{"id":427,"date":"2015-10-23T02:17:59","date_gmt":"2015-10-23T02:17:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.idina-here.com\/press\/?p=427"},"modified":"2015-10-23T02:17:59","modified_gmt":"2015-10-23T02:17:59","slug":"grab-a-dream-and-sing-out","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.idina-here.com\/press\/grab-a-dream-and-sing-out\/","title":{"rendered":"Grab a Dream and Sing Out"},"content":{"rendered":"

Hearing From the Women Who Made the Year\u2019s Musicals Sing<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cYou\u2019re not going to get us to pull each other\u2019s hair,\u201d Kelli O\u2019Hara said as she and her four fellow Tony Award nominees for best actress in a musical \u2014 one of this year\u2019s most competitive races \u2014 met recently to discuss life in the theater. But as warm as they were to one another, their words carried some bite about the business.<\/p>\n

In a coincidence of timing, the five women gathered just two hours before the producers of Ms. O\u2019Hara\u2019s musical, \u201cThe Bridges of Madison County,\u201d announced that the show will close on May 18 because of poor ticket sales. Ms. O\u2019Hara, now a five-time Tony nominee, spoke with the insight and occasional bluntness of a survivor of flops past and present. So, too, did the other seen-it-all members of the group, the two-time Tony winner Sutton Foster (nominated for \u201cViolet\u201d) and the Tony winner Idina Menzel (\u201cIf\/Then\u201d), though their current shows are selling well.<\/p>\n

Then there were the two relative newcomers: the best actress nominees Mary Bridget Davies (\u201cA Night With Janis Joplin,\u201d a flop) and Jessie Mueller (\u201cBeautiful: The Carole King Musical,\u201d a hit). They arrived first for the gathering, and still seemed in the thrall of Broadway. No matter their levels of experience, though, all five spoke with wonder about their careers: None had expected to make it big when they were belting in their bedrooms as teenagers. These are excerpts from the conversation.<\/p>\n

Q: If you could go back and say something to your teenage self, what would it be?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Sutton Foster I was very overeager and chatty, so I would tell her to shut up and listen. Slow down. Watch.<\/p>\n

Kelli O\u2019Hara That you\u2019ll have a place as long as you know what your place is and do that. Find out what you sell.<\/p>\n

Foster Don\u2019t try to be us.<\/p>\n

O\u2019Hara Though there was a time when I thought, \u2018If only I could sing like Sutton.\u2019<\/p>\n

Jessie Mueller It\u2019s harder to be yourself, though. There\u2019s much more a chance of failure if you come across as unique, new. And it\u2019s hard to be confident as a woman. The day we shot our photo together, I kept thinking: \u201cWhat\u2019s Kelli going to wear? What\u2019s Sutton going to wear?\u201d<\/p>\n

O\u2019Hara But, Jessie, you\u2019re the most individual person who has showed up in this town in a long time.<\/p>\n

Mueller Directors didn\u2019t know what to do with me in college. I didn\u2019t really sound like a belter. I didn\u2019t look like a soprano. But in New York, I was in the right place at the right time, where my unusualness fit the bill.<\/p>\n

Mary Bridget Davies My first performance is on VHS. A dance recital in a basement. I\u2019m 3. My bun is the sloppiest. My little undies are sticking out underneath my tights. I can\u2019t keep my arms up. I touch my feet and fall. People didn\u2019t know what to make of me. I would go back and tell myself: Don\u2019t let other voices get you down.<\/p>\n

How much of your character this season is you?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Davies Janis is me. She was an outcast growing up. I was always talented enough to hang with the cool kids, but they didn\u2019t accept me. I was better than them, technically, but they were prettier than me, so they couldn\u2019t understand how I could be given attention.<\/p>\n

Mueller Growing up, I never felt like the pretty girl. Carole King felt that.<\/p>\n

Idina Menzel<\/strong> In \u201cIf\/Then,\u201d art\u2019s imitating my life a little too much for me. Balancing kids, career, self, family. Starting over and taking risks, whether you like it or not. My character lets me get out onstage and work through my own stuff. I feel like every experience I\u2019m having right now is preparing me for the next man I might meet, the next conflict I have with my son.<\/em><\/p>\n

Sutton, you\u2019re known for jubilant, glamorous roles in \u201cThoroughly Modern Millie\u201d and \u201cAnything Goes.\u201d The character of Violet is anything but. Are you more in sync with one of those types?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Foster Violet\u2019s from the South. I\u2019m from the South. I used to be very religious. We used to watch televangelists growing up, so I understand her passion for true healing. I can\u2019t relate to her having a physical scar, but I can relate to her having emotional scars, especially from my childhood, from my parents. But that\u2019s a bottle of bourbon and a whole other day. I feel like the show is a gift \u2014 I get to conjure a parent and face them every night and forgive them and love them. That is, is, uh \u2014\u2014<\/p>\n

O\u2019Hara Useful.<\/p>\n

Foster Very useful. But also very hard. And it\u2019s probably the most vulnerable and exposed I\u2019ve ever been onstage.<\/p>\n

Menzel<\/strong> It\u2019s interesting, pouring emotion into the singing. It\u2019s actually very hard.<\/em><\/p>\n

Foster I\u2019m just blubbering and useless.<\/p>\n

O\u2019Hara I cry here. [Points to her nose]<\/p>\n

Foster I\u2019m leaking on Joshua Henry every night, and I\u2019m like, \u201cI\u2019m so sorry!\u201d<\/p>\n

O\u2019Hara I kiss Steven Pasquale and a snot hits his face, and he pulls apart from me, and it\u2019s like \u2014\u2014<\/p>\n

Davies Like a Toll House cookie.<\/p>\n

O\u2019Hara Thick and gross.<\/p>\n

Have you played a role that left you feeling lousy afterward?<\/strong><\/p>\n

O\u2019Hara The hardest role that I\u2019ve ever tried to play was Clara Johnson in \u201cLight in the Piazza\u201d at Lincoln Center. It was the least fun I\u2019ve ever had, but the most beautiful experience I\u2019ve ever had. I could not understand her. I could not put my feet in her shoes. I came home every night, and I was depressed.<\/p>\n

Menzel<\/strong> I felt very insecure through the whole rehearsal process of \u201cWicked.\u201d I just didn\u2019t feel powerful the way that Elphaba did. I\u2019ll admit, there was one night when the director was giving me a lot of notes, and I felt like I wasn\u2019t taking them in. I felt small. He said: \u201cGet up there and take the stage. The thing is called \u2018Wicked,\u2019 so be a witch. Be a strong powerful sorceress.\u2019 So I decided I would act as if Glenn Close was playing this role. [Laughter.] I took moments, I ate up time, I let the audience applaud more, because I wasn\u2019t afraid to just stand there and take it in.<\/em><\/p>\n

Foster I use Toni Collette. What would Toni Collette do?<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s talk about music. Four of your musicals have pop-inflected songs; Kelli\u2019s score in \u201cBridges\u201d comes closest to a classic Broadway sound. Is that sound disappearing?<\/p>\n

Mueller Hopefully, it\u2019s good for the theater if there\u2019s a whole lot of music out there for people to choose from.<\/p>\n

Menzel<\/strong> Exactly. A little bit of everything.<\/em><\/p>\n

O\u2019Hara My positive side wants to believe there\u2019s room for all kinds of music, but we\u2019re not \u2014 maybe there\u2019s not anymore.<\/p>\n

What do you mean?<\/strong><\/p>\n

O\u2019Hara We\u2019re not going to make it. My show. The score is acclaimed, but it\u2019s not commercial enough. It\u2019s not the thing that is exciting and really in people\u2019s heads. Back when all the classics were written, people had a different mind-set of sitting still and listening to something and learning it. Nowadays, people want to love the music right now.<\/p>\n

Mueller The other day, someone pointed out the lack of overtures now. That\u2019s what an overture used to do: People would come in, sit down, get acquainted with a little bit of each melody, so when they heard the melody again, they were engaged.<\/p>\n

O\u2019Hara When we did \u201cSouth Pacific,\u201d they did eight minutes of overture with 40 pieces, and people loved it. No one will pay for that anymore.<\/p>\n

Mueller But look at how we all relate to our roles. If you give people something honest, they will see that, too \u2014 maybe enjoy it or connect to it.<\/p>\n

O\u2019Hara But how do we get them in the seats?<\/p>\n

Menzel <\/strong>My whole life, everyone\u2019s told me I needed a certain kind of song if I wanted to crossover and get played on the radio. Something that sounds like Sheryl Crow or Alanis Morissette. Then I go do this Disney movie and get on the radio with \u201cLet It Go,\u201d and you know what? It has the lyric \u201cfrozen fractals\u201d in it! [Laughter.] But I\u2019m old enough to realize you can\u2019t keep chasing that perfect song.<\/em><\/p>\n

Do you take it personally when your shows don\u2019t get big audiences?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Foster Of course!<\/p>\n

Davies I thought \u201cJanis\u201d was really good, with a lot of hard work in it by everyone. But enough people didn\u2019t come. Empty seats. That hurts.<\/p>\n

O\u2019Hara It\u2019s a different world now. When I came back to Broadway after having my kid, it had been two years away, and I did \u201cNice Work If You Can Get It.\u201d They were suddenly all about social media. They kept pushing it: \u201cWe\u2019re going to record the rehearsals.\u201d \u201cYou should tweet.\u201d And I was like, \u201cI\u2019m sorry, I\u2019m going to rehearse seven days a week, and I\u2019m going to do eight shows a week.\u201d But \u201cBridges\u201d is the first time in my life where I opened a Twitter account. Because they basically forced me to. And I\u2019m like, \u201cCome see \u2018Bridges\u2019!\u201d \u201cHere\u2019s a picture of me with Sutton Foster!\u201d \u201cCome see \u2018Bridges\u2019!\u201d And they were like: \u201cThere\u2019s too much stuff about \u2018Bridges\u2019 on your Twitter account. Can you change it to be real cool?\u201d So then I just stopped. Because you start thinking, \u201cI\u2019m not a star, because I can\u2019t sell tickets via my Twitter followers.\u201d But you know, gosh, I rehearse, I do eight shows a week.<\/p>\n

Foster I just tweet about food. Food and cookies and my dog.<\/p>\n

Menzel <\/strong>I\u2019m a reluctant tweeter. You know, I had this wonderful recognition from John Travolta messing up my name at the Oscars. But I don\u2019t need that talked about or tweeted about. I want people tweeting about \u201cIf\/Then,\u201d the quality of the work.<\/em><\/p>\n

Do casting directors regard you each very differently from the others, so you don\u2019t end up being in competition?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Menzel<\/strong> You can\u2019t try to be other people.<\/em><\/p>\n

O\u2019Hara You can\u2019t.<\/p>\n

Mueller But a lot of women don\u2019t look at it that way, Kelli.<\/p>\n

O\u2019Hara That\u2019s true. I\u2019m in a good place to say that.<\/p>\n

Mueller I think a lot of young women tear each other down for their difference. Or \u201cOh my God, why did she get that part?\u201d<\/p>\n

Davies I remember when we were rehearsing, there was a hallway full of girls auditioning for something else. They all looked the same, they\u2019re all singing the same thing. You could just tell they were ready to kill each other.<\/p>\n

Jessie and Mary are pretty new to the Broadway scene. Idina, Sutton, Kelli, do you have any \u2014\u2014<\/strong><\/p>\n

Foster We\u2019re veterans!<\/p>\n

O\u2019Hara When did that happen?<\/p>\n

Foster [sounding like an old man] Listen to us, girls.<\/p>\n

Menzel <\/strong>We are relatively young.<\/em><\/p>\n

Foster The biggest thing I\u2019ve learned is priorities. When I was first starting out, it was like 98 percent \u201cThoroughly Modern Millie\u201d and 2 percent the rest of my life. That\u2019s not so good.<\/p>\n

Menzel<\/strong> With eight shows a week, I only put my son to bed Sunday night and Monday night, and it\u2019s killing me. I wake up at 7, I take him to school, I come home and nap, I pick him up at 3. What will happen is tonight, my voice is kind of raspy, so my expectation of myself is lowered. I\u2019m sleep deprived. And when I have to go away for a concert, I want to take a red eye so I can read him a book at night. I never would have taken a red eye before a concert. But now I do, and I run onstage, and I\u2019m not as prepared. But I\u2019ll probably have a better show, because I\u2019m more myself, my personality is alive, and I may hit some hard notes.<\/em><\/p>\n

Is there a role you\u2019d like to see each other do?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Foster Oh I just got so excited. [Looks at Ms. O\u2019Hara] Guenevere!<\/p>\n

O\u2019Hara [To Ms. Foster] I think there should be another Carol Burnett variety show, and I want you to have that.<\/p>\n

Menzel<\/strong> There are only two musical revivals that I\u2019m kind of right for, but maybe I\u2019m too old for. \u201cFunny Girl\u201d and \u201cEvita.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

Mueller Evita!<\/p>\n

Menzel <\/strong>I\u2019m too big.<\/em><\/p>\n

Foster You\u2019re not!<\/p>\n

Menzel<\/strong> That\u2019s why I cheat and get involved years early with new shows so everything is written with me in mind.<\/em><\/p>\n

O\u2019Hara [To Ms. Mueller] The Baker\u2019s Wife.<\/p>\n

Mueller I just want to work my way through that entire show. [To Ms. Menzel] You\u2019d be an amazing Witch in \u201cInto the Woods.\u201d<\/p>\n

Menzel<\/strong> I auditioned for the last revival, before \u201cWicked.\u201d I learned \u201cLast Midnight.\u201d When I was done, James Lapine said, \u201cWell, that was witchy.\u201d I left crying. I thought, I can\u2019t pull off Stephen Sondheim.<\/em><\/p>\n

O\u2019Hara [To Ms. Davies] I\u2019m sorry I didn\u2019t get to see your show, because I\u2019m trying to think of parts. Do you like to sing other music than rock?<\/p>\n

Davies Oh yes. My favorite would be Reno Sweeney [in \u201cAnything Goes\u201d]. I love tap.<\/p>\n

Foster You\u2019d be a great Reno.<\/p>\n

Some of you have been nominated for best actress, but your show isn\u2019t up for best musical. What\u2019s that like?<\/strong><\/p>\n

O\u2019Hara I\u2019ve got to go.<\/p>\n

Menzel <\/strong>Pffff.<\/em><\/p>\n

O\u2019Hara It hurts. Steven not being nominated hurts. I don\u2019t read reviews, because if you believe the good ones, you have to believe the bad. So here\u2019s the thing: If I don\u2019t agree that nominators left people out, then why should I agree so much with their nomination of me? I didn\u2019t build this alone.<\/p>\n

Menzel <\/strong>We know the kind of work that goes into original musicals and what kind of risks these composers and writers and directors take. We have to do it, otherwise we wouldn\u2019t have \u201cWest Side Story\u201d and \u201cCompany.\u201d Our director, Michael Greif, was like, \u201cYeah, 20 years from now, some British director will bring it back.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

Foster That\u2019s what\u2019s happening with \u201cViolet.\u201d It was underappreciated in 1997, and now people are like, \u201cOh wow, it\u2019s really great.\u201d It just took 17 years.<\/p>\n

O\u2019Hara You do start to feel badly when the show gets passed over. As much ego as we have, you do say to yourself: \u201cIs it bad? Was it bad? Is what I\u2019m doing bad?\u201d<\/p>\n

Mueller The whole idea of measuring art \u2014 how do you ever begin to say this is worthy and what isn\u2019t? So many elements of my show were recognized, which makes it so much sweeter, because I don\u2019t feel comfortable with a lot of this stuff.<\/p>\n

O\u2019Hara [To Ms. Mueller] But you know what, this is a finicky business. You embrace this time, and I will, too. Because the next day, it\u2019s all different.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Hearing From the Women Who Made the Year\u2019s Musicals Sing \u201cYou\u2019re not going to get us to pull each other\u2019s hair,\u201d Kelli O\u2019Hara said as she and her four fellow Tony Award nominees for best actress in a musical \u2014 one of this year\u2019s most competitive races \u2014 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":428,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_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","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[2],"tags":[42,40],"class_list":["post-427","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-interviews","tag-42","tag-ifthen"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.idina-here.com\/press\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/10\/roundatable.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6Srnq-6T","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.idina-here.com\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/427","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=427"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.idina-here.com\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/427\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":429,"href":"https:\/\/www.idina-here.com\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/427\/revisions\/429"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.idina-here.com\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/428"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.idina-here.com\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=427"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.idina-here.com\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=427"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.idina-here.com\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=427"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}