconic Bebe Neuwirth sings in the show called “What Would You Do?”, and it's a direct question to the audience. It's nonjudgmental, it's an open question, but it hopefully provokes some thinking.

Eddie, what does that add for you of having that audience in the round and it being surrounded on all sides?

Redmayne: It's amazing. The interesting thing for the Emcee is the other character in the scene with him is the audience, and that shifts and changes every night. The audiences that have come here in New York have been so passionate.

What's extraordinary about the evening is you get people dressed in black tie, sitting next to people in fetish gear, next to people in jeans and a T-shirt. For me, interacting with people from different walks of life who are finding different things funny, who are finding different things moving, it's live theater in its most essential form. Of course, that's why actors, we love doing it.

Eddie, I was struck by how physical your performance is. You're really contorting your body. You used the word “puppeteer,” and it's interesting because it looked like you were a marionette at some points. How did you arrive at that physicality for the performance?

Redmayne: It was a dialogue really with Rebecca and Julia, our choreographer. I'm not a great dancer, but–

Gayle Rankin: You are a great dancer.

Frecknall: Not true.

[Laughter.]

Redmayne: Frecks comes from a movement background as well and so we just started very early, didn't we? We had four months of just workshops, and Julia, our choreographer, brought the physicality out of me.

There's an amazing dancer called Mary Wigman, who's worth looking up on YouTube. She did a dance called The Witch Dance, which I found very thrilling, and compelling, and terrifying in equal measure.

Actually, even here in this city, the Neue Galerie has all those amazing Egon Schiele drawings. He depicts hands and some of those bodies. It felt very much of that moment. There was a bit of that and there was a bit of clowning. There's this school in Paris called Lecoq, which is a physical theater school.

I went and did a course there before Frecks and I started working on the theater of the absurd, and it was lots of mask work and all these things. It was lovely to put all of that in the cauldron, I suppose, mix all that around, and then under the guidance of Rebecca and Julia, find a way through him.

Gayle, your Sally has a kind of manic energy to her. What do you think is the source of all of that energy? Do you think it's covering something for Sally?

Rankin: I think it's centuries or decades of some kind of angst. With Sally – there's so much iconography and so many amazing performers have played her, and there's a legend around this character. I think it's why people are so drawn to her. Like the Emcee, Sally carries with her a lot of mystery. I think, especially as a woman, that's a really interesting thing to start to open a door into a character.

I actually don't believe that Sally intends to be mysterious or intends to cover. What I find beautiful and challenging about her is that I think she is intending to tell the truth at all times. I think there's something about the world that is quite difficult for her, and I think it's heightened. I think she's a creative soul and a deeply feminine soul, and in some ways an asexual soul trying to move through this world and we're watching that as an audience, and many people have many, many, many thoughts and feelings and opinions about what that is.

While I was watching it, I was thinking how now is, of course, a particularly poignant moment to be staging a play that deals with antisemitism. Eddie, you did this show in London on the West End a few years ago. I was wondering, have you noticed a difference in audience reception at this particular moment in time?

Redmayne: I think the audience reception shifts nightly. It's a very odd thing being an actor because you get to see how groups of people respond and what the ripple through can be.

What I find extraordinary about [composer] Kander, [lyricist] Ebb and [writer] Masteroff's piece is it's so razor sharp and specific to the period it was written about, but it also then, of course, sung to the moment it was written in, in the '60s – 20 years after the end of the war.

When it was then redone in the '90s, in the Sam Mendes production, there was a war going on in Eastern Europe, and it felt very pertinent then. And it feels extraordinarily relevant now.

I think that it's a testament to the piece that it has that specificity of the period, but it can also be read as rippling across generations, and the sadness that we perhaps haven't learned from our mistakes. I think John Kander puts it beautifully that he hopes that it will stop being relevant at some point.

[sitpwgs]

Hi! I'm sorry for this somewhat late response. I hope you had a nice week. Haha oh I am going to the twenty one pilots show next month so that's something to look forward to. Omg all those shows you're seeing seem amazing. I'm really curious and interested to hear what you think of Stereophonic since I've heard its too long but I really enjoy the music. Also, just what the plot is and how it can be so long, but I think maybe most plays are that long. The only play I've ever seen is the Cursed Child and that had some music as well but not singing. Idk if you ever watched HP and obviously fuck JK Rowling but a part of me will always love it. But I think the story itself was just not that good either anyway but still enjoyed it..some of the effects were cool. But that's also why I was so happy to see Daniel Radcliffe win his Tony too and I saw a few clips and it seems so well deserved so I'm very excited about the proshot now. There also was an update on the Waitress proshot which is going to be on PBS in November so hopefully I can watch with my antenna. I'm also jealous of you seeing Once Upon a Mattress with Sutton and Jordan Fisher in Hadestown. The video I saw of his Wait For Me is so good, and randomly I've been singing this song all week haha. I'm also curious about Oh Mary too since I just found out what it was about..lol.

I'm still interested in the SMASH musical and curious who they would cast. Is it going to Broadway next season cuz I think Megan Hilty is already going to be in another show lol. I also love season 2 songs and cuz of Jeremy but it makes sense if the musical is only season 1 so it tells a complete story cuz that's what the show was about but curious to see how they handle the show within a show thing and if they will add anything. Maybe I will do a rewatch before it comes to Broadway.

I also saw some clips of the Bonnie and Clyde proshot and am definitely excited to watch it. I listened to the Gatsby album and it made me miss Jeremy and his voice I guess and I've been nostalgic over Newsies too. I enjoyed Gatsby a lot when I first heard it but I think Jeremy sang my favorite or most memorable songs. The way that Jeremy describes it is a show that has a bit of everything and most things like big dance numbers and a Broadway sound that people think of when they think of Broadway. It seems like it's a spectacle kind of show and it's fine if people dislike it. Once I accepted what it was trying to be, I liked it a lot more and felt like it succeeded with that. Like it felt pretty similar to the Leo movie I guess and it reminds me a lot of Moulin Rouge too, with the music, movie, time period and tragic love story. I realize that is not the message of the book though. Someone said the songs almost sound like Disney songs and I kinda agree with that, at least the solos. His song is called For Her and singing Daisy over and over and I can't resist a song with a female name being sung which are usually my favorite and Jeremys vocals of course. . However I noticed the end of the song sounds almost exactly like the end of Why God Why from Miss Saigon lol..maybe cuz I've heard Jeremy sing that song though. My sister loved it too. It was funny after we listened to it, she said she couldn't even remember the plot or what happened and she read the book and I only saw the movie. I think the thing that's weird to me is how much people seem to ignore the musical even though it has two big Broadway stars but I guess they can do better too and I probably wouldn't like it as much if not for them. I think I liked it more than Water For Elephants though..which are kinda a similar story but that could be biased cuz of the actors. Like those songs had to grow on me and I liked Gatsby right away but now after a week I can't remember that much Gatsby songs either. But it was probably one of my favorite listens at least along with The Notebook and the Outsiders. It could just be cuz I was familiar with the stories though or maybe I just like musicals where the characters die lol. There was an interview where Jeremy was asked about dying on stage every night and how he also did that in Bonnie and Clyde haha and I always wonder how that would be. I did feel like they glossed over Gatsby's death and there was no emotion really but I think that's kinda the point and I'm also not seeing the full musical either to have an opinion. Anyway I know you already said you dislike it because its not like the book but these are just my thoughts. It's not really my favorite or something to get obsessed over unfortunately and part of me still wishes I kinda liked it more and that he had better songs..like it didn't reach it's full potential. I am however obsessed with the Outsiders now and I can't tell if you don't like that show either cuz you never said anything about it. It's fine to have different opinions but I don't wanna feel like I'm annoying or anything. I know this was long and I just never want you to think like..ugh I don't care and I hope you don't cuz I never think that reading your responses. Anyway I will send you another ask cuz this feels long already but I will respond later!

helloooo friend! you are totally fine! no pressure to respond soon; just know i'm always happy to hear from you! 🤍 how's your week going? i know how much you love 21p, so i'm super excited for you! i can't wait to hear about it from you!

i am seeing a lot of shows! i love to pack as much as i can whenever i'm going on a trip (whether that's new york, or anything at all) just to soak up every minute! but i am also one of those people who are always on the go. i used to be one of those people who were married to their calendars (i still am, actually) but i used to plan out every minute of my day. like every single minute. i also just love traveling! very sagittarius sun + capricorn rising of me, i guess. i'm really excited for stereophonic but i am very worried about the length (and about running from stereo to dinner to hadestown. luckily one of my friends is doing all of that with me because she loves me so at least we will be crazy (and crazy tired) together! i've seen a few plays; the play that goes wrong is one of my favorites (and i highly recommend it if you ever get the chance to see it). i almost fell asleep once during a three-act play (which is also what stereophonic is, so i am a little nervous about that), but in my defense that was the day of broadway flea and the show was not ... that exciting. anddddd i've seen a few plays locally that were pretty cool! i really do want to see more plays, and i think it's interesting that the shows i'm most interested in seeing this trip are plays. i wonder if it's something to do with how overly commercial the state of musicals on broadway is right now / how they're geared towards a very specific audience, vs. plays. i don't know if that makes sense; i definitely have more thoughts but my brain is kind of jumbled right now!

who would you cast in the smash musical if you could? i think it's interesting it's a smash musical and not bombshell (or hit list), and i wonder if they're going to focus more on one season (season 1?) over the other, just like you said. and yes! megan hilty is going to be in death becomes her — fun fact, megan hilty went to my rival high school! show within shows (and similarly, books within books) is one of my favorite genres; such as: the play that goes wrong, pippin, the drowsy chaperone, the starless sea, amelia unabridged, a novel love story, etc. i just think that concept is so so fun!

i've been very nostalgic over newsies lately (which i'm sure you've seen)! and i'm already prepared to be very much a waitress blogger from january - march of next year, haha. one of my best friends is visiting me from australia this winter and we're doing a short san francisco/san jose trip and seeing waitress at the san francisco playhouse, and then we're doing waitress regionally here in seattle in march!! i think the thing with gatsby is that i ... 1) am very disappointed as someone who knows the book very well, 2) am a lot more intrigued by the ART production, & 3) i think that the music is not ... my cup of tea, which is really disappointing, because i do like some of tysen & kerrigan's other stuff — i really liked tysen's work with tuck everlasting and also amélie, and kerrigan's the mad ones (prev titled: the unauthorized autobiography of samantha brown) as well as the songs on our first mistake, and kerrigan-lowdermilk: live & kerrigan-lowdermilk: live extras! which is also kind of how i felt about mean girls; i loveeeed legally blonde and thought the lyrics on mean girls just weren't very clever in the same way.

i think it's really interesting how much a cast can really affect a show! like what you said with eva and jeremy in gatsby, but also how the cast of the notebook really carries it — like maryann plunkett is just absolutely phenomenal (still think she should've won the tony), as is joy woods, and john cardoza (can't speak to dorian harewood since i didn't see him in chicago). and it makes me wonder, if these shows will still be successful once these casts leave! i am really intrigued in broadway as a business and how it works and so these are just things i like to ponder hehe!

i really need to listen to the outsiders! the problem is that i keep telling myself i should read the book and watch the movie first, and i just have not had time to do either yet 😭 !! i thought about seeing it on my trip but ended up going with other shows based on what my friends wanted to see & if one of my shows get cancelled or something i might try to see that instead! a few of my friends really like the musical and i'm really intrigued in the choreography and staging.

please don't ever feel like you're being annoying! i really genuinely love hearing from you (whether your asks are short or long) 🤍 sending you love and will reply to part two shortly!