YEAST NATION

New Line has produced only musicals over the years -- 84 so far, in fact -- but at the same time, we've told stories in so many different genres of storytelling, comedy, drama, film noir, crime drama, thriller, melodrama, allegory, fairy tale, fable, folk tale, science fiction, horror, documentary, sex farce, social satire, political satire, political drama, absurdism, expressionism, impressionism, religious drama, autobiography, confessional...

But it occurred to me a while back we had never done a bio-historical musical. I don't know how we missed that, but we had!

Luckily for us, Greg Kotis and Mark Hollmann, the mad geniuses behind Urinetown, have been nurturing and developing another wild, dark, comic show, and can you believe it, it's a bio-historical musical! I mean, what are the odds?

"It is the year 3,000,458,000 BC. The Earth's surface is a molten mass of volcanic islands and undulating waves. The atmosphere is a choking fog lit by a dim red sun. And the mighty waters of the world are inhabited only by rocks, sand, salt, more rocks, a little silt, and the great society of salt-eating yeasts – yes, yeasts! – the world's very first life form! These single-cell salt-eaters are the only living creatures on earth, and they’re up against a food shortage, a strange new emotion called Love, and the oppression of a tyrannical Yeast King. But when the king’s son ventures out of the known yeastiverse, the yeasts’ story – and ours – is changed forever. "

Now if that doesn't sound like a New Line show, what does?

So we snatched up the rights and now we embark on yet another weird, uncharted adventure, though this time heading for the floor of the ocean three billion years ago. And all the actors will be playing yeasts. Single-celled yeasts, who can nevertheless sing and even dance a little. And Rob Lippert has to make our theatre look like the floor of the ocean. And Sarah Porter has to figure out what yeasts wear...

As we often say, if it's not scary, where's the fun?

Yeast Nation has been produced so far at the Perseverance Theatre in Juneau, Alaska, in 2007; at the American Theatre Company in Chicago in 2009; at the New York International Fringe Festival in 2011; with Home School Productions in Brooklyn in 2013; at the Ray of Light Theatre in San Francisco in 2014; at Lebanon High School in New Hampshire in 2017; and at the Good Company in Freiburg, Germany in March 2018. We'll be Production #8, and they've been doing some further rewrites, so the writers hope to come see us.

When we produced Kotis and Hollmann's brilliant Urinetown back in 2007, I had been in email contact with the writers, and recognizing the freakishly intellectual underpinnings to their intensely silly but sociologically dense, Brechtian comedy, I had asked them for suggestions on reading material. They directed me to Thomas Robert Malthus and his 1798 book, An Essay on the Principle of Population, which predicted that human population would increase geometrically, doubling every twenty-five years, but food production would only grow arithmetically, and that would result in famine and starvation -- unless births were controlled.

And yes, reading Malthus really did help me understand and focus the show.

This time around, a couple weeks ago, I asked again, and this time, Kotis suggested two books by Jared Diamond, Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Socieites; and Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed. I'm in the midst of the first, which is also a short documentary series, by the way.

And then Kotis also suggested Antigone and Macbeth. Yes, you read that right. Antigone and Macbeth.

I laughed when I read that in his email, until I remembered that I'd no doubt eventually realize he wan't joking. And sure enough, last week I watched Antigone (the brilliant production on video with Genevieve Bujold) and Macbeth (Patrick Stewart's version!), and then I re-read Yeast Nation. And guess what? Kotis wasn't kidding. I see big, clear, interesting parallels to both plays in this crazy musical. And seeing those parallels really will help me get at what Kotis and Hollmann are after.

I love working on material these guys have written!

One of the fundamental things most people don't get about Urinetown is also an important foundation of Yeast Nation, the idea of taking the characters and story so intensely, freakishly seriously that it's hilarious. Same style as Bat Boy, Spelling Bee, Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson, and the granddaddy of all neo musical comedies, Little Shop of Horrors.

Compare the following. First, bookwriter-lyricist Howard Ashman's 1981 forward to his published script for Little Shop of Horrors:

Little Shop of Horrors satirizes many things: science fiction, B movies, musical comedy itself, and even the Faust legend. There will, therefore, be a temptation to play it for camp and low-comedy. This is a great and potentially fatal mistake. The script keeps its tongue firmly in cheek, so the actors should not. Instead, they should play with simplicity, honesty, and sweetness – even when events are at their most outlandish. The show’s individual “style” will evolve naturally from the words themselves and an approach to acting and singing them that is almost child-like in its sincerity and intensity. By way of example, Audrey poses like Fay Wray from time to time. But she does this because she’s in genuine fear and happens to see the world as her private B movie – not because she’s “commenting” to the audience on the silliness of her situation. Having directed the original New York production of Little Shop myself, and subsequently having seen it in many versions and even many languages, I can vouch for the fact that when Little Shop is at its most honest, it is also at its funniest and most enjoyable.

I remember first reading that -- after already having seen and loved the show off Broadway -- and it really had an impact on me. I became aware that the funniest comedies are always the most honest and the most straight-faced.

Now, here's Greg Kotis' new author's notes to the Yeast Nation script:

Yeast Nation (the triumph of life) is a comedy, but what kind of comedy? There aren’t too many jokes, and it’s not all that witty. The script and score actually seem to take themselves rather seriously -- which is actually the key to how to attack the show. For the comedy (and therefore, the show) to succeed, the production must commit whole-heartedly to the grim, ominous, brutal, terrifying reality of the world of the play. This is a tragedy, apparently, a great epic saga, an origin story, and perhaps even a very important work of art (at least in the mind of the production). The comedy is character-based, meaning the performances must be heightened just enough to be funny, but not so much as to be overly-broad or ridiculous. Calibrating this energy is, as they say, the whole ballgame. No winking! No clowning! Play it straight, essentially, and you’ll find the tone. There’s also room for tenderness and sincerity here and there, which might offer a welcome break from the madness from time to time. The comedy is also context-based, meaning this is a harsh, punishing world where imminent destruction lurks everywhere. People are jumpy! They’re frightened! They’re desperate! They’re also ruthless and fierce and determined and, hopefully, completely present and alive! Seeing our heroes and villains (and everyone in between) struggle to survive and prevail in this unforgiving world is where the fun of the show lives.

I was lucky to see the original productions of both Urinetown and Bat Boy before we worked on them. Like other neo-musical comedies, each show has its own feel, its own style, its own visual and physical language, its own oddball, straight-faced humor, its own quirky set of rules. No other show operates quite like Little Shop or Bat Boy or Urinetown or Yeast Nation. They are all sui generis, and that's one of the coolest things about this new golden age for the art form that we're in.

I'm lucky to have both seen and directed Urinetown, and written about it, before working on Yeast Nation. The two shows are pretty different in most ways, but I feel like I understand Kotis and Hollmann's writing now and I get what they're up to; plus Kotis is really terrific about explaining anything that's confusing. He knows he writes crazy, fucked-up musicals, and he wants us to understand them as best we can. I love that.

Our rehearsal process starts Monday with learning the songs, so I don't have to block anything for a couple weeks. I'll use that time to sit in music rehearsals and soak it all up, let it percolate in the back of my head, let my ideas form, morph, solidify. I can already see in my head several moments in the show. This is going to be such fun to work on.

Another wild adventure begins!
Scott

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