DEAR EVAN HANSEN (Part 1) & The Broadway Season w/ Ruthie Fierberg

Summary

Broadway Breakdown Podcast Episode: "DEAR EVAN HANSEN (Part 1) & The Broadway Season" w/ Ruthie Fierberg

Host: Matt Koplik
Guest: Ruthie Fierberg
Date: December 21, 2023

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Overview

This episode of Broadway Breakdown features host Matt Koplik and guest Ruthie Fierberg (veteran theater journalist and host of "Why We Theatre") for a double-header: a deep exploration of the musical "Dear Evan Hansen" (Part 1) and a state-of-the-season discussion of the 2023–24 Broadway year. True to the show’s reputation, the conversation is deeply opinionated, candid, and at times irreverent—diving into the heart, controversy, craft, and current trends on Broadway.

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Main Theme: Why Is "Dear Evan Hansen" Seen as Problematic (or Not)?

(00:00–31:55)

Summary:
The first part unpacks why "Dear Evan Hansen" became viewed as "problematic," as well as personal connections to the show, how public perceptions shifted, and what the musical gets right (and wrong) in its treatment of heavy topics.

• What is "Dear Evan Hansen" About?
  (04:21–06:08)
  Ruthie summarizes the plot, emphasizing Evan's social anxiety, the inciting incident (Connor's suicide), the snowballing lie, and the show’s themes of adolescent grief, family, and community.

• Personal Connections to the Story:
  (06:12–10:41)
  Ruthie shares her own high school experience with the sudden deaths of classmates and how that shaped her empathy for the show’s characters.

  "I lived what the characters in this musical, in the high school of this musical lived like... how much right do I have to this grief? ... This musical felt like someone understood that and saw that and was telling the world that for the first time." (07:28–08:50, Ruthie Fierberg)

• Initial Reception & Buzz:
  (10:41–14:49)
  Both Matt and Ruthie reminisce about seeing "Dear Evan Hansen" in its early days—off-Broadway and in D.C.—noting the immediate critical and audience buzz, and how it was poised for groundbreaking mainstream success.

• Emotional Moments & Parent Perspectives:
  (14:49–16:20)
  Both recount which moments in the show "get" them emotionally, especially parental vulnerability:

  "There's nothing more powerful than when the parent or ... person who has been unable to feel cracks open and it floods them. And how could you not cry at that?" (15:19, Ruthie Fierberg, on Larry's breakdown in "You Will Be Found")

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Problematic? Public Backlash and Morality in Art

(16:34–35:08)

Why the Backlash?
Matt and Ruthie break down how an initially beloved musical became the subject of harsh critique and "problematic" discourse.

• Timeline of Backlash:
  (21:12–27:30)

  • Shift in public mood around 2017 (post-Hamilton, during MeToo era).
  • Online discussions and podcasts misinterpret Evan as a sociopath; show viewed as justifying lying/manipulation.
  • Broader change in how audiences process "gray area" art.

• Addressing the Criticism:
  Ruthie’s stance is clear:

  "I fully stand by the opinion that the musical is not problematic, that the character Evan is problematic… But a musical about problematic people or things does not have to be, and in this case is not." (28:18–28:36, Ruthie Fierberg)

• Media & Movie Adaptation Effects:
  (31:55–39:04)
  Matt describes how the movie adaptation’s tweaks, aimed at neutralizing controversy, actually undercut the show’s complexity. Both agree that "Dear Evan Hansen" is most potent in its gray areas—not when simplified for mass consumption.

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In-Depth Analysis: Art, Accountability, and Empathy

(39:04–58:18)

• Misunderstanding Thematic Intent:
  Audiences often conflate a character's perspective or an artist's intent with endorsement. Ruthie clarifies:

  "Telling a story and believing that a story has merit is not the same thing as condoning a person's actions... the telling of the story itself does not say this person is good, it says that this person is worth looking at." (41:00–41:51, Ruthie Fierberg)

• Gray Areas, Consequences, and Forgiveness:
  Evan’s actions are not unpunished—he loses everything:

  "But Evan does lose everything. There are consequences for him... And I do think that, spoiler alert, by the end of this musical, that is Evan's path. I think he takes responsibility and maybe it's not in the way everybody wants, but he doesn't just like get to go off gallivanting." (29:36–30:39, Ruthie Fierberg)

• Parents, Grief, and Healing (Focus on the Murphys and Heidi):
  (45:13–67:56)
  Both highlight the nuanced portrayals of grief, the complexity of family dynamics after loss, and the powerful parental moments—especially "So Big/So Small" and the layers in songs like "For Forever" and "To Break In a Glove."

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The Music and Its Perceived Message

(73:22–78:33)

• "You Will Be Found" in Context:
  Its anthemic quality is not pure uplift; it carries tension for Evan:

  "For the rest of the company, it is 'You will be found.' For Evan, it’s 'You will be found out.' " (75:44, Matt Koplik)

• Songs Out of Context:
  The hosts discuss how hit songs (like "Waving Through a Window") get warped into feel-good anthems, masking their real dramatic function and complexity inside the show.

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Conclusion: Ruthie’s Verdict

(78:34–79:00)

• Ruthie declares "Dear Evan Hansen" not problematic—at least, the stage show:

  "For those reasons, I deem this not—NOT a question—and not problematic." (73:14, Ruthie Fierberg)

Part two is promised for a future episode—potentially with a dissenting voice.

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2023-24 Broadway Season: Trends, Transfers & Excitement

(79:02–134:42)

Key Points:

• Bustling Spring & Why Season Crowding is (Not) New:
  (79:00–86:35)
  Ruthie demystifies how spring season pile-ups happen and why Tony proximity isn’t the only factor.

• Trends:

  • Rise in new musicals with first-time Broadway composers (Ingrid Michaelson, PigPen, etc.)
  • A contemporary sound palette emerging from this cohort.
  • Not just jukebox musicals—more original stories or different adaptation spins ("The Outsiders," "Lempicka," "Suffs").
  • Surprising speed of some off-Broadway to Broadway transfers (e.g., "Hell’s Kitchen").

• Notable Revivals and New Shows:

  • "The Wiz," "Cabaret," "Tommy"—all major revivals with buzz
  • High-profile plays: "Prayer for the French Republic" ("three hours, feels like ninety minutes"), "Appropriate," "Uncle Vanya," "Doubt," "An Enemy of the People" ("Jamie Lloyd, Amy Herzog, Jeremy Strong—bring it on!")
  • Diverse, variable options for all tastes—more shows, more types, more reasons for all kinds of theatergoers to visit.

• What Excites the Panel?

  • Ruthie highlights her anticipation for new works, directorial innovations, and performances from established and new Broadway stars (Paul Alexander Nolan, Rachel McAdams, Marianne Plunkett, and more).
  • Both praise ensemble casts and under-recognized performers.
  • Special plug for "My Son's a Queer"—a hit in the UK centering queer joy in family dynamics.

• Advice for Audiences:

  • There really IS a play or musical for everyone.
  • Don’t give up on the art form after one miss—try something new for your taste.
  • Broadway isn’t just for “theater people”—it is as broad and varied as audience taste itself.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

On Ambiguity in Storytelling

"What happens when I start to feel for and understand why the person did the bad thing? …There’s also a difference between understanding and condoning."
— Ruthie Fierberg (41:42)

On the Season’s Variety

"…If you tell me that there is not a piece of theater for every single person out there in that list... [you’re wrong]."
— Ruthie Fierberg (127:59)

On “You Will Be Found”

“For the rest of the company, it is ‘You will be found.’ For Evan, it’s ‘You will be found out.’”
— Matt Koplik (75:44)

On Audiences and "Problematic" Stories

"The telling of the story itself does not say this person is good. It says that this person is worth looking at, and this idea is worth looking at."
— Ruthie Fierberg (41:00)

On Theater as Food

"When people say they don’t like theater or don’t like musicals, to me, it’s like saying you don’t like food. There’s so many different kinds of cuisines and recipes."
— Matt Koplik (128:46)

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• 00:00–06:08: Introduction & "Dear Evan Hansen" plot overview
• 06:08–10:41: Ruthie’s personal story and connection
• 14:49–16:20: Most moving emotional moments in the show
• 21:12–27:30: Timeline of critical backlash
• 28:18–31:55: Ruthie’s defense: the musical vs. the character
• 39:04–41:51: On empathy, understanding, and complexity in art
• 73:22–78:33: "You Will Be Found" and out-of-context marketing
• 79:02–110:57: Broadway spring season breakdown: trends, transfers, titles
• 110:58–127:59: Anticipated performances, talent, ensemble praise
• 127:59–133:57: On theater for everyone, audience recommendations
• 133:57–End: Outro, plugs, and “Who’s the Diva?” (Shoshana Bean)

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Final Word

This episode is a robust, passionate defense of "Dear Evan Hansen" as a nuanced piece of theater—not a black-and-white "problematic" text—alongside a sweeping tableau of the current (and future) Broadway landscape. Koplik and Fierberg’s blend of critical insight, lived experience, and unapologetic theater geekery makes for a lively, illuminating episode for anyone—fan or skeptic—of contemporary musical theater.

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Diva Selection for Outro:
Shoshana Bean (“...And I'm gonna end it with a button of her throwing spaghetti on a plate like she does in Hell's Kitchen.” [133:57, Matt Koplik])

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For further news, commentary, and recommendations:

• Follow Ruthie Fierberg (@RuthieFierberg) on Instagram or visit ruthiefierberg.com.
• Read her work at broadwaynews.com.
• Follow Matt Koplik (@tcoplik) on Instagram.

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Transcript

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Have you been writing those letters to yourself? Dear Evan Hansen, this is gonna be a good day. And here's why I started one. Those letters are important, honey. They're gonna help you build your confidence.

[Matt Koplik]

I guess.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Can we try to have an optimistic outlook, huh? Can we buck up just enough to see the world won't fall apart? Maybe this year we decide we're not giving up before we've tried. This year we make a.

[Matt Koplik]

Hello all you theater lovers, both out and proud and on the DL. And welcome back to Broadway Breakdown, a podcast discussing the history und legacy of American theater's most exclusive address, Broadway. I am your host, Matt Koplik, the least famous and most opinionated of all the Broadway podcast hosts. And today is a very special day, and I'll get into the reason why in a minute. But first, let me introduce our guest. You might know her from her work with Broadway News. You might know her from her own podcast, why We Theatre, or you from CUNY tv, where she was on Theater, all the Moving Parts with yours truly, please welcome to the podcast, Ruthie Fearberg.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Thank you so much for having me, Matt. I'm so excited to be in discussion with you again, shall we say?

[Matt Koplik]

I'm so excited, too. You know, I thought we had such a blast doing this on time. Yeah, so did I. I had a lovely time. And I knew that I needed you back in my life to discuss theater, to be your wonderfully verbal, intelligent, opinionated self, like I.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

All things you could definitely say about me.

[Matt Koplik]

Yeah. And I would say I'm the same. But the truth is that lately, as I've gotten into my older age, I have had a lot of struggles finding the right words. So I'll start a sentence that I'm really confident with, and halfway through it go. You know that word? It sounds like the word nuanced, but it's not nuanced. Like, that's how I do things now.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Well, allow me to help you, because I'm the word person.

[Matt Koplik]

I mean, it's your job.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

It's the job.

[Matt Koplik]

It's the job. So here's the tea, everybody. I asked Ruthie to be a part of problematic, and she was super into it. She was super ready. But because Ruthie is a working girl with many professionals, contracts to her name, a few of the options that we had were taken. In particular, one musical, Dear Evan Hansen. Now, after that happened, Ruthie was so gracious and agreed to come on and just talk about the season now, because as I spoke with Rob Schneider, things have changed since that last episode. But then things changed even further because after Ruthie was like, oh, absolutely, I can. I can be, you know, malleable. The audio of my episode of Dear Evan Hansen got corrupted. And I don't. I did not have enough time to get my former guest back and edit and record that episode again. So Ruthie is.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Is the lucky lady.

[Matt Koplik]

The lucky lady who has agreed to be uber generous, and she is going to both talk about the rest of the Broadway season, updated 2.0 and as well as Dear Evan Hansen. Now, we cannot go as far into the show as we usually do on Broadway Breakdown, because, you know, we're discussing a lot of stuff.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Yeah, there's a lot to get to.

[Matt Koplik]

And I cannot hold Ruthie hostage for nine hours. Much as you would love it, guys, I just simply cannot. So let's consider this Evan Hansen part one with Ruthie, and we'll have a part two sometime between now and, you know, June.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Sure.

[Matt Koplik]

Yeah. And that could be Ruthie again. That could be somebody else. I might bring Ruthie back in March to discuss God knows what or the Tonys in April or May. You know, this is.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

I'm here for it all.

[Matt Koplik]

This is what it is. Now that I've gotten my monologue out of the way. Yeah, Ruthie, where do we want to tackle first? Do we want to get into.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

I mean, I feel like we set up Dear Evan Hansen. We shouldn't make the listeners wait too long for that.

[Matt Koplik]

Sure, let's do that then.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

I'm also, like, always ready and raring to go about Dear Evan Hansen.

[Matt Koplik]

Phenomenal. So for the uncultured fucks out there, what is Dear Evan Hansen about?

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Well, now that the show is out there, we don't have to use the, like, cryptic logline of when it first came out in, you know, December of 2015. So we can say that it is about Evan Hansen, who is a senior in high school when one of his classmates dies by suicide. And Evan himself was in therapy and doing a therapeutic exercise where he was writing letters to himself. Dear Evan Hansen. And that letter had been found by his classmate before the classmate died. And so when the classmate died, I feel like I'm doing a bad job of this. I actually want to rewind. Okay, take two. Dear Evan Hansen, Obviously, Evan Hansen, at the center of it, an anxiety rattled teenager, senior in high school, really going through it. And he's not the only one, because what happens pretty early on in the show is that one of his classmates dies by suicide. And through a mysterious happening, it is believed that that Evan and this classmate Connor are former best friends. And it is a little bit of a lie that turns into a big thing of a lie and an avalanche of a lie. And it has to do with what happens when you're really socially anxious. It has to do with what happens when you're in a family that experiences sudden grief. What happens when you're in a community community that experiences sudden grief. A lot of complicated emotions that all of these creators tackled with that one.

[Matt Koplik]

How did dear Evan Hansen come into your life?

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Dear Evan Hansen came into my life because at the time I was working at another publication and a colleague of mine had seen it down in D.C. and was obsessed with it. So it kind of was on my radar from that moment. But I saw it at Second Stage when it was off Broadway and fell so deeply in love with it. I am a person who lost multiple classmates during my time in high school. I lost, in my sophomore year, I lost a classmate who I really didn't know other than by name and face. I went to a really large high school and, you know, different social groups. It's how it works. He died in a house fire really tragically. I mean, not that there's such a thing as non tragic death, unless I guess you're 140 peacefully close your eyes. But when it's that young, certainly it's always tragic. So he passed away my sophomore year. At the beginning of my junior year, I lost a friend who I actually grew up doing musicals with. She went to the other high school on the other side of town, but in the summers, everybody came together and did musicals. She pin curled my hair every single night for our run of Guys and Dolls. And she died because she had an aneurysm while driving a car. What the heck? Three weeks later, someone who I knew really well, I wouldn't say he was my best friend, but I had, you know, six out of eight classes or something with him. And we really had known each other since we were, I don't know, 11 years old. He died also from injuries sustained in a car crash. And then in my senior year, my neighbor from two houses down died by suicide. So I lived what the characters in this musical, in the high school of this musical lived like. I think about the Alana character a lot, but I know the Cynthia Murphy's of this world. I know the Larry Murphy's of this world. I know the confusion when you are that young and someone dies. I know what it is to experience, like, how much right do I have to this grief? I only Kind of knew them. And this musical felt like someone understood that and saw that and was telling the world that for the first time. Because even just in my high school, I wasn't the only teenager experiencing that. And there are so many teenagers experiencing this all over the world. Not to mention most of these happened before any of us were even on Facebook. Facebook got to high school when I was in my senior year. And so that added layer of social media, which, honestly, if you put on a production of Dear Evan Hansen today would have to change entirely. Right. Like, TikTok wasn't in the original production. It really was mostly like Facebook posts and Facebook groups and a GoFundMe. So I think all of that is incredibly important. And so that's how I first came to it, to very lengthily answer your question. And then I saw it when it came to Broadway. That was my second time seeing it. But I had interviewed Benj Pasek and Justin Paul on the red carpet of the Drama Desk Awards that year for the Off Broadway production. And then, you know, once a show starts to open, there's the press day, there's the interview for this part of the publication, there's the opening night. And then, of course, once it was nominated for Tony's, it was just constant talking with Steven Levinson and Michael Greif, the book writer and the director, respectively, Ben Platt, who originated the role of Evan Hansen. So I felt. I feel now very close to the. Very close in knowledge, I should say, to the creators of the material. They're not like my best friends or something, but I feel like I've investigated it very deeply and many, many times.

[Matt Koplik]

Wonderful. I first saw Evan Hansen, like your friend in D.C. i knew nothing about it. My mother, friend of the pod, Danny Tickton, Coppola. Hey, Mom. She was going to a wedding in D.C. and she wanted me to come spend the weekend there with her. And there's. Because I wasn't going to the wedding. There was an evening that I had to sort of entertain myself, and I didn't know what to do.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

And. And so you go to the theater.

[Matt Koplik]

Exactly. Friends were like, oh, there's this new musical at the arena. It's Pask and Paul. It's Ben Platt. And, you know, those were all names that meant something to us theater kids, but they weren't huge like Pask and Paul. Pask and Paul made their bread and butter at first as part of the YouTube musical theater writer brigade.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Sure.

[Matt Koplik]

Like Ryan Scott, Oliver, Kerrigan and Loudermilk. And they have been the ones of that generation to continue. Yeah, exactly. And I think, you know, maturing and get even sharper, at least for a time. We can't talk about Greatest Showman because then I'll go off on a major tangent. But with Evan Hansen, I thought that was definitely their most mature, nuanced work. And, you know, Platt at that point was really only known for Pitch Perfect and, you know, being a replacement Cunningham. So I was. I was excited to see it. I ended up sitting next to Will Roland's parents in the.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

That's so funny.

[Matt Koplik]

Yeah. In the half empty mezzanine, by the way. And I remember really liking it. I thought that a lot of the music was wonderful. I thought the story was really fascinating. I thought Ben was wonderful. There was a lot going into it that I really enjoyed. And then I didn't see it at second stage because I just knew it was gonna transfer. Yeah, everyone knew. And so I. Similar to when Hamilton was at the Public, which I somehow was lucky enough to see.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

That's crazy.

[Matt Koplik]

Truly. I. Right place, right time, but also you.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Felt like it was that much of a sure thing.

[Matt Koplik]

I did.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

That's funny. I did well. I was so new really, to the business at that time, so maybe it really was. But my memory, you know, I didn't have the tentacles in the places that I do now.

[Matt Koplik]

Well, so. Okay, so. And this is something. We'll talk about it when we get into the season.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Sure.

[Matt Koplik]

For me, it's not even about, like, the quality of the show so much as everybody now and then. You really can tell when the buzz around something is real. And it was very real for Hamilton. It was real for dear Evan Hansen. It was real for Fun Home when it was at the Public, which is why I got very impatient that they took so long to transfer and then got very worried when they did. I was like, oh, did they lose the momentum? They didn't. It's fine. But, you know, every now and then with an off Broadway show, there's like, there's a difference between when something is sold out and hard to see and when it's truly the kind of show where, like, everyone's talking about it, it has all this attention, like it's got to move somewhere. And so I thought Evan Hansen was good at dc, but because of how it was being treated at second Stage, I was like, oh, this is absolutely going to transfer. We're just waiting. And Hamilton was just about to win all their Tonys. And so there were a lot of eyes on Broadway and what might be the next show to continue the legacy of radio play and being a cultural phenomenon. And Evan Hansen was very much primed for that.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Yeah.

[Matt Koplik]

So, again, similar to Hamilton, though, I got to see it at the Public, and all my family wanted to, and they couldn't get tickets. And I said, let us wait till they go on sale for Broadway. You tell me what my ceiling is for tickets, and I will make sure we all have seats. And because of that, I got to see it again with my mom and grandma the night before it opened. My dad saw it the night after it opened, and my dad and I had really good seats for Evan Hansen, like a month into the Broadway run because of. Because I was like, let's wait. Let's have the foresight, and then let's pounce.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Sure.

[Matt Koplik]

So I saw it again on Broadway about two and a half years after I saw it at D.C. and I once again, really enjoyed it. Did not cry, but I admired the craft of it, because by the time I saw it, even though it hadn't been on Broadway very long, it already had the reputation of, like, people go and they cry. Exactly. It's the you go and sob show.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

And I did go and sob. And I did go and sob multiple times.

[Matt Koplik]

There's. There is one moment in Evan Hansen that really, for Clemspeed, even when I watch a bootleg of it, there's.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

I. Can I guess what it. Well, let me tell you what mine is.

[Matt Koplik]

Let me tell you what you. Well, let me tell you what gets me in most things, and then you can guess what it is in the show. I have a really big soft spot in movies and shows when a parent.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Yeah, duh.

[Matt Koplik]

Yeah, duh.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

I didn't even need the clue, Matt.

[Matt Koplik]

There you go. Ruthie's like, I can read you for filth, baby.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

When Larry collapses.

[Matt Koplik]

Yes.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

And you will be found. It is. It is.

[Matt Koplik]

It.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

There is nothing. I like. I'm gonna. I actually, like.

[Matt Koplik]

That's the power.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

I just got the chills. And. And there's nothing more powerful than when the parent or when a person who has been unable to feel. Cracks open and it floods them. And how could you not cry at that?

[Matt Koplik]

It's. It's the delayed emotional gratification. And for you. So it's that. And also in movies and shows and TV shows, when a parent recognizes that their weird kid isn't just weird, they're, like, artistic or they're whatever. That always gets me. People laugh when I tell them that the Lego Movie makes me cry. But it's when Will Ferrell realizes that his son wasn't just messing with his Legos. He was making a story and then hugs him. I know, right?

[Ruthie Fierberg]

But I believe you.

[Matt Koplik]

Yeah. No, it's a beautiful moment. Point is. So. Yes.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

But I'll also say, like, kudos to Michael Park.

[Matt Koplik]

Yeah.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Because the landing of a nonverbal moment, particularly in a cacophony of sound, like at that height of music, of musical forte, is the thing that you have to nail. And he nailed it every time.

[Matt Koplik]

So do you know, then, why this was selected for the Problematic Question Mark series? Because I want to make it very clear. I told this to Ruthie in all of our correspondences, but. And I've always told my listeners on every episode, it shows you're mad at and their possible redemption. This does not necessarily mean a show that I think is morally wrong or a show that I love or dislike. It's a show that has had some kind of backlash at some point. Analyzing that. Analyzing the show and going like, is this warranted? Spoiler alert. Most of the shows I've covered up until now, and I haven't released all the episodes that I've recorded yet. The answer has been like, the show is not problematic. It can be a product of its time. And, you know, time has not been kind to. In terms of how we've lived. It could be just a major misrepresentation or miscommunication with audiences. A bad production can often do that, or a bad movie version can do that. But problematic. So I've quoted him before, and I'll quote him again. Our dear friend Patrick Pacheco, which is how he met. When he heard the title of the series, he was like, well, problematic means like a problem show. Right. A show that can't be fixed. You know, like Cantina Marilene.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Oh, that's fascinating. Yeah.

[Matt Koplik]

And I was like, technically speaking, Patrick. Yeah, you're right. People are not using it that way. They're using it to define shows as morally problematic. Exactly. And every now and then, there's a show where I'm like, you know what? Yeah. Like, let's discuss. What is it that the show is saying? Because there's. Just because a character says or does something doesn't mean that's what the show is saying.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Right, Right.

[Matt Koplik]

And there are. And I would like. I would love to discuss it as much as we can, as much as time permits us today with Evan Hansen, how often the show is not condoning something that's happening, and how often it's like, we're not condoning it, but we kind of want you to cry anyway. And that is up to each of us to decide. There are moments that I didn't used to question, and then the movie happened, and I've questioned it a bit, but then I watched the Bootleg in preparation for this and I was like, I don't know again. Because I think part of what made the show work for me on stage was that, you know, yes, there were these songs that have now become anthems on the radio, but that's not the show's fault that they caught on with the masses the way they did.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

100% right.

[Matt Koplik]

And you will be found when you watch it in context of. Of the show. And also like how Michael Greif staged it. The tone of it is very different than how it's performed in an arena with Hugh Jackman.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

And that's extremely true of so many songs. Right. Like Send in the Clowns.

[Matt Koplik]

It's not about the circus.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

It's definitely not about the circus. But even out of context, it's usually not about the circus, but out of context, it's this general like, I've missed the boat on something. Yeah, well, within the context of a little night music, it is. I missed the boat on this relationship. And I'm realizing it now with this particular person who I had a chance with.

[Matt Koplik]

It's super relatable. Egg on your face. And it's someone who. Speaking of, like, the Larry of it all, a character like Desiree who put together such a confident, sensual front for two and a half hours and then decides, this is the moment that I'm gonna be vulnerable and shoot my shot because I think I can do it right.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

And then even just because you use the phrase this is the moment made me think Jekyll and Hyde. Sure, you can have that song of this is the moment be literally anything. Someone taking a leap into doing anything, not into becoming the devil that incarnate. That is Mr. Hyde. Right.

[Matt Koplik]

I can't get into Wildhorn. I refuse. I will not do it.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

That's fair. But I'm like, especially songs with a pop sound.

[Matt Koplik]

Yeah.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Can stand on their own, can be uplifting, can be ascribed meaning to. That has nothing to do with the way they were written within the book of a musical. And I don't think that that's a fault of creators like, oh, they should have foreseen that this maybe was going to be taken out of context and then therefore shouldn't have been so seemingly praiseworthy is not even the right word. More like saving almost of their. Of the character they're not responsible for the way an audience reacts. They're never responsible, actually, for the way an audience reacts.

[Matt Koplik]

That's art. It's. You create the story that you create, and then audiences respond how they respond.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Yes.

[Matt Koplik]

So this is. So we come back to the question, which is, why is dear Evan Hansen a part of this series?

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Sure.

[Matt Koplik]

And the obvious answer is simply it got backlash eventually.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Yes.

[Matt Koplik]

And I was sort of going back into the history of how that began because it was so lauded early on and was considered this beautiful jewel of a musical. And, oh, how wonderful that is. Coming off that heels of Hamilton, Broadway is back at the forefront of pop culture. It's a fascinating tale. It's nuanced. And Ben Platt, what a performance. And right around the time that Platt was about to leave, there was a bit of a turn with some people on the show. And I was reading up on it, and a couple things are true. First off is, did they re review.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

When were critics officially invited to re review? No, I was curious.

[Matt Koplik]

So a couple things happen when it comes to Broadway shows. No matter how popular the show is, only a certain number of people are seeing it every night. So it's different from like a movie where 10 million people can see it in a weekend. You know, Evan Hansen, we're talking, you know, 4,000 people from Friday to Sunday every week, no matter what, no matter how huge it is.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Right.

[Matt Koplik]

And when a show from Broadway breaks out in the way that Hamilton or Evan Hansen did, more than just like the theater nerds are listening to it or reading the plot or anything like that. Like, we're talking people on major podcasts on talk shows who don't usually go to theater, who aren't used to kind of breaking down stories this way, the way that we are, which is not a judgment call, it's just the fact. And two things happened. One was John Lovett on the podcast Love it or Leave it, saw Evan Hansen around the time it won there, it's Tony, and had a bit of a rant on his podcast about how sort of jokingly but sincerely at the same time saying that the main character is, ah, sociopath, and that the show is all about a lie and it's very deceptive. And people who didn't see the show kind of latched onto that. They. They read like his.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Simple, always the problem.

[Matt Koplik]

Every show, the one at the book.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Club that didn't read the book.

[Matt Koplik]

Yep. You want to. Like, one of the most fun games to have in the world is, is to write a byline for Any Broadway show ever. It sounds ridiculous. It sounds terrible and stupid.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Log lines are just difficult to. Loglines are difficult to write for anything.

[Matt Koplik]

Yeah, but, you know, oh, a rock musical about the last week of Jesus, and he's kind of over it, and you're like. You're like, what? Why would you do that? Or you're like, oh, a discotheque about Imelda Marcos and we're not going to ever talk about her shoes. And it's like, what? I don't like that one bit. But these things do happen. So that happened, and that kind of got into the pop culture vernacular. But the other thing that happened was in addition to the fact that the show became incredibly successful, and it doesn't matter how good the show is or how good a movie is or whatever, when someone or something reaches a certain level of popularity and mainstream success, it's no longer the underdog, and it's now ripe for the picking to get deconstructed and taken down.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Yeah, I think that that's true about pop culture.

[Matt Koplik]

Yeah. I mean, and on top of that, in the fall of 2017, right around the time Ben Platt was leaving, and this is something I didn't realize at the time was when the Harvey Weinstein news broke and then the MeToo movement resurfaced. And the narrative of these men who lie, these lies that get covered up, we cannot accept this. Every. Every person who's ever done wrong, no matter how small or big, must be taken to justice. And that is not to say that there's any me too isms to Evan Hansen, at least not in my viewpoint. But I think we both can agree with. When there is a lot of passion and heat behind a movement, many things can kind of get sucked up into it. And how we're feeling in the moment can then filter how we view art. You know what I mean?

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Especially because also in that moment, you're looking at people and namely movies, but also other properties that you saw as one way. And all of a sudden you're like, wait, this wasn't how I was told it was. And so when you re examine the things that you're being told to re examine, you also start to re examine the things that you're not told to re examine. And that's not a problem in and of itself.

[Matt Koplik]

But I mean, so I talked about this once on the POD as well. Like all art, you know, it's all subjective, but also how you feel about any movie or show, whatever it's. Your immediate impression just comes from where you are in life at that time that you absorb it and you can.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

It's why I went back to the show more than once. It's why, you know, obviously why revivals happen. It's.

[Matt Koplik]

And I've. I mean, I don't think this is a hot take, but I do think after 45 got elected in 2016, there was so much sadness and anger and confusion and frustration, and that was something we couldn't really change for a while.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Yes.

[Matt Koplik]

And we had to channel that into something. And there was a lot of good that came from that. The MeToo movement, Black Lives Matter resurfacing and whatnot. But with art, for a community that talks about how, like, gender and sexuality aren't binary, We've become very binary in how we look at art.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Yeah.

[Matt Koplik]

It's got to be this, it's got to be that. And it can't have anything with. Regarding conflict or mistakes. You know, if a character does something that is not cool, the story is thus problematic. And I'm like, no, that's a character making a human fuck up. Like we all do.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Or. Well, I think. I think what some people. Okay, well, let me even rewind to just say that I don't think. While I understand why Jar Evan Hansen is a part of this problematic question mark discussion. Because of the backlash. And quite frankly, because long before the backlash, there were some people who saw this show and were like, what? He lies. That's messed up. And I was like, exactly. Like, you're supposed to get that. But I will say that I fully, fully stand by the opinion that the musical is not problematic, that the character Evan is problematic. What he does is certainly problematic, but that the musical about problematic people or things does not have to be. And in this case is not. And I feel so strongly that I wrote. I don't even know how many words it is. Maybe it's like 2,500 words. A piece on medium called In Defense of Dear Evan Hansen. Like, I felt so incensed because of exactly what you're talking about, that this was a paragon of how we have started talking about art, that Dear Evan Hansen was just the poster child of the moment, but that it really scared me and continues to scare me that we need our theater to be black and white, that we need to be told this person bad, this person good. When this person who we thought was good does something bad, they are now a bad person. And. And I want to see them punished, or else that means the story is not calling them bad. And therefore the whole thing is Corrupted and bad. And I think that's where people go with Evan Hansen, that they think, and I also think this is false, but that they think that Evan gets away with it. Because the aftermath really is, if you're talking about percentages of stage time, it is a fraction of what happens on stage. But Evan does lose everything. There are consequences for him. The consequences are not that he thinks he's a terrible person and lives under his covers for the rest of his life and can't show his face to the world. And I wouldn't want that to be the case. And I think if people sat for a minute and thought really hard, they wouldn't want that to be the case for a 17 year old kid either.

[Matt Koplik]

Yeah.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Or anyone of any age who made a mistake. Like, I'm a person that believes in remorse, forgiveness, second chances that come with change, that come with the work, not just like, ah, yes, everybody gets a second chance. If you come and you say, I've done wrong and this is how I'm going to change it, then let's give you the second chance you've earned. And I do think that, spoiler alert, by the end of this musical, that is Evan's path. I think he takes responsibility and maybe it's not in the way everybody wants, but he doesn't just like get to go off gallivanting. He doesn't take the Murphy's money and go off to Harvard or some university that he'd never be able to pay for on their dimensions. It's not like the entire town forgives him and everyone says it's fine. And he keeps dating Zoe until they get married and everyone lives happily ever after. Like, that's definitively not what happens. And so I think that showing that there are consequences, but showing that the consequences don't have to be life ruiners is really important. And that's actually something that Steven Levinson, the book writer, spoke about that he was like, if we're telling kids or anyone that the worst thing you ever do is the end of your life, what kind of message is that exactly?

[Matt Koplik]

My. So first of all, I love everything you just said and I want to continue talking about it right after this break.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Billy, I beg to differ with you.

[Matt Koplik]

How do you mean?

[Ruthie Fierberg]

You're the top. Yeah, you're an arrow collar. You're the top. You're a coolidge dollar tread.

[Matt Koplik]

And we're back. What a wonderful break that was. So. No, I agree with you with all of that. And you know, I, you know, we're talking to Someone right now whose favorite musical is Carousel, whose favorite Disney movie is the Little Mermaid. Two stories that hinder on their protagonists making bum decisions and having to learn from them, and one in particular, literally, about forgiveness, which, you know, you'll hear more about that on the Carousel episode with our dear friend Juan Ramirez.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Oh, cool.

[Matt Koplik]

Yeah, it'll be a good one. But something that I kind of. I have many thoughts with Evan Hansen, and I agree with you about so much of it. Where I got started, where I started to get confused was when the movie came out. They made a lot of small changes to the story that felt like they were trying to address the Internet backlash. And I thought it actually weakened the argument of the show with the changes that they made.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

That's so interesting for me, anyway, because.

[Matt Koplik]

I think what makes the show work, especially in the staging of it all, is that it lives so much in the gray, and it's so easy to, on paper, hear the music or read the script and just see nothing but sacchariness. And I thought what the original production did so well was it cut into that Gryff staging was not incredibly emotional. The set design was actually very cold. It very much showcased the isolation of the social media age. And there was, you know, a very dark design, and so even.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

And all of those characters, right. Like, it's a tiny musical with seven characters that even when they're all on stage, what you really have them as are, you know, stars very far apart. I don't mean stars as, like, actor stars. I mean, like, stars, constellations that are really distant, physically distant from one another, that when you make a movie, you inherently fill out the world and, like, kind of color in the spaces between those dots.

[Matt Koplik]

Yes. The original staging reminded me a lot of George C. Wolfe staging of Caroline or Change, which also did a lot of isolation to highlight how lonely everyone in that show is.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Sure.

[Matt Koplik]

And the first of all, film is a very literal medium. And so you already are working, you know, going upstream with that battle. And then on top of that, I just also thought that, you know, cutting so many songs from other characters undercut the potency of the show. And they. They claimed it was because, you know, they really just wanted it to be Evan focused, come from his perspective, which did not help the narrative of the Ben Platt Nepo baby backlash, which I also want to say there is a false narrative. That this show was written for Ben, that it was bought for Ben. That is not what happened.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Not what happened.

[Matt Koplik]

Ben auditioned for Dogfight, was deemed too young, and about two years Later, Pask and Paul called him back in for an untitled musical that they had been working on with Stephen Levinson for a while.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

That's right.

[Matt Koplik]

And he was a natural fit. He did three readings of it, I believe, and then a workshop. And it was at the. It was either at the last reading or the workshop that Ben's father came to see it. Because Ben's father is a producer, he was one of many who were invited. He was simply the one who was most passionate about getting it up off the ground and moving forward. The movie came out. They filmed the movie around the time that the Hamilton Pro shot was released, before the Waitress pro shot was released. The There is now a new way to preserve performances from Broadway, rather say a new trend.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

The option was there. Certainly it's an expensive option. Not that making a feature film isn't. But by that point, Ben was no longer in the show.

[Matt Koplik]

It's true. But the same is true of Sarah and Waitress. I think the difference is that. And maybe this is me being cynical, but I think there's also just the. The temptation of when you make it an actual feature, the property has a new chance to get recognition with awards bodies, with a new audience, people are more likely to see a feature film than a pro shot of a stage show.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

I also think that unless you're Sara Bareilles, that is just true of a capture, even though personally I'll prefer a capture capture over a film adaptation, particularly of a musical, any day of the week.

[Matt Koplik]

So many stage works, I think, do not translate to film. And on top of that, there are so many directors who just don't know how to make a movie musical, whether they are visually creative or really good with dramatic scripts and actors. It's a really difficult task to do.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Yeah, it really is. And you have to have a real reason. The same is true when you're making a musical from. Not that you know, Dear Evan Hansen is original, but if you're making a musical from source material, you really have to have a reason to see it on stage and for it to sing, as we always say, but not only for it to sing, for it to make sense to sing coming out of scenes, unless you're going to be all the way sung through. And those transitions are really hard to make in a contained stage space. And then therefore, when you go from a contained stage space to anything goes because it's film, you can put this in all different spaces. That's another big transition that you just have to really know why you're doing it. And I think that it can be done like John M. Chu in John M. Chew We Trust after In the Heights, because personally, I love that adaptation.

[Matt Koplik]

So.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

So. But I'll also say that when it comes to the Dear Evan Hansen movie, I've only seen the movie once. I. Like I said, I know the creative. The. Excuse me, I know the creative team and the creation story of the musical very deeply. I saw that multiple times in multiple forms. I listened to that cast album. So I'm just far more familiar with that and the intricacies there and whether or not that is problematic. Spoiler alert. It's not. Then. Then the changes that were made for the movie.

[Matt Koplik]

Agreed. I think the problem is movies are far more easily accessible to the masses.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Of course, and they're much more lasting.

[Matt Koplik]

And they. And therefore people view that and make a comment on the show.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Backlash actually came.

[Matt Koplik]

Backlash came before.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Right. But people now, before the film actually was released, knowing that it was coming.

[Matt Koplik]

I think for me, for me in my life, the reason why I bring up the film in terms of my confusion with the show is I saw the show and I thought there was absolutely no question about what it was trying to do, what it succeeded at, where the creatives were coming from. And then I got confused with the movie because of the changes made, where I was like, oh, did. Was that not what your intention was? Because, as I said, you know, yes, there's a lot of sweetness to the show. There's a lot of heart to the show, But I think what makes the show work as well as it does is there is an intelligence and a bit of a cynicism to blend in with it. Because what Pasch and Paul talk about, where sort of the idea came from, was they both came. They went through a high school experience where students had taken their lives, and they watched how their classmates made it about themselves and watched how they started spinning narratives that weren't true. And they.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Yeah, I have seen that happen, too.

[Matt Koplik]

Well, I think it's just. I think that's true of all of us for anything. I mean, this is not nearly as dark, but how many times do we see when a celebrity passes and everyone we know goes on social media goes, oh, this one hurts.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Yeah.

[Matt Koplik]

And it's like, their work meant a lot to you, and that's wonderful, but I'm always like, you didn't know Carrie Fisher. Harrison Ford knew Carrie Fisher. So don't.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

And yet, at the same time, I don't want to say that that response is wrong. It's not that it's not that it's wrong.

[Matt Koplik]

I don't want to.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

You don't have a right to your feelings and to certainly feel connected to a person, but it. Be the Persona of that person.

[Matt Koplik]

But there's a. There's a centeredness around it that always rubs me the wrong way. I bring up the Carrie Fisher because I remember specifically when she died. And eventually Harrison Ford released, like, his statement of. Of how he felt. A lot of people I knew were very angry about it because, like, it was him saying, like, oh, she was so beautiful and I loved her and all this stuff. And, like, she was more than just her looks and. How fucking dare you. And I'm like. And I. And I sat there and I went. Harrison Ford knew Carrie Fisher.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Right?

[Matt Koplik]

Intimately. For 40 years. They were friends. They were former lovers. Like, they had a life together that we'll never know. You don't get to tell him how to grieve his friend.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

That's right.

[Matt Koplik]

And so that. That was something where it was. I'm. We're all upset. It's a tragic passing, but none of us.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Is it about you.

[Matt Koplik]

Exactly. And I think that's what Pask and Paul were seeing people do was rather than live in the moment, be honest with themselves, of this person passed. And that's awful. I didn't know them, but I grieve for the people that, you know, who did and whatnot. It became. Well, no. No one has. No one is feeling what I'm feeling because it's. It's a. It is about me.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

But I also think audiences are transposing the creator's commentary onto the piece itself. By which I mean audiences are saying, oh, because they told this story, they're saying that it's okay. Or because they make Evan sympathetic, then they are sympathetic to Evan and condone what he's doing. Right. It's the leaps between things that are the problem, quite frankly, for me, that telling a story and believing that a story has merit is not the same thing as condoning a person's actions. And that putting a person at the center of a story. And I actually think that here lies love, since you brought it up, is similar. That, like, the sole act of putting someone at the center of a story does not make them the hero and it makes them the protagonist. And we've come to use those words interchangeably. And that's incorrect. With Evan as a protagonist, it means that he is the prominent character in the story. It means that we are going to see many things from his perspective. Although the beautiful thing about theater is you see it as your own perspective looking at a thing through the fourth wall. I think that the telling of the story itself does not say this person is good. It says that this person is worth looking at, and this idea is worth looking at. And quite frankly, I also don't think this was Pasta and Paul saying, like any judgment, positive or negative, towards the people who make it about them, whether you're Alana or whether you're Jared or whether you're Evan, it was just, these are some reactions people could have served up to us. And if you think. I really think that everyone's backlash is actually towards themselves. I think people are pissed as hell that they feel for someone who did wrong. Because it's so much easier to say, in the words of Alex Edelman, oh, I'm such a good boy, because I believe the person who did bad things is bad. But what happens when I start to feel for and understand why the person did the bad thing? And there's also a difference between understanding and condoning. And I think that anything out there in the world, be it art or science or whatever it is that creates more understanding, more compassion, without necessarily letting people off the hook, that will only breed goodness. Because when you understand something, you can figure out how to change the outcome for the next time. If you understand. Oh, my God. My interpretation of why Evan did this is because the look on Cynthia's face was just, how do you say you didn't know her son? How do you say he didn't have friends? How do you say that to her? Combined with the fact that, like, Evan is such a socially anxious person that he just is a people pleaser and says whatever it is and is also a child. And is also a child.

[Matt Koplik]

Yeah.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

So I don't see any world in which that understanding is a problem. Because maybe if we look at those three things and say, okay, these are the three things that led Evan, in this version of the story to tell this first lie. What if we look at how we're helping children understand grief? What if we look at how we're teaching children to interact with adults who are dealing with grief? What if we teach adults how to interact with teenagers who are. What? Right? Like, what if we look at all of those things that led to a lie and think, well, if this should happen again, what will lead to the truth?

[Matt Koplik]

Something that I love, that the show explores, and I wish it explored it more, just because it's the story that I now gravitate towards in this winter of my life. And I'M glad you said Cynthia, because it's the Murphy's. In particular, the complexity of. Because part, as you said, part of what leads to the lie taking root is, as you said, Evan looking at her and not knowing how to tell the truth to her face, which is that your son did not have friends. Connor was not a kind person. And.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

And also what that would mean about him. You have. We also have to remember that Evan's kind of looking into the eyes of his own mother in some ways knowing that, again, spoiler alert. Like, Evan had a suicide attempt.

[Matt Koplik]

He did.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

So what would it be for another kid to be looking in Evan's mom's eyes and saying, evan didn't have any friends?

[Matt Koplik]

So I. I've got like. Yeah, no. So, okay. Laundry list. I'm gonna start with the Murphy's, because it all trickles down from there. Something that the show explores and part. Again, part of the reason why the lie grows the way it does is there's a difference between, you know, someone having a physical illness that ends up taking their life or being in an accident and someone coming to the conclusion of their journey, that they are going to end their life on their own accord.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

To an extent.

[Matt Koplik]

Yes.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Yeah.

[Matt Koplik]

Because that is. That is a conversation that.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

I mean, I think this is a little. This is a little beyond my expertise in it. And it goes with. I will just put it out there and then we'll follow down this. This road that, you know, the terminology around suicide has changed a lot from, you know, committed suicide is something we no longer say. We say died by suicide. Because it is still the result of illness.

[Matt Koplik]

Exactly.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Albeit mental illness rather than physical illness.

[Matt Koplik]

But yes, yes, I think it was two years ago, three years ago, I was talking to someone about it for a story that I had been writing, and I think I had said, like, oh, the choice. And they had said, well, it's not really a choice, it's a conclusion. This is where their road has led to. And this is also something that I know people discuss with Evan Hansen of, you know, the. The forged letters and Evan wanting to paint this rosy picture of Connor. And then people like Alana saying, well, why would he, you know, unalive himself if he was doing so well? And, you know, then there's also the argument of, actually, that's a common misconception. Many people, as they come to that moment of their life, actually do have a sort of more pop. Yeah. Because they feel like they're finally taking control or they. Or they know that it's coming and that the pain will go away soon. This is. And, guys, you know, this is. This is a topic that is going to be discussed a lot in the series. It already has been. It's been discussed in Downstate. It's been discussed in Promises, Promises. It's discussed in Carousel and Heather's, which will be coming up. But with someone like Cynthia and Larry, it's not just, you know, the pain of their child being gone. It's the lack of answers. There's no closure. They are so confused. They don't know why, and they're just looking for answers anywhere. And Larry's immediate response is to just go, he was troubled. He was a troublemaker. He had demons. Leave it alone. And Cynthia won't accept that answer. And it's how the whole Orchard thing kind of comes about with. And I will say the Orchard is something that I feel. I don't get moved by the end of the show. I think partly because of the Orchard. And I'll get into that in a second, which is just that, like, what's supposed to be a very moving thing because it's based off of a lie. It's not the morality of it so much as I'm like, it's not really closure for Connor. I'm getting off track. That's. That we're gonna get that. We're gonna get to that. I swear, again, it's one of those things where I'm, like, pretty. I don't cry, though. And that's just been me exploring why that is. I love that dynamic of the Connors. Because then you also have Zoe, who, in my opinion, or at least Zoe in Act 1 is one of my favorite characters. I. I get frustrated that that arc isn't explored deeper in Act 2 because she and Evan get linked in a more romantic way, and that becomes.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

But I also could be very accurate to teenage hormonal experience. Right. That, like, she might just get hugely caught up in this new relationship and you fill a hole with something else. Right.

[Matt Koplik]

It's not a criticism. It's. It can be absolutely accurate. It's more me being like, I. I wish. Exactly.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Yeah.

[Matt Koplik]

And that. And again. And when you're criticizing something, rather say when you're talking about something in a critical way, you always have to kind of have two minds of, what is it that the writers were trying to do and what. And did I want something different? If I wanted something different, I can talk about that. But it can't be a ding against the writers because they set out to do what they wanted. And they did it. But with Zoe, you know, the pain that she feels is halfway between her mother and her father because she also, you know. And it's what makes Requiem, in my opinion, one of the better songs of the show, because it is exploring this idea of, just because my brother is dead doesn't change who he was when he was alive, how he was to me. And, yes, he had a mental illness, but that doesn't change the trauma that has been inflicted upon me. I can't sit here and call him a martyr or a conflicted person, basically.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

I can't sit here and be sad. There's a lot of relief, I think.

[Matt Koplik]

Of Zoe's character and I think guilt for the relief. And, you know, she's caught halfway between her parents in that respect. And also, like, kind of having to parent her own parents in this grief. Her mother, who is trying to paint a picture that isn't accurate, and her father, who just won't talk about it and what. And she's. She's a child herself. She's 16. What do you do with that? And I love that part of the story because I think it adds to the complexity of. Dear Evan Hansen. It's not just that Connor was a good kid who tragically, you know, acts or died by accident or, you know, was struggling in a. In a very easy to understand way that the whole audience can go. But of course, this is lifetime, baby. You know, it's. It's a lot more faceted than that. And so Evan is conflicted, a. For a person he never really knew who his few interactions with him were not great. And then seeing people who are kind to him and all, and they want answers, and his immediate response is just to give them something, right? He's just trying to. He's trying to put this chapter to a close. And unfortunately, lies like this, they just. They're. They're stones gathering moss. There's no way to not have it snowball. It's just. It's how it goes, right? But, you know, the whole for forever number happens purely because Cynthia is so desperate for any kind of closure. She just hears tree. And she goes, he took you to the orchard, right? And everyone. And I also love, like, everyone at the table is like, what? And like, they don't even remember the orchard for a second. It takes them a minute. But it's because she is so intent on it. Where the show loses me with the orchard in the end, is that because they continue perpetuating the myth that Connor loved this orchard, that his family used to go to. He took Evan there. That's where the for forever dream sequence happens. Whatever. And then they do the whole gofundme with the orchard and all these things. The final scene with Zoe and Evan. And correct me if I'm wrong, Zoe's the one who reaches out to Evan right after when a year goes by.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

And no, I think he reaches out to her.

[Matt Koplik]

He reaches out to her, but she's the one who decides to go to the orchard because he says, why did you pick here?

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Yes.

[Matt Koplik]

Okay. I think that's why I was confused. So he reached he. A year after everything unfolds. And I also want to point and we should talk about this as well. When we talk about forgiveness. Evan does admit to his wrongdoings.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Yeah.

[Matt Koplik]

To the. To the people who in most matters to confess to. I was like, I'm Jewish, I don't do confession. I'm like, what's that word? Burn. But he. He and Zoe are at the orchard. She tells him, I wanted you to see the orchard. You know, we saved it, whatever, all this stuff. And I think because I look back at it now, I'm like, well, we actually never know if it meant anything to Connor.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

But that's the thing, is that. So I don't get particularly emotional at the end because it's at the orchard. I also think that for argument's sake of dramatic structure, you're not supposed to get all worked up at the end. Again, like this is resolution moment. But the whole thing for me is that the orchard has now become significant to this family. And it was a thing that they all. Connor was not the only problem within this family. Right. The very opening scene shows like one kid going this way, one kid going that way, the dad being pissed that he's late for work and the mom being like, I don't know how to do any of this. Where's the map?

[Matt Koplik]

Yeah.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

And so it's a fractured family to begin with. Not. It's not like some tight knit family with a black sheep, you know, it's a fractured family that whether the root of why the Orchard could have or should have become important. Even though that's the lie, the fact is that they do gather around this orchard. And so I think it's a healing spot for the Murphy family. But I also think that just in the scheme of the musical, it is proof that again, mistakes aren't fatal. Mistakes can lead to unintended consequences. Sometimes those are terrible and sometimes those are good. It doesn't make the mistake more acceptable. Again, it's just saying that, like, these. Here is an option and a menu of things that could happen.

[Matt Koplik]

Musicals are like, a good thing.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Like the revitalization of an orchard and a family healing around it is a good thing that can come from really messed up stuff.

[Matt Koplik]

A good musical is like a pasta bar where you choose your own adventures. Many options, and they all can go together. No, I agree. I think something that people mistake in the final scene when Zoe says, you know, you helped my family. Something along those lines. Right? I know a lot of people who get, like, very worked up about that, and they're like, that's him getting away with it. It's not there. Something that I know that I have felt because, you know, when. When Hillary Clinton was running for president, 2016, and she. She was talking about how she had originally been opposed to gay marriage, but she came around and changed her mind. And Dan Savage, who's a very prominent queer, you know, reporter and podcaster, someone asked him, like, well, how can you accept her? Like, she was against it for so long now that she changed her mind like that. That's what you have to hope for. He says, when someone comes from the opposite side to your side, you don't break them for not coming over sooner. You say, welcome. And I think the same is true of any kind of healing or break, emotional or mental breakthrough that anyone has. There's a judgment that, like, as we were saying earlier, you know, people want everything to be squeaky clean, have a perfect journey. As Alex Edelman says, now, I'm a good boy. No, they want no paper trail. They want no mistakes. Everything's gotta be. It's not just that you have to have come to a good moral thinking. You have to have always felt that way, or if you didn't always feel that way, your journey to it has.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

To be perfect in terms of drama and theater. That's boring.

[Matt Koplik]

It's absolutely boring.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Who wants to see someone stay the same over two and a half hours? That's the whole point.

[Matt Koplik]

All good stories are people making mistakes and the wrong choices for 90% of the story learning and then starting to make better choices after that.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Right. I also think that I'll just add that, like, while the things that Evan made up about Connor are not true, they're also not not true. The whole point is that you don't know that the loss of Connor is a loss of knowledge. Right? That no one seems to have truly known him, whether that was the. The sunny sides of his personality or the dark sides of it. That and that's why Cynthia had that searching look on her face. Because she didn't know.

[Matt Koplik]

Yeah.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

And so I also think that, like. Well, he just made up everything that Connor was. He absolutely did make it up. That's not debatable.

[Matt Koplik]

This is. That's.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

But whether he accidentally hit on some truth, we do not know.

[Matt Koplik]

It's true. It's true. They say you put 12 monkeys in a room with a typewriter and give them infinite amount of time. They eventually write Shakespeare. You put. Yeah. You say enough lies. Eventually a hit on a truth.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

I mean, my father would say, you know. Well, actually, I shouldn't say what my father would say, but I will say what other people say. A broken clock is right twice a day.

[Matt Koplik]

Yeah. You know, or, you know, a broken in glove is the right way. Right. The right way to break. Can you. Okay. Can you explain to me the importance of that song outside of just Evan having a fatherly moment?

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Yes.

[Matt Koplik]

Okay. Please do. Because I still don't know.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Because I don't. I wouldn't say, like, melodically the song is significant at all, but. Yeah, it's. I think it's wildly important for the parents in the audience because the whole song is about this dad who was convinced there was one way to do it. And I tried so hard to make the one way work, and then it didn't work. And there is a. I think it's also key to show Larry's side that he cared. Right. Because without that song, it really is like, he's probably right. Like, he's probably already high right at the beginning and knowing that and feeling unchanged and he's removed and he's distant and he shrugs off Cynthia's grief because my kid was a problem. But when you watch and listen to that song, you learn that that reaction is protective on the part of Larry because he tried so many things that didn't work, that the only thing he can think to do then to protect himself from probably his own self harm of like, you know what? Like, you must feel when you feel like you have failed your child.

[Matt Koplik]

Mm.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

It's protective to then say, well, I. I tried. It was the hard way, but it was the right way. It's what my father taught me. Right. Because that idea of breaking in a glove is also, like, very generational. It's very like America's pastime. Sporty dad. So I think that that song. I think that not having it in the movie, I think there's a. I think there's something missing there for not having it. I Even though, again, it's not the waving through a window vocal pyrotechnics. Right.

[Matt Koplik]

First of all, damn, Daniel, never have I thought that I would truly think about this song in that way. And now I have, so thank you. But also, I do think it was a major mistake not to have more material from other characters in the movie because I think having those perspectives from Heidi, from Larry, from Cynthia, is what makes the musical far more adult than people give it credit for, because it has so much maturity to it.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

And I think that's also why it did so well. Right. Like, it wasn't just talking to the teenagers in the room. It was talking to the teenagers in the room, the grown up teenagers in the middle in the room, and the parents in the room. And parents really felt like they could bring their children to it. And it wasn't just. Not that there's anything wrong with just. But it wasn't just, I'm bringing my kid for a theatrical experience. It was, I'm bringing my child to something that we're going to share.

[Matt Koplik]

Yeah.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Because then I'm going to be able to talk to them about this. And that is a gateway to conversation about other things, which I think there was also. And there probably still is, though we've all been now enveloped by it with COVID that we're all looking at how everyone communicates and how everyone is lonely. But at that moment in time, we were really, really looking at teenagers and their isolation and what are they not telling us, and how do I get my kid to open up to me? And so I think that that was something that made it a financial success as well.

[Matt Koplik]

Which leads us to Heidi, a character who I think is just the tits, if I may. I think that character is a wonderful character. Rachel Bay Jones.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Unbelievable.

[Matt Koplik]

Incredible. And what I love about Heidi, because it's everything you were just saying about parents trying to relate and communicate with their kids. How do I raise this person to become a person in the world? And how do I let them. Sorry, how do I let them know that I am there for them, that they can talk to me? What is it that they're going through? And you watch Heidi not necessarily be like a female Larry. So she's not doing just one thing to try to communicate to Evan. But I would argue that it is coming. She is kind of going back to a similar well, which is like a well of positivity. And it's not toxic positivity. She's not trying to cover anything up, which is the different, you know, that's the difference between actual positivity and toxic positivity. She's willing to talk about anything, but she's always going for the, like, hang in there, kitty. You can do it, kid mentality. Because she thinks that's what her son needs right now, is, like, ultimate support, ultimate confidence. Like, let's go. Let's do this.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Sure.

[Matt Koplik]

And as she says in Act 2, when all the cards fall apart, and she reads the letter that started the whole thing and realizes that it was a letter that Evan had written to himself. And she says, I'm sorry. I didn't realize how in pain you were. She saw, obviously, the pain that he was feeling, but she didn't see just how.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Because I also think that, you know, anxiety and depression are two sides of the same coin. And more often, and certainly in the case of Evan, anxiety was the thing that was. She was able to see and that we were all able to see, not the depression and the pain that goes with the depression that she couldn't see until she read that letter.

[Matt Koplik]

I think that what makes that final scene with Heidi and Evan so powerful is it is her not forcing, but demanding that he sit in this moment with her now, now that she knows sort of where he's been at and what he. Where he's at now. It's. We're not gonna. This is. You know, we will eventually make it through and all that, but it's.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

No, that's so interesting. And I don't know that I saw it that way, but I can see it that way.

[Matt Koplik]

I think it's what leads me to so big, so small, though.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Well, yeah, I mean, I'm just thinking about so big, so small. And I think that what she's offering for the first time is validation with the cheerleading. Right. It's like, it was always like, you're gonna do great, and you're gonna do this. And it was, like, unintentionally ignoring. Well, why does he feel like he can't do great, that you need to cheerlead? Like, you're skipping the first part. And so the first part of so big is. It is so big right now. Valid. Yes, it is huge, but soon it will be so small. And that's the cheerleading part of we will get through this to the part where you're gonna be great and it's gonna be okay. And I think she's also, for the first time, taking accountability for her own stuff and acknowledging her own feelings. Right. Like, she's also modeling for him. Right. She's giving him that entire story of the day that her husband left her, the day that she felt like everything was so big, it was the biggest failure she ever had. Because the whole time, we don't see her failing. We see her fighting. We see her working the job, we see her leaving comments for the essays. And. Right. Like, that's her version of succeeding, too. It's not just cheerleading and. And prodding him. It's like, this is how I'm gonna do good, is by getting him to do good. And so by also showing him her vulnerable side, her pain, her sadness. A time when she felt like this and now he doesn't see her as. That is kind of the proof that, like, oh, there will be another phase. But by far, to me, the lyric that is the most important part of that song is, and I did, and I do and I will. Right. That's her acknowledgement of it all. I didn't do it all right. I'm not doing it all right. In this exact moment while I'm singing to you, and I'm gonna try, but most certainly I will mess up again. And that also allows. Gives him the permission to say, I did mess up. I have messed up in this moment, and I'm probably going to mess up again, but it's not going to be for lack of trying the next time.

[Matt Koplik]

There's the side of Evan that we don't, I think a lot of people forget is actually a side of himself, which is whenever he's talking to the quote, unquote, ghost of Connor.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Yeah.

[Matt Koplik]

Which I feel like best could be described as a physical manifestation on stage of depressive thoughts, of the antagonistic thoughts. Only because in Act 2, as the anxiety starts to come back, as the lie gets a little too big for him to control, and he's having second thoughts about how far he's willing to go, maybe he should come clean. And that ghost of Connor says, you can't do that. You're in too deep. You tell them, they're gonna hate you. No one's gonna speak to you ever again. You're an awful person if you do that.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Oh, yeah, I guess I see that in Act 2. Act 1 is in the first act. I'm thinking of, like, no one deserves to disappear. That doesn't feel very depression thought to me.

[Matt Koplik]

No, that's. That's more of that. More the seductive thoughts that lead you into the cave of sadness. But act two, Connor, that is absolutely where it goes. And it leads to that conversation with Heidi where, you know, once he's confessed and she reads the letter and all this stuff and he says to her, you know, if you knew who I was, what I did, you know, you would hate me. And she says, I know who you are and I love you. And that is for me, that living in it moment. I've seen what you've done. I know it, I know it and I know what you've been through and I still love you. You need to hear that because you know, as you said, he's gonna fuck up again, as she's gonna fuck up again. But like as you do that, know that I am here.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

But I'll. And I'll also say though that I think the beauty in the story is not only that Heidi says that, but that essentially Cynthia says that again later. Right. I think a lot of the backlash and a lot of why people think it's problematic is because once it, once letters start coming out, the fake Connor letters start coming out and then there's this Internet backlash calling the Murphy's terrible parents. What does not happen is publicly no one finds out that Evan was the one to write them. Privately that happens. And I think there are a lot of people who are like, Evan didn't get his because the Murphy's didn't say these were fake all along. And we did all these things for our kid and you don't know anything about anything. But I think that therein also lies more beauty. I think that the Murphy's are the adults in the situation and they chose mercy. What was it going to do for anyone to say these letters are fake? Actually go back to being mad at this 17 year old kid if they could even manage to push the wave of the Internet off them and onto someone else. Yeah, right. Like what, why, why keep hurting each other? Why not? What they decided to do instead was say this stops here. The pain is going like we're gonna do our healing and that's when our pain will stop. We're not gonna inflict this back on Evan. That's hopefully where his pain is gonna stop. We are going to choose mercy above vengeance. And Evan still loses the girlfriend, the potential free ride to school, the second family of two parents that he always wanted, the trust of the entire school community. He still loses all of those things, but it maybe wasn't as like ugly and he got his as some people want. But I think that again we have to look at ourselves and say, well why do we want that? And turn it on its head and say like in the mercy, in the compassion, in the understanding, in the gray is where the lessons lie in this musical. And that, again, you can have problematic people, and you should have problematic people at the center of drama to help us make the right decision. Right. This is all still a play.

[Matt Koplik]

Yeah.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

It's to help us in the real world do the right thing.

[Matt Koplik]

Ultimately, we, the audience, are like all the high school students in Dear Evan Hansen. What happened to Connor and with his family is not about us. It is about them. We are not. It is not for us to make a judgment call on what. How they react to anything that happens throughout the story of Dear Evan Hansen. That is who they are. And as you said, they chose mercy. And what does that mean for us? What are we to take away from that? And with.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

And for those reasons, I deem this not. Not a question and not problematic.

[Matt Koplik]

Yes. Well, the one thing I also just want to say is because we still have a whole season, we have to talk about a whole season. The one thing I want to say, though, is just there's. There's the song. You'll be found.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Yes.

[Matt Koplik]

I just want to talk about it for a hot second because I think. I think that song encapsulates so much of what makes the show work, where I do think the movie kind of lost its way and why you can't take out of context things of a show and then. And then judge the show based off of that. Or you also can't judge a show based off of its marketing, because that song became that and like Waving Through Window sort of became like the anthems of that show.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Sure. But I also don't think it's a problem.

[Matt Koplik]

It's not a problem. It's not that it's a problem. It's that.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

That song, rather, I should say, I don't think it's a lie to say that, to imply in the marketing that you will be found through seeing the musical. Because as I sit here and started at the very beginning, like, I did find myself not in Evan and in the. His actions, I found myself other places. And like I was saying, these parents and these teenagers, I think there was a lot of finding and discovery.

[Matt Koplik]

Yes, also.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Yes.

[Matt Koplik]

Yes. And also. Okay, what I love, again, what I love what it does in the show is it's like the whole theme of the show in one, Evans gives this speech that becomes, you'll be found. And it goes viral, and it really helps a lot of people. And that's beautiful. It helps Larry. It leads to that moment that makes both of us just go, oh, God. What? The musical. This is how I. This is how, in my opinion, you know, in the musical, in the stage version, the writers and Michael Greif are not saying, hey, you know, not only should you like Evan, you should be moved by all the things he's doing. Because the way that they staged the number, the way they do all of the social media viralness, the way they have it happen, the way that Ben played it, and I never saw the following Evans, but he wasn't particularly happy in the Act 1 finale. That you will be found went super viral because it was all. It was. There was an anxiety that came with. The more people hear about this, the more likely it is that someone's gonna poke a hole in this story, as is what happens with Alanna in Act 2. Yeah, I always viewed it as.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

I also think there's probably just baseline anxiety of like, oh, my God, so many people are looking at me.

[Matt Koplik]

Yeah, but that's. But as I said, you know, when a Broadway show goes to the mainstream, it's gonna eventually find the people that don't like it and then have and are gonna, you know, make a whole narrative online about what's, quote, unquote, problematic about it. The. The line I've always said about you'll be found is that for the. For the rest of the company, it is you will be found. For Evan, it's you will be found out. Someone. Someone's going to catch you at one point because you're. I mean, this is me now going on my own tangent. Like, he is a child and he is smart, but he's not so smart that he can fully cover his tracks. He. He leaves breadcrumbs that get picked up in Act 2 by a fellow student. Like, he didn't do a super great job. And it just takes one viral video. How many people got super famous very quickly from a viral thing or whatever, and then more information comes out about them and it all just falls apart. Yeah, there was that dude who asked that question at the Clinton Trump debate where he's like, say one thing about each other that you admire, and everyone's like, oh, my God, he didn't pit them against each other. How wonderful. Then it turns out he was one of the top leakers of the fappening when all those Hollywood actresses photos got leaked. And it's like, you know, you get the whole world on you. Your skeletons come out of the closet. And I think that's what makes the show so incredibly complicated in a great way that I enjoy is that it has this song that can be so Powerful and so moving and is powerful to those characters. But it has that undercurrent of tension. And then the song became a theme for the show, which is wonderful. As you said, people have found themselves with Evan Hansen and also, objectively speaking, she a bop. But like, there's a difference between Hugh Jackman singing it in Madison Square Garden, the New York City Gay Men's Chorus, and how it is played in Evan Hansen, the stage musical.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Definitely.

[Matt Koplik]

I think also what doesn't help is that the movie took out that undercurrent of tension and just made it a moving moment. And there's interesting.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

And like I said, I really can't speak to that.

[Matt Koplik]

It's one of the few things I remember point blank because it was something that I was always so thrilled about. The stage show, was that how they did that? And then when that didn't happen in the movie, it was like, that was a moment I went. Did you not understand what made this so powerful on stage? Because it was that double edged sort of moving, but also tension. And it was just trying to go for the jugular in the film version. And again, I don't blame necessarily, the writers, the director of the movie had had a vision and a way that they wanted to sell it and that they thought they could make it into. Into a cinematic feature. And it might have worked for some people. It didn't work for me. So that's just me explaining that dichotomy.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Sure.

[Matt Koplik]

And now Ruthie has decided. Evan Hansen, no question mark. It is unproblematic. Unproblematic for me in my life. Hold tight, because There's a part two that's gonna come out sometime in 2024. I'm gonna get someone who hates all of it and is going to listen to this episode and it's gonna say, I took notes to everything Ruthie said. Point a no. But that's for another day. Let's get into a season, shall we?

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Let's get into a season.

[Matt Koplik]

Before we do that, we must take one more break.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Billy, I beg to differ with you.

[Matt Koplik]

How do you mean?

[Ruthie Fierberg]

You're the top. Yeah, you're an Arrow caller. You're the top. You're a Coolidge dollar. You're the nimble tread of the feet of Fred.

[Matt Koplik]

And we're back. Okay, so, Ruthie, since I last recorded about this season, some things have changed. Some shows are closing, some other shows have announced and there might be a show or two that hasn't announced yet that we might be getting in the spring. I think the trickiness with spring. There's this theory that I just don't think is founded because it keeps being disproven, that if you're a new work and you know you're not based off of ip, that many people know you don't have a movie star, you know, if you're. That you gotta open in the spring because you're closer to Tony nomination time and closer to the Tonys. And, and therefore, if you get nominated for stuff, you have a better shot at, you know, making money and actually becoming a runaway success. And we've had enough shows that aren't based on well known IP or don't have a movie star in them that opened in the summer or the winter and did well. And then we've had a million shows that have opened in the spring that did not.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Right. And I think that, I mean, producers will tell you this, that some of them think they need the time to build word of mouth so they are angling for a fall opening rather than something so close to Tony's that you don't have any time to really build your message.

[Matt Koplik]

Yeah.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

And then there are also pretty much every producer will tell you, you take a theater when you can get a theater. Like there's only 41 of them and they are not all the same size in terms of playing space and number of seats in the audience and depending on the budget of your musical and the running costs. Like all of there are all of this to say of the 41, which is already a limited supply. There is a further limited supply when you take out the nonprofits. And then there's a further limited supply of the ones that are right for your show. And so when you are offered a theater that is right enough for your show, I don't know that you even have the luxury of choosing so much whether you want to open in March or in November, sometimes.

[Matt Koplik]

There's also, again, I mean, awards help just in terms of visibility, right?

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Yeah.

[Matt Koplik]

And with ticket prices being high and, you know, critics not having the sway that they once had, awards just can help in respect of getting people who are on the fence about seeing your show to maybe make the commitment of going like, well, it won this, so maybe I'll give it a shot. But that's not the be all, end all. And it's not always the deciding factor for a producer of why the show comes in when it does.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

You know, I mean, part of my job is looking into the data of all of this. Like Broadway news is very data forward and situation group and Broadway Direct, I want to say was. I think it's the two of them. Yeah. Situation, which is an advertising and marketing firm, and Broadway Direct did a collaborative study together. Broadway Direct provided some raw ticketing data for a limited number of theaters, and Situation surveyed a number of theatergoers. And in terms of motivations for purchasing tickets, like, they asked if the show has won a Tony or Tonys. And how influential is that? It's not in the top three motivating factors for certain demographics. I don't want to misquote the research. And it's much more complex because they do it by geographic location, they do it by demographic age, they do it by other demographic measures. But that was something they asked about. It is less significant a motivator than it used to be. So word of mouth, being a direct recommendation from a family member or friend is still, like, one of the top things that makes someone buy a ticket. A celebrity, being in the cast. A celebrity they know being in the cast is really high. But. Yeah. And Tony Awards still affect it.

[Matt Koplik]

Yeah.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

It's just a matter of, like, are they affecting it the way they used to affect it?

[Matt Koplik]

There's no one thing that guarantees a ticket purchase.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Never, ever, ever.

[Matt Koplik]

No. Many things can contribute. And, you know, I think the way it's. You know, it's when you're on grubhub and you're looking for a place to get, you know, a burrito, and you look at the ratings, but the end.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

But then you're also looking at the price, but then you're also looking at the delivery time, but then you're also looking at, is it raining or is it a nice day? And do I want to walk or do I want a delivery person and they have a delivery fee or not? Right, Exactly. All of those things. Everything is weighing on a purchase.

[Matt Koplik]

You want to take a chance, but you also want to have as close to a guarantee as possible that you're going to get your bang for your buck. And that's why, yes, Tony's help. A critic can help. Word of mouth can help. You need a lot of things to kind of get your show going. If it's something that people don't know very well or doesn't have a celebrity in it, you need to get something to keep the ground running, something to get people talking about it. And we've seen some shows have success with that, with a very clever marketing campaign, and then word of mouth helping in that respect. Some shows have been able to get it for a short period, and then it kind of dies off for one reason or another. And it's, you know, for all of the data, it's not an exact science because it's art. And art is something that you can't really predict the success of in terms of this season. Is there a trend that you're starting to see with how what shows are coming out or when they're coming out or where they're coming out? Sorry, that was very vague.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

No, I mean, is there a trend? I. I don't think so. I also think everybody's talking about how crowded the season is. Let me tell you. This is how it always is, folks. Like those last two weeks before nominations, always a show, a night opening. It's. I think we just have kind of amnesia. Like the same way that mothers do after they give birth. They literally have a hormone release that creates an amnesiac effect so that women will have children again. And I feel like there must be something similar happening. I say this out of love and not disrespect to anyone who's ever given birth, but that like, we always forget every year that like, this is how it is. There's just a zillion shows that open up. It's busy in the fall and it gets right. Like there's a few weeks in each spot. This past fall was much more spread out. That's actually more the anomaly of this season than the spring being crowded. I think what people are emphasizing is not the number of shows total opening, it's the number of musicals and particularly new musicals.

[Matt Koplik]

Yeah.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

So that is slightly larger than we've seen in a while. We're doing the data on like historically in the past 30 years. In the past, maybe if we have the time, 50 years, like how many musicals truly ran at once. Not only the new musicals that were coming or the new productions, I should say. So that is inclusive of original and revival, but new productions and also the ongoing. Right. Because all of these shows are still technically competing with the Lion Kings and Wicked of the world. But yeah, I don't know that there's. I don't know that there's a trend. I will say maybe score wise I'm seeing a trend that like where the music is coming from are from people who we haven't heard of them like writing musicals before. And I don't want to say they're non musical writers because that's categorically false since they all just wrote musicals that are opening up in the spring. And I don't like to prognosticate who writes musicals and who Doesn't. But we'll say that they haven't done it before. So Ingrid Michelson writing the Notebook. Pig pen with Pig pen with Water for Elephants. Is it the Jameson Collective with the Outsiders?

[Matt Koplik]

Maybe.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

I think that's their. Gosh, if I'm wrong, I'm going to be very embarrassed.

[Matt Koplik]

Is it Adam Rapp who wrote the book for the Outsiders?

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Yes, that's.

[Matt Koplik]

Yeah. I was like, there's one name in that creative scene that I actually know.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

But Justin Levine also, I should say, like, also wrote the music, but it was with. With the Jameson Collective. So seeing names from. And you can't call those people mainstream music. Right. Like, they're not. I don't know.

[Matt Koplik]

They have. I mean, they have their followings, but sure. Ingrid Michaelson does not have an ERAS tour.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Right. So that's if any trend I'm seeing, maybe that. And. And also the sound that they bring with them. While Matt Gould, for example, with Limpicka is someone who has been writing pretty much strictly musicals. Like, I don't think Matt Gould released NLP or anything of songs that do not exist within the context of musicals. But the sound of Lempicka, while singular to Matt and to that musical, also fits into this, like, more contemporary sound, whatever that means. What it means to me is that, like, you could hear it on the radio and it wouldn't sound like Compton and Green or Cole Porter or Lerner and Lowe or Rodgers and Hammerstein. Like, I think maybe this is what our era of musicals is going to sound like. That in 50 years from now, someone will be like, it's not sounding like Michaelson and it's not sounding like Gould and it's. Right. But I think there's something to that.

[Matt Koplik]

Yeah. I mean, Compton and Green, Coleman Stein, Richard Rogers, like, they. They were influenced by the music of their era, just like the people right now are influenced by their. As you were saying. But I have. I've listened to one song from Lempicka. I couldn't tell you which one it was.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

I remember thinking, probably Woman is probably.

[Matt Koplik]

Probably. To be honest, I was listening to it in the shower and maybe that's why it sounded so fluid to me. But I mean, of. Of the musicals coming in the spring, we have quite a few transfers. I saw Hell's Kitchen at the Public.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Oh, yeah. And let's not forget Hell's Kitchen.

[Matt Koplik]

Hell's Kitchen coming in at the Shubert. I saw Days of Wine and Roses at the Atlantic.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Same.

[Matt Koplik]

We'll see how they do. I saw. I feel like there's one more I'm missing that I also saw, but I.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Can'T Suffs at the public.

[Matt Koplik]

I was supposed to see Suffs. They canceled our performance due to Covid.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Oh, no.

[Matt Koplik]

I know. I'm excited to see it because Shaina Taub and I both went to the Manor. I don't know what to expect.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Honestly. I don't either because I've heard they've done a lot of work on it.

[Matt Koplik]

Since the public, as have I. I've heard they did a major overall.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Yeah, the Hell's Kitchen transfer is obviously a faster transfer, as is Days of Wine and Roses from the Atlantic.

[Matt Koplik]

Yes. Hell's Hell's Kitchen's transfer is the kind of transfer that we talked about on the last series, which was the big move, which was off Broadway to Broadway transfers of every now and then there is an off Broadway transition show that moves to Broadway so fucking quickly. You know, Hamilton obviously was quick. The rent was a month in between New York Theater Workshop and Broadway. And even though this revival of Merrily is relatively quick, but closer to a year in between productions, where Hell's Kitchen, it's like a three month layover.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Yeah.

[Matt Koplik]

I'll be interested to see if they. What changes they do make because they just got a grant to. For. For like more development on the show.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Hell's Kitchen did.

[Matt Koplik]

Yeah.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Interesting.

[Matt Koplik]

I don't. Don't ask me the name. It literally was in Playbill this afternoon while I was at work and I just like, I skimmed it and something about the grant was just about like. It was for more. For sure. It was for more development. And I think that show. I would like them to have more development because I think there's a lot of potential in there. I think that the main girl is a star. But I'll leave it at that for now. I don't like musicals that rely super heavily on narration.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Sure.

[Matt Koplik]

I'm a bigger fan of scene work, but.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

And I think when there is show instead of tell.

[Matt Koplik]

Exactly. Did you see Ain't too the Temptations musical?

[Ruthie Fierberg]

I did, yeah.

[Matt Koplik]

That was a show where for me, every time a scene started to get cooking, that was when Derek Baskin would turn to the audience and give narration and I was like, no. We were like, sam, off topic. But fuck it, it's my podcast. It was. It was the scene where his girlfriend tells him that she's pregnant. And I'm like, ooh, interesting. And there's a beat. And then he turned to the audience and he goes, when she told me she was pregnant, I'M like, no, no. Live in the moment. Live in the moment. So big, so small, baby, though, that's.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Like, you know, Dominique Morisseau is one of my favorite playwrights, period, Let alone living playwrights. And I'll just say that, like, when you're trying to capture so much time as the full careers of these, like, artists who have had decades long careers, it's like a victim of the story you're trying to tell.

[Matt Koplik]

And Jersey Boys kind of set a false narrative of doing narration and having it work. But I don't. I don't want to give the implication that in order to have a successful jukebox musical, you have to always have narration.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Yeah. It can be done without. I mean, Hell's Kitchen. Well, we'll see if it's successful or not. But it is a jukebox musical for the most part.

[Matt Koplik]

Yeah.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Relying on Alicia Keys catalog with a few new songs.

[Matt Koplik]

A few.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Yeah. And you're right, she does have.

[Matt Koplik]

It's a lot of narration.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

So we'll see.

[Matt Koplik]

Yeah. If they were to make any immediate changes, for me, it is more Keisha Lewis, who is just. When every time she comes on stage, I just. I lost myself. And I think they can cut maybe two or three different times that Shoshana Bean serves dinner. I think. I think she does it just a little too often, but that's just me. I know Michael gripe's, like, very obsessed with how real the food is. She's serving. That's real salad she has.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

I just want more Shoshana Bean. Like, I don't care what have.

[Matt Koplik]

Have her serve us music. Less. Less food, please. She's not in waitress no more, Michael. That's all I'm gonna say. Is there something coming that you're extremely excited for in the spring?

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Well, I'll also just mention that since in. In the musical conversation that, again, neither of these are originals, but they are new. With the Wiz and Cabaret coming.

[Matt Koplik]

Oh, sure.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Because let's. Let's not forget that both those revivals are coming, and so is Tommy.

[Matt Koplik]

If you think for a second I forgot that the Wiz is coming in this season, you're sorely mistaken.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

I feel like I need to consult the list about, like, what am I. I mean, I don't know. I'm at. Look, I try not to prejudge when I haven't seen something. That being the definition of prejudge. Thank you. But I do try to withhold, like, ah, this is a jukebox, or, ah, this is a revival, or, ah, this Is whatever. Because at the end of the day, I have seen artistically successful pieces that have a Hollywood studio movie for its source material or a completely original idea for its source material. I have seen Jukebox. I have seen jukebox by 25 composers and jukebox by one composer. I have seen, you know, a danced, fully choreographed musical and something that is more like staged movement. Like, I have seen every iteration, and one version of all of those. Right. Has worked. And so I never want to say that, like, the form or the premise or the whatever is the thing that, like, turns me on or turns me off, because I really want to say that, like, prove to me. Yeah, prove to me that you can make it work.

[Matt Koplik]

Great works come from anywhere.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

But looking at the list, what am I most. Oh, can we switch to plays for a second?

[Matt Koplik]

Oh, yeah, please. There are two in particular that I'm pumped for.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Prayer for the French Republic was, I guess, 2022 off Broadway. I saw it twice. It was the best play I saw that year. And as much as I raved about it, I still couldn't get everyone to go in time to see it off Broadway. So the fact that we get another chance.

[Matt Koplik]

And it just extended.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

And it just extended two more weeks at Manhattan Theatre Club. I'm interested to see the fact that it's a blended cast in terms of some people returning from Off Broadway, some new people. I think you don't often get that. Like, sometimes you get, like, one person.

[Matt Koplik]

Right.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Like, scheduling conflict. One person. But this was like, we're gonna keep some people, we're gonna keep others. I'm sure some of it was due to scheduling.

[Matt Koplik]

Right.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Like, it's. It's.

[Matt Koplik]

Yeah.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Two years later. But Joshua Harmon's writing is unbelievable. David Cromer's direction is so thoughtful. And this was a play that I needed as someone Jewish two years ago before things got to the place where they are now. And I think it's, you know, the best plays only become more important.

[Matt Koplik]

Absolutely. And more potent. I saw it at Manhattan Theatre Club in the Off Broadway space as well and really loved it. I will also say, I want to say this for people who get turned off when they hear length. I know it's three hours, y'. All. I'm telling you, it don't feel it.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

I made a joke that I wanted to start telling people, like, the weather, you know, is 20 degrees. Feels like negative five. I wanted to be like, is three hours? Feels like 90 minutes.

[Matt Koplik]

Yeah.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Like, it's all about how long it feels. And this play propels you through it that it doesn't feel like that much time. And if it does, it's only because it's glorious and you want to savor every minute of it. Like, I really.

[Matt Koplik]

I mean, if something is.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

I'm much more concerned about whether it's great and whether it validates itself as being that long, which I think this show does, then its actual timestamp.

[Matt Koplik]

No, absolutely. Again, people prejudge and they get nervous when they see something like that. But, you know, if people could sit through three hours of Oppenheimer, why can't they sit through three hours?

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Exactly.

[Matt Koplik]

I think this is just as compelling as Oppenheimer. In my opinion, more so. But, hey, that's just who. That's who I am. You didn't see Oppenheimer. Bless you.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

I. I Barbied only.

[Matt Koplik]

That's what I like. Barb, you barbed. That's what. You wanna know what? Oppenheimer. Oppenheimer is a classic Nolan movie. It's men sitting around going, I need to make a decision. But here's the issue. That decision, it's gonna have implications. That's Nolan for you. That's a Nolan movie. It's good. But no Prayer for the French Republic is a lovely play. I'm so excited for it. I gotta say, this season so far has been very underwhelming for me. There have been a couple things that I've really loved, and they've both been plays. I loved Jaja's African hair braiding love. Fucking delightful. And I thought Pearly Victorious was such a blast.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Absolutely.

[Matt Koplik]

So I'm very excited to have her prayer come in. I've heard amazing things at appropriate. I'm really looking forward to it.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

I just saw it on Saturday night.

[Matt Koplik]

Did you like it?

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Very good.

[Matt Koplik]

Okay.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Very good. Excellent, even. I would say. I called it in my Instagram post. I was just gonna say another one that is on the lengthier side. And I don't care because it's good.

[Matt Koplik]

Doesn't. Doesn't care.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Here's what I want to say about this show, because I read that Logline and thought, oh, adult children coming to clean out their father's estate. Really? Again, question mark. And Brandon Jacobs Jenkins made me eat my words because he, as a playwright, has introduced something absolutely new and absolutely fresh. I'll give you the hint that it's like. But what did these children find in their father's plantation home that maybe brings up an entirely different side of what it means to remember your parents.

[Matt Koplik]

Absolutely so.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

And the ensemble is so well balanced. Everyone is giving. Obviously, Sarah Paulson is just next level when you see her live on stage. Lila Neugebauer is one of my favorite directors. I really love watching her stuff and just like. Yeah, I feel like all the pieces come together with it.

[Matt Koplik]

Is she directing Vanya? Lila? No, Someone. Someone else is directing Uncle Vanya or. No. Or is it her?

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Hold on, hold on. I think it's her because it is. It is.

[Matt Koplik]

Because.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Adapted, obviously, by Heidi Schreck, but of course, yes, but because by Lila.

[Matt Koplik]

The other two things in the spring that I am, I could not be more pumped for are the revivals of Uncle Vanya with that fucking cast, Heidi adapting it, and then also the revival of Doubt, a play that I like, but a cast that I am so fucking here for.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Yeah. I mean, bring me Tyne daily any day.

[Matt Koplik]

The children need to know that Tyne Daly is Mother, because she's so mother. She's just a phenomenal actress.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

So brilliant. Yeah, definitely. Look, I mean, I can't look at this list and say I'm not excited about anything. Which in and of itself is exciting. Right. Like an enemy of the people. I saw the adaptation at the Armory. Um, and so I'm. I'm interested to see it. If. I mean, Amy Herzog. If she hasn't earned our attention with A Doll's House, I don't know what will. So. I am so thrilled to see her adaptation of another piece. Jeremy Strong is such a legit actor. Michael Imperioli, like, that's exciting to me. Cabaret is exciting to me. Days of Wine and Roses, Doubt Hell's Kitchen Home, which I know very little about. I think, technically, it's part of the.

[Matt Koplik]

Roundabout season, and I think it's, technically speaking, the first thing of next season. Yes, indeed.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Oh, yeah. So I guess we shouldn't talk about it.

[Matt Koplik]

We can.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

No, it's okay.

[Matt Koplik]

You have the floor.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

I'll abide by the rules.

[Matt Koplik]

No, you can have the floor. Come on. I do want to say, though, speaking of Amy and Doll's House, talk about eating your words and not leaving any crumbs. I went and saw that Doll's House with my grandmama, and just based off of, like, like, what I had seen about it, I am a. The opposite of an Evo Van Hoffe. Stan. I don't enjoy him.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Okay.

[Matt Koplik]

And everything I had seen about that Doll's House just looked to be like, that. I was like, oh, God, is it gonna be. I just thought of myself, like, is this gonna be deconstructed? And kind of whatever. And I Gotta tell you, I didn't.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Make that association at all, by the way. So it's very funny to just like, oh, yeah, that's insane. I understand. Where I came from. I understand.

[Matt Koplik]

But so I go in, it begins, and I gotta say, within the first five minutes, I went, oh, no, this is not that at all. And I'm having the best time.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

So all praise to Jamie Lloyd.

[Matt Koplik]

Amy's adaptation was wonderful.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Amy's adaptation was fantastic. Jamie knew what to do with it.

[Matt Koplik]

Yeah.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

And so. Yeah. So I'm excited for another Amy.

[Matt Koplik]

Her. They collaborated in a way that turned that play into almost a thriller completely, and I was so here for it. Continue with what else is exciting, Ruthie?

[Ruthie Fierberg]

I mean, Lempicka. I saw Lempicka at Williamstown, and I was excited. Just, it was my first time at Williamstown. I had seen Invisible Thread, now renamed or re. Renamed back to Witness Uganda. So I knew I liked Matt Gold's music. It is a fascinating story of, like, you know, the. The artists who make the art. Like, it's a little Sunday in the park in terms of story, not in terms of sound. And then Rachel Chavkin always makes something exciting as a director. So, like, I'm here for that. Mary Jane, we're going to get to see Rachel McAdams on Broadway.

[Matt Koplik]

Did you see Are youe There, God? It's Me, Margaret.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

I did not.

[Matt Koplik]

Okay. I would very much love it if you do.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Okay.

[Matt Koplik]

It's. It's a.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

First of all, homework.

[Matt Koplik]

It's a what? I mean, you've read the book, right?

[Ruthie Fierberg]

I actually never have.

[Matt Koplik]

Well, it's sitting above you if you ever decide you want to read it. Right above my copy of Harriet the Spy, because that.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

That feels right. That is what I know about those.

[Matt Koplik]

Like, those two books together. That sounds like Matt Koplik underneath the biography of Chita Rivera and Rita Hayworth. Because I am. What? Gay? But it's a lovely book. The movie is a wonderful adaptation. Rachel McAdams, as the mother, is giving my favorite cinematic performance this year. She's been nominated for a whole bunch of critics groups, but nothing big yet. And I keep shouting on Instagram to get that Oscar campaign.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

She's a real. She's a capital A actor.

[Matt Koplik]

Sure is.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Right. And so I'm excited to see what she's gonna do on a stage.

[Matt Koplik]

Me, too. I'm very excited.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Paula Vogel, Mother play.

[Matt Koplik]

You said Paula Vogel. I'm there.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Right?

[Matt Koplik]

And then you add Lang, and I'm like, okay, yeah, no, I'll have a firstborn just so you can take it.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

And then my son's a queer. I saw the like presentation of that. It is truly delightful. Rob is very compelling. But I also think it's. It's the opposite side of the coin of like so many stories that we've seen of like, here's what happens to a young queer child when you tell them that they're wrong being who they are. And we've seen that and I'm sure we'll see more that are different takes and important takes on that as well. I'm not saying stop making those because I think we still need to learn from them.

[Matt Koplik]

Yeah.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

But equally as important is a story we haven't really heard, which is here's what happens when you tell your queer child to be who they are and it is right to be who they are rather than it is wrong to be who they are. And so I think that that's exciting and delightful and it does like, you know, this artwork that's like pink and gold. It is a fairy explosion on that stage. I mean, it's all about like how he was in love with Disney characters. Sorry, Rob. It's all about how Rob in love with story characters and made their father participate in that love. And it is so heartwarming.

[Matt Koplik]

I'm excited for that. Yeah, that sounds lovely.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Prayer suffs. Oh, we did not talk about the jukebox musical du jour. The heart of rock and roll, Huey Lewis and the news. I honestly have no idea what to expect or think of this. It will be a surprise no matter what.

[Matt Koplik]

Someone else leaked to me who the female lead is in that. I'll tell you off mic because it is not reported publicly yet.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Okay.

[Matt Koplik]

If the lead role is true, if the female lead is true, it'll the very least be a very charming cast.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Okay.

[Matt Koplik]

Yeah. But there's still so many unknowns of the season left and there's still kind of room for one or two more shows to come in and fuck things up, which I always, I love like a last minute.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Which he means as make things better.

[Matt Koplik]

I just, I love when something comes in and just like excites us all because it's. It's so last minute.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

It just like disrupts expectations.

[Matt Koplik]

Yeah. Because that's happened. I mean, we had that like super last minute transfer of sign in Sydney Brustein's window which got Miriam Silverman her Tony. And I think. I think shit like that is so fucking exciting.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Yeah.

[Matt Koplik]

Yeah.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

I'll continue going down the list.

[Matt Koplik]

Please do.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

So then we have the Notebook. And other than Ingrid Michaelson's music. And you know, that's exciting that we're having her debut as a composer, lyricist for Broadway and Becca Brunstetter as the book writer for that. I've seen plays by Becca, but this will be exciting. I've never, never seen a musical by Becca before. People out there who are. This is us fans. Becca worked on that writing team, headed up the writing team. Worked on the writing team one or the other. But let me tell you why I'm excited about the Notebook. Because I think it's actually going to be something very different. Because they have three people instead of two people playing each character. That to me already says, like, okay, you're doing something different. And then I've also heard that they switched the time period. So that changes things and says to me, again, you're looking at this as a completely fresh theatrical piece, which is what I think improves the odds. The greatest when you're doing an adaptation.

[Matt Koplik]

Yeah.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

And then I'll also say that Ryan Vasquez, hello, there. Is so much talent, and I want to just, like, bathe in his voice. And I just saw Joy woods in I can get it for you Wholesale. So Ryan and Joy are playing middle Ally and middle Noah. And between that talent alone.

[Matt Koplik]

So I'm so glad. I'm so glad you said that. I also saw Joy in Wholesale. And that. That woman, magnetic, magnetic. Amazing voice, an amazing presence.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Just like truly like Fosse dancer esque in that. She rolled her shoulder and I. And I just wanted to know, like, was her shoulder glowing? Is that why I looked at it from the inside out.

[Matt Koplik]

And on top of all that, I have one more person to fucking say I said it last time. I'm gonna say it again. Marianne goddamn Plunkett.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Yes.

[Matt Koplik]

Tony winning actress for the musical Me and My Girl. She's the one who replaced Bernadette Peters in Sunday in the park with George on Broadway. She beat out Patti LuPone for that job when she was a nobody. By the way, she was the second replacement and Agonist of God.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

And she's kicking it in the Apple plays ever since. Rocking me off Broadway and playing Jody.

[Matt Koplik]

Jody Sawyer's mom in center stage. That woman is incredible. She's coming back to us in a musical in a Broadway musical for the first time in, like 35 years. And I am here for it.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

So here for it.

[Matt Koplik]

So here for it.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Yeah.

[Matt Koplik]

Let's do it, mama.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Let's do it.

[Matt Koplik]

Let's continue.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Okay, so speaking of the other Ryan Vasquez, Choices. This is the Outsiders. You know, he did not choose, but other people chose. But I am like, I'm intrigued because I've known about the adaptation for so long. I'm intrigued because if Brody Grant's voice did not melt my heart in the encores production of Parade, nothing did. I mean, so to hear him sing again is gonna be so great. But I'm here for, like, a band of brothers type musical, and I'm also a choreography girl, so. Rick and Jeff Cooperman, I really love their choreography. Some people might have seen it in Alice by Heart off Broadway. I'm excited to see their movement. And I also think Justin Levine is a dang genius.

[Matt Koplik]

Justin.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Justin Levine and Adam wrapped the Sound Inside was such a fantastic play.

[Matt Koplik]

So, like, the Sound Inside and slapped. Levine did the arrangements for Mulan Rose Crush. Yeah, yeah. He. He did a mass. I. I have my thoughts on that show. But he did a masterful job.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

But, like, more so than Right. So I just want to clarify for the listeners that, like, it was not just the arrangements of, like, here are the songs. Now make vocal and orchestral arrangements. It was like, what song fits where and what two verses of this song will proceed. This verse of this song will proceed. The bridge of this song. And made it all masterful puzzle piecing and storytelling. And so. So to hear what he's going to do with something original, I'm really. And something that he wrote alongside, like I said, this collective. I'm excited to hear that.

[Matt Koplik]

Same. Same. And listen, you know, I'm all for shows that are a group of boys just dancing. It's something that I enjoyed about harmony. I was. I called harmony, like, newsy. Like when the Newsies fans grow up and they decide that they want someone. A boy they can take home to mother.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Sure.

[Matt Koplik]

Now they have harmony because those are. Those are newsies in tuxes. But then you have the outsiders, which are just you 50s newsies.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Yeah. I was gonna say, like, still dirty and running around the streets.

[Matt Koplik]

Yeah. But they're fighting for social justice too, so, you know. Yeah, I appreciate. I appreciate. I'm very. I'm very intrigued by the Outsiders. I don't know what to expect yet.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Angelina Jolie was sold on it enough that she is lead producing.

[Matt Koplik]

I know. But here's the thing about Hollywood actors. They don't really know how to produce a Broadway show.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

No. But the fact that she. Well, well, well, we're gonna find out. But the thing is, she's not lead producing alone. She's lead producing with partners. So she's gonna be able to learn. But it was her saying, I want to be in the ring, and I want to have. And not just in the ring as a co producer, where I'm gonna put my money. Like, I'm gonna learn as well on.

[Matt Koplik]

This show, and I'm gonna put my clout behind this show. I'm gonna get people to pay attention.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Exactly.

[Matt Koplik]

Which I. Again, I appreciate. I listen. I love Angelina, and she's someone who, if she doesn't know how to do it, she's gonna learn how to do it. Because Angelina Jolie doesn't like to flop. Angelina Jolie likes to top, not flop. And that's that on that. That's all she wrote.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Then you have the who's Tomi, Which I did Tommy in college, and I'm not into disturbing plot lines as such.

[Matt Koplik]

After we just talked about dear Evan Hansen for so long, the most disturbing.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Of shows, not compared to Tommy. I mean, truly, I think this is next. Well, okay, here's what I'll say.

[Matt Koplik]

Sure.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Particularly sexual trauma.

[Matt Koplik]

Sure.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Right. That's really hard for. I think hard for a lot of people. I think it should be.

[Matt Koplik]

It's a hard subject matter, for sure.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Hard for me to watch things about that. That being said, I hear the production coming out of Chicago is phenomenal. I hear the lead is fantastic. I hear it's totally fresh and new, which is exactly what you want to hear when you hear the word revival, Even though it's the revival of a rock and roll musical that kind of, like, broke things the first time around.

[Matt Koplik]

Yeah.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

So, yeah, I'm like.

[Matt Koplik]

I mean, I'm intrigued because the Original staging from 1992 is. Or 93 for 93 is a staging that has lived in infamy.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Yeah.

[Matt Koplik]

I speak to a lot of directors who talk about, like, the productions that changed, you know, their thinking on how to stage stuff. The ones that are, like, definitive and, you know, everyone has theirs. You know, it's hell. Prince, Evita, Michael Bennet, A Chorus Line, Tommy Toon, Grand Hotel, Des Mackinaff. Tommy and Dess started a whole new way to incorporate multimedia with the original Tommy. And so I'm fascinated to see how he comes back to it with his production, because sometimes with directors, when they do a revival of show they've done before, it doesn't always work, in my opinion. Cough, cough. James Lapine. Cough, cough. And I. I'm very interested to see what happens with Dess, because I think when Dess is good, he's so good. And then there are times when I Haven't been as into him. But with Tommy, I don't know. I'm not wearing.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Not being only the director, that he's the co writer on it as well.

[Matt Koplik]

Exactly.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

It changes his perspective on it.

[Matt Koplik]

I think that there's. There's a lot more in the camp of me excited for Tommy than there is about me being wary about it. It is what I'm trying to say. Like, I'm. All the things about it that should make me wary, I'm not wary of.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Sure.

[Matt Koplik]

I think that it'll be a very exciting production. It's. I'm. I. I'm looking forward to having another revival that's not Merrily or Cabaret to come in and, like, excite us all. Be another option for the revival front.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Sure. Although I will say, I think Merrily is like.

[Matt Koplik]

Well, now that Merrily has announced that they're extending through July, it's. At the very least, it is Jonathan Groff and Merrily saying, like, so we're officially the front runners of our categories, and y' all can catch up if you'd like.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

All right. We got three shows to finish up the announced season thus far. Okay. So the Wiz. I mean, Joy Machine. Like, I also say that, like, while I think there's going to. There's going to be a lot of quality this spring, the tone is not a lot of, like, happy, peppy. And the Wiz, I think, is going to give us the substance with that, like, obviously Technicolor, bright, vibrant vibe about it. I'm hearing amazing things about Nichelle Lewis, who's playing Dorothy. I saw Deborah Cox sing at a gala and was just jaw on the floor. Yeah, I stoked about Jaquel Knight's choreography. Let's see some Wiz.

[Matt Koplik]

I am very excited to see it. I'm, again, I'm trying very hard to go in without preconceived notions. I saw a couple of stills, and I was a little disappointed that they were going aesthetically for Oz similar to the movie of, like, it's New York City, but done Oz style. Because what I always loved about the stage show of the Wiz is that it is the wizard of Oz and it didn't have that New York City aesthetic. That's something that the movie did. And because, as we've discussed, movies live on longer and are much more mainstream, that has now sort of weirdly become the imprint on the show of, like, oh, it's like a quote unquote, urban wizard of Oz. Like, no, it's a joyful, earnest version of the wizard of Oz told with a very different perspective from these people, specific writers. But again, I have to let that go at the door when I go in, because if it works, it works. I will be thrilled. I just love that score. That score is fire. I'm so excited to hear it with a big band and amazing voices just, like, singing to my mouth, all of it. I love that whole score.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Vanya, obviously, we already talked about with.

[Matt Koplik]

The cast that got me pregnant just by reading the announcement. My lady of the Lake, Anika Noni Rose is gonna be back on the Broadway, and I could not be more pregnant. It's she. I adore her. I adore her. Add on to the fact that it's Karel making his debut. Alison fucking Pill.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

I love Alison Pill.

[Matt Koplik]

Jane. Howdy, Shell. Jane, Howdy, Shell. Alfred. Alfred Molina.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Alfred Molina. No, it's a rock star cast.

[Matt Koplik]

Chidi from fucking Good Place.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

My.

[Matt Koplik]

Like, my God, just in. In my veins. I'm very excited. And Heidi is such a. William Jackson.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Harper is his name, folks.

[Matt Koplik]

I know, but I just. I can't. Every time I think of him, I lose all of. Because I just think of his swole upper body in that.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

I saw him on stage for the first time. This was it. Over the summer. He was at Roundabout.

[Matt Koplik]

Yeah.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Really, really compelling.

[Matt Koplik]

Yeah.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

And then the w. Water for Elephants. And I'll say that aside from the things that we've already said, I saw that presentation where they showed, like, the first 20 minutes.

[Matt Koplik]

Same.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

I got so excited. I mean, I think Jessica Stone is such an exciting musical director of musicals. Not musical director. Rick Ellis is a great book writer, but the puppetry. I'm so excited. I get excited just for innovations in any segment of theater. And I'm a design nerd. So the fact that we're gonna get to see circus again, which we haven't gotten to see since PIP in 2012. Was that 13?

[Matt Koplik]

2013.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

And new types of puppetry which just open up different sides of your imagination. That's the thing that I'm excited about with this show and with the season in general, as I would say, is like, I. I want my theater to feel genuine, but I don't need it to feel literal. I much prefer imagination. And I think. I hope Water for Elephants is going to give us a lot of that.

[Matt Koplik]

There are a lot of shows for me this season that are a question mark and not a skeptical question mark. Not like a why, but more sort of a. I don't know. Exactly. And that's. In a way, that's very exciting for me. I love to make super bold early Tony predictions, just not because of what's actually the best, but because it's the closest thing I have to betting on sports saving with the Oscars, it's just fucking fun. And with the spring, there's just so much I don't know yet. I also was at that presentation for Water for Elephants, and even in those 20, 25 minutes in a black box where they didn't have much to go off of, there was so much imagery that was just stunning. I am interested to see what changes they made to the text. But of course, the first 20 minutes are not necessarily indicative of what the whole show is. There was a lot that I enjoyed, I think.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Here's three words for water for elephants.

[Matt Koplik]

Go for it. Paul Alexander Nolan. Ruthie.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Ding, ding, ding.

[Matt Koplik]

Ruthie. Ruthie, Ruthie, Ruthie. So, okay, I'm gonna say this and then you can have the floor because I just need to get out of the way because I won't be able to hear a goddamn word you say until I say what I say. Paul Alexander Nolan, for me, is one of the, if not the most exciting musical theater actors we have right now. I adore him. I think he's so special. He first of all sings like a dream. Seriously, he's an incredible actor and he has just been fantastic in pretty much everything I've seen him in. Not always in things that I've loved, but he has always been a bright, shining star. And the man keeps not getting nominated for Tony Awards. And I sit here, Ruthie, before you and God, and I say, what does the man need to do? He sang the bejesus out of Jesus Christ Superstar. He. He was the other great thing alongside Carma Cusack in Bright Star. He was the only good thing in Dr. Zhivago. He was smarmy and awful in the best kind of way in Parade and he hung dong in Slave Play and was lovely about it. What does my man need to do to get recognish from the Tonys?

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Well, here's what I'll say is that whether or not this is the performance to do it, I think that that resume and that there are some people who just like, would you rather have one Tony nomination or award and like, never a career again or the career that he's had? And I don't know that you have to choose between the two.

[Matt Koplik]

But some people.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

But if. But. But if you are choosing, like, gosh, I would hope we choose Paul's path. And I just think that what's also incredible in the roles you just listed is, like, the man played literal. Jesus.

[Matt Koplik]

Literal.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

And also can play the villain. As, you know, the character in Water for Elephants is much more leaning towards that dangerous, shady side. And so his flexibility in his acting, the vocals, everything about it. Accent work. The man's from Canada.

[Matt Koplik]

He sure is. And if the. Again, there was. We. The. That role wasn't shown very much in that presentation. Right. It was like. He was like the last number, I want to say.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Well, it was small, but it also wasn't him in that presentation.

[Matt Koplik]

No, I know. It was Sebastian.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Yeah.

[Matt Koplik]

But. But based off of the material, I do think he's gonna get a good amount of time to shine because he's.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Yeah, based off the material.

[Matt Koplik]

Yeah.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

And based. And saying that the material is the book, not the movie. Yeah, I would say. Yeah. The character is substantial because he gets.

[Matt Koplik]

He gets a lot of stage time. He's also a very seductive villain.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Yeah.

[Matt Koplik]

And that is something that. Hey, he can do it because he.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Can do it again. We're gonna have to see what this adaptation does with it.

[Matt Koplik]

Yeah. And just everything about this cast that they've assembled, I'm very excited by. Izzy Mikayla is a young actress in musical theater who has really impressed me in past works. I think she's so. She's a charming with a lovely voice, but she's also not afraid to get weird. I loved her in the Prom, and I didn't. And I've always championed her performance in the Prom. And you can. Guys can listen to me talk about that more in the Prom episode. But it wasn't until I saw other people play that role where I was like, oh, what she did was really special. She brought a lot to it.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Isn't that amazing how sometimes that can happen?

[Matt Koplik]

Absolutely. Yeah. And that I look forward to seeing what she does with this show. What. How large that role is, because if it's substantial enough, she could be a contender in that leading actress category as well. I mean, again, front runners, I couldn't fucking tell you.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

I mean, I can't even go near awards, to be honest.

[Matt Koplik]

I know. It's very different. Late. It's late.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

But I think there's just so much more to see. Again, with the idea of, like, not prejudging. I can't guess who's gonna be a frontrunner before they perform.

[Matt Koplik]

Let me also be very clear, guys. Guys. Ruthie's relation to the Tonys is very different to mine. Like, it's. For you, it's. Oh, God, okay, here comes the Red Bull. Whereas I'm like, oh, yeah, you get to watch on TV and just enjoy it from afar.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Ruthie's like, and I do enjoy it, too, but, yes, it is.

[Matt Koplik]

You're in the thick of it far more than I am.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Definitely in the thick of it. Yeah, you gotta stretch soon a place where I. I prefer for it to be that way. So I like where I am. I'm lucky to be where I am. And it is also hard work to be where I am. But, you know, it's that way for a lot of people. But again, like, I think that overall, what I'm seeing for the spring is a lot of choices. And that particularly if tourists, albeit domestic or international, come here for this robust season, what they're going to say is, oh, I came for one show and I saw two. Or I came for two shows and I saw three. And that it can hopefully, like, All Boats Rise, you know, that we can hopefully show that, like, Broadway has enough to offer all these different people. And the musicals and plays that we just went through are so variable. Right. Like, you cannot tell me that there is not a piece of theater for every single single person out there in that list of just, again, the new productions for the spring, not even mentioning, like, what opens fall and summer, that some of them are still there.

[Matt Koplik]

Yeah.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

And not what is ongoing. Right. Like, it's just not even taking into account any of those things. And then when you add in the Off Broadways and the Off Off Broadways of the world, it's just like anyone who thinks that theater is not for them. I challenge you to look at any one of these things and pick the thing that intrigues you, whether it's the plot, whether it's the star, whether it's the music, whether it's the movement, whether it's the design, whatever it is. Because they're truly. When we have. The reason I believe in more is more is because the more choices we have within the limited constraint. Right. We don't have infinite choices, but we have more choices, the more different types of. Of people we're going to be able to attract 1000%.

[Matt Koplik]

When people say they don't like theater or don't like musicals, to me, it's like saying you don't like food. I'm like, there's. There's so many different kinds of cuisines and recipes.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Well, I always say it's like going to see. Let's say you saw a musical you didn't like.

[Matt Koplik]

Yeah.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

And then you just go, well, I don't. I guess I just don't like musicals. No one would ever go to a movie, see a movie they didn't like, and be like, well, I guess I just don't like all of movies. Be like, no, I didn't like that movie, or that was a bad movie, or I don't like that director or whatever it is. But you'd go back and try. And I know that there's a price differential there that allows people to try some movies in a way that you can't try all Broadway shows. But to that I say, like, Broadway ends up on tour. These shows end up licensed in regional theaters. Like, there are places and ways to see theater that is suited to you and will be what you are looking for. And not every piece of theater is going to be that. Just the same way, not every movie is going to be that. And you just have to find your way.

[Matt Koplik]

Yeah. When people ask me for recommendations, I'm always asking, are you asking what I like? Are you asking what I recommend for you? Yes, because the two are very different. And it's not a judgment call. Just, you know, I work. I work in a space with a lot of, let's call them what they are. Straight men who, you know, are more on the sports side, but there are a lot of them have actually recently moved to New York and they want to try Broadway. And I'm like, well, tell me about, like, the movies you like, the TV shows you like, the books you read.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Yeah.

[Matt Koplik]

I always ask, I'm like, do you want something? Spectacle.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

I always say, as a woman who enjoys sports and theater, the two are not mutually exclusive.

[Matt Koplik]

No.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

In fact, the tension and the drama that are the reason you watch a lot of. Of sports are what theater is built around.

[Matt Koplik]

Sure.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Listen, so go see a show.

[Matt Koplik]

Go see a show, then go see a soccer game. I just. Because sports are not in my wheelhouse doesn't mean they can't be in others. Ruthie, this has been delightful. Thank you.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

It has. Thank you so much for having me.

[Matt Koplik]

Thank you for braving today with me.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

You're welcome.

[Matt Koplik]

You have done so much and continue to do so much, and I appreciate you. Where can people find you if you want them to find you?

[Ruthie Fierberg]

People can find me on Instagram. Uthiefiersberg. It's there to try and help people get it, to pronounce it correctly. RuthieFiersberg on Instagram, you can go to my website, RuthieFierberg.com F I E R B E R G and sign up for My monthly newsletters. And of course you can read me every single day on broadwaynews.com you can read all the articles there to your little heart's content. Subscribe to your Broadway Briefing. It's once daily newsletter that compiles all of the content being written about all theater across the globe. Some written by me, some written by many other talented writers. So if you want to be up on the news of the day, that's the only way to do it.

[Matt Koplik]

Perfect. I love that. If you want to follow me, I'm on Instagram only. Attcoplek. Usual spelling. If you like the podcast, you can give us a nice 5 star rating or a little review. As always, if you write a review, I will read it on the pod. And I did get a review recently and it's short but I will read it and I will put in post the Light in the Piazza Overture. So play the music. Five stars. Love, exclamation point. This week's shorter episode was great. They're referring to the King and I episode which was 90 minutes. Would love it if more episodes were around that length. End of review. Now I shared that. Listen, they want my episode short, so they wrote a short review.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

I posted that content matches form.

[Matt Koplik]

I posted that on Instagram to be like, oh, you know, whatever. And it was right before I released the Promises Promises episode, which is almost three hours. And I was like, sorry that this episode's gonna be. This next episode's gonna be longer. And the flood I got from listeners that were like, absolutely not. I don't want 90 minutes. I want two to four hours. Like give, give it to me long, daddy. Here we go. So I'm just saying, guys, if that's what you want, you gotta write in and put your reviews that say, screw shorter episodes. Give me episodes as long as Lawrence of Arabia, please. And I will do my danvers.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Also say if you like long episodes, episodes, the podcast of mine that you mentioned to begin with. Thank you so much. Why we theater is also some like, well, not long compared to yours, I guess. But they're like an hour and 15 hour and a half.

[Matt Koplik]

Those are long. Yeah. Well, also my episodes, they vary. I've had 90 minutes, I've had an hour, I've had three and a half hours. I try not to go that long. Just things happen as we talk.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

We said before, it's not about the run time, it's not about the timestamp, it's about how long it feels.

[Matt Koplik]

Exactly. Three hours feels like one hour. That's what we always aim for Ruthie. We close out every episode with a Broadway diva. I put her in post. But I would like for you to choose what Broadway diva is gonna sing us out today.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

Shoshana Bean.

[Matt Koplik]

And I'm gonna end it with a button of her throwing spaghetti on a plate like she does. Like she does in Hell's Kitchen. All right, that's it. Shoshana Bean is gonna close this. Thank you so much for listening, guys. Join us next week for. I'm pretty sure it's either Carousel or Heather's. It's one of the two for sure. Until then, have a great. I think this is coming out. It's coming out this week. So, yeah, have a great Christmas or Hanukkah, whichever you celebrate. Or if you don't celebrate either, just have a good week and I'll see you. And. Well, yeah, the next episode will be coming out right before New Year, but, yeah, have a happy.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

So don't have a good.

[Matt Koplik]

Well, Ruthie wishes you a happy New Year. I'll wish you a happy New Year next week. And that's it. Thank you so much. And take us away, Shoshana. Bye.

[Ruthie Fierberg]

I'll give you cars and a townhouse in Turtle Bay and a fur and a diamond ring and we'll get married in Spain on my yacht today at the honeymoon in Beijing and you'll meet stars at the parties I throw in my villas in New at Paris in June. And I thought, okay. And I took a breath and I got my yacht and the years went by.