The Ensemblist

Roundabout Theatre Company's Caroline, or Change was the second Broadway musical to announce postponement in the wake of the Coronavirus pandemic. I was curious what it would feel like to be in the middle of a creative process, only to be stopped suddenly and placed on hold for the foreseeable future.

Nasia Thomas is the dance captain and plays Radio 1 in this Broadway revival of Caroline, or Change. She spoke to me over the phone about how she heard about both the shutdown and postponement, as well as what's she's doing in the meantime. Here's our conversation...

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“Publicity” premiered on April 23rd, 2012. It marks the return of our original team from the pilot and first few episodes of the series: Theresa Rebeck and Michael Mayer, who respectively wrote and directed this episode. The viewership was up this episode! Yay! Premiering to 6.01 million viewers, about sixty thousand more than last week!! Gotta be that Bollywood promo, right?

There were three featured songs this episode, which may have been my favorite episode soundtrack of the season. One cover of “Run” by Snow Patrol, and two original songs: the Bollywood-inspired original “A Thousand and One Nights” and shadow Marilyn’s ballad of “Secondhand White Baby-Grand,” both written by Marc Shaiman and Scot Whitman.

Derek calls Karen into rehearsal early to ask her to continue looking over the leading lady material, saying “I think you’d make a brilliant Marilyn.” Rebecca invites Karen to go out together in order for Ms. Duvall to “check out the competition.” When Karen slays Snow Patrol’s “Run,” Rebecca tells her “You are not an understudy, you are a star!” 

But Rebecca Duvall continues to give notes on the Bombshell script and score, including to ut one of the show’s only romantic duets “Mr. and Mrs. Smith.” When Tom and Julia write a new song called “Second Hand White Baby Brand,” Rebecca says it should be given to one of Marilyn’s “shadow selves”: Karen! Rebecca continues to ingratiate herself with the company, making smoothies with Linda the stage manager, and becoming BFFs with Karen - taking her clubbing and giving her designer clothing.

Everyone’s having dinner dates: Ivy at drinks with Sam and Tom, Eileen and her bartender boyfriend out at BAM, and Karen out to Indian food with Dev and Rebecca, who end up passive-aggressively arguing about what Karen wants her future to look like. In her mind, Karen transports herself to multicultural Bollywood where Dev and Karen challenge each other to prove their love is longer than “A Thousand And One Nights.”

The number features 30 dancers including current Broadway performers Ericka Hunter, Nina Lafarga, Nathan Lucrezio and Katie Webber. The fantasy sequence is performed in an Indian wedding venue as scores of multicultural dancers in tunics and saris pitch their thumbs and middle fingers together and push flexed hands towards the corners of the room. In curtained corners of the hall, Rebecca, Tom, Eileen, Julia and the rest of our leading players pose in tableaus that reflect the song’s quandaries.  

Back in reality, Julia’s missing son turns out to be sleeping on a friends’ floor, but the search for him causes Julia and her husband to come back together. Her son’s return also brings Tom and Sam together, cementing their budding relationship with a sweet and subtle kiss.

Ivy watches Ellis relegated to making Rebecca Duvall’s smoothies, and concocts a plan to get both Rebecca and Karen in trouble by feeding them misinformation about the rehearsal schedule. When Rebecca returns 15 minutes late from a 10 minute break, Derek lambasts her. But when Karen doesn’t return to rehearsal at all, Derek gives Karen’s new song to Ivy. 

Ivy crushes her first run of “Second Hand Baby Grand,” which includes staging that rolls Rebecca Duvall upstage as Ivy’s Shadow Self takes downstage center. But the moment the company applauds Ivy for her spectacular performance, Rebecca tells the room that she thinks Marilyn should sing the song.

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Here at The Ensemblist, we have always striven to celebrate the hard work and passion of Broadway ensemblists. And in our second full season, which first aired in 2016, our co-creator Nikka Graff Lanzarone and I took a journey through Broadway’s past to learn about its future. We explored how the ensemblist experience has changed and been changed by some of the theatre’s most influential shows, writers, and subject matter. And so in this new mini-series, I will be sharing some of the best moments from that mini-series we made four years ago.

Our plan is to release these re-edited versions from our season on The History of The Ensemble once a week for the next five weeks, so stay tuned for our episode on South Pacific in your podcast feeds next week.

Thank you to Jennifer Ashley Tepper for allowing us to reshare her stories with us this week.

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As the Coronavirus pandemic as raged across the country, national tours have been some of the first productions to fall victim. One of those is the national tour of Once on This Island which unexpectedly closed this week, cancelling almost five months of upcoming performances. Company member Tatiana Loftin spoke to us about how she heard the news and what she's doing now. Here's our conversation...

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The Coronavirus Pandemic is taking a serious toll on the theatre industry. However, there are glimmers of hope where people are still connecting creatively online. One of those opportunities is thanks to Jeanna de Waal, currently starring as Diana in Diana: A True Musical Story. She is also the co-founder of Broadway Weekends a "theatre camp for adults" that has started teaching free online classes on their Facebook page: Broadway Weekends at Home. Here's our conversation...

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There are only a handful of moments where you can feel your life change. The moment you say “I do,” the birth of a child. But performers can add another to that list: the moment you find out you’ll be making your Broadway debut. In an instant, you feel your life has change as a door you’ve always wanted to walk through finally opens.

There’s nothing more heartwarming than hearing these stories. So I brought together five actors who made through debuts this year together to share the stories of how and when they booked their first Broadway shows. Here’s our conversation...

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This week, we are pivoting our stories about the Coronavirus from how it caused theatre productions to shut down to what performing artists are doing with this time. Today, we speak to Joe Rosko, founder of Built for the Stage, an online training program that helps actors achieve their fitness goals. We spoke about how to stay mentally and physically fit during this time of isolation. Here's our conversation...

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“The Movie Star” premiered on April 16, 2012. It was written by Julie Rottenberg and Elisa Zuritsky, and directed by Tricia Brock. Again, shout-out to an all-female team! The episode was viewed by 5.95 million viewers. Down again, man.

This episode had three featured songs total, though one could argue that that spoken-word version of “Let Me Be Your Star” should count for half! Wow. The other two were one original song by Shaiman and Whitman called “Dig Deep,” and a cover of “Our Day Will Come” by Ruby & the Romantics.

Everyone in the Bombshell rehearsal room is abuzz about movie star Rebecca Duvall, especially her new understudy Karen Cartwright. But as the company sits in her first sing through of “Let Me Be Your Star,” they realize she’s not a vocalist like Karen or Ivy Lynn. You see, “Everyone said she could sing,” but nobody on Bombshell bothered to check first hand. Eileen asks Derek, Tom and Julia to come up with “constructive solutions.” Derek advocates for bringing Ivy back into the show, just in case they need her. 

All that Karen can wonder is what Ivy’s return means for her. But once Rebecca showcases her ineptitude, Ivy and Karen begin to conspire together. Ivy teases Karen, prodding her that “you’re counting the minutes until she implodes, and if you’re not you’re in the wrong business.”

Rebecca Duvall confides in Derek that she wishes Bombshell could delve into the story of Marilyn with “a little less singing and dancing.” The writers try adding in a short scene for her at the Actors Studio, but she is still perplexed by the idea that a character would break into song. Eileen advocates for Rebecca, demanding a new “extra long scene” for her Marilyn. 

Eileen imparts an old adage to assistant Ellis, “Keep your friends close, celebrities closer, and their assistants even closer still.” For Eileen, this includes Rebecca Duvall and her many, many, many ideas for script revisions. But in a late night work session with the creative team, Rebecca turns out to be surprisingly candid about her own limitations, asking for keys to be lowered and ballads to be cut. Based on the collegial session, there’s a new jazzy version of “Dig Deep” added that references Stanislavsky, childhood drama and Sigmund Freud.

At a screening of Rebecca Duvall’s new movie, Ivy and Karen talk about their hot-headed boyfriends and catch each other sneaking out of the boring movie. They share a laugh followed by Ivy announcing “She’s annoying. She stole our part. We hate her. Let’s go drinking.” After a few, Ivy tells Karen “When Rebecca Duvall goes down, everything’s up for grabs. You’re going to have to pry that part of my cold dead hands.”

In other news, Julia and her separated husband Frank come together to get their son to improve in calculus. Ellis gets caught trying to pull one over on Rebecca Duvall’s assistant. And Tom’s date with “chorus crush” Sam stops short of physical intimacy because “he’s old-fashioned and believes in God.”

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As the coronavirus pandemic continues to grow, we are speaking with performing arts around the country about how the shutdown of theatre performances continues to affect their lives and work.

Today, we speak with Tara Tagliaferro, who was performing in the Maltz Jupiter Theatre production of How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying when the show was postponed. She shared how the theatre has been taking care of their artists in unique ways. Here's our conversation...

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As the coronavirus pandemic continues to grow, we are speaking with performing arts around the country about how the shutdown of theatre performances continues to affect their lives and work.

Today, we speak with Jane Bunting, who was in Dallas performing with the national tour of Come From Away until performances were cancelled on Thursday. Here's our conversation...

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