Favorite Musical Moments of 2012

I know there's been a little too much radio silence from this blog as of late. Things have just been a little busy with the launch of a new podcast (check out our latest episode where we talk about Michael John LaChiusa and Sybille Pearson's Giant) and some other exciting things that I'm hoping to talk more about in 2013. Still, I am very proud of things that have happened on this blog over the past year, and I am looking forward to continuing to talk new musical theatre with all you guys in the new year.

As a way of looking back and celebrating some great theatre over the past year, I wanted to just highlight some of my favorite live theatre musical moments over the past year. While not all of these moments necessarily happened in musical theatre pieces, they have exemplified the magic of music and live performance, and they've definitely inspired me as a writer and artist.

Here we go:

The final scene in Leslye Headland's Assistance

Assistance was a straight play loosely based on Leslye's experience working as a personal assistant to Harvey Weinstein. If you've ever had a stressful, menial job, this play almost hit too close to home as employees set their hopes and dreams on a faceless boss who they are determined can either make or break their careers. But just when you might be reaching for the Xanax remembering your time getting yelled at for small mistakes or being used as a punching bag, the final scene of this play is a completely unexpected moment of retribution when we enter a fantasy dance sequence that, quite literally, brings the entire house down. It's a stunning theatrical feat-- getting to experience a moment of true catharsis brilliantly carried out through genius set design, music, and a wonderfully executed dance routine.

The Opening number from Natasha, Pierre, and The Great Comet of 1812

Everything about this show was pretty awesome, but the minute the lights went up, the audience was presented with dumplings, and the cast launched into a rousing recap of the story's many characters, we knew we were in for a treat. Creating a spirited environment from the get go, my friend and I were reaching for the vodka and settling in to an exciting night of Dave Malloy's Russian electro pop opera (and who can begrudge that?).

Molly Pope singing a mashup of "We Found Love" and "How to Love" at the final Our Hit Parade

For anyone who didn't have the pure and strange joy of experiencing Our Hit Parade at Joe's Pub, this monthly cabaret mainstay was a fantastic series where a rotating variety of performers from the music and theatre scene each took a top 10 pop song and reinterpreted it. Their final show played Joe's Pub earlier this week, and it was probably one of the most electric events I have ever been to in New York. We talk a lot about artistic homes, but never was it so potent to be in a room of talented artists and to feel the love from the audience, the hosts, and the venue as everyone was just themselves. While there were a lot of laughs, one moment that utterly destroyed me was hearing Molly Pope, an Our Hit Parade mainstay, sing her interpretation of "We Found Love" and "How to Love." The love of performing coupled with a heavy heart that Our Hit Parade was ending made her performance all the more profound-- and I sat with tears streaming down my face, just as she had on hers. What a gift to be able to experience something so intimate and special.

"Just Like the Sea" in PigPen's The Old Man and The Old Moon

Another moment that managed to get some tears out of Grinch-y old me, PigPen Theatre Co.'s latest fable about an old man who traverses the world to find his wife featured a particularly striking moment that demonstrated a man's loss with only a few lights and some well-crafted shadow puppets, creating a montage of memories that was completely cinematic and emotionally affecting. Above is a video of another song from the show, "Bremen," and you can catch the moment live still, since The Old Man and The Old Moon is playing at The Gym at Judson until Jan 6!

Emerging Musical Theatre, the theme song

I couldn't be more thrilled (or slightly embarrassed) to have two wonderful writers sing a song about this little blog. Big thanks to Jeff Luppino-Esposito, Matt Savarese, and Anna McGrady again!

The Hamilton Mixtape at Lincoln Center

Can we all just agree that Lin Manuel Miranda is a genius? Because his American Songbook concert, which primarily featured music from his project The Hamilton Mixtape about the life of Alexander Hamilton, is nothing short of brilliant. With rap battles mixed in with R&B hooks, this project is destined to be a great modern representation of history that makes history.

Giant at The Public Theater

I can't really single out any particular moments from Giant, and I have a good feeling this show is going to go on to a longer life, so I can't say that this production was necessarily definitive. Still, this epic musical that tells a sweeping story as vast as the landscape that it covers is a real winner. With a beautiful score by Michael John LaChiusa and smart book by Sybille Pearson, this restored my faith in the range of musical theatre being made-- and the wonderful people who support it, as well.

Emerging Musical Theatre: The Theme Song

Were you aware that this blog has a theme song? Well, it does now!

A while ago, I donated to The Online Musical's Kickstarter campaign for their Mini Musicals, and a perk of making my donation was a custom song written and performed by none other than Jeff Luppino-Esposito and Matt Savarese. I asked them to write a little theme song for this blog, and here's what they came up with:

Big thanks to Jeff, Matt, and Anna McGrady! Now go check out some of their other works here!

Pokemon: The Musical

This new mini musical from The Online Musical team, Jeff Luppino-Esposito and Matt Savarese, totally made my day. Also, almost literally did a spit-take watching Matt Savarese play a small but crucial Poke-role.

The Online Musical: An Interview with Jeff Luppino-Esposito and Matt Savarese

Though there are other musical web series out there, Musical: The Online Musical goes a step beyond the just a serial comedy/drama with a couple of big production numbers. The first kind of interactive online musical experience, Musical: The Online Musical used Youtube comment suggestions to shape the story and influence the development of each weekly installment, which was written and shot on a week-to-week basis. The series, which has concluded after ten episodes, tells the meta tale of a protagonist who realizes that his life is a musical. Revealing this reality to the characters surrounding him, chaos ensues when a main character dies, threatening the musical world they all inhabit. It's satiric and campy while still hilariously endearing with very real stakes for protagonist Henry (no matter how absurd).

Especially because technology and musical theatre seems to be a recurring theme on this blog, I am very excited to share this interview I had with Musical: The Online Musical writers and University of Virginia students Jeff Luppino-Esposito and Matt Savarese. In this Q&A, Jeff and Matt talk about writing the online musical, their upcoming mini musicals, and how that translates back to the stage.

Episode 1 of Musical: The Online Musical

Me: How did you two start writing together? How would you describe your process of collaborating?

Matt Savarese: In the Spring of 2010, I approached Jeff to join me in working on a one-act musical entitled Sorting Through. Unlike our recent comedic works, it was a dramatic piece about a young man reliving his past as he sifts through a box of memories left to him by his mother who recently passed away. After we mounted that at the University of Virginia, we knew we wanted to attempt a full length musical, and our collective interest in the Internet led us to start working on Musical: The Online Musical. For Sorting Through we did a lot more at-the-piano collaborative work, but with the crazy week-by-week grind of Musical: The Online Musical, we found the most success with the two of us first outlining the episode, Jeff pounding out the lyrics, and then me plugging away on my midi keyboard. By the end of the semester, after writing at least a song a week together, and not killing each other, we were excited to discover that we were often thinking on the exact same page, even when we weren't in the same room simultaneously.

Me: Also, I saw you are both UVA students. What's the theater community like there? And what kinds of opportunities are there for producing new musical theatre work?

Jeff Luppino-Esposito: A lot of the great theater happening at UVA is driven by student-run organizations; the two of us actually met in a group called 'First Year Players'. The organization is particularly unique in that it not only aims to put up a high quality musical every semester, but that it does so with an entirely Freshman cast. Within that group, we both got a chance to act and direct, which really opened up a ton of opportunities in the University theater community for us. Beyond FYP, the UVA Drama Department always mounts quality productions and there are a ton of other student organizations putting on everything from Opera to Shakespeare. In terms of 'new' musical theatre, we've self-produced our works so far as there is not a pre-established outlet, but we've been fortunate to have our projects received with open arms. We got a ton of support from not only the Drama Department, but any and all other disciplines at the University who could help us out. Between grant money, free use of facilities, and borrowed equipment, the community has really come together to support our projects.