No Shit, Bucky Beaver

My last post was about trusting the audience. Really important. But today I'm reminded of an equally important thing to remember -- to trust the show -- something not all directors and actors do.

With the national tour of Grease here at the Fox, a lot of people are remembering New Line Theatre's production in 2007. Judy Newmark did a great interview in the Post-Dispatch with the show's co-author Jim Jacobs, whose real high school life in Chicago was the primary material for the musical (including some actual friends' names!). To my great surprise and delight, Judy wrote in her piece that Jacobs:

would love to see a revival that returns the show to its raw, R-rated roots, pounding with hormones and nervy rock 'n' roll. (In fact, New Line Theatre staged a production along those lines here about three years ago. Jacobs says another may be in the works in Chicago.) It wasn't supposed to be refined, Jacobs said, and even if that has made him a very rich man, he still has a soft spot for the [original Chicago] Kingston Mills show, which won't be at the Fox, but which was 'the real McCoy,' he said. 'That's the way we were.'

Fuckin' A!, as Sonny would say...

Then today I got two messages from local reviewers telling me how bland the production at the Fox is and that it reminds them how much they liked our version. Nice, huh?

At the time, audience reaction for our version was very mixed back in 2007. We really put Grease back the way it was at the beginning, putting all the foul language back in, returning the show to its mean, nasty, raw, rowdy, vulgar roots. But there were a fair number of people in our audience who only knew the considerably kinder and gentler movie version. They wanted that much sweeter, cuter Grease, but that didn't interest me in the least. They were horrified at some of what we put on stage. Some nights you could hear an audible gasp when Sandy said the last line of the show before the finale: "Nah, fuck it!"

Up till now I always thought our Grease was a really cool, worthwhile experiment that only partly succeeded. But now I feel better about it. We were being true to Grease. We were trusting the material. We didn't try to impose anything on it; instead we did our best to understand the show fully (it's far more substantial than most people would ever guess) and then share that "original" Grease with our audiences. (Here's my analysis chapter if you're interested.) And apparently most of our audience appreciated and enjoyed our handiwork.

It reminds me of the first time we did Hair. We really didn't understand the show at all. But I found a national discussion group about the show that included members of the original cast. They all told me the same thing when I asked questions -- "Just trust it."

Words to live by.

I learned from Hair -- and it's reinforced with almost every show we do -- that my primary job is to trust and respect the material. If there's something in a show that doesn't seem to work, chances are it's my fault, not the material's fault. Instead of jumping to "fix" it (as too many directors do) with rewrites or physical schtick, I try to figure out what I don't understand yet. It's a lesson that has served me well for years.

So once again, the New Line Way is vindicated. We didn't do Grease the low-impact, "commercial" way; we did it the way the authors wrote it. And I'm so glad we did. I mean, what's the point of telling an audience what they already know, leaving them exactly where they began? People go to the theatre to understand themselves and the world around them (they're not always conscious of it, but that's why). It's why we tell stories in any form. And if we just reinforce what our audience already thinks, then we're not offering them anything of real value, are we? And our job is to offer them something of value. That's what I think, anyway...

Long Live the Musical!
Scott

Defying Gravity

I came to a decision today. Usually in the past, when we were putting together a season, we tried very hard to include in every season one Big Name, like Chicago, Cabaret, Rocky Horror, Hair... And over the years, we've come up with a bunch of shows that are both Big Names and also genuine "New Line shows" -- more than I would have thought possible. Right now, as I work on assembling next season, I've got two shows settled and one more to figure out. And I've been trying to come up with a Sure-Seller for that third slot that still adheres to our mission statement.

There are a few shows that fit the bill but are very old -- Pal Joey (1940), How to Succeed (1961), Sweet Charity (1966). But though we've re-imagined older shows before (The Cradle Will Rock, Camelot, The Nervous Set, Man of La Mancha), next season will be New Line Theatre's 20th season and an older show like that just doesn't feel right. The other two shows we're producing next season are both from the 1970s, although they were both pretty radical for that time. (I've noticed we do a lot of shows from the 60s and 70s, but it's because that was an incredibly active time of experimentation in musical theatre; we do a lot of shows from the 90s for the same reason.) And those two shows make it even less of a good idea to choose an even older show for our third slot.

And then today I realized that some of our best selling shows in recent years have been shows that most people had never heard of, shows like The Robber Bridegroom, Return to the Forbidden Planet, Bat Boy, Floyd Collins. And I think that though a Big Name can help a little, early in the run, it's not really necessary for good ticket sales. What's necessary is really good, bold, surprising theatre that people won't see anywhere else -- because audiences love an adventure, and that generates good word-of-mouth, it generates great reviews, and quite often it also generates repeat customers. We had a ton of repeat customers for Hair, but we also had a lot for Forbidden Planet and Spelling Bee.

A while back I was trying to define what it is that makes a musical a "New Line show." A lot of people in town use that term, but I think it may mean different things to different people. I came up with a few definitions of my own. I think my favorite is that a New Line show is a musical that you'd never think ought to be a musical. But that's pretty general. True, but general.

I think the real definition has more to do with both artistic fearlessness and extreme contrasts (which are related). Many New Line shows are both outrageous and ridiculous and also very emotional and moving. Many of them are silly in the extreme and yet also really smart and about serious issues. Almost all New Line shows operate in the realm of the imagination, with very minimal sets and props, requiring the active participation of the audience, but at the same time also grappling with real and substantial matters. I could list tons of shows that are textbook examples of a New Line Show: Bat Boy, Hair, Urinetown, Forbidden Planet, Johnny Appleweed, Reefer Madness, Hedwig and the Angry Inch, The Robber Bridegroom...

When I was in college (some of you have already heard this story), my mom wrote to all these theatre and film celebrities and asked them to send me birthday greetings on my 21st birthday. The first one to arrive (to my enormous surprise!) was from Lucie Arnaz and Laurence Luckinbill. Lucie wrote the nicest two-page letter, very sweet, very encouraging to this young theatre freak... and then Larry wrote a P.S. that changed my life. He wrote, "Go broke if you must, but always over-estimate the public's intelligence. They will thank you for it." That never left my mind from that day to this. And years later, it became the animating force behind the creation of New Line Theatre.

But sometimes I have to be reminded of that. We were trying to find Big Names because we were scared our audiences weren't adventurous enough to come see shows they've never heard of. Except they do. All the time. Sometimes more than once. That's the only reason we're still in business today, after nineteen years.

So I stand reminded. Trust the audience. They trust us, after all.

Long Live the Musical!
Scott