This transcript was automatically generated and might contain errors.

[0:00] ♪ Musical number: "My Favorite Things" — performed by Unknown artist ♪

[0:18] Kevin David Thomas: Hi, this is Kevin David Thomas.

[0:19] Robert W. Schneider: And this is Robert W. Schneider.

[0:21] Kevin David Thomas: And we're you no, no, Rob, let's together.

[0:24] Robert W. Schneider: So Kevin and I have to share a mic today because we're too cheap to buy a fourth mic, because we've got two guests with us today, which is so exciting.

[0:30] Kevin David Thomas: Huzzah.

[0:30] Robert W. Schneider: But every time Kevin and I are gonna kiss at some point, it's gonna be very awkward.

[0:34] Kevin David Thomas: I don't know how you're gonna explain this to your wife.

[0:37] Robert W. Schneider: No tongue, please.

[0:39] Kevin David Thomas: Just happen to work.

[0:40] Robert W. Schneider: Just happen to work.

[0:41] Kevin David Thomas: I don't know. We're just two guys.

[0:42] Robert W. Schneider: Just two guys chilling.

[0:44] Kevin David Thomas: I don't know. We were sharing a mic talking about musicals. Next thing you know, we were...

[0:47] Robert W. Schneider: Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Well that went from like zero to a hundred.

[0:52] Kevin David Thomas: We like to accelerate here.

[0:53] Robert W. Schneider: We like to accelerate.

[0:55] Kevin David Thomas: Oh my god, go ahead. Why don't you introduce our guests today?

[0:56] Robert W. Schneider: So you have the mic for a little bit.

[0:58] Kevin David Thomas: No, no, you go.

[0:59] Robert W. Schneider: Okay, so a while back I got an email. Um, because you know, I teach at Penn State University saying uh we want musical theater students to take a survey for this new publication.

[1:08] Kevin David Thomas: And I was like, what is a new publication? What is this thing?

[1:11] Robert W. Schneider: And it was for Musical Theater Today. If you don't know what Musical Theater Today is, you will by the end of this episode, but it is a fantastic, fantastic.

[1:21] Kevin David Thomas: I want to call I really want to call it a book, but are you okay if I call it a book?

[1:25] Robert W. Schneider: It's a book.

[1:25] Kevin David Thomas: Yeah, it's a book, yeah.

[1:26] Robert W. Schneider: Okay, it's it's a really fantastic book that is pretty much discussing what is going on, once again, like the title says, in musical theater today, but I mean from all aspects.

[1:37] Kevin David Thomas: We're talking acting, directing, writing, publicity, musical composition, casting, diversity in casting. This book, you have to buy it. I cannot tell you, I have devoured it.

[1:45] Robert W. Schneider: Kevin has tried to steal mine on many occasions.

[1:50] Kevin David Thomas: Yeah, we were recording a My Favorite Things that, and I I spied this book, and I thought, Rob, what is this book that I've never seen before? What is this periodical of articles of all these people that I've heard of? And I was transfixed by it, to say the least.

[2:02] Robert W. Schneider: So everyone's gonna want to buy a copy, but first let me introduce you to the two gentlemen that are working on this and that have created this. Their names are hold on, I gotta I got one.

[2:11] Kevin David Thomas: Oh god, Lucas, Lucas, Lucas Sayed. Is that the okay?

[2:15] Robert W. Schneider: But the middle name Lucas, because I'm really bad with it. Tahiruzaman.

[2:19] Kevin David Thomas: Say it again for me.

[2:19] Robert W. Schneider: Lucas Tahiruzamen, Saed.

[2:21] Kevin David Thomas: God, I'm so I I would I don't want to fuck up your name, Lucas. I'm so insecure.

[2:24] Robert W. Schneider: I'm not precious about it.

[2:25] Kevin David Thomas: And Ben, I can say Van Buren, but I'm gonna fuck it up just so Lucas feels good.

[2:29] Robert W. Schneider: That's Ben for Burger.

[2:30] Kevin David Thomas: Yeah, that's right.

[2:31] Robert W. Schneider: Great awesome.

[2:31] Kevin David Thomas: That's how he says it.

[2:32] Robert W. Schneider: Okay, great. But Lucas and Ben, what have you created here and why did you decide to set out to create this?

[2:40] Lucas Sayed: All right. Well, I mean, I'm uh This is Lucas, by the way, speaking Lucas, yeah. Um I'm a musical theater composer of sorts, but I came into the musical theater writing world kind of through the backdoor. I mean, BMI is definitely not the back door, it's the front door, but you know, I went to school.

[2:54] Robert W. Schneider: And what is BMI for a...

[2:54] Lucas Sayed: It's the BMI Lehman Engel Musical Theater Workshop. It's a musical theater writing workshop that's been kind of an industry standard uh incubator for new writers since the 70s.

[3:05] Robert W. Schneider: And we do interview Pat Cook and Rick Fryer in the book to talk about the existence and future of the workshop.

[3:11] Lucas Sayed: Yeah, we've got a really good uh kind of comprehensive history of the workshop in there because it is an important New York thing and it's inspired a lot of similar uh places over the years.

[3:19] Robert W. Schneider: Indeed. Um continuously so you know, I went to I went to New School and I studied literature and music, and I was very much an academic. That's always been a huge part of my background. I was an art history major for a while. Um and but I left a lot of that to follow my interest in music, and BMI was really when I first got involved in musical theater writing in earnest. Um so for me, it's only natural that this endeavor is an intersection of my work as a composer and my interest in academics, wanting to have this kind of material and discourse out in the music theater world.

[3:51] Lucas Sayed: And Michael John LaChiusa's 2005 article, The Great Great Way, that was published in Opera News was a huge inspiration to me.

[3:57] Robert W. Schneider: Oh yeah.

[3:58] Lucas Sayed: Yeah, right the year before I moved to New York. Um I got my hands on the Bernard Albrecht recording, which I saw that show. Yep. I'm which I'm obsessed with. It remains one of my absolute favorite scores of all time in any medium. So complex.

[4:10] Robert W. Schneider: So complex.

[4:11] Lucas Sayed: And so, but also just so attentive to the world, just so precise. It's just it's so motivated. Um but and through that I've just discovered his work, and then I discovered this article, and then I moved to New York, and I was I've been thirsting for that kind of intelligence and erudition in the musical theater world. Not that it's not there, it's just like I want that platform. But it's not there as much as other art forms. Other art forms have been treated with so much respect and reverence for so many years, and we don't really have a lot of intellectual publications that are probing musical theater because it gets dismissed so much, I feel in academia.

[4:48] Ben Van Buren: For sure.

[4:49] Ben Van Buren: Yeah, I mean, my background's a little bit in uh is in dance, really, and is in performance studies a little bit. And I lived and worked in Brussels for a couple years in Belgium, and there was quite a healthy publishing tradition around the dance context there. So coming back to the States after some time over there and being good friends with Lucas, it made you guys meeting.

[5:08] Lucas Sayed: I'm sorry to interrupt you.

[5:09] Ben Van Buren: Okay, cool. Um we met at New School, and it just made sense that we would end up making a book about musical theater together.

[5:15] Lucas Sayed: Yeah, we were just texting on the bus one day, and this was born, and nine months later it existed. Uh, and I had taken done some work starting to move into publication design and to publication more generally, and it just made perfect sense that we would make a 480-page trade paperback crammed full of uh musical theater today.

[5:35] Ben Van Buren: So that's how it started.

[5:38] Robert W. Schneider: Let's oh we're gonna end up. I was gonna describe a little bit of the book. Uh do you have a website or...

[5:42] Lucas Sayed: musicaltheatertoday.com and that is spelt with an E R friends.

[5:50] Robert W. Schneider: Sorry to all of you RE people out there. No disrespect as Nintendo.

[5:54] Lucas Sayed: Oh, yeah.

[5:55] Robert W. Schneider: I think it's my northeastern roots.

[5:57] Lucas Sayed: It's the long um question of what do we is it a place or is it an art forum? And I usually do RE, but that's I I I'm still buying the book.

[6:07] Ben Van Buren: We're learning.

[6:07] Robert W. Schneider: And I understand why. I understand why. So may I ask you a couple of questions about about this? I mean, I hope that's why you're here today.

[6:12] Lucas Sayed: Or we can talk about something else if you don't want to talk about your book.

[6:16] Ben Van Buren: Um the book is absolutely loose, absolutely fascinating. So the idea is that it's gonna be an annual publication, is that right?

[6:22] Lucas Sayed: And so this one is our 2016 to 2017, is that correct?

[6:25] Ben Van Buren: Yep.

[6:25] Lucas Sayed: So when is the second one gonna come out?

[6:28] Ben Van Buren: Well, uh June of next year is sort of the short answer. Yeah, the uh roughly the beginning of the summer is when we'd like to have an issue out per year.

[6:35] Lucas Sayed: Great.

[6:35] Kevin David Thomas: How many articles are in this current one?

[6:37] Ben Van Buren: Oh my gosh. There's 46 contributors, I believe.

[6:41] Lucas Sayed: 38 down to 38 articles are in this, yeah.

[6:43] Kevin David Thomas: Are you okay if I just pick a couple at random and we can discuss what their subject matter is in the genesis?

[6:49] Ben Van Buren: There are really three types of content in there. I'll just say there's there are um interviews, which are which are uh range from, as you said, people all over the industry on all in all different ways.

[6:58] Lucas Sayed: Which we conducted ourselves, which you saw, yeah.

[7:02] Ben Van Buren: Um there are script and score excerpts, uh which are extremely fresh donuts, let's say. I mean, these are people who before they were even announced to be the um artists in residence at Lincoln Center this season had submitted some work to us. We're very grateful to have some uh something like that.

[7:18] Lucas Sayed: Um and then there are editorials of all sorts of textures, stuff that runs from academic with you know citation and really thoroughly critical and research to more just off the cuff thoughts and feelings about the form.

[7:30] Kevin David Thomas: Great. Um so we're gonna pick a couple of articles here at random so we can discuss them a little bit. One of the ones I found most satisfying um and really fascinating was it's called Paul Ryan Selfie or Broadway.

[7:41] Ben Van Buren: Yep.

[7:41] Kevin David Thomas: Um would you be so kind as to discuss a little bit about what this article is and and the contributor is uh Luis Mora. Is that right?

[7:49] Ben Van Buren: Luis, sorry.

[7:51] Kevin David Thomas: I'm I'm literally looking at because Kevin and I are sharing a mic, I'm literally looking at the book on a diagonal while still trying to speak into the mic. So my apologies, but tell us a little bit about uh the book the the chapter Paul Ryan Selfie or Broadway, which I was thought was so interesting.

[8:05] Ben Van Buren: Well, Luis is one of two uh contributors who talks really uh explicitly about uh race representation mostly in casting but also in creative teams and the presence of casting directors of color and how that there's this trickle down effect that just the optics of Broadway tend to be...

[8:05] Kevin David Thomas: I'm so sorry to interrupt but I think you just hit on something really important which you said casting directors of color.

[8:28] Ben Van Buren: Yeah.

[8:28] Kevin David Thomas: We really have a discussion more about artists of color on stage where we never talk about the people that are employing them to begin with.

[8:34] Ben Van Buren: And there are really not a lot of casting directors of color.

[8:37] Kevin David Thomas: No there are no casting directors of color writers of color, you know direct you know it's it's you know, the for the audience it's the visibility thing. Like for example, you know, when I went to see the edit the production of A Trip to Bountiful, you know, there was this, you know, fantastic turnout from a community that doesn't always show up for the Broadway shows. And or at least in my experience, going to Broadway for t you know, 11 years of living in New York. And um Yeah, the Paul Ryan Selfie or Broadway is really just about the, like I said earlier, the optics of the Broadway show and that situation and being attentive to diversity in casting, not only...

[9:17] Ben Van Buren: Sorry, you picked this up for me.

[9:18] Kevin David Thomas: Sorry. I'm like, it's it's like a big thing. I'm thinking about North Shore and I'm like, my head's getting cutter. But like, please throw out whatever you want.

[9:25] Ben Van Buren: Yeah, there's a piece in there by Lauren Villegas as well, which is explicitly about about um Evita. Uh and it is extreme extraordinarily prescient. She's been somebody who's been in the news recently, written up and written up in the Boston Globe and on Playbill. Her and Louise in Tandem actually are the two names that are kind of spearheading all of the stuff with North Shore.

[9:43] Kevin David Thomas: Oh, okay.

[9:44] Ben Van Buren: And is this um I'm so sorry, do you mean uh a previous Evita besides this one? Because there was this happened at USC last year. The same thing that's happening at North Shore now happened at USC last year. And I was wondering, but no, that's something else altogether.

[9:58] Lucas Sayed: This is a new one.

[9:58] Ben Van Buren: Okay.

[9:59] Kevin David Thomas: How sad is that that this is the this is the new misstep as opposed to the old misstep?

[10:03] Ben Van Buren: Okay.

[10:04] Ben Van Buren: The way that their articles work in tandem is that Louise is open Louise really sort of opens that topic for discussion. And then Lauren's article, and this is just great how they were submitted separately, but they work together so well. Lauren's article is specifically about casting the show, Evita right now. And you know, obviously we can't revise the fact that Patti LuPone and Matthew Broderick amazing people were in this show. But the nowadays, if you cast that, you would expect you know that you wouldn't even consider that for that story.

[10:29] Kevin David Thomas: Right.

[10:30] Ben Van Buren: You know, exactly.

[10:31] Kevin David Thomas: And that's the evolution of theater.

[10:36] Ben Van Buren: It's the way it should be going. I mean, that's um, we can talk about this subject all day.

[10:40] Kevin David Thomas: Unfortunately, we could be talking about it all day.

[10:43] Ben Van Buren: Um, the articles that you cultivate, do you give your contributors any sort of guidance? Do you say by the end I want the reader to feel this way or that way? Or did you s or do you even throw a topic at them, or do you just say, what are you interested in writing? How does that work? How do you get a contributor in there?

[10:57] Lucas Sayed: We tried to make as much noise as possible uh with the call for submissions, really with the the goal of just bringing as many voices of as many different textures as possible into the publication. So we were very interested in having um academic work as well as short, grittier, um almost exclamatory snippets.

[11:20] Lucas Sayed: So there's all sorts of stuff in there. Ed Weissman has a piece in there that goes from Trump to the French Canadian French fry dish Poutine. Via Putin. Via Putin to musical theater today. And it I think it's fantastic. So I mean it's actually working on a long form thing, he told us in the BMI workshop on Monday. There we go. That is some inside baseball. You heard it here first. So what I didn't realize is that you set out to you did not take these articles from other periodicals. You commissioned them on the city. No, most of this is and it was a mixture of some sometimes. We were approaching people and saying, like, hey, um, you know, via my friend Paul Libman, I was like, I want to talk to your friend David Hudson, who you work with at the regional theater circuit, writing original shows that are premiering in regional theaters and focusing the work there.

Like I'd love to have a piece by him. You know, so we did a mixture of curating and just yeah, having an open call, and that was really great to be, you know, to be reaching outside of my own one degree of separation around me. You know, that was yeah, and we're absolutely thrilled by existing this year and having met the community that we've been able to interact with, and we're so excited for the next issue. We hope that everybody who listens to this will feel invited. I mean, really, musical theater today is a 480-page space that I would love to see everybody in and discussing and bringing these different traditions and these different practices that all fly under the form of musical theater into a place to find agreement and to find disagreement.

You know, I think we I think that's important to have that space in a physical object that doesn't slip away so easily. It's been a pleasure. And having the discussion, to create a discussion, to create opinions and thoughts and make people actually think a lot. And it's also been important for us to do it in a non-commercial space. No one is talking to us with like nothing in it. None of the interviews, especially, were ever felt like they were about publicity. And there's no advertising.

[13:07] Kevin David Thomas: Yeah.

[13:08] Lucas Sayed: That's for you, Kevin.

[13:09] Kevin David Thomas: Yep.

[13:10] Lucas Sayed: Now I'm gonna just bring this up to our listeners because my jaw hit the floor when I asked you guys this question the first time. How much does the book cost to purchase?

[13:18] Ben Van Buren: The book costs $25. Uh, you can find it at the Drama Bookshop, which is a favorite, obviously. You can also find it on Amazon.com. I honestly thought they meant to say $125. I'm being dead serious because I mean, this publication is uh thank you for doing it for an affordable rate so students can purchase it, and poor people like Kevin and myself can purchase it as well. Um, there is no reason why you should not have this book on your shelf. It is affordable and it's fantastic.

[13:46] Lucas Sayed: I want to talk about a couple of more articles in here that I was really, really fascinated by. Um, where do I find that music building the digital storefront for our new writers? Tell us a little bit about this because I haven't really seen this covered anywhere before either.

[14:01] Ben Van Buren: So I'll start and then you can pick it up because you yeah. Um so Dave and Laura, David Cisco and Laura Joseph are absolutely fantastic individuals who are running contemporary musical theater RE dot com, which is a website where you can pay for uh by membership, basically. And they have a great new book out too.

[14:19] Lucas Sayed: And they do, yes.

[14:20] Ben Van Buren: They have a plug plugging their book.

[14:21] Lucas Sayed: Absolutely. Go to their website, check out their blog, check out their book. Um, and that on that website you can get new music for your book, and you can get new music for your book from people who are writing very much today. And those writers receive 100% of the proceeds. So it's also one of the most exciting things uh about it, I think for performers as well is that A, you are you're having you're getting access to, and it's it's on a subscription basis, but once you're in, you have all this access, and you often have a direct access line to the writers. If you need a if you need it dropped down a key, you need to put up a key if you have questions about character, questions about context, questions about uh ideas for how to make it into an eight or sixteen bar cut.

Um that that putting the writers in touch with the people who are going to be representing their music remotely. And it's a great way for writers to get themselves out there, and it's a great way for people auditioning to surprise casting directors and the people on the other side of the table with material they've never seen before, which is often a better way to actually perceive the performer when you have a clean slate. For students too, it's a fantastic resource.

[15:23] Lucas Sayed: Um I would say in general, if you're listening to this as a BFA student or someone aspiring to be a BFA student of musical theater, something like David and Laura's book or the contemporary musical theater blog, is it's just filled with excellent advice as to how best to navigate audition circuits, programs, standing and getting in the room, being a part of a process. I think it's just a great resource for that.

[15:47] Ben Van Buren: And I'll say just too the book for us is something that I think we wish we could have had as students. It's really uh it's ri it's it's compiled not explicitly with that in mind, but certainly looking over it. We think it's a fantastic resource for BFA students, and we hope they'll feel invited to check it out.

[16:04] Lucas Sayed: Yeah, I mean, I myself have you know, in moments when I'm you know integrating a bunch of dialogue into an existing song of mine, as I was doing recently, I've just grabbed the book to be like, how does Timothy Wong handle this? You know, like looked at the the sheet music as like a template for formatting. Right, you know.

[16:19] Ben Van Buren: I think what's great about it, because it is all separate articles that you don't have to read it, you can read it page to page, but you can also just pick it up like you pick up a magazine, you can pick it up and just read some articles that feel pertinent that feel important to read right now. Uh and that's I think, and and I like that the look of it is not uh for those of you who are out there listening. There's pictures, there's there's different little aspects of it that keep the eye excited.

[16:41] Lucas Sayed: I love how the you're like, which way do I turn it? Do I turn it this way or do I turn it like a calendar?

[16:47] Ben Van Buren: Uh but I I think that it it no, I'm there's little things like that. Make me Rob laughed at me and I got a little subconscious.

[16:53] Lucas Sayed: I'm happy that you're happy.

[16:54] Ben Van Buren: It does.

[16:55] Lucas Sayed: When I found it in Rob's room, I was I was yes, I was very excited.

[16:59] Ben Van Buren: Um, as you can tell.

[17:00] Lucas Sayed: Um go.

[17:02] Ben Van Buren: Um what do you think the biggest thing the two of you have learned by putting this book together?

[17:08] Lucas Sayed: Oh my goodness, you start.

[17:10] Ben Van Buren: Um I've learned that transcribing is really intense. Transcribing music transcrodo, transcribing, transcribing a two-hour interview.

[17:20] Lucas Sayed: Oh yeah, is a meditation and a kind of patience that I don't think either of us knew we had.

[17:25] Ben Van Buren: Yeah, it was really it was really cool. I mean, I I love the fact that we like we were really scrappy about it this year. We just did the whole thing ourselves. That was so satisfying.

[17:33] Lucas Sayed: Um, but uh biggest thing that I learned was that the industry is I've always known that the industry is obviously so much more than Broadway, but just the sheer depth and diversity of the goings-on everywhere and the passion everywhere. Like a really surprising aspect of our interview when we interviewed Michael Ma and his mentor Frank Wildhorn of interviewing Frank was just him talking so much about how robust of a life his work is having in China and outside of Broadway.

[18:05] Ben Van Buren: Yeah, and it's and he's so happy doing it, and he's making kinds of he's actually making kinds of work and adapting properties that the West that I would just never even have a chance to necessarily see in the West.

[18:15] Lucas Sayed: And some of them might, you know, and it's just it's so cool. You know, so just that that effortless diversity is actually it's there. Like it's just there, and it's interesting that that's not always what you perceive when you walk down 45th Street and look at the marquees, you know.

[18:31] Ben Van Buren: And and real funny is I b I believe that regional theaters, universities across the United States that aren't in New York City, I imagine would read this feeling a closer connection to what is the pulse of what musical theater is. That's that to me is what's going on in this book, is that it's giving a pulse to where musical theater could be going, or at least raising those discussions.

[18:51] Lucas Sayed: And the fact that you include music in in snippets of actual sheet music and all that is for you know, uh those of us who can't go to the nymph festival, whatever music festival or whatever new work is being done at the you know, York or wherever, but it gives you a an insider's look at who are the people talking, who are the players of this this year, you know.

[19:09] Ben Van Buren: And I I don't know, I think that you're gonna get a lot of people across the country and the world perhaps that are want to feel a part of it, you know, and and and you're interviewing a lot of uh older people, young people, you know, across the board. So I think it's it's the pulse of where musical theater is heading.

[19:24] Lucas Sayed: Well, and God bless YouTube, too. You know, you know. Anyone buying the book, uh um, no matter where you are, you can probably experience a really good performance of most of the work excerpts we have. The sheet music, it's right on YouTube, you know, which is great.

[19:36] Ben Van Buren: Yeah, it's great for everybody.

[19:38] Lucas Sayed: Uh what do you hope is going to be in the second edition of this? What do you what would what would you like to what have you learned that you'd like to alter or edit or change?

[19:46] Ben Van Buren: I took that last question, I'm sorry.

[19:47] Lucas Sayed: Sure, no, yeah, yeah, I'll dive in.

[19:50] Ben Van Buren: Talk, talk, talk.

[19:51] Lucas Sayed: Talk amongst yourselves. Um yeah, the next issue is more of the same, I think. And I I think we're just gonna take what we learned and get better at it. We're we're interested in expanding our editorial team. We're interested in finding ways in which the publication can yeah, have more people behind it, have more people involved in it.

[20:10] Ben Van Buren: Um, and but I think the content, the kinds of content that are in there, at this stage, at least in our first editorial meetings, more or less the same. Interviews we think are really important to get that tone of voice, absolutely from people all over the map.

[20:21] Lucas Sayed: Um really granular examples of scripts and of scores, how many exactly and of what length. That's a that's a question mark right now, but also very important.

[20:31] Ben Van Buren: And absolutely more long form writing. I'm I'm personally am really interested in uh more long form prose writing, uh, work that is critical, is researched, may or may not be academic capital A, but I would really just like to push that spectrum uh further and go from the really blippy quick editorials, excellent, to the longer work also excellent.

[20:52] Lucas Sayed: And we have there's a piece in there right now, the to circle back, the BFA student survey. To me, the the industry of the BFA program in the United States of America is massive. Uh, they contribute an unbelievable amount of energy and momentum to this form. I am very interested, and this is really me speaking for myself now, of creating a space uh in which those students who are young, 18 to 22, is a really sort of vulnerable time to not only feel like they have a place, but to feel have a place where they can test their voice and understand and sort of have this reflective moment of realizing that they are part of this beautiful big thing that is musical theater and that doesn't necessarily end at Broadway, but has lives, like Lucas said, all over the world and in extraordinarily different, diverse contexts.

[21:40] Ben Van Buren: So I think for me it's it's about this intergenerational connection. The Michael Mott Frank Wildhart interview is very, very interesting in that way. Um, to see that there is in this form this tradition of passing knowledge down, but also this uh institutional look at schools. I'm really interested in looking at schools more.

[21:56] Lucas Sayed: And also for the student and the aspiring performer professional, just representing, and even for me as a composer, like one of the most um between sorry, backing up different ways to approach the career that are not necessarily in the public eye. Like we have this great interview with this cruise ship performer, Elizabeth Sauter, who's doing this amazing work on cruise ships.

[22:18] Ben Van Buren: Some of my favorite pictures in the publication are of Liz on stage in this.

[22:22] Lucas Sayed: They're very good.

[22:23] Ben Van Buren: Amazing, some amazing, amazing moments of humanity.

[22:25] Robert W. Schneider: That was the point of us doing the podcast traditionally, is that we wanted people to see that there are so many different paths in this business that you can take. And it's like she's got this great and super sober plan as a performer to come back into the New York City scene more solidly when she's a little bit older, because she knows what role she wants, she knows what she wants out of her career. Meanwhile, she's sustaining herself more than sustaining herself, working in the state-of-the-art theaters with every combination of instrumentation, click tracks, backing vocal tracks, everything. You know, she's so prepared to walk onto a state-of-the-art stage whenever she needs to. You know, that's a huge amount of experience that you might not think of as a performer. You think you just want to be in shows, you want to be in a show, but that versatility with the actual hardware that you're using to execute your performance, that's invaluable.

[23:17] Kevin David Thomas: Yeah. Um so the survey, like we said, circling back to it. I want to read to you some of the—may I read some of the statistics?

[23:25] Robert W. Schneider: All right, are you ready for this, Kevin?

[23:27] Kevin David Thomas: I'm ready.

[23:27] Robert W. Schneider: You're gonna have to guess for me.

[23:29] Kevin David Thomas: Oh, I think it's on the—oh okay. I know.

[23:32] Robert W. Schneider: So over the next five years, do you expect musical theater to become more or less popular in the United States? How many do you think said more popular? I need a percentage.

[23:45] Kevin David Thomas: High. It's gonna be high. I want to say like seventy-five.

[23:52] Robert W. Schneider: Yes, even better than I wanted it to be.

[23:54] Kevin David Thomas: That's even better. It makes me so happy. Oh, this is a really interesting one. Would you drop out of your BFA program if you booked a professional gig that required you to do so? So, once again, would you drop out of your BFA program if you booked a professional gig that required you to do so? What is the percentage that said yes?

[24:15] Robert W. Schneider: Ooh, that's a really good question. Because you didn't say Broadway show, it was a professional show.

[24:21] Kevin David Thomas: Yeah. So oh man. How many? I'm I I don't know. I'm so curious of the answer to this. I would think it's higher than I want it to be. I'm gonna say it's like 60%.

[24:32] Robert W. Schneider: Who said 38.8 because no, no, no, wait, hold on. Don't stay, don't drop out of school. 48.8 said not sure.

[24:42] Kevin David Thomas: Oh, you look so disappointed. Stay in school kids. What do you feel is the most important criteria in auditions?

[24:48] Robert W. Schneider: What do you feel is the most important criteria in auditions? Now hold on. You have options.

[25:00] Kevin David Thomas: Oh okay.

[25:00] Robert W. Schneider: Vocal technique, dance technique, look, connections, or other.

[25:10] Kevin David Thomas: Other.

[25:12] Robert W. Schneider: You're so good. Ding ding ding ding ding ding ding ding. And some of these other things are really interesting. They say acting. This person, wow, this person says I think it's really an amalgamation of all of these things. So I think the most important criteria in audition is just being able to be yourself and represent the work that you are capable of to the best of your ability on that day.

[25:32] Kevin David Thomas: Can that person come teach my class? That's what I loved is that we're also working in a situation where we can publish a list of all the other things that people wanted to write. You know, we don't just have to publish the charts. You know, I mean, one of my favorite things in there was that you know, we have the diversity in people's reply to what is their favorite show, also the discrepancy to what is your favorite show and what was the first show you saw. There's just a lot of evolution of taste implied in the discrepancies between those two answers. But yeah, that only between over 150 students, the highest number that a show was said was seven times. So that's some crazy diversity. You know, and then there's there's one student out there who says Grand Hotel is their favorite show, and I just winner and win.

[26:14] Robert W. Schneider: Winner. Yes, indeed. Oh, yeah. I'm yeah, I'm looking right now. What is your favorite musical? I mean, I'm seeing a lot of chorus lines, a lot of oh, wait a minute. Parade and ragtime. Oh, you know how I can tell this was done last year? I don't see a Hamilton on here.

[26:29] Kevin David Thomas: Is there not?

[26:30] Robert W. Schneider: Oh, one Hamilton. Oh, this person got an advance. This person saw it off Broadway, got very excited. Ordinary Days is on here. This is awesome. Oh, Kevin Kisses the Spider Woman.

[26:41] Kevin David Thomas: Oh my god. This is me. Too many to choose from in all caps. Yep. Violet is Violet there?

[26:47] Robert W. Schneider: Oh, yay, one person put Violet.

[26:50] Kevin David Thomas: Yes. One violet. You and me, kiddo. Oh my god, this is a few. Whoever that is. Amen. Nice. All right. So, um what you told us what we can look forward to in the second one, which is going to be published in June of 2018. Is that correct? Um is this available in electronic form yet? Or do you think that maybe one day it might be on a Kindle?

[27:08] Robert W. Schneider: One day, not now, but maybe one day. Yes, absolutely. As soon as possible. We're working on it right now, actually. Yeah, we're excited about that.

[27:15] Kevin David Thomas: Yeah. I hate to push you guys, but it's such a great book. Uh maybe biannually? Twice a year. I really like it. What do you want from it? I mean, like, listen, if I I I mean, I I I said bed, but we were in one of one of our some of the crunchiest of the crunch time, and we were just really in the thick of it, getting the dra the first complete design draft of it together. I said, you know, if this could be my full-time job, I wouldn't mind that.

[27:42] Robert W. Schneider: Yeah, oh yeah.

[27:44] Kevin David Thomas: Yeah, oh yeah, we got that. I feel that. Well, and as an artist right now, too, I I find it to be one of the most immediately satisfying ways that I can participate in the industry right now, personally.

[27:54] Robert W. Schneider: Yeah.

[27:56] Kevin David Thomas: What do you hope a reader takes away after their first encounter with this book after they've read it? What do you hope they take away from it?

[28:06] Robert W. Schneider: No matter who you are, I hope you take away a sort of relaxing sense that all things are possible in this form, that there are no rules, that we don't need to feel the need to gravitate to any particular professional scene, but that there are opportunities out there for anybody willing to do work and to enjoy the form. I would just like to remove the anxiety. I think it's just there to say that we're celebrating this form. It's got problems in its contemporary expression. There are certainly people with differing points of view, but the discussion is there and it's ready to be had, and I think it could be productive. So make that.

[29:17] Kevin David Thomas: Um Sarah Wordsworth interview about um the process of in transit, which was a very lengthy process. Very lengthy process. She says Romain, it's not a golden ticket. You know? And it's that's on Broadway right now. And all I really want is for that to be like the idea of your show on Broadway, for that to be decentralized in the minds of artists, and to have it really just be like make the work. Go to where you can make your work and make it happen. Again, like you know, we interviewed Sam Pingleton, you know, the choreographer for Natasha Pierre. What as an artist is so inspiring about that show to me is that its development that we've witnessed from Ars Nova to the Run, which recently closed, so sadly, was that it was in some state of production and evolution in front of a paying audience for almost every step of that journey since the Ars Nova premiere.

And different. I mean, like every like environment is different. Not every show can do that. Not every show is built that way, but to me, that's the dream of development. That's you, you know, that's that's inspiring to me.

[30:39] Robert W. Schneider: We cannot thank you enough for putting this out there. And I know that uh just not only now, but I know years to come that people are gonna be looking at this as what was exactly happening in the contemporary musical theater scene. And what an exciting time to be writing this because musical theater is changing and it's becoming more prominent again. And uh this is a very valuable resource. If you're in the industry now, pick it up. Once again, musical theater today available for $25 from the drama bookshop or Amazon.com. It's I'm still kind of I want you to raise your price, but I don't want you to raise the price.

[31:19] Kevin David Thomas: But we were talking about that pricely too. One of the things for me was like I see so many uh shows and in development and in the works kind of series at New York Theater Barn at Musical Theater Factory, both of whom we featured here, but I was like, I want it to be about the price of admission for one of those developmental events. I want it to be re I want it to be accessible to that group of people. That's like that was the baseline for me. Um and also connect with us on social media.

[31:39] Robert W. Schneider: Oh, musical theater today.

[31:41] Kevin David Thomas: Yeah, go ahead. Um yeah, it's all it's all on the website, but musical theater Today, type it into Twitter. Theater ER. Theater E R, exactly. Twitter we're on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook. And we'll tweet at you and do all that stuff.

[31:52] Robert W. Schneider: Please do.

[31:53] Kevin David Thomas: And do you have personal Twitters and stuff that you put out there?

[31:56] Robert W. Schneider: Yes.

[31:56] Kevin David Thomas: Yeah, so what and what are they?

[31:57] Robert W. Schneider: Totally. I'm on Instagram at Yonkers International Press, which is actually the publisher of this publication.

[32:02] Kevin David Thomas: Great.

[32:03] Robert W. Schneider: Yonkers International Press. That's Ben and Lucas. I'm a Tahiru Zaman, is my middle name. On Twitter.

[32:08] Kevin David Thomas: Yes.

[32:09] Robert W. Schneider: Great. And can I just tack on one tiny little thing? Earlier I mentioned a Lincoln Center artist in residence, and I did I neglected to mention the name, so I just wanted to add uh Michael R. Jackson is that artist. And we are so proud to be able to include him in this publication. Anyone in New York, he has a show on Monday. We'll probably be after this is before the first time.

[32:27] Kevin David Thomas: Oh, that's true.

[32:28] Robert W. Schneider: But Michael's never going away because he's that good. So if you miss Monday, don't worry about it. Um gentlemen, thank you so much for spending time with us. Thank you so much for going to all of this great work. And we cannot wait for the second copy to come out.

[32:41] Kevin David Thomas: In a year, not six months.

[32:44] Robert W. Schneider: Nine months.

[32:46] Kevin David Thomas: Less than a year. We'll wait patiently. We'll wait patiently. I'll just keep reading this over and over again. And now, hey, they brought Kevin his own copy. Thank you, Lucas and Ben.

[32:54] Robert W. Schneider: Oh, well, thank you, thank you, thank you. This has been a delight.

[32:57] Kevin David Thomas: Awesome. Can't wait. And readers, once you take a take a read, tweet at us, let us know what you think.

[33:02] Robert W. Schneider: Yeah, sweet, yeah. Because it's a great dialogue starter.

[33:04] Kevin David Thomas: That's the plan. Come on over.

[33:07] Robert W. Schneider: Congrats, guys.

[33:08] Kevin David Thomas: Thank you.

[33:08] Robert W. Schneider: Thank you.

[33:09] ♪ Musical number ♪