CAROUSEL w/ Juan A. Ramírez

Summary

Broadway Breakdown — "CAROUSEL" w/ Juan A. Ramírez

Air Date: December 28, 2023
Host: Matt Koplik
Guest: Juan A. Ramírez (theater critic/writer: Theatrely, NY Times)

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EPISODE OVERVIEW

This episode of Broadway Breakdown dives deeply into Rodgers & Hammerstein's Carousel—long Matt Koplik’s favorite musical, and a show frequently debated for its problematic, or at least challenging, subject matter. Matt and critic Juan A. Ramírez go deep on Carousel’s reputation, its place in Broadway history, and the nuances of its narrative, with special attention to how different productions (especially the lauded 1994 Lincoln Center revival and the controversial 2018 revival) have shaped its legacy. The conversation is as passionate as it is explicit, brimming with musical theater nerdery, sharp cultural critique, and plenty of four-letter words.

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KEY DISCUSSION POINTS & INSIGHTS

1. Why Carousel? The “Problematic” Series

• The episode opens with Matt describing this series as tackling shows “you’re mad at”—the ones now labeled problematic for their dated or controversial attitudes (04:05).
• Matt: “I think it’s the most misunderstood…people blatantly ignore so many nuances in the material in favor of one line out of context” (04:37).
• Juan shares he was “born to talk about Carousel,” and they bond over researching every extant production before recording (05:24).

2. First Encounters & Personal Faves

• Juan recounts seeing his first Carousel during NYC Pride—recounting entering as a neophyte and being overwhelmed to tears by the score and performance, even if the production had flaws (07:40).
• Matt’s gateway was the movie, but his obsession was rooted in the 1994 Lincoln Center revival. He hails it as “the greatest thing to happen to Broadway since air conditioning” (04:02).
• Both remark on the intensity and sexuality of the 1994 production compared to subsequent ones (09:48, 18:26, 19:41).

3. Defining “Problematic” in Theater

• Matt: “There’s a difference between what a character says and does and what a show says and does. Just because one character says something doesn’t mean the show believes it” (05:12).
• Juan: “It’s not necessarily defending…I’ll say this for the show. I love the messiness…the unsettled feeling it gives me” (28:21).

4. Plot, Adaptation, and Themes

• Juan gives a comprehensive, irreverent plot summary (21:44–25:42): “The plot is set in a quaint fishing village...there’s a sexy carnival barker…they get to getting on in a lovely nine, ten minute bench sequence…”
• Discussion of Liliom, the source play, which Matt characterizes as “not about redemption” and much bleaker: “Molnar [the playwright] literally being like, toxic masculinity is a killer, people…Oscar Hammerstein was a bit more of an optimist…” (25:57–26:55).

5. The “Infamous Line” and Domestic Abuse

• They discuss the notorious line (from both Molnar and Hammerstein): Julie: “It is possible for someone to hit you—not hurt at all.” (28:55)
• Matt: “Carousel is about, ultimately, redemption...Billy at first denies the chance to go back. He’s told he’s not in heaven, he’s in the backyard of heaven” (29:30).
• The hosts are adamant the show doesn’t condone Billy’s abuse; rather, it’s about complicated emotional realities and longing for closure: “If the show condoned domestic violence, it would end with Billy alive, married to Julie...” (26:55).

6. 2018 vs. 1994: Modern Approaches

• Juan describes why he loved the 2018 revival (and Jesse Mueller as Julie), emphasizing the “cosmic fatality” and “horniness” (09:16).
• Matt critiques the 2018 revival for letting the actors be in “different versions of Carousel,” and for missing emotional intimacy (10:18), but credits Jesse Mueller’s subtlety and “wisdom in her eyes.”
• Detailed takedown of critiques, what each revival cut, and how different directors handled tone, sexuality, and class (10:58, 18:26, 19:45, 84:21).

7. Class, Setting, and Tennessee Williams in Maine

• Matt likens Carousel to “Tennessee Williams…these are working class, messy people” (14:39).
• The episode traces Hammerstein’s Americana worldview—how moving the story from Hungary to Maine made it resonate with American sensibilities and allowed for optimism rather than existential fatalism (51:56–52:46).

8. The Bench Scene and Song Structure

• Deep dive into the famous bench scene (“If I Loved You”), praising its unique non-duet structure: “Julian and Billy are never really on the same page…pride and stubbornness keep them from singing at the same time” (112:07).
• Matt: “It’s what they share…and what makes it so sexual and exciting. I’m not going first—you go first. You go first!” (112:09).
• Praise for the 94 staging and how staging choices can transform the meaning of a moment (89:39).

9. Supporting Roles and Sondheim’s Heir

• The richness of female supporting roles: "We have four, five if we count Louise, but I don’t totally...four female roles that are so vastly different and all insanely actable" (107:05).
• Audra McDonald’s legendary take on Carrie and the song “When The Children Are Asleep” are singled out for subverting “comedic fodder” and revealing the toxicity of acceptable relationships (107:23–109:06).

10. Performers, Casting, and What Makes a Great Billy & Julie

• Discussion of various Julies (Jessie Mueller, Kelli O’Hara, Sally Murphy), Billys (Michael Hayden, Josh Henry), and why “unknowns” often bring the best result (121:11, 121:53).
• The role requires acting over “booming” singing, and must capture both the sexual aggression and childlike vulnerability of Billy.
• Juan: “Who would you cast now?” Both struggle to name young performers, gravitating toward the idea that a new “unknowns” cast (as in 1994) would be best (115:44–121:22).

11. Sex & Horniness as Core Themes

• Both agree the show is “about death and sex drives”—"Lead with lust,” Juan says about how he'd direct (140:01).
• Matt: “Sex is weird…hot…confusing…sweaty…when you’re doing it, you’re like, no better feeling. And that’s Carousel” (158:02).

12. Modern Sensibilities, “Anthem Musicals,” and Why Carousel Endures

• Matt laments the current trend toward “anthem musicals” where every song is meant to validate the listener's worldview (94:31): “That’s not what Carousel is. And honestly, not what the best musicals are.”
• Both argue musicals need to be about “problems”—art isn’t just for comfort, it’s for complexity:
  • Juan: “Art should be about problems—of the heart, of the soul, of destiny. That’s what I want explored” (156:45).
  • Matt: “You need both. I don’t think Carousel is problematic—I think it’s about problems, and it’s uncomfortable” (156:57).

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MEMORABLE QUOTES & MOMENTS

• Opening Salvo:
  “Censors? Fuck, no. I say cunt every five seconds. Hello, all you theater lovers, both out and proud and on the DL…” —Matt (00:42)
• “2018 was my introduction [to Carousel]…I did not stop crying from beginning to end.” —Juan (07:41)
• "2018 was my intro…Maybe I wasn’t a Joshua Henry fan…maybe it was just the Ben Brantley review—which is such a rave.” —Juan (07:14)
• "The 94 one is extraordinarily horny. When he straddles the horse head and has his fucking dick in her face, I’m like, that is this show in a nutshell. Literally.” —Matt (18:26)
• "Evita is a good musical? Find me the nuance in the lyrics of Evita.” —Matt (16:44)
• “If I Loved You is so fascinating because…Julia and Billy are never really on the same page…It’s what keeps them from singing at the same time.” —Matt (112:07)
• “Art should be problematic…not in the sense of ‘the book is bad,’ but because I want art to have more than one idea in its head…and the conflict is what drives it.” —Juan (157:03)
• "It feels very adult in that way. It fucks like a grown-up.” —Matt (158:01)

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TIMESTAMPS FOR MAJOR SECTIONS

• Theme Introduction / Problematic Musicals Series: 04:05–05:24
• Personal Encounters — Falling in Love with CAROUSEL: 07:40–11:56
• Plot, Source, and ‘Liliom’ Origins: 21:44–25:57
• ‘The Line’: Domestic Violence, Condemnation, and Misunderstanding: 26:55–33:43
• Horniness/Sexual Energy in Staging: 09:48–10:15, 18:26, 140:01
• Revival Reviews—2018 vs. 1994 vs. Movie: 09:16–20:20, 84:21–85:41
• Bench Scene Deep Dive: 76:51–92:31; esp. 89:39–91:16 for the 94 version’s staging
• Songs, Supporting Characters, & Structure: 63:16–66:52, 107:23–110:08
• Casting: Now & Then: 121:11–125:18
• Carnival/The Merry-Go-Round of Life: 160:21–160:38

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FINAL REFLECTIONS

Is Carousel “problematic”?

• Both Matt and Juan ultimately find the term inadequate and reductive. The show, they argue, is about messy, deeply human problems—abuse, trauma, sex, dissatisfaction, and the desperate hope for redemption. It’s uncomfortable, but essential.
• “I do not think it has aged poorly. I think, if anything, it has grown to give us opportunities to make it better.” —Juan (155:37)
• “It’s not Carousel’s fault that these people exist in the world.” —Matt (157:36)

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CLOSING FUN

If they could restage Carousel?

• They’d cast unknowns (“Look at Steppenwolf, look at Juilliard,” 121:11).
• “Lead with lust, impulse, and the mess of being alive”—that’s the directorial line (140:01).
• Multiple ideas for immersive or site-specific stagings.
• What the hosts want most from the show: emotional honesty, sexual tension, and actors who can “bleed” onstage, not just sing beautifully.

Outro Song: Patti LuPone, “As Long as He Needs Me” (from Oliver!) — “She’s just yelling!” (163:17)

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SUMMARY IN A SENTENCE

This episode is a bracing, affectionate, and delightfully filthy defense of Carousel as a messy masterpiece about lust, trauma, and redemption—arguing for musicals that reflect the real, often ugly, complications of human lives.

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For more Broadway Breakdown:
https://bwaybreakdown.substack.com

Transcript

[A]

Sam, do we have sensors on this?

[B]

Sensors? Fuck, no. I say cunt every five seconds. Okay. Hello, all you theater lovers, both out and proud and on the deal. And welcome back to Broadway Breakdown, a podcast discussing the history and legacy of American theater's most exclusive address, Broadway. This series is called Problematic question mark, covering shows that you're mad at and their possible redemptions. I am your host, Matt Koplik, the least famous and most opinionated of all the Broadway podcast hosts. And with me today is a scholar, a writer. You know his work from theaterly, the New York Times. You might have seen him on TV with me talking about Sondheim, where I was told online that I was nothing but a young queen with measles with meager biceps. That was. That was a fun day. That post eventually got deleted, but it was there. It was there long enough for me to read it.

[A]

Hi, thank you for leading with.

[B]

And here's someone, but the other gay who did not have meager biceps. Juan Ramirez.

[A]

Hi, everyone. Thank you for leading with scholar. Did someone DM you that, or was that a YouTube comment that you found?

[B]

It was on Talking Broadway.

[A]

It was because you're in the chats.

[B]

No.

[A]

So on the boards, I go on.

[B]

So I go on. I read Broadway World every day because it's so funny.

[A]

Sure.

[B]

Just like the people who claim to have knowledge. I'm like, girl, you don't know shit. You are vision boarding this right now and pretending that it's real. And then Talkin Broadway tends to be a little more accurate. But also, Talking Broadway is just a mess of a site in terms of how it's structured. So I don't go on it a lot, but after our episode dropped, I just. I know. For some reason, I was like, you know what? Let me check out Talkin Broadway to see if there's any news today. And at the very top was theater. All the moving parts. Yuck. And it ended up being this, like, long chain that got deleted after 24 hours. And I don't know what it was that got it deleted, because all the things I read were, like, so hateful. I was like, what was the comment that got this thing deleted? His meager biceps.

[A]

Do you still do theater Twitter? Like, is that a thing that you engage with?

[B]

Theater Twitter? Yeah. Oh, I don't have anything.

[A]

Oh, okay. Good for you. I'm basically the same. Yeah.

[B]

The good thing from that episode was we both got screen time.

[A]

We both.

[B]

We both have faces for cameras. Sure hope I got to meet you. And I think you're Lovely. And you agreed to come on this podcast today?

[A]

I sure did. For listeners at home. He DM me and was like, hey, I have this podcast. I'm doing a thing on problematic shows. Which one? I blacked out and all I saw was a halo. Around the World Carousel. Little did I know that it was your all time favorite show.

[B]

It was my all time favorite show. Yeah.

[A]

I was kind of scared when you said that. I was like, oh, no, let me just do it. What else did I say I could do?

[B]

You listed a couple. No, it is my favorite. You're also forgetting all the sexual favors I offered you if you came on the podcast. But I think that's because you just went straight away and you're like, you don't need to do that. I'll just talk about Carousel.

[A]

Well, okay, sure. We'll just ignore the zipper sound at the top of the podcast.

[B]

No. Yeah. So Carousel is an episode that my. I don't like to say. My listeners, I feel like I sound like Khloe Kardashian.

[A]

My listeners just say, those wonderful people out there.

[B]

Out there in the dark. Yeah. I say the people who listen to the podcast, usually who choose to people.

[A]

Of podcast of this podcast listening experience.

[B]

The people who decide to listen to this for some reason, they have listened for many a time. Now every time I bring up Carousel and specifically the 1994 Lincoln center production, which I consider to be the greatest thing to happen at Broadway since air conditioning.

[A]

The West End. Take notice.

[B]

It did. It did come from the West End. But the. They've all been like, when are you gonna cover it? I was like, it's gonna be a nine hour podcast. It's gotta be someone. Q And I eventually decided on this series theme because I'm sure you've seen it, but people on online discourse just going on about shows they don't like or have issues with calling it problematic. Because we've discussed this in our opening episode of the Prom, Patrick Pacheco actually was on who was talking to me about this. He was like, I feel like problematic should be described about shows that don't work. Like a Merrily or a Candide.

[A]

Sure.

[B]

Like there are problem shows, you keep trying to fix them and they never fully gel. I was like, yeah, Patrick, but that's not how people are using it anymore. It's about shows that they find to be morally reprehensible or have bad whatever. And that is what the series is about. And I could not talk about Carousel because it is sort of the ultimate golden age musical that people gravitate towards about that. And I think it's the most misunderstood in that respect. I think a lot of people blatantly ignore so many nuances of the material in favor of one line out of context and not talking about what that line is actually about.

[A]

Sure.

[B]

Or they see a bad production or whatever. And as I also talked with Ali, like, there's a difference between what a character says and does and what a show says and does. Just because one character says something doesn't mean the show believes it.

[A]

Sure.

[B]

And I think this is a prime example of that. So we're here and we're at it. And when everyone I reached out to all was like, I would love to talk about Carousel with you, but you were the only one who said, and I quote, when I tell you, Matt, I was born to talk about Carousel. I was like, okay, she confident. She's unzipped and confident.

[A]

I see something, I want it.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Okay. I mean, that's crazy. I'm glad I beat the rest of them.

[B]

You did.

[A]

I might have given you a. They might have been the ones to see all those productions that, you know, but I did it. I. You sent me into the stars and back with this research because I've seen literally everything at this point related to Carousel.

[B]

Well, I also told you you didn't have to look through all of it. I just said, hey, but I.

[A]

But you know what? Imagine me coming on here unprepared. Also.

[B]

Wait, what is this let's on time episode?

[A]

Do you say Carousel or Carousel? Because I've noticed that I put the emphasis on the second.

[B]

I think. I think I say Carousel. Carousel. Carousel. Carousel. Sure. I think. Yeah, I do. Like a little.

[A]

We'll give. We'll give the listeners whatever they want. Diversity in that.

[B]

Okay. Yeah, we love diversity.

[A]

So, Juan, that's the diversity pronunciation.

[B]

Juan. That's my Rachel Zegler impression, You know, when I play the role of Maria. What was your introduction to Carousel? How did it come into your life?

[A]

Okay, so I was living in Boston and taking the train with my friends for what they thought would be sort of like a fun, debaucherous weekend in New York.

[B]

Mm.

[A]

And not that it wasn't, but they never accounted for the fact that I would be, like, buying tickets to two or three shows and rushing two others. So I'll be seeing, you know, like, on shows that have, like, Sunday and evening performances, it would truly be just like that. Couldn't tell you what drew me to Carousel. Maybe I wasn't a Joshua Henry fan. At that point, I was not a Jesse Mueller. Stan. At that point.

[B]

I don't know.

[A]

Maybe it was just the Ben Brantley review, which is such a rave. I read it earlier this morning.

[B]

It was a half rave. Yes.

[A]

He says it's a half terrific.

[B]

Half terrific.

[A]

But he just says the second act doesn't work, which is maybe never going to.

[B]

I disagree with him, but we'll talk about that when we get to this revival.

[A]

I can see his point. Anyway, I went alone. It was Amber Pride. Because I have little the Rainbow Playbill, which I love. The Blade will not the rainbow of it all.

[B]

Although. Sure.

[A]

Although that. You know, it's.

[B]

You love a good rainbow.

[A]

It's colorful. Oh, my God. I. When I tell you that I walked in and I did not stop crying from beginning to end. It was so beautiful. It was my first introduction to the material. So I'm sure I. You know, this is the only allowance I'll give to my being wrong on this revival. I'm sure. But I'll say this. Since it was my intro, I'm sure I glanced over any takes. Any directorial or, you know, it was your advances. So I was just sort of gagged about the whole thing in general.

[B]

There's also a lot that you don't know is cut. Sure.

[A]

But I'd never. I didn't feel anything was missing. And also mean the orchestrations. I do think maybe you're not the universe, but I think it's universally accepted that that's like. That is such a good. Well orchestrated. Oh, yeah. No, sounds gorgeous. The singing was beautiful.

[B]

The music on that production were not my issues. The orchestra was very well orchestrated. My only issue on the music side of that production was just. I thought that the dynamics weren't quite there. I wanted a little more intimacy on certain moments. It was when it was brash. I was. And intentionally so. I was super into it. Like, I thought the orchestra sounded phenomenal on the waltz. I loved the dance arrangements, all the big choral stuff. There were certain moments, like in if I Loved you'd and what's the Use of Wonder? I'm like, I think we can go a little slower. I think we can go a little quieter. But that's just. That's also because, again, I come from the 94:1 where, like, acting was very much first on that. So the singing is a little simpler on that. But, like, I'm not mad. The whole cast, top to bottom, is like vocally gifted people. When you listen to vocally gifted people sing one of the greatest chorus of all time. You're not totally upset.

[A]

Right, Right. I love Jesse Mueller. And then like, sort of going back and seeing all these different productions recorded, you know, film ones, whatever. I do think hers is sort of the definitive Julie for me. I think she has a knowledge that the rest of them don't, or an awareness, a sort of. She's tapped into the cosmic fatality of it all, I think. And she's very. And she. And she is very horny as well. Maybe not as much as the 94 production, which. I saw it on YouTube. I saw it on YouTube.

[B]

The 94 one is extraordinarily horny. So, first of all, I am a Jesse Mueller fan. I did not love her in Carousel, but not because of her, because of direction. Here's why I agree with you. Jesse is so good at being knowledgeable, but not like, overt, where it's just sort of like the sadness and wiseness in someone's eyes. She's really good at sort of sitting there and you're being like, oh, you've lived a life.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Which is what makes her so right for Julie and what would have made.

[A]

Her right for Fanny Brice.

[B]

Yeah. Well, I'm sorry, do we want this podcast to be 10 hours? My. I also had an issue with that production where I just felt like everyone was in a different version of Carousel. Like, Lindsay Mendez was doing 1945. Jesse was doing 2018.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

Gemini was doing Steppenwolf. Henry was doing Carnegie Mellon. Renee Fleming was riffing. I was living. I also, like. I'm sorry, what's his face? The. The douchebag who played Jigger can't act worth a damn. So I was re. I also reread Brantley's review of that, where he's like, one of the greatest Broadway debuts I've seen in years. I'm like, are kidding me? Fag?

[A]

Yeah. We love you, Ben.

[B]

We love you.

[A]

Yeah, that was. I mean, he did it for me in that one. By the time that, like, all that happened after Unfurled and he was cast in west history, I was like, why are we keeping him around?

[B]

Yeah, I don't know why, but that's.

[A]

A 12 hour podcast.

[B]

Beautiful dancer, beautiful gowns. He dances beautifully. And I wish that I liked the choreography for Blow High, Blow Low. I don't think that's a number that necessarily needs dance. I don't think they needed to make a boat out of men in that. That's where it becomes a hasting party show. Because, again, Jigger Cragan is a Thief and a killer and a rapist. So I'm like, that's not a character who dances. There was a. There was a hornpipe in the 40s because the way the musicals were presented in the 40s, there were certain things that were expected. Even though Hammerstein and Rogers, like, we want to keep pushing the boundaries, they're like, some things we have to adhere to. Big production numbers do need dancing. And also, like, we have got Agnes de Mille. We promised her at least three dancers and dances, and we cut the Clam Bake Waltz, so we got to give her the hornpipe. Learned a lot today on. On the making of the original production. By the way, for this episode, I.

[A]

Will have questions because I feel like you've actually read the books. I've only.

[B]

Oh, sure have.

[A]

I've only been on the Wikipedia, which then, like, cites something, and it's, you know, like a Cincinnati inquirer article from 35 that you can never access.

[B]

Yeah, it's. I've. I've read a whole bunch on this. I know a lot about it, and some things are going to come out of my mind, but I have notes. Carousel came into my head, actually. The movie version first, which, as much as I do hate the 2018 revival, what I hate more is the movie. And we'll. We'll go into that as well. 2018 revival actually took note from the movie of starting in heaven and then going to Earth. But in the movie, it's like, it's in heaven already because Billy's dead. And they're like, Billy, it's been 15 years. Got to go back to Earth. And, like, tell us about this Carousel you worked on. He was like, well, it all started when. And then they go back, and I'm like, oh, fuck that. What? I will give the 2018. I'll say props, but I will be like, I see what you're trying to do. Whether it's successful is up to the person. But it was Jack o' Brien being like, we spend two hours earthbound, and then someone from heaven shows up, and it's a little bit of a. What he's like, so maybe we open on Heaven. So even if we don't come back to this for another two hours, the audience is aware that it's in the world of the show that, like, we are gonna go between the two realms. I get that. I'm not super angry about it. I think if I liked the set for it more and it didn't look like one giant cardboard cutout of a star, I'D be okay. But also, I don't know. I think I'm just a hateful twat.

[A]

Um, you might be. The jury's out. The. You know, the grand jury's out on that. I. It worked for me. I like the idea of this being sort of this. I mean, God, not to let the poster or something indicate how you're gonna feel about it, but even the, you know, the sort of Grecian urn, like, icon of. You know, the poster design for the 2018 production is so beautiful. The stars of it all. I just love the idea that this is like a story. Sort of like that show at the Walter Kerr, which I won't name and I'll never see again. It's like, if we're gonna do a story about, I don't know, you hated.

[B]

Bruce Springsteen so much.

[A]

Is that where he was?

[B]

Yeah, that's where he was.

[A]

They cleared out, like, for the post Covid one. No. What?

[B]

No, no, that's. Oh, he came back after Covid.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

Oh, Is that the St. James? No, he. He did. He did his pre Covid show at the Cur.

[A]

At the Kerr. Okay, got it. That's a carousel. Rick. I. Yeah. If we're gonna do a story about a story that we tell, and it's, like, faded, and it just felt very, very apt. I loved it. Yeah.

[B]

There are many ways.

[A]

And that also influenced how I felt about ballet and why. I guess, not having seen this production for us, I would be like, why is there so much ballet movement in this sort of, like, rough main sea town?

[B]

And that's the thing is, like, I don't care exactly what style of dance you do, as long as it sprouts from character and story. And Peck, God bless.

[A]

That felt like a ballet.

[B]

It was very ballet, everyone. Because this is. This is a show about working class people. The thing I always tell people is Carousel is Tennessee Williams.

[A]

Sure.

[B]

Like, if some. Oh, wow.

[A]

I would love just, like, a sweaty carousel.

[B]

Well, okay. I know you watched the bootleg. I'm gonna take your hand. I'm gonna drag you to the library. We're gonna watch the 94:1 together. You. You see the sweat on the bottom.

[A]

Sweaty.

[B]

Okay. Yeah. And you see the set, but isn't.

[A]

It so inherently just, like, blue and Maine and, you know, rocks?

[B]

The set is blue for sure. They're like, the character. The actors are all sw. Because the show begins in, like, late March, early April, and then goes into June, obviously. So, like. Yeah, there's. There's sweat on them. They're they're these, they're the 9401 definitely leaned into that. They're messy. These are working class, messy people. For a while I've been saying to me, the best Rodgers and Hammerstein shows are Tennessee Williams. Sondheim is kind of Edward Albee esque. Herman is sort of like Wilder, not just because of Dolly, but that sort of hope for humanity and lightness. Andrew Lloyd Webber is, you know, a.

[A]

Popper, but yeah, a single. Like a single sniff of poppers or. What do you mean he's a single?

[B]

So here's where we're gonna get graphic. Sorry, everybody, but I'm not eating on the podcast anymore. So take your wins. Andrew Lloyd Webber is sort of the musical equivalent of you, as the audience are a fairly untrained bottom. And he gives you one whiff of a popper before just entering.

[A]

And what's the one whiff for you?

[B]

The one whiff would be the half of a verse of Heaven on their minds. And then the entering is Jesus. So it's. My mind is clearer now. At last. All too well.

[A]

Okay, so you think he's forceful, you think he's.

[B]

Yes, and sometimes it works. I've said before as well, I love nothing more than a coked out of her mind. 30 year old Patti LuPone belting Evita.

[A]

Correct.

[B]

Leaving her vagina on the floor. Yeah, it's the kind of.

[A]

For us to mop.

[B]

Absolutely. And she literally turns around, she goes, you clean that up. And then she walks away. I don't think Evita is a good musical, but I think it can be a thrilling one if you lean into that like Dynasty meets Gypsy element.

[A]

Oh my God. Yeah.

[B]

But like that, like, it's why, like when certain people like, well, I want to go into the nuance. I'm like, find me the nuance in the lyrics of Evita.

[A]

No, you don't. Which is why if this Sammy Kennel revival actually materializes in New York again, we'll have an issue.

[B]

I mean, it hasn't made it back this so far.

[A]

It's inching closer.

[B]

It is inching closer. And I will give her credit, unlike Angela Weber, she understands the importance of inching closer rather than just jamming it in. That is where Sammy. That's where Sammy is an ally right up. Moving on. So I watched the movie first as a kid. Hated it. And then I got the 94 cast recording as a kid and it has this amazing booklet of all these photos of the gorgeous set. And I'm just like, what the fuck is this? Show lost it, found it again in college. Felt I fell back in love with the score and those performances. Got to go to the library to watch. It was like, Jesus Christ. I've never seen anything as amazing as this, where it's just like. And. And that was a show where Heitner cast Juilliard actors and Steppenwolf actors. So it was like, as good of an acting of any stage play I've ever seen. And. And it got flack at the time for not being sung in the way that, like, the last revival was sung. You watched like, I don't know. This is something pretty fucking. Well. Yeah. Especially like, there have been so many more vocal performances since that production that have been so garbage and some of which have won Tony awards that, like, we look back on that after hearing how maligned Michael Hayden was as Billy vocally, and you're like, yeah, no, he doesn't sound like John Ray, but he's not bad. No, he sings well enough. He's on pitch. Like, it's. What are we talking about? And his acting is fucking second to none. And he's sexy. He has sex on a goddamn stick when he straddles the horse head in front of Julie and has his fucking dick in her face. I'm like, that is this show in a nutshell. Literally. I digress.

[A]

And that was sort of doing like the 2019 Oklahoma of like, we're gonna make our big strong man just like a hot tonk, kinda.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

It's not burly Michael Hayden.

[B]

No. And it didn't work as well for me in Oklahoma.

[A]

Oh, I was.

[B]

No, I know.

[A]

I talk about mopping up the floor after.

[B]

I liked Oklahoma plenty. Minus, Minus. Minus the dream ballet where she had worms and was scratching her butt on the floor. But I did, though, I did like it. I liked it a lot. I liked it mostly in the book scene, specifically the auction with the. At the lunch baskets. Do you remember that?

[A]

Yes. Yes.

[B]

Just like Mary Testa controlling the whole room, being like, I'm not gonna show emotion. But just so you all know, I'm terrified.

[A]

All right. Boys revolt.

[B]

And Damon is just, you know, I. I enjoy him thoroughly. I wish he had gotten to do the show you don't want to talk about on Broadway. But no, Hayden was not burly. He. The way that they described when they were casting was like, we're looking for James Dean, who sings where it's a heartthrob, but it's not someone physically imposing. Like, he's beautiful in a, like, masculine way, but also it's that beauty that makes him broken. So when he's violent, it's not threatening. You're just like. You're just a little boy.

[A]

Right.

[B]

Which I think is what makes that production work so well, is we'll get into it, but Ree fell in love with it, Watched at the library. It's been my favorite ever since.

[A]

Is this still the intro?

[B]

No, we're just. The intro's gone.

[A]

Okay, okay.

[B]

Oh, girl, I walked away. No, but. So this is all to say, this is where we're at now. And the show has been on my mind forever, and I always have to defend it. And people will say, well, is the show great? Is the show truly great? If you all think this one production is the only one that works, I'm like, I don't think it's the only one that works. I just haven't seen a production since then that I think has trusted the script as much. And that's something we'll also talk about with 2018. And I know you said you didn't feel like a lot was missing when you saw it. I wonder, though, when we talk, if you'll be like, oh, I think that could have been there. Or maybe you'll stand on your ground. I don't know.

[A]

You would love it if I just, like, served it up that easily, but maybe it'll happen.

[B]

So I've heard you're easy. No. So I want to also give a shout out to Patrick Pacheco. He's always like, matt, your guests agree with you too much. So he's gonna be thrilled that Juan Ramirez is sitting here looking daggers in my face and going, try. Try to tell me that I'm wrong.

[A]

We'll fight. But I also think we both. I feel like even getting to the point. Well, I'm not gonna say Carousel is a universally not beloved musical, but the fact that we would care to speak of it so intently.

[B]

Absolutely.

[A]

It's not a musical I get to discuss often. It doesn't slay.

[B]

We're both coming from a place of people who enjoy the material, and I think that is.

[A]

Yes. And I really love diving into how I read Lilliam, which I hadn't. I thought I had read, and maybe I hadn't. I don't remember. Maybe I read pieces of it, extras of it. Read that. Read the book for the show again. And just like reading the lore, reading everything. And like, this rich text it is. And it's such an interesting little play have going on there.

[B]

Lilium is weird.

[A]

Yeah, it is.

[B]

A weird, weird play.

[A]

It's. Julie's a. Like, I'm not gonna say a. But she's rough in Lilliam. Oh, yeah, it's fun.

[B]

Well, because also, Lilliam's a twat.

[A]

Yeah, he's.

[B]

Yeah. So for those who don't know, because they haven't listened to my podcast before, my uncultured, as I like to call them, what is carousel about? 1.

[A]

Okay, so the plot is set in. Is there a time period in, like, turn of the century?

[B]

It's late 1800s.

[A]

Yeah, late 1800s.

[B]

Like 1880s, 1890s. Yeah.

[A]

A quaint, you know, fishing village, I guess.

[B]

Right. Sure.

[A]

You're looking at me like I'm gonna get it wrong, and I'm getting it wrong.

[B]

I'm looking at you, waiting for you to say the next sentence.

[A]

There's a carousel in town. Or maybe it's always there.

[B]

There's a traveling carnival that's, you know, in those days. Like, it wasn't like you came for a day and left. Like, they're there for a couple of months. They're there for spring through summer, and then they go during the winter.

[A]

Sure. And there's the sexy carnival barker there, Billy. Billy Bigelow, who, as we are, dropped into sort of the setting up of the carnival. We see how he commands so much attention. He has so much sex appeal. All the girls who work at the nearby factory are sort of staring at him, but so is the carnival owner, Mrs. Mullen. Ms. Mullen.

[B]

Mrs. Mullen.

[A]

Mrs. MullEN.

[B]

She's a widow.

[A]

Oh, okay. Yeah. You can't win them all. Mrs. Mullen sees Billy flirt with Julie Jordan, one of the girls who works at the factory, who's there with her friend Carrie Pipperidge. Thank you. Of the farm, kicks out. Billy Bigelow says, don't come back here if you're not gonna, you know, not touch this girl and not fuck me or whatever. So he then leaves the carnival. Julia says, no, I'll stay with you, even though Carrie tells her to leave and go home, because if she doesn't go home, then she'll lose her job, too. And then the two of them just get to getting on, basically in a lovely nine, ten minute bench sequence, as we call it. They fall in love and then things are rocky. He's very much a ruffian, and at one point he sort of flies into a fit of rage and hits her. And then that sort of changes the entire relationship dynamic. But they're still together. And then they find out she's pregnant. He freaks out about how he's gonna provide for this child, enters a sort of very stupid crime plan with this guy Jigger, who also, I think, works at the. Who's also a sailor at this.

[B]

Yeah, Jigger's a sailor.

[A]

Not also a sailor. A sailor. They're also sailors in this musical.

[B]

Also, I think I'm wrong.

[A]

Or longshore. What are they called?

[B]

Yeah, longshoremen.

[A]

But they even do that, because that sounds official. And these shucking oysters.

[B]

Yeah, she. Julie calls him a sailor. He's on a. He's on a ship that's in port. They. They come in frequently. Also, I'm wrong. The car. I think the carnival has always been there. It's a fairground. Billy is new to it because Billy comes from New York. They say that in the bench scene. Yeah. When the policeman and Mr. Bascom show up and. Because that's. That's another important detail. But, yeah, when they catch Julie and Billy together, and the policeman says, we've got a report on Billy over here. He comes from Coney Island. And Mr. Bascom says, oh, it's never dies in love. Never dies. Yet he. He. The phantom came in, and Billy's like, I'm out, right? And when he's like, I'm going as far away from this shit show as possible, I'm going to Maine. So, you know, I think Billy is new to this. To this situation, but the fairground has always been there.

[A]

Got it. Okay. So Billy and Jigger do the stupid crime. Billy is cornered. The climb does not work out. And instead of giving himself up, he kills himself.

[B]

We mentioned that Julie's pregnant, right? You said that.

[A]

Yes. He freaks out because he doesn't know how he's going to provide for the.

[B]

Child, for the bebe.

[A]

For the Bebe, who we learn is a daughter. Billy kills himself. The town is like, we told you, Julie. He was bad news. She cries. And then we go to heaven, where Billy is giving the opportunity to go back to Earth to sort of write one of his wrongs. He was back to Earth where 16 years or 16. 15. 16 years have now passed. He sees his daughter. He tries to give her a star that he stole from heaven to make it up. She's like, who are you? Leave me alone. He again flies into a fit of rage, slaps her, and he's not allowed to go back to heaven. Or is he?

[B]

He allows himself one more chance after that. Yes.

[A]

Oh, and that's how he goes to the school.

[B]

Lillium is. He hits her, and they're like, okay, so you go to hell now.

[A]

Right?

[B]

Okay. Carousel ends a little differently. And, well, unless it's the Regent's park open air production. But we don't have to get into that.

[A]

I would love to, but let's.

[B]

Well, I. Because I didn't see it. I only read about it and they're like, we. They talk about cuts, like, and just cuts left and right. So the main thing you need to remember with Lilliam and Carousel as we go into it, Lilliam is not about redemption. Lilliam is Molnar. Literally being like, toxic. Masculinity is a killer, people. If you're in an abusive relationship, get the fuck out or one of you is going to die. And, you know, awful people are awful people and they never get redeemed and everything sucks. And that's the end of Lillium. Oscar Hammerstein was a bit more of an optimist, and he was like, I like to believe that people can be better if we give them the chance. And if you ask for help, we can help you. So he ends it on a more hopeful note. It's still bittersweet. Billy is still dead. People always say that the show condones domestic violence. I'm like, if the show condoned domestic violence, it would end with Billy alive, married to Julie, with Louise hitting them both as the curtain came down and be like, you'll never walk alone. Well, that's.

[A]

You were talking about how things are problematic or not, and you said that, you know, there's a difference between what the show believes and what its characters believe. I don't. I agree with that. I don't not think the show itself is slightly problematic. I can't believe I'm saying this on a defending Carousel podcast.

[B]

It's not necessarily defending. I'm defending, but you can have whatever opinion you want.

[A]

But, okay, so, yes, he's given one more chance. I thought he was just sort of wandering about for a little bit after the star thing did not go through. No, he's given one more chance. And now we see his daughter at her high school graduation where she, this whole time has been sort of ostracized growing up, you know, like your single mother, your, you know, deadbeat dad, whatever. And as the school is sort of wrapping up its graduation, his presence just sort of fills her with this joy. As we hear the commencement speaker talk about how we're not, you know, our parents sins and how we should just, like, move forward and, you know, be ourselves and be our greatest selves. And as this is happening, he Sort of his spirit sort of moves her, and she rises, and the community finally embraces her. And then he, you know, goes by Julie, tells her, you know, I always truly loved you. And then she rises. They're all singing, you'll never Walk alone. The idea that it's like, oh, she is so now. She's now so much stronger because she has had to do. She has had to go through this, is true. And there is beauty to be had in that idea, but it's also like, oh, I don't know. It's just.

[B]

I. Okay, I love the.

[A]

I love the messiness of it. I love that. The unsettled feeling it gives me. I'll say that.

[B]

So it's so.

[A]

It makes me love it more. I guess it would be cleaner if it.

[B]

If he just got punished and went away.

[A]

No, I don't even get punished because that would be weird. Rereading Lilliam, which, by the way, is the Frederic Millar play that Carousel is based, on which Carousel is based.

[B]

He.

[A]

It really just sort of is. You know, on one page, he fails to give her the star. On the next page, it's like.

[B]

And you're in the flames.

[A]

Cover him.

[B]

Yeah. And. And. And the. The line that everyone hates from Carousel, which is in the show, which is in Lilium, is actually the final line of Lilium.

[A]

Yes. And it's insane.

[B]

And it's actually. It's worse than Lilium, because the line that people hate in Carousel is the. Is it possible for someone to hitchhit your heart? Not have. Not hurt at all. And Julie says it is possible for someone to hit you and not hurt at all. That's the line. And Lilium literally ends with, like, it is possible for someone to hit you and hit ya and hit ya and hit ya and not hurt at all, which is so much worse.

[A]

And then curtain, which is.

[B]

Yes. So, okay, I have talked about this on a previous episode of PJ Adzuma. So for everyone, I apologize for talking about it at length again, but this is the Carousel episode, so suck my dick.

[A]

They were looking for it.

[B]

Yeah. I honestly thought I was gonna have to wait much later to get to this moment, but I'll talk about it again, because what the flying again. Carousel is about ultimately, redemption. And Billy. We also have to remember, Billy at first denies the chance to go back. He's told he's in the. He's not even in heaven. He's in the backyard of heaven. They're like, you have the chance to go to heaven, you just haven't Done enough. Good. And the reason why is, like, you left Earth with the people who actually cared about you in a fucking mess.

[A]

Right?

[B]

Your wife was pregnant. She's a. She's an emotional disaster because of your relationship. Like, your daughter's gonna be the town, you know, outsider the fuck, dude.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And, like. And you're not gonna go back to try to fix it. And they're like, so think of something. And he first isn't gonna do it. And the whole reason why the ballet exists is to give him a face to put to the pain he's caused. He sees it, and he decides he's gonna do something about it. But it's still a little selfish because he's ultimately thinking about his own salvation. He's like, I don't want to go to hell. How do I not go to hell? And I do care about my daughter. So, yeah, he gives her the star. And when he's giving it to her, she freaks out because some dude she's never met is like, you know, I knew your dad here's a star. Like, I'd freak out, too.

[A]

I'm like, get the.

[B]

Away from me. Stranger danger. And he's thinking. All he's saying is, like, I can't go to hell. I can't go to. Like, she doesn't know what's at stake. And he knows what's at stake. And he's such a man child. And the Heavenly Friend even says to him, like, when things don't go your way, all you do is hit someone you love. Like the. Is wrong with you. And what I also love is in the 94, when they made the Heavenly friend a woman, which is some. Which is actually a callback to something Hammerstein wanted to do. And they ended up cutting. We'll talk about it. But it's Lauren Ward in 94, the original Violet and Ms. Honey. And she. She is cunt on toast in that role. I know. I love. I love it because when she first shows up after he kills himself and Nettie sings you'll Never Walk alone, and everyone's carrying his body away, there's darkness. And then Lauren Ward comes out in a, like, Amish attire, because the whole point of that production was like, oh, heaven's not warm. Like, we're judgy and. And we're puritanical. And she comes down, she looks at Michael Haynes, she goes, get up. She. Like, she does. She. She's like, I'm the one assigned the misogynist wife beater me. And so she's like, get the up. And she's like, you gotta get up. And he goes, well, am I going before God? She goes, why would you go before God, you little piss squeak?

[A]

And she does not say that.

[B]

No, but she. She does. She what? She.

[A]

You can fool me, is the thing.

[B]

What she. What she does say is, what have you ever done to go before him?

[A]

Right?

[B]

And she does. And she says it with the tone of like, the fuck God you in this economy. And then he. She brings him back to earth and meets Louise and the slap happens. And Julie sees Billy for half of a second before he, like, disappears. And Louise says the line of like, he hit me, but it didn't hurt. It was almost as if he had kissed my hand. Which is also from Lilliam. And people are like, oh, it's because he loved her. I'm like, no, it's because he's a ghost and he's translucent. Like it physically couldn't hurt her. He's a ghost, you fucking dumb. Dumb. I don't like the line. I think it's a bad line. I just think it's poorly written. I think bad poetry. But that's what it's saying. They're not saying, well, Billy loves his daughter, so she didn't feel like, no, he's fucking dead. He's from the beyond. That's why when Julie says it's possible for someone to hitch it, it's not the show saying, if someone loves you, it doesn't hurt. Billy needs to hear her say that.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Because he needs to finally put again a face to the pain he's caused. When they ask him about Julie up in the backyard of heaven, and they ask about the hitting, and he's like, I hit her once. I was not working. And he was in an emotionally devastated, depressed state. And we'll talk about depression, the character of Billy as well, because it's all. It's everywhere. This is gonna be nine hours. 1. Get ready, strap in. But you know, for 1890s America, where the man is supposed to provide and Billy doesn't know how because he has one trade and he's not doing it anymore. He's aware of what everyone thinks. He. He feels like a failure and disaster. The one person he has any, you know, power over in some way is Julie. And it's not even that because, like, she's smarter than he is. She's the only reason why there. She's still there is because she chooses to be, which is, you know, a bad decision on her part. But she's horny. And it's her decision, ultimately, that's sort of the. What makes Julia wonderful character is she's so smart, and she makes the stupidest decision of anyone in the show. And it's like, well, what brings her to that?

[A]

Right?

[B]

Great. Great. There again, Williams horniness. But he sees that. He sees that she has sort of become a shell of herself. And so it's actually one thing I did like about Jesse's performance and that revival is she also tapped into what Sally Murphy does, which is like, Julie, 16 years later, is not, like, young and vibrant like Carrie is. Even though Carrie's now had 20,000 children, like, Carrie still looks better than Julie does. Julie is so downtrodden. And what it ultimately is is, like, the pain and confusion and having no answers from her relationship with Billy. The one time she ever said I love you to him was over his dead body and she never heard it back. She has no closure from this moment of her life that had a lot of power and good to it. It gave her some happiness and sexual vibrancy. But she also caused. It caused her a lot of pain and no answers and all this shame and stigma. And so when we get. So when Billy sees that and he demands a little more time, the two things he finally does is he's like, I can't even think about myself anymore. Myself. Like, fuck that. He's like, my daughter is miserable. It's like she's got a whole life ahead of her. How do I. How do I help her? And he's like. And. And Julie also, like, the one person on earth who actually remembers me and still loves me somehow. Like, my daughter only has heard terrible things about me and she knows it's all true. What do I do? So what he does is with the power of being dead and being a ghost, where it's, like, spooky scary. He's like. He tells his daughter, just like, please just listen to this guy who's telling you to let go of the shame of me. Like, cut ties with me, cut loose of me and start. You know, and start walking on your own. And, like, also just embracing the community. Like, there are people around who care. Like, don't shut them out like I did. Just. Just not to sound corny and hammershound. You, like, hold your head up and, like, look around and when you need help, ask for it. Like, that's all he's doing. He's just giving her those tools so she can start being better than he was. And then the one thing he says to Julie is when he says, I loved you know that I loved you. It's the closure she needs so she can close that chapter and move on. And that is what he does, is he ultimately allows the people who remember him to not forget about him, but to move on from him. And that. And that is the one piece of good he does.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

And that is what gets. Ultimately gets him into heaven. And it's ironic because it's when he's finally no longer thinking about himself, but thinking about others. Now, is that effective for everyone? Maybe not. Because as we've gotten older and times have gotten shittier, it's harder to be optimistic about redemption, right?

[A]

Oh, I'm optimistic about redemption.

[B]

I'm not saying it's impossible. It's harder. I would say.

[A]

I just think that the daughter and Julie's emotional journeys. That he's the one to. To afford them. That is the thing that I'm a little. Huh. Okay. Sure. But, you know. And you know, I. Forgiven. Forgiving those who trespass them.

[B]

I guess as someone who would very much like closure from one particular person in his life and is pretty sure he's never gonna get it, I would. I think that it would help me a great deal.

[A]

Well, but.

[B]

But it's. But that lack of closure is what's keeping me thin, so. Okay, on that note, let's take a break. Billy, I beg to differ with you. How do you mean? You're the top. Yeah. You're an arrow collar. You're the top.

[A]

You're a Coolidge dollar.

[B]

You're the nimble tread of the feet of Fred. And we're back. How was your break, Juan?

[A]

Lovely. I got a couple deep breaths in.

[B]

Great. Fantastic. I went to a nice little clam bake. It was great.

[A]

How do you feel about that number? Because I feel like I hear people discussing it in such. What a joyous moment.

[B]

And I'm like, oh, I've never heard anyone say that.

[A]

Really?

[B]

Everyone I know who even. Even if they like the show, like, oh, cut that number. I am half and half. It is. It is definitely a welcome back from the bathroom number.

[A]

Yes, yes.

[B]

It's a little silly.

[A]

It also, the cast is sort of. The whole entire ensemble is sort of like lounging on these rocks.

[B]

I.

[A]

For me, rubbing their tummies. And, you know.

[B]

Yeah, I've never. I don't like it when people do the whole, like, golly gee whiz. Like, I think there's still a bit of not horniness, but, you know, it's like the little bit of calm. Right. Before the rest of the storm that is act two.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And it's. And I think if you have a good company and you're a good director, like, you create a tableau where you can sort of see dynamics with different people. It's like something I really love in the 94:1. I don't. Do they do it. I think they only did it in London with Joanna writing. But, like, Billy's head was in Julie's lap and, like, it was. It was. He. It was like the last time that he was actually, like, centered before everything went to shit. So it's those little details that I like. Does it do anything to move the story forward? Fuck, no.

[A]

Oh, I don't need that.

[B]

No.

[A]

Although today I learned. And this is so obvious, but that it was originally an Oklahoma. Song.

[B]

Yeah. It was called this Was a Real Nice Hayride.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And they. And they cut it and they put it in a carousel. Yeah, I learned that as well from the book Round in Circles A. Dude.

[A]

Thank you for your contributions. Dude.

[B]

Yeah, it was some British guy. The book came out last year and I bought it and I was like, I'll read this at some point. And I finally read it now, and the COVID is Joanna riding and Michael Hayden from the National Theater production, which is what transferred to Broadway in the 90s, of him putting her on the horse. And it's, like, very sexual and very dark. Like, her face is not. She looks a little bit like she's gonna get assaulted. Even though. Even though, like, her Julie very much is like, I want that dick so bad. If you go on Aurora's Spider Woman, he has the video of the prologue in London because, you know, Heitner being the British director, he was. And, you know, he had to plant this production that worked so well to Broadway. He was like, yeah, you know, the staging will be similar and the design will be similar. He's like. But, you know, actors are different. Like, give them all new things to do. So, like, Joanna Riding's Julie Jordan and Sally Murphy's are very different. And if you watch the Rory Spider Woman video from the National Joanna Riding, once they get to the carnival on that turntable, she is, like, running around looking for Billy. She is fucking stalking him. And then when he jumps up on the horse, she's the first one to bolt. And she, like, slaps the horse. And when he walks right past her, she's like, okay, well, I'm going to wait here and hope that he notices me. And then when he picks her up and scoops her up on the horse, she's like, oh, better than I expected. Like, it's like she's. She, like, she got there. Ready.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

You knew that that was a Julie who was absolutely going to stay on that hill because she was like, I am getting fucked before I turn 30, and I would like nothing more than it to be this. Dude.

[A]

Sure.

[B]

Okay. Yeah, 30.

[A]

She's like, 18.

[B]

Yeah. She's letting out 19. 20. But she's not gonna get married. She says so.

[A]

Right. I adore that line. Yes.

[B]

I'm never getting married. I mean, that bench scene's incredible. The carousel. How much do you know about, like, sort of.

[A]

The line in question, by the way, is that she says that she has to be careful about what she does and who she fucks because she's never gonna get married.

[B]

Her character. Yeah.

[A]

The line being, I'm never gonna marry. If I was gonna marry, I wouldn't have to be such a stickler, but I'm never gonna marry. And a girl who don't marry has got to be much more particular. Particular.

[B]

Particular. With Sally and Michael on that one. They laugh at it because it's like, almost like she made a little pun joke. Yeah. It's because some women, like, they play very straight. I have to be much more particular.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Yeah. And then, like, Sally doesn't get the line out. Totally. She starts to chuckle, which I. I like because it gives them a nice, like, jovial line and it makes Julie smarter.

[A]

You know, she's such an ingenue in some of these older productions, which is why I think that character doesn't really work for me until the later ones.

[B]

I. I wish the Jesse. And I don't. And I say Jesse. I mean, I wish that. I wish that Jack o' Brien would let Jesse be a little more working class in that production, because I know she can do it. She did it with Carrie in the Philharmonic. Whereas Kelli o' Hara was like, I went to Wharton. I hate Kelly's Julie. I prefer. I prefer Jesse's character.

[A]

I mean, beautiful singing, beautiful gowns.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Beautiful singing.

[B]

That Philharmonic.

[A]

But the psychology of her performance is so. I mean, unless, I guess, maybe in her mind, she was like, I'm gonna give them exactly what the public got. And 40, 45.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

It's just the psychology of her performance is so regressive.

[B]

Yeah. Well, also, let's be very clear. Kelly was last messy in South Pacific in 08, and she only just got messy again in Days of Wine and Roses. That I don't think is very good. But I do appreciate that. She's messy again.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

I'm like, so that Philharmonic one, I'm like, kelly, girl, you're working class bum and you want to get dick down on this bench like, come on, stop sitting with your hands in your pockets like you went to fucking. No, Sarah Lawrence. That's the thing about, like most productions of Carousel, when they, like, hearken back to the 40s, they're like, oh, make it all sweet and innocent. No, she's smart, but she. She's horny as fuck. Do you know a bit about the inception of Carousel, how it came to be?

[A]

Yes.

[B]

Tell me.

[A]

Why don't.

[B]

Okay, well, I'll add whatever pockets you want filled in.

[A]

Okay, let me know. Who told Rodgers and Hammerstein to kill themselves instead of attempt a sequel to Oklahoma?

[B]

You know, I think it was Samuel Golden. Samuel Golden. Corre. Century Fox. Yeah. He went to go see Oklahoma and he's like, kill it. Shoot yourselves.

[A]

Oklahoma was a huge hit. They were looking for something else to do. Rodgers and Hammerstein and their. Two of their producers would have lunch every week.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

Sort of toss around ideas.

[B]

The producers were from the Theater Guild, which is what ultimately produced Oklahoma.

[A]

Got it.

[B]

But you're right about. Sorry. It was two producers. They were just. They were the two producers from the Guild.

[A]

They flirted the idea of Lilium by Frederic Molnar, who, successful Hungarian turn of the century playwright, had hit after hit. And then Lillian came out. It played for like 30 performances. People did not like it.

[B]

No.

[A]

And then a decade or so after, after World War I, they staged it again. It was immediately a hit. Ingrid Bergman did a production of it.

[B]

She. I think Broadway or New York. Because she did it on Broadway. Yeah, I think she was the first. She was the second Julie on Broadway.

[A]

Which, I mean, just. I'm just sort of transplanting her performance in the movie Gaslight, I just watched.

[B]

For the first time last week.

[A]

Oh, isn't it so good?

[B]

She. And the beginning. When she's having those twice, the beginning of that movie, she looks like Rebecca Luker and Showboat and I. I'll never get.

[A]

So keep Ingmar. Ingmar.

[B]

Ingrid.

[A]

Ingrid. I think you're not the other one. No, keep Ingrid and Julie Jordan together. And then I'm gonna add a third woman to that sort of trifecta of women who are in psychological thrall to a brooding man. Anyway, then they suggested they take on Lillian, Rogers and Hammerstein. They were hesitant, and then they got the rare approval from the playwright who had turned down.

[B]

He turned down Puccini.

[A]

Puccini's offer to turn into an opera. Saying that he wanted to be the one remembered for writing it, not Puccini.

[B]

And then there was another one, another person who wanted to make it into a musical. I don't remember who, though. Oh, Kern. Jerome Kern wanted to do it.

[A]

Oh, sure. Interesting. Well, anyway, he can say the playwright of Lilliam, because Roger and Hammerstein wound up writing Carousel. Carousel. And they hired unknowns and it was dark and broody and they were like, let's just make a complete anti. Oklahoma. Yeah, in a sense.

[B]

Yeah. The. What made so the reading round in circles. Rogers and Hammerstein were not like a done deal as a duo.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Because Oklahoma was very much a one off.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

You know, I think Richard Rogers was hoping that Lorenz Hart would dry up and, you know, become productive again. And that didn't end up happening. And Hammerstein also, like, wasn't quite sure if he wanted to continue. He was working on his Carmen Jones and blah blah, blah. But so first, first they had to decide they wanted to work together again. And then, yes, the Guild, Teresa, whatever her last name is, Hellman, Helpman, something like that, she was, she was a big fan of Lilliam. Lilliam, like, was weirdly a really big hit in America and like Broadway in particular, really loved it. So when people were hearing about, oh, they're making a musical of Lillium, everyone was like, that masterpiece. How could they? And what's so funny is after Carousel opened, there's never been a production of Lillium on Broadway ever again.

[A]

I wonder if that's like, I want to look up the production history recently because who. It's genuinely so weird in a way that I would love to see it performed in rep with like the play Spring Awakening. Reading it last night, yesterday, I was like, this is so similar. And how brutally Eastern central to Eastern European these like morality plays are. Yeah. And it's like at the very end, like Satan himself shows up and like drags her main character to hell.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Or out of hell. I don't know. Do we need Lilliam?

[B]

Like, I don't think. Well, so. And that's the thing is it would.

[A]

Be a cute sort of like NYU Skirball, like radical blah, blah, blah with puppets or some shit. But.

[B]

Well, I wonder like, would it be better to sort of go whole hog and make it weird or do you want to try to make it as much of a. A play play and, and try to counter how weird it is? I don't know. I truly don't know, because there is such a stylization about Lilium. And one of the things that they did between its premiere in Budapest and when it got revived a decade or so later was, first of all, World War I happened, which changed sort of the perception of audiences of, like, what they wanted, because it. Yeah, Lillium, I think, first reign, like 1908 or something like that. And then it didn't come back again till, like, 1920. And audiences were just very different after the war. And then on top of that, they added the prologue to Lilliam in the second time around. It originally just opened with Mullen, or she has a different name in Lilliam, but Mullen, essentially.

[A]

And it's like Muskrat.

[B]

Muskrat, yeah, that's exactly what it is.

[A]

It's not actually Muskrat, but I think.

[B]

It is Muskrat or something.

[A]

It's like Muscat. It's like something with those letters Merskat.

[B]

And Marie is Carrie.

[A]

Oh, wow. Okay. Well, so listeners. Yes, Lilliam. Sort of the same way that Carousel opens with a sort of 10 minute waltz where the fair is set up and we can sort of meet these characters. We see Julie, you know, lustily staring at Billy and doing whatever. Lilliam, I guess the second time around opened with this sort of beautiful tableau of that same exact thing.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

Which must be so shocking to think about. I mean, I can't really think of a sequence like something I've seen in theater in a straight play, where I'm just sort of watching people interact for 10 minutes. It sort of feels like it's built like an opera, sort of in the way that it's just a thousand characters milling about, doing their thing. We're told that, like, some dialogue, you know, surfaces and we can hear a joke or something and people laughing. But that's insane to just sit down and have 10 minutes of, like a wordless play. It's like a biome.

[B]

Yeah. And that then goes into nothing but dialogue. But I. It apparently, like, made all the difference, which, I mean, how could it not? We look at the waltz now and we're like, you can't not do Carousel without the opening waltz. You can't just open with. No.

[A]

I mean, Ethan Morton, who I might bring up later, he. Of all the things he said about this musical, he did say that it's the greatest sort of intro to a musical theater.

[B]

Oh, absolutely.

[A]

It drops us in the absolute center of it.

[B]

Yeah. It's.

[A]

It's not just like in media res, like Ooh they're already arguing. No, it's like we're literally being just plot from the stars. I think that's why the 2018 works for me. It's like we're dropped from the stars into this random little town in Maine and here's everything that's going on and.

[B]

That, you know, and then the music is just so. It starts so odd and yet so engaging and intriguing. And then it gets into this really exciting waltz. And I mean, the truth is, even if I don't like how another production might start to stage it, the music is always there and is always going to get you. It's a chemical thing. And I appreciate when different productions like, okay, what does this music mean? So what I love is that heitner in the 90s, he hears the opening strains and he's like, I don't know. It kind of sounds like the girls at the Loom working at the mill, which I've always loved because it gives you a little insight into Jul day to day of like, why the carousel and why Billy is so exciting to her. You know, she's stuck being a robot 10 hours a day and in the prime of her life. And as you said, like, it's. It's. We're seeing the show, we are getting ease into it a little bit, but ultimately it's like in the thick of action and so much is going on and it's so exciting and. And engaging and it's operatic, but yet musical and European, yet also American. It's very fascinating. It's also fascinating to know that the music of that was not originally written for the show.

[A]

Was it a trunk song?

[B]

Trunk composition, Kind of ish. Wow. So Rogers was originally hired, I think, with Lawrence Hart to score a Charlie Chaplin movie. I think it's Charlie Chaplin. Yeah. And there was gonna be a pantomime sequence that was in Central park of all these different things. And so Rogers had basically mapped out what is now the Carousel Waltz for that. And it's not. It's not the full waltz. Like, it's not as we hear it now.

[A]

But like, in that it's not as rich because I cannot imagine, just like you're watching a Chaplin comedy and then all of a sudden this, like, grand, beautiful, sort of sweeping, you know, orchestral piece starts playing.

[B]

I know. Well, that's probably best then. That it wasn't. That it didn't end up happening. No. Like, he. All the themes of the waltz were already written, like, plunked out. He's like, I have the melody for this and this melody. And this melody. And like, that's interesting. Yeah. I don't think it was necessarily structured exactly the same. Okay. But all. Every theme we know from the waltz was originally there. And then when that kind of didn't happen, he put it away. And then he was asked to contribute a suite for some philharmonics special. Like all these Broadway composers were asked to come up with suites. And Rogers, much as he loved to work, he was also like, I don't know, I already kind of have like a 7ish minute suite here. So he went back to it and refigured it a bunch. And he played it for Hammerstein because it was after they were working on Lillian when he was asked to submit this. And he played it for Hammerstein. He's like, does this sound like anything? And Hammerstein heard that. He's like, so that's gonna be the opening of our show.

[A]

Right? Right. By the way, you wrote this, like, weirdly circular concentric waltz that might be perfect for the show about cycles of violence and redemption.

[B]

And that's. And that's sort of the gen genius of Hammerstein as well as, like, what made their partnership work so well is like, one of them would come up with ideas that the other one would be like, no, actually, yeah. Or one of them would do something random. The other one be like, okay, so that's actually kind of brilliant. So, like, it was Rogers's idea because one of the reasons they didn't want to do Lilliam was Hammerstein was like, I am not European. He's like, I don't know. It's like, I don't like Hungary. I think it's ugly. He's like, it's like, I. I know.

[A]

Which, to be fair, Lillium is not by any means, in any way of the imagination pretty.

[B]

No.

[A]

It's an ugly play with ugly people and ugly things happen to them.

[B]

It's very bleak. Very, very bleak. And Hammerstein, but appropriately, they were like.

[A]

This is not for Brock.

[B]

Yeah, well, Hammerstein's first law. He's like, I'm a fucking jaybird. He's like, I'm a sweet little country boy. I like to believe in the good of man. I'm not really religious, but I'm sort of religious. He's like, I. He's like. And I. I like blueberry pie. I'm Americana. He's like, I don't. Lilium. It's a beautiful play, but, like, it's European and it's bleak. What am I supposed to do with this? And then Richard Rogers was in his country home in Connecticut, and he was like, what if we said it in the country? And Amersign's like. Like, Maine? And Roger's like, fuck, why not? And that was the first N. And then once Molnar saw Oklahoma, he's like, yeah, you guys can do Lilliam if you treat it with the same death you treated Green. Grow the fucking lilacs. I know.

[A]

Which I now am desperate to read.

[B]

I read it once in college, and I remember being, like, this girl. It was very Ann from Arrested Development, where I just was like, her.

[A]

I mean, even describing the plot of Oklahoma to people who haven't seen it, it's like, well, there's a girl and two guys want to take her to a dance maybe, and maybe she wants to go with them.

[B]

Maybe. To quote Sondheim, oklahoma's about a picnic. Carousel is about life and death.

[A]

Right.

[B]

And that's the master before he put me into his dungeon. So the. Which is not what we're calling. Here we are.

[A]

Whoa.

[B]

It's a bit of a dungeon. Here we are.

[A]

I mean, just like, literally, it's about being trusted. And you are in the shed, which, at any moment, like, you know, the bolts might come out of the door and you might never leave again.

[B]

That is true. That is true. Nobody. So it was. Moving it to Maine was like, the first breakthrough which led them, I read.

[A]

To a wonderful sort of. I need a comedy now of them to learning how the fuck, like, New England culture works. Because I read that they had to send an expert, like an investigator into a kitchen to find out how lobsters are boiled.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

So that's a ridiculous. I'm, like, deep. I really. You know, they didn't have, like, food talk or whatever back then, but the things they didn't know are kind of hysterical.

[B]

Well, and also, Hammerstein was such a. Was such a stickler. It's where Sondheim got it from, because Hammerstein was Sondheim's mentor. But he was like, I don't want to just make shit up. He's like, I want as much research as possible. That's all. It's also easier to write when you just, like, have information at your fingertips. Easier to have something and adapt it than to create something. But, yeah, no, it was for clambake, basically. Once they turned hayride into clambake, he was like. He researched all the different things you do at clambakes and all this stuff. He learned the. There was a. A recipe for, like, codfish chowder and he learned how to make it, and it's. And it's in there. The thing that happened was he wrote the lyric about the lobsters, about slicing the lobsters from the back. And he had a friend who was like a New England. New Englander going, you know, you actually slice them in the front. And then he had people. He had friends go to, like, all the main chefs in New York, and they're like, no, you slice it down the back. And Harrison's like, I think people just don't know which is the back of the.

[A]

Everyone is confused. Yeah, that's what Carousel's about.

[B]

New England is confused.

[A]

Yeah, that's.

[B]

That's pretty true. There was another one also about, like, the lambs in. In other.

[A]

U. Sheep.

[B]

The U sheep. What time.

[A]

What time they made.

[B]

What time they made. And it was like. That is, like, in this particular year, in 1887, they, for some reason, made it in the spring, and that's done.

[A]

I love that.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

In another world. This is an SNL skit.

[B]

Oh, totally.

[A]

By the way, another world, but also.

[B]

Like, just for us.

[A]

It's a dream I had last night.

[B]

Yeah, but I know, like, Rogers also came up with the idea for Soliloquy and sort of how. How that was going to be structured. Hammerstein had other. Other ideas. He also was like, can I change the ending? Because he's like, I just can't let audiences go out on this note. The other thing to think about, which I never actually thought about myself, was the show premiered in 1945. World War II was about to end, but they didn't really know yet when that was happening. And that's something.

[A]

The strike right now.

[B]

Exactly. Just like. But they were. You know, most of the audiences for Oklahoma. Carousel, when they opened were, you know, women whose husbands and sons were off fighting and knowing that they might die. You know, these men who they knew weren't perfect and had fucked up in the past and, you know, had done. Had done just as terrible things as Billy or worse, but for some reason, these women still love them in their heart of hearts. They wanted to know that these men could possibly make it into heaven subconsciously. And Hammerstein's like, I can't tell them that their loved ones are gonna die and go to hell. He's like, I just can't do that. Something I never actually thought about it was. That was something that I read that I was like, that's fascinating. Which I. Which maybe just makes Carousel a product of its time in that sense of what we want. An Audience to take away from the character of Billy.

[A]

Ethan Morton says that, too in his. He has a theater talk appearance where he talks, you know, at length about this. I'm always so cautious against projecting a show's success on what the audience wanted. I, I, that seems like the reason, you know, for why they did that and why, you know, like, the women or whatever flock to it and why it was so popular. Like, that makes sense. And that's.

[B]

Well, first of all, I think people flock to it because it's good, but I don't know.

[A]

It's, It's. I always worry about how realistic these theater people are writing about the broader cultural impact of shows. I'm like, were sailors really banging on the doors of Oklahoma. Trying to get in? Just so desperate.

[B]

Sure.

[A]

Type of thing. I believe it.

[B]

Yeah. Well, speaking of Broadway world, people were posting about the first preview of Spamalot because, you know, there's someone in Spamlot right now who's currently fucking a pop icon. And, you know, people said, oh, yeah, no, she was there. Like, it was, it was totally cool. Like, maybe three people came up during intermission. It was very, very respectful. And then one person posted the next day. She was there. She was absolutely mobbed. Everyone was like, the fuck are you talking about? And it's just, there are some, There are some people. First of all, you know the way history always works. Right. It's like, you know, it starts off as one story, and then over time, it grows into this kind of legend. But then also, people just want to sometimes believe that they were in a room where something happened.

[A]

Well, and thank you for bringing up that show, which we will not get into, but I fear for how that show will be discussed in history books in 10 years, because it's just such a. It would be so easy to say that that is the show that just sort of, like, solved Broadway or whatever, and that it changed the culture. And I'm like, it just changed the art section of the times for a few years.

[B]

Yeah. But nothing ever really changes Broadway immediately. It's a long. It's a long effect.

[A]

But also, like, or the other way around is my. Yeah, like, I don't know how much really. You know, the kids are going, Going to school in 44 were, like, changed by their. No, being the, by there not being an overture in Oklahoma.

[B]

Yeah, the, the thing about Oklahoma. Was that it was sort of the first Broadway musical to be such a national talking point. Like, Broadway was still. Was very much the focal point of pop culture, but, like, Oklahoma. Became the kind of phenomenon where it was played on the radio all the time. Everyone knew the songs. There was fucking merch for it. South Pacific also, like, weirdly, was a shit.

[A]

There was like plates.

[B]

Yeah. South Pacific literally had lunch boxes. So I'm like, can you imagine having a Mary Martin lunch lunchbox from South Pacific that sold. And not ironically either, but that sort of. Rodgers and Hammerstein became sort of this institution. And they became that. The difference between them and Lynn is that they wrote far more frequently. They did a show every two years, and Lynn's like, It takes me 20. I'm like, okay.

[A]

And that's fine.

[B]

That's your process. That's your process. But I mean, I think it's less of projecting of like, this is why. And more sort of like taking, you know, what's happening around you, whether you realize it or not, does have impact on how you write and also how you take in shows. I was talking about this again with the prom, which I also. I'm pretty sure this is going to be like five episodes after the prom episode. But we are recording this on the same day. You know, we were talking about how. How you feel about a show often comes from, like, where you are in life when you meet it for the first time. And that can always change over time. There are things about the prom that I loved that I never no longer love because of how my life has gone. Not to imply that I don't like where my life is, but rather things happen in life that you're like, become. Moments where you see something happen on stage, like, that reminds me of a moment that happened to me that I didn't like.

[A]

Right.

[B]

Okay, So I don't like this anymore.

[A]

2018. I was primed to love the show.

[B]

And you did not.

[A]

And defend it. No, I do. And I do.

[B]

I do, I do.

[A]

On the other side of things, I was defending Lana Del Rey's album Lust for Life, which was a. What a Lana Del Rey? Are your listeners not Lana Del Rey fans?

[B]

Oh, Lana Del Rey. I think. I think all they know about Lana Del Rey is that's who the gays to in red, white and royal blue. Is it?

[A]

Is it? Well, actually funny that you mentioned it because have you seen it?

[B]

Red, white and royal blue. I sure did.

[A]

The most cursed, not haunting, haunted version of if I Loved you plays sure that I almost fell into my couch.

[B]

It's. It's a moment for sure. I just remember when the princess lifts his knees and I went, okay, now everyone knows.

[A]

No, I think they. Maybe they do listen to Lana. Anyway, I was thinking about her the entire. The entire show and her music and the battles I put up for her and the battles I put up for that production and this show.

[B]

No, there's passion. Passion should be rewarded. But, you know, it's. I don't know if necessarily if Hammerstein is like, this is what audiences want so much as he was going with, like, what he personally wanted to do, because Hammerstein was sort of half and half. Like, he was artistic, but he also did think about audiences, which is, I think, always important because you have, I think, some of our most talented, fascinating musical theater artists today don't give two shits about the audience. And that is what is hindering some of their works.

[A]

Name them.

[B]

Michael John Lachiusa. There, I said it. Yeah. And I listen. I. I think his wild party is the better wild party. And I love some of Marie Christine. I. I really like hello again. But I saw First Daughter 3, which, you know, there were two scenes that I loved and two that I was like, oh, you don't care if I'm sitting here, right? You actually kind of resent that I paid to see this. I haven't seen Gardens. I don't know anything about it, but I had, like. I had friends who saw Queen of the Mist, and they're like. I mean, I support Mary Testa being the lead of a show, but I sat there being like, michael John, are you mad at me that I came? Like, like, you wrote a show where you're like, fuck off. And I. And maybe that's not how he feels, but that's how I feel when I watch it. And then I. I watch other writers who are like, I want to give the audience all they want. And I'm like, you gotta. You gotta find a halfway, right? Make them get. I think Tal Prince, who was like, I want to give audiences things they didn't know they wanted. And I think that's where it gets really fascinating. And Hammerstein, I do think, does that with Carousel, because whereas, Oklahoma, there were so many things about the form that they brought together to create this, you know, very impactful musical Carousel. He was like, okay, we can't, like, it's like, let's lean a little further into the darkness here. And so that way we can come out the other end and, like, still have that semblance of closure and hope that we love and that we, you know, make our bread and butter on while still honoring, like, the edges of the text. And to his credit, Molnar was like, I actually really like your ending. He's like, it's actually. It's like, it makes a. It's a better button than what I wrote. And it's like, oh, yeah, the button where it's just Billy off in hell and Julie going. And hitch. Ya. And hitchhi. And hitchhia. And hitchhia. I'm like, yeah, no, you'll never walk alone as a better button bitch.

[A]

Yeah, yeah.

[B]

Yeah. What is your favorite song in this show?

[A]

What's the Use of Wondering? Which I also think is, like, the key to that show, which is why I think, you know, to throw her under the bus. And Kelly o', Hara, the way that. That way. That song.

[B]

She's so thin. It's so easy to throw her anywhere.

[A]

And congrats, congrats. But no, I just think that you have to have some, like, psychological nuance to that number. Because, I mean, even fucking Shirley Jones of the movie, she's like, staring off into the middle distance just, like, genuinely, what's the use of wondering if your man is good or bad?

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Whereas, you know, you have to be resigned to what you're saying. You're not just blindly chirping it out. It's sort of like a. Yeah, well, but I'm horny. You know, sort of like, what is the use.

[B]

Yeah, it's. I mean, listen, it all comes down to, like, basic urges, right? And horniness is definitely the basic urgestest of carousel. There is sort of like. There's a. You're good.

[A]

Phone down.

[B]

Phone down. You get it? I'll keep talking. There is a sadness to Julie in the sense of. So this is. This is how I've sort of talked about her.

[A]

Can I set the scene for the viewers, for the listeners? Excuse me.

[B]

Yes, sorry. What's he said?

[A]

The girls are all just like, what are you. What the fuck are you doing with this guy who hits you? And we all know about it.

[B]

It's actually Carrie that they're first comforting.

[A]

Correct. So Jigger, the guy who ropes Billy along to his evil scheme.

[B]

Jeez.

[A]

Tries to seduce, rape Carrie. And then she's freaked out and the girl's trying to comfort her, and she's like, what? Like, you know, why would you ever do this to yourself? Like, be with someone like that? And then Julie chimes in and says, what's the use of wondering? You're his, he's yours, and you're gonna do what?

[B]

He says. Well, because.

[A]

Well, also the life you've resigned yourself to.

[B]

Mr. Snow, who, until that point, everyone has, like, just thought of his Comedic fodder. He shows up to see Carrie being carried off into the woods, and he victim flames, and he's like, well, I was about to marry a slut and that. I don't want that no more. And the revive the 2018 revival cut his song Geraniums in the Window, which I do kind of get. Not everyone likes that song, but I. The pompousness with which Mr. Snow sings it underlines just how much of a douche he actually is.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Because.

[A]

Which is more aligned with, like, the Milan world, the Molnar world of everyone in this is horrible.

[B]

Yeah, well, it's. What it. What it does is it's like, people look at. Because Carrie builds up. Mr. Snow is, you know, he's. He's steady and reliable. He's got a job. He's got plans to, you know, build a business. We're gonna have a family. Which. Which he is dictating how many kids we have. I'm nothing but a baby machine for him. Which. First she's like, absolutely not. And then when we flash forward 16 years, it's like, well, she actually acquies because. And she's sort of pissed about it now, too. But when. When a moment of conflict comes into their relationship, rather than Snow be like, what happened here? He's like, I know what happened here. And you don't have to say anything. You. And he becomes so pious and pompous and, you know, then kind of goes up in arms with Jigger, because Jigger then says, you know, well, no, there's nothing worse than a pious man like you. Like, you guys are so full of. Like, you think so highly of yourselves. And the women who are with you are never actually happy. Like, they might as well have fun with people like me and Billy because we. We're honest about who we are. And then the girls. When all the men leave and Carrie's crying because, you know her, she was about to get raped, and now her engagement's over because of it, because that's the world in which they live and some of us still. And the girls go, well, you know, all men suck, whether they're good or bad. And then they go, well, Julie, you're married. Tell her. And they're like, julie's totally gonna be like, yeah, girl, married life, please. You're better off. And Julie's like, well, I'm not gonna give you the answer you want, but this is my answer.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And what I love about that song, it actually. I think that is a perfect example of a character saying something that the show is not saying is the message right? Because while Julie is saying, what does it matter if he's good or if he's bad? You love him. Like, fuck this. And there is. There could be a positive message to spin from this in the sense of, like, if you were to take this to modern day, I won't name names. I had a friend who had a hard time finding boyfriends, which, you know, girl joined the club, but they finally got a boyfriend. And you're like, oh, well, how do you feel about it? And he was like, you know, I'm probably gonna have to end it soon. We're like, what? It's your first boyfriend? Why would you do this? He goes, I just. I keep imagining our couple picture in my profile on Facebook. And he's like. And it's just not cute.

[A]

Is this 2012?

[B]

It's about 2014. Yeah. Okay.

[A]

Okay, sure.

[B]

But it stuck in my brain, like, nine years later. And I was like, are you fucking serious?

[A]

I was like.

[B]

But I was like, you like him? He's like, yeah, but, you know, like, I. I don't think we've got enough likes. I was like, what the fuck are you up to?

[A]

And send them to dog fight.

[B]

Dog fight. But you're like, it's a little bit of that. Like, who fucking cares if you like him? Like, who cares what anyone has to say? Yeah, obviously, like, if when people who care about you are like, I think you're in danger, girl. Molly, you know, then you want to maybe, like, listen to them a little bit. But that's another story. But where Carousel is like, okay, here's where. What Julie has to say is not necessarily what we're saying. The song gets interrupted with Billy and Jigger going off to, quote, unquote, find the treasure that all the men on the island are gonna do. But they're actually going off to do the robbery. And Billy's got the kitchen knife under his jacket. And I remember that 2018 cut this moment in their interaction. Billy came on stage and Julia's like, where are you going? He's like, we're out to find treasure. She goes, billy, I don't want you. He goes, bye. And he goes off stage. And then neighbor Fleming goes, common sense. Which I hated. But no, I love that because I.

[A]

Think the women chiming in makes.

[B]

I wanted more women. I didn't just want Renee.

[A]

No, because I think, okay, so, yes. What's use of wondering? And then there's sort of a brief immediate reprise. Yeah. But I think the women chiming in is the show agreeing and being like, well, all these women are like, common sense, whatever. Whereas I think Nettie, which is Renee Fleming's character, Julie's aunt, she's defending her, and she's saying, okay, I know that you're getting shit on by the whole entire town, but if this is what you want, if this is how you're gonna defend it, I'll stand up for you. And, you know, like, yes, you're right, it is. What's the use of wondering? It's what you want. And I like the fact that she comes to her aid, which, you know, foreshadows the same scene, you know, the same moment two scenes later or whatever.

[B]

But this is what 2018 cut. Want. And you saw this in the. In the bootleg of 94, when Julie's like, I don't want you to go. She touches his jacket and she feels the knife, and she goes, is that.

[A]

An every production, though?

[B]

It should be. It's in the script.

[A]

Oh, interesting.

[B]

She then says, billy, let me have that. Billy, please let me have that. And he freaks out. He goes, you. He's like, I can't. You don't understand. Like, I gotta go. And so he goes off, and then the girls sing the song back to her. And you. You can also direct those girls to do whatever you want. Either they're agreeing with Julie or not mocking, but more sort of like slightly throwing her words back at her. It's like, okay, you said common sense may tell you to run away and you won't like. Do you still stand by that? He's going off with a thief with a knife in his jacket. What's happening now, girl? 2018 cut. The moment of her discovering the knife, which I. I don't like, but I do like Renee singing and then Jesse singing back at her, if only because it gave Jesse Mueller more to sing. I mean, listen, I would love a Jesse Mueller soliloquy, but, you know, that's. That's my own Eva Van Hoffe production.

[A]

Well, either way, honestly, however the actress or the production approaches it, I think it's a just beautiful fucking song. Like, I really. More time. More often than not, I will shed a tear listening to that song. Whichever. Whichever rendition. And again, with the. With the whole Del Rey of it all, you. You and your listeners out there might not know about her, but she's someone who, like, you know, her whole career has been defending these songs. She's very openly like, my boyfriend is sucks, and this is a toxic relationship. Her song, the titular track from her second album, Ultra Violence. Literally says, he hit me, and it felt like a kiss. And that was the whole point of contention in, like, 2012, 13, whatever. And I'm like, she's just saying what's real to her, and she's not agreeing with it or with herself, but we're just.

[B]

She was at that moment.

[A]

And it, you know, it sort of dovetails into what I love about the show and what I love about quote, unquote, problematic shows, which is sort of to bring dear Evan Hansen into this. But, you know, I remember when the movie came out and everyone was acting surprised that he's straight. The character. The character straight. And they're like, oh, my God, wait, this plot makes me sick. We're really just following a person with questionable morals for an entire show. And I'm like, that's called fucking drama.

[B]

Like, that's story time.

[A]

I want a story to unfold. I mean, like, it is fun to root for a hero who just, like, wins the whole time. Sure. But, like, please. My God, I'm not saying again, Jeffrey Hansen, vastly different. But that's. That's called drama, honey. That's called an inciting.

[B]

That's.

[A]

No, no, sorry. It's leaving behind inciting incident. It's continuing conflict by having characters be complicated.

[B]

Yeah. Evan Hansen will be covered. That's absolutely gonna be covered. And I.

[A]

Let me find. What else is that I told you I would do with you for this podcast.

[B]

Everything I have. I have other stuff that I have notated. First of all, tell me more about this Doris Day cover that you found.

[A]

Oh, my God. So I was like, you know, what. What if. What if this podcast just turns into us discussing every cover of every, you know, carousel song that exists? So I looked up, started, obviously, with my favorite, was the use of Wonder and Doris Day, who I guess just like that year, had it in her contract that she couldn't be vulnerable or didn't want to. Just comes at you with, like, the cuntiest, absolute cover of this song. It's just these sort of. Just like. It's like she's begging the guy she's singing about to, like, to go against her anyways. She's sort of like, well, what's the use of wondering? It's so confrontational. It's so fun. You really just sort of see her, like, spitting it at Rock Hudson in one of the little. You know, she.

[B]

And she. I told you she was up for the movie, which is crazy to me. If it was, you know what that.

[A]

Would have been So I mean, like, would it have been good? Maybe not, but it would have been far and away the most interesting take on that material.

[B]

Doris Day and Frank Sinatra in Carousel would have been Diana in the sense of every minute would have been a choice.

[A]

And everyone would be in a different production.

[B]

Maybe.

[A]

But it would be the absolute most like, we're gonna tear the fuck up out of this text and give you something. Sure. But you bring up Frank. I listen to his if I Love youe and it's maybe the most tender song of his I've ever heard. He's giving like I love. When Frank leans into the fact that like at the heart of it, he's kind of a tap dancing theater joink.

[B]

Yeah. Who's 10 pounds soaking wet.

[A]

Yeah, exactly. He's very tender. It's very sort of your 94, man. What's his name?

[B]

Michael Hayden. Yeah, it's. That song is tender and it's why I don't love it when it's sung super booming because it comes from a place of insecurity.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Well, we will go into the bench scene for sure. Don't, don't.

[A]

None of it is tender. But I mean, if there's someone who know made a career out of turning tender songs and just like macho swagger, it's Sinatra. Etc. I appreciate that. He kept the sort of, you know, twinkle in my eye. I'm a poet deep down.

[B]

Yeah. I'm a brooding soul. Now we will talk about that. I've seen a bit more in a second because it's. That's like a whole fucking.

[A]

I told you I would do Carousel, Jagged Little Pill. Second, downstate, third.

[B]

All choices. There was another one that you're like. There's. There's one that I think you said you didn't want to entertain. No. What?

[A]

I said downstate, I don't want to entertain.

[B]

No, because you didn't want to entertain the critics is what you said. You're like, I don't. And I am covering down.

[A]

I think if you. That's interesting.

[B]

I. I'm.

[A]

Are you having like Desantis? Come on.

[B]

No, no. I'm having my friend Itai. Come on. Actually, I think that episode will have aired before this one does. Again, I'm trying to delay this episode as much as I can because the 10 people who keep coming back are like, when is it happening? Like, I'm gonna hold you, I'm gonna keep you. But no, I. I think Downstate is a brilliant play and one of the best American plays the last couple of years. And I think that the critics of it. It. I don't like plays that just only comfort you. I think there's a. There's a diet for everything. You know, I love the things that smooth my. My edges. I also love the things that make me uncomfortable because I think you only grow when you are in uncomfortable spaces. And you have to challenge your own perceptions of the world and yourself in order to become a better you. Which is something that. That so many people who I like just are unable to do there. I mean, listen, there are people who have done nothing nearly as bad physically as Billy Bigelow has, who I've known, who. I'm like, you're still not a good person, right? Like, yeah, no, you've never done domestic violence or whatever. Like, I also still think you're very toxic. Yeah.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

But that those people will never come from the deep end. End because they're so engulfed in themselves and who they are and how they're perceived. And they just. They won't look at. They will. They would rather keep their head underwater than look in a mirror.

[A]

Okay, sure. What's your favorite song from Carousel?

[B]

All of it. I love all of it. The only song I don't love love is Stone Cutters Cut it on Stone just because it's kind of simple. But like, I. I enjoy Clam Bake on a chemical level. The music, even if I'm sort of like, yeah, I get it.

[A]

Oh, it's pleasant.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

I'm not skipping it necessarily if I've decided to play the whole thing.

[B]

Yeah. And if I'm making a movie remake and I'm like, okay, we gotta get this to two hours. Yeah. Like, I'm cutting Clam Bake for sure. I. The two things I listen to most often are the waltz, but only specific versions of it. I listen to the 94 one a lot. I actually, I do listen to the 2018 version of the waltz a lot. It's very well done. Andy Einhorn, who's a friend, conducted that thing like a motherfucker. And the bench scene, or the hill scene, depending on how you stage it.

[A]

Oh, interesting.

[B]

Because 94, they did it on the hill because it was very physical and they were moving around. It was. It was so good. But what I love about the bench scene, so like, the first sort of like, in. Was how to musicalize that scene for Hammerstein. And if you read the scene, there's of a lot. There's so much that Hammerstein has kept. He's very faithful to the text in Many ways he consolidates certain scenes.

[A]

Oh, entire scenes are like word for word, basically.

[B]

Yeah. And then there are some scenes that are cut or, like moved around because it was actually more faithful when they were out of town. But the first preview in New Haven was like six hours long and they had to start cutting. Yeah. Wait, did they have a.

[A]

Did she, Agnes the Mill really have a 40 minute ballet in there?

[B]

Yeah, yeah. So originally what the ballet was was Billy left earth to go to the backyard of heaven. And as he traveled, it was the life of Louise Bigelow. And when it ended, that's 40 minutes. Yes. From literally her.

[A]

You see the birth.

[B]

Yeah, literally, like, Jan Clayton was like, I gave birth on stage. It was great. Through her upbringing to her teenagers and all that other shit. And then once it was over, then we were in heaven with Billy and It's like, well, 16 years have passed and. And so Hammerstein's like, okay, so again, like, the rumor goes that the curtain came down on the first preview at 1:30 in the morning. Who knows how true that is? But I'm sure it was very, very long. I think they only cut like two songs from Act 2 because they said Act 1 pretty much was working as is. They tightened some stuff up. They cut. They cut. There was a waltz for a dance break for Clambake that they cut, cut. There was. And there was one other thing that they cut dance wise, which is why they kept the hornpipe. Because they're like, we've all. We've already cut so much dance for Agnes. She's gonna leave if we don't keep one thing. But yeah, they basically, they said, okay, let's switch these around so Billy's gonna go straight to the backyard of heaven. And that's also how they wrote Highest Judge of all, because they needed to cover the scene change, which 94 cut, which I am okay with because that's a song that, while I like it, I do think it. It's basically saying what's already said in the scene to me.

[A]

Yeah, it's a good song because they're good songwriters, but it is sort of like the. The macho number that the male lead is contractually obligated to have. Yeah, he's just sort of like biceps up, just a hulking, you know, show me God. It's very like.

[B]

Yeah, well, it was kind of makes sense.

[A]

Yeah. It's like.

[B]

And Heitner, you know, doesn't cut much in 94. He, I think, has like two bits of dialogue, but mostly it's just that one song, which was controversial at the time, but he went to the estate. He was like. Like. He's like, okay, I can pretty much figure out this entire text. He's like, the one song I don't know what to do with is highest judge of all. Can you give me some insight? And Mary Rogers was like. It was to cover a scene change. And he's like, well, we can do the scene change in 10 seconds. Can I cut the song? She's like, yeah. Which I. Mary Rogers. Talk about cunt on toast. I love that bitch. And if you read shy. She's such a. She's such a boss with bde.

[A]

But is she the titular shy girl?

[B]

She is the titular shy girl. She's the man.

[A]

See? So cunts can be shy. I was saying earlier that I was shy to ask about your shirt.

[B]

And you're also saying you're a cunt. Well, yeah. No, bde. Shy people are the best kind of people. But which is Mary? That's what I want. I want Mary Rogers on the COVID of the shy book with saying, bde. Shy people are the best kind of people. But no, she, like, she loved. She. Yeah, she did say that she loved her father's legacy. Not necessarily her father, but she understood, like, in order for the shows to survive, they had to adapt to the times. And like. Like, it's not so much that the material dates, but rather how. Again, how shows were presented in the 40s and 50s are different than now. Sometimes you needed a song for a scene change, how big production numbers were structured, were different. It used to be you sang the song, there was applause, there was an encore applause, then a dance break, then applause. And now it's like, well, no, now we do three verses, dance break, close it out with one big rousing chorus and end it. That's what we're used to in a. I think it's better. It's more integrated. But, you know, they cut down the ballet from 40 to, like, 15 minutes, which Agnes was like, well, now there's no point. And they're like, agnes, it is still 15 minutes. It's longer than the dream ballet in Oklahoma. Like, what do you want from us? And like. And they're like. And the show is already. It's like, still close to three hours. Like, we can't. This is the best we can give you. The bench scene. Billy Lilium, in the play, he is so aggressive. And it's because Molnar basically is like, these guys exist. These rough men who basically are bleeding inside and are Too proud to say anything. And society wouldn't let them anyway because men aren't allowed to be weak. So he overcompensates. And because of this, he's awful.

[A]

There's also a whole class thing going on, more so in the play than in the musical, but we haven't talked about that. But just. I think it's interesting concept.

[B]

Oh, no. Yeah.

[A]

And the whole thing, you know, he wants to see. He dies and he wants to be shown to the highest judge of all because before they'll commit the crime. Jigger is basically like, when guys like you and I die, we're seeing like court magistrates. Court magistrates at best. Like, what's. What's the furthest you've been thrown into jail? And he's like, well, the police magistrate, I guess.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

So then, yeah, it's like, yeah, we're.

[B]

Not going to the Supreme Court. We're. We're going to some circuit court.

[A]

The garden. The garden of heaven. Right, the backyard of heaven.

[B]

Exactly. Which. Yeah. Which is in Carousel. And you better believe Heitner emphasized the class system because Julie, when. So, okay, in Lilium, before they get into the whole, like, if I loved you conversation, you know, Carrie, Marie, and Lilium goes away like Carrie does, pretty exact as it is in the Carousel. Hammerstein, of course, condenses a little bit, so it's a little less back and forth. It's basically like instead of 10 lines, it's two. But, you know, certain things of, you know, Marie saying like, should I go? And Julie being embarrassed, like, why do you ask me that? And Marie's like, well, you know, what's best to do? And then she goes, okay, you can go home. And, you know, in Lilium, it's meant to sort of be sweet. Marie's a country bumpkin and Julie's hardened and she was like, okay, you go home. I can go get fucked now with Audra and Sally, Audra's a little more not judgmental, but she's sort of like, I know why you want to stay, but you know what's best to do. So I'm going to ask you one more time. Should I go? And then, like, Sally won't look her in the eye. She basically looks at the hill. She's like, you can go. And she's like, okay, you go ruin your life. I'm out. So that's her first option, her first chance to leave. And she doesn't. And then in Lilium, they get interrupted again by two policemen and Hammerstein changes it to a policeman and Mr. Bascom, the owner of the mill where Julie works, which I think is an amazing change, because it's not just, like, two random, you know, fucking system dudes come around waving their imaginary dicks around, being like, you do what we tell you. It's someone who actually, like, Julie knows who is giving her a chance. And you could read it as a very sweet man with some power and his clout being like, I think that you got hoodwinked, and I think you should come with me now. And that's a totally valid way to play it. Heidner had it played where Bascom was pompous and condescending and very much of, like, this is one of my girls, and you will not embarrass me. And he. And basically, like, takes the whole thing of, like, of course you're coming with me. Why wouldn't you?

[A]

Well, I think the best aspects of the best productions of Carousel are the ones that show you that not apologize for their coupling, but, like, the outside world is so evil and cold that when we do have these sort of interactions with the outside world, you see why these two are pushed against each other and why they would sort of, like, seek that solace I love. For example, like, just as soon as Billy dies, everyone is so cruel to Julie. She's literally, like, crying over her husband and the father of her unborn child's corpse. And they're like, yeah, no, so we told you he was bad. Yeah, well, you're better off this way.

[B]

They think. They think they're being kind by being like, you're better off. Like, this burden has been lifted. But, yeah, it's a mean.

[A]

Is so mean.

[B]

Yeah. I mean, even her friend, even Carrie says to her, like, the first thing Carrie says, she's like, julie, don't hate me for saying this. Yeah, you're better off. Yeah. And, like, Julie ends up having to comfort Carrie because Carrie's crying. Something else that the 2018 revival cut is Mrs. Mullen comes back to find Billy's corpse and, like, have say her goodbye. And everyone's like, no, don't let her through. And basically, Julie gets up, turns her back so Mrs. Mullen could have her private moment with Billy and then leave. And then Julie comes back and says her monologue, and they cut it in 2018, and I hate it. Oh, interesting. It's such a wonderful moment because these two women and you. And it's in Lilliam. You see it in Lillium.

[A]

She tells her, get the fuck of the out.

[B]

Yeah. And Lily tells her she knows she Lets her have her moment. But first she says, get out. First. First Julie says, get the fuck out. I've got no beef with you. I don't want to talk to you.

[A]

Right?

[B]

And she's like, well, I love them, too. And then basically, Julie turns her back and lets Ms. Mullen.

[A]

And Ms. Mullen says, like, that's how I know you're not. That's how I know you didn't love him, because if you loved him, then we. The two of us, would be the same.

[B]

Exactly. Whereas. But in Carousel, Hammerstein gives Julie a little more empathy, grace and empathy. And basically, like, she doesn't say goddamn words. You know, Carrie goes off with Enoch because basically he's like, okay, well, you know, I guess I'll marry the slut, because, you know, we're not them. And then you hear Mrs. Mullen, like, come through the ruckus, and they lock eyes, and Julie just gets up, turns her back. Mrs. Mullen goes up, gives him a little kiss on the cheek. She looks around, she sees that everyone's staring. She gets up, throws the shawl over her shoulder, and she's like, I'll leave this stinking show with dignity. And then Julie comes back and sits down and. And Hammerstein wrote it that you don't have to do. I think it's a little pat, but, like. Because there's the whole bit of, like, Mrs. Mullen is always telling Billy, get your hair off of your face. Put it over your. On your head. And when she sees his body as, like, her last parting gift, she, you know, she puts the hair off of his forehead and puts it on top. And then Julie comes back down and puts it back on his forehead. And I don't think she does it to be like, fuck her, but more be like, this is how you liked your hair. I'm gonna let you leave your hair how you liked it. I think it's a little f. But if you do it, you do it. I won't be mad. And I think it's also in the script of Lilium. But no, just. You see, as you said, like, the way that class is done in Lilliam, and it's not heavy in the text of Carousel, but you can play it, as you said, how sort of the outside world treats the two of them that pushes them together. I met Michael Hayden after lighting the piazza in June. I had a friend in the show. And I'm not a stage door girl anymore because I'm just too in the sauce now. It's too weird.

[A]

Do you want to know what the last. Same. But you want to know what the last show I staged her was?

[B]

What was it?

[A]

2018'S carousel sounds about right.

[B]

But the thing is that I have only staged Door in the last couple of years with people involved with the 94 one. Because in my mind, I'm like, I think so highly of it. Everyone involved in it, to me, is a superstar. So, like, I stage doored Admissions at Lincoln Center Theater because Sally Murphy was in it, and I had her sign my Carousel Playbook. Like, that's all it is. I'm just like, just sign it for me, please. And Hayden was in Piazza. He played Margaret's husband. Husband. And my friend Matt was in the ensemble. And he's like, oh, I share a dressing room with Michael. I'm like, can he sign one of my playbills? He goes, absolutely. And I was gonna have him sign it. I missed him. So Matt gave it to him. And I was waiting for Matt after the matinee that Saturday, and Michael ended up coming out for a smoke after his scene because he has so much time off stage. I was like, oh, hey, I'm. I'm the dude that Matt Liese told you to sign for. He's like, oh, my God.

[A]

Hi.

[B]

And we were talking. It was like when my. I was like, I have to go back and then take bows. Like, do you want to talk afterwards? I was like, absolutely. Would love nothing more. And one thing he said to me was so fascinating. He was like, you know, these are two people who have no business being together. He's like, they should not be together. He's like, it is happenstance that they ever met. It's not fate, but like a sequence of. Sequence of events.

[A]

Cosmic, sort of. Right place, right time, wrong place, wrong.

[B]

Time, wrong place, wrong time. They just keep pushing them together. It's like. And like, they are right for each other in so many ways, except for, like, some of the biggest ones. And what I said to him, what I love is. And I've talked about it on the pod. Sorry, everybody, but Juan hasn't heard me talk about this yet. So this set for that production, instead of a bench, they were on this big, giant green hill, and there was a backdrop with a giant moon and the church in the. In the distance. And they end the bench scene with, you know, the blossoms falling on them. And. And two things happen. One is after Billy sings and he says, I'm not kind of fellow to marry anyone. Even if a girl wanted me to, I wouldn't. And Julie says, don't worry about it, Billy. There's a beat there. It's in the script. There's an ellipses. Kelly didn't take that pause. Jesse didn't take that pause.

[A]

No, but Jesse added an extra beat somewhere else, which I love. You're right about there being no win tonight.

[B]

Yeah, she did, she did, she did. Night. But she didn't take that beat before Billy. But the Billy is important because it's the first time she calls him by his first name. And in that production, Hayden absolutely clocked it because she's only called him Mr. Bigelow until then. She goes, don't worry about it, Billy. And he looks up at her. The blossoms are falling. Says who's worried? And most Billy's do like that. Who's worried? But Hayden just like, like who's worried? Like he's. Because he know they're. They're getting vulnerable finally with each other after a whole scene of being like, no, no, I don't, I don't. And they kiss in a way that's like fucking visceral. They hold on to this bear hug and you know the Beaumont stage, deep as a football field. So as that music is playing, that hill starts rolling back through that deep Beaumont stage as all the lights go out except for one spotlight on them that gets tighter and tighter and tighter until it blacks out as they're in this bear hug. And it's this. Not only is it a great scene transition, it's a beautiful metaphor for that relationship. As you were saying, like the, you saying like the darkness around them, like it is so mean spirited the world, especially to them, for the class of people they are, for the choices that they made with each other. And Julie, smart girl that she is, she's aware of what her station in life is, that she's a woman in America in the 1800s of like what's ahead of her best case scenario. She meets a guy she kind of likes who makes a little bit of money and they have a decent home life together, but never any passion, never any, any fire like the life that Carrie's describing for herself with Mr. Snow. Julie's hearing and she's sort of like, good for you.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And with Billy, she recognizes she might get that Julia Roberts, Shelby, 10 minutes of happiness. And she's like, you know what? Fuck it. Because, you know, let go. There's nothing but darkness. And it's gonna end and it's not gonna end well. But like, I want my 10 minutes, right? I want it. And she, and she goes for It. Whether you. What's the use of wondering? And it's, It's. It's the heart of that relationship. It's a messy heart, but it's hard. And you don't have to agree with it. Who has to agree with all the choices characters make in shows? You just have to find a way to understand it. And that is what I love about this show, which has made it so controversial for people, is Hammerstein refuses to have one character come to the front and go, look at this. Bad choices he has. Characters tell her like, what the fuck are you doing? But he's never like, we're gonna judge her. He's like, these are people. These are just people. And they're. They are flopping like the rest of us.

[A]

And they're free to flop like the rest of us. For her as a woman, like, she has. She is free to do this. Mm.

[B]

It's her choice. You can agree or not agree, but you. You'll watch. And it's so funny to me that people will continue to watch Streetcar with no problems, where there's a full on rape, where Stanley gets away with it and Blanche goes off to the madhouse. Grant, I love Streetcar cards. It's a masterpiece. I don't have the problem. But like, people will watch that, be like, yeah, sure, no, no notes.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Then they'll see Carousel and be like.

[A]

I think people just lose their. When something becomes a musical, like, we're so not.

[B]

Which. It's true, though.

[A]

It's true. Like, obviously, you know, being a musical is what complicates things because we are given this sort of invaluable, precious insight that we wouldn't have otherwise.

[B]

Even.

[A]

Even, I mean, like, unless the play was all soliloquies. But so much of, you know, the character psychology we learn through their songs and I think also the sort of double whammy for those people who don't like Carousel, everything is problematic is that the music is so fucking beautiful that I think it's, you know, certain people can be swept away, swept in by all the beauty and think that it's a beautiful show about beautiful people and beautiful things. And I'm like, no, it's a beautiful show about stormy and beautiful emotions, I think.

[B]

So also because of where we're kind of at, we've sort of regressed a bit with a bit. Well, we've regressed a lot.

[A]

That's absolutely insane. So I was reading, there was an Atlantic piece in 2018 that Corby Kummer wrote talking about sort of shitting on My Fair lady in Carousel, which both came back the same season.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

I remember one I fucking hated and lasted forever and one I loved and lasted six months, I think, at most.

[B]

Yeah, that's the world we live in.

[A]

One hero in a complete Surprise, the revival of Once on this Island, a 1990 musical whose current production celebrates love that crosses class and race barriers, won the Tony for best music rival of a musical in a complete Surprise. I mean, maybe in 2018. That was surprising, but like, that seems pretty powerful, the fucking chorus at this point.

[B]

Yeah, I also. I mean, I was not surprised that Once on this island one.

[A]

Oh, I'm saying that's like, I don't think was anyone like. And if they were, is that the reason why it's surprising?

[B]

Yeah, it's. So where we've regressed, though, now we are sort of expecting all musicals to have a moment to be like, this is what we're singing. This is what we're about. Most songs are anthems that we want you to relate to and be like, I can. I can sing this out of context. And everyone will be like, absolutely. Go slay, girl.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

Live your life. And that's not what Carousel is. And not honestly, in my opinion, not what the best musicals are. No.

[A]

This reminds me of when I was in college and I was at a musical theater class and are. There's like this very sweet boy, beautiful voice, but didn't know much about theater. So we had a showcase coming up and then she was like. He went up the professor and was like, hey, what's a good number for me to do? And she's like, oh, you know, it'll be perfect for. Cut to the night of the showcase where we're presenting sort of out of context numbers. This boy goes up there and does. If you. If you could see her or no, if. If you could see her from Cabaret.

[B]

And does.

[A]

People have never been like, quieter and more soft at an ending ever. And that's. And that's fine. And that's fine. I wish that number I don't think I would ever like, do without at least a scene partner.

[B]

I wish people had that reaction to that song during the show these days. When I saw the revival of the revival that I first saw with Michelle Williams, then I saw with Emma Stone.

[A]

Oh, jealous. Emma was amazing.

[B]

I wanted Michelle to be amazing and.

[A]

I was just fine. She looks scared. Like, IRL scared, but she looks scared.

[B]

Absolutely. And then that's when people talk about the Sally Bowls of it all. I'm like, here's the thing about Sally, even if she's not the best singer, when she's doing those cabaret numbers, like, don't tell mom or whatever, you cannot tell her she's not the one.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And that's the. That confidence that. That BDE was what Michelle was missing, which was what Emma had in flying colors. Emma. Emma was, like, 90. 90% of what I wanted for Ms. Sally. And if she had had the full rehearsal developmental process, she would have been 100%. But I do know that she was supposed to be the first choice, and she dropped out of the last second, so that's her choice. She was. But she was wonderful. Natasha is still the best one, but you have to go to the library to watch her. Point is, we're talking about Carousel. Oh, yeah. But these, as you said, like, these musicals, now, people watch them and they go, once it's a musical and we hear a song, we go, okay, this is an insight into a character. This is what the writers are saying. And based on the melody and the tempo, like, you know, oh, it's defiant, therefore, like, it's a triumphant moment. And I remember talking to a friend. No, it wasn't a friend. It was the head of my department. Fuck. We were talking. Well, he was. He was a friend. He sadly passed. But, no, I. I always thought of him as a friend and not as the head of my department. But Steven and I were talking about that production because he. When I fell in love with it, and I went to his office.

[A]

94.

[B]

94, yeah. And I went to his office to talk about it. He gave me this, like, look of like. He's like, oh, I was in New York when that revival happened. He's like, I saw it 10 times. Times. He said, change the game. Because it did. It did change the game of how we approach golden age musicals. It's what started the trend, unfortunately, of let's take golden age musicals and look at them dark. And Heitner was like, no, carousel's dark. It's got a suicide and domestic violence and all this other. He's like, you know, guys and dolls is not dark. Yeah, but he said where we sort of thought about this. He was like, the one thing I don't like about Hayden's performance. Performance, you know, because the voice wasn't as strong. He's like, billy really needs to end. Soliloquy, triumphant. Like, almost like a superhero, because that's where the music's at. I'm like, I actually think it's. What I love about Hayden is that he doesn't sound super powerful at the end. The music sounds triumphant. But we as an audience know that Billy's not gonna succeed because he just can't.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

He's not someone who could ever succeed at, you know, getting money and.

[A]

No. And if he, like, gets close to succeeding, he's gonna get in his own way.

[B]

Yeah. And I think there's a problem sometimes with soliloquy, not as a piece, but sometimes as an audience. And I feel this way just about musical theater in general now, where we applaud the efforts of a performer rather than the craft of the performance and song, the effort.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

These blogs online love to be like.

[B]

Well, but it's so hard to be.

[A]

In a show eight times a week. And I'm like, it's so hard to sit through it, too.

[B]

Yeah. And also, like, yes, it's hard.

[A]

There are 1 million people who can do it.

[B]

Yeah. And are currently doing it. The people who are using that excuse are not the people who are actually in shows, which is what I find funny. Every one of my friends in a Broadway show right now, anytime we talk about stuff, they're never saying, well, it's so hard to do.

[A]

Right.

[B]

They're like, no, we know it's hard to do. And they're doing it. And when they see someone else doing it poorly, they're like, yeah, no, fuck them. Right. Or they see a show they don't like, they're like, fuck that. No one got into musical theater on Broadway for a steady gig. No one got into it because it's easy. They got into it because they fell in love. It's all they know how to do. And they want to do shows that fucking, you know, give them something exciting. So when they're doing a jukebox musical of a person who's dead or a movie transplant with special effects and bad songs, they're like, you know, grateful for the paycheck, I guess. Like, I wish I was doing something different, but I lost my train of thought. No, no, it's. I had a post, like, two years ago based off of a certain musical where a performer won a Tony for a song that I think is a bad song, where I was just like, we're not applauding this person's performance. We're applauding the fact that they got through it.

[A]

Right.

[B]

Their endurance, their. Their agility, not their ability.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

And sometimes with soliloquy, I do feel like an audience will applaud the actor who sang it really well rather than the story. I didn't feel that way about Josh. I felt that way about Nathan Gunn in the Philharmonic, where I'm like, you're applauding the opera singer who sang the song you like?

[A]

Well, yeah.

[B]

Okay. Because Nathan, unlike Josh, Nathan Gunn cannot act. Josh can sometimes he needs the right material, the right director. If you saw Tap Dance Kid, you'd be like, okay.

[A]

No, that. He was insane in that. Are you kidding? I loved him.

[B]

It was just.

[A]

It was different fucking show.

[B]

Exactly.

[A]

But he did something he like.

[B]

But that's the. That's the problem.

[A]

You forgive the cliche, but he really went there with that fucking performance at the end.

[B]

And part of me loves that, and part of me was like. But you also have to recognize what the preceding two hours.

[A]

It's like a kids show for 20 for like two hours. And then this like.

[B]

And then he does Shelly horrifying sort.

[A]

Of like Hellscape vision of like black people's role in American pop culture. And I'm like, what is happening? It was thrilling, though.

[B]

It was thrilling because he's a thrilling performer. But I'm just like. I was sitting there going to be like. Like someone needs to sit and talk to everyone and be like, we can't. Either Josh has to tone it down or we have to amp up the preceding two hours because the. Neither can exist at the same time. But is that the same.

[A]

Sorry, that was.

[B]

That was the same year as the Life.

[A]

The Life. Oh, my God. Right, okay. And her parade.

[B]

No, Woods. It ended with Woods, Correct?

[A]

Yes. The Life. I think fondly of my theater going.

[B]

Experience, as I'm sure you do. I wonder if woods would have been as well received if the Life and Tap Dance Kid were any better.

[A]

Oh, no. I think that woods was always sort of like Jordan Roth's for the Snatching.

[B]

Oh, Roth was always gonna snatch it.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

I'm saying, like, would we as an encores audience have sat there and be like, oh, my God, thank God. Yeah.

[A]

Because the people who went to into the woods are like normal human beings. Tap dance and the Life are like freaks like us who are going to these things.

[B]

Sure.

[A]

Where it's like, oh, my God. A really strange revival of an unheard of 1993 musical. Whatever. Like, yeah, sure, let's go into the Woods. Like, people, people. People with jobs and people with lives outside of theater. We're going to see into the Woods.

[B]

I suppose I did like that. Heather Headley came on stage and she was like, I will go at my own tempo. She's like, I don't know what Y' all were rehearsing, but this is what I'm doing. God bless her.

[A]

You like Josh's take on Bill? Billy Bigelow or.

[B]

No, I don't, but that's. But the thing about Josh is. So I. I first saw Josh in American Idiot, where I remember he came out.

[A]

Yeah, I saw the tour. I don't really know about the.

[B]

He played the American son, like, army commercial dude.

[A]

Oh, interesting. Okay.

[B]

Yeah, I like that show, but because it was such a princess track, I'm sure he had, like, ensemble stuff going on. But I just remember he came out, I was like, oh, who's that? This golden throated man, right, who just, like, comes out jacked as all hell, singing into my mouth and then, like, goes off stage and leaves me pregnant. And then I saw him at Scott's Roar Boys, where he was truly tremendous.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

Then I saw him in one other. I saw one other thing where I thought he was super underwhelming. Then I saw him in Violet, which I loved, but I also just loved all the Violet Shuffle along where I thought he was. Oh, it was Porgy and Bass, where I was like, oh, you're fine in this.

[A]

What more do you want out of him in that role?

[B]

That wasn't a him problem. That was a production problem. I felt basically everyone but Audra was good. I thought Audra was amazing, but I was like, okay, Diane Paulus, can we give a little more direction?

[A]

Oh, wow.

[B]

I have opinions. It's fine.

[A]

Well, okay, you can have me back for the Porgy and Bess episode.

[B]

Sure.

[A]

That has haters. That surely has haters.

[B]

Oh, yeah, Diane Paul hates it. Do you not remember the controversy when that was happening?

[A]

I am Rasanha's letter.

[B]

Yeah. Because she and Audra were in an article being like, we're gonna fix it. And he was like, it doesn't need fixing.

[A]

Right.

[B]

But also, anyone tell me of any show, you can answer this for me because you just saw something yesterday. Any show that tried to fix an old show and did it Pal Joey.

[A]

Oh, my God, I'm on the spot. I haven't even read my review yet.

[B]

Did they fix it?

[A]

Juan? I've only seen, and I only really know the movie Pal Joey.

[B]

Sure.

[A]

I. I really can't. No, I don't know. Like, no, it did not fix it.

[B]

I mean.

[A]

I mean, I guess it's not. I think it follows it's the logical endpoint of its book, or rather what it wants to do and be like, well, this is realistic. They're not gonna end up together. He is a rake. And he will, you know, just sort of, like, scurry along to the next thing after this, you know, adventure's over. The show really just goes out when. With the fizzliest whimper of all time, which is. But I cannot tell you enough how immaculate the first act was.

[B]

Okay, I haven't seen it. I don't.

[A]

And Aisha Jackson, Elizabeth Stanley are having just this, like, mother off in the first act. Definitive versions of Bewitched, Bewitch, Bewitched, Bewitched. Bothered and Bewildered for Elizabeth and Aisha Jackson. My Funny Valentine.

[B]

I like. I like both of those ladies. I remember seeing Elizabeth Stanley in Company and then in Crybaby. And there's. There are two moments in Crybaby that I'll remember. Three moments in Crybaby that I'll remember. I don't remember anything else. I remember Ali Mozzie doing Screw Loose. I remember Elizabeth Stanley's character deciding that she wants to leave the squares and go be with Crybaby. And she sings the. His name Crybaby. And she hits this super high note, and it goes. It's the scene transition. I'm like. Like, who can pay attention to the set when this is doing what she's doing? And then in the very end of the show when James Snyder's crybaby comes out, he's like, I'm gonna cry. And I was like, okay. Only things I remember. But I digress. But no, people will look at these older shows and be like, we're gonna fix it. And they said that with Porky Bess and Sondheim was like, it doesn't need fixing. And then I saw it at art. Maybe that's wrong. I saw it at art before they, like, like, basically decided that what was there was fine. Because they made all these changes, like, added book scenes. They around with the orchestrations. I think they even around with the ending at one point. And I saw it where they had cut most of the book scenes, but the ending was still the same. And I was like, this makes no sense. And the set was like one giant piece of wood. And it was just odd. And I was like. I feel like Audra is the only one who's like, I am doing Porgy and Bess. And everyone else is like, we're doing. Diane Pol is working the best. I'm like, yeah, everyone get off that boat and go on this boat. But also, I have fallen less in love with Diana Paulus over the years. The back to what you were saying when. When you said These are the three shows I'll cover. And you said Jagged Little Pill. I said, the problem with Jagged Little Pill is covering it means I have to watch it again. I didn't like that show.

[A]

Good show.

[B]

I don't like that show. I don't like that. Anyway, we're gonna have to have another fight.

[A]

I know about Here We Are. Because, I mean, talking about, like, I haven't seen her. I want to hype up. I will hype up Carousel and its ability to not beg us to love what's happening on stage.

[B]

Sure.

[A]

The logical endpoint of that train of thought, though, leads to Here we are, which is so not abrasive. I wish I could say we're anti audience, but it's like, okay, we're doing this very sort of European satire thing that just does not necessarily work in musical theater.

[B]

Totally.

[A]

But I appreciate the effort. The effort. If it was an effort. If it was the effort we were meant to see. If it was the effort that he thought, you know, whatever. That's a whole kid of worms. I actually brought up Lilliam in my review of Here We Are.

[B]

Interesting. The thing about Carousel that I love is it we have four. Five if we count Louise. But I don't totally counter. I think we've got four female roles that are so vastly different from each other and all insanely actable and that.

[A]

It'S Louise being the daughter.

[B]

Louise being the daughter. Yes. But I think obviously Julie is a very complex role that is, you know, very powerful. So much rich material. Carrie can be a hell of a lot of fun. That's something that Barbara Cook was talking about because she played. She played Carrie at City center and then Julia, like, the year later. And like, what's the difference? She goes, carrie's more fun. Which is like, yeah, no, Carrie gets more songs. Carrie, she gets jokes. But also, like before, Audra, most carries were, like, very. Played it very dumb. Like Marie and Lilliam, like country bumpkin. And then I'll just like, no, Carrie's not dumb.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

You know, she maybe thinks she doesn't know, like, that Sphinx is the print, protect correct pronunciation. But, like, she's not a dumb dumb. And the way that Audrey played her was very sassy. She has this great line delivery when Enoch finally shows up and embarrasses her because she's been talking up to sort of like, you know, know, look like Joshua Henry and he looks like Eddie Corbich, who, God love him, you know, he's not 10ft tall. He's five, three. And bald. And all the girls are like, okay, Carrie, this is your big hunkin man. And she's embarrassed. And then they're trying to make small talk. And Julie's like, you know, looks like we're gonna have good weather for this glam bake. Not. Not a cloud in the sky. And he looks out the window and he goes, you're right. And his long beat. And Audra goes. He don't say much, but what he does say is awful pithy. I'm like, she's serving bitch. I love it. And there's this great bit where. With the. And it's. It's both funny and also kind of a great commentary of sort of who Enoch is as a person, where he's talking about his plans in the first half of when the Children Are Asleep, which is a song that some people want to cut. Like, oh, you cannot cut that song. Yeah, it's. Their relationship makes so much sense. It's. First of all, it's.

[A]

Well, that's the exact opposite of what Carrie and Billy could ever have. We need that sort of diametric opposite presented to us.

[B]

Yeah. Well, a relationship that can succeed in success in society, but is. Has its own sort of toxicity, which you don't even recognize just yet. It's actually very subtle and something I realized when re listening to it. I'm not sure how intentional is with Carrie and Enoch. It's very much intentional with Julian. Billy. But I'll get to that in a second. When he's talking about the boats in the 94 1, Audra has just taken out a tray of muffins because the whole scene takes place in Nettie's parlor in her kitchen. He takes out the muffins to represent each boat. He's like, I'm gonna make this boat. And then this boat and this boat. And he's, like, getting very excited. He's, like, pushing around. And Audrey's just looking to be like, I was gonna eat one of those. And then when he's done, and he's like, I'm gonna make all the sardines and we're gonna get rich. You mean all of us. Us. And he's talking about the kids they're gonna have. And he goes, our dear little house is gonna get bigger. And Andre hears this. And she looks at the muffins, and she no longer sees boats. She sees babies. And she takes each one. She just slams them.

[A]

And she's like.

[B]

She's like, nope, not this baby. Not this baby. Not this baby. It's so fucking Good. And she belts and so will my figure. It's one of the last times Audra belted. Belted what I realized musically first of all, in that song. So Enoch sings most of it with a few interjections from Carrie. And then when Carrie gets to sing the chorus, when the children are asleep we'll sit and dream. She never gets to. To finish a full lyric. He always jumps in right before she ever finishes it. Which is mostly just musical theater counterpoint. It's not. I don't think that's Richard Rodgers like making a dramatic statement or Hammerstein. But there is a little something to that of like she. Once they're together, she never gets like her own verse. In fact, she actually did get a verse in the original script that's. That they cut. It's no, it's no longer in the show. They cut it, I think out after the show opened because there's no recordings of it with her singing that verse anymore. So it's just him singing and then when she sings, he's always interrupting. Billy and Julie never actually have a duet. They never sing at the same time. It's always separate, which that is absolutely intentional.

[A]

Yeah. I had never thought about that. Look at that.

[B]

Yeah, well, because you have.

[A]

Julie does not sing that much, which is sad, depending on which Julie you have. But.

[B]

Yeah. Well, neither of them really sing all that much, which is. I mean, Soliloquy is a marathon.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

But after, you know, you've got if I Loved you and Soliloquy for Billy, there's like almost an hour's worth of show in between. Maybe 45 minutes. And then he doesn't sing again in act two, if you cut highest judge of all. But even if highest judge of all, like, that's still another 45 minutes till then, like of a two hour, 45 minute musical. Billy probably sings 20ish minutes worth of music. Julie about 15.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

So you do really need actors in the show. But if I Loved you is so fascinating because we think of it as this big love scene. And it is. But like, as opposed to Lori and Curly in Oklahoma who duet together, who let people say we're in love or Mary Martin and Ezio Pinza in South Pacific or anything like that. Julian, Billy are never really on the same page.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And their pride, the one thing they really share is pride and their stubbornness to ever admit anything about their vulnerability. While it's what they connect on, it's what makes it so sexual and exciting of the like, I'm not going first. You Go first. Yeah, you go first. It is what keeps them from singing at the same time. And I think that's so fascinating and it's so rare in musical theater for two lovers to not ever share a moment, to have a note together. Even in the promolous. And Emma sing together. Right.

[A]

Well, they're too horny. They're too taken by what the other one's saying to like want to join in? Have you. Wait, have you seen the 67 TV version with Robert Goulet?

[B]

I've seen parts of it.

[A]

I watched this morning. It was good. It's horny, I think because of sort of like. Well a how bad the transfer quality is. At least how it wound up on YouTube. But just sort of like the tightness of the TV cameras. Everything is sort of a very tight two shot at most. A two shot. There's some. There's some fun stuff with the carousel walls but like, like there if I love you into, you know, the Courtship. The whole of it is very, very sweaty.

[B]

Good.

[A]

And she play. I forgot her name. But she plays Carrie just like a lusty Carrie or Julie. Julie, sorry. She plays Julie like a lusty little. She's having fun.

[B]

Good.

[A]

She's horny. She's staring the fuck out of Billy Bigelow during the waltz as well.

[B]

She. Yeah. I love when people take texts like that. And I feel the same way about Sondheim where it's like where you just inject some blood and sweat and fun, you know, like make these people.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And make this exciting. Don't treat this like, you know, with kid gloves and you're working at some museum, you know, doing curating. It's what I have sort of had issues with some of the last couple of Sondheim revivals. Like it's why I don't like the Sweeneys because I'm like, it's fine, but I'm like, can you get dirty a little bit? Can you get miss a little bit? And I love it when people do that with Rogers and Hammerstein too because like again, Rodgers and Hammerstein, they got horny. And like Hammerstein in particular, I mean whether people think that it's there in his material or not, like he did have respect for women that I think he tried to put in his shows first. His mother was a massive feminist, like huge march for voting rights for women and equality and all this other stuff. She actually died from a botched at home abortion when he was 15. And that has always. That always like kind of stayed with him throughout his life. And how highly he thought of his mother. But, I mean, I. There's. You look at these Rodgers and Hammerstein musicals where he in particular wrote the book as well. There are so many potent roles for women, and they're all different from each other, which I think is what's important, because when people talk about, like, oh, I need a good, like, strong female role, like, what does that mean to you? You mean like a woman who has absolutely no flaws? Flaws, yeah. Makes no mistakes.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Or do you mean like a woman who's actable, who. Who has rich material to play because, you know, there's so many roll. Like, I love Belle and Beauty and the Beast girlfriend does not make a single mistake in that entire show.

[A]

Sure.

[B]

She's always just like, oh, you can't read. I'll help you. Everyone here so. Everyone here. So beneath me, but that's okay. And I'm like. Like, girl, make a mistake once or twice in your life.

[A]

Sure.

[B]

Yeah. I like that.

[A]

Playable roles.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Bring back Carousel.

[B]

Bring back Carousel. Who would you want to see if we brought it back today?

[A]

Oh. Oh, God. Truly. Who?

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Restage it. I loved it so much. It didn't. It didn't last six months. Just bring it back. What do you want?

[B]

There was a time I wanted Philippa sue, but after Camelot, I say no.

[A]

Oh, interesting.

[B]

Maybe would Philippa. Pippa, for those of us who don't actually know her, what she has, which is sort of what you were talking about with Jesse. And what Sally also had is the sadness in the eyes of, like, she can just stare out into the distance, and you're like, oh, you have a lot of thoughts right now. And, like, you've. And you have such foresight. My issue with Pippa right now, and I'm hoping it's just I need her to maybe be in a different show with a different director.

[A]

Did you see Suffs?

[B]

I did not see Sefs.

[A]

She was great.

[B]

I heard she was a lot of fun in that.

[A]

Don't spend three hours for it, but she's great.

[B]

I'm hoping that they trim. Trim the day. The day I was. The day I was supposed to see stuff. They canceled because half the cast had Covid again. But I'll. I always remember the first time I saw her was in Great Comet in the tent. Saw her three times, actually, and she was so dynamic. And I haven't seen her be that potent since then because then there was Hamilton, really. She's playing Liza, and she's sweet. She's a bit of a wet blanket. And then I saw Amelie, which was just NyQuil on stage, and then Camelot, which was just, you know, sandpaper. I saw her in Woods. I thought she sang beautifully. I don't think she was terribly funny, but, you know, that was. She was trying things. I'll give her credit. She. She was like, I'm gonna try a laugh here. I went, right. Applause on the effort, babe. But I. If she can channel that energy from Comet, I would like to see her play Julie Jordan. I don't know who I want for a carry. I use. If he. If he were, like, 10 years younger, I'd want Paula Alexandra Nolan as Billy.

[A]

Oh, sure.

[B]

That man, I think, is. First of all, he. Sex on stage. He's got an amazing voice. He's an incredible actor. Yeah. I don't know of any young dudes. Right now.

[A]

I'm struggling to piece together, like, one person in this cast.

[B]

Yeah. For a while, I wanted. I thought about maybe Ryan Vasquez, who's a friend, but he's kind of leaning more into pop these days, so I don't want to hear him sing classical.

[A]

Sure.

[B]

But if he was willing to go into the classical realm again, I'd be like, let's talk.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

He's about to do Notebooks, so talk about, you know, getting wet and romantic.

[A]

Sure. Maybe Lea Michele. Nettie.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Yeah, why not?

[B]

How was her Carnegie hall show?

[A]

Oh, spectacular. She did, like. She took audience requests and did Glee bits.

[B]

Oh, good for her.

[A]

It was really funny, except she was very politely sort of like, you know, people were raising their hands, and she only picked from the orchestra and whatever.

[B]

As far as you can see.

[A]

Well, that I was about. I was so close to yelling, but my friend kept sort of grabbing my hand and being like, right.

[B]

Carnegie Hall.

[A]

Don't do this. But I wanted to scream, run, Joey, run. So bad.

[B]

I would have shouted Halo, but I.

[A]

Know that in the Walking Dog.

[B]

Yeah. Sunshine mashup, where she hits that insane.

[A]

Note with the hairography.

[B]

Well, she's done that note live, by the way.

[A]

Really?

[B]

There's.

[A]

When they were in the concert film.

[B]

Yeah. When they were doing the Glee tours. Yeah. You. You can see her doing it.

[A]

Fascinating. She's amazing. She's. You know, she's leaning into not being, like, just like your gals gal, you know, which is so fun.

[B]

Yeah. No, she's not someone you get beers with. No, but she'll never be that.

[A]

No, but we can get, like, our nails done or something.

[B]

Really? I beg to differ with you. How do you mean? You're the top.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

You're an arrow collar. You're the top.

[A]

You're a cool dollar.

[B]

You're the nimble thread of the.

[A]

Cast unknowns. It. We need a new.

[B]

We need new people. We do need.

[A]

I don't. Can't think of a single damn person on Broadway right now who could be in Carousel. So.

[B]

Well, and that's. Okay, here's the problem there. There are so few young people right now on the Birdway who I'm like, you're interesting.

[A]

Huh?

[B]

Talented. But I'm like, okay, wait, hold on.

[A]

Let me cast her. But the one person I do have for that is Soleil. If I.

[B]

For which one I'm.

[A]

You say young person who's interesting and I'm like her. But now, now let me place her. She could be an interesting Julie.

[B]

Do we have a nine foot tall Billy in mind?

[A]

Maybe that's the thing.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Maybe it's a Napoleon complex thing. That's why he hits her.

[B]

Yeah, she.

[A]

I think genuinely, she's like one of the few people I grew up musical wise because, I mean, other than that, there's like actors that I think are interesting, but play actors that I think are interesting.

[B]

No, there are plenty of play actors that I'm obsessed with right now who are, you know, newer onto the scene. Musical actors, far less so, especially on the young side. And it's not necessarily their fault. It's like, it's like the only youngish performer right now who I enjoy because I think that they're different is Ava Noble Zada. And it's. She was so.

[A]

Ugh. And Gatsby, that might not be her fault. Yeah, that really is not her fault.

[B]

Yeah. I would say let's, let's take Gatsby out of the equation, shall we? Which I have not seen. But like, I just, I watched the rehearsal clips, I looked at the production team. I was like, I know what this show is.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

This is Tick tock Gatsby and you can kindly go jump into the river. But her. And even like Andrew Barthelman, these. The kids who like, come from the Jimmy Wards, like Renee Rapp, like, the kids come from Jimmy Wards and then don't go to college and go straight to Broadway. I'm like, yeah, you're a little, you know, you, you're raw, but your potential is so good. And you're not going to conservatories that are turning you into Michigan, ccm, Emerson robots. And I think that's what's making them interesting. Yeah.

[A]

I mean, let's see what Justin Cooley's doing in 10 years, maybe he could do.

[B]

I'm not mad about it. I'm not mad about it at all.

[A]

About him being Billy. I mean, it'd be like.

[B]

No, I'm not mad about him.

[A]

1080 from. You know, from. From Seth and Kimberly Kimbo.

[B]

Absolutely. I. I'm not mad just because I'm like, someone new and someone who I like and who's engaging. But, no, I'm absolutely with you. Unknowns do what they did in 94. Like, look at. Look at Steppenwolf and look at Juilliard and. And random ensemble members who haven't had their moment in the sun yet. Like, because, I mean, that cast, you know, Sally had just done Grapes of Wrath where she played Rose of Sharon. No one knew she sang. Audra was a recent Juilliard graduate whose only credit was playing the Aya in Secret Garden on tour. Eddie Corbich had. Was. It was Tobias and the teeny Todd four years prior.

[A]

Who's young? Who's new? Okay. Well, Aisha Jackson, who I saw in Pal Joey yesterday. I mean, I guess I've seen her in things before, but she's never really been given the chance to do anything. She was styling these songs, which I loved. I don't know what her. Like. Because she, like everyone in Peljobi, is such a type.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

That I can't really currently see them outside of what they were playing last night. Who else is young? What else do I like?

[B]

Who's young that I like?

[A]

No, because truly. Oh, my God. Who was it? Who was the one who was gonna be like. She was. She's, like, been tied to Anita Simone project forever. And this is not. How happening.

[B]

I have no clue.

[A]

Amber Amon.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Oh, I'll.

[A]

Maybe it's happening. Knock on wood. I would love that because I've seen her do Nina Simon songs, and it's insane.

[B]

I remember Amberman. I saw her in Shuffle along, which. Did you see? Shuffle.

[A]

Mess of a fucking show.

[B]

I adored it. I saw.

[A]

My friend Chris Can Talk, but I think a movie might be interesting.

[B]

Did you see Chef Long once? It was Frozen.

[A]

Oh. Actually, you know what? Hard to say this before I moved here, so I just saw, like, whatever I could fit in that weekend. Ooh.

[B]

No, I think after.

[A]

I think Frozen.

[B]

Okay. Because, you know, it was messy, but I. I thought it was just fire on that stage. But I remember Amber Amon singing. It was Brooks Ashman's gets an Act 2, telling all the creators.

[A]

Who gets zip in this Pal Joey by the way.

[B]

So I heard. Which is, you know, fine, whatever. That's on my vision.

[A]

He's great. That song, however, just does not play.

[B]

Brooks is, unfortunately, Brooks comes in, he does what he do, and I'm like, yes, you know exactly who you are, what you're about, and you make this work for you every single time. He's a fucking pro. But in Act 2 for shuffle along, he tells the creators of Shuffle along like, they won't remember you. And he has this whole big number of like, they won't remember you. And Amber's like behind a scrim singing as sort of like, kind of like the spirit of the show, almost in the memory of the show. And she's just wailing in this beautiful gospel way as the lights are getting like more dim on her. And I just being like, oh, this is a woman who is singing from the vagina.

[A]

Yeah, I know she's singing.

[B]

I know. And I miss that kind of singing. It's what I liked about Leah in Funny Girl. I was like, oh, I miss this kind of Alice Ripley and sideshow singing where you sing from the gut. You know, a movie version could be.

[A]

Good of Shuffle Along.

[B]

Shuffle along and, and, and Carousel. Honestly, I, I would be down to watch a. A good screen actor who can get one really good audio take in the studio and do that.

[A]

You think Emma could do Julie?

[B]

Emma Stone? No, she. I think she could have made a good carry. I think that's.

[A]

Oh, okay.

[B]

Yeah, Yeah, I think, I think that's more her vibe. Back in her Blue Valentine days. I would have thought maybe Ryan and Michelle Williams for Billy and Julie, but yeah, I just think she's a little. They're both too old for it now because I think those characters do need to be on the young side.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And I remember getting to a fight with someone at a party. This old queen. Don't ask me who they were, but they were like working for Playbill or Theory man. I don't know, whatever. But they're like, like 35 is not old. I'm like, I know it's not old because I was like 27th. I'm like, I know it's not old, but in the context of the show, they are all like 20, 21 around that age. And we need to see like how young and horny they are. Like, they're like, well, I think there's beauty in a 45 year old Billy. And I was like, okay, bye.

[A]

No, that's embarrassing. It can't be a 45 year old Billy.

[B]

Well, they're like, well.

[A]

Or if you are, it's a different.

[B]

Show at that point. His golden chances have passed him by.

[A]

Right, right.

[B]

What's he singing about? I'd let my golden chances pass me by. They happened already. There needs to be the wasted potential and opportunity in these characters. And that's sort of part of the tragedy, is how old they become before they ever get old.

[A]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. True.

[B]

Yeah. As opposed to, like. Well, we're. We're going through menopause now and.

[A]

No. Right. Julie is, like, 30.

[B]

When.

[A]

When, you know, in the final scene.

[B]

Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah.

[A]

32, 33.

[B]

Yeah. So you don't think she's 14? Yeah, 32, 33. No, they're. They're. And. And that's sort of, again, the tragedy is she's in her early 30s and yet she looks 50.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

You know, time has not been good to her because of how much. How much is eaten away at her in that time. Which leads me to the talk of depression. No. Something. So the past year has been very fascinating for me in terms of, like, my life, my choices, what's happened, what hasn't happened. The fallout of shit. And I will say, you know, with my own journey in romance, I had a bit of a Julie Billy moment. No physical violence. Just, you know, being with somebody who was clearly struggling and drowning and loving them and wanting the best for them and doing what I could to help without drowning myself. And I didn't realize how close to being fully underwater I was until it ended. And it didn't end on terms that were copacetic. It ended because another party decided it ended and I was given no closure, just shut off. And in the end, that was probably for the best. I'm probably better off now, although it still hurts. But being that close to someone who is in such a funk and helping them work through it, I felt a bit of that journey of Julie, of, like, I need other people to see what I see so I can have other people help me because I can't do this alone. And. And he, like. Because of the world, of society, of how, you know, men are supposed to act, he is. He will never say that he needs help because men are not allowed to do this in. In this society. But I know that he needs it. Can someone help me? And she has that scene with Carrie where she talks about how, you know, how it's all going and says that he hit me. And there's a difference in this, in Lillian where, like, you know, Lillian tries to deny that he ever consistently Beat Julie's like, I only hit her once. But other accounts have talked about, like, no, he. It's been more times. And she's specific about where he hit her too. And carousel at like, we don't need to know where. We don't need to. Like, he's like, he did it. That's bad enough. Whereas in Lilium Molnar is like, no, no, it was the face, breast and head. But Hammerstein makes it that it. That it was a one time incident. Which doesn't necessarily make it better so much as that it gives you insight into where Billy's at. Of like, he's at this low point and has this major lash out, which he regrets. And it immediately tarnishes him as this one thing and that he can never bounce back from. And because he's told you can never bounce back from this, he's like, well then why try? And just keeps going deeper and deeper. You know, when people tell you you're garbage, you can't bounce back from this, you start to believe them and you lean in and especially when you're depressed. In my experience, you know, depression is not necessarily like a funk that you're in so much as that it puts a filter on everything and you can no longer see the good. And then not only that, like, if people tell you good, you don't believe it. You only believe the bad.

[A]

It's all these outside forces. And I think like again, he, he probably knows when he agrees to do this robbery that's going to end poorly.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And I think when he kills himself, ultimately it's not because of like, oh shit, I'm cornered. But it's like, well, yeah, here's where I put myself.

[B]

Yeah, this is, this is the end. And. And he.

[A]

Here's where I let it get to me and let myself get to this point.

[B]

Yeah. And he's. And he also panics. You know, he's a. He's a dog in a corner and he can't. He says, like, I couldn't see anything ahead. Like, all he could see was the, the failure and the stench of him being in jail all those years and the, and the shame. And he's like, I can't. He literally is at a breaking point now. He's like, I can't go any further than this. I can't. And he shouts Julie's name, stabs himself. And when I directed him in college, our, yes, I just stole 94, but I mean, I made it work in a black box because we had $2,000 for a budget. So we did it with two pianos. Did it in a black box setting where I took an umbrella, a giant beach umbrella, ripped off the canvas. And then we put some streamers around it. So when it opened up and made the carousel, it was very cute. But my Billy, who's now in beautiful noise, when we were talking about that scene and we were talking about why Billy shouts Julie's name before he stabs himself and, you know, thinking what would make sense for him. Max was only, like, 20 at the time. And what we ultimately decided on was like, it was almost like a kid shouting for their mom of like, I need help. I'm. I'm trapped. Help me out of here. And you couldn't. And boom. Which is. I don't know. I find that incredibly heartbreaking. And people will hear me say this and go, yes, but he hit her. I'm like, if that's all you can think about.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Then you're. Then truly your empathy has bounds and something, you know, which I'm sure we. Itai and I will talk about with. With Downstate, which, as I said, will come out before this episode. That's sort of what Downstate often talks about is like, you know, how far does your empathy go?

[A]

Well, and how. What is punishment? Not just redemption, but, like, what is punishment? How much punishment is too much punishment? How much punishment actually correlates to the crime, and how much is just sort of like, at this point, your.

[B]

Your.

[A]

Your role in society is destroyed.

[B]

Yeah. And wet. And can anyone actually be redeemed? Do we want redemption for anyone? Like, how big of a monster is someone for them to get?

[A]

And what are we getting out of the. Punishing someone else?

[B]

Exactly. What's the end game here? Because at the end of the day, these are all still people. And, I mean, there are true sociopaths who feel no shame or empathy or anything like that. But when you see people who are conflicted and are. And have trauma that make them do terrible things, it's like, well, what. How do we help? Or do we let them flounder? And everyone in Carousel lets Billy flounder. You know, you've got two people who try to help. We've got Julie and we've got Mrs. Mullen. Mullen obviously has her own selfish reasons. She likes getting dicked down by Billy. She's also in love with him in her. In her way, in her.

[A]

And she's profiting off of him because he's a good broker.

[B]

Yeah, it's. It's triple win for her. Yeah, you Know, she. The man. The man that she's loved for the first time since her husband died is also a gorgeous young ruffin who depends on her, who makes her money and, you know, dicks her down good. And he ends up, you know, going off because of their own disagreements. I mean, that's. She ultimately sees that Julie is different from every other girl that he's ever probably fucked behind her back. She sees it immediately. It's why she kicks Julie out and she claims it's for indecency. Oh, you let him, you know, grope you. But it's, you know, again, it's that thing where sometimes other people can see what you don't. And it's not so much like love at first sight. Although I know people who kind of have. I know two people have had that where they met someone who they're now married to.

[A]

Me and mine, I'm not married, but.

[B]

Oh, it was love at first sight for you guys.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

That's amazing.

[A]

Yeah. But anyway.

[B]

No, no, no. Well.

[A]

And her one year is tomorrow, two days from now. I was kidding. But.

[B]

So talk about that, though. Like, when you guys.

[A]

You could not stage how we met, but we don't have to go into.

[B]

The how, but talk about, like, the. The feelings you had when you saw each other.

[A]

Like, erotic. It was at a club. So it's like the initial thing was the attraction. And I wasn't, like, in love with his mind from, you know, the first sight.

[B]

No, but it was a instant.

[A]

It was an attraction. Then we just, like, did not leave.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Other. So it's like we count, like, truly. It was not official or whatever. Like, we didn't have titles, like, maybe two or so months after we met. But, like, we count us meeting as the Lord, like, day one, as well it should be, because it was just sort of like we did not leave each other after that.

[B]

But, I mean, I think that's sort of what people don't. When people mistake first love at first sight, they think it's immediately like, oh, I. I have fallen and I have this love for this person. That's not really what love at first sight is. It is an instant connection, and it tends to be attraction. But it's. It's more than just that because, like, there are a lot of hot people in the world. Yeah, it's. It's. It's.

[A]

Well, it's even like, in the way that, you know, I mean, I do think, like, eroticism and sex is a language. So it's like, yes, I might have. I might have given eyes at somebody else in the club that night. That night. And they might have given them back. But the way the two of us gave each other eyes communicated something that was deeper than just like, you're hot.

[B]

Yeah. No, it's. It's this.

[A]

It's like, oh. Or if. Even if it is just that, it was still. The way you communicate is you think I'm hot is hot. And I think the way I'm communicating, you know, I'm saying, like, it's. Yeah, it's still that language that is being shared.

[B]

Well, and that's. That's the thing about Julie with Billy. Right. It's. I feel like when people watch like a rom com and they need all these reasons for these two people falling for each other. Well, what are the things they have in common? And. And it's like sometimes it's just. It's just that snap where you can't define it. Just there's. There is a link between you and every. It. It's not so much everything that they do is amazing. It's rather just like you find them so compelling that you like the things that they do. Tickles a part of you that no one else can in a way. That's not work. It's just there.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And that is really what the Billy and Julie thing is. Enoch and Carrie love each other. And then sort of on paper, marriage, like, you check all these boxes. Like, that's what Carrie likes about Enoch is steady and reliable. And he's nice looking. Right. Isn't he? He's an investment. Literally. When he gets her flowers, he gets her seeds for flowers. It's about the work. And Julian, Billy. It's not about the work. It's about what you can always sort of fall back on. And I think you need a little bit of both in order to make a relationship last in a way that's healthy. But you do need both. And I think neither Julie and Billy or Carrie and Enoch have what the other one has even an Iot. Sure.

[A]

And there's also nothing. What pushes Carrie and Enoch together is society. But like society showing its good face. It's society being like, well, you're a nice girl and you're a nice boy.

[B]

Like.

[A]

Like, you know, here you go. Whereas yes, there is sort of the animal magnetism, magnetism between Billy and Julie. But it's also. I'm not ruling out that she only, you know, there's. We talk about these outside forces that sort of push these two together. I'm not ruling out that she was just sort of doing this despite Mr. Bascom. No, Ms. Mullen.

[B]

Oh, Ms. Mullen.

[A]

Ms. Mullen. She's like, well, you. I'm going to him now. Like, you thought he was putting his hands on me in the carousel. Like, well, okay, yeah, now we're going to.

[B]

It's possible there's.

[A]

I don't think it's like, the main thing, but, you know, the way they meet, the way they sort of are pushed together first, we sort of have, you know, they both rebel against her. They're about. Against this mullet. So, okay, like, well, fuck you. You're not gonna tell me how to do my job. And it's you. You're not gonna tell me what to do at this, you know, fair that I'm paying for. And then the cops show up and threaten her with sort of like, well, you're gonna ruin your life and you're gonna not go home to your. It's home. Whatever.

[B]

It's. It's how they describe Scarlett Johan Hansen's character in Vicky Christina Barcelona, where she's like, I don't know what I want. I just know what I don't want.

[A]

Right?

[B]

And it's like both of them are like, I'm not necessarily sure what it is I'm rebelling against. I just know that I'm rebelling. There's also. They also have the moment where they disclose that Julie's actually been to the carousel a bunch. Because Billy's like, oh, I don't. I haven't seen you around much. Like, maybe two or three times. She's like, I've been there much more than that. And he immediately zeros in. He's like, ah. And you saw me. You like? Yeah, yeah. And it's clear, like, you know, she doesn't go there to that carousel every time because the ride is so good. She goes there to look at him.

[A]

Right?

[B]

But it's not as. It's not just instant attraction. It's many things that can be a little bit rebelling. It's also her seeing a side of him that I don't think any other of the girls see. That I think is also why he connects with her in a way that he's never connected with anyone else. Whereas every other girl looks at him like a piece of meat to be devoured, which makes him feel good about himself. It's like, yeah, I'm desirable.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

But then the way that Julie looks at him, it's not just, I want to fuck you. It's like, I want to fuck you. And hold your head in my hands afterwards while you cry.

[A]

Right?

[B]

Which is like. What is this thing of. Like, this thrill of having a release and a safety net, which I don't think he's ever felt. And, of course, he's not built to take advantage of that in a healthy way. But that is what Julie kind of ultimately provides from, is this. Is this safe. Safe space for him to be vulnerable in that he can't even really be with Mrs. Mullen because she. Mom, she mothers him in a way that's not the same. It's, you know, ownership in a way. Whereas Julie is trying to be a partner, and Billy just is not built to do that. And ultimately, he's. He's still not able to be that in the end, what. All he can do is try to sever the ties that Julian. Louise have from him. Him. So they can only take away what good they had from that experience and then can just go on and beat people because, you know, anyone who's died to him can't be a person. We never know what happened to Mrs. Mullen after he died. And Heitner stages Louise's pas de deux on the ruins of the Mullen Carousel, which I think is. I love. I do love that detail because it's. Rather than in other productions, which is also how Hammerstein wrote it. Like, it's a traveling carnival. Some ruffian comes in and he's like, oh, yeah, I'll. This Louise kid, actually, she kind of wants it a bit too much. Right, I'm gonna walk away. Heitner does it where it's like, well, at this point, the carnival's dead. Something happened in the last 16 years. It's over. The. The remains are there. So Louise and her male friends go and they around, and they also almost try to rape her. And then this random dude comes along and, like, the first guy who makes her feel like a woman, who makes her feel some sort of happiness that allows her to kind of forget all the outside forces. And then Heitner has the snow children come in and interrupt them, because once again, the outside world always finds a way. I think that's another message you could have from Carousel. The outside world always finds a way.

[A]

Yeah, life finds a way. Like in Jurassic Park.

[B]

Is that what he says in Jurassic Park?

[A]

Jeff Goldblum? Yeah.

[B]

Life finds a way.

[A]

They're like, we only brought females. And he's like, life finds a way.

[B]

Life finds a way. Yeah. You can only be in your cocoon of dysfunction for so long before other people come in and go, hold the fuck up.

[A]

Right.

[B]

Yeah. So if you were directing a production to Carousel with all unknowns and you had an unlimited budget, so, yeah, this is truly what Juan wants.

[A]

Finally.

[B]

What is. How are you telling your cast to approach this show? Like, what are you. What. What are the things you want them to focus on when they go into this text?

[A]

Ooh. Impulse. Forced horniness. I think that's sort of like the driving, you know, I think it's a show about, like. Like, the death and sex drive. It's like they are bound to each other because they're horny and they see something in each other, and that's. I'm not gonna say they don't consider other factors. They don't consider, like, Billy sort of unhappy being tied down before he finds out he's gonna be a father. Julie knows that she's gonna lose her home and her, like, respectability if she continues his romance, but that's immaterial to them at that point. So I think, yeah, I'm telling my cast to lead with lust. I mean, the play starts with two women fighting over this guy and who gets to fuck him. So it's like.

[B]

Yeah, yeah.

[A]

I think that's the guiding principle. And then, you know, lead with lust.

[B]

I, like, lead with lust.

[A]

And then some characters, I guess. Maybe not Carrie. Not really.

[B]

Yeah. I think Carrie, she has her own.

[A]

Sense of lust that maybe is still developing itself, and it's, like, confused directionally.

[B]

But I think, yeah. What is it that your character wants out of life? What is it that they expect out of life? And what is it they think they can get out of life?

[A]

Yeah, I like the idea of Nettie being sort of like a madam in a way, where it's like, she's just, like, bringing out lobster to all these, like, hot sailors that are pulling in. Whatever.

[B]

I think maybe part of the reason why Carrie. Why Julie is like, I'm never gonna marry, is she sees her cousin Nettie, who probably never married, has her own business and, like, is doing pretty nicely.

[A]

Yeah, she's a spa. Whatever that meant back in the day.

[B]

Yeah, whatever that meant. And. And. But, like, you know, is free, makes her own money, has her own home, and. And is able to kind of be a person of society and be respected and liked and not tied to anybody and probably has also gone dick down once or twice. I always wonder if it's better to cast Nettie older or, like, a little closer to Julie's age. More like a big sister age, you know?

[A]

I think Carrie takes The big sister role. Well, I'd be interested to have, like, the counterpoint of having Nettie be sure.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

No, I like the idea of a little bit of wisdom.

[B]

Yeah. Agent Ness. I also like. I like a slightly. There are. I also. I also saw a production of Carousel in London at the Savoy, which Alexandra Silber was Julie. And she was.

[A]

Whoa.

[B]

When 09, I want to say.

[A]

Okay, cool.

[B]

I didn't love the crazy theater for that.

[A]

I don't know if I see that, but sure.

[B]

It was this. I talk about an ugly set. It was all projected because it was the height of the projection craze.

[A]

Right, right, right. Still ravaging Broadway.

[B]

Yeah. It was super bad on this one. It was just awful. They cast a Billy where they're like, we're doing the John Rate thing where, like, he can't really act, but he sings beautifully. And then it's Silver who was like, oh, no, I. I act on Storm. So she was just mopping the floor with him. But I remember when she does her whole monologue to Billy and then she says, what am I gonna do? And she starts to freak out the act. The woman who played Nettie, who was an opera singer, who wasn't much of an actress, but the one scene she nailed was that speech to Julie. She kind of grabbed her, and she was basically. Her tone was basically like, you need to calm down. She's like, I know you're upset. She's like, but there is a baby coming, right? It's like. And you have to get your head on your shoulders, because once that thing is out, like, it's up to you. She's like, so. She's like, you're not alone. I'm here with you. You're gonna stay with me. We're gonna care for your kid. And, like, you gotta get your together, girl. It's like, I know he's dead over there right now. He's like, no one's like, take a minute. Everyone's like, you're better off. And Daddy's like, get us together. It's that Jennifer Lewis story that Marissa Jarrett Winiker talks about when she. She got diagnosed with breast cancer right before, like, a reading of Hairspray. And they're doing this industry reading. And she's, like, crying all throughout Act 1. Jennifer Lewis pulls her aside and she goes, you are on stage with Ms. Jennifer Lewis. You need to talk about. It's so good. But I love. I just love that Nettie, kind and nurturing as she is in that moment, she is like, you gotta toughen up.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

I, like, you don't want to hear me say this, but it is the truth. And that is also what I love about you'll Never Walk Alone, which is. I was reading this book round in circles. This song has a huge legacy that I never realized. It's called.

[A]

Lana Del Rey covered it at one point.

[B]

Of course she did. She knows exactly what to do. And, I mean, obviously it's been covered a million times. Times. But it's known as the football song in Europe, which I did not know.

[A]

Because of the Liverpool team, I think, specifically.

[B]

Yeah. And then. But then other football clubs started using it as well, to the point where, like, everyone in the UK just knows that song.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And I think in certain parts of South America as well. But it's. It's so fascinating to me. And they were. They were discussing what it is about the song that makes it so powerful. And there's the technical elements of the music, how it's. It just. Just builds and goes higher and higher and higher into this final declarative chord. But the lyrics are also simple yet powerful. Like, Hammerstein's really good at finding the power in simplicity. It's maybe not the most.

[A]

He's the Casey Musgraves of his time.

[B]

Yes, that's exactly what he is like. It's not maybe the important, most sophisticated of lyrics, but it's why he always tended to write more about, like, country folk than about New Yorkers. Like, he did two shows about New Yorkers and neither show worked. And it's. Even though he was a sophisticated New Yorker himself, he's like, I don't know. I feel more comfortable writing about people on a farm. And so the lyrics of youf'll Never Walk Alone, they are sort of about, like, you know, it's gonna get shitty sometimes.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And the important thing to remember is, like, it eventually will pass and you have to brave through it. It. Because if you do like, you will be rewarded in the end. Whether it's with more strength, with determination, with a community, but even though, like, you'll. Frank Rich wrote a piece about carousel in the 90s. So, like, he's the reason why the one that came to Lincoln center transferred. It started at the national and it was this big sensation. And he went and saw it because he's like, I'll be the judge of whether this is good or not. Because at the time, London loved to be like, we just did a Golden Age musical, better than in Broadway, can you believe? And he would come over and be like, no, you didn't. So a Carousel. He's like, actually, no, you did it this time. You did it, Joe. And so they brought it over and then he reviewed it and he's like, it's. It's even better here because, you know, we got better singers. But he said, you know, it's so funny that the final song is yous'll Never Walk Alone. He's like, cuz it kind of feels like with Carousel, it's sort of like you always walk alone.

[A]

Right.

[B]

As, you know, as we said, life finds a way and all of us are alone in this world. As Billy says, we're, you know, just a bunch of stars in the sky. None of us count at all. But sort of what that song is saying is like, yeah, you'll be on your own physically, but if you don't let the worst get the best of you.

[A]

Well, I always thought it was like, you'll never walk alone. We're all together in how alone we are.

[B]

Kind of.

[A]

Yeah, yeah.

[B]

And again, like, if you don't, like.

[A]

You are part of a constellation of sad people. And we're all sad.

[B]

We're all sad. And we all are just trying to brave through every day. We're all just trying to find a reason to get out of bed. But again, if you don't let the worst get the best of you, then you will have something you can hold on to each day.

[A]

There's also a tinge of it with like, with the football. Ification of it all. I think, like, there's a way of reading Walk on. Walk on as. Walk it off.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

You know, it's like, just keep going. Oh my God. Like, just exit the field. But, you know, take the L and keep going.

[B]

Absolutely. Yeah. Take. Take the L. I love it. What? Okay, parting. So parting words on Carousel. If someone comes up to you and like one. What? Why? Why? Why this show.

[A]

Explored why this show? Why am I. Are they catching me mid argument?

[B]

I think I don't know.

[A]

Or like when I tell people that I did an episode of this podcast and they asked me which show and I say Carousel.

[B]

Why? Sure. Yeah, let's. Let's say I don't know the music.

[A]

I think honestly, like, I don't even have to get past the music. It's so fucking beautiful.

[B]

It is.

[A]

The music is so, so, so, so beautiful. It's. It's a reductive word, but it's interesting. Not many musicals, even ones I like are interesting, you know, Like, God, what show? I mean, even, like, even shows that don't carry out their interesting things fully. Still hint at them, I think, makes them superior. Like, for example, I don't know, wicked. Like, there are some complex decisions made in that show. Like, sure, sure, I'll tack onto that. You know, like, what does it mean to throw your friend under the bus and then like, live with the consequences forever? In a way.

[B]

What does it mean to take the man who's been with your best friend and be like, no, he's mine now.

[A]

Right, exactly.

[B]

We could do what society tells us and you can still be with Glinda. Or we could go off and be happy.

[A]

Right, exactly. Yeah, similar. Yeah. It's just sort of the, the Lana Del Rey of musicals. For me. It's about feelings that we don't. That society doesn't want us exploring, but they're the ones that we need most explored. Because if we don't explore them through art, then how else are we going to sort of confront them? How else are we going to have our own sort of. Julie. Moments of like, I'm doing something that's objectively stupid, but it's what I'm doing and I need some comfort in that choice.

[B]

No, absolutely. The question is always, like, how? None of us have ever been perfect. We all make fucked up choices and we've also hurt other people. All of us, every single one of us. Us, hopefully unintentionally. The people of Carousel are actually people. They're not archetypes, they're not tropes, they're not stand ins for a message.

[A]

Right.

[B]

They are truly complicated, messy, red blooded human beings. And that is what, for me, keeps the show alive. What makes me frustrated is I do think that the second act works. You have to trust it and you have to lean into the fact that, as you said, like, lean on the. Lean into the lust and, and also, like lean into the trauma and the hurt and the pain. The movie version with Shirley Jones, God bless her, you know, when she's doing that whole, like, it's possible for someone to hit it, like she holds her daughter close to her and they look off into the distance like it's an episode of Lassie.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And that's. I mean, that's the 1950s. That's the aesthetic, but the best. Julie, please don't say it like it's a piece of beautiful poetry. They don't say it like they're saying, walk on, walk on. It's their truth and it's not necessarily something that gives them comfort. Julie is saying, you know, yes, I got Hit once and it didn't hurt because I knew what was happening behind that hit. What hurt was everything that came after where I'm at now. And again, that line is more important for Billy to hear. Hayden has like a. He lets out sort of a no when he. When he hears her say it. And they cut it. In 2018, Rudin said in an article, he's like, we're keeping the text exactly as is. And then he cut the line. I think he had Louise say like, he hit me and it didn't hurt. Is that possible? And then basically just. And then Jesse was sort of like, yeah, bye. And then they sang. But you need for a Billy, you need to be able to show some of the tenderness. You need to show some of the conflict. Soliloquy is this great number for an actor, for Billy, because you have that bravado at the beginning and that excitement, that sort of childlike excitement. It's almost like Billy's playing house at the idea of being a father. And the fun he's gonna have until he realizes it could be a girl. And in his own simple minded way, he thinks, well, a boy could get by on just having fun with me, but I gotta take care of a girl. But you got to take care of both genders. And like, what if that boy you had is a flaming homosexual? You're a sensitive man and you're straight. You're gonna. You're gonna give birth to a sensitive boy. But you need to buy that boy well for sad children. A sad well for boys. But it makes him realize all of a sudden the importance of the role he's gonna have to have as a father and how he's got a man up and he doesn't know how. So he goes for the time first. First thing he can think of, which is an opportunity to make some money. And that whole my little girl section is such a sweet moment because it shows that he has that side to him. He's not just a blowhard. There's a great line. Fuck, there's a great line. And again, it's not Jesse's fault. Jack o' Brien was like, everyone take one line of cocaine and say all the dialogue. Get to the songs as fast as you can. But when Enoch brings Carrie her hydrangea, see seeds and geranium seeds, he says, I really like getting into a garden, taking care of flowers. Does your husband like to do that? And Sally takes a beat and she goes, no, I cannot rightfully say Billy likes to take care of flowers. And then she Takes another beat, she goes, he likes to smell them, though. And that is Billy in a fucking sentence. Just because he doesn't know how to take care of a flower doesn't mean he doesn't appreciate the perfume and the beauty of them. Which I think is something that not a lot of men either are able to do or capable or willing to let themselves do. And that is sort of. And Julie's always sort of focusing on the. He likes to smell them, whereas Carrie and everyone else is like, he can't take care of a flower. And that is the tragedy of him. That's the beauty of him. And that is sort of where I need. I need a Billy who can bleed. And if you play the bravado, all I see is the wife beater. If you play the person who, who's broken, I see the man. So that is what I want to say. And when we talk about that line and when people ask why the show is still relevant, I had a friend once asked me, like, I just don't know why we need to do this show ever again. I'm like, because this still happens.

[A]

Right, people?

[B]

And it's not. First, also, let's. Let's be also honest here. It's not just women in toxic relationships with men. There are men in toxic relationships with women, men in toxic relationships with men, and women with women. Like, abuse can come in any form. It can be physical abuse, it can be mental abuse. Talk about Gaslight. Yeah, I mean, that's the thriller element of it. But, you know, manipulation is, is another form of abuse.

[A]

Control is another form and self manipulation. Jesse also, sorry. Julie sort of, you know, manipulates herself into believing that, like, that this has a future. This could end well. Possibly.

[B]

Yeah. The hopefulness that it could end well. Yeah. And. And because she is a strong, smart woman, I think she partially thinks, like, I can handle this for the both them of us. And the way like Charlie says in Heartstopper, he's like, oh, I'm gonna make sure that Nick's coming up as perfect. Like, I can control this. No, you can't. Life finds a way. And the. That is the tragedy of the stupidity of Julie, which makes her so fascinating, but it doesn't make it any less compelling. And when you. If again, if Carousel were saying that Julie was right and Billy is not all that bad, they would have a happy ending.

[A]

Ending.

[B]

They don't. They get. She gets closure, he gets to not go to hell, but they don't get to be together. You know, the world still kind of proved Them right. That their relationship was doomed. But she also can proves people right from beyond the grave that, like, he is capable of it if we give him a minute and. And. And. And a chance. Some people don't want to hear that. Some people just want people who do bad, who've done a bad thing or multiple bad things things to be punished forever with no redemption.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And some people, you know, want no one to ever do bad ever. And I'm like, okay, stay in your apartment and, you know, watch Bluey. What's that kids program that. Coco Melon. Watch Coco Melon. Stay in your apartment, watch Coco Melon. Otherwise, I don't know what to tell you. You know, it's. It's. You go, people. Well, I go into a theater to escape. I'm like, sure, but if you only see idealized versions of humanity, how do you go out into the world and learn from that or do anything with yourself? You know, you need. You need both. That's what I got to say. Juan, this was lovely. This was very lovely. So now the question is problematic.

[A]

Mm.

[B]

Do you think that Carousel is problematic? Do you. After we've had this talk, do you think that it is a show that maybe has dated poorly, or do you think it's a show that maybe could use a second chance?

[A]

I do not think it has aged poorly. I think, if anything, it has grown to give us opportunities to make it better. Sort of with the same thing that happened with the Oklahoma 2019 revival that sort of excavated it and, like, brought out its, you know, like, sex drives. I think whether it was written to be problematic, whether Julie was meant to sing what's the use of wondering with a straight face and tell her daughter that love. Like, sometimes men hit us, and that's it, you know? Like, I think, if anything, the passage of time has given us the vantage point of being able to see. Like, okay, let's complicate that. Let's see what. How can we read that line? What could they have meant? What does that mean now? What will that ever mean? Is it problematic? Yes. But I think art should be problematic in that sense. Like, not in the sense of, like, the second act is bad. The book is whatever. Art should be about problems, like, of the heart, of the soul, of, like, destiny, whatever. Like, that's what I want explored. It's nice to have an escape. It's nice to have a hello, Dolly. That's sort of like, yay the whole time. And I love hello, Dolly. But, yeah, it's, you know, I. I want. I Would rather things be problematic. That's what I'm going to be remembering. I'm going to be thinking about. That's what I'm going to be.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Spending three hours recording.

[B]

Yep. I. I will go see Titanique and Barbie, as well as Kimberly Akimbo and Downstate. I. I need both. I absolutely need both. I don't think Carousel is problematic. I think Carousel is.

[A]

It's about problems.

[B]

Sure. It's uncomfortable.

[A]

I also think the word problematic means, like, nothing at this point.

[B]

Oh, absolutely.

[A]

Which is why it's like, oh, that artist is problematic. And I'm like, wait, I want an artist to be problematic. I want an artist to have more than one idea in their head. And that the conflict of that and the confluence and convergence of those ideas are the things that are driving the art. And, you know, like, yeah, I love them.

[B]

People go, well, this is saying that, you know, this is okay, or people should be. Should be doing this or not be doing this. I'm like, okay, you say this now, then you. You're gonna go off into the world and do all the things that you say are problematic about this song.

[A]

Right.

[B]

The art reflects who we are and what we've done and what we will continue to do. And it's not Carousel's fault that these people exist in the world.

[A]

Right, Exactly.

[B]

It can make you uncomfy, but it's there. And it's not the fact that it's not saying, just so you know, this is wrong. They're just. They're just simply presenting it with no judgment. And that makes a lot of people scratch. And I get it. But I'm also like, okay, step the fuck up and get some tougher skin.

[A]

Sure.

[B]

Got it. Got it.

[A]

Yeah. It feels very adult in that way. Yeah.

[B]

It fucks like a grown up.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Which is what? Did I say that about another show recently? Oh, no, I said that about that production. I said the 94 production. Yeah, said it like a grown up. And there are so many shows right now that claim to have sex appeal, be sexy. And I'm like, you are a gummy bear in lingerie and you know it. Do not tell me that this is sex. Sex is weird. Sex is hot. Sex is confusing. Sex is vulnerable and can be funny, and it's sweaty. And it's. When you think about what the fuck it is, you're like, if you stood out of yourself and looked at it, you're like, the fuck. But when you're doing, you're like, no better feeling. Want to do it all the time.

[A]

Yeah, well, it's very animal. And not to literally, not to open up yet another can of worms as we are wrapping this up. But it's like there is so much made in Carousel about what time of year it is. And it's spring and everyone's fucking the yew, sheep, the fish, everything. Like, it's just. We are just another species that's doing its thing.

[B]

June isn't peeping out all over, it's.

[A]

Busting out all over.

[B]

Your face, your chest, back, feet, whatever you want. It's my favorite Roger lines from American Dad, I can't let you come in sad. So you can either do it on my feet or back Dion's choice. No, it's busting out. And I did have a listener say, like, can you please just quickly mention Miss Leslie Uggams with the hoobas and the jibas and the heezas and the wazzas there. We said it. We mentioned it. Another moment where Carousel got mentioned in the pop culture vernacular. It's a carousel as a show is not necessarily brought up a ton in pop culture. Every now and then there's a movie where, like, it's called City hall, where there's a mob police meeting during intermission of a production of the show. But mostly it's just the songs that have been put into the vernacular, like the weird if I Loved you for Red White and Royal Blue. There's some pop band that used the theme from the Carousel Waltz in one of their songs. Oh, yeah. I don't know which one it was, but someone's like, I was thinking on.

[A]

My way here, because I am an avid city biker, just bicycle, you know, enthusiast. And I love listening to the waltz while I'm biking because it's a very, you know, cyclical way. Very sort of like going in that. I'm not an avid Carousel attender, though. Do we know how often that is played at a carousel? Because I would love to have that sort of, you know, how often the waltz is played at Immersive experience for myself where I'm like, riding that, listening to it.

[B]

I don't know. I. It's. I'm sure it's played. Sure. And it's usually like the main theme. I actually.

[A]

Okay, here's my production. St. Anne's Warehouse does it. And it starts at the carousel outside and, like, shift inside.

[B]

Sure, why not?

[A]

And it's all. It's on rocks. Are you kidding?

[B]

Yeah, let's do it. I would love to do a site specific carousel all in a park. And it's just it. And we do it sort of circular. It's like we start in. We start in one location, and we shift over a little bit to the left. And then we're on the castle, and then we're on the hill, and then we're on the Bleh.

[A]

And then going to heaven is that thing from gym class where you, like, lift the sheet and everyone runs under.

[B]

Yeah. And then Billy gets on the carousel horse, and the carousel turns and he goes away, and that's it. And then when the carousel horse comes back on, he's gone. And that's. And we have come full circle. That was another theme of the Design of the 94. One was circles. The. The curtain was a giant circle. There was the clock of the. The factory. There was a giant circle on Bascom's cotton mill gate. The hill, the moon, everything. I don't know. It was a really. I love that design for many reasons. I love a. It was very impressionistic almost and very theatrical. So it gave off the impression of, like, yes, this is a real situation, but this show is not realistic, which allowed us to buy into the whole, like, we're gonna go to heaven soon. It's like, yeah, no, look at. Look at the set. It almost looks like a miniature golf course. Like, yeah, it's fine. But also, I just loved the thematic elements of it and how big it was. It made you feel so small. And I feel like the characters in Carousel all feel small. Julie and Billy are aware of how small they are. I don't think Carrie and Enoch are aware. Carrie and Enoch are like, we got 20 likes on Instagram for our engagement photo. And Julie's like, yeah, we're gonna die one day. And that is the whole theme of those couples. In a nutshell. Anyway. Yes, let's move on. Juan, this was delightful. Thank you for having me. Thank you for coming on. Sorry to interrupt. If people. If you want people to find you, where can they find you?

[A]

Decreasingly on Twitter, but on Instagram at its number. Juan, the. Its is very much part of that. Do not go follow whoever number Juan is at. It's number one. Or you could read me. I am the chief critic at Theatrely. I'm also in the Times, and whenever I'm not doing theater, imagine other places. Just follow me on Instagram.

[B]

Yay. It's a fun follow. I highly recommend, if you want to follow me at Matt Koplik, usual spelling, nowhere else. Do not do Facebook. That is for family pretty much only. What else do I want to say, I don't know what our next episode is going to be. This whole, I've been recording so much out of order and I'm just sort of figuring out the game plans. But just either way, join us next week. If you like the podcast, give us a nice 5 star rating or review. As always, if you like it, I will read the review on the podcast. With the lightning the Piazza Overture playing in the background. That is always the music we play every time there's a new review. Juan, we close out every episode with a Broadway diva. What Braway diva would you like to have play us out today?

[A]

I don't think that has to do with all this, you know, Doris.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

Okay. Does it have to be like a recorded track or can we pull from YouTube?

[B]

I can pull from YouTube. I've done that.

[A]

The insane and insanely grainy, I believe, London recording of Patty doing As long as he needs me, Ms. LuPone.

[B]

Okay, okay.

[A]

She's just yelling. That's amazing.

[B]

Oh, she is. Same thing with her final performance of Evita. She is. She's just yelling, rainbow high in 90 seconds. She's like, I. I've got the meter running, baby. God, I love it. All right, Right, Okay. So it's going to be Patti LuPone doing that again. Thank you so much for listening, guys. We'll see you next week. And that'll be it for now. Take it away, Patty. Bye.

[A]

As long as.