Chita Rivera is a living legend. It was just announced that the 85-year-old superstar will be awarded a special Tony Award for Lifetime Achievement at this June’s ceremony in New York. And no wonder. She originated the roles of “Anita” in West Side Story, “Rose Grant” in Bye Bye Birdie, “Velma Kelly” in Chicago, the “Spider Woman” and “Aurora” in Kiss of the Spider Woman and was most recently on Broadway as “Claire Zachannassian” in The Visit. To date she has two Tony Awards and 8 other Tony nominations. So what do you ask someone who has probably been interviewed more times than just about anyone else in the world?  I wasn’t sure either, so here goes…

In Seth Rudetsky’s Broadway Diary Volume 3, he quotes you as saying about him, “You’ve really got it, don’t you? Every fucking word you say is funny?” What makes him so funny and how does that humor influence the conversations you have with him in these shows?

I can guarantee I did not say the F word. I can guarantee that’s Seth! But it sounds better if you stick that in. I love when it comes back to me and my face twists. He does. He absolutely can’t help himself. He’s so funny and he’s so smart and he’s so interested that I think he’s sometimes more interested in people’s careers than they are. He describes situations and shows and he’s been in many an orchestra pit and he knows what it’s like to hear it and play it. He’s a great musician. I defy anyone to be as funny. He’s so -effing funny. (Yes, she really said -effing instead of dropping the F-bomb.)

In an interview prior to your 54 Below engagement in March, you said you get bored talking about yourself. How does your relationship with Seth make those conversations not boring for you?

Because he does things in an easy and jovial way so that I can enjoy it. When he tells a story or reminds me of something he’s not so serious. It’s a drag when you take yourself really terribly serious. It’s in the past now. I don’t live in the past, but I’m grateful for the past. Seth has a way of spinning things and making them fresh. I enjoy it. He celebrates it.

When I spoke to Seth about his book, I asked him which shows he would like to go back in time to see. He immediately said Funny Girl to see Barbra Streisand and West Side Story to see you as “Anita.”

He’s never said that to me before. That’s wild. That’s a good thing you told me, because I’m going to ask him what’s the thing about Anita. Of course West Side Story itself, the whole doggone piece is extraordinary and still is. It blows my mind that the story in West Side Story is still very…it’s still a serious problem. We even have more problems on top of it with what’s been happening with the ladies and all of that. The prejudices are just blowing my mind. It doesn’t seem as though people really understand what it is when they say they want us all to be equal. You really do have to care for a human being for who they are. That’s called love, affection, understanding. It blows my mind and makes me angry.

This appearance with Seth is tied to the celebrations surrounding the centenary of Leonard Bernstein’s birth. What’s the one thing you think people should know about him that perhaps they overlook?

I think pretty much people appreciate he was an amazing teacher, forgetting about the God-given gift. He was the sweetest and warmest and most loving. This was man who really understood appreciating the difference between people and genders. He treated everybody the same and he had a great sense of humor. To see him conduct, from our point-of-view, the Quintet [in West Side Story] is just to drop dead. He pulled it out of us using his own energy and his own physical body. So much so he fell through the chair. He was pulling and tugging and making sounds and he suddenly disappeared and went right through  the chair. It was pretty funny.

I recently spoke with Tommy Tune with whom you sometimes tour. He quoted you as saying “nobody told me to stop.” Can you imagine yourself not dancing or singing or entertaining?

Oh gosh no. Because it’s a language to me. It’s a way to relate to each other. It’s a way to express myself. It’s just a part of my DNA. I can probably say more in a dance than I can with words. That’s probably stupid to say. If I had the words, I’d have to move my body to express it all. Without music, without dance, I can’t survive. I really can’t imagine it. I say to my audience during “Sweet Happy Life,” I tell them to move their body any way you want and let it go. Then I say to them, “How does it feel when your spirit says hello to your body.” When it does it turns to dance.

In Part 2 we continue our conversation with the legendary Chita Rivera and show some rare rehearsal footage from the original production of Chicago. To see part two of this interview, please go here.

Photo Credit: Laura Marie Duncan

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THIS IS THE THIRD OF OUR BEST OF 23 REVIEW OF INTERVIEWS: On April 19th of this year I spoke with Tony Award-winner Stephanie J. Block about her upcoming show with Seth Rudetsky at The Wallis. She was on tour at that time with Into the Woods. But the show with Rudetsky was postponed. It has since been rescheduled for this Sunday at The Wallis. Instead of just one show there are now two.

I held the interview you are about to read until closer to the rescheduled shows. Which means some of the conversation we had is less timely now that it was in April. Discussions of Into the Woods, Funny Girl and her performance as Norman Desmond in Sunset Boulevard at the Kennedy Center aren’t as topical today as they were then.

But Block is not just a great performer – as her roles in Falsettos, The Boy From Oz and The Cher Show (for which she won her Tony Award) can attest – she’s also a great interview. So though slightly dated, this is one thoroughly entertaining conversation. What follows are excerpts from that interview that have been edited for length and clarity. I strongly encourage you to go to our YouTube channel to see the full interview.

You’ve sung on stage with Cher, you sung with Dolly Parton, and of course, you have your Tony Award. When you were tackling the very intense roles of Fifer, Belle, Ariel and Mary Poppins at Disneyland, is this what you imagined your career would be?

First of all, damn you! Secondly, as the story has it and it is true, my mother forged my birth certificate so that I could audition for the Disneyland Summer Parade. I wasn’t yet 16, so she had to forge my birth certificate. So that already tells you enough of what you need to know about the loving show mother that embraced me and encouraged me. But I was serious even back then.

I went to the Orange County, which was the High School of Performing Arts back then, and everything had that high level of stakes and intensity and discipline. So whether I was Fifer the Pig dancing down the parade route at Disneyland, I took as much pride in that as I did with doing Stephen Sondheim’s Into the Woods.

You were referred to at your church as the little Ethel Merman when you were seven years old. You have since had the opportunity to play Reno Sweeney in Anything Goes, which is a role that Ethel Merman originated. Are there other Ethel Merman roles that you would like to do?

I think with a lot of the classic musical theater pieces there might have to be some reworking. Would I love to play Annie Get Your Gun? Absolutely. I’d love to play Annie. But I think someone like Larissa FastHorse might have to go in there and change a lot of the lines in the material. But does the music still hold up? Yes. Does the sort of crackle in her performance and the indelible performance that she’s left for us still hold true in my heart? Yes. Because in my heart, I’m an old MGM girl. You put on one of those old movies – anything with Judy Garland, anything with Ann Miller – and it just changes the whole course of my day.

I saw you in Falsettos, and frankly, I think you were robbed for the Tony Award because that performance, that whole show, was one I will never forget. I saw 9 to 5 in Los Angeles. I saw The Boy from Oz and I recently saw Into the Woods before it closed in New York. And the first time I saw you was in Crazy for You at La Mirada. 

Oh, my gosh.

Those shows, absent Crazy for You, are a mix of huge successes and less successful shows. Something Hal Prince said that I thought was really interesting was how much he learned more from the shows that weren’t successful than the ones that were. Is there a difference between the lessons you’ve learned on shows that were successful versus the ones that were not?

I think we just have to say that 75% of most Broadway endeavors would be defined as quote unquote, failures. So right off the bat, three quarters of every show that gets mounted is not going to last [long enough to] get their money back. I can’t speak to the producer end of it. I can only speak to the actor end of it. Yeah, I do learn a lot about myself when things don’t go as I hoped, prayed or wished. I will say I always enter a piece 150% because I think you have to love the project with that much in order to dive in.

When it starts falling apart, I’m also very much aware of that. I like to drink the Kool-Aid, but, all of the flags start going up. Or you go, Oh, this may not be going to Radio City to collect all the Tonys. But somehow I look at these artists that always start from scratch, begin again, are willing to put their vulnerable selves on the line for show after show after show. That, to me, is the biggest statement of most artists I know. That we really are willing to accept three quarters of it as failure and a small one quarter as success, and we keep jumping in headfirst.

Your performance in Falsettos of I’m Breaking Down, strikes me as a three-act play in 4 minutes and 48 seconds. What was the process of creating the ever increasingly intense breakdown over the course of that song?

You’re exactly right. You’ve got to have a beginning, a middle and an end. I find it so interesting that [composer/bookwriter] William Finn wrote essentially an 11:00 number in the first half hour of the play. That, in and of itself, is so out of form that it’s kind of wild. [Director/bookwriter] James Lapine said, I’m going to give you your space. I’m going to give you a couple days by yourself with our choreographer. I’m going to give you a whole host of props that you would find in your kitchen. I’m going to let you play and then I’m going to come in to see what you have created. For James, it’s very much simplicity defines mastery. Believe it or not, that epic song had more crap and props and movement to it than what you saw in its final version on Broadway. But I approached him and he said, How do you see this song? And I said, I think I see this song is like Carol Burnett having her own culinary show. And he goes, okay, well show me what you got.

This is Carol Burnett-slash-Trina trying to put on a very composed culinary show. Little by little, her inner voice, all of her demons, just start taking over. I actually went too far and he had to bring me back. Now we’ve got to find the balance between humor, angst and a conversation with the audience. So that was the balancing act.

Carol Burnett has to be a huge influence for you. While you were doing Sunset Boulevard you posted on your Instagram account a picture of Gloria Swanson side by side with Carol Burnett and said that your performance was going to be a combination of the two. How important is Carol Burnett in your life?

She’s wildly important to me. She, to me, being able to stand up as her and have a conversation with her audience to break that fourth wall and to be secure enough to say this is who I am as Carol, let’s banter and talk, then to embody a character in some of the most dramatic things I’ve ever seen. Then to embody humor and to not be so serious about herself that she could absolutely make fun of herself in the middle of a full skit. She’s a genius. I knew that if I could even do a fraction, if I could do one quarter of what Carol Burnett was doing, then there was a place for me in this world. 

Regarding Into the Woods, you said that was a dream role, 30 years in the making. What inspires you most about this show in general and more specifically about the role of the Baker’s wife?

In the beginning of my career I wanted to wear characters as like a costume and take on their shape, their form, their sound. Now as I get older, the goal is to bring myself to a character. To bring my story, my shape, my sound to these characters. The Baker’s wife is very much that. I am playing opposite my husband [Sebastian Arcelus]. So the baker and the baker’s wife couldn’t be more true than I feel is being portrayed now. My husband and I had quite a journey to get a child. It took us well over five years. As you can imagine, from Chinese herbs to shots to geriatric pregnancies, all of the above. When we tell that story, we are them and they are us.

The themes that are interwoven in this piece: it doesn’t matter if you’re in high school or you’re 80 years old or you’re a middle-aged woman, or you have a child, don’t have a child. Everybody’s journey personifies a different stage in someone’s life, and that’s what you’re going to hear. That’s what the audience is going to be attuned to. So right now, my journey as the baker’s wife and having a child is far different than me wanting to play the baker’s wife, like you said, 30 years ago.

You met Sebastian when you were in Wicked together. You got married before a performance, I think it was six years ago, and then you just went on stage. What do you remember most about that performance, particularly when you were singing As Long As You’re Mine?

Any time a couple, regardless of what stage it is in your relationship, when there’s a secret that just two of you hold, there is that sort of butterflies in the belly. There is sort of the giggle and the unspoken. We know something that nobody else knows. So that excitement certainly carried through. I’m sure we had smiles. [Elphaba] isn’t supposed to smile through the whole show, but internally I’m sure I had an extra sparkle in my eye and a smile that was underneath that green make-up when we did As Long As You’re Mine. It was a defining moment, certainly in my career, because all of those words took on a completely different meaning as husband and wife.

I saw one of the interviews that you did around The Boy From Oz and you said you weren’t doing the Liza Minnelli that we all know and love. This is Liza who was 18. It was before her fame had come to her. If 30 or 40 years from now, somebody wants to do a musical about somebody with whom you collaborated and an actor was going to take on the role of the young Stephanie J. Block, how would you like that character to be portrayed?

I would like her to be hopeful. I would like her to be silly. I would like her to be brassy because I was big and brassy. And I think always kind. Always kind, but ready to play. Those would be the words that I would infuse into the actress. It would be, I think, much like Liza, very difficult to watch that portrayal. Especially if somebody was to play young me but span 35 years of me in 45 minutes. I would feel like there’s a lump in my throat going, Oh, but there’s more. Oh, but you forgot to add that. But I think I would also have an open heart and the grace to accept it and receive it and hopefully lovingly support it.

In a 2006 interview you did with BroadwayWorld, you called the role of Fanny Brice in Funny Girl your “favorite regional theater role.” You went on to say, “It’s time to bring her back to Broadway. What a powerhouse role for any actresses. Producers interested can call 555-Stef!” which I thought was terrific. Fanny is back on Broadway now in a production that has had more rollercoasters than Disneyland. What does this production tell you about the challenges of producing contemporary musical theater and the pitfalls that have to be avoided? 

If I’m going to answer this, my disclaimer is I am taking great liberties because I have no horse in the race as a producer. But what I would like to see happen is that we cast a part based on the merit and the truth and the marriage of an actor and a piece not based on what could possibly sell tickets because of the pedigree of one particular person or one particular thing. It is a collaboration and a marriage and they all have to meet up.

I think we also have to entertain the idea of thinking outside the box. Then step into rehearsal. And then if it doesn’t go as planned, that there is the open-heartedness and the grace that I just spoke about to say, okay, great. You are monstrously talented. Perhaps this is not the vehicle that we all thought it was going to be for you, and that’s not going to service you or the piece. Let’s rethink. How do you feel about that? Let’s re-engage the conversation.

Much like art, live theater, is a living, breathing thing that I wish the creation of a piece can continue to be that without looking at the bottom line. That something is being created for artistry’s sake, and that within that landscape or ecosystem, things change or mistakes were made or gosh, this isn’t working out the way we hoped, or my God, this is working out even better than we hoped, right? But that the conversation can still happen and that grace can surround that. That’s what I feel.

Reviews and audience response to the Kennedy Center production of Sunset Boulevard means you’re giving us all optimism that there might be a Broadway revival. Do you have any new ways to dream, shall we say, about a Broadway production in which you play Norma Desmond?

I have 25% chance, maybe 50% chance, that there will be new ways to dream. The timing is not the timing I would like. There is a project that is in the works for cinema for Sunset Boulevard. That is ALW’s [Andrew Lloyd Webber] focus. That’s The Really Useful Group’s focus. And I can understand that as a business woman. As the artist, I would have loved to have seen a momentum and a transfer.

When I was asked by [Broadway Center Stage] Artistic Director, Jeffrey Finn of the Kennedy Center, what would you like to do in the next year, and I came out with this, I had no idea that this part and I would embrace each other in such a way that it affected me. It affected the audience. It affected the whole piece to be looked at in a completely different way. That was not my goal. But that was one of those times where we were all jumping in headfirst with no expectations, just wanting to create something different. Timely. I am of the school now that if you are going to revive, there needs to be a why. So we shall see what the next couple of years might bring. I’d like to hope that there’s space for it back on Broadway. We’ll see.

There was a Tony Monday last year or the year prior where you posted a video saying to your friends who were or were not nominated, that regardless of that the story continues to be told. What’s the story that’s most important for you to tell through your work today and through these evenings you have with Seth Rudetsky?

For me, right now, the word that is screaming in my head is connection. Absolute connection. If you are putting something out there and it is not being received and then digested and something is being thrown back at you, that’s my ultimate goal. Whether I am playing a part, whether I’m myself, whether I’m beside ridiculous, monstrously talented and smart Seth Rudetsky, for me, the evening was not a win if I did not connect and communicate with my audience. So that’s always the goal.

I certainly think we’ll do that at The Wallis. These intimate nights and spaces, they’re a joy to me. They really fill up my artistic bank. And much like Carol Burnett, it does feel like I’m standing there in my own skin wanting to meet them and wanting them to meet the real me. 

To see the full interview with Stephanie J. Block, please go here.

Main Photo: Stephanie J. Block (Courtesy The Wallis)

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John Fleck rose to a certain type of fame when he was labeled one of the NEA (National Endowment for the Arts) Four. Conservatives didn’t like the art he was creating and were up in arms about his receiving money from the NEA. That didn’t stop him and nothing has slowed him down since that controversy erupted in 1990. We spoke about his show It’s Alive, It’s Alive! and his career. He’s wildly entertaining.

Before Joshua Henry joined the Encores! production of Into the Woods, we spoke with him about his Broadway career which included In the Heights, The Scottsboro Boys and a revival of Carousel.

We first got to know Wayne Cilento as an original member of the Broadway cast of A Chorus Line. He’s the director behind the upcoming revival of Bob Fosse’s Dancin’ which will open on Broadway in 2023. This production began its life at The Old Globe in San Diego. So we talked all things Fosse (and perhaps a little A Chorus Line).

Adam Pascal is best-known for originated the role of Roger in Rent. This year he was on the road in the musical Pretty Woman. We talked about Rent, Pretty Woman and coming to grips with the ups and downs of fame.

Bobby Conte had just finished his run in Company on Broadway when we caught up with him before he was performing his show Along the Way. He talked about Sondheim, LuPone (Patti, of course) and his approach to music.

If anyone had a Cinderella story this year it was Broadway star Julie Benko. She was Beanie Feldstein’s understudy in Funny Girl before taking on the role full time until Lea Michelle joined the show. We spoke with her and husband Jason Yeager about their album Hand in Hand, but you don’t think we ignored Funny Girl do you?

Julie Halston is one-of-a-kind. She’s also a Broadway star, has a recurring role on And Just Like That, and a wonderful conversationalist. This might be our most purely enjoyable interview of the year.

John Rubinstein originated the role of Pippin in the Stephen Schwartz musical directed and choreographed by Bob Fosse. He’s currently on stage in his first one-man show as President Dwight D. Eisenhower in Los Angeles. We talked Ike, Fosse and politics!

Those are just some of our Stage Interview Highlights from 2022. Be sure to go to our YouTube channel to check out all of our interviews to date and to subscribe.

Tomorrow we conclude our interview highlights with some of our favorite interviews from the world of opera!

Photo: Jared Grimes and Julie Benko in Funny Girl (Courtesy Polk and Company)

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Perhaps you didn’t know Julie Benko’s name before this year started. You certainly do now. She was Beanie Feldstein’s understudy in the Broadway revival of Funny Girl who took over the role when Feldstein left the show early. She also did numerous performances as her understudy. Benko will continue as Lea Michele’s understudy once she assumes the role and will also play the part at Thursday night performances.

This is a big week for Benko and Yeager as their album, Hand in Hand, gets released by Club 44 Records on Friday. The album was born out of online Quarantunes the couple did during the pandemic.

Then on Monday they will perform at Birdland Jazz Club in New York. That concert will be live-streamed at 7:00 PM ET/4:00 PM PT so you’ll be able to see the show without having to be in New York.

Having heard an advance copy of the absolutely delightful Hand in Hand, I spoke to the couple about how they merged their musical styles for the album, how their relationship has deepened by being collaborators and about the whirlwind that is Funny Girl. The musical’s signature song, People, is on the album, but it’s a much more personal version of the song than Benko performs at the August Wilson Theatre.

What follows are excerpts from our conversation that have been edited for length and clarity. If you’d like to see the complete interview, please go to our YouTube channel.

Q: Jason, in the press release you’re quoted as saying, “Every song that we chose has a special meaning to us and has grown with us in our relationship.” What does Hand in Hand tell us about your relationship and how you not only weathered the pandemic, but also creatively flourished during it? 

Jason: If you play every week with the same person, you develop a certain close musical rapport. Which we already had, but it only deepened through that period because we weren’t collaborating with anyone else. We weren’t able to. So we learned new repertoire and explored new repertoire, we also got suggestions from listeners, family and friends and fans who would tune in online. Many of the songs bring to mind certain memories from that period, as well as memories from New Orleans. Songs that are included on the record bring to mind the several trips that Julie and I have taken there.

Q: Did you find that your relationships with the songs changed from when you first started performing them to when you finally had to cement them in a formal recorded version? 

Julie: Some of the songs we recorded so many takes of and they were all so different and we had to choose. Each take was very different: some out of time, some more New Orleans, some more playful and more theatrical, some less so. I think the good news is that we actually have all those other recordings and we could always put them out as an alternate take if anybody wants to hear some of the other fun stuff we had.

Q: The entertainment industry has been filled with married couples who have achieved incredible highs and some who have achieved incredible lows by working so closely with their spouses. What is the best thing about working with your spouse and what is the most challenging? 

Jason: I feel we’ve become closer as a couple as a result of our music making. And our musical partnership has become solidified and stronger because we are a couple. I’d say the most challenging aspect is when I mess up I disappoint, not only the vocalist who is the star, but I also disappoint my spouse.

Julie: This is sort of a special thing that we do as opposed to the primary thing that we do. So it really does feel like an escape from all of the really stressful stuff that both of our careers bring us. Making music together actually feels like a vacation because it’s just fun.

He really means it when he says he doesn’t want to disappoint. You have to to find a way to support each other as an artist and as a person and be a cheerleader for both and and be able to make space to hold that.

Q: Is there something from merging musical lives that can serve as a role model for anybody who’s trying to bring to two different voices to shared lives, to different points of views together?

Julie: We have to be so just tuned into the other one so that we can have that call and response. It’s a give and take. It’s a dance. It’s a dialogue. What he plays affects what I sing and vice versa. So I think there’s certainly a lesson in the music for relationships in that way. We actually try to consciously say, I’m going to really listen to you and watch you and be with you, rather than focus on doing the song, quote unquote. The music is better because it’s really just about being present with one another. 

Jason: I would only add that also in selecting the the repertoire and creating the arrangements, it was very much a collaborative process that involved bringing songs from Julie’s world and songs from my world together. And then finding, compromise isn’t the right word, but sort of meeting each other at a place esthetically where we both feel at home and excited. That’s a tough combination to reach. We’re different artists and we have different projects and different esthetics that we enjoy. So finding the Venn diagram of where the circles overlap is also kind of a good metaphor for merging two lives together; remaining independent and distinct. 

Q: One of the songs that I love on the album is Sweet Pea, not just because it’s dedicated to Billy Strayhorn, but also because it sounds like a song that Strayhorn would have written, which I assume is intentional. What does Strayhorn mean to you?

Jason: I wrote Sweet Pea as a tribute to Strayhorn on his 100th birthday in 2015 and then later added lyrics and knew that I wanted to have Julie sing it. Strayhorn is one of my heroes as an artist. Somebody who, without much of an ego about it, was casually just brilliant beyond what most of us can even conceive. They say that he would write and read scores of music while other music was playing. In other words, he could read a score of music and hear it in his head, or even write one out as though he were writing a letter or reading an article. The man was brilliant beyond belief and he was a brave person as an out gay man in 1940s New York City. He he took part in various civil rights actions as well. 

Q: I can’t wait, Julie, for the time when you sing and record Lush Life, which Bettye LaVette told me she is going to spend her entire life trying to get right. 

Julie: I know it’s intimidating, honestly. We were actually in tech in Funny Girl. Michael Rafter, who is our music director, who also is a jazz jazz pianist and has been Sutton Foster’s music director for a long time, he just noodles around at the piano in rehearsals. I would just sit there and I was one of the only ones who would recognize what he was playing. I remember he played the four opening bars of Lush Life and I came over and just started singing. He was like, “You know, it?”

Q: Since you brought up this little show that you’re in, obviously there’s no way you could have predicted what this year was going to bring you.

Julie: No, I was not manifesting any of this. 

Q: So given the wild shifts and changes that this production has endured, what are the challenges in staying focused and more to the point, enjoying all of the opportunities that this maelstrom has given you?

Julie: Well, there are challenges in that. Obviously there’s the media swarm, which I have not generally enjoyed being a part of when it’s the tabloid kind of stuff. That’s just all speculation. It’s just very upsetting to read because it’s full of lies. You don’t want to even dignify stuff with responses. But I’ve learned how to tune it out and just turn it off. I try to just focus on doing the work.

One of the main challenges is the vocal, physical, emotional exhaustion. But once you are in there it’s put on the costume and see everybody around. You get on the train and you go and it’s a party. The audience is excited to be there and you can feel that. And it’s just such a dream come true and such a joy to get up on stage and do this huge, complex role that requires every bit of you. So you get on the train and try to enjoy the ride. 

Q: Are you able to enjoy it, Jason, given everything Julie just said about getting caught up in a lot of the gossip and all the other crap that goes along with this position?

Jason: I feel for Julie. That can be upsetting at times, but I think she’s done a great job of making sure her relationships with her colleagues at work are good and honest and free of that noise. My contribution to that is when none of us knew what was going to happen, I started a thread with the family that Julie is not on. So if there was an article of interest that, say, someone else in the family really needed to share, they could share it there so that everyone except Julie would see it.

Q: Which brings me to the version of People that you have on Hand in Hand. People is one of those songs like Being Alive in a Company where it seems like everybody needs to make it as big as possible at the end. What I love is that you’ve taken this less-is-more approach and made it much more intimate on the album. What did the song reveal to you that maybe you didn’t know before when you started looking at it from that perspective? 

Julie: We didn’t know People before I had to audition for Funny Girl.

Jason: And I only knew it from her audition she asked me to accompany her. 

Julie: The fact that we didn’t have that long-standing relationship, or feeling like there were expectations we had to fulfill, probably helped allow us to just explore in our own way. The sense we got from the scene was this is about people who are in a seduction, this love that’s beginning. And it’s also about loneliness and connecting. I think when you do it in a show on stage and you have a big theater to fill and have a big orchestra to sing with it, you get to belt things out. But to me, the lyric and the the emotion behind the song of wanting to connect in a very intimate way with someone really spoke to let’s find a way to express that intimacy and the intimacy we feel when we get to play together.

Jason: In the context of our album, which has that kind of intimacy, even on the tracks that are orchestrated with more instruments that we overdubbed, there’s still this little house concert or small salon feeling to the record that’s, we hope, inviting. So that’s the feeling we brought to it. And I was thinking of something like a tango or a bolero, because the song feels like a dance between these two characters. We just came up with a couple ideas the night before the session and then played around with it in the studio

Q: I want to conclude our conversation by asking you about something Fanny Brice said: “Let the world know you as you are, not as you think you should be. Because sooner or later, if you are posing, you will forget the past. And then where are you?”

Julie: I love this quote. 

Q: I do, too. So how does Hand in Hand let the world see who the two of you are and how do you think you’ll look back on this maybe ten years from now?

Julie: I think that the album is eclectic. We really bounce around between a lot of different genres and feelings. We try not to let ourselves be limited by genre. It’s not a jazz record. It’s not a theater record. It’s our record and it’s very emblematic of the music that we enjoy listening to and the music that we enjoy creating together.

Jason: I think also that there’s a lot of humor and playfulness on the record as well, which is a part of our relationship and who we are in our home lives. There’s also tenderness and love and respect, I think these are also all values that we try to live out in our home lives and in the world. I think it is a reflection of us individually and as a couple.

Julie: I think that it speaks to the fact that the album is unique and is something that really, truly, came from us and from loving each other. 

To see our full interview with Julie Benko and Jason Yeager, please go here.

Main photo: Jason Yeager and Julie Benko (Courtesy Club 44 Records)

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MUSICALS:

AMERICAN PROPHET – Arena Stage – Washington, D.C. – July 15^th – August 28^th

The writings and speeches of abolitionist and statesman Frederick Douglass serve as the inspiration for this new musical from composer/lyricist Marcus Hummon and director/creator Charles Randolph-Wright.

This show was a recipient of the Edgerton Foundation New Play Awards prior to this world premiere.  Cornelius Smith Jr. stars as Frederick Douglass with Kristolyn Lloyd (original Broadway cast of Dear Evan Hansen) as his wife, Anna.

For tickets and more information, please go here.

BETWEEN THE LINES – 2ndStage – New York – June 14^th – October 2^nd

This musical is based on the young adult novel by  Jodi Picoult (Wish You Were Here) and her daughter, Samantha van Leer, from 2013. The story surrounds, Delilah, a young girl infatuated with Prince Oliver in a book she loves. Her world and his in the novel come together when he starts speaking to her.

Timothy Allen McDonald collaborated with Picoult and van Leer to write the book. Kate Anderson and Elyssa Samsel wrote the the music and lyrics. Jeff Calhoun (Newsies) directs with choreography by Paul McGill (Hedwig and the Angry Inch).

For tickets and more information, please go here.

FUNNY GIRL – August Wilson Theatre, New York – Open-ended run

When this musical opened this spring on Broadway it was the fact that it had been 58 years since the musical Funny Girl opened on Broadway and turned Barbra Streisand into one of the world’s greatest stars. Then came the whirlwind of controversy about whether Beanie Feldstein was miscast in the role.

She is no longer in the musical. Her understudy, Julie Benko, will be taking over the role until Lea Michele (Glee) assumes the role of Fanny Brice on September 6^th. 

Enter Beanie Feldstein who is tackling the role of Fanny Brice. Like Streisand, Feldstein has only played a supporting role in one musical before this one (Hello, Dolly!). Joining her are Ramin Karimloo as love-interest Nick Arnstein and Jane Lynch as Mrs. Brice (through September 4^th). Tovah Feldshuh will assume the role on September 6^th.  Jared Grimes, the sol recipient of a Tony nomination for this production, dazzles in the role of Eddie Ryan.Michael Mayer directs the show which has a revised script by Harvey Fierstein.

For tickets and more information, please go here.

INTO THE WOODS – St. James Theatre – New York – Now – October 16th

This often-produced musical by Stephen Sondheim and James Lapine was such a hit at New York City Center’s Encores series that it was inevitable the show would transfer to Broadway…and it has and the reviews and ticket sales are proof that was a great idea.

If you don’t know the musical, multiple fairytales are all taking place in the same forest at the same time. We’re big fans of Act II where not everything is as happy as it first seems. (Our favorite act is the second act.)

Lear deBessonet directs an all-star cast including Sara Bareilles as the Baker’s Wife, Gavin Creel as Cinderella’s Price and the Wolf, Joshua Henry as Rapunzel’s Prince , Brian D’Arcy James as the Baker, Patina Miller as the Witch and Phillipa Soo as Cinderella.

The recent announcement of an extension means there will be some cast changes that have yet to be announced.

For tickets and more information, please go here.

MJ THE MUSICAL – Neil Simon Theatre, New York – Open-ended run

It was, of course, inevitable that there would be a jukebox musical showcasing the countless hit songs by Michael Jackson. What may set this musical apart from failed attempts to use songs by The Beach Boys, Cher John Lennon and more is that the book is by two-time Pulitzer Prize-winner Lynn Nottage and the show is directed and choreographed by Christopher Wheeldon.

Myles Frost makes his Broadway debut as MJ and was the recipient of a Tony Award for his performance. The show also won Tony Awards for Lighting and Sound Design. The other Tony Award recipient was Wheeldon for his choreography. (Kudos to the outstanding company of dancers that perform this show.) 

We’ve seen the show and while it does gloss over much of the controversy that surrounded Jackson, it is wildly entertaining. Based on the audience response, this show is likely to run for a very long time.

For tickets and more details, please go here.

MOULIN ROUGE! THE MUSICAL – Al Hirschfeld Theatre, New York/Touring Company: Currently at The Pantages Theatre, Hollywood – STRONGLY RECOMMENDED

Why turn Baz Luhrmann’s ground-breaking film into a musical? Because you can can can. It might seem impossible to out-Baz Baz, but director Alex Timbres has done exactly that. This is bigger, louder, more song-filled than Luhrmann’s film. Surprisingly it loses nothing in translation.

The musical won 10 Tony Awards including Best Musical. The Broadway production currently stars Ashley Loren as Satine and Derek Klena as Christian. The touring company stars Courtney Reed and Conor Ryan (with Yvette Gonzalez-Nacer as an alternate in the role of Satine).

For tickets and more information on Broadway, please go here. For touring dates, tickets and more information, please go here.

A STRANGE LOOP – Lyceum Theatre, New York – Open-ended run STRONGLY RECOMMENDED

The 2022 Tony Award for Best Musical and the 2020 Pulitzer Prize for drama went to Michael R. Jackson’s musical A Strange Loop. It’s an aptly named meta-musical about a gay Black man who’s writing a musical about a gay Black man who is writing a musical about…You get the picture.  

Stephen Brackett directs A Strange Loop. The ensemble features Antwayn Hopper, L Morgan Lee, John-Mihael Lyles, James Jackson, Jr., John-Andrew Morrison, Jaquel Spivey and Jason Veasey.

This is a wholly original musical that challenges everything we imagine a Broadway musical to be. Jackson does it in all the best possible ways.

For tickets and more information, please go here.

OPERA:

SANTA FE OPERA – Now – August 27^th

Isabel Leonard as Carmen; Mitchell Harper choreographing The Barber of Seville; Quinn Kelsey as Falstaff; the first-ever Santa Fe Opera production of Tristan Und Isolde and the world premiere on Saturday of M. Butterfly by composer Huang Ruo and librettist David Henry Hwang are all good reasons to attend this year’s season at Santa Fe Opera.

If you’ve never been, you owe it to yourself to experience this amazing venue. And be prepared to tailgate!

For tickets and more information, please go here.

PLAYS:

HERE THERE ARE BLUEBERRIES – La Jolla Playhouse – La Jolla, CA – July 26^th – August 21^st

Anytime Moisés Kaufmann and Tectonic Theater Project have a world premiere, it’s a reason to go to the theatre. They’re the team behind The Laramie Project Cycle, The Tallest Tree in The Forest, I Am My Own Wife and more.

This new play is an investigation into the Hoecker Album of photographs from Germany during World War II.  They are named after Karl-Friedrich Hoecker who was an SS officer for the Nazis. Most of the photographs were taken in the summer and fall of 1944.

As the webpage for this production asks, “What hidden secrets can a photograph reveal?” Kaufmann (who co-directs with Amanda Gronich) and Tectonic Theater Project will make it mesmerizing.

For tickets and more information, please go here.

ORESTEIA and HAMLET – Park Avenue Armory – New York – Now – August 13^th

Director Robert Icke received an Olivier Award as Best Director for Oresteia, an adaptation of the three Greek tragedies written by Aeschylus. The show was a critical and commercial success in London.

Equally acclaimed was his production of Shakespeare’s Hamlet at The Almeida Theatre in London. Alex Lawther stars as the conflicted prince. 

Both shows appear in repertory. For tickets and more information for Orestia, please go here. For tickets and more information for Hamlet, please go here.

PRIMA FACIE – National Theatre Live – Beginning July 21^st (check local listings)

Jodie Comer (Killing Eve) stars in this play by Suzie Miller as a young lawyer whose main clients have been men accused of sexual assault. Her perspective on what she’s doing gets challenged when she gets assaulted herself.

It’s a powerful role for Comer and she is considered a front-runner for the Olivier Award next year. She’ll also potentially be up for a Tony nomination as the play is scheduled to open in New York in the 2022-2023 season. So, too, might director Justin Martin.

But you can watch the play in a theater near you as it is part of National Theatre Live’s programming. To locate a theater near you and to get tickets, please go here.

For our weekly Best Bets, please check every Monday for that week’s selections.

Main Photo: Conor Ryan and Courtney Reed in Moulin Rouge The Musical Touring Production (Photo by Matthew Murphy/Courtesy Broadway in Hollywood)

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Barbra Streisand’s shoes are impossible to fill. Yet the expectation was that any actress who took on this part would be required to do just that. From that perspective alone this is a losing proposition. Streisand is a once-in-a-generation artist and the musical was tailored to her particular talents. No one before or after will ever be Streisand. But somehow we expect anyone playing this part to be as good as she was.

While some might argue that casting is of paramount importance in the success of any show, I’d offer that even more credit, in this case, has to go to Feldstein for agreeing to be the first person to face the collective firing squad of theater queens, social media and critics.

The success or failure of any first revival has fallen on her shoulders. Not on any other cast member and not on director Michael Mayer. I would have to believe that Feldstein knew the eyes of the musical-loving world were focused like laser beams on her every move. How many of us would make such a brave decision? In a world where playing it safe has become far too commonplace, Feldstein did just the opposite.

Her doing so will also make it easier for anyone – literally anyone – to do the show. Even her replacement once Feldstein leaves the show in September. Someone had to be first. Beanie Feldstein chose to be that person.

Rumors have it that Lea Michele will be taking over the part when Feldstein leaves. If she does she will owe her predecessor an enormous amount of gratitude and respect. She who goes second will have a much easier path.

Simply put, without Feldstein’s nerve it might have been even longer before there was a revival of Funny Girl. I’m willing to bet there will never be as long a time between Broadway productions of this musical.

I have seen Funny Girl and while I found some of it very satisfying, it didn’t fully succeed for me for a multitude of reasons. What I did leave feeling was a profound amount of respect for Feldstein for singing she’s the greatest star knowing how many people were going to rain on her parade.

Photo: Beanie Feldstein in Funny Girl (Photo by Matthew Murphy)

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for colored girls who have considered suicide/when the rainbow is enuf – Booth Theatre – New York – Now through May 22nd

Ntozake Shange’s “choreopoem” first opened on Broadway in 1976 and ran for 742 performances and also earned a Tony Award nomination as Best Play. 7 Black women, nameless but identified by the color of the clothes they wear, explore their lives and experiences through poetry that has been choreographed to music.

Camille A. Brown makes her directorial debut with this revival. She recently co-directed and choreographed Terence Blanchard’s opera Fire Shut Up In My Bones at the Met. The ensemble of women appearing in the show are Amara Granderson, Tendayi Kuumba, Kenita R. Miller, Okwui Okpokwasili, Stacey Sargean, Alexandria Wailes and D. Woods

For tickets and more information please go here.

Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? – Geffen Playhouse – Los Angeles  – Now – May 29th

Edward Albee’s Tony Award and Pultizer Prize-winning 1962 play about marriage as seen through the eyes of a hard-drinking and embittered middle-aged couple  and a younger couple with mixed motivations for being their guests after a faculty party gets a new production in Los Angeles.

Zachary Quinto and Calista Flockhart play George and Martha – the older couple. Nick and Honey, the younger couple, are played by Graham Phillips and Aimee Carrero. Gordon Greenberg directs.

For tickets and more information, please go here.

A Strange Loop – Lyceum Theatre New York – Now playing

The 2020 Pulitzer Prize for drama went to Michael R. Jackson’s musical A Strange Loop. It’s an aptly named meta-musical about a gay Black man who’s writing a musical about a gay Black man.  Reviews were through the roof when it ran off-Broadway.

Last week’s reviews were even stronger for the Broadway production. This is going to be a very hot ticket this season and quite possibly the musical to beat for the Tony Awards.

Stephen Brackett directs A Strange Loop. The ensemble features Antwayn Hopper, L Morgan Lee, John-Mihael Lyles, James Jackson, Jr., John-Andrew Morrison, Jaquel Spivey and Jason Veasey.

For tickets and more information, please go here.

An Evening with Fran Lebowitz – Multiple Venues – April 28^th – May 6^th

It probably surprises no one more than Fran Lebowitz that after the Netflix series Pretend It’s A City debuted she would be a hot ticket around the world. But here she is participating in conversations – exactly what she did with Martin Scorsese in that series.

April 28^th – May 1^st will find her at The Broad Stage in Santa Monica. On  May 2^nd she’ll be at the Balboa Theatre in San Diego. On May 5^th she’ll be at Roy Thomson Hall in Toronto and on May 6^th she’s at St. Jean Baptiste Church in Montreal. A European tour launches in late June.

For tickets and more information, click on each venue’s name.

MJ The Musical – Neil Simon Theatre NY – Now – September 4th

It was, of course, inevitable that there would be a jukebox musical showcasing the countless hit songs by Michael Jackson. What may set this musical apart from failed attempts to use songs by The Beach Boys, Cher John Lennon and more is that the book is by two-time Pulitzer Prize-winner Lynn Nottage and the show is directed and choreographed by Christopher  Wheeldon.

Myles Frost makes his Broadway debut as MJ. Walter Russell III (so good in Fire Shut Up in My Bones at the  Metropolitan  Opera) and Christian Wilson alternate performances as Little Michael. Interestingly Tavon Olds-Sample is listed as playing “Michael” in the show. 

Will this musical be a Thriller or will audiences tell this show to Beat It? Either way it’s bound to be interesting.

For tickets and more details, please go here.

American Ballet Theatre on Tour – Now – May 15^th

ABT is on tour with two different programs. Opening this week at the Segerstrom Center for the Arts in Costa Mesa is ABT Forward. Leonard Bernstein is celebrated in Bernstein in a Bubble; Alonzo King premiere’s Single Eye with music by Jason Moran and Tony Bennett is front and center in Zig Zag. This same program will be performed at the Kennedy Center March 29^th and March 30^th.

Don Quixote is on the program for performances at Chrysler Hall in Norfolk, VA; the Kennedy Center and the Mahalia Jackson Theatre in New Orleans.

For tickets and more information click on each venue’s names.

Take Me Out – Hayes Theater New York – Now – October 2^nd

Richard Greenberg’s 2003 play Take Me Out won the Tony Award for Best Play. It tells the story of a professional baseball player (Jesse Williams) who comes out as gay. His doing so reveals a lot about his teammates and their prejudices about his sexuality and his race.

Also appearing in the play are Patrick J. Adams and Jesse Tyler Ferguson. This is a very adult show that features a nude shower scene with most of the cast. So few professional athletes on major teams have come out in the 19 years since this play was first performed on Broadway. That means Take Me Out is just as topical today as it was then.

For tickets and more information, please go here.

Plaza Suite – Hudson Theatre (NYC) – March 28^th – June 26th

Neil Simon’s comedy about relationships and marriage opened on Broadway on February 14, 1968. The show ran for 1,097 performances and featured George C. Scott and Maureen Stapleton as three separate couples who all visit the Plaza Hotel in New York at different times. 

This first-ever revival of the play stars Matthew Broderick and Sarah Jessica Parker. John Benjamin Hickey (Tony Award-winner for his performance in The Normal Heart) directs. Danny Bolero, Molly Ranson and Eric Wiegand round out the ensemble.

This limited engagement is scheduled to close on June 26^th.

For more information, please go here.

(Photo by Joan Marcus)

Cyrano – Brooklyn Academy of Musc – April 5^th – May 22^nd

The recent Joe Wright film of Edmond Rostand’s play presented a variation from tradition in telling the story of the man with a large nose who falls in love with Roxanne. Get ready for an even more radical approach.

James McAvoy stars in this new version by Martin Crimp. Gone after the period costumes and pleasantries. This Cyrano is more interested in the love of language than in unrequited love.  Modern clothes, hand mics and stand mics are the tools at the cast’s disposal.

Directed by Jamie Lloyd, this production earned the Olivier Award for Best Revival.

For tickets and more information, please go here.

Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater –multiple venues –  April 6^th – May 8^th

For over 60 years the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater has celebrated what it is to be an African American through innovative dances that utilize a wide array of musical styles. 

They are on tour to celebrate the 10^th Anniversary of Artistic Director Robert Battle. Amongst the pieces on the program are 2004’s Mass; Ella from 2008 and For Four from 2021. Also on the program is Revelations created by Ailey in 1960.

This tour takes them to the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion in Los Angeles (April 6-10); The Granada Theatre in Santa Barbara (April 13^th and 14^th); Marcus Performing Arts Center in Milwaukee on April 20^th; KeyBank State Theatre in Cleveland (April 22^nd – 24^th); The University of Massachusetts on April 26^th; Boston’s Boch Center Wang Theatre (April 28^th– May 1^st); University of North Carolina (May 3^rd and 4^th) and concludes at Prudential Hall in Newark (May 6^th – 8^th). Click on each venue’s name for more information and tickets.

Sheku & Isata Kanneh-Mason Tour – April 19^th – May 8^th

Pianist Isata Kanneh-Mason and her brother, cellist Sheku Kanneh-Mason, launch a recital tour on April 19^th at Campbell Hall in Santa Barbara. The core repertoire finds the duo performing works by Frank Bridge, Benjamin Britten, Karem Khachaturian and Dmitri Shostakovich. The Khachaturian is replaced by a work by Beethoven at a few concerts.

The tour takes them to Los Angeles; Costa Mesa; La Jolla; San Francisco; Ann Arbor; Princeton; Kansas City, MO; Baltimore; New York; Toronto; Boston and Atlanta.

For tickets and more information, click on the name of the city above.

Funny Girl – August Wilson Theatre – Now playing

It’s been 58 years since the musical Funny Girl opened on Broadway and turned Barbra Streisand into one of the world’s greatest stars. Since then producers have long considered a revival, but let’s face it, those are big shoes to fill.

Enter Beanie Feldstein who is tackling the role of Fanny Brice. Like Streisand, Feldstein has only played a supporting role in one musical before this one (Hello, Dolly!). Joining her are Ramin Karimloo as love-interest Nick Arnstein and Jane Lynch as Mrs. Brice. Michael Mayer directs the show which has a revised script by Harvey Fierstein.

People, people who need tickets and more information should go here.

Top Album Choices

Jeremy Pelt: Soundtrack

Jazz composer and trumpeter Jeremy Pelt releases his new album this week. It features 10-tracks with Vicente Archer on acoustic & electric bass; Victor Gould on piano; Chien Chien Lu on vibraophone; and Fender Rhodes and Allan Mednard on drums. Anne Drummond plays flute on two tracks and Brittany Anjouy plays Mellotron on two track.

Pelt is a terrific musician and his previous two albums, The Art of Intimacy Vol. 1 and Griot: This Is Important!revealed an incredible range and are essential listening.

Spencer Day: Broadway by Day 

These two albums couldn’t be more different, but both are immensely satisfying works. Vocalist/songwriter Spencer Day offers his interpretations of songs from some of Broadway’s greatest musicals including A Chorus Line, Follies, My Fair Lady and South Pacific on Broadway By Day. His unique stylings provided a new way of hearing these classic songs.

Gerald Clayton: Bells on Sand

Composer/pianist Gerald Clayton’s new album is one we’ve been listening to for over a month. It’s a quiet and gentle album that is filled with inventive music that requires your concentration. That commitment will be deeply rewarded with an inner-peace that Bells on Sand brings to your ears.

Main Photo: Stacey Sergeant, Amara Grandson, Okwui Okpokwasilli, Tendayi Kuumba, Kenita R. Miller, D. Woods and Alexandria Walles in for colored girls who considered suicide/when the rainbow is enuf (Photo by Marc. J. Franklin)

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The show, which official opens on Sunday, April 24th at the August Wilson Theatre in New York, tells the story of Fanny Brice, her time as a member of the Ziegfeld Follies and her passionate and troubled romance with Nick Arnstein. Beanie Feldstein plays Brice with Ramon Karimloo as Arnstein. Michael Mayer (Hedwig and the Angry Inch; Spring Awakening) directs. Harvey Fierstein has revised Isobel Lennart’s book. The show features the songs People, Don’t Rain on My Parade and Who Taught Her Everything – all written by Jule Style and Bob Merrill.

For trivia buffs, Funny Girl is opening on Barbra Streisand’s 80th birthday. She, of course, originated the role of Brice on stage and won an Academy Award for her performance in the film version.

In January I spoke with Lynch who was planning a small tour with Kate Flannery that was postponed due to the pandemic. During part of our time we talked about Funny Girl and what follows are excerpts from that conversation that have been edited for length and clarity.

Obviously, Beanie Feldstein has big shoes to fill, but I don’t think we should forget that Kay Medford played your part both onstage and in the film. What are you looking forward to most about this revival and what challenges are you going to face as an actor in bringing your own take on Mrs. Brice?

I’m never going to be Kay Medford, so I never think about things like that. When we were talking about doing this I watched the movie again. One of the first movies I ever saw in my life was Funny Girl and I loved it. I’ve been singing that score since I was a little girl. So I watched the movie again and she was brilliant. I mean, first of all, Barbra Streisand was like a revelation. And Kay Medford was just wonderful and grounded and funny and kind of put upon. And I think that’s definitely something that’s going to affect my performance.

I totally get that point of view. She’s a tough broad who created this business all on her own without a man. In those days that was a hard thing to do. So she’s independent and she loves her kid and she’d do anything to protect her. I just love that. I think it’s great and I think Kay Medford played it with such aplomb. And she’s Irish too, by the way. She’s a hundred percent Irish playing a Jewish mother. 

When I see a show has a revised book I wonder what’s going to be revised. I felt that way before I saw the new version of West Side Story and then I saw it and actually thought it was better than the original film. Do you feel that people who are fans of Funny Girl are still going to find the same material they loved?

Absolutely. In fact, as I was watching the movie, and this is before I had read the new book, I thought it was just going on a little too long. And if I were doing this book I’d condense this part and jump from that part to this part and forget this part. And I think Harvey Fierstein was reading my mind. 

Or you were a silent collaborator, who knew? 

Yes. Yeah, yeah. (she laughs)

Have you heard the Supremes album Sing and Perform the Songs of Funny Girl?

No. Really?

You have to. It is endlessly fascinating. But what it made me think about is how universal the songs and the story of Funny Girl really are. What do you think there is about Fanny Brice’s story and the way it’s told in this musical that it can be performed by the biggest all-female group of all time and still work? 

I think it’s about wanting something so bad and knowing that you’ve got something in you, but the world doesn’t know yet. And damn it, you’re not going to stop until the world knows it.

That was that was one of the things that impressed me so much about that movie. Seeing it after so many years was, boy, she was not to be discouraged. She was not to be denied. I mean, even with Florence Ziegfeld, she’s “Excuse me, Mr. Ziegfeld, Mr. Ziegfeld. Hello!” Nobody talks to him like that. “I can’t do that song because I’m not beautiful.” And he says, “You will do that song.” Then she defied him and did it as a pregnant woman and made a joke out of it. I mean the way Barbra Streisand played that.

I think that’s probably the truth about Barbra Streisand, too. She was not going to be denied. To look at her you might go she’s not a standard size that fits the standard dress*. She’s got a nose with deviation*, as my character says. The Supremes and Diana Ross being African-American women in that very patriarchal society that Motown was, I can understand why they would relate to those songs.

What does returning to the stage after everything we’ve gone through in the past two years mean to you?

I’m most alive on stage. I’m my happiest. You don’t realize how much you miss something until you’re back. Then you get back on stage with these people doing these songs and you go, Oh my God. We say it after every show. This is the best gig in the world. And I think if we’re having such a great time, I know that the audience is there with us and it would be nothing without them, either. They’re a big part of what makes it so joyful.

*A reference to one of the lyrics in If a Girl Isn’t Pretty from Funny Girl

Photo: Jared Grimes and Jane Lynch in Funny Girl (Photo by Matthew Murphy)

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None of that should distract from the fact that Styne is one of musical theater’s finest composers. His work, and that of his collaborators, is celebrated in this week’s new episode of Lyrics and Lyricists: Preludes from New York’s 92nd Street Y. The show is called Jule Styne and His Many Lyricists. It begins streaming on December 7th and will remain available through December 31st.

The lyricists with whom Styne worked include Bob Merrill (Funny Girl), Betty Comden and Adolph Green (Bells Are Ringing, Do Re Mi, Subways Are For Sleeping, Fade Out – Fade In), Leo Robin (Gentlemen Prefer Blondes) and Stephen Sondheim (Gypsy).

Performing in this show will be Farah Alvin (It Shoulda Been You), Allison Blackwell (Pretty Woman: The Musical), Nikki Renée Daniels (the postponed revival of Company), Jeff Kready (A Gentlemen’s Guide to Love and Murder), Julia Murney (Wicked), Zachary Noah Piser (Dear Evan Hansen), Zachary Prince (Honeymoon in Vegas), Pearl Sun (Come From Away) and Mariand Torres (In Transit). Beth Malone (Angels in America) narrates. Paul Masse created the series and serves as musical director.

Every episode of this series has been entertaining, informative and at times emotional. Tickets are $15 per episode or you can get access to all five shows for $60. All episodes are now going to be available through December 31st. I strongly recommend checking them out.

Photo: Composer Jule Styne with Stephen Sondheim (Photo by Friedman-Abeles/Courtesy New York Public Library Archives)

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Parker has appeared locally at the Geffen Playhouse in These Paper Bullets and won an Ovation Award for her performance as Fanny Brice in the musical Funny Girl.

On MadTV she was known for her wild parodies such as in the clip below of Parker as Ellen DeGeneres singing a rewritten version of Katy Perry’s “I Kissed a Girl.”

So imagine putting these qualities together for a 65-minute show that showcases all these strengths and serves as a parody for celebrity self-indulgent solo shows where the only thing on display is ego. It’s definitely a show not to be missed.

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