Chad Jones’ Theater Dogs

For the Tony Award-winning composing team of Steven Sater (book and lyrics, above left) and Duncan Sheik (music), Spring fever may be abating.

The duo, along with director Michael Mayer, worked on bringing their musical Spring Awakening to Broadway for seven long years. Then the show opened, won eight 2007 Tony Awards and has just launched its national tour at San Francisco’s Curran Theatre. Upcoming productions will begin sprouting up around the world.

But Sater and Sheik are at work on other productions. As previously reported here, the duo’s adaptation of the Hans Christian Andersen fairy tale The Nightingale could make its world premiere at San Francisco’s American Conservatory Theater next season if the theater gods (and money people) smile.

The duo is also re-working Nero, which had its world premiere as a play with songs at San Francisco’s Magic Theatre in early 2006.

“That project has really changed dramatically,” Sater says. “We did a workshop of the revised version at New York Stage and Film with Idina Menzel, Lea Michelle, Michael Arden and a fantastic cast. It’s becoming our new musical along with The Nightingale. It’s really dark and dynamic and funny and musically really rich. This project has become very exciting.”

Sheik says that he’s pleased with the various iterations of Nero: “We’re very close to finding a kind of more final, presentable version. The Magic run really helped us figure out what works, what doesn’t. We had six or seven songs in that production. Now there are literally 30 pieces of music in that show.”

He says that five or six of the original songs are still in the show, with the song “Lover from Hell” as the cornerstone.

“I had my own skeptical feelings about Nero and whether it was something artistic or commercially viable,” Sheik says. “With the work we did this summer at New York Stage and Film, I saw it could really work. That was a huge relief for me, personally because, you know, you want to tell a story people can understand and get into. It’s hard to do that with an anti-hero. We figured out how to make it truly engaging, even with characters who don’t have a lot of sympathy attached.”

Sater is also at work with System of a Down frontman Serj Tankian on a rock spectacular version of Aeschylus’ Prometheus Bound. Diane Paulus, who directed Hair in Central Park this summer, is slated to direct.

And Sheik is at work mixing his latest record project, Whisper House, which is released on Sony/Victor records on Jan. 27. This will be a full-on Duncan Sheik album, but the songs, developed with Kyle Jarrow, also form the score of a show, also called Whisper House about a boy who loses his father in World War II and moves with his mother into a haunted lighthouse. Sheik says there may be a production of the show (for which Jarrow is librettist and co-lyricist with Sheik) in Delaware next year.

“I just finished mixing the record, and I’m so happy with it,” Sheik says. “It was such a weird surprise. I recorded these things as demos, and everyone who heard them said if that’s not your next record, you’re crazy. Holly Brook, an amazing singer I’ve been working with, is my vocal partner on this record. I can’t wait to get it out in the world.”

Visit Sheik’s official site: http://www.duncansheik.com/oldsite/httpdocs/index.html

For information about the Spring Awakening national tour, at the Curran Theatre through Oct. 12, visit www.shnsf.com.

Here are Duncan Sheik and Holly Brook performing “Touch Me” from Spring Awakening:

Michael Mayer, the Tony Award-winning director of Spring Awakening, remembers people looking at his show and saying things like: “You can’t be unconventional.” “That’s choreography?” “This is a musical?”

And Mayer is just fine with those questions.

“We didn’t set out to break rules,” Mayer says. “The idea was to tell this story, and this is the way we figured out how to do it.”

The “we” in this case is book/lyrics writer Steven Sater, adapting a late 1800s German play by Frank Wedekind, composer Duncan Sheik, choreographer Bill T. Jones and a passel of producers.

“We weren’t looking to Broadway,” Mayer recalls of the long gestation period for Spring go from play to pop-rock musical. “It took us seven years to produce this fucking thing. The goal was not to do a Broadway musical but to do Spring Awakening as a musical. It is miraculous and fantastic that Broadway became the final destination. Against all the odds, too, because this show plays by its own rules. Completely.”

Spring Awakening, about German teens coming of age and discovering sexuality in a highly repressive society, is sort of a play with a rock musical mixed in. Scenes stop, young actors whip out handheld microphones and launch into gorgeous, occasionally raucous, songs.

“The music functions differently here than in other musicals,” Mayer says. “It’s not a conventional musical where songs are concerned with character and logical storytelling in a narrative sense. There is an intentional dichotomy between the scenes and the songs.”

Some of Jones’ choreography, as in “The Bitch of Living” or “Totally Fucked,” is incredibly energetic – leaping of chairs and desks, jumping, spinning, chaotic flinging – and it feels somewhat dangerous. Mayer likes that.

“If the number feels safe, it’s not as exciting,” he says. “That said, we don’t take it to the point of injuries. Bill and I are constantly striving for the kids to push to the edge so it feels dangerous. Being careful in this show is only good in the scenes when you’re aware of how careful the characters need to be so they don’t transgress against the watchful eyes of adults. The story is all about transgression, but even then, `careful’ isn’t one of our watchwords. Au contraire. Try to be as risky as possible – emotionally, physically, musically.”

For the national tour of Spring Awakening, now at San Francisco’s Curran Theatre through Oct. 12, Mayer and his team scoured the country for fresh young performers, many of whom are making their professional debut.

“It’s tricky,” Mayer says. “We need the kids to deliver a professional show but still have the raw quality that is so important. The work is in some ways easier because they’re so close to who the characters are – they can relate.”

Undoubtedly, Spring Awakening will hit audiences young and old the way it continues to do on Broadway.

“I think what we love, all of us, is how bold the whole conceit of the show is and how brave it is for the performers to put themselves out there in such an extreme way,” Mayer says. “It pays off, and it’s personal. I ask for a deeply personal investment to be made in the song so that we almost get the sense of who the performers are as people through the song as opposed to just who their characters are. I feel like the audience can fall in love with these actors during this song as well as care about the characters’ journey. That’s why the audience gets so invested.”

One secret to the show’s success, something that took “weeks and weeks and weeks” to get right, according to Mayer, is the sound design.

“It’s very complex, and so much of the show is the band and the sound of the voices,” he says. “Once we got it right, you add in the audience response, and it’s completely not like any other show. It just isn’t.”

Spring Awakening continues through Oct. 12 at the Curran Theatre, 445 Geary St., San Francisco. Tickets are $30-$99. Call 415-512-7770 or visit www.shnsf.com or www.ticketmaster.com.

Members of the Spring Awakening creative team will take part in a free “In Conversation” onstage event from 2 to 3 p.m. Sunday, Sept. 7 at the Curran Theatre, 445 Geary St., San Francisco. The team will discuss the development of this Tony Award-winning show.

The event, moderated by Jesse McKinley of the New York Times, is in conjunction with opening night of the launch of the Spring Awakening national tour as part of the SHN/Best of Broadway season.

Seating is limited and available on a first-come, first-served basis. Visit www.shnsf.com for information.

In other Spring Awakening news, iTunes released yesterday a live, six-song album of songs from the show performed at the Apple Store in New York. Performers include composer Duncan Sheik, new Broadway cast member Hunter Parrish, and original cast members John Gallagher Jr. (a Tony winner) and Lauren Pritchard.

Read my breakdown of the Spring Awakening number “The Bitch of Living,” which originally appeared in the Aug. 31 Pink Section of the San Francisco Chronicle: www.sfgate.com.

If the name Tom Hulce sounds familiar, it’s probably not because he’s one of the Tony Award-winning producers of the musical Spring Awakening. He rings that familiarity bell because he has one of the world’s most famous giggles. In 1984, he played Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart in the movie Amadeus and received an Oscar nomination. Or, perhaps the less cultured among us remember him as Pinto in Animal House.

Hulce, 54, still acts occasionally but he’s more of a producer these days. While producing the 2004 movie A Home at the End of the World, Hulce discovered that his director, Michael Mayer, and the soundtrack composer, Duncan Sheik, were working on a musical adaptation of a controversial German play called Spring Awakening with writer Steven Sater.

Hulce agreed to join the team as a producer, and that decision led him to the 2007 Tony Awards.

Did that night at the Tonys remind you of being at the Academy Awards?

Tom Hulce: They were similar evenings because they were both oddly friendly and fun – I think because so many people from each project were nominated for their work. And here’s the funny thing. Amadeus was nominated for 11 awards and won eight. Spring Awakening was nominated for 11 awards and won eight.

What do you think that means?

Hulce: I’ve been extremely lucky. That’s what it means.

Why do you think Spring Awakening, which is essentially a late 19^th-century teenage drama infused with a 21^st-century pop-rock concert, has been such a huge hit?

Hulce: There is universality in the subject matter and this time in everyone’s life. Whether you’re 15 or 70p, a parent or a child, the show offers a different point of entry, a point of connection to the story. By the end of the evening, this commonality of experience accumulates so that everyone becomes one by the end. There’s something so satisfying about that. And then there’s the fact that the musical moments created by Duncan and Steven allow a kind of articulation and exhilaration that isn’t available in the real world of the story. There’s a kind of guilty joy in witnessing those kinds of moments. Duncan’s music is so amazingly melodic and Steven’s words are so poetic that you can really sense the darker moments underneath.

Is it inevitable that there will be a Spring Awakening movie musical?

Hulce: The negotiations are ongoing for the film version. It’s such an interesting prospect because everything that is so essential and unique about the musical is theatrical, about being in the room with the young people and feeling the excitement when they pull a microphone out of their school uniform. It’s interesting to talk about a cinematic equivalent.

The national tour of Spring Awakening launches in San Francisco with two leads from replacement casts on Broadway. How hard was it to cast the tour?

Hulce: Because people know what Spring Awakening is now, unlike when we started, we had interest from all over the country and assembled an incredible cast. We’re in love with this cast. And we have more casting to do because we have productions coming in London, Germany, Tokyo, Seoul – all these very different cultures around the world finding something so compelling about the story. This is so far beyond what I would have dared to dream.

For information about the Spring Awakening tour at the Curran Theatre, running through Oct. 12, visit www.shnsf.com.

Duncan Sheik (left) and Steven Sater say they hope to open their new musical, The Nightingale, at American Conservatory Theater. Photo by Bryan Bedder/Getty Images

Could San Francisco be the starting point for the follow-up to Spring Awakening?

If Tony Award-winning creators Duncan Sheik and Steven Sater have anything to say about it, The Nightingale, their follow-up to the mega-hit musical Spring Awakening, will make its debut at the American Conservatory Theater in the near future.

In a recent phone interview, Sheik said that when he’s in town for the official launch of the Spring Awakening national tour in early September, he and Sater hope to sit down with ACT artistic director Carey Perloff.

“We really want to get down to brass tacks in terms of a schedule and a plan,” Sheik said. “I’m so crossing my fingers that we do the show in that theater. That’s been a dream of mine and Steven’s since we saw The Black Rider there. Love that space, love the ACT team. What better place to begin The Nightingale, this fairy tale of mythical China?”

Sater also confirmed the discussion with ACT: “We are in serious conversation with them,” he said. “I’m very hopeful of bringing Nightingale there sometime next year.’

Perloff said in a statement that The Nightingale has been a dream project for Sheik and Sater for many years, and they have “longed to see it born at ACT.” To that end, ACT, in association with Martin McCallum, produced a major New York workshop of The Nightingale in November last year in after which the writers continued working through rewrites and maintaining an open dialogue with ACT.

“After last year’s workshop, they did a major rewrite, coming up with a gorgeous, streamlined and deeply moving version of Hans Christian Andersen’s magical tale,” Perloff said. “We very much hope to realize this new musical as part of our 2009-10 Season. Like Fool Moon, Shockheaded Peter and other cross-generational pieces ACT has produced, this should be a huge event for the whole Bay Area.”

The Spring Awakening tour, part of the SHN/Best of Broadway season, opens Sept. 4 at the Curran Theatre. Visit www.shnsf.com for information.

We here at TheaterDogs are about to kick into high gear with Spring Awakening, which officially kicks off its national tour (after a “preview” run in San Diego) Sept. 4 (official opening night is Sunday, Sept. 7) at the Curran Theatre.

In the next couple weeks, you can expect interviews with composer Duncan Sheik, lyricist/book writer Steven Sater, director Michael Mayer, producer Tom Hulce and choreographer Bill T. Jones.

To kick things off, you should check out the podcast interview with Mayer on the SHN/Best of Broadway Web site here: http://shnsf.com/podcast/index.asp

You can subscribe to SHN’s podcasts here: http://shnsf.com/podcast/podcasts_rss.asp

Now here’s a glimpse of the touring cast as they prepare for performances in San Diego:

For ticket information visit www.shnsf.com.

If you’re a fan of Showtime’s “Weeds,” as I have been since the series debuted four seasons ago, you’re probably quite aware of the emergence of Hunter Parrish (right, photo by Joan Marcus), who plays elder son Silas Botwin, as one of the show’s more intriguing characters.

This season Silas a) discovered the gym b) discovered a disdain for shirts c) began an affair with a much older woman and d) became a man in more ways than just the physical. In short, Silas has had a fantastic season (as has the show itself). And Parrish, a 19-year-old Virginia native, isn’t having such a bad year either. Last week he joined the cast of Broadway’s Spring Awakening in the leading role of Melchior Gabor.

He was supposed to join the cast next week, but he was ready to go, so he made his Broadway debut a week early. I had a phone interview with Spring Awakening producer Tom Hulce last week, and he mentioned just how amazing he thought Parrish was. “Hunter is going to surprise a lot of people, especially with that voice,” Hulce said.

Parrish talks about his theater geekness with New York magazine here

Broadway.com has a good video of Parrish in rehearsal here. Parrish’s voice is a nice surprise.

And now here’s a video of Parrish discussing his Spring Awakening experience.

Visit the official Spring Awakening site here.
For tickets to the launch of Spring Awakening’s national tour in San Francisco, click here.

Tickets for the launch of the Spring Awakening national tour go on sale Sunday, July 20.

The tour of the eight-time Tony Award-winning rock musical by Duncan Sheik and Steven Sater kicks off at San Francisco’s Curran Theatre Sept. 4 through Oct. 12 as part of the SHN/Best of Broadway series.

Tickets will range in price from $30 to $99 and beginning Sunday, July 20, can be purchased online at www.shnsf.com, through Ticketmaster by calling 415-512-7770 and at all Ticketmaster Ticket Centers. On Monday, July 21 tickets will also be available at the Orpheum Theatre Box Office (1192 Market St., Mon-Sat 10am – 6pm).

Here’s the performance schedule:
8 p.m. Tuesdays–Fridays; 2 and 8 p.m. Saturdays; 1 and 6 p.m. Sundays. Added performance Sunday, Sept. 7 at 6:30 p.m. and Wednesday, Oct. 8 at 2 p.m.
No performance Sunday, Sept. 7 at 1 p.m.

The tour will star Canadian pop star Kyle Riabko as Melchior Gabor. He’s currently doing the show on Broadway. Here’s an intro to Riabko. Keep in mind some fan literally filmed his/her television to get this footage (thanks, fan!), so the quality is not great.

The national tour of the Tony Award-winning Duncan Sheik-Steven Sater musical Spring Awakening is growing ever closer. Performances begin Sept. 4 at San Francisco’s Curran Theatre as part of the SHN/Best of Broadway season, and though that will be here before we know it, here’s a little casting news to fill the void.

Current Broadway SA cast members Kyle Riabko (Melchior Gabor), far right, and Blake Bashoff (Moritz Steiffel) will depart the New York cast to reprise their roles on tour.

Stepping into the role of Melchior on Broadway will be Hunter Parrish, right, who’s best known as Silas on Showtime’s “Weeds.”

For information about the San Francisco stop of the tour, visit www.shnsf.com or visit the official Spring Awakening site: www.springawakening.com

Here’s a little video action from the Spring Awakening kids.

News of Broadway just because:

The revival of A Chorus Line will close Aug. 17 after 759 performances. The production, which had its premiere in San Francisco before heading to Broadway, recouped its costs in only 19 weeks.

Fans shouldn’t mourn. The touring production lives on and will play July 8-27 at San Francisco’s Curran Theatre as part of the SHN/Best of Broadway season. Visit www.shnsf.com for information.

And because they’re still adorable, here are the kids from Spring Awakening performing a medley from the show on “Good Morning America” last March. It’s also a chance to say goodbye to Jonathan Groff and Lea Michele who have since departed the show (Groff is starring in Hair in Central Park this summer). Please appreciate the re-working of “Totally Fucked” for television broadcast.

Remember the national tour of Spring Awakening kicks off in San Francisco Sept. 4 at the Curran. Click here for information.