Seth's Broadway Diary, Volume 1: Part 2 (10 page)

Finally, I asked him what he was wearing to the Tonys and the answer was a nice simple tux. He said he didn't want to pull a Todd Graff. I asked for further explanation, and he said that when Todd was nominated for playing Danny in
Baby
, he took a limo with his agent. His agent was mortified when she saw that he was wearing a tea bag as an earring (it was the ‘80s). She reached forward, and Todd said, "If you try to take it out, I have three more in my pocket." I wish there was a shot of him at the after party dipping his ear for three minutes in boiling water.

That's it for me. Tonight is the "music" challenge on the
Legally Blonde
reality show. I made the bold choice of wearing a tank top, and my L.A. friend Jack Plotnick left me an emergency message saying, "Never again." Hmph. I always thought, "When you got it, flaunt it." I think his point was, "When you don't, cover it." See ya next week!

Tony Thoughts

June 24, 2008

First, let's discuss the Tonys. And by "discuss," I mean have a one-sided discussion (see: my childhood with my mother). I loved how there was so much Broadway on the show! And all of it was actual performances from shows, not headache-y medleys with people I don't want to hear sing them.

A major highlight for me: Patti LuPone winning and dishing the fact that she hasn't been up there for 28 years. Regardless of whether she should have won for
Anything Goes
or
Sweeney Todd
, the issue for me is how few musicals she's been in! Patti LuPone, Bernadette Peters and Betty Buckley are three of our greatest Broadway stars; they need to be on Broadway constantly! If Will Ferrell can make ten films in the last six months, they can each do one Broadway show a year.

Secondly, I loved seeing
In The Heights
on the Tonys because, not only do I love that show, but I totally heard my friend Andréa Burns (who plays Daniela) get entrance applause!

And finally, can we please talk about Cheyenne Jackson's performance. His voice was out-of-control
perfect
! The placement, tone and vibrato was flawless. I was doing my Sirius radio show at the time and, right after he sang, my sister Nancy called me and said, "Cheyenne sounded amazing. His face is stunning and his body perfect." She, of course, had to follow it with, "And Seth, to be blunt… you'll never be him." I didn't ask her to be blunt! It reminds me of that amazing moment in the movie
Happiness
when Jane Adams is standing in a kitchen while her relatives laugh. Her sister says, "We're not laughing
at
you, we're laughing
with
you!" and Jane says, slightly bewildered, "But I'm not laughing."

Wednesday night, I went to see
Cry-Baby
with James and we thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. I thought the cast was
so
talented. Harriet Harris was hilarious as usual. I loved when her granddaughter, who becomes a bad girl, said that she kicked a policeman in the b***s and Harriet sternly corrected her with, "Scrotum." Then on Thursday, I had four ladies from the cast on the
Chatterbox
: Tory Ross, Alli Mauzey, Carly Jibson and Elizabeth Stanley. First I asked Carly how she got discovered. She was 17 and performing in her Michigan hometown, and an agent happened to be there (the opposite of
Waiting for Guffman
) and got her an audition for
One Life To Live
. Her family couldn't afford the plane fare, so her mother drove her to New York. She auditioned for the part and… Kathy Brier got the gig.
But
then she auditioned for
Hairspray
and… got a callback. And another one. And another one. Let's just say eight callbacks. She and seven other Tracys would have to do super aerobic things and sing at the same time to see if they had the stamina to sing and dance. I asked Carly if it was difficult to be so young, yet star on Broadway (she was 19). She said it was great because she didn't know anything. One night someone told her, "Ben Brantley is coming to the show," and she was like, "Cool! Who's that?"

Then I chatted with Tory Ross, who plays Hatchet Face. Her first big gig out of high school was doing the national tour of
The Producers
playing the roles Kathy Fitzgerald originated (homeless woman, ugly showgirl, lesbian techie). On her first day of rehearsal, she remembered her training at the Cincinnati Conservatory of Music and made a "bold choice," which they're always telling you to do. They didn't tell her that it could lead to being supremely yelled at. She was learning "The King of Broadway" where Max Bialystock is talking to street people about how he's gonna make a comeback. She played a homeless woman that he makes out with and, at one point, her head was in his crotch while he sang a rhythmic phrase. Every time he hit an accent, she bobbed her head in his crotch. Mel Brooks got up and started yelling at her, "Who do you think you are? This isn't your show! You're in the ensemble! No one knows who you are!" That's four ouches! She thought she was gonna get fired and didn't know anybody in the cast who could comfort her so she spent the break crying hysterically on the phone with her mother saying, "It's over before it began!" But the powers that be got her a ticket for the Broadway show so she could watch Kathy do it and, essentially, copy her. Tory said that now she and Kathy are good friends and, starting soon, they're both going to be in
9 to 5
together!

Then I got to chat with Alli Mauzey who was
brilliant
as the crazy stalker girl. I asked her about her worst audition she'd ever had, and she said that it was for
On The Town
in L.A. She was going in for the role of Lucy Shmeeler, the character who's supposed to have a cold. Alli said she really wanted to feel like she had a cold during the audition so she put some toilet paper up her nose to stuff it up and some wax in her ears to block them up. She could hardly breathe or hear, just like a real cold. Unfortunately, after she read, the director started giving her notes, and she was too mortified to take the wax out of her ears so she literally spent the whole time saying, "…What?" Shockingly, she didn't get it.

Alli was also the stand-by for Glinda in
Wicked
on Broadway, and one of the rules for a standby is that you don't have to be at the theatre every night, but in case you have to go on quickly, you can only be five blocks away. Well, turns out, she lives
four
blocks away, so she literally got to spend every night at home in her living room, watching TV. And getting a paycheck. Wow. Doing nothing but getting a Broadway paycheck. I thought that was only me in
The Ritz
.

Finally, I spoke to the gorgeous and fun-nee Elizabeth Stanley who plays the good-girl-gone-bad. She wanted to be an opera singer while she was growing up and said she was a total opera snob. Her friends would say, "I love Mariah Carey!" and she would shake her head knowingly and whisper, "She is going to ruin her voice."

While majoring in opera at Indiana University, Elizabeth switched her interest to musical theatre. Her first big gig was the non-Equity tour of
Cabaret
where she played the elderly Fraulein Schneider. Hmm… maybe I should turn non-Equity so I can finally do
The Gin Game
. I remembered loving Elizabeth's performance as April in Broadway's
Company
last year and asked her if she got to meet Sondheim. Turns out, he came to their first performance in Cincinnati, and she was totally intimidated and couldn't speak to him. They all went out to a bar afterwards, and Sondheim was sitting next to her. She whispered to her friend to make a funny face so she could take a picture of him, but in actuality, she was taking a picture of Sondheim. So now she has a picture of Sondheim in profile with her friend making a "funny" face next to him. Raúl Esparza warned her not to be devastated if Sondheim gave her notes, because he only gives you a note if he thinks you're good. Elizabeth had based a lot of the April character on the fact that she was an airline stewardess: very pert and precise. After he saw the show, Sondheim told her that April is more like someone who's perpetually stoned, even though she's not. Elizabeth tried a totally new interpretation that night, and even though she was terrified to change it so dramatically, it worked!

I asked how hard it was for the actors to play all those instruments and Elizabeth said that Rob, who played Paul, dropped the mute out of his trumpet so many times that John Doyle started charging him $5 every time it happened. ("I'd like to propose a toast" + CLUNK = $5). After
Cry-Baby
opened, Elizabeth was doing a workshop with someone who was in
Grease
, and when the Tony nominations came out, they both approached each other saying, "Oh my god! Everybody hates our shows, and we just got Tony noms. Miracles happen!" I have to say that I'm so glad I saw
Cry Baby
. I just wish there was a CD. Anybody with a cool $50,000 wanna sponsor it? A hot $50,000? Tepid $50,000?

Speaking of which, I saw
In the Heights
again ("Why is everything in this fridge warm and tepid?"). I was nervous to see it because it's my fifth time and I thought maybe I'd be a little over it by now. I literally loved it even
more
! I had full-out tears flowing down my face, which is what happens to me when I hear or see something that I think is theatrically perfect — like the ending of "At the Ballet" in
A Chorus Line
when the line forms again, or the last three "Calors" at the end of Abuela's song in
In the Heights
. As I was sitting in my box seat, I decided I want to see
In the Heights
once a week as a rejuvenating tonic. That cast is so amazing. I can't get over Mandy Gonzales' voice. She has to sing so high throughout the whole show! I know she sang just as high in
Dance of the Vampires
, but she didn't have to worry about a pesky long run during that show. She only had to sustain her vocal health through previews and then a smattering of performances. Also, special shout-out to Eliseo Roman, who plays the Piragua guy. He has one of those songs where, when the ending approaches, I think, "surely he's not going to go for the high note," and he does! It's a delicious A (track 10 on disc one of the cast album). It's the same way I felt when I saw David Carroll sing "Love Can't Happen" in
Grand Hotel
. I heard the ending note coming, and I thought he wouldn't be able to go up to it... but he did! Listen to the last track on the
Grand Hotel
CD… so thrilling
!
P.S. Since then, I’ve deconstructed both David Carroll and Eliseo Roman. Go to my website!

That's it for me… happy start of summer!

Andrea, Alexis and Agonizing Auditions

June 30, 2008

Greetings from Alaska! And by Alaska, I mean San Francisco.
Why didn't anybody warn me that it's colder here than the reception Daisy Eagan got when she saw
Once on This Island
? (She won the Tony over LaChanze that year… remember? Anybody?)

I'm playing for beltress Andrea McArdle here in the new cabaret space called the Rrazz Room. I arrived with a pair of cool shorts and two new tank tops I wanted to work since it's gay pride and instead I've been walking around in long pants and a bulky sweatshirt. I was doing an interview on the phone for
The Dallas Voice
(more on that later), and the interviewer heard my non-stop complaining and said there's an expression that goes, "The coldest winter I ever spent was summer in San Francisco." Why didn't I hear those sage words before I boarded Jet Blue? All right, I'll get back to San Fran.

But before I do that, I also had my
Chatterbox
and I don’t think I’ve shared my story about when
A Chorus Line
was coming back to Broadway. I desperately wanted an audition. I grew up obsessed with that show and played piano for the European tour, so I knew the choreography like the back of my hand from playing piano at rehearsals. My agent said he would have to schmooze the casting people to get me an audition because they probably thought I couldn't dance. I told him to tell them that if you watch the 1976 Tony Awards, some of those
Chorus Line
dancers look amazing and some look awful. I proudly said that I am definitely as good as one of the awful ones. My agent sounded confused and muttered, "OK… I'll tell them you're awful," and for some reason, I didn't get an audition. Well, that wasn't going to stop me. I stormed over to Equity and signed up for the EPA. I was positive the audition would consist of the opening combination and I knew I could dance it. The only thing I was nervous about was the double turn at the end of it ("turn, turn, out, in"). Well, a few weeks before the audition, the great dancer and former member of the show, Carlos Lopez, was teaching a class at Broadway Dance Center to prep for the audition! I went and told my friend, Grant Turner, to come with me because he had just gotten his green card (he's from Australia) and could finally start working on Broadway. Carlos spent a lot of time focusing on the turn, turn section, and I was actually doing it! I was psyched as I arrived at the audition. Well, I walked in with the other dancers, who all had amazing dancer bodies, and decided my trick would be to wear my shirt out. I'm sure it fooled everyone into thinking I had a six-pack that I was too humble to highlight.