The Ensemblist

Over the last two months, I’ve been speaking to performers who have reopened theatre doors in productions across the world. But we have yet to speak to anyone who is on the team working to reopen shows here in the United States, until now. 

This week, I spoke to associate director Gina Rattan. She’s helped lead a number of major Broadway shows over the last decade, most recently working with director Marianne Elliott on Company. She joined me to talk about what an associate director does, her work on Company and how associate directors will be at the helm to bring back many of Broadway’s most treasured shows. Here’s our conversation...

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Last year, I got to chat with the president of the Outer Critics Circle Awards, David Gordon. The OCCs bestow awards to both Broadway and off-Broadway theatre, but have never had a category for Outstanding Ensemble in their more than 70 years of existence. So I sat down with David to learn about the OCC nominating process and why, according to him, creating an Outstanding Ensemble Award is a lot more complicated than I had imagined. Here’s our conversation...

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Robert Walters is a three-year veteran of the Broadway company of Hamilton. A native Australian, he recently made the trip to Sydney to join the original Australian company of Hamilton. Of course, that journey included the well-known two week quarantine mandated by the Australian government for anyone entering the country. 

During his two week quarantine, Robert was kind enough to send us daily voice memos about his life in lockdown. Each day he responded to a unique prompt from The Ensemblist co-creator Mo Brady, which he would then respond to by voicemail and send back. Today we share the first half of Robert’s experience quarantine, where he tells us how he got the call go to Sydney and how he spent two weeks locked in a hotel room high above the city. Here, in his own words, in Robert Walters…

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This month, we are collaborating with Broadway performer Shaye B. Hopkins and her new creation: Podcast Portraits. In this new podcast, Hopkins invites guests to share some of life's hairy and hilarious moments and thoughtfully reflect on how those experiences shaped who they are today. 

On today’s episode, I got the chance to talk with Shaye herself above the drive that led her to travel halfway across the world to pursue a career on Broadway, as well as to start a podcast of her own. Here’s our conversation...

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In Stephen Sondheim’s Follies, the character of Carlotta sings of her long and varied character in the showstopper “I’m Still Here.” The lyrics share that her decades in the show business have provided her with “plush velvet sometimes, sometimes just pretzels and beer.”

The same could be said of today’s episode guest, Cameron Adams. The legendary Broadway ensemblist made her Mainstem debut in the 2000 revival of The Music Man. In the twenty years since she’s been a mainstay on New York stages, performing in an extraordinary 13 Broadway shows. 

Cameron joined me over the phone to share some of the most memorable moments of her career thus far, as well as how the industry has changed for ensemble performers in the last two decades. Here’s our conversation…

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So, we’re off! Thank you for coming along on my mission to discover how to celebrate, recognize and award great theatre ensembles. As I shared in the first episode of this miniseries, I started this journey wondering why there is not a Tony Award for Best Ensemble? But the more I thought about what such an award would recognize, the less convinced I became that it was possible to quantify what makes theatre ensembles so great.

I figured that speaking to a member of the press was as good of a place as any to start. Since theatre press are often the tastemakers for audiences at large, they have experience watching and adjudicating what makes excellent theatre. If the press attend shows in order to convey their expertise about excellent performances, scores, direction and sound design, they could also distill what makes an excellent ensemble. Right?

In my esteem, there was no better press member to have this initial discussion with than Jack Smart. Not only does he work for Backstage, the premiere resources for actors in the entertainment industry, his title is “Awards Editor.” His job is literally about awards. So I was lucky enough to speak with him on the topics of what makes a great theatre ensemble and how can they be recognized with awards. Here’s our conversation...

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Today, we are taking a detour and not talking about a show that we need. In order for those shows to come back, we need a clear, safe and realistic plan for our industry to move forward. Hadestown cast member Timothy Hughes wrote a letter to Actor’s Equity Association demanding transparency and a seat at the table for union members to be heard when discussing how we go about getting back to work.

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It’s a question that has been on host Mo Brady's mind for years. Definitely since the infancy of The Ensemblist, but probably earlier. “Why is there not a Tony Award for Best Ensemble?”

It seems a simple enough question on the surface. If we can recognize actors playing leading and featured roles in musicals, why can’t we do the same for ensembles. A Tony Award for Best Ensemble would bring legitimacy and respect to the contribution ensemble performers make to shows. It would also bring a level of equity and equality to those performers themselves, making them eligible for the same commandations as our industry’s leading performers. 

In this time where we are “paused” due to the Coronavirus pandemic, our industry is engaged in many important conversations. So he figured it was as good of a time as any to throw this into the mix, and formally ask the Tony Awards to add a new competitive category beginning in the 2021-2022 season: Best Ensemble.

Except, he couldn’t exactly figure out what he was asking for. 

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Although not exactly touring in stock, today’s episode guest is indeed still here. Gaelen Gilliland has been delighting Broadway audiences since making her 2005 debut in the musical phenomenon Wicked. Between taking a break as Courtney in Legally Blonde to Bikini Bottom’s Mayor in SpongeBob SquarePants The Musical, she has spent most of her career creating musical comedy gold. 

Gaelen is now sharing her talents across the country in the First National Tour of Mean Girls. Looking back at her career spanning six Broadway shows and three National Tours, she delights in how lucky she has been to have worked with some of the most collaborative individuals in the industry. 

Jon M. Wailin spoke with Gaelen about the inspiration behind her incredible character work, as well as how life on the road has changed since her first tour twenty years ago. Here’s our conversation . . . 

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Travel back in time. Way, way back to a long ago year called 2013, when an overly caffeinated 30-something with a single Broadway credit was looking for a way to stay connected to the community of performers he so dearly wanted to be a part of. It was out of that desire to celebrate, to advocate and to connect that our experiment called The Ensemblist was born. And here we are almost eight years later, sharing with you our 500th episode. 

What we found is that for every person who has stepped onstage as part of a theatrical ensemble, there are a multitude of stories to share. Over the years, we’ve expanded our mission - from simply sharing the unknown stories of working in theatre ensembles to make connections between those stories to document and celebrate our collective history. 

To commemorate our 500th episode, we asked our podcast collaborators both past and present to share their favorite stories of working on and listening to The Ensemblist.

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