{"id":384,"date":"2015-10-23T01:24:21","date_gmt":"2015-10-23T01:24:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.idina-here.com\/press\/?p=384"},"modified":"2015-10-23T01:24:21","modified_gmt":"2015-10-23T01:24:21","slug":"a-snow-queen-to-melt-our-hearts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.idina-here.com\/press\/a-snow-queen-to-melt-our-hearts\/","title":{"rendered":"A snow queen to melt our hearts"},"content":{"rendered":"

She\u2019s got the biggest voice on Broadway \u2013 and now leading musical actress and Glee star IDINA MENZEL is flexing her vocal cords in the Disney Christmas blockbuster. Lina Das is spellbound<\/em><\/p>\n

When it comes to fanbases, Idina Menzel certainly possesses one of the most proactive in the business. The sultry Broadway superstar with the glossy hair and big, big voice bears an almost uncanny resemblance to Lea Michele \u2013 one of the lead actresses in the TV series Glee \u2013 and when, around three years ago, the show\u2019s producers were casting around for someone to play the mother of Lea\u2019s character Rachel Berry (a girl similarly bountiful of hair and voice), Idina\u2019s fans lobbied hard for her to get the part. Which she duly did. <\/p>\n

It was, says Idina, \u2018so cool, because my husband and I were already Glee fans before I even got the part \u2013 even though I like to say I\u2019m more of a big sister than a mum!\u2019 she laughs. \u2018But the show is great and has really garnered respect from audiences for [showcasing] all kinds of music. They celebrate Broadway divas, rock stars, everyone, which is wonderful.\u2019<\/p>\n

We\u2019re in a studio in New York, where Idina is in the middle of the YOU photo shoot. Her husband, the actor Taye Diggs, is there too, as is their gorgeous four-year-old son Walker, busily dancing along to the Michael Jackson tracks playing in the background. Though he loves to dance, says Idina, he really is \u2018a storyteller. He likes us all to tell a story one line at a time, but then he\u2019ll interrupt and force his ideas on us. Maybe he\u2019ll become a writer one day and write parts for me when no one will hire me!\u2019<\/p>\n

Frankly, the chances of that happening are pretty slim. Glee certainly helped to put Idina, now 42, on the map as far as TV audiences are concerned, but she is also one of the biggest musical theatre stars of the modern age. She made her Broadway debut in the popular 1990s stage musical Rent, then went on to star as Elphaba, the Wicked Witch of the West, in the phenomenally successful production of The Wizard of Oz retelling Wicked (both on Broadway and in the West End) \u2013 a performance which won her a Tony Award, not to mention a legion of fans in the process.<\/p>\n

In addition she has released four solo albums (encompassing everything from pop to Broadway musical covers), performed at the Royal Albert Hall with the Royal Philharmonic Concert Orchestra, not to mention at a tribute concert for Barbra Streisand (\u2018her thank-you card is right next to my Tony in the living room \u2013 it has equal weight!\u2019), and starred in films such as Walt Disney\u2019s 2007 Oscar-nominated hit Enchanted with Amy Adams and Patrick Dempsey.<\/p>\n

Ironically, it\u2019s her very versatility which may have left some audiences unsure of how to define her musically, but Idina\u2019s most recent project is bound to win over a whole new set of fans. Frozen, Disney\u2019s latest animated film, is a fantasy musical loosely based on Hans Christian Andersen\u2019s The Snow Queen. <\/p>\n

It stars Kristen Bell as the voice of Princess Anna and Idina as her elder sister, the Snow Queen Elsa, whose magical powers of creating ice and snow have unwittingly trapped their kingdom in an eternal winter. When Elsa banishes herself in order to spare everyone from more harm, her sister Anna goes in search of her, hoping not only to set the kingdom free from its wintry spell, but also to recapture the closeness she and Elsa once shared. It\u2019s a beautiful tale, stunningly told, with Idina\u2019s voice \u2013 invariably described as \u2018powerhouse\u2019 by critics \u2013 used to startling effect, particularly when she sings the film\u2019s showstopping number \u2018Let It Go\u2019. <\/p>\n

Moreover, despite the presence of a handsome prince (voiced by Santino Fontana) and a buff mountain chap by the name of Kristoff (Jonathan Groff), a clever twist towards the end ensures that Frozen isn\u2019t necessarily the romantic fairy tale one might imagine. \u2018Frozen definitely isn\u2019t about a man,\u2019 says Idina, \u2018but about the relationship between two sisters. At different times in our lives we find ourselves either more connected to or disconnected from the people in our family, and I think audiences will really be able to relate to that.\u2019<\/p>\n

During her self-imposed exile from the kingdom, and free from the worry that she might harm others, Elsa starts to revel in her powers, creating extraordinary structures out of snow and ice. \u2018She finds herself and accepts who she is and she\u2019s very vampy,\u2019 says Idina. \u2018She\u2019s quite sexy for Disney, I have to say \u2013 they\u2019re pushing the limits there a little bit! But there\u2019s a gleam in her eye and a supermodel walk that goes with it and, for me, it was fun to be a blonde because I\u2019m not in real life.\u2019 <\/p>\n

In the original tale, the Snow Queen is essentially the villainess of the piece, \u2018but Elsa isn\u2019t your typical Disney nemesis,\u2019 explains Idina. \u2018She\u2019s powerful and initially misguided but finally accepts herself and what makes her special. She\u2019s a complicated person. I tend to have a pattern of playing misunderstood characters.\u2019<\/p>\n

This was certainly true of Idina\u2019s most memorable stage creation \u2013 Elphaba in Wicked, one of the most successful musicals of all time. The tale, told from the perspective of the witches, provides the backstory of how Elphaba became the Wicked Witch of the West \u2013 the hated villainess of The Wizard of Oz \u2013 starting out as a young woman with an innate talent for sorcery, who is misunderstood by those around her.<\/p>\n

\u2018There\u2019s something very similar about Elphaba and Elsa in that, as young women, they have huge powers but don\u2019t know how to harness them properly,\u2019 says Idina. (Both Elsa and Elphaba tend to use their powers when they\u2019re feeling emotionally cornered.) \u2018I think Wicked appealed to multigenerational audiences because it\u2019s the story of the underdog who finds a way out. With young people, I always say, \u201cYou\u2019re not doing anyone any favours by withholding your power.\u201d As women, we do that a lot because we are afraid of being misunderstood or perceived as too strong. But the older I\u2019m getting, the more I realise you have to let that go.\u2019<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a sentiment that has a certain amount of resonance with Idina herself. Growing up in New York with her younger sister Cara and parents Stuart (a pyjama salesman) and Helene (who later trained to be a psychotherapist), she knew by the age of five that she wanted to become a performer. Yet being blessed with an extraordinary vocal talent did at times separate her from her peers. \u2018I think I hid my singing talent from a lot of my friends at school,\u2019 Idina admits, \u2018because I didn\u2019t want to alienate anyone. If everyone was singing along in the car to a Madonna song, I didn\u2019t join in because when we\u2019re younger we\u2019re afraid of sticking out or showing off, when in fact we should own those things that make us really unique.\u2019<\/p>\n

Her parents were, says Idina, \u2018really supportive and sent me to singing lessons, but weren\u2019t supportive of me working as a child professionally \u2013 I had to go to school.\u2019 Yet by the time she reached 15, her parents had already started going through a divorce and so, to bring in some extra money, Idina started working as a wedding singer.<\/p>\n

\u2018It was where I started to find myself,\u2019 she admits. \u2018It taught me a lot about music \u2013 about my tastes and how to interpret music \u2013 but it also taught me how to carry myself in those environments. Sometimes the crowds would be very sexist and misogynistic so I had to learn to deal with that, but I also had such a sense of pride that I was making money as a singer. I grew up fast.\u2019 Did her parents\u2019 divorce also make her grow up somewhat quicker? \u2018I think so, yes,\u2019 she replies. \u2018You just get in the middle of your parents and you want to figure it out for both of them, support one or the other. But,\u2019 she shrugs, \u2018what can you do?\u2019<\/p>\n

She studied drama at New York University and then came her big break \u2013 the part of lesbian performance artist Maureen in the 1996 rock musical Rent. The show was a big hit with the critics (with Idina going on to secure her first Tony nomination, and the musical itself winning a Pulitzer Prize) and while it certainly propelled her career forward, it had the additional benefit of introducing Idina to her future husband Taye, who played the show\u2019s opportunistic landlord Benjamin Coffin III. <\/p>\n

Was it a case of love at first sight? \u2018More lust at first sight, I\u2019d say,\u2019 she laughs. \u2018He wondered if my boobs were real and I thought he was really taut and beautiful, but we didn\u2019t like each other that much. We took a walk around the block to [suss] each other out,\u2019 she adds, but says that \u2018it wasn\u2019t till five months into the experience that we all became really close, so we became friends first and then let down our guard.\u2019 Idina and Taye \u2013 the African-American star of films such as How Stella Got Her Groove Back and TV series such as Private Practice \u2013 quickly became one of Hollywood\u2019s hottest couples.<\/p>\n

Yet at one point they received hate mail, reportedly threatening Taye with physical harm because of their mixed-race relationship. \u2018It was when I was in Wicked, so it was a long time ago [Idina began her Broadway run in 2003], but that kind of thing was quite rare. I don\u2019t know if we get any more [threatening letters] because we have someone read stuff so that we don\u2019t have to read it ourselves, but it was scary. We had a bodyguard for a week. But our industry is so welcoming of all kinds of people, which is why it was shocking. It was weird.\u2019<\/p>\n

The couple have been together for almost 18 years, married for ten, and have forged a long relationship in an industry not exactly renowned for them. So how have they managed it? \u2018We don\u2019t always, you know,\u2019 Idina admits, \u2018and we have our ups and downs. We have to work really hard but we\u2019ve grown up together and I think the friendship is a common denominator. We truly care about each other\u2019s wellbeing too and like to laugh together and be silly. But we don\u2019t pretend to be perfect\u2026 \u2018We have a pact to try and stay in the same city as much as possible [they are based in New York] and if we can\u2019t, we try not to let more than two weeks go by. Now we have a child, neither of us wants to be away from him either, so it takes a lot of work because you have to really keep the other person involved in the projects you\u2019re doing, even if they\u2019re not a part of them, otherwise it starts to isolate you.\u2019<\/p>\n

‘I have a pattern of playing misunderstood characters’<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

And they both love Glee. Idina had already worked on the New York stage with Lea Michele, who plays the show\u2019s ferociously ambitious performer Rachel (now a college student and formerly the star of her school\u2019s glee club New Directions), before she took on the role of Rachel\u2019s biological mother Shelby Corcoran (initially the coach of New Directions\u2019 rival show choir Vocal Adrenaline). <\/p>\n

Lea had, of course, been dating fellow Glee star Cory Monteith just prior to his death earlier this year from a drugs and alcohol overdose. \u2018I haven\u2019t spoken to her a lot,\u2019 says Idina. \u2018I\u2019ve been giving her space, as she has family and friends who are closer to her. But I\u2019ve sent several messages to let her know I\u2019m around if she needs me. It was just so devastating. I didn\u2019t get to know Cory that well, but he was totally cool and sweet and worked really hard too. It was a real shock.\u2019<\/p>\n

Glee cemented Idina\u2019s popularity among younger viewers, many of whom were already fans thanks largely to her role in Wicked, and she\u2019s rightfully proud of helping to introduce a whole new generation of youngsters to musical theatre. \u2018I do take a lot of pride in that and it\u2019s a real gift to meet young people and hear about how these productions that I\u2019ve been involved with have changed them and maybe helped them.\u2019<\/p>\n

Three years ago, she and her husband started A BroaderWay Foundation to help support young people through the arts. \u2018It\u2019s a summer camp for inner-city girls and the idea came from my love of my own days at summer camp. I really found myself more when I escaped to camp and could reinvent myself, so we wanted to give these girls an escape from the city. In addition to sports and singing and dancing, we put on a concert and the girls are authors of their own show. I think they\u2019re pretty astounded to see what they\u2019re capable of.\u2019<\/p>\n

It\u2019s close to 11pm and, though Taye and Walker have long since gone home, Idina has stayed behind to make sure we have everything we need for the interview. One wonders how, given the tightness of her schedule (she is currently in rehearsals for the new Broadway musical If\/Then), she manages to juggle the demands of work and family life.<\/p>\n

\u2018Well, I let myself off the hook more nowadays,\u2019 she says, \u2018and I feel that motherhood has helped that. There\u2019s only so much you can do when you have a young child and only so much sleep you can get, so if taking more red-eyes [night flights] means I can put my son to bed and read him a story, then I\u2019ll do it. All those years of vocalising, and sleeping as much as I needed for my voice to sound just perfect\u2026well, I can\u2019t do that any more,\u2019 she admits. \u2018But there\u2019s a liberation in being able to get on stage and say: \u201cThis is what I have and this is going to have to be good enough tonight.\u201d\u2019 And, given Idina\u2019s majestic voice, \u2018good enough\u2019 for her is still more than enough to knock the socks off the rest of us.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

She\u2019s got the biggest voice on Broadway \u2013 and now leading musical actress and Glee star IDINA MENZEL is flexing her vocal cords in the Disney Christmas blockbuster. Lina Das is spellbound When it comes to fanbases, Idina Menzel certainly possesses one of the most proactive in the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":385,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[2],"tags":[39,8,38,18,5],"class_list":["post-384","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-interviews","tag-39","tag-family-life","tag-frozen","tag-glee","tag-wicked"],"acf":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.idina-here.com\/press\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/10\/snowqueen.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6Srnq-6c","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.idina-here.com\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/384","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.idina-here.com\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.idina-here.com\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.idina-here.com\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.idina-here.com\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=384"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.idina-here.com\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/384\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":386,"href":"https:\/\/www.idina-here.com\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/384\/revisions\/386"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.idina-here.com\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/385"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.idina-here.com\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=384"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.idina-here.com\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=384"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.idina-here.com\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=384"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}