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[0:01] Jesse McAnally: In terms of immortality, what would be the age you would like to be stuck at?

[0:05] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: Alright, you go. You go first.

[0:07] Jesse McAnally: I would say somewhere in my 30s.

[0:11] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: Really?

[0:12] Jesse McAnally: Yeah. I didn't like my 20s. Teenage years were fine, but I didn't know anything. And then 30s was where I stopped caring about the things that I wasn't supposed to care about and started caring about the things I did. So, some place in there I think would be great.

[0:28] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: I'm still sticking with 18. I think 17 is too young. So, maybe exactly between 18 and 20. Somewhere in between there. But then again, I haven't lived much life. I'm only 24 right now, so we'll see how I feel about my 30s when I get there.

[0:46] Jesse McAnally: I'm just saying, I think you have a lot to look forward to.

[0:49] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: Oh, great. I thought it was all downhill from here, so that's great to hear.

[0:54] Jesse McAnally: I feel like that's what I always heard from people who were even nearing 40. What I would give to be in my 20s again. And I'm like, oh my gosh, I never want to go back there.

[1:06] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: Well, I probably won't either, considering I'm in a quarantine throughout a good chunk of a year of it. Let's go back to 2020 when we were all stuck in our closets recording podcasts. That was a great time.

[1:24] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: Welcome, everybody, to A Musical Theatre Podcast where we discuss the cultural and emotional impact of some of our favorite musicals in theatre history. My name is Jeffrey Scott Parsons. You can call me Jeff. Today we're talking Tuck Everlasting because our listener Rachel requested it.

[1:46] Jesse McAnally: Hey, Rachel.

[1:47] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: Hey, Rachel. We love you. Thank you for requesting this show that we might not be talking about without you. So, listeners, you are important. Joining me in my first long-distance episode.

[2:00] Jesse McAnally: What?

[2:01] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: Corona episode two. Is Mr. Jesse McAnally. Oh, shoot. See, I messed up. Is Jesse McAnally. I don't know why. It's spelled McAnally. It's really bad.

[2:14] Jesse McAnally: I know it. Everyone knows it's the first thought anyone gets. Substitute teachers did it for years. It's fine. I get it. It's weird looking. Just live up to it. Own it.

[2:26] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: It's McAnally. Looks like McAnally. McAnally. It's Jesse McAnally, everybody. From the podcast Musicals with Cheese. I'm so grateful you're on.

[2:38] Jesse McAnally: I'm sorry. I really don't know anything about you.

[2:45] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: And that's fine. Did you go to college? And if so, did you study musical theater like a crazy person like me?

[2:51] Jesse McAnally: No, I studied film. I was lame. I was the lamest person.

[2:55] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: Whatever. There's money in film.

[2:59] Jesse McAnally: And that is what is paying my bills currently. So I guess I lucked out there. But I made musical theater content into films. So I wrote musical numbers and filmed it and all that. And that was a lot of my thesis work.

[3:14] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: Yeah. Oh, my gosh. That's cool. Now, I wanted to ask you a question, because when we were talking about what show to discuss and Tuck Everlasting came up, you wrote this quote. I've been dying to talk about Tuck, but I don't think it would suit my show well. Please explain yourself.

[3:37] Jesse McAnally: Why have you been dying to talk about it and why wouldn't it suit your show?

[3:41] Jesse McAnally: My show is mostly about getting my co-host's reaction to musical theater. And this is like the most musical theater, like almost kind of cookie cutter musical theater thing. And the things I want to talk about are very specific things that he would laugh at me for.

[3:56] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: At this point, because you guys have been going for a long time. At this point, is he still anti-musical theater? Because I feel like he has to have been won over. Otherwise, he'd go screaming, running from the building.

[4:08] Jesse McAnally: The thing is, I consider anyone that doesn't listen to it for pleasure anti-musical theater. If there's a long road trip and you're not okay with a double disc cast album to keep you company, you're anti-musical theater.

[4:23] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: Exactly. So he was never really even anti. He just hadn't listened to any of it.

[4:30] Jesse McAnally: And I was like, well, we got to change that, don't we?

[4:33] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: Well, I would say that there are plenty of people within the musical theater world that might have a lot in common with him. I find a lot, especially in the tumblerization of musical theater, where it's like, if Wicked is your favorite musical, don't even talk to me. And it becomes a very high and mighty, like, if you like this, then we can't be friends.

[4:52] Jesse McAnally: And there's a reason why Les Miserables is more high art than Be More Chill. And that is more high art than Hamilton and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And having to find these obscure musicals that you like better just because they aren't the mainstream thing. And I feel that is more common in musical theater than anything else, which is why with my show, I'm really big on like, hey, anyone can get into this and anyone can enjoy the good things and the bad things. And altogether, there's no snobbery.

[5:22] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: Speaking of elitism in art forms, I got to say that I've been to a few parties out here in Los Angeles where I'll get talking about film with somebody and it will kind of go along the same lines that we're talking about with theater, which is, oh, you like Alfred Hitchcock? What's your favorite Hitchcock film? And don't say Psycho. And it's like, why not? Why can't I say Psycho?

[5:46] Jesse McAnally: It is there, too. But the thing is, with film, it's a lot easier to get a bunch of films than it is to see a bunch of musicals.

[5:53] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: Yes. That's a really great point.

[5:56] Jesse McAnally: Which is that line between it's like, yeah, Wicked can be your favorite musical because that's the only musical that's coming to Oklahoma or wherever you are. And that was an emotional experience. Not everyone's going to see the Falsettos tour. Some musicals I love, I never even got to experience in full, like Parade is one of my favorite musicals of all time. I have never seen a live production of Parade outside of clips, bootlegs and all that other nonsense.

[6:20] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: Really?

[6:21] Jesse McAnally: Yeah, I know. Really sad, right?

[6:24] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: My gosh. I saw it with T.R. Knight out here at the Mark Taper Forum, which was that...

[6:30] Jesse McAnally: The Donmar Playhouse.

[6:32] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: Yeah, the Donmar. Exactly. Yeah. And man, is that thing depressing.

[6:38] Jesse McAnally: It's great. It's wonderful.

[6:40] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: It is a wonderful musical. There are musicals with really heavy subject matter that don't make you feel terrible walking out, but Parade is not one of them.

[6:48] Jesse McAnally: No, it is not. And I stand by the fact that it's probably Jason Robert Brown's one good musical.

[6:54] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: Oof.

[6:56] Jesse McAnally: Yeah, that's a take, guys.

[6:58] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: I realized that maybe I should give you a quick tour of my closet because that's where I'm recording currently. Behind me are my ties. I have a lot of ties right here.

[7:07] Jesse McAnally: That is a lot of ties. Oh, my God.

[7:09] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: As an LDS missionary, you're only allowed to really show personality through the ties you wear, and so I collected quite a few.

[7:15] Jesse McAnally: Oh, my gosh. You're a Latter-day Saint?

[7:18] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: Yeah.

[7:19] Jesse McAnally: Oh, my gosh. Have I swore yet? I swear so badly.

[7:22] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: No, you're fine. You're fine.

[7:25] Jesse McAnally: I've already told my mom that if the episode has a little E next to it, you don't have to listen to that.

[7:33] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: So, welcome to my closet. Today, though, we're talking about Tuck Everlasting, which is first and foremost a children's novel written in 1975 by Natalie Babbitt. It's considered one of the best books for children. It's on all of those lists.

[7:48] Jesse McAnally: I would describe it as like Anne of Green Gables meets Bridge to Terabithia. You're in this romanticized time of Americana history in the North, but then there's a magic element to it. Did you ever read this book growing up?

[8:05] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: I did very, very young. I barely remember it, aside from the ending.

[8:09] Jesse McAnally: Did you really?

[8:10] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: Yeah.

[8:11] Jesse McAnally: Yeah, I definitely did not. Did you have favorite books growing up, though, specifically children's novels, I should say?

[8:17] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: See, I didn't get into reading as much. I didn't read for pleasure until I got much older, and mostly I read nonfiction nowadays. So, I didn't have a big children's...

[8:26] Jesse McAnally: You're a film guy.

[8:27] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: Yeah. I'm lame, is what I'm saying.

[8:29] Jesse McAnally: No, that's not lame at all.

[8:31] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: I was always really into the Newbery Medal honors. I don't know, I was always obsessed with awards. Tony Awards, Academy Awards.

[8:39] Jesse McAnally: As soon as you saw that medal on there.

[8:41] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: Yes, I'm like, oh, you guys, I gotta. But I never got into Tuck Everlasting. I actually had never heard of it until the musical, to be honest.

[8:50] Jesse McAnally: You didn't watch the Gilmore Girls spinoff movie?

[8:53] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: See, this is where the mission comes back in as well, because they did a film version in 2002 with Alexis Bledel. Actually, everyone's in that movie. Sissy Spacek, Victor Garber, everybody. It's a crazy cast. And I did not see it because I was on my mission in 2002.

[9:09] Jesse McAnally: So, there are like these two years of history in the world that I still am playing catch up on.

[9:16] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: I don't... I mean, that's a big time to be missing parts of the world. In 2001, the world basically ended. In 2002, it would be me MIA for a bit.

[9:26] Jesse McAnally: Exactly. I was on my mission during 9-11, and we were knocking doors, introducing ourselves to people. And we saw everybody in their homes just watching TV, watching the news. But nobody was answering the door. And we're like, this is weird. What's going on? And then finally we talked to somebody on the street. But yeah, we still didn't read any newspapers or watch the news. And so a lot of people have very visceral, emotional memories when it comes to 9-11. And I'm... I really don't. I just was kind of on the outside looking in.

[10:02] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: I mean, I was very young when 9-11 happened. I was in kindergarten when it happened. So, I just remember the teachers wanting to turn the TV on and the principal being like, don't you turn that on in front of the kids.

[10:14] Jesse McAnally: Oh, wow. Interesting.

[10:16] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: That is my memory of 9-11. Teacher and the principal were fighting in front of you, and you're like, something must have gone down.

[10:21] Jesse McAnally: Yeah, stuff like, it felt weird. We weren't learning anything. Like, it felt weird.

[10:27] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: Yeah, but I guess the movie happened. It wasn't a flop. It recouped its money, its budget back.

[10:35] Jesse McAnally: Okay, so then fast forward to 2015. The musical gets put together and premieres in Atlanta. And the music is by Chris Miller, lyrics by Nathan Tyson, both of whom had worked on a musical called The Burnt Part Boys, which is kind of a small chamber musical about two boys and this mining accident in a small town.

[10:57] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: From what I understand, it was pretty well received, and also carries with it this folk element to the music that I think everyone thought would be good for this story.

[11:08] Jesse McAnally: The book is by Claudia Shear, and also co-written by Tim Federle. Now, Claudia Shear wrote Dirty Blonde, right?

[11:18] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: Have you seen or heard of that show?

[11:20] Jesse McAnally: I've heard of it. I have not seen it.

[11:22] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: It's a cool play. It's a cool small play about a woman who becomes a big fan of Mae West. And then that actress plays both the fan and Mae West at different points throughout the show. It's really interesting and funny and kind of provocative because it's Mae West, of course.

[11:41] Jesse McAnally: So from that point, we have music and lyrics by these two guys who have written a very serious musical. We have the book written by a woman who wrote a very complex play that was Tony nominated. But that is not what Tuck Everlasting turns into.

[11:57] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: While it has serious themes, it's very much like a children's novel come to life on stage. It feels very much of the kin of the Rodgers and Hammerstein musical without that crazy dark turn in the second act. It's like if the movie had ended with the Captain and Maria getting married. That's the kind of musical I describe this as.

[12:17] Jesse McAnally: That's interesting. I like that. It also makes me wonder if when Tim Federle was brought on, he helped sculpt it a little bit more toward a family friendly experience. Because his canon of work looks very different from everyone else's.

[12:34] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: After he writes Tuck Everlasting, his career kind of explodes. And he writes the Ferdinand, which is that animated film about the bull. He's currently working on another animated film with Pasek and Paul of Dear Evan Hansen fame and Greater Showman. And he's currently showrunner for the High School Musical series on Disney+. So I almost feel like this is his project. And I don't know if that's true or not, but it's just kind of what I'm feeling.

[13:06] Jesse McAnally: If it didn't start as his project, it became his project. Once upon a time, wasn't Barrett Wilbert Weed supposed to play Winnie?

[13:15] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: Oh, really? I didn't hear that.

[13:18] Jesse McAnally: There's some really old videos of her singing Everlasting from years before this was put on Broadway. I was like, that was a whole different feel they were going for with that, wasn't it?

[13:27] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: That's a completely different show. Wow. Interesting. Once it all becomes this cohesive piece that we know it now, it's directed and choreographed by the busiest person on Broadway, Casey Nicholaw. And it opens in Atlanta to, I guess, pretty decent reviews.

[13:44] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: And transfers to Broadway in 2016, and closes after 39 performances. So definitely consider it a flop. Now on this podcast, as I've said, the F word is not a bad word. And by F word, I mean flop. Because I do think that we learn a lot, not only about the creative process by looking at flop musicals, but also about the societies in which they didn't succeed. I mean, I guess I'll open this up to you. Why do you think it didn't succeed? Hamilton. Like, that was Hamilton fever. And on top of that, you also have Waitress, which is a much more, well, it's a traditional musical, it is kind of experimental, and you have a really big name attached to it with Sara Bareilles and all that. And while I don't think this has anything to do with the quality of Tuck Everlasting, because I think it's great.

I think it's fabulous. I think that Waitress and Hamilton just sucked all the air out of it. And then this is just fluttering in the breeze with no one in the seats. Yeah. Let's just look at the Tony Award nominees for Best Musical that year. You had Hamilton, which of course won. You have Bright Star, which is another folk musical, but written by Edie Brickell and Steve Martin. Big name. Yeah, exactly. Big name. You have School of Rock, which is both a movie and has Andrew Lloyd Webber attached. You have Shuffle Along, George C. Wolfe directed, Audra McDonald starring in. And then you have Waitress with Sara Bareilles. That's a pretty starry list of Best Musical nominees. It's pretty impressive.

And I would say that where maybe Tuck Everlasting misses the boat a little bit is that Waitress was smart enough to be small. And Bright Star was smart enough to be big, but justified in its ensemble and movement. And then Tuck Everlasting kind of falls in the middle of that. It's neither small enough to be an intimate theater experience, but it's also not big enough to be as splashy as I think they were advertising it to be. It's still at the heart, this quiet story about a girl facing an existential crisis.

[16:04] Jesse McAnally: I mean, you're not wrong. And I don't think the name recognition, I know that's a really dumb movie branding type thing to say, but it is important. Even something that's based on a children's book like Matilda has that kind of brand recognition and all that.

[16:15] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: Absolutely. I mean, I'm not going to lie. I think Tuck Everlasting is a horrible title.

[16:21] Jesse McAnally: I agree. It sells you nothing about this. And it makes me think of Puck, like Midsummer Night's Dream. And so then for the longest time, I thought, oh, the main boy, his name is Tuck.

[16:34] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: And you're like, no, that's not it. It's their last name.

[16:37] Jesse McAnally: But Everlasting is a great name for a song.

[16:42] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: Amen. And it's a great song. What if they had just called it Everlasting? We just solved all of their problems.

[16:51] Jesse McAnally: I would see a musical called Everlasting as a good musical title. Everlasting exclamation point? Just throwing it out there.

[16:57] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: Question mark? Everlasting exclamation point colon a new musical. Yes, perfect. Solved all your problems. Ridiculous. Where did it play? Do you remember what theater it was in or anything?

[17:14] Jesse McAnally: Well, let's take a look at the Broadhurst Theater.

[17:18] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: Oh, OK. It's not a terrible place for it.

[17:24] Jesse McAnally: No, no. It closed before the Tonys even. Yeah, this was a big old mess. It only got one Tony nomination, which was for costuming. Shout out to Greg Barnes. But it was just a really crowded season because even if it didn't get the best musical nods, you still got all of the competition from the revivals, which was also incredibly starry, like She Loves Me and Color Purple.

[17:45] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: Color Purple. Exactly. When there's not enough room for Carolee Carmelo in the supporting actress category, you know it's a busy year. And then you also have just the stuff that's always on Broadway, like Lion King, Phantom, all that stuff. That's just going to take away like the tourist's mindset.

[18:05] Jesse McAnally: Exactly. What do you think about this idea that sometimes musicals go to Broadway not to be successes, but to at least get a big enough profile that they are then performed in community theaters or high schools?

[18:21] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: I think that's true. Things like Big Fish feel right for that. And Beetlejuice, before that became what it was, I felt was going to be very akin to that. Sometimes with shows like this, you're like, well, at least it'll be out there. We'll get a cast album. And maybe through the royalties, we'll make some money off of it in the long run. Let's be honest, theater is kind of a long game anyway. What's a couple more years to wait to see if it starts getting produced locally? As an author, I think I might tend to look at things like that.

[18:58] Jesse McAnally: Let's talk as an author now. Let's actually talk about content. Great. This is a very strange musical to me. So it starts out with a prologue in which we meet all of the characters, right? And the through line through which they all are connected through this song is that they feel stagnant in their lives. And they're constantly asking, is this what is going to be forever? Their present is, I don't know, so blah that it feels like forever. And for some people, it's more literal than others.

[19:36] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: Right? Fair enough. So after this prologue, then we start meeting the characters by name. First and foremost is Miss Winnie Foster, who's 11 years old. She's a good girl. She's 11, but she wants to raise something other than a little bit of heaven. And it bothers her because her father died recently. And so her mother's got her on a real tight leash like you can't go anywhere.

[19:56] Jesse McAnally: Exactly. They're all wearing black because you have to wear black for a year like mother in Ragtime. And she just wants to go to the fair, which is this big event that's come to their small town.

[20:09] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: Where do you think we're at? Are we like Connecticut?

[20:12] Jesse McAnally: New Hampshire.

[20:14] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: Thank you. So we're in New Hampshire in the turn of the century, maybe a little bit earlier. Now, this opening song sounds a lot to me like the opening of Frozen.

[20:26] Jesse McAnally: I was going to say the same thing. Anytime it comes up in my shuffle, I'm like, oh, I didn't remember putting Frozen on. Oh, it's Tuck Everlasting.

[20:37] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: What is that? Is it just like this Celtic influence? Because it seems like a very Irish, white Irish community.

[20:42] Jesse McAnally: It sounds like come from a ways like I like Canadian.

[20:50] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: Oh, yeah. Oh, totally. Trying to go into some, like I said, Anne of Green Gables territory, Nova Scotia.

[20:59] Jesse McAnally: So we got Winnie. We got her mom who is in mourning. We got grandma who's feisty. All three of these women, though, are pretty well-drawn characters.

[21:10] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: I think we can give that to Claudia Shear and 100 percent. Winnie has also found a toad and this toad has become her friend. Her mother is disgusted and says, you take that out right now. And Winnie's like, great, because now at least I get to go outside.

[21:29] Jesse McAnally: So she goes, I think it's just like this most ridiculous toad puppet. Like that's worth bringing up. They just kind of fling it around on a stick.

[21:37] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: It is the goofiest looking piece of like Julie Taymor. This is not.

[21:41] Jesse McAnally: No, it might as well have been a toad piggy bank that you get like an antique store.

[21:49] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: So she's carrying this toad back into, you know, into the woods, which, oh, the family, the Foster family owns the woods. They own this property. And so it's private property. She's going through their woods while she's in there. She meets this kid, quote unquote, Jesse Tuck.

[22:10] Jesse McAnally: Now, Jesse looks to be about 17. So he's a couple of years older than Winnie. And they immediately hit it off because they're both in search of adventure. And they are at this tree. Next to the tree is this spring, this fountain of water.

[22:29] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: And Winnie sees Jesse drinking from the fountain and she tries to drink from it. And he's like, no, no, no, don't do that. This isn't for you. But let's climb a tree. And so then they climb a tree.

[22:41] Jesse McAnally: And they go to the top, to the top, to the top of the world. And this, I feel, is supposed to be like the hit, the earworm of the show.

[22:51] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: I mean, it's either this or Everlasting. Like, I don't know which one is more marketable.

[22:56] Jesse McAnally: I guess. I think it's just this one is promoting Andrew Keenan-Bolger, who is a Dorbz.

[23:03] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: He is a Dorbz. And spoiler alert, this show is about immortality and drinking a magic potion that lets you live forever. And do we believe that the whole Keenan-Bolger family has participated in this ritual? Because none of them are getting older.

[23:15] Jesse McAnally: No, that's just the water from being raised in Michigan.

[23:22] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: It's a Michigan thing.

[23:23] Jesse McAnally: It's a Michigan thing. Adorable. So they climb this tree, which I think it's one of these things that I think is going to keep it from being produced locally. It's like now you've given every community theater the problem of figuring out how to stage an entire song while climbing a tree.

[23:41] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: Well, you could do the usual stage theater, have a kid dressed up as a tree and just have them stand on his back. It loses none of the magic for me.

[23:48] Jesse McAnally: I'm not going to lie. It's a great tune, though.

[23:53] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: So they are forever connected, I guess, because they climbed a tree together. Can I ask a question about this romance here? Do you get the heebie-jeebies from it?

[24:00] Jesse McAnally: Because I do.

[24:03] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: I 100% do. When you think about it too long, it's absolutely disgusting. It feels like child grooming to a certain point where he's like, at the end of Act 1, spoilers, folks. He's like, if you drink this, you could be my wife. And I'm like, she's 11. Stop this, please, you 100-year-old man.

[24:21] Jesse McAnally: He's not actually 17. He's over 100 years old. So the fact that he sees this girl and is like, hey, I see my future. They found an even creepier version of the Edward and Bella plot.

[24:35] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: Oh my gosh, you're silly. At least Bella was the age of consent.

[24:40] Jesse McAnally: This 11-year-old, no.

[24:41] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: Oh man. Just drink this and don't tell your parents is basically what he's asking her to do. It's inappropriate, you guys. Don't ever ask children under the age of 16 to drink magic potions to make them live forever.

[24:55] Jesse McAnally: It's not appropriate.

[24:56] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: 16 is our cutoff age.

[24:57] Jesse McAnally: 16 is the cutoff age.

[25:00] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: But yeah, that's a big driving force in this story. And it just makes me feel uncomfortable to think about.

[25:06] Jesse McAnally: Here's the thing, though. When does the romance start? Does it start here? Because there's no way an 11-year-old girl, all she wants to do is get out of the house, meets this boy and feels the butterflies. I don't buy that.

[25:19] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: It starts in Partner in Crime.

[25:21] Jesse McAnally: So not until the end of the first act is when romance starts budding.

[25:26] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: Yes. As soon as she gets the full context of it and she's like, oh, live forever, young boy forever, young girl forever. Partner in crime, seed the world.

[25:35] Jesse McAnally: Oh, problematic. So but at this point, they're just friends, right?

[25:41] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: Yeah. I just I want to live in this friend land as long as I can before I face the inevitable.

[25:48] Jesse McAnally: So Jesse has this big mouth and spills the secret, his family secret, which is one day they were many, many years ago, were walking through the woods, got thirsty, drank some water from the spring. And then from that point on, they stopped aging.

[26:08] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: So they literally found the fountain of youth. They drank from it. And now every 10 years, because it's been like 85 years, every 10 years they get together to reconnect as a family because they can't stay together or it draws too much attention from people in the townships or wherever they might be staying.

[26:29] Jesse McAnally: So he's on his way back to meet with the family. He meets Winnie. He spills the secret about the fountain, doesn't let her drink from it, but then realizes the only way to kind of control the secret is to kidnap her.

[26:46] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: I couldn't even say it. I couldn't even get through it.

[26:50] Jesse McAnally: So he kidnaps her, this poor girl, and takes her to the home. Now at the home is Mama Tuck, Papa Tuck, and Brother Tuck. They all have their own stuff going on. Mama Tuck and Papa Tuck are kind of facing what I think most marriages face.

[27:14] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: This idea of trying to keep things fresh. I think the most interesting storyline is actually the brother.

[27:21] Jesse McAnally: I 100% agree. Who was married, had a child, and then...

[27:27] Jesse McAnally: They kind of left him because he freaked them out. They were getting older. He wasn't. So they left. Yeah, they freaked out because they thought he was possessed, thought he was a devil, and they just... They feared the unknown and then they just ran away and he couldn't... he didn't know what caused his eternal life at this point, which at that's another question: like when did he find out about that? But that doesn't matter. So his child and his wife left him and grew well beyond him, and he's stuck with the same damn family, same annoying brother, same life he's always lived, and he's just sad and broken from it.

[28:04] Jesse McAnally: Yeah, sad and broken. That's the best way to describe him. But since he's the only one that had to bring in the responsibility, that is the reason why he is the more adult between the brothers. And I think that's the reason why Jesse still comes off as 17 years old because he's lived his life like free-falling, like a hippie, and hasn't had to take on responsibilities, right? Forever stuck at 17. You're not going to settle down and get married. It's weird how age is not defined by experience, but a number. Changes to your personality aren't affected by what you experience, but how old you get and how you mature, which is strange to me to deal with in my head.

[28:50] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: Well, but here's the thing: would a 17-year-old start acting like anything other than a 17-year-old if everyone around him is constantly treating him like he's a 17-year-old because that's how he looks?

[29:00] Jesse McAnally: Right, fair enough. I mean, and he can't exactly say, "I'm older than I look, you guys, give me some credit," because then that botches the secret. So he's kind of just embraced this fact that he's always going to be this age.

[29:14] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: That makes complete sense. Can we talk about Terrence Mann as the Man in the Yellow Suit?

[29:20] Jesse McAnally: Now enter the strangest villain you've ever encountered in musical theater. And that's saying something; King Herod still exists, guys. The man is literally called the Man in the Yellow Suit, and that's exactly who he is. He's a man, and he wears an all-yellow suit. He's kind of this carny-type person with the fair, right? He's always trying to swindle people, and he too is feeling a little stale in his life. I think his own mortality is weighing on him, and he has heard rumors of the Tuck family. He doesn't know if it's true because it's just been myth at this point, but coming into town with the fair, he's set an intention to find them and find out if it's true or not, and then if it is true, he can use the fountain of youth to make millions of dollars.

[30:23] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: He's got it together. Yeah, he has a business plan, guys. The ultimate capitalist. Like any good villain now on Broadway, this was played by none other than the Beast, Rum Tum Tugger himself, Mr. Terrence Mann. Did you see this show? I didn't even ask you.

[30:44] Jesse McAnally: And the most that a bootleg can let you see something. Yes, fair enough. How would you describe Terry's performance?

[30:52] Jesse McAnally: Interested. Definitely not small. Every choice is the biggest one he possibly can. It seems like on the page, like if I read this script, he would seem a lot more devious and diabolical, but he plays him just too charmingly that when he does end up violently getting beaten to death, I'm like, I don't know if he deserved that.

[31:14] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: You're like he's just a good small business owner.

[31:19] Jesse McAnally: Yes, a stupid suit. He dances around like a weirdo, like whatever. Like he deserves to get put in jail maybe, but beaten? The thing is, is that if you're in an all-yellow suit, nuance is kind of thrown out the window, right? At this point, you're just embracing your costume and letting it inform every decision you make as an actor.

[31:40] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: I agree, and it's weird with a show with this much nuance to have such a bombastic big character in there just like, "I'm gonna entertain you for a bit, now back to this mental dilemma of whether or not it's okay to die eventually or to live forever." Which would you prefer? Right, now back to Terrence Mann dancing. Now along those lines as well, we've got this vaudeville act known as Constable Joe and his deputy Hugo, and they're like... they're the constable and his deputy of the town, and they're just kind of bumbling idiots. You find out that they're actually father and son, and that seems kind of like a strange detraction as well.

[32:18] Jesse McAnally: I don't like it. That's the one part of the story I actively dislike. I really do. I really do feel like this show should have been 90 minutes, no intermission, and you could eliminate 50% of the cast.

[32:34] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: I agree, but then again, that would also feel like it would lessen the impact of one of the most impactful parts of this story to me, which we'll get to that because it makes me cry. Yep. Like that part is what I was like, "This is wonderful." No, what it gets right in this show, it gets better than almost any modern musical I've seen in the past 15 years. The emotional verisimilitude of this show is there. It's just to get there, you got to truck through some thumbtacks.

[33:07] Jesse McAnally: So, I guess those are all the characters. You can kind of guess what happens, but when he goes to the house, meets the whole family, she connects with the mom in a way that she hasn't connected with her own mother, and in doing so brings out something in Mama Tuck, who never had a daughter; she only had these sons. And so they're in the attic looking at all of these different clothes for Winnie to wear, and she finds this dress that reminds her of the moment that her husband proposed to her, and she has this beautiful song called "The Most Beautiful Day."

[34:50] Jesse McAnally: So it sparks something within her to reconnect with her husband. I guess we can just talk about how Winnie helps each of the members of the family? She helps them deal with their individual baggage, except for Jesse, who has to have time with his baggage.

[34:57] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: Yeah, right. She talks to Miles, the brother, who has experienced his great loss with his own family by talking about how her father has passed and that she misses him every day, but it doesn't mean that she'll ever love him any less. And that gives him a degree of courage and hope. And that's also a difference from the original story and the film. Winnie's father was alive in both of those. I really like that touch because dad had passed on; she has a gateway into pain and loss that is able to connect with that character specifically.

[35:52] Jesse McAnally: Well, it shows that she's willing to deal with death as a part of life in a way that no one really is. Like the fact is that ties death as a theme and the wheel of life. You know, trying to step aside, step away from saying "circle of life." We're gonna call it a wheel. Like, Winnie's already come to terms with that as like, "Yeah, that's part of life, but that doesn't mean I shouldn't live," right?

[36:17] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: I think that that's probably one of my problems with at least the structure or the story is I don't understand why Winnie would want to live forever. She hasn't really... if she was more scared of dying or at least had baggage because of the loss of her father or seeing what it did to her mom, any of those things, I might be more interested in whether or not she wants to live forever. Instead, the story that we double down on is her connection with Jesse, and like we said previously, that's just gross.

[36:46] Jesse McAnally: Yep, it's really weird, and they try to play Andrew Keaton Bulger as like wide-eyed kid as he can, like, "Oh jeez, Winnie, we got this, and it's gonna be great," but you're still a grown man. That's still a child, and I'm thinking even weirder.

[37:12] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: Yes, and I think if they had aged Winnie up a little bit, maybe like four or five years, that wouldn't be as bad.

[37:17] Jesse McAnally: But ooh, that's a good note. Make her 16 instead of 11.

[37:24] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: Yeah.

[37:25] Jesse McAnally: But that would also cause my biggest problem. Like, I think the reason why this show works so well for me is the performance of Sarah Charles Lewis. I think she's brilliant in that lead role.

[37:36] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: Oh, that's so sweet to hear. I love that.

[37:40] Jesse McAnally: And I don't have anyone else. I think she plays it wide-eyed, but not doughy. She doesn't feel like a child model trying to play around. I relate this a lot to Fun Home, where Sydney Lucas was just so brilliant in that initial role, but then you get some of the replacements and some of the other people, and they play it like they're in a Gap commercial.

[37:58] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: Yeah, she does not. She actively does not. She plays a very... she's happy, but not cheesy. Right? Professional kids are... it's a difficult line to toe for sure.

[38:10] Jesse McAnally: How much of a dancer is Miss Sarah? That's another weird part of this story. Dance doesn't play a big role in this entire show up until that moment, until the very end.

[38:23] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: Yeah.

[38:24] Jesse McAnally: And in that, she dances minimally, like with her other incarnations of herself, which she does fine and admirably. But before that, like the only dancing is Terrence Mann acting weird.

[38:35] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: That's interesting. I have some thoughts about that for later. So Jesse and Winnie decide to go to the fair. They disguise her in boys' clothes because at this point, the constable and the deputy are looking for her because the mom has said that she's missing. So they go to the fair in disguise. The Man in the Yellow Suit has like an interaction with them, and Jesse forces him to stab him, but he won't do it, which then proves that he's immortal. And then the Man in the Yellow Suit is like, "I knew it, they exist," and that's the end of act one.

[39:18] Jesse McAnally: Now, I know I rushed through that, but for being a long show, some of these plot twists feel very abrupt to me.

[39:25] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: And I agree with you completely. It feels like they're trying to race through the big plots so that they can get to the numbers and the emotional... like I had a farmhouse with a grandfather clock moments, you know?

[39:37] Jesse McAnally: Yes. Yeah, because for every weird moment where Terrence Mann is, you know, dancing around in his yellow suit, there is an incredibly still moment in which one of the Tuck family is revealing their inner life in an incredibly vulnerable way. It feels like the songs are more confident for what the show wants to be than the book is, is where I sit with it.

[39:56] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: So act two starts. I don't remember this number at all. Can you tell me?

[40:02] Jesse McAnally: Oh no, this is Terrence Mann's, right? This is the Yellow Suit singing a song about being golden in a yellow suit.

[40:10] Jesse McAnally: No nuance lost; it writes itself, guys. It really does. Also, in the second act is this great moment with her and the father, Papa Tuck, and they're going fishing. And I think they're both getting something out of it because she is able to be with a dad, and he is, you know... I think there are moments in life where we teach ourselves by teaching others, and I think that this is his moment where he is able to impart his wisdom on her, and in doing so reminds himself of what he needs to do in his life, particularly with his marriage.

[40:46] Jesse McAnally: But within this little number that they have while they're fishing is basically any Pinterest quote, Instagrammable moment that you would ever want. You can't have living without dying, so you can't call this living. Deep. Don't be afraid of death; be afraid of never feeling truly alive. You don't need to live forever; you just need to live.

[40:59] Jeffrey Scott Parsons: Like one of those would be enough for one song, and one song has all three.

[41:05] Jesse McAnally: Yes, this is probably tied with "Time" as my favorite song in the entire show. Like, it's beautiful. As "Everlasting" is, this one is really important thematically. Like, it goes into the theme of... hashtag not trademarked, circle of life, the wheel. Yeah, it's beautiful. It is a beautiful, beautiful song. Then things continue. The Man in the Yellow Suit... things continue. The Man in the Yellow Suit ends up finding the family. They're all... I'm just skipping right to the end. There's not much that happens in act two. There's really not going on. There's a lot of character stuff, but... and it's 55 minutes, but I can literally...

[41:11] Jesse McAnally: Where they're all at the tree, you know, with the fountain and the man in the yellow suit, man in the yellow hat. I'm like, no, this is not Curious George. The man in the yellow suit is threatening the family and they're like, you can't do anything to us. You can't kill us and he's like, yeah, but I can kill her. And he grabs Miss Winnie Foster. And so now he's holding her hostage until they tell him how to live forever. And then Mama Tuck takes a big old rifle and just full on beats him to death, right in the spinal cord. Like once upon a time in Hollywood, just full on takes out all of her 85 years of aggression. And that is when the constable and the deputy show up and they're like, there's the dead man.

He's wearing a yellow suit. And Winnie's like, no, she didn't do it. I did it. She's trying to protect me, kind of alluding to the fact that he had kidnapped her. He was the one who had kidnapped her. And the constable has no reason to not believe her. So she gets off on self-defense and the Tuck family—there's a really good joke in here though. Like I want to—oh, what is it? Just cause it made me laugh and I don't laugh easily. It's when he's like, she's like, oh no, I'd probably go to jail. He's like, nope, there'd probably be a hanging. And then Miles is like, no, there won't. And I'm like, all right, that's cute. It's cute. It's cute. Now the Tuck family needs to go their separate ways. Jesse wants Winnie to drink the water to live forever when she becomes 17.

So then they can get married and live together forever. And so she's kind of left with this huge question. Should I live forever? She goes home and sees the toad and she puts the water on the toad and decides that no, she needs to live her life and only her life. See, that doesn't come off as a decision or an active choice. Cause she literally says, I can always get some more later. Oh really? Does it not come off that way? Yeah, she says that word like, hey, I can always get some more later. Don't worry. Here you go toad. And I'm like, what? Oh, that's stupid. Make that the, like the big moment. Interesting. It doesn't come off as a kick, like a song, like they should be in a different place than they were when they started.

And she had just got done singing the whole everlasting song, right? Like we said, which is a great tune. And it's all about what is lasting, what needs to die, what is life really. So from there, since she decides not to take the water comes, I think the most beautiful part of the show, easily the most beautiful part of the show, which is a ballet. It's a ballet of what her life is from that moment. Her growing up, her actually marrying the deputy kid. They have a child. The child grows up. Along the way, she loses her grandma. She loses her mother. Her child gets married. She's able to watch that. She loses her husband and then ultimately she passes away. And I have never, I mean, not since like the days of Rodgers and Hammerstein, kind of like you said, has a dream ballet been so impactful.

And in fact, I might say it's even more impactful than the dream ballets from Rodgers and Hammerstein's days. I was about to describe it as if the dream ballet from Carousel actually had some meaning behind it. Yeah, right, right. That had a deep soul to it. To see all of this expressed through dance is the perfect vehicle for at least reaching me as an audience. And I'm glad to hear it's the same for you. Like that was the moment where I was like, all right. Like, cause it kind of hedges it. Like, you know where it's going as soon as like that music cue starts and you're like, just lay it on me. And like, it's just so perfectly, beautifully done. And I wish the rest of the show lived up to as great as this moment was, is kind of how I feel.

Which then kind of comes to what you were saying earlier. Why is the language of dance so essential to this show and yet only found within the last 10 minutes? I a hundred percent agree. This is the only part where dance is like really reflected. And the director was also the choreographer of this like. Right. And so it really should be ingrained in there in the same way that Susan Stroman ingrains dance in usually all of her pieces, but it just isn't. And I feel like that came a lot with the rewrites to make it a little bit more child-friendly and lowering the age of Winnie, likely. Possibly. Yeah. I think it's a missed opportunity for sure. As beautiful as that moment is, there's very little setup for that kind of device in the rest of the show.

The closest we get to it is maybe the mother remembering the time that she was proposed to. Flashbacks. That is another time when the choreography really shines. It's like in time, you have a little bit of flashbacks with the kid and the actor portraying the dad, but it's not nearly as intensive as this scene is. Like it's general stuff. It's not like as impressive. And then my question remains, can you keep this part of the show, which is far and away the best thing in the entire show, and have a smaller cast? Oh my gosh. You could try to do like real fast old lady makeup or just have a really nice ensemble willing to hop in for a bit. Because otherwise it is a thankless ensemble. Yes, it is.

There is nothing. But I can't stress it enough. These 10 minutes are the most beautiful thing in the whole show. And one of the most touching things I've seen in the last 15 years of musical theater. I'd say it's probably one of the more emotional parts of that entire Broadway season. Like I'd put it within the top three. Agreed. Like I can't even—just gave me chills. I can't even think of a thing that tops that for me, like personally, like Hamilton's great, but like am I really gonna be sobbing during it's quiet uptown? Right. Yeah, Hamilton's great. I think that Bright Star is incredibly emotional to me. I can't wait to listen to it. I'm always excited for a new musical to listen to. So you've convinced me I'm gonna do that now that the world's ending and I'm trapped inside all the time.

Listen to Bright Star. It'll brighten up your day. And so the show then ends with Winnie dying as part of the wheel, this great wheel of life. And her gravestone is by the tree. And now we're led to believe that now it's like 2015. We're now in modern day. The Tuck family has come to pay their respects like they do every 10 years at the grave of Winnie Foster who taught them about living, maybe more so than they had ever learned from living forever. And they seem to have mended all their broken relationships, the broken pieces. Like Papa Tuck and Mama Tuck seem a lot happier. The brothers are a lot more friendly to each other. They seem to have mended fences. For sure. And at least from their point of view, they have Miss Winnie to thank.

And that toad, the toad that was the domino that fell everywhere. And Andrew Keenan-Bolger just shoves it into his knapsack and then waltzes off into the sunset. It's like the producers, but instead of Bialystock and Bloom, it's Andrew Keenan-Bolger and the toad. Yes. Did the toad ever get a name or did she just call it toad? Just toad. The most important character in a musical to never have a name is this toad. Even Milky White had a name, guys. Wasn't a good name, it was a name. And that's Tuck Everlasting. It's a show that is very sweet. And I think that if you have grown up with children's literature, this show is your jam. One of the best things about musical theater that really separates it from any other medium is it is malleable.

You can change it and keep on changing it and keep on fixing it. Like, look at Jesus Christ Superstar. They knew those lyrics were bad when they do it and they just keep changing with every new version. You keep changing them. Absolutely. You're totally right. Heather's too. Heather's too. Like that keeps adapting and changing with every new production that's on. And I think they're closer and closer to get something really great with each one. What I love about this show is that most American stories that really represent old school Americana are usually tied to the American dream. Beware the pursuit of riches because it might distract you from what really matters. And what Tuck Everlasting does, while it has elements of that, is actually willing to go to an existential place and really talk about what life is.

And those are my favorite pieces of American literature and American storytelling because so often we are focused on economy and the kind of the here and now and our wants and needs without really calling into question any of the greater questions of our existence here. And this show is willing to do that and still at the same time, feel very much a part of our country and our history and our society. And so I really applaud it for that. I think Everlasting should be the New Hampshire national anthem. I hate you. Everlasting exclamation point. I still want the exclamation point. Pull in a new musical. Exactly. Well, thank you so much for talking about Tuck with me today. This was a lot of fun.

I was so glad to have an excuse to talk about this show because it is an anomaly in Broadway, a huge flop that isn't bad. Right. No, it's not bad. There are some things that are inexplicable, but it should be done. And I think it will be. I mean, there's a lot of flawed Broadway shows that are popular. Look at Rent. Right. And also I think that being a flop on Broadway nowadays feels different to me than when I got my, you know, Ken Mandelbaum flop book back in the early nineties. I mean, I was able to research Tuck Everlasting just fine because the cast albums on Spotify, all of the rehearsal footage from press preview is on YouTube through broadway.com. You know, there are all of the commercials.

Hashtag that bootleg life. Right? Bootlegs. I think it's much easier for flops to remain in the consciousness of our culture and certainly our art form now than they ever were in the past. And I'm grateful for that because there are always great things to be found within them, even if they were, you know, considered financial failures. Art isn't really, it shouldn't be a matter of the bottom line, but it is, honestly. And that's the sad part. But yeah, we shouldn't forget these things. That's whether or not we forget them. That's really important. Well, and I think it's part of theater too, right? Because whether or not people get to see a show is dependent on whether it's produced where they are, kind of like you said.

Sometimes I wonder if these types of musicals like Tuck Everlasting might have an even greater reach than something like Passing Strange, which was critically acclaimed, but will never be produced, you know, locally. Or like the Scottsboro Boys, which I feel very similar about. Yeah, exactly. Shows that are incredible, but who's going to ever mount one for—can't wait to see the high school production of Parade. Boy. Thinking about those old Red Hills, little children. As always, if you have any shows that you would like us to cover here on a musical theater podcast, like our friend Rachel, reach out to us at musicalpodcast at gmail.com. Tell him to do Camp Rock. Don't listen to him. And then be sure to follow us on Instagram and Twitter at a musical podcast for more great content.

Jesse, how can we follow you? I'm on Twitter at Jesse McAnally, and my podcast is Musicals with Cheese, which you can find on all podcatchers that you like. Hey, hey. Everybody stay safe, stay healthy, and wash your damn hands. Wash your hands. And while you're washing your hands, now you have a couple more songs to hum in your brain. Have a great day. You need a partner in crime. Someone to take in the view. All right, we're done.