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[0:20] Bryan Plofsk: Hello, and welcome to the official Broadwaysted podcast where we're drunk on theater. I'm your host, Bryan Plofsk, and I'm dead and loving it. If this is the last voyage of the Demeter, then grab your invitation to join the monster squad. Did you meet Renfield or meet Abbott and Costello? Well, then take out your blade and befriend Van Helsing because a lot of this is untold. Joining us today are the usual brides of Dracula, including Kevin, the satanic rites of Jager. He's still in his coffin, so he's not joining us today. But we do have Kimberly, our once bitten game master and unofficial babysitter for the hour.

[0:57] Kimberly: Once bitten. Hello.

[0:59] Bryan Plofsk: And with us today is an award-winning writer-director extraordinaire. You may have seen his work in LA, like the revival of Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf or his current baby, Dracula: A Comedy of Terrors in New York City. Let's give a big Broadwaysted welcome to Friend of the Show, Gordon Greenberg.

[1:18] Gordon Greenberg: Hello. Hi. Thank you for having me here. I have to say, I just got what Broadwaysted was. I'm just looking at it and I'm like, what's Broadwaysted? Like homestead or inside.

[1:31] Bryan Plofsk: We're just gonna talk about Light in the Piazza ending the whole time.

[1:36] Gordon Greenberg: It's clever. It's very clever. I'm with you. And I'm glad I poured some wine.

[1:41] Bryan Plofsk: So you can spare it.

[1:43] Gordon Greenberg: Well, that's in your heart what you were about to do.

[1:45] Bryan Plofsk: Yeah, you can feel like the wine.

[1:47] Gordon Greenberg: Oh, I don't think so. Instincts were right. I don't need any excuse for the long.

[1:54] Bryan Plofsk: That is a great segue into our first segment. What are you drinking?

[1:57] Gordon Greenberg: What are we drinking? Oh my gosh. I should promo this because my partner and I love this red that we get from Beacon Wines, and it's called Lavier Ferme. It's literally $8.99 a bottle. Is that crazy? And it's so good. It's dry, it's smooth, it's French, low in tannins, no headaches, delicious, pairs beautifully with pretty much any meal, or even without a meal, or even with smart food, cheese popcorn, it works. But it's a high recommend, and it's a nice kind of unwind at the end of the day wine.

[2:35] Bryan Plofsk: I love that. Wonderful.

[2:36] Gordon Greenberg: I probably had it with popcorn as well.

[2:38] Bryan Plofsk: Exactly. I think I've never attempted to say the name. I'm just like the rooster, the rooster.

[2:43] Gordon Greenberg: Oh, it is one. That's so amazing. Yeah, it means the old farm. It feels a little Kerry Washington when you're having your popcorn and giant red wine and a bowl of popcorn.

[2:56] Kimberly: Exactly. That's my idea of paradise.

[2:58] Gordon Greenberg: Me too. Uh Kimberly, what are you drinking today?

[3:02] Kimberly: Oh, just a concoction of things I still have in my house. So just a little seltzer and gin and a splash of bitters.

[3:10] Gordon Greenberg: Oh, nice.

[3:11] Kimberly: Yeah, that's almost a Moscow mule.

[3:13] Gordon Greenberg: Almost.

[3:14] Kimberly: Almost pretty close.

[3:18] Bryan Plofsk: Um I am drinking, yeah, I have some beer. I'm drinking Maine Beer Company, their IPA called Little Whale Boat. So I'm drinking that. When we went to Maine this summer, we brought back like a case of Maine Beer Company, and we're working our way through it, and I just felt like opening one tonight.

[3:38] Gordon Greenberg: Very nice.

[3:39] Kimberly: Nice. I like that you have a fancy cup for it too.

[3:41] Bryan Plofsk: Oh, yes, and I mean, it defrosted a little bit, but this was when the freezer I planned.

[3:47] Gordon Greenberg: Yeah, very, and I like that you're making that case last all the way into the fall.

[3:52] Bryan Plofsk: Yeah, we're doing our best. We're doing our best. We finished our wedding beer from a year and a half ago, so we had to start something else.

[3:59] Gordon Greenberg: Um congratulations, Baseltuff. That's great.

[4:01] Kimberly: Oh, thank you. Thank you.

[4:03] Bryan Plofsk: Um but uh yeah, let's uh let's just get started. What's uh what's your favorite musical?

[4:11] Gordon Greenberg: Oh my gosh, that's so hard. Why do you ask such controversial questions? You can define, you can define, you can give multiple answers. You can define how you want to answer it. Up to you.

[4:23] Gordon Greenberg: Well, I should say that um my first musical was Grease, which I saw when I was seven. And when I saw that, I didn't know there was any other musical. I thought it was its own. So my plan as a seven-year-old was to grow up and be in Grease, and then once I had done that, I direct Grease in other places, and then maybe I'd write Grease 2. I just I was unaware that that it was one of Betty. Um and then ultimately, many years later, um I found Evita, which um between that and Dreamgirls, I used all my bar mitzvah money to see it every Saturday afternoon. I would see one of those shows. Um, and I think both of them had at their core something so theatrical to them, both were non-literal. I mean, the Hal Prince original staging of Evita is impossible to um to really match for what it did and how it moved theater forward.

And I think for me as a kid, my imagination, just knowing that with some chairs and a rake stage, um, you could tell such a tremendous story. Um, so I always loved that. It was a big, big part of my childhood. And then Dreamgirls was another huge part of my childhood.

[5:43] Gordon Greenberg: Um I probably spent more time than I should have studying fascism in South America. Um my, you know, seventh grade teacher pulled up uh you know a little red flag to my parents, like there may be an issue here, and they said no, he's just a theater queen. But uh Dreamgirls same. And when I really think about shows that are um beautifully constructed, um, things like uh Fiddler on the Roof, which is so well made, it is hard to not do a beautiful production of it. Guys and Dolls, obviously, I'm deeply familiar with. Um, and I do think it's possible to not do a great production of that. It's a lot, it's a lot of material for attention spans today. Um, but it's another excellent one. Gosh, there are so many. But I think if I had to pick a favorite, it would probably just be Dreamgirls for the sheer um nostalgia and sentimental value that it has to me.

[6:48] Kimberly: Sure. Uh Kimberly, does James have a favorite musical just yet?

[6:52] Gordon Greenberg: My baby?

[6:54] Kimberly: Yes.

[6:55] Gordon Greenberg: How old is James?

[6:57] Kimberly: He's four months old.

[6:58] Gordon Greenberg: Is he a human?

[6:59] Kimberly: He is, he's a human.

[7:01] Gordon Greenberg: He is asleep just here.

[7:03] Kimberly: Oh, that's a real baby.

[7:05] Gordon Greenberg: I thought you, I thought it was James was gonna be a dog or a cat.

[7:08] Kimberly: No, no, he's a real human baby. Um, and actually, I sing his lullabies to him. I have a playlist that I'm adding to of theater songs that I consider lullabies.

[7:19] Gordon Greenberg: Oh, that's cool.

[7:20] Kimberly: Um, so if anyone has suggestions for more, uh, but right now he's very into Kimberly Akimbo.

[7:27] Gordon Greenberg: So that's one should.

[7:29] Kimberly: As one should.

[7:30] Gordon Greenberg: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I like Carolina Change for that for lullabies and for the gym.

[7:31] Kimberly: And for the gym.

[7:36] Gordon Greenberg: Oh, yeah. It does get you going.

[7:39] Kimberly: Oh, I have sung some Carolina Change for him before because then it just goes into like a suggested songs on Spotify. So somehow we also sing uh Mad About You from Head Over Heels a lot in this house.

[7:52] Gordon Greenberg: Nice, right?

[7:53] Kimberly: I like that.

[7:54] Gordon Greenberg: Also from the 80s.

[7:56] Kimberly: Also from the 80s, yes.

[7:57] Gordon Greenberg: Um, well, here's a question. Um, in terms of you mentioned nostalgia, and a lot of our favorite musicals end up being ones we grew up with or, you know, said something to us during a part of growing up or not even growing up, but just a part of life. Do you think that it is possible for a new musical that somebody sees at an older age to become a favorite musical when it doesn't have that nostalgia attached to it?

[8:22] Gordon Greenberg: That's a really good question. Um I think there are different appeals to musicals because they're so visceral and they kind of get you in the heart, they make the hairs on the back of your neck stand up if they're functioning well. They're a gateway drug for theater, right? So you can be seven and understand the power of a musical more than you can a play for the most part. Some of the plays I write, you know, with Steve Rosen in particular, are a function like musicals almost. So I feel like a lot of them can work for young people, but um the just the kinetic um energy that comes off the stage is enough. Now, the things that make a musical work for me are uh not only craft and um sort of just the intellectual Rubik's Cube of how something is put together.

Um, but sometimes my experience with a family member um or my partner who's not in theater, he's a doctor, but he'll watch something. And when he's moved by something, I am moved. Or I took my nephew, who's 13 to see Kimberly Akimbo and watching him get carried away by it. And when she sings that song, I like your point of view, um, to that kid with the anagrams. Um he just started crying and I started crying. And uh I texted David Stone, this is my new favorite musical, um, because of how powerful it was to my nephew in middle school, who is, you know, middle school is a horrible time of life. Um it gave him some emotional uh intelligence um that I like to think made him feel a little less alone and buoyed and um is still with him.

[10:10] Gordon Greenberg: Um and that to me is the greatest thing a show can do. Like if a show entertains you, fabulous. If it's as my dad would say, a toe tapper, wonderful. But if it's also a therapy session and it can a little bit, then it's worth 200. Then it's worth everything because it's your life better in ways that um are hard to quantify.

[10:32] Kimberly: Yeah, I love that. I love that somebody else, I love your answer. If somebody else having that experience can impact the experience you have. I think that's beautifully said.

[10:41] Gordon Greenberg: It's so true. I mean, what is the value of anything if you're not sharing it? It's why we're in theater here doing this podcast, right? I'm assuming the joy is not only in um the eyeballs or the attention, but it's in sharing a story that you think by putting it into the world is going to make people's lives a little better, maybe.

[11:02] Kimberly: Um, hopefully.

[11:04] Gordon Greenberg: Or diverted from all the things that are not so better on the day-to-day basis.

[11:11] Kimberly: A lot.

[11:11] Gordon Greenberg: Yeah.

[11:12] Kimberly: Yeah, absolutely. Um did you ever show I've seen, I remember who I saw it with. Like I can always like sure where I was sitting and who I was sitting next to.

[11:23] Gordon Greenberg: For sure. Seeing the show alone is still, I mean, I do it, but I much prefer to see it with someone else because I love I love the comparing notes. And even when I am alone, maybe it's because I'm a director, but half the time I'm looking at the people in my row behind me, just fascinated to see if they're if they're connecting uh and how it's what is that relationship between the story that's coming off the stage and the audience.

[11:48] Kimberly: Yeah.

[11:49] Gordon Greenberg: Absolutely. Um, did you did you grow up in and around the city? Did you grow up uh where did you grow up?

[11:56] Gordon Greenberg: I grew up in Rockland County, um about 20 miles north of the city in a town called New City, um, which is next to Nyack and Terrytown and just north on the Hudson. At the time, I felt like I could have been in Nebraska. I had felt just you know, leagues away from anything um New York. So my greatest ambition was always just to live in the city where I could see a Broadway show whenever I wanted to.

[12:26] Gordon Greenberg: I mean, I used to, it was a special occasion. I would have my parents drive me into the city and I would pose underneath marquees of Broadway shows, snapshots, like Kodak pictures of the film that developed. Um, and then I was in my first Broadway show when I was 14, um, thanks to Stage Door Manor, um, where I had to beg my parents to go there. They wouldn't let me go until after my bar mitzvah. Um, you know, it'll turn you gay if you go too soon. Um, of course, didn't matter, still turned me gay. But um, I went there and then um in that first year, um, a manager named Shirley Grant, who at the time represented big names like Keisha Knight Pullium from the Cosby show. Like people, I was terrified.

And she auditioned the whole camp and picked like five of us to represent and put me out for auditions. And uh in that year I got cast in the show called The Little Prince in the Aviator, which hangs proudly on the wall at Joe Allen's as a legendary flop. Um based on the San Exubery book. It was me and Anthony Rapp, we're both child actors in it. Um, and I played young Michael York due to my um aggressive British accent. I was very proud of it. Um that was my introduction to show business. Um, and it uh it was I I think all of a sudden I felt like it was possible. Like it just put it all within reach. Um and I started to consider um that there may be other careers, you know, and and a an actual life to be built around the theater as impractical as it seemed to me.

And to my parents, who were like a dentist and a lawyer and very square. Um, and not unsupportive, but definitely non-supportive. Like even when I was 14, I organized my own transportation. I found someone, I paid them out of my salary. Cause my parents were like, you figure it out. If you can figure it out, you can do it. Um, and I had a guy who was a stage hand on another show who lived near us. Um, and so he would wait for me at Mikhail's bar. Um, much like this podcast drinking on my show is much longer because it was in previews and uh and in trouble and a mess. We had three different directors in four weeks. Oh, wow. Yes, our stage manager ended up becoming the director. Um, Jerry Adler, who's an actor, he was in is uh some what was that? Woody Allen, Manhattan murder mystery. He's been in a bunch. Um, he was the third and final. Um, but uh that was my that was my time and my introduction to um to really professional theater.

[15:19] Gordon Greenberg: And um after that, I started to think about how on a practical level I could make a life doing it. Um, and with a lot of, you know, sort of um left turns and and uh careful navigation, I I ultimately came back to it. So can you talk a little bit about how those experiences, like specifically like getting yourself there and and the director changing so many times and kind of being a part of a very chaotic experience, and then probably being a part of more or less chaotic experiences. How that influenced your philosophy as a director?

[15:57] Gordon Greenberg: It's interesting. I never thought I was a director. At that point, I was just an actor. All I wanted to do was act. I mean, I was 14. But since then, um, working with lots of different directors on plays and musicals on Broadway and uh regionally and abroad, um, I kind of picked up different styles and started to um started to feel very strongly impulses um for how I would want to tell a story and what I thought was particularly effective at moving large groups of people simultaneously. Um and I remember at some point I was doing yet another um Neil Simon play, um, probably Broadway bound, at I think it was Indiana rep with Libby Apple, who ran the uh Oregon Shakespeare uh festival, Ashland Festival, yes, at the time.

Um, a beautiful, generous, wonderful uh director. And I innocently and naively went up to her at one point and said something about someone else's performance. He's doing it wrong. This is how it should be. It's so clear, right? And she looked at me and said, it's not clear. That's the point of theater. There are 8,000 ways to do it. This is I'm I'm sort of orchestrating this one. I'm the air traffic controller here. Um, but the fact that you feel it so strongly tells me you should consider a career in directing. Um, I will write your recommendations, and here's where I would apply if I were you. Yale, uh UCLA, NYU, and I did, and she did.

[17:31] Gordon Greenberg: Um, and then um I almost went. And um, and um I'm not sure why, but at the moment, I I decided not to go to grad school. Um, I think I at that time was in how to succeed. It was like the late 90s, the Matthew Broderick one. Um and uh I was thinking about my options, and I realized that I could start to develop pieces on my own. Um, and I did that. And I I think the first play I started developing was with Daryl Roth. Um, and uh we had a mutual friend who wrote a play about coming out. I mean, it was late 90s, that was still a subject. Um it was um a play that we ultimately did starring Tova Feldschu, of course, and a slew of brilliant Jewish women. It was a very Jewish-centric story. Um, it was who else was in it?

Doris Bellach from Tootsie, if you look her up, she's the one who said, How about Cleveland? Like with the camera back. Um, Alex Corey was my voice teacher at the time and is hilarious. She was Yanta and the last fiddler, Jess Stone, um, who, as you know, is a director now too. Um, and we had been in How to Succeed Together, so we were pals, and in a pencil commercial, actually a commercial for the IRS about the move to um electronic filing, and we played board pencils.

[19:00] Gordon Greenberg: Um, and that was um so I think that was me starting to put together how you direct and really by culling ideas from different people I had um worked with and what was successful, what was not, how do you nurture actors? How do you give notes in a way that is not um overwhelming? How do you treat notes like antibiotics just a little at a time and let it totally sink in and create um obviously now we would say a safe atmosphere, but at the time I just said, how do you create a friendly atmosphere where people are kind to each other and we operate on the principle of um yes and like a good improv. So everyone says, yes, let's see, let's explore that. And it's something I I obviously still try to try to do.

[19:52] Gordon Greenberg: Um the interesting thing about my trajectory as a director, I would say over the years is going from the impulse to try and control everything, because it's almost like like editing a movie is simple and clear. You can you can fix the rhythm so that it works exactly how you want it. And that's why when an actor auditions for a film or a TV show, they don't have to be everything. You don't have to give your full performance, but we need aspects of it. So I could, if I were casting a TV show, I could just have someone who knows how to cry, knows how to whisper, knows how to giggle, knows how to make a snarky comment, and then I put it together and fix the timing. If you're casting someone for uh for a player musical, they need to almost self-edit.

They need to know how to create the rhythms, the cadence, and sustain it and understand um why they're doing it so that there's a fire within, and then it feels like it's it's fueled by something that is true and relatable.

[20:52] Gordon Greenberg: Um understanding as a director that you cannot control everything, and it's the first thing I share with actors, until you recognize you're not going to be perfect, you won't even be good. So it's it's like don't let perfect be the enemy of good. Um so understand that it's your foibles, your imperfections, your your the fraying edges that make you human and interesting and vulnerable. Um you remember when Adina Menzel like cracked on some, I don't know where it was. She was singing something in a very public way, and people came after her. I think people were um criticizing. I think it was that's pretty public for the theater. Um, and people came after her and she said, Oh, I only hit that note 75% of the time. That's 25% where I don't. But if I sing it in such a way that I'm gonna hit it 99% of the time, it won't be exciting.

[21:50] Gordon Greenberg: And that's why, like there's a risk, there's a danger. You wouldn't go see Cirque de Soleil if there was a net right under them. There's a risk. And that's why you go see a play. You can tell the difference between an actor who is who's truly risking something emotionally, physically, whatever it is, in in a safe way. There's there's a safety net there somewhere, but you shouldn't see it. Um and that's what uh what makes uh an evening out like that feel relatable and thrilling.

[22:21] Gordon Greenberg: Um, so all that is to say that as a director, coming to the the idea that I am creating barriers, safe guardrails for actors, almost like a bento box for their performance. So here are all these little compartments that you're gonna play in all night, and this will get you to hear, and this will get you to hear within that, the chemical reactions will be different, unique every night. Um, and that will be a beautiful thing. Uh, and the audience will feel it. But if every move is programmed, and it is for some shows, the things that I direct are usually not like that. Even something like Dracula, which is highly choreographed, within that, there are pockets, lots of air pockets for play, for um for actors to feel impulses and feel the audience and and enjoy it.

[23:10] Gordon Greenberg: And that freedom, I believe, is is a big part of the um ebullience and um and and levity uh of the evening in a show like Dracula, but really in any show in Virginia Wolf. I mean, there is no way to program that three hour and 15-minute show, especially with you know, with actors who are as skilled and and starry and wonderful um and creative as the people that that we had in that company. Um I felt like I certainly had a point of view and I wanted them to know that. Um, but it was it was all there just to support them and to make sure we're all on the same page.

[23:51] Gordon Greenberg: And other than that, um I think everybody left off a cliff every night, knowing that there was this net unseen there for yeah, you're building their safety net for them.

[24:04] Kimberly: Totally.

[24:05] Gordon Greenberg: That's my hope.

[24:07] Kimberly: Um, well, you mentioned it. Let's talk a little bit about Dracula. Um where did your idea come from? Where are you? Are you a big uh you know, Universal Monster fan? Are you of the book? Like, where did that come from? And kind of like how did you develop that?

[24:21] Gordon Greenberg: Well, Steve Rosen and I had written um a show called Ebenezer Scrooge's Big Your Town Here Christmas show. Um we wrote it originally for the Bucks County Playhouse because they kept asking me to direct Christmas shows and Robin Goodman called again with some other idea, and I just said, Robin, can I just write one already like?

[24:45] Gordon Greenberg: Like this is this is nuts. Just give me the parameters. And they were like, five people, cheap set. This is what we want. It'll be producible. And I said, Great, I'll come back to you in two months. And Steve and I wrote it. It did very well. Um, and uh ultimately we rewrote it, continued to work on it for um uh San Diego for the old globe. Um and it's still playing there in its fifth year now, um, opposite the Grinch in the other theater. And San Diego plays in the round, which I love, um, but it's highly physical, much like Dracula, five people, one of which is Scrooge, the other four play multiple roles and they change live on stage. There's music, there's berrymant, there's physical hijinks.

It feels like a cross between play that goes wrong, 39 steps, um, and elf. Like it's it's just and then we use some of the real Dickens text, but not a whole lot. Um and uh Andrew Cato, who runs the Maltz Theater in Florida, which used to be the Burt Reynolds dinner theater a million years ago, which is really fun. Fun fact. Um, and he had worked there when he was a kid as a waiter and always wanted to go back and turn it into uh a non-dinner theater, and he did that very successfully. Um, and he said, We've never commissioned anything. I want to commission something. Can you do a Dracula that's like your uh Christmas Carol? Um do the same thing, riff on it, whatever you want, five people. Um, and so Steve and I took the challenge and wrote it, and they did it there just before the pandemic.

Um, and then we went to Chicago Shakespeare to do a workshop there. [25:46] And um, Rick Boynton, who's um in charge of new works there and is really smart dramaturg, gave us incredible notes. Um, and we continued to tweak the piece. [25:54] Um, and then uh the world shut down, and Dory Berenstein offered to put it out as a radio podcast. [26:02] And um we created this uh amazing version with everyone because everyone was available. So everyone from John Stamos, Chris Sieber, Laura Bonanti, Ashley Park, James Monroe Eigelhart, uh Alex Breitman, Rob McClure, Richard Kind, just a whole panoply of crazy talented people. [26:19] Um Annalie Ashford, everyone's in it. [26:22] Um, and they were so great and it caught on and it did well.

[26:26] And between that and um, I guess the word about what we had been developing for the stage um got us more productions and producers, which then led to um product further development at Capital Rep, and then in Montreal, the Siegel Center, which is such a beautiful theater, um, and then here off Broadway um in a commercial run at New World Stages, where it currently is running. [26:48] Um, and it it's just been a joy to develop that show over over these years where its primary function is to make people feel good. [26:58] Um, there of course is thought in there, there is a play underneath the play, there has to be because it can't you can't, you know, support a whole evening on cotton candy.

[27:09] Um, so we knew why we wanted to write it. We knew that underneath the idea of Dracula of everlasting life is how does life lose its value? [27:17] And is too much of something just as bad as not enough. [27:21] Um, and we put at the center of this story a couple who are questioned who are about to get married, but sort of questioning it and uncertain. [27:29] And Dracula, who is this horrible narcissist who is also questioning, he's sort of a pansexual Gen Z guy who is going through an early/slash very late midlife crisis, sort of wondering what the point of all of it is. [27:46] But in doing that, in looking for his purpose, he ends up being a divider between this woman and this man.

[27:54] And as the more we developed the show, the deeper we went into the life of Bram Stoker, who was himself a closeted, queer guy living in Victorian London. [28:03] He ran the Lyceum Theater where The Lion King is playing near Covent Garden. [28:09] And through his job there, became friendly with Walt Whitman when he visited and Oscar Wilde and had these deep epistolary relationships with them. [28:17] And we found very cool letters and went back to the book and suddenly were able to read between the lines of what was there. [28:27] And so we incorporated that into the show and really now have a sort of equal opportunity seducer, um, who uh with Andrew Keenan Bulger, there's uh there's a whole romantic entanglement.

[28:42] And then with Jordan Boatman, there's a whole romantic thread. [28:45] And you're never quite sure who he's actually gunning for, but one gets the sense that he's gunning for himself at the end of the day. [28:54] Sure. [28:55] He wants the attention. [28:57] Um, and I won't spoil the rest, but um, around that story is a whole world of um insanity um of different characters and people um sort of theatrically changing characters either quickly backstage and ultimately just in front of your eyes. [29:12] Um, it becomes quite manic and silly. [29:14] And we have a cast that's so inventive and so fearless and strong and and skilled and experienced that um it's a joy to watch them just as actors be able to do this kind of high wire act every night.

[29:31] Um it really is, it should make you a little nervous. [29:34] And there are moments where the audience is just breathless from how fast things happen and they break into applause. [29:40] Um, some of these changes that Ellen Harvey, when she, you know, she starts off as Renfield jumps out a window and is screaming, ah, as if she's falling, and then all of a sudden comes in a in a whole new costume as another character, and they're like, How did that just happen? [29:56] Um, but that's part of the fun, that's the silliness. [29:58] And um, there are those sorts of things all over the place. [30:02] And there is puppet sex, there is gogo bordello, gypsy punk rock, and it's uh it's it's a wild night out, and um uh I'm really proud of it.

[30:12] And it's it's a lot of fun. [30:13] And the cast loves each other, and um, and that I'm very proud of as well. [30:18] It's like it's like my dad feeling good when I'm with my brother and sister. [30:22] Love each other. [30:23] I didn't stop, and with such like a risky show where they're doing so many costume changes, it's probably very helpful that they all get along because I'm sure helping is we share a backstage with the play second. [30:39] The space at New Stages is highly limited. [30:40] Um they are passing each other. [30:42] I mean, the crossovers are the same. [30:44] And in previews, early in previews, someone walked in, not on stage, but to the back of the house where I was sitting writing notes.

[30:52] And literally the door popped open so loud and the light floods in and I looked like furious, like, who is ruining my show? [30:58] And it was an actor from the play that goes wrong in his underwear. [31:03] I don't know where he thought he was going, but I was like, you're in the wrong fan or get out. [31:09] Out of the play that goes wrong. [31:11] Um, so it's definitely nice there. [31:14] I don't know what it is. [31:16] Should we play a game?

[32:11] Kimberly: Oh, sure. Let's play a game.

[32:16] Gordon Greenberg: Okay. I have a spooky, what did I call it in my head? Just spooky season, because that's what it is. I spent my entire day decorating for Halloween at work.

[32:27] Kimberly: So that's what I do with my college degree. I put webs on mirrors and dance studios to make sure it's spooky for the children.

[32:35] Gordon Greenberg: That's great. Huh?

[32:37] Kimberly: Is that your job?

[32:38] Gordon Greenberg: I run a kids' dance studio.

[32:38] Kimberly: Yeah.

[32:41] Gordon Greenberg: Oh, that's amazing.

[32:42] Kimberly: So they're thrilled.

[32:44] Gordon Greenberg: People are serious about Halloween now in a way that weren't always.

[32:48] Kimberly: Oh, yeah.

[32:49] Gordon Greenberg: And just like October 1st, we decorate.

[32:51] Kimberly: I was like, okay.

[32:51] Gordon Greenberg: Yeah.

[32:51] Kimberly: Oh my god, Bryan.

[32:54] Gordon Greenberg: It's getting to be like Christmas.

[32:56] Kimberly: I mean, it's a month-long celebration.

[32:58] Gordon Greenberg: I love it.

[32:58] Kimberly: Absolutely.

[32:59] Gordon Greenberg: I mean, it might as well be.

[33:01] Kimberly: Like, why not?

[33:02] Gordon Greenberg: It's great.

[33:03] Kimberly: Costum's just the one day, but you might as well have fun for a month.

[33:02] Gordon Greenberg: Totally.

[33:07] Kimberly: I'm okay.

[33:10] Gordon Greenberg: So in my.

[33:12] Kimberly: Oh, geez.

[33:14] Gordon Greenberg: It's the thing I do all the time.

[33:17] Kimberly: Is I lose my tabs.

[33:20] Gordon Greenberg: Well, while you're finding your tabs, I'll just say I was out in LA last week at my sister's.

[33:25] Kimberly: Um, and the people in Los Angeles are even more serious than New York about decorating for Halloween because that design, they all work in TV.

[33:30] Gordon Greenberg: Insane.

[33:37] Kimberly: Insane how much they do.

[33:40] Gordon Greenberg: Just for the love of it.

[33:41] Kimberly: Well, it's be so interesting to be somewhere for Halloween that's not cold.

[33:46] Gordon Greenberg: Yes, it's not cold there, but they have it's not cold here right now, so that is true.

[33:51] Kimberly: It's 80 degrees.

[33:51] Gordon Greenberg: Yeah.

[33:55] Kimberly: Everyone, all of the kids were being like really rambunctious and weird.

[33:59] Gordon Greenberg: And at the end of the day, we were all like, maybe they're all just hot.

[34:03] Kimberly: They all have to put phone on today because their parents were like, it's fall, and then they didn't need to.

[34:08] Gordon Greenberg: They're just they're just creeped out.

[34:11] Kimberly: Okay, so my spooky season game.

[34:14] Gordon Greenberg: We're going to create star vehicles for people in my Lights of Broadway show cards deck.

[34:16] Kimberly: Okay.

[34:26] Gordon Greenberg: Like Broadway cards.

[34:28] Kimberly: What is that?

[34:29] Gordon Greenberg: They're the Lights of Broadway show cards.

[34:31] Kimberly: Do you know Squiggs?

[34:32] Gordon Greenberg: He does the illustrations.

[34:34] Kimberly: Right, yes.

[34:35] Gordon Greenberg: Kind of stuff.

[34:35] Kimberly: So he makes trading cards as well.

[34:37] Gordon Greenberg: I mean, I did not know that.

[34:39] Kimberly: They're very cool.

[34:39] Gordon Greenberg: So you this I just pulled Calicetto as an example.

[34:42] Kimberly: And then there's like facts on the back.

[34:45] Gordon Greenberg: He um he did such a beautiful drawing for Dracula.

[34:48] Kimberly: Oh, yeah.

[34:49] Gordon Greenberg: Yeah, yeah.

[34:50] Kimberly: That's amazing.

[34:51] Gordon Greenberg: I love those.

[34:52] Kimberly: I am obsessed with them.

[34:54] Gordon Greenberg: All right.

[34:54] Kimberly: Um, I have a whole stack of people's cards, and then I also have pulled up um a list of the 50 best classic horror movies of all time.

[34:56] Gordon Greenberg: Okay.

[35:05] Kimberly: So when it's your turn, you'll get I'll sort of scroll.

[35:07] Gordon Greenberg: You tell me when I'll stop on a random horror movie, and I'll pull you a star, and then tell me how you would create something for that person to use the source material of that movie.

[35:21] Gordon Greenberg: With the source material, okay.

[35:21] Kimberly: Great.

[35:23] Gordon Greenberg: Whether they're doing a cabaret act or a full-scale musical or something.

[35:28] Kimberly: But how you would pair those two together.

[35:32] Gordon Greenberg: Could it just be like a Netflix series?

[35:34] Kimberly: Oh, yeah, anything.

[35:34] Gordon Greenberg: Okay.

[35:34] Kimberly: Great.

[35:37] Gordon Greenberg: All right, Brian, do you want to go first?

[35:39] Kimberly: Yeah, sure.

[35:39] Gordon Greenberg: Okay. Say when for a movie.

[35:42] Kimberly: Uh when.

[35:46] Gordon Greenberg: The Last Man on Earth.

[35:47] Kimberly: Do you know this?

[35:47] Gordon Greenberg: Yeah.

[35:49] Kimberly: Oh, you do?

[35:50] Gordon Greenberg: Yeah, but you can pick something else.

[35:52] Kimberly: That's fine.

[35:52] Gordon Greenberg: No, you can do the last man on Earth.

[35:54] Kimberly: Tell us all about it.

[35:56] Gordon Greenberg: Um, no, I want to redo. Pick something else.

[35:56] Kimberly: Okay.

[36:00] Gordon Greenberg: Say when.

[36:00] Kimberly: When.

[36:04] Gordon Greenberg: The Omen.

[36:05] Kimberly: Okay, sure.

[36:07] Gordon Greenberg: I've never seen that movie because my dad told me how scared he was of it as a child.

[36:12] Kimberly: I've just never seen it.

[36:13] Gordon Greenberg: Okay, and I'm gonna pick you someone random.

[36:13] Kimberly: Alright.

[36:19] Gordon Greenberg: Liza Manelli.

[36:19] Kimberly: Okay.

[36:23] Gordon Greenberg: How would you do it?

[36:23] Kimberly: Sure.

[36:23] Gordon Greenberg: Um.

[36:31] Kimberly: Alright, so I've got a couple couple thoughts here.

[36:34] Gordon Greenberg: One, you have her play Damien.

[36:38] Kimberly: Um, kind of like Clifford, the Martin Short movie.

[36:42] Gordon Greenberg: Um, where it's like awkwardly like an older person playing a younger person, and it's super weird, but it's a comedy.

[36:48] Kimberly: It's played for a comedy where she plays, you know, this this yeah, this young child who is the you know the reincarnation of the devil.

[36:56] Gordon Greenberg: You can do that.

[36:58] Kimberly: I'm also thinking that I think you do the omen from the perspective of the housekeeper um in the movie, uh, and and that's Liza, and it's just like very showy and and told from that perspective.

[37:15] Gordon Greenberg: Uh I guess that's a comedy as well. Well, yeah, you know what? A lot Liza plays every part in the in everything. Damien and everything. Um one woman omen. Yeah, no, you know what? I take it back. This is a one-woman show. Okay. This is a one-woman show. Um, uh, but it's about Damien years later, about how Damien's life turned out. But we learn that, you know, the movie got it all wrong. Damien was their first bond born daughter, and that's Liza. So Liza does a full one-woman show as like you know, Deborah, um, you know, the omen child. Uh, and you know, she's she's doing numbers, she's explaining like, and it gets more and more ridiculous as the show goes on. So, like, she's like, you know, my housekeeper killed herself, and then like, you know, this that the other thing, and um, and then you know, and and uh in the end, she she you know, she she talks about how she actually finally went down to hell, and it's just a wild romp, and it's you know, it's like it's like it's like an hour and a half at fifth 54 below or something like that.

[38:21] Kimberly: You're gonna do you think Liza would play 54 below?

[38:24] Gordon Greenberg: Uh I think if she uh I think she hmm. I feel like question. Just describe could fill like the new palace.

[38:33] Kimberly: Yeah, I could probably feel like the marquee. For sure.

[38:41] Gordon Greenberg: Just about Broadway theater, maybe.

[38:43] Kimberly: Yeah. Is it um the the Britney Spears show closed, so we can put it in in the marquee?

[38:48] Gordon Greenberg: That's totally fine. Yeah, as an interim thing. That could go there. I'm into that. It's just her in a chair. With some like real nice, you know, red, you know, demon lighting.

[39:01] Kimberly: Who's the music?

[39:01] Gordon Greenberg: Um, she improvs it on the spot. Okay. Uh I think I don't know. Who writes the music for her? Um, I think it's oh, this is tough. Bring him in. Huh. Say it again. It's it's your dream, so it could be anyone.

[39:24] Kimberly: I know. Um damn, who do not now you just got nervous? Who do I want?

[39:31] Gordon Greenberg: Yeah. Um, actually, what's crazy is that the this is actually they found it in the Sondheim vaults. Um, and this is this is actually the last musical he wrote. It was crazy. He just got so into Sweeney Todd that he wrote this like, you know, as a little hangover from that, put it away, and then they just recently found it, and uh, and Liza decided that she's gonna do it for six weeks to both honor him and you know, have a little fun during October.

[40:06] Kimberly: I think you just extended your run.

[40:08] Gordon Greenberg: Yeah, that's true. Well, we plan for six weeks, knowing that we're going for much longer than that, and we already have the replacements lined up for like those six weeks after that and stuff like that.

[40:21] Kimberly: Replacements, extensions. I feel like her first replacement is gonna be Karen Mason.

[40:26] Gordon Greenberg: Yeah, I think that's uh we could Karen Mason. Um I think we uh down the line you get like Carol Lee Carmelo in there. Uh um say that again. Eat Elaine Page.

[40:38] Kimberly: Yes, absolutely. All the greats who are still with us and and and romping through life right now, we'll all get a shot. Even if it's just the Wednesday matinees, that's totally fine too.

[40:49] Gordon Greenberg: Money for international casting, like can we do visas, housing?

[40:52] Kimberly: Yeah, we'll do everything. Yeah. Okay. I just wanna I wanna check before I let my imagination run. Is that the marquee? It comes with a room at the hotel.

[41:00] Gordon Greenberg: Yeah, totally. So that's Deborah. That's Deborah based on Damian.

[41:09] Kimberly: Yes. Starring Liza. Oh, and there's also I I totally forgot, because this has a huge budget, there's a hologram of Gregory Peck with all new lines and everything.

[41:21] Gordon Greenberg: You know the omen really well. When you mentioned the universal horror movies, like is that something that you follow?

[41:28] Kimberly: Yes, I am I am I I know a lot about horror movies and stuff like that.

[41:33] Gordon Greenberg: Yes. He also hosts a horror movie podcast.

[41:35] Kimberly: I do. Well, you have to come see Dracula.

[41:38] Gordon Greenberg: Oh, yeah, I absolutely want to. I mean, it's right up your alley.

[41:41] Kimberly: Oh, very much so. Very much so. Funny, Arnie Burton, who's in the in the cast is also nuts about all of those. And when he was a little kid, clearly um he would stay inside and watch those movies um on channel 11 or whatever they were on.

[41:57] Gordon Greenberg: Oh yeah. Growing up, I used to um I used to go in the TV guide uh and look up what um uh uh TCM was playing all day. I would schedule my VCR to record everything throughout the day, and then I'd come home and I'd have like you know, Dracula, I'd have, you know, uh uh I'd have the great the great dictator. Like I have all these old amazing movies, and that's what I would watch while I did my homework at night. So I'd I'd like and and I grew up on like Dracula and all that stuff, but Psycho and Jaws and all of that, and I just I love it.

[42:36] Kimberly: Did your parents appreciate that? Did they share your passion?

[42:39] Gordon Greenberg: Oh, very much so. They my parents shared their movie passion with me for sure.

[42:45] Kimberly: That's amazing. My I mean Hitchcock, all the Hitchcocks. I mean, I wanted to be a film director growing up. I read the Hitchcock Truffaut book backwards and forwards like five times.

[42:56] Gordon Greenberg: That's so funny. Yes, I do love that. So you're you will probably go see um here we are quickly soon.

[43:05] Kimberly: Say that again. Have you seen the new sound time?

[43:09] Gordon Greenberg: Oh, not yet. Not yet. No.

[43:11] Kimberly: Well, knowing that it's based on two uh well-known classic European films.

[43:17] Gordon Greenberg: Yes. It's on my list. I that's one that's that's for reasons other than it's him. Like, I absolutely that's high on the list. That the the shark is broken, um, Dracula. There's a lot that that's playing right now that I uh I have to put my butt in a seat for.

[43:33] Kimberly: Gotta get you onto Amtrak quick.

[43:35] Gordon Greenberg: I mean, I'm in there every Tuesday. I'm I'm in New York every Tuesday, so oh yeah.

[43:42] Kimberly: Yeah, I should. Share a room with the baby.

[43:47] Kimberly: Okay, Gordon, would you like a turn?

[43:50] Gordon Greenberg: Sure.

[43:51] Kimberly: Okay. Say when for a film.

[43:55] Gordon Greenberg: And you can pick again if you don't know it. When?

[43:57] Kimberly: Sorry, I was trying to say when. I just had to mute myself because my dog was making loud noises.

[44:05] Gordon Greenberg: Very timely for you. You got El Vampiro.

[44:09] Kimberly: Okay. I don't know it in particular, but I like the title and I can play with it.

[44:13] Gordon Greenberg: It's the classic Dracula tale you know, told from the perspective of an Argentine filmmaker, Fernando Menende Amendez. You may not.

[44:21] Kimberly: Okay. All right. Who's starring in it?

[44:25] Gordon Greenberg: Let's see. I'm so excited. Oh, I got two not actors very quickly. It's going to star Anne Hirada.

[44:38] Kimberly: Oh. Just answer her like the other day when I saw Squigs at the Broadway Flea Market.

[44:46] Gordon Greenberg: Oh, I love Broadway Flea. Um, I that was my first time ever going. Um, but we had some Dracula stuff going on, a little commotion by to see. Um, and there was Anne, of course, who's such a great supporter of all shows and a great performer too. She did Holiday In the second cast, which was at Paper Mill after Broadway.

[45:09] Kimberly: We saw that one.

[45:10] Gordon Greenberg: We did. I loved, I I gotta say, that cast was so special and loved Hayley Bashoon and just all of them. Nick, Rodriguez, and anyway. I love Anne. We love each other. Um, so I would do anything with her for her. Um, and El Vampiro, I mean, it'll be interesting to see like a gender-bending um situation where she plays um that director who is directing uh Spanish language version of Dracula um and suddenly realizes that she herself is actually a vampire and discovers in the course of that she carries special blood and has inadvertently infected uh her beloved husband and son and has to grapple with the consequences and um uh uh explain that to them. And that the only way really to save her children is to sacrifice her own life. So um she uh has great arias. Fortunately, um Andrew Lloyd Weber has lent us his um from Stephen Weber.

[46:19] Kimberly: Was that what it was called?

[46:21] Gordon Greenberg: Stephen Weber, Steven. You know that show about the chiropractor. I'm not even kidding, it's about a chiropractor.

[46:29] Kimberly: Stephen, oh my gosh, hold on, wait, I'm googling it because it's too good.

[46:35] Gordon Greenberg: Stephen, anyone British would know this.

[46:37] Kimberly: Stephen Ward.

[46:40] Gordon Greenberg: Stephen Ward. So this was an Andrew Lloyd Weber's show about a famous chiropractor who became a confidant of some famous uh members of parliament um and got embroiled in a big scandal where he was hooking them up with um young ladies um for pay. Uh and he was, you know, a very high-level chiropractor, let's say. About it. It was also called, I think the profumo affair, because that was the name of the the MP. Um, and there was a movie about it called Scandal. Anyway, I think that score could easily be repurposed because it doesn't need to ever be purposed like that again. So I think Anne would sing a lot of that stuff well. Um, and we probably do all new arrangements that were broad and dramatic, and um probably bring Lynn in for some, you know, just to give it a little contemporary spin because it takes place now.

[47:45] Kimberly: Perfect. So does that I mean, is that worth seeing? Could that play like would that be at?

[47:52] Gordon Greenberg: Oh, yeah. I would see that. Would you see it at Walnut Street or would you come to Broadway for it?

[47:58] Kimberly: Um, or tinker out of town for a while.

[48:04] Gordon Greenberg: Yeah, I guess if we did out of town in Philly, like where you could be a part of it, um, then I would probably use you like have you come and consult and talk about that's what we are, and then we'd move it from Walnut into probably um, I don't know, what house would something like that go in? It feels a little scary to me. The court feels that's not the court anymore. Isn't that the most haunted theater? The Belasco. I love that idea. It's a theater.

[48:38] Kimberly: Oh, the marketing team would love that. Um, and just FYI, the James Will Jones is one of the most beautiful theaters now on Broadway. It was completely renovated.

[48:47] Gordon Greenberg: Oh, the James Will Jones, right? Right, right, right, right. Gutenberg is about to open. Um but they take out all the dressing rooms and made a huge backstage and moved them all to the building next door, which they purchased and occupy now. Um, and it's all incredibly well done, beautifully done.

[49:10] Kimberly: Cool. I want to go.

[49:11] Gordon Greenberg: Oh, is that the games? Are we done with our games?

[49:13] Kimberly: Cool, Kimberly, you want to go?

[49:15] Kimberly: Yes. You tell me when.

[49:18] Gordon Greenberg: Me tell when.

[49:20] Kimberly: Anyone.

[49:21] Bryan Plofsk: Okay.

[49:22] Kimberly: Ooh.

[49:23] Gordon Greenberg: When the shining.

[49:28] Bryan Plofsk: Okay. Got a good one. Starring. I'm very much looking forward to this.

[49:35] Kimberly: The shining starring Kate Baldwin.

[49:38] Gordon Greenberg: Oh. That's an opportunity.

[49:42] Bryan Plofsk: So I don't want to say it's also a one-woman show, but maybe it is just like she plays both husband and wife.

[49:54] Kimberly: I like it.

[49:56] Gordon Greenberg: And you never quite see them. Well, obviously, you never quite see them on stage at the same time.

[50:01] Bryan Plofsk: So it becomes known that it is just the mother there with the son.

[50:07] Kimberly: Well, are you thinking of Psycho?

[50:09] Gordon Greenberg: Maybe.

[50:10] Bryan Plofsk: Yes. I think you are.

[50:12] Kimberly: Isn't there a wife and a little boy in a tricycle?

[50:15] Gordon Greenberg: Yeah, that's your movie.

[50:17] Bryan Plofsk: I've only seen it once or twice.

[50:19] Kimberly: Who's Jack Nicholson then?

[50:24] Gordon Greenberg: Yeah, let's see. Okay, so Kate Baldwin plays Jack Nicholson's wife.

[50:28] Kimberly: Okay.

[50:29] Gordon Greenberg: This very lush, large musical version of The Shining at the Vivian Beaumont, so that we can really see the hotel and then it opens up.

[50:40] Bryan Plofsk: I love that.

[50:42] Gordon Greenberg: Perhaps it really snows on stage, like Bart Sher is doing his best giant production there.

[50:50] Kimberly: Um Jack Nicholson is Alex Brightman.

[50:56] Gordon Greenberg: I love it.

[50:58] Kimberly: Um, The Little Boys Lizamanelli just kidding.

[51:04] Gordon Greenberg: Um, it is a giant cast, a giant orchestra. Who will write it?

[51:09] Bryan Plofsk: Adam Geddle.

[51:11] Gordon Greenberg: I would seriously see this. I would very, very, very I would really see this for sure.

[51:17] Kimberly: I need to get the rights. Kate Baldwin as Wendy Torrance.

[51:22] Gordon Greenberg: I'm sounds incredible. She would have some incredible notes.

[51:26] Kimberly: So she gets these very lush ballads contemplating what has brought her to this day.

[51:33] Gordon Greenberg: I'm I dig that. I really dig that. From her perspective, that's killer.

[51:38] Kimberly: Yeah. Unintended.

[51:39] Gordon Greenberg: And she's just in these very fun 70s outfits.

[51:42] Kimberly: Absolutely. Whole time.

[51:45] Gordon Greenberg: And that's The Shining.

[51:46] Kimberly: That's great. I love that idea.

[51:49] Gordon Greenberg: Yeah. Let's do it. The stage magic. Like with the I mean, if you're doing the movie, like the stage magic with the maze and everything, like the hedge maze would be truly uh incredible.

[52:01] Kimberly: You bring in the team from Cursed Child.

[52:04] Gordon Greenberg: Yeah. Yeah. It's a, I mean, it's definitely an opportunity for fun magic projections, stagecraft, all of that.

[52:11] Kimberly: Yeah. I think people would want to go. And I think for Alex, perfect.

[52:16] Gordon Greenberg: Yeah. I agree. He's doing his, he's, you know, from Richard Dreyfus to Jack Nicholson.

[52:22] Kimberly: I love it. He'll just be in his like 70s actor era.

[52:28] Gordon Greenberg: I love that. It's a good transition.

[52:31] Kimberly: All right. And that was our game. Spooky Star season.

[52:34] Gordon Greenberg: That was fun. Thank you. I like that game.

[52:37] Kimberly: I would thank you for having me on that. I like that game.

[52:40] Gordon Greenberg: Yeah. Thank you for playing. Now I now I just want to see a shining stage production.

[52:46] Kimberly: I so when I was living in London, I saw a production of Vertigo. That's one of the best productions I've ever seen of uh of uh ever.

[52:56] Gordon Greenberg: Um, the season was specifically books that were made into movies that were now going to be made back into plays.

[53:05] Kimberly: Um, so Vertigo was the one that I bought my ticket to see. And it it took place, it was it was framed from the perspective of the Jimmy Stewart detective.

[53:18] Gordon Greenberg: Um, but he's already been committed. So it's the doctor and the nurse like talking through, and they're trying to find out what happened, so they keep um triggering him to like think that he's still in the trying to figure it out.

[53:35] Kimberly: But everything is used from this like 1960s asylum, so like they're using the like bathtubs and everything, so it's it's all like it's like within the context of the play, it's all found props.

[53:48] Gordon Greenberg: And the thing I'll if you if you know if for our listeners, if you know Vertigo, there's a there are people falling from bell towers in the movie, and there's this one moment and I'll never forget in the play where to simulate like him experiencing like her falling from the bell tower.

[54:06] Kimberly: They they on stage dipped all of these towels in water and dropped them from the top, and they splattered on the stage, and it was just like I'm getting goosebumps right now.

[54:18] Gordon Greenberg: It was it was truly incredible to watch them like do all of Vertigo, but not but not make you think of the Hitchcock movie, which was very hard for me, but I was just like so engaged.

[54:30] Kimberly: Um, that was super cool. If we're talking about like Hitchcock and and you know, eerie movies, as that's not so horror as much as it is psychological, but still um very cool. Anyway, just wanted to share that.

[54:42] Gordon Greenberg: Yeah, that sounds like a great idea. The poster alone.

[54:46] Kimberly: Yeah, I'm looking it up right now just to see where that was.

[54:50] Gordon Greenberg: Very the program somewhere in here, but um, yeah, that was super cool. Um but uh that was in like 2007, I think.

[55:04] Kimberly: Yeah, I don't see I'll find it. It was uh the only two I remember from that season were Vertigo and Get Carter.

[55:12] Gordon Greenberg: Huh?

[55:13] Kimberly: It's based on a French novel. Living in the D.

[55:18] Gordon Greenberg: I think the novel is I've never read the novel, but I I think the novel is from the same perspective of like the asylum, and then the movie adapted it to just be the straightforward narrative.

[55:29] Kimberly: Yeah, based on a Parisian lawyer, interesting stage.

[55:37] Gordon Greenberg: Super cool 97 UK.

[55:40] Kimberly: Yep, Jenny Seagrove. I like it. That was a cool production.

[55:47] Gordon Greenberg: But uh one last question for you. If you had to direct yourself through the years in one show, you're the director and you're the performer. What show would you want single show, but you would play all the parts in it over the course of your lifetime?

[56:06] Kimberly: So, you know, when you're 15, you're playing this part, but you know, you age up to play the patriarch of the show or whatever it is, and you're directing it as well.

[56:15] Gordon Greenberg: How you thought Greece would be.

[56:17] Kimberly: Yeah, how you thought Greece would be. What would you do? What would you pick?

[56:23] Gordon Greenberg: Oh, wow. Think of what would be how you thought Greece would be.

[56:43] Kimberly: And now I'm headed for our codna. That's where that's where I'm going.

[56:48] Gordon Greenberg: Um, but I don't mind. I love it. Um, and I feel like I love all those characters, and I would relish a chance to soak in any one of them.

[56:58] Kimberly: Um they used to, I discovered years ago that on the lake where our house was in New City, they um uh they used to do Chekhov on Lake Lucille.

[57:10] Gordon Greenberg: Um and it wasn't when I was growing up there, I I it wasn't happening to my knowledge, but many years later, a friend of mine who was running a theater said, We've got to go see this thing.

[57:21] Kimberly: I don't know where it is. And he's directing me as we're driving up. And I said, We're driving to my house right.

[57:29] Gordon Greenberg: And with a view of my old house, I watched this beautiful production of The Seagull, and I it occurred to me how much of it um reflected my moments either at stage door as a camper.

[57:41] Kimberly: Um, my music teacher there, my first music teacher and still beloved friend Janine Tassori, kind of instilled these um these values in us, this love for theater and um discipline and rigor and and respect for the craft and um almost this romance uh that I think is prevalent in in that play and many of Chekhov's plays, but for sure The Seagull.

[58:09] Gordon Greenberg: And in fact, my dog who's been barking um is named Chekhov because Damik when we were living upstate and longing for Moscow slash New York.

[58:20] Kimberly: Oh, that's amazing.

[58:23] Gordon Greenberg: I saw um well, actually, that same time when I was in London, I saw the the before it came here, the Kristen Scott Thomas uh Mackenzie Crook, Carrie Mulligan, Chuetel E. G4 production of The Seagull.

[58:35] Kimberly: And there were some I think Christopher Landon adapted it or um but um Hampton, sorry.

[58:44] Gordon Greenberg: Um man, there were some the direction of that play specifically, there were moments of silence on stage where you know, but so much was happening.

[58:55] Kimberly: I'll never forget that. That was truly incredible. Where like she would just like wrap his wounds, the um, and uh, and it would just like you were just watching the the actors and the director had done such a strong job of creating these relationships that you didn't need the words to understand exactly what was happening.

[59:13] Gordon Greenberg: And the the placement of all that silence was just like truly immaculate. It's pretty freighted.

[59:19] Kimberly: I thought the new group just did a great version too with um Parker Posey and an incredible cast.

[59:27] Gordon Greenberg: Um, but it was an update. Uh oh my gosh, who did the update? I forgot. Someone terrific.

[59:31] Kimberly: Um, really interesting. But it's a story that I think is evergreen and highly relatable, particularly for people in the arts and people with mothers.

[59:48] Gordon Greenberg: Um, but thank you so much for joining us. Um, if you're listening to this in the description, our tickets to see Dracula.

[59:55] Kimberly: Um, definitely take that opportunity. Um, thank you so much for joining us. We really appreciated your your taking the time to chat with us, and and we had a delightful time, and I hope you did too.

[1:00:05] Gordon Greenberg: Absolutely, my pleasure. And I haven't even finished my glass of wine.

[1:00:13] Kimberly: I talk too much. I gotta shut my um but thank you so much for joining us. We really, really appreciate it.

[1:00:22] Gordon Greenberg: Um, we end every episode with a quote, of course.

[1:00:26] Kimberly: Um, and today it is blood will run down his face when he is decapitated, his head on my mantle is how I will let the world know how much I love you.

[1:00:35] Gordon Greenberg: Die, die, die.

[1:00:37] Kimberly: I can't. That is uh Dracula's Lament from forgetting Sarah Marshall.

[1:00:44] Gordon Greenberg: Everyone asks about that. Everyone.

[1:00:47] Kimberly: Um, but uh yeah, you can find us wherever you're on social media at Broadwaysted.

[1:00:47] Gordon Greenberg: You can find us wherever um you get your podcasts. That includes things like Spotify and Apple Podcasts.

[1:01:00] Kimberly: Rate and review us there. Five stars, please.

[1:01:05] Gordon Greenberg: Um, but uh thank you so much for joining us. We really, really, really appreciate you and you taking the time.

[1:01:12] Kimberly: Um, but as we end every episode, we raise a glass and we say, oh, the one musical, Zoo do uh thank you, Brian.

[1:01:25] Gordon Greenberg: Have a great day.

[1:01:26] Kimberly: Thank you so much.