{"id":707,"date":"2018-07-06T16:05:16","date_gmt":"2018-07-06T16:05:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.idina-here.com\/press\/?p=707"},"modified":"2018-07-06T16:38:26","modified_gmt":"2018-07-06T16:38:26","slug":"the-reigning-queen-of-broadway-idina-menzel-is-on-top-of-the-world-and-she-isnt-letting-it-go-anytime-soon","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.idina-here.com\/press\/the-reigning-queen-of-broadway-idina-menzel-is-on-top-of-the-world-and-she-isnt-letting-it-go-anytime-soon\/","title":{"rendered":"The reigning queen of Broadway, Idina Menzel, is on top of the world and she isn\u2019t letting it go anytime soon"},"content":{"rendered":"

Idina Menzel has the billion-dollar voice \u2013 that is billion with a \u201cB.\u201d It is in no small part because of that voice singing the hit song \u201cLet It Go\u201d that Disney\u2019s Oscar-winning animated musical Frozen<\/em> became the highest-grossing animated film of all time with a $1.2 billion worldwide box-office showing. Menzel\u2019s powerful vocals in Wicked<\/em> also began that Broadway musical\u2019s ascension over the billion-dollar mark, which it crossed in 2016, only the third time that feat has been accomplished on Broadway.<\/p>\n

The Tony-winning Broadway icon released her fifth studio album, Idina.<\/em>, in September 2016, starred in Lifetime\u2019s remake of Beaches<\/em> and will soon begin recording the voice of Queen Elsa for the much anticipated animated sequel, Frozen 2<\/em>.<\/span><\/p>\n

You\u2019d think with all of that she would take some time to kick back and relax, but Idina ain\u2019t got time for that! Menzel has taken to the road with her band on a 50-city, worldwide tour, and that tour is bringing her to Ruth Eckerd Hall in Clearwater May 25. Her majesty held court for a few moments with us in-between gigs to take a stroll down memory lane.<\/p>\n

You are full steam ahead on a 50-city world tour right now. How\u2019s it going?<\/strong><\/p>\n

It\u2019s going great. We went to Japan recently, which was incredible. I\u2019ve been there before and I love the country and the audiences so that was wonderful. We just did big hometown gigs; one in Long Island where I grew up and another in Los Angeles, and those are high pressure gigs, so it\u2019s good to have those out of the way [laughs].<\/p>\n

Do you prefer doing concerts like this so you have a lot more influence on what you get to sing or performing on Broadway where they give you the songs and let you what to say and what to sing?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I like everything, because each one has something the other doesn\u2019t. I like that I get to do all of it and I can balance it out. I can go out and do eight shows a week with all of the excitement and camaraderie with a cast but then it gets a bit exhausting. It\u2019s a grind and it gets hard doing it every week, so after that, I go into the recording studio and get a little more solitary and then, when I get lonely enough, I go back out and do maybe a movie of TV show, or I go on the road with my band and I get that camaraderie again, so it\u2019s nice to be in a place where I can go back and forth like that.<\/p>\n

I was lucky enough to see you perform in 2010 in Washington, D.C., at the Kennedy Center with Marvin Hamlisch. What was that experience like?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I miss Marvin a lot. That was an amazing time. It was a great connection between doing a more orchestral gig and keeping my more spontaneous, earthy band type of gig because he came from both worlds as well.<\/p>\n

Was it nerve-racking performing with him? It\u2019s one thing to share a stage with some of the biggest voices in the world, but you must feel some pressure performing some of the world\u2019s greatest songs with the songwriter right there on stage with you.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Marvin was such a warm and supportive person and we connected in a very deep way. He would treat me like another daughter, so I felt that paternal connection with him, so that made me feel very comfortable on stage with him. Now put me at the Kennedy Center a couple of years before that, when I had to sing \u201cDon\u2019t Rain on my Parade\u201d for Barbra Streisand, that was a whole other thing. That was terrifying.<\/p>\n

Many of Broadway\u2019s greatest performers can be tied to a particular role they brought to the stage and owned it. You have two. The first one was Maureen in RENT<\/em>. How did you get involved with that show?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I was struggling in New York and I was going on auditions. I also had my own band and was writing music and just doing what I could do. I got an audition for RENT<\/em> and I wore my colorful, suede patchwork skirt that ended up being part of the show\u2019s wardrobe, and I sang \u201cWhen a Man Loves a Woman\u201d and Bonnie Raitt\u2019s \u201cSomething to Talk About\u201d and then I got the call back and it has changed my life forever.<\/p>\n

It wasn\u2019t just a great musical, but it was also an important show because it drew attention to the AIDS epidemic and what the gay community was dealing with. A\u00a0lot of people in the community didn\u2019t feel like anyone was listening and then RENT<\/em> comes out and made people look. What did getting to work on a show like that feel like?<\/strong><\/p>\n

It was an emotional, sad, traumatic, exhilarating, thrilling time in my life; there was just so much going on. The beautiful thing about that whole experience was that a lot of kids our age, if they had gotten so successful and got to be on the cover of all these magazines, they might lose perspective of what really matters, but because of our relationship with [RENT<\/em>\u2018s writer and composer] Jonathan Larson, we had to get on stage every night and do his music justice. It was much bigger than us, so we had to get up there and keep going, keep performing. [Larson passed away the morning of RENT<\/em>\u2018s first preview performance Off Broadway of an aortic dissection]. I carry Jonathan and that experience with me everywhere I go. I actually sing \u201cNo Day But Today\u201d in every concert that I ever do, because for me it\u2019s a really good reminder of what\u2019s important in life.<\/p>\n

Your other Broadway role that you\u2019re connected to is, of course, Elphaba from Wicked<\/em>. Maureen and Elphaba are very different characters but you envelop them so wonderfully that it\u2019s like they were written just for you.<\/strong><\/p>\n

I think because they were both original pieces when they came to me and I was with them from the beginning so I was in [Wicked\u2019s composer] Stephen Schwartz\u2019s studio when he would say, \u201cI rewrote this song, come here and sing it,\u201d or Jonathan would say, \u201cI reworked the duet with the girls,\u201d so as they get to know you and get to know your voice and inflections, it becomes kind of like what came first? The chicken or the egg? And you start feeling them and they start feeling you, and before you know it, it\u2019s this organic thing that\u2019s happening, and you come out the other side and the character actually is written for you. I would much rather work that way than try and follow in someone\u2019s footsteps in a big, iconic role on Broadway! It makes my life easier.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s also an honor to be there, with them, during their creative process, and have them thinking about you while they\u2019re writing. They hear you sing something and they are like, \u201cOh, I like that. Let me rewrite this so I can fit it to that.\u201d It also works the other way, too. I step up and sing a song they wrote and push it to this spot where they were thinking it should go. It is definitely a give-and-take kind of relationship.<\/p>\n

You and your Wicked<\/em> co-star Kristin Chenoweth reunited last year and blew up the internet with a video of the two of you singing \u201cFor Good\u201d from Wicked<\/em>. Separately you both are iconic, but a special kind of magic happens when you both are together. Have the two of you ever discussed doing a tour together or teaming up for a project again?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I would love that. I don\u2019t know of a project right now that the two of us could do together, but if we had it, we would definitely entertain the idea. We have talked about performing here and there together because it was really nice to reunite with her and be in the same room singing that song. It was kind of like riding a bike, and it was very emotional of course, because we\u2019ve come a long way in those years and we\u2019ve seen Wicked grow. It\u2019s been preformed all over the world and these characters really effect so many people, and we are both proud that we had a part in creating that, and the song itself is a song that brings people together. So, yeah, I think we both felt when we did [the video], we thought we need to do this more often.<\/p>\n

Now my nieces would not forgive me if they knew I had you on the phone and we didn\u2019t talk about Frozen<\/em>.Huge successful film, not just the highest grossing animated film worldwide but Frozen<\/em>Mania swept the country. It was everywhere. Did you think it was going to be as big as it was?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Just being asked to be a part of a Disney film was an accomplishment in my eyes, being a part of something like that. I had no idea it would be such a phenomenon, but I knew it was important for me to be in the room with these writers and artists, so that\u2019s where my head was while we were making it. My thought was there is nothing bad that can come from doing this, only good.<\/p>\n

Something that came out of Frozen<\/em> that was different from other Disney Princess films was this idea that a princess doesn\u2019t have to be saved by \u2013 and end up with \u2013 a prince at the end of the film. It was empowering for girls to see, but it also empowered LGBTQ youth who saw Elsa as being different like they are and stories came out that Elsa could possibly be the first gay Disney Princess. Did you see any of that subtext?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I don\u2019t get any say in Disney writing, not until I get in the studio and start to put my voice down, so the trajectory that that character takes isn\u2019t up to me, and whether they choose to take the character that way or not I don\u2019t think anyone should read into it in any way, it\u2019s just what\u2019s the best storytelling. Now, if they did decided to go that way I think it would be a wonderful thing. I would be so proud to stand behind that character. Either way I think what\u2019s important with Elsa is that it wasn\u2019t about a man, Prince Charming, saving the day. It was about these two sisters coming together and celebrating the love between them. I think Elsa will always be the kind of girl who stands up for herself and doesn\u2019t have to rely on anyone else which is extremely powerful and brave. So we\u2019ll see what happens, but of course I would be an advocate for that, but I don\u2019t have that kind of clout at Disney.<\/p>\n

You recently released a new album, and you are coming to Ruth Eckerd Hall next month. What can we expect to see from the show: more original songs or more Broadway classics?<\/strong><\/p>\n

It\u2019s a real eclectic show. There are the songs you would expect from my past, songs that I\u2019m really proud of from the shows I have been in, maybe a new arrangement of some of those songs. I have a few surprises in there, too. Because I\u2019ve been playing with the same band for so long, I think we have a really good approach that makes it all seem seamless. It\u2019s like one big, long story that we tell going through different phases in my life. I love it and I\u2019m really proud of this show. I didn\u2019t mess with the stuff that people want to hear \u2013 too much [laughs] \u2013 I don\u2019t think they will be mad at me, but they will hear what they came to hear, but I\u2019m also going to take them on a journey in some new directions.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Idina Menzel has the billion-dollar voice \u2013 that is billion with a \u201cB.\u201d It is in no small part because of that voice singing the hit song \u201cLet It Go\u201d that Disney\u2019s Oscar-winning animated musical Frozen became the highest-grossing animated film of all time with a $1.2 billion […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"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":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[2],"tags":[45],"class_list":["post-707","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-interviews","tag-45"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6Srnq-bp","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.idina-here.com\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/707","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\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.idina-here.com\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=707"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.idina-here.com\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/707\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":708,"href":"https:\/\/www.idina-here.com\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/707\/revisions\/708"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.idina-here.com\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=707"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.idina-here.com\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=707"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.idina-here.com\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=707"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}