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[0:43] Teresa Attridge: Hello, everyone. Welcome to another exciting episode of Backstage Pass. It's pals.

[0:49] Pauls Macs: And Teresa. What's up, Barnacles?

[0:52] Teresa Attridge: It's going to get a little dark in here. It's probably going to get a little intimate in here.

[0:57] Pauls Macs: It's definitely going to get a little murdery.

[1:00] Teresa Attridge: Oh, my God!

[1:02] Pauls Macs: Because today we're going to be discussing Southern Harmony – A Murder Ballad with Kevin Fogarty, who wrote the book, music, and lyrics for the show.

[1:09] Teresa Attridge: Kevin, welcome to Backstage Pass.

[1:11] Kevin Fogarty: Hey, guys. Thanks for having me, y'all. I'm really glad to be here. Very much appreciate it.

[1:16] Pauls Macs: Oh, my God. What a personable man. Kind of like the lead in your show.

[1:20] Teresa Attridge: Or hopefully not too much like the lead in your show, but we'll get into that later.

[1:25] Kevin Fogarty: Some similarities and hopefully some big, big differences.

[1:29] Pauls Macs: Yep. I mean, if we had to testify from all we know right now, great guy.

[1:33] Teresa Attridge: From the moment you logged in, I could tell Kevin was a very generous, kind person.

[1:38] Kevin Fogarty: Oh, yeah. I mean, honestly, we have kind of a nice kid club right now, which means one of us might be a murderer.

[1:44] Pauls Macs: Possibly.

[1:46] Kevin Fogarty: Possibly. Maybe by the end of the episode we'll figure out who it is. Everyone knows it's me.

[1:50] Pauls Macs: Well, I know that at least one of us in here is a musical theater composer.

[1:53] Teresa Attridge: Kevin, today I was thinking a lot about the versatility of this art form of musical theater. This is our second show in a row that features a murder mystery.

[2:03] Pauls Macs: The last show was Marlies that Teresa was in.

[2:06] Teresa Attridge: But the thing that's so great is the two murder mysteries are so, so different.

[2:10] Kevin Fogarty: Yes, I was thinking about that when I listened to the last episode. I'm like, murder is hot right now.

[2:15] Pauls Macs: I didn't plan it this way.

[2:16] Teresa Attridge: I mean, it's around Halloween, probably.

[2:19] Pauls Macs: Oh, yeah, it is. This is going to be our spooky season podcast.

[2:21] Teresa Attridge: Oh, my God, we're getting a little spooky.

[2:24] Pauls Macs: But I mean, I wouldn't say a dead body is inherently spooky, but yet again, I'm getting ahead of myself.

[2:29] Teresa Attridge: How should we go ahead and read Kevin's bio? Let the people know exactly who we're speaking to?

[2:34] Pauls Macs: Kevin Fogarty wrote the book, music, and lyrics for Southern Harmony, A Murder Ballad. He was a finalist for the John Wallach Award and the Pamela Phillips Oland Award for lyric writing. His songs have been featured at the New York Musical Theater Festival and the New Voices at CUA Music Festival. Southern Harmony was a finalist at the Pipeline Theater Grant and had its world premiere in 2025 at Wellfleet Harbor Actors Theater in Wellfleet, Massachusetts. His other projects include musical lyrics for Unbelievable, a musical about female baseball pitcher Jackie Mitchell, as well as lyrics for the musical A Thousand Faces, the story of silent film star Lon Chaney. He and his wife can also be seen performing in NYC with their band, the Tipsy Pigeons.

[3:09] Teresa Attridge: All right, Kevin, thank you so much for being here.

[3:11] Kevin Fogarty: Impressive. Tipsy Pigeons. Love the name.

[3:14] Pauls Macs: Yes, we play jazz covers, original arrangements of mostly like, you know, pop music, radio hits and whatnot.

[3:21] Teresa Attridge: Well, have you ever done a cover of a musical theater song?

[3:24] Kevin Fogarty: Oh, yes, absolutely. But it's not a new musical theater song, but we do have an arrangement of Too Darn Hot that we play.

[3:30] Pauls Macs: Oh, that's fantastic.

[3:31] Kevin Fogarty: Oh, I mean, yeah, but that's not. There you go.

[3:34] Pauls Macs: It's kind of cheating, I guess.

[3:35] Kevin Fogarty: I don't think that's cheating. I think that people need to hear their Cole Porter.

[3:38] Teresa Attridge: You know what? What's a little cheating? What's a little lying every now and then?

[3:43] Kevin Fogarty: Again, this relates to the show. I'm not just condoning horrible things.

[3:48] Pauls Macs: Well, you know, Kevin, in my opinion, the people need to hear their Cole Porter. So bless you for doing the Cole's work.

[3:55] Kevin Fogarty: Thank you.

[3:56] Teresa Attridge: Thank you so much for being here again. Your show is different than any other musical I've experienced so far. But why don't I read a synopsis so the listeners at home can know what show we're talking about today.

[4:09] Kevin Fogarty: Bernie Tita was a model citizen. He was a star tenor in the church choir, director of the community theater, a trusted friend and everyone's favorite funeral director and mortician. Marjorie Nugent was a wealthy widow estranged from her entire family, conservative in her lending practices, accustomed to always having the final say and had a reputation for being less than warm and welcoming. They were an unlikely pair. Their arrangement was unconventional. There were bound to be problems, but the murder was just the beginning. When an ambitious, no nonsense district attorney takes what he thinks will be an open and shut case, an East Texas town has to rethink everything they know about right and wrong to make sense of the situation. Mixing traditional musical theater with Southern gospel and Texas folk influences, the line between good and evil runs right through the heart of Texas in this dark true crime musical comedy.

[4:55] Teresa Attridge: That is a great synopsis, Kevin.

[4:57] Kevin Fogarty: Oh, thank you. I labored on that. I couldn't believe it. It took me so long to do because all my synopsis, they're either like, you know, we need three sentences or we need act one and act two.

[5:08] Teresa Attridge: I can't tell you how many writers I've worked with on their synopsis as a dramaturg specifically because they often find it's one of the hardest things to do.

[5:16] Kevin Fogarty: It really is. And that's so helpful. I didn't even think I should have got outside help. That's great that you do that.

[5:21] Pauls Macs: We're a small town community just like that little town in Texas. It takes a village to write a synopsis, but the murder was just the beginning is a great hook.

[5:29] Teresa Attridge: And, you know, I try to read that with gusto.

[5:32] Kevin Fogarty: You did. You read it fantastic. Are you an actor?

[5:34] Pauls Macs: Oh, come on, Kevin. Whoa. No, Teresa's the actor. I mean, I used to be an actor. I'm a director now.

[5:40] Kevin Fogarty: Are you trying to flatter me over here, Kevin?

[5:42] Pauls Macs: No, absolutely.

[5:44] Kevin Fogarty: Powell's transcended from being an actor to being a director, which is the pipeline when you're like, I'm able to remove my ego enough to just look at the whole and make it better.

[5:53] Pauls Macs: And I'm still stuck down here where I'm like, clap for me, you peasants.

[5:58] Kevin Fogarty: It's more like I'm so nervous about forgetting my lines. This isn't fun for me anymore. So I'm going to be in the audience and just be like, the lights need to be brighter. You need to stand over there. I'm very, very good at those sorts of things.

[6:10] Pauls Macs: Yeah, I'm being totally real. Even my wife will tell you like acting. I love actors because I've never been on stage. I've never had a stage role. I would freeze.

[6:19] Kevin Fogarty: So I am absolutely in awe of what actors do. Directors do actually.

[6:23] Pauls Macs: I'm trying to remember the name of the study, but there actually was one done where they were testing the stress levels of various occupations. And they used like monitors where they would put something on the bodies of people about to do their job. And they found that an actor about to go on stage had the same heart rate as a fighter pilot.

[6:39] Kevin Fogarty: I believe so that the equivalent of that stress.

[6:42] Pauls Macs: I know that's very similar stakes. I mean, very similar stakes for the stress.

[6:46] Kevin Fogarty: Lines are at stake either way.

[6:50] Pauls Macs: You'd rather do the cockpit. I think I would feel more comfortable on stage.

[6:54] Kevin Fogarty: I do come out of retirement every once in a while. I had to tell you, Teresa is a terrific actor. As you know, because you listen to Marley's episodes, Teresa, your butler bot in those episodes.

[7:03] Pauls Macs: Goodbye. It's still cracking me up.

[7:07] Kevin Fogarty: It seems like there's a lot of awareness about this person in trial, but I had never heard of this before encountering this musical. I mean, in a way, this musical should have never happened. I had just completed my first year of the BMI Lemon and Gold Musical Theatre Workshop, which I know you all are familiar with. Shout out BMI!

[7:26] Pauls Macs: They're fabulous. I mean, all of the folks.

[7:29] Kevin Fogarty: You mean Lehman and Engel? The real Lehman and Engel?

[7:32] Pauls Macs: We should have Lehman and Engel on the show. I'm going to cut that. Maybe.

[7:36] Kevin Fogarty: You laugh, Kevin.

[7:38] Pauls Macs: So I had just finished my first year of the workshop. And when you go into the second year, you choose a partner. I was there as a leader assistant, so I was to choose a partner and come up with a project for the second year. And I had partnered up with a composer that I knew who's fabulous. And we had picked out a project and we were all set to do it. And I kid you not, a couple of weeks before the year was about to start, he came to me.

[8:03] Kevin Fogarty: And he's like, Kevin, I found someone else.

[8:06] Pauls Macs: What? Oh, my God.

[8:09] Kevin Fogarty: He dumped you?

[8:10] Pauls Macs: He's like, I'm sorry to leave you at the altar, but I've fallen in love with another lyricist.

[8:13] Kevin Fogarty: Oh, my God.

[8:15] Pauls Macs: I've never heard this story told on the pod.

[8:18] Kevin Fogarty: This has never happened to us before.

[8:20] Pauls Macs: Yes, but it wasn't bad at all. He did pair up with another person. I mean, I would have done the same thing. They work fantastic together. Both two amazingly talented writers are fabulous. But I was there and I sort of didn't know what to do. And I was like, I don't know about trying to. I didn't know a lot of other composers outside of the workshop that I could maybe try to bring in or anything like that.

[8:41] Kevin Fogarty: So I went to the two mentors that were running the workshop, explained the situation. I said, is there any chance I could work by myself? They're like, if you can find a project, we'll see how it goes. I think they had maybe known that I was a composer as well, but they certainly were not that familiar with my work. But anyway, so I had two weeks basically to find a project. And I had absolutely no idea what I was going to write as a musical. But I do remember one thing that they had said. They're like, if you're choosing subject matter for a musical, just make sure. Don't even worry about what the story is. But make sure that the characters are huge.

[9:12] Pauls Macs: So that's what I had in my mind as I set out to find some sort of material to make a musical out of so that I could stay in this training program. I was on vacation with my wife's family, and my brother-in-law is a creative writer. And he's also a film critic, but he sort of keeps up. And he had heard about this story from, if you all are familiar with my musical, it mentions this part of the musical. The musical is not an adaptation of the film in any way, but the musical mentions the film because the film is very much a part of this real story that happened.

[9:44] Kevin Fogarty: He had heard about this film, had not seen it, but he was like, you might check out the story.

[9:48] Pauls Macs: So I got to...

[9:49] Kevin Fogarty: You're talking about the film Bernie by Richard Linklater.

[9:52] Pauls Macs: Right. Yes, exactly.

[9:53] Kevin Fogarty: And so once I heard the story immediately, I was like, I don't need to know anything else. Like this character can be musicalized and should be musicalized. And I think I have a vision for what he sounds like, what the songs would sound like. You know, it's just for this second year of this workshop. Let's see. I became excited about it. I think this could work. And so I worked on this musical, just writing music and lyrics. I was writing some book. I never thought of myself as a book writer. I had not written a libretto before for a musical, but I was just writing some scenes to get me from point A to point B so that I could write songs in this training program.

[10:28] Kevin Fogarty: Long story short, it kept going well in the sense that I kept getting more and more excited about writing the show as I was going through the program. And so I decided to continue it on my own. And it was at that point that I found out that... So this was back in probably around 2015, I guess this was. And if you know about sort of the chronology and how things were happening right around that time or a couple of years later as I was working on this musical, basically all of Act 2 of the musical happened in real life, in real time as I was writing this musical.

[10:58] Pauls Macs: I was actually wondering about that as I was reading the musical.

[11:02] Kevin Fogarty: Well, what happened was I read the musical. I then went to Wikipedia. Let's be honest. I went to Wikipedia. It was like, what is this real? Because one of the first lyrics is like, is this a real story? And then I'm reading the Wikipedia article and I'm thinking to myself, this all just happened in Act 2. This is happening probably as Kevin is writing it.

[11:20] Kevin Fogarty: Exactly right. And that's what was happening.

[11:22] Kevin Fogarty: Just the questions the material was making me ask, not about these characters, the questions that it was making me ask about the world and just humankind and then myself, that was the real sort of kicker is reading this material and this story and what happened to these characters. I just found it fascinating as a sort of study on the human condition. And I found myself just very intrigued by this. So I kept writing, as the story kept unfolding, I kept writing it as I saw and as I kept reading things about it, I kept incorporating what was happening sort of in real time into the script. And then finally, around 2020, I had, in fact, it was right before COVID hit, I had what I thought was sort of a reasonably finished first draft.

And I took it to a theater company that I had worked with in New Jersey, Skyline Theater Company, whose founding artistic director is Sam Scalamone, who's a great director that I've worked with on other projects already. And I went to him and, you know, showed him the project. And we did a stage reading of it on March 4th of 2020. So about two weeks before the world changed.

[12:29] Wow.

[12:30] Kevin Fogarty: And so that was the and then I had the next, you know, sort of few years to continue rewriting it after that. But that was sort of the genesis of how this came about. It was sort of a happy accident. And it just became very much a passion project for me, I would say.

[12:42] Teresa Attridge: Okay, wow, that story is wild. Can we just pause and like, I once had something similar where in my last year of grad school, we had this project where we were basically responsible for creating 45 minutes of original theater. And I went to the new school where I was a director, and I was paired with a playwright. And a month before, and I worked with this playwright all summer to help develop this piece. And then like a month before the play, it was like, hey, I just need time to work on my thesis. I don't think I can help you with this.

[13:09] Oh my god.

[13:09] Teresa Attridge: I basically ended up writing my own play. But I think it was right, because the play was very much my sensibilities. So it was also a happy accident, but also just good on you for like, hanging in there. And so fortuitous that your friend showed you this movie when you really needed it the most.

[13:26] Kevin Fogarty: Yeah, exactly. Exactly right. I'm very much, yeah, just very grateful that the story came to my attention. And you know, it's worth noting, of course, I'm sure we'll get into this. I mean, it is a, the subject matter, of course, is extremely serious. And it's touchy and tricky for me as a writer. In fact, of all the shows that I've written, this has certainly been the hardest one to sort of try to find the right tone to strike a balance between sort of the gravity that these are real people that obviously extraordinarily terrible things occurred. And then also leaning in a little bit to the comedy of it, because some things, some elements of the story and some of the characters, particularly my telling of this story revolves very much around the community that is sort of telling the story. I mean, people are funny. So striking that balance was very intriguing, but fun.

[14:12] Teresa Attridge: I was cracking up. There's some great laugh lines in the show.

[14:15] Kevin Fogarty: Yeah, even the title of your piece being Southern Harmony was very, very fascinating to me. The idea that a harmony are, you know, they're different notes that still like create something together. And I think that the various opinions of Bernie create like such, like, yes, there's dissonance in the fact that like, these are people who are trying to decide whether this man is guilty or like guilty. But in that everybody can agree that this was a good person who did a bad thing. And the thing that they don't agree on is whether that bad thing should define him. The idea that it's this community, it's this town, and it's the things where all of those different notes are what make it sing. And I feel like that that was just a very cool. That was a cool title for a show that is essentially about, are you defined by the best or worst thing you've ever done?

[15:09] Kevin Fogarty: I love that you view it that way. I view it slightly differently, Teresa. I don't think we're going to disagree. But yes, it absolutely is a story of community. There's no way to get around that. It's in the title Southern Harmony, right? How the Southern community is dealing with this person. And yet I also really saw it as the story of two people. I mean, of course, Bernie, but I really saw it. Maybe I'm projecting myself, but the story of Danny Buck Davidson, who's the district attorney. What he's trying to do throughout the whole show, he's trying to grapple with Teresa's question primarily. He's trying to figure out as an attorney, number one, is this a criminal? But I think fundamentally he's trying to understand human nature.

What could have driven this good person to do this horrible thing? You know, the answer, I don't want to give up the last line of the play, but the last line of the play really is fascinating and really hits the nail on the head. So I saw these two people grappling with each other in the midst of community, and that made it even better because I saw these parallel stories happening.

[16:10] Teresa Attridge: Yeah, obviously outstanding observations. And it was very interesting. So this musical did make its world premiere, as you said, at Wellfleet Harbor Actors Theater in Wellfleet, Massachusetts last summer. And it was really fascinating. I saw it ran for, I think, 24 performances, and I saw four or five of them. And the audience's reaction on any given night could have been completely different. Sometimes it depended, as you might imagine, on sort of the age demographic of the audience. The younger generations reacted very differently than the older generations. It was very, very interesting to see how they reacted to sort of different lines and different action that was happening throughout the play.

So I do think it is one that has room for coming at it from a lot of different angles, for sure. And I think that speaks to the strength of the piece and makes it something that is really interesting to meditate on. But why don't we start by talking very specifically about Bernie? Who is Bernie? How did you research that character? Full disclosure, I have not seen the movie Bernie, although Jack Black plays Bernie in the movie. That's a very, very, very strong interpretation of the character. What I was reading in your piece felt more grounded. So I'd love for you to talk about how you brought that real person into your musical.

[17:15] Kevin Fogarty: Yeah, that's a great question. You're right. So one of the great things about having this character, having been portrayed by Jack Black, is the fact that whatever you do, it's going to be different because nobody's Jack Black, right? So that was actually very much working to my advantage. But I know about Bernie what anyone would know from reading. He and I have never spoken, so what anyone would know from reading all of the things that are out there about this character. I think what I was most drawn to about his personality is there is innate childlike joy about him. It's kind of loaded to use this word. There's an innocence about him in his sort of day-to-day. There's obviously a warmth and things like that.

What I didn't know when I started writing the piece, again, I was learning things about the real man as I went along because more articles were being written, more stories were coming out, more people were talking, more people that knew him were talking about him as more of the story was unfolding. And that's a very different way for me to write a musical. But yeah, I think I mostly leaned into, I think grounded is a good word. I think I leaned into the childlikeness or sort of the, yeah, the innocence about him. Or like the overall goodness of the character. He is beloved by his community. It said this in the synopsis, but he's in the city's choir. He's a theater director at the local community theater.

[18:45] Teresa Attridge: Oh my God, shout out.

[18:48] Kevin Fogarty: Oh, and of course, absolutely true. Like all of these things that you're saying, including his involvement in the theater was 100% historical.

[18:52] Right.

[18:53] Kevin Fogarty: That's why it has to be a musical.

[18:55] Teresa Attridge: It did help it make sense, didn't it? Yes, that was also working in my favor for sure. No, and that lens on it helped provide a great window into this experience. He even does checkup visits with people after a funeral. I have always been curious about how someone finds their way into becoming a mortician. In fact, maybe now is a perfect time to talk about the song People Person because that gives us an insight into him and it gives an insight into what it is to be a mortician that I found really fascinating as I was listening to the song. Would you set that up for us?

[19:15] Kevin Fogarty: Yes, absolutely. So this song called People Person is the first song that the main character sings in the show. It's a way for the audience to get introduced and feel like they get to know Bernie Tita. And again, luckily the story did so much of the work for me here because what better way to dramatize getting to know a character than by a character basically getting to know another, you can't see me, but I'll use air quotes here, getting to know another character, which in this case just happens to be a recently deceased corpse that has been wheeled into the funeral home where Bernie works. So this song is called People Person. And so Bernie is singing this song about how much he loves his job as a funeral director. He's singing this to the owner of the funeral home, which is his character's name is Merle. And yeah, this is just a way for the audience to get to know what really makes Bernie tick.

[20:19] Teresa Attridge: Fantastic setup. And who is performing this song?

[20:22] Kevin Fogarty: Yes, this is being performed by Todd Buonaparnie. I've actually played the character Bernie at the production in Wellfleet Harbor. So this is Todd singing.

[20:31] Kevin Fogarty: Here's People Person performed by Todd Buonaparnie.

[20:35] ♪ Musical number: "People Person" — performed by Todd Buonaparnie ♪

[22:44] ♪ Musical number: "People Person" — performed by Todd Buonopane ♪

[24:34] Kevin Fogarty: Much like the audiences that you were talking about, this is really exciting. Well, you'll have to tell us at the end whether Teresa or I are older or younger because we are the same age. I found this song to be really endearing. Ultimately, I think it was a real insight into somebody who recognizes the humanity in others, which I find innately kind of optimistic and hopeful. Maybe I should be clear. I don't think I disagree with you at all, Teresa. The idea of this person singing this song while they are stitching up a body for a funeral is, I guess, maybe I'm using the term incorrectly, but morbid to me, or dark. But within that, you learn so much about his humanity that is so endearing. And so that's what I really loved about it. I really understood that person. I've never understood why a person would go into the mortician business before, and suddenly I was like, well, what a giving, honorable thing to do after listening to this song.

[25:31] Teresa Attridge: That's great insight. I have to say that writing this show, I learned more about how to prepare a body for burial than I ever thought that I would know. I learned so much about the work of the mortuary sciences. It is so interesting. And then just like you were sort of saying, to me, an outsider, it has those qualities to it, Kevin. It feels dark. It feels morbid. I learned from this research, obviously, to a funeral director who does this type of work every day, it feels extremely natural. And they're craftspeople just like I'm a craftsperson writing musicals. And so it's very fascinating. The tools that are named and the tools that the character is using, they seem, yeah, whatever the word is there. It's actually very interesting because mortuary sciences are actually, it's a field that's primarily dominated by women.

[26:19] Kevin Fogarty: I had no idea.

[26:20] Teresa Attridge: Yeah, predominantly dominated by women. And a lot of that, they say, has to do with the innate sort of like empathetic nature and the ability to look past what is a grotesque thing and find the beauty in it. They often say that a woman's journey is opposite from the hero's journey and not for a lot of men or people who associate as male. It is about the journey outward and onward versus a lot of stories about women are internal and about dissecting and understanding something that has already happened. So one of the things I find really interesting about that perspective is that a lot of men who are seen as queer coded do end up in a lot of these professions as well. Like you look at, you know, Bernie or you look at the father in Fun Home. A lot of men who are associated with mortuary science are also seen as innately more feminine or queer coded. So I just think that that's a very interesting parallel.

[27:12] Kevin Fogarty: Oh, that is interesting. And I didn't know that. Also, so I think you're right. It's, I would say, morbid at first glance. And then as you go through it, it reveals itself to be not morbid at all. It's actually very endearing and very, very human and very, very alive, which is partially what makes this character so interesting as you're wrestling with him and trying to understand him.

[27:35] Teresa Attridge: Yeah. And yet, again, there's also a second layer or a third layer, however many layers deep, that this actually reveals a lot of Bernie's innate shrewdness. The ability to see what other people aren't seeing, the ability to craft a story out of very small details and clues. So this song is not only about his character, but about what he is capable of doing. And this, again, goes into the idea of what you do versus who you are. It's already like so deliciously layered at this point. And it's the very beginning of the show. Y'all are picking up on everything in just a first listen. Very, very impressive.

[28:12] Kevin Fogarty: But yeah, it's so the people are so complicated for sure. But that's also reflected in the music in the sense that at one moment it's a very energetic melody and this happens throughout the piece. But very dissonant notes will then make their way into the musical chords. You know that something's not as you would normally hear it or understand it. There are precisely layers underneath it. When you write a character like Bernie, specifically a song like this, where we're establishing who they are through what they love, did it take a long time to find like a narrative voice that felt appropriate and comfortable? Do you feel like this song was one that you're like, actually, it came pretty easily once I had a better understanding of who he was? I'm just kind of curious about your approach in writing it.

[28:54] Kevin Fogarty: Yeah, this one, this particular song came for me relatively easy. That's relatively speaking because I am a slow writer. And sometimes it takes me just to get through a first draft of a song. Whereas, you know, some of my favorite writers do a first draft in a few minutes or a couple of hours. Sometimes for my first draft, I'll take a few days on it. And I think I probably did for this. And I think the most challenging thing, again, was the tone. I think I probably believe it or not, there's only been one draft of this. I mean, the song for this moment in the show has always been "People Person" and the music has always sounded like that. The only part that is completely different from the first draft, I mean, there were lines tweaked here and there, kind of all over the song.

But the only part that's completely different from the first draft is the middle section where he basically dramatizes how he would do his work. And I don't remember what the earlier version was, but I think I probably brought it into my peers in the workshop. And I think they helped me work through sort of why the approach that I was taking wasn't working. Like, we really need to see, we really need to see what makes him come alive in this type of setting and really why this type of work draws out this part of his character, which of course comes into play throughout the entire show. So I think the hardest part was really, it did take me a while the first couple of days of writing the song to find more than the lyrics.

I think the tone of the music. I think in this show I really wanted to see how much subtext the music could give the words. In fact, we may or may not get to some songs later where, just on their face, this is a very simple song. The song is about what's sort of underneath the song and what the characters are not saying. I tried to see if I could get the music to do a lot of the work and get a little bit of what you were mentioning in there, Teresa, which is, with all of his happy and joyous demeanor, could the music sort of indicate that there's something else? That there's layers to this character and there's other things going on underneath. So I think that was the big challenge for me and that's probably the part that took the longest.

The language I felt like was coming. I mean, he's just so talkative as a person. If you read interviews and whatnot, he's not shy. And so I was able to get kind of a feel, I think, for the language much earlier on. If you're a lyricist and your character is talkative, I do think it makes it a little easier.

[31:04] Teresa Attridge: Absolutely. Well, why don't we talk about the other key relationship in the show, which is precisely Bernie and Marjorie? Because these are real characters, this is really fascinating. This is, I think, our very first true crime musical. Can you talk to me about how you brought that into the story? And the thing I think I want to specifically ask about is it doesn't necessarily happen in chronological order, I believe.

[31:27] Kevin Fogarty: Yes, absolutely. So just to sort of confirm what you were saying, it is true that the show is not entirely in chronological order. Mostly because it's told through the lens of the district attorney who's working this case. And so we're sort of getting, the audience is getting information as he's getting information. At least for all of Act I and Act II, things go a little bit differently. So I will say that Marjorie, writing for Marjorie Nugent was the hardest part of this show for a couple of reasons. A, really the biggest reason is Marjorie's not here to tell her side of the story. And so that had to be respected. And so I tried not to base her character on what I could confirm and reading from people who knew her and were close to her.

So that's one thing that made it hard. The other thing that made it hard is from what I was able to learn about Marjorie Nugent, she was not at this stage in her life as talkative. She was not talkative and outgoing the way Bernie was. And so trying to find language and things like that for her was much more difficult. In fact, whereas the establishment song for Bernie, I only wrote one song for that. I think I wrote probably five or six songs for an establishment song for Marjorie Nugent. Yeah, so bringing her into the story was the hardest part. Obviously she had, she needed to be in the story. But I tried to put forth the character as Bernie experienced the character. And then also incorporating anything else that I could learn about how their interactions went.

She also, from what I was able to know, very much a layered character. And I think that's one thing that I tried to focus on in portraying her. Depending on how much of the show you were able to get familiar with, there are some scenes with Marjorie that show a very different side of her than I think has been portrayed in a lot of articles and other media. And I thought that was important and I don't really think it took away from the story as Bernie experienced it really at all. People are just, we're not just one thing, I guess. Which is part of what the show is about. But yeah, so that relationship. And then the relationship was, it was just strange. Meaning, yes, it was unusual. They were, as I said in the synopsis, an unlikely pair.

But in some ways it made perfect sense that he was the only person really in the entire town. And this is from reading several sources. I mean, she was at that stage in her life, he was the one person that she had a relationship with. And they were extremely, extremely close. I mean, she really did have, certainly in the beginning, she really cared for him a great deal.

[34:05] Kevin Fogarty: So, Marjorie Nugent is a character who is quite complex. She is a wealthy widow, estranged from her family, and she has a reputation for being quite cold and unwelcoming.

[34:35] Marjorie Nugent: I always had the final say in everything, and I was used to getting my way.

[35:05] Marjorie Nugent: Bernie Tiede, on the other hand, was the complete opposite. He was the star tenor in the church choir and the community's favorite funeral director.

[35:35] Marjorie Nugent: Their relationship was unconventional, to say the least.

[36:05] Marjorie Nugent: It started off as a sort of companionship, but it quickly became more complicated.

[36:34] Marjorie Nugent: The dynamics between them were fascinating, and they really highlighted the contrasts in their personalities.

[37:04] Marjorie Nugent: Bernie was charming and well-liked, while I was more reserved and controlling.

[37:30] Marjorie Nugent: This tension ultimately led to the tragic events that unfolded.

[37:56] Marjorie Nugent: The murder was just the beginning of a much larger story that involved the entire community.

[38:20] Marjorie Nugent: It forced everyone to confront their own beliefs about morality and justice.

[38:36] Marjorie Nugent: The way the town reacted to the situation was eye-opening.

[38:48] Marjorie Nugent: It really made them question what they thought they knew about right and wrong.

[39:12] Marjorie Nugent: The story is a dark comedy, blending elements of true crime with musical theater.

[39:36] Marjorie Nugent: It’s a unique take on a very real and tragic event.

[40:02] Marjorie Nugent: The music reflects the Southern gospel and Texas folk influences that are central to the story.

[40:24] Marjorie Nugent: Each song captures the essence of the characters and their struggles.

[40:50] Marjorie Nugent: It’s a journey through the complexities of human relationships and the consequences of our actions.

[41:18] Marjorie Nugent: The audience is taken on a ride that is both entertaining and thought-provoking.

[41:32] Marjorie Nugent: I think that’s what makes this musical so compelling.

[41:58] Marjorie Nugent: It challenges the audience to think deeply about the themes presented.

[42:24] Marjorie Nugent: And it does so in a way that is engaging and accessible.

[42:42] Marjorie Nugent: I’m really excited for people to experience it.

[43:00] Marjorie Nugent: The characters are relatable, and their stories resonate on many levels.

[43:28] Marjorie Nugent: I believe that art has the power to provoke thought and inspire change.

[43:42] Marjorie Nugent: And that’s exactly what we aim to do with this musical.

[43:54] Marjorie Nugent: It’s about more than just the story; it’s about the conversations it sparks.

[44:19] Marjorie Nugent: I hope audiences leave the theater with new perspectives.

[44:47] Marjorie Nugent: That’s the beauty of theater—it can challenge us in ways we never expected.

[44:55] Marjorie Nugent: I’m looking forward to seeing how people react to it.

[44:56] Marjorie Nugent: It’s going to be an exciting journey for everyone involved.

[45:11] Marjorie Nugent: Thank you for letting me share this story with you.