This transcript was automatically generated and might contain errors.

[0:00] Ben Rimalower: Broadway Podcast Network presents Giants in the Sky: How Sondheim and Levine Went Into the Woods with me, Ben Rimalower.

[0:09] Ben Rimalower: Today's guest, Pamela Winslow Kashani, the original Broadway Rapunzel.

[0:14] Ben Rimalower: Once upon a time.

[0:21] Ben Rimalower: Pamela Winslow Kashani created the role of Rapunzel in the original Broadway production of Into the Woods. She also originated the role of Babette in Disney's Beauty and the Beast on Broadway and appeared on Broadway in Meet Me in St. Louis. Star Trek fans know her as Ensign McKnight on The Next Generation. And she has been a producer on many productions on both coasts, including Hair and Memphis on Broadway.

[0:48] Pamela Winslow Kashani: I had the great good fortune to grow up not too far from New York City. So I saw my first Broadway show when I was eight or nine years old. I saw Man of La Mancha, and I was mesmerized by Richard Kiley's performance and the set and the experience and the music. Um, it hit me so viscerally. And, uh, years later, I ended up going to a summer camp for the performing arts called French Woods. I don't know about that camp. Uh, but I became a French Woods person. And that was my first foray into doing a musical. I started singing in church when I was very, very young and sang in the church choir, uh, which sort of really honed my sight reading skills. I went kind of a cracker jack that way, and, um, sang alto forever because my choir teacher thought I was an alto, which, I mean, if anybody even listens to my speaking voice, you can probably guess that I'm not an alto, but I was.

And I would sing all those, you know, weird, awkward parts, and I'd sight read them really fast. So I got my musical skills through that. Um, those are the hard parts. I mean, the altos have to have the more, uh, musical skill to be able to not just sing the straight melody line, right? I mean, completely soprano is easy; it's the melody almost always. I mean, unless it's some weird, um, juxtaposition at that point, yeah, yeah.

[2:18] Pamela Winslow Kashani: So I went to this French Woods Festival of the Performing Arts, and they said, "Oh, you better bring some audition music with you." I had never really done an audition or anything. So I brought the only sheet music I had, and I went to the audition for a show called Chicago. Wow. And I sang Oh Rest in the Lord by Mendelssohn. And I got cast as cell block murderess number two. Oh my god. And which one is that in the, um, he has correct? Uh, six wives. Oh yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So she's the Mormon in the Sixth Wives and the blah blah. Yeah. So, um, yes, that's how my fate would have it. I realized at that moment in that crazy production of Chicago that I belonged on stage. I was never happier than when I was on stage.

I felt like I could be my true self and really feel fulfilled up there. And I came back to my high school counselor in New Jersey and said, "Guess what? I'm going to be an actress." And they looked at this girl with, um, this chubby girl with a terrible perm. And, uh, they said, "No, no, sweetheart, you really should stick with the math." And, um, hey, I proved them wrong.

[3:41] Ben Rimalower: Did you go back to French Woods the next summer again?

[3:44] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Oh, yes, yes. And then after that, I became sort of the leading lady of French Woods for a couple of summers, which was all your parts of French Woods.

[3:52] Pamela Winslow Kashani: I have, oh my gosh. I did On the 20th Century when I was 14 years old. I played Lily Garland, uh, which was phenomenal. I played Maria in The Sound of Music, I played Cunegunda in Candide. I did, um, The Miracle Worker. I played Annie Sullivan. I was busy. Yeah. And those are all soprano roles. I mean, not Annie Sullivan, but, uh, you quickly found your footing.

[4:21] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Exactly, exactly. And so then it brought me to going to Carnegie Mellon for my musical theater training. And the summer, I believe it was the summer before Into the Woods, I had done Sweeney Todd in Pittsburgh with Carnegie Mellon rep. I played Joanna. Amazing. And it was an amazing production. Mel Shapiro directed it. It was, um, it really changed me and forever created a Sondheim fan inside of me and was so just absolutely in love with everything that he did and was doing, and then found out that there was going to be this Sondheim show. And I was freelancing with an agent while I was going to school. It was my senior year of college.

[5:09] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Wow. And I got an audition for Into the Woods, and so I flew one way $19 on People's Express. People's Express. Yeah. The bus of the sky to Newark, right? And my parents could pick me up from Newark. They were very close from Maplewood. And we would go in, do the audition, and I kept getting called back and called back. Do you remember where the auditions were?

[5:38] Pamela Winslow Kashani: I think some of them were in 890 Broadway.

[5:41] Ben Rimalower: Yeah, Michael Bennett Studios.

[5:43] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Um, but I think it's a good one. And was it Paul Ford for you?

[5:48] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Yeah, I think so. And it was Paul Gemignani was there for sure. Um, and I think the first preliminary ones were in some just nebulous rehearsal space.

[5:56] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Yeah, with Joanna Merlin.

[5:58] Ben Rimalower: Yes, with Joanna Merlin, yes. And do you remember what you sang for your Into the Woods audition?

[6:05] Pamela Winslow Kashani: I sang Glitter and Be Gay. Perfect. And I was asked to sing a bit of Summertime. This was at my final callback. I knew the song Summertime, but that wasn't what I was, um, putting forward.

[6:21] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Yeah. And so Paul Gemignani asked me to sing a bit of Summertime, and I did. And then I did the monologue. And as I was doing the Rapunzel monologue, I heard this sort of distracting noise in the audience. So we were on the Martin Beck theater stage at that point with a ghost light next to the...

[6:42] Ben Rimalower: Were they already like, um, had they already done that final workshop?

[6:47] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Um, no, no, so they had not done the workshop yet. This was like in April of 1987.

[6:55] Ben Rimalower: Yeah, oh, I love that you know that.

[6:57] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Yeah, and, uh, I did the monologue, and there was this noise coming from the blackness of the seats in front of me, and it was none other than Stephen Sondheim literally cracking up.

[7:13] Ben Rimalower: Did you know it was funny, or did you think you were doing a heartbreaking, heartbreaking moment before that?

[7:19] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Oh no, I was working, I was working the comedy. Um, I got the comedy, and I got the irony of the situation. So I played into that. Amazing. Um, they appreciated it. I could tell audibly, and so I was super happy at the end, and I left and I reached into my pocket for a dime to find the nearest payphone and call my agent, and I told him I think I got it. And he said, "Oh, sweetheart, they saw hundreds of people, don't get your hopes up, blah blah blah." And then sure enough, back in Pittsburgh, I get a phone call, and then they send me the contract.

[8:00] Pamela Winslow Kashani: And you hadn't even graduated.

[8:02] Pamela Winslow Kashani: I mean, my life, I had just graduated out of a musical theater program, and then I got a principal role on Broadway two weeks later.

[8:13] Ben Rimalower: Did everyone hate you in your class?

[8:15] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Yes, yes, everybody hated me, and they had every reason to hate me. It was ridiculous.

[8:27] Pamela Winslow Kashani: After Sunday, which I did see twice. I was able to, you know, go into the city and get my ticket and see it, and absolutely was bowled over by that, um, incredible, incredible piece of art. So, yes, yes, uh, they hated me as they should.

[8:44] Ben Rimalower: Well, they since have come around, but okay.

[8:48] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Good. Okay, so you got the offer then, and that was for the Broadway production and the workshop.

[8:52] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Yes, and a little twist here.

[8:56] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Yeah, I was also cast right around the same time as Kay in the Gershwin musical OK.

[9:04] Pamela Winslow Kashani: It was my fourth year at Carnegie Mellon rep. And it was my first time that I was carrying the show.

[9:12] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Wow. And it was a big deal. And we were running, I think we had about a seven-week run. It was a pretty long run. It was pretty exciting. And I get Into the Woods. And I felt so torn for loyalty to my school and all of that. I didn't want to leave all of that with a bad taste in everybody's mouth. Everybody was already mad at me.

[9:36] Ben Rimalower: Right. Right.

[9:38] Pamela Winslow Kashani: So I turned down the opportunity to get residuals for the end of time.

[9:47] Pamela Winslow Kashani: And to do the workshop. Right. Because the actors who did the workshop had a percentage as like a co-creator of the show. And you wouldn't have that if you didn't do the workshop.

[9:57] Ben Rimalower: But they didn't. I'm surprised.

[9:59] Pamela Winslow Kashani: And you believe they came enough to ask you to chase me.

[10:01] Pamela Winslow Kashani: They were believed. We love you. We want you. We'll do, we're gonna do this. It's fine. You don't have to be part of it then. That's what they did.

[10:09] Ben Rimalower: Were you scared to ask for that?

[10:11] Pamela Winslow Kashani: I mean, I was scared, but I guess I at that time, at that age, I, that was my decision. Looking back, I think that was probably pretty stupid.

[10:22] Ben Rimalower: I mean, did you have a boyfriend in the show or something that you were like, was there some immature reason you were staying?

[10:28] Pamela Winslow Kashani: No, no, just loyalty.

[10:30] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Yeah, just loyalty, and I wanted to feel, you know, I wanted to fulfill my obligation to run the show, and I did, and I missed the workshop. And Kay McClellan played Rapunzel in the workshop. She was Florinda, as you were. And I guess she had already done, they had already decided not to double cast it, but she had done it double cast in San Diego.

[10:55] Pamela Winslow Kashani: So she knew that's correct. She played Rapunzel at the Old Globe, but they were looking to not double cast it. But they just thought, okay, for the workshop, yeah.

[11:06] Pamela Winslow Kashani: And so that's how it all went down. And then I joined the company the first day of official rehearsals for the Broadway show.

[11:15] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Yes, at 890 Broadway.

[11:17] Pamela Winslow Kashani: The first day that I met Bernadette Peters, which, you know, still to this day makes my heart go pit or pat just thinking about the first day that I met Bernadette Peters.

[11:28] Ben Rimalower: Yeah.

[11:29] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Uh, I was signing for my equity card that day. Amazing. And I was going to the bathroom, uh, on a break, and, um, there was Bernadette Peters washing her hands in the ladies' room, and I was literally breathless, didn't know what to say, and I said something absolutely stupid like, "You have beautiful hair."

[11:49] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Uh, yeah, it was quite crazy. And that relationship never changed the whole time that we worked together so intimately. I just adored her.

[12:01] Ben Rimalower: Yeah.

[12:02] Ben Rimalower: Now your material together. I mean, I know that her, um, like was Stay With Me, even in the show at that first rehearsal.

[12:14] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Yes. Stay With Me was in the show, as I recall.

[12:19] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Already there. But not, uh, she didn't have Last Midnight yet. But, um, and then like what, so you said you had done the monologue at the audition, so that scene also was already there.

[12:32] Pamela Winslow Kashani: It was there, but I, you know, the monologue seemed to be in it longer than, and I wish I had the text of it.

[12:40] Pamela Winslow Kashani: I don't have the text of it, but I believe it was a little bit more fleshed out than what ended up in the actual show.

[12:49] Ben Rimalower: Did you have coming? I mean, is this was your Broadway debut and really your first show out of college? Did you have a sense of like, oh, there's going to be a lot of rewrites and we're gonna have a preview period and things might be coming in and out? Where were you prepared for what that was going to be like?

[13:06] Pamela Winslow Kashani: I guess my teachers at school kind of let us know that that was kind of the process. So, yes, I did know that there was going to be previews and all of that. Uh, but our previews went on and on and on. They went longer. I think they were extended twice.

[13:25] Ben Rimalower: Twice, wow.

[13:26] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Yeah, I believe so. I mean, I think it was gonna be four or five weeks, and then it up six weeks, and then it was like six and a half, going on seven. It was a lot of rewriting, especially in the second act. It was um a lot of work to be done. And now that I write my own musicals and have had this experience in other ways, I realize it's just part of the process.

[13:49] Ben Rimalower: Yeah, it's that mad, frantic do everything you possibly can to get it up and get it functioning before you have to freeze it.

[14:00] Pamela Winslow Kashani: And they didn't get in our little world. Had that been written yet at that time?

[14:05] Ben Rimalower: No.

[14:06] Pamela Winslow Kashani: But I did watch a video of you and Bernadette doing it at the 10th anniversary, which I was very happy about.

[14:13] Ben Rimalower: Yes, that was uh just such a joy. What an experience.

[14:17] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Yeah. That it sort of made up for the fact that we didn't get to do it.

[14:21] Ben Rimalower: Yeah, I mean, such a great number. And uh I remember when I first got the London cast recording being so mad that I hadn't gotten to hear you two do it, and then lo and behold, you did.

[14:32] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Um Yes, yes. And so it was written for the London production about six months after we opened. Uh and I do it in my one person show.

[14:43] Ben Rimalower: Which I will get to Green Room 42 and Rapunzel.

[14:48] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Oh, amazing. Oh wow. Well, you've got arranged, I guess. Um, okay. Uh during that period of the um well, just tell me more about the rehearsal process. I mean, it must have all just been so um uh uh intense for you having that be your first job.

[15:09] Pamela Winslow Kashani: It was very, very intense. And I guess unlike the shows that I had done previously and the Carnegie Rep summers that I had had, the thing that was different for me is that it really people were there to work, which that's how it always is, but then after work is done, everybody just dispersed.

[15:29] Ben Rimalower: Yeah, there was no social connection and growing up doing high school theater and all summer camp theater and college theater, you're such a social network when you're in a show.

[15:45] Pamela Winslow Kashani: And I just was kind of taken aback by that, like, huh? Where's everybody going? What's what's going on? And I was in a city on my own without a whole network of friends at that time so that was a little difficult.

[15:52] Ben Rimalower: Where were you staying?

[16:03] Pamela Winslow Kashani: I was living I first uh yeah I got an apartment on 92nd in Riverside I was there and then I moved to Hell's Kitchen on 51st and 9th and I was there for the rest of yourself well I met somebody while I was doing the show um my who turned out to be a boyfriend of four years his name was Steve and I met him I think around the opening night party time like end of November of 87 and we became a hot item.

[16:33] Ben Rimalower: Oh well I'm just glad in the 80s in Hell's Kitchen that you you know you you weren't all by yourself it wasn't sacrifice yet then um yes yes and what but what I mean because there was other young people in the cast I mean I guess I wasn't Ben Wright and Kim Crosby around your age at that time?

[16:33] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Yeah Ben was younger than me Kim was about my age a little older possibly um and everybody was just so lovely and of course Danielle Furland was my dressing room mate.

[17:03] Ben Rimalower: Oh nice so we became kind of chummy and uh we just had a blast together.

[17:09] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Well she was still in high school that time right yeah I think she was like 16 she was quite young yeah and I had just turned I was 21 and I I think I turned 22 when we were in rehearsals.

[17:25] Ben Rimalower: Yeah did you have any regret at that time when you even just the first week of rehearsal that you hadn't done the workshop. Did you feel behind at all?

[17:33] Pamela Winslow Kashani: No. I I didn't. I I mean, I I'm just grateful that they still they didn't fire me. Really? Um I was grateful to be there and I'm I just did my best.

[17:48] Ben Rimalower: Yeah.

[17:49] Pamela Winslow Kashani: It kind of was water under the bridge by the time I came into the room and and did my Rapunzel thing. Um and one cool thing was I think this is the first or second day of rehearsal when we were going through the score. Uh we were singing through the stuff, and Jeminyani said, Pam, they everybody called me Pam. Now I'm Pamela, but everybody called me Pam back then. They said, Pam, uh, can you try this in octave up?

[18:20] Ben Rimalower: So it was written, you know, in like middle B flat.

[18:24] Pamela Winslow Kashani: And then so I put it in octave up.

[18:27] Ben Rimalower: Are you talking about the Rapunzel like vocal?

[18:29] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Obligato, yeah, yeah. Oh my god. I mean, then that and then the minute I did that, that was in.

[18:36] Ben Rimalower: Yeah.

[18:36] Pamela Winslow Kashani: So I apologize to all the rest of the Rapunzels for the end of climb that you have to now have high notes because that's that's how it happened.

[18:44] Ben Rimalower: It wouldn't be it would I mean it's I that's so incredible that that was something that you uh had to bring to it and that wasn't the intention already. It seems so crucial to it.

[18:53] Pamela Winslow Kashani: I mean I know, I know. That's what makes her such a like you know, fairy tale ingenue is that that's right, that innocent quality, right? That that that high voice kind of gives you that.

[19:08] Ben Rimalower: Yeah, yeah, isn't that cool?

[19:10] Pamela Winslow Kashani: That's so cool. Um and uh the I mean, this is the things, and you know, of course you would be the one to tell me that. I'm so happy to hear that from you.

[19:20] Ben Rimalower: Um what about um did now I know that you eventually replaced in the role of Cinderella?

[19:28] Pamela Winslow Kashani: I did. Were you also understudying it from the beginning?

[19:33] Ben Rimalower: I was from the very beginning.

[19:35] Pamela Winslow Kashani: I was the second cover, I believe, for Rapunzel uh for Cinderella rather. And Suzanne Douglas was the first cover. She covered Cinderella and the witch. She was wow, did she have a range? She was phenomenal. And I think she had done it in um she did the witch, I think the first week of the workshop before Betty Buckley could get there.

[19:59] Ben Rimalower: Oh wow. I didn't know that.

[20:02] Pamela Winslow Kashani: But funny not, I didn't know that she was all both parts. That's a lot. Uh yeah, it is a lot. It's a that talk about a range.

[20:09] Ben Rimalower: Yeah.

[20:10] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Uh and then she got a movie. She got tap with Gregory Hines.

[20:14] Ben Rimalower: Oh, cool.

[20:14] Pamela Winslow Kashani: When we were just about getting into previews. And or maybe in the middle of previews, somewhere in like October of eighty-seven. And because that happened, I all of a sudden became the first cover for Cinderella.

[20:29] Ben Rimalower: Now you had never covered anything before, right? I mean, when would you have been in understudy?

[20:34] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Well, I had I had covered in in college at Curky Mellon. I had covered covered things, but see, that's a good training program that they that they had those parts too, because that's real.

[20:47] Ben Rimalower: Oh, that is real.

[20:48] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Yeah, that is serious, especially when you're underrehearsed. Oh my lord, it's just sweating bullets time. But were you scared about that? Or was that fun to think you'd get a chance to do a different part?

[20:59] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Oh, I I thought it was wonderful and fun. Yeah. And Cinderella, of course, has such incredible music.

[21:06] Ben Rimalower: Yeah.

[21:06] Pamela Winslow Kashani: A great trajectory, a great arc. So I was over the moon that I was that I didn't really understand the amount of hours that meant.

[21:16] Ben Rimalower: Right.

[21:17] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Per week.

[21:18] Ben Rimalower: Yeah.

[21:19] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Once you got into it, that was pretty exhausting to do the show eight times a week and then always have understudy rehearsal and always be in the show.

[21:26] Ben Rimalower: Yeah.

[21:26] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Um so I but I was young, I could do it. It was fine.

[21:29] Ben Rimalower: Yeah. Right. So it's almost like you're in previews forever, right? Because you oh yeah, don't it the rehearsal period never because then they use you, it's not just for your sake to be um ready to go on your own role. They're also using you as like the company so they can rehearse replacements in individual parts, right?

[21:48] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Exactly. I was called every freaking time because I was too useful to them. I could even do Rapunzel in understudy rehearsal.

[21:57] Ben Rimalower: Right.

[21:57] Pamela Winslow Kashani: So I I was never uh not called for understudy rehearsal. Uh but I did get to then the lucky accident was that I got I got to go on a lot early on.

[22:10] Ben Rimalower: Oh wow.

[22:10] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Because Suzanne was gone kind of suddenly. And they they put me on in the role very early on. I know I I did it in previews or like right after we opened.

[22:22] Ben Rimalower: Wow.

[22:23] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Um, because everybody was exhausted and people were getting sick and all of that. So Kim was out a few times. So I was able to go on and they were happy with that.

[22:33] Ben Rimalower: Great.

[22:34] Pamela Winslow Kashani: And so I ended up going on intermittently quite a bit. I was the first cover for Cinderella. So I did go on when she when when Kim was on her week vacation and such, I would bump up and then my understudy would come Marin Mazie, ready. R.I.P.

[22:50] Ben Rimalower: Yeah in in the happiest place ever. What an angel.

[22:54] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Um was my understudy, which is a shock to me. I I can't even. Did she come in as the understudy right when Suzanne left?

[23:04] Ben Rimalower: It sounds about right.

[23:06] Pamela Winslow Kashani: It sounds about right. She was with you earlier. She could cover the witch too.

[23:10] Ben Rimalower: Yeah, I think I had heard that as well.

[23:13] Pamela Winslow Kashani: So um uh okay, so then were you in this extended preview period while they're making all these changes. Did you have this confident sense of like this is the guy that wrote Sweeney Todd? This is going to be, you know, this is James Lapine sending the park with George. This is they're gonna get it. Or was there were you nervous? Like, I don't know if this is gonna work or not, you know.

[23:37] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Oh, I was nervous. I didn't know. I had never been through this process with this intensity before. And I could feel the nerves, I could feel the kind of the panic, but our preview audiences were fantastic, and we were just getting that New York intelligent audience that was getting all the jokes, the wonderful jokes, and um also getting the gravity of it as well.

[24:06] Ben Rimalower: Yeah.

[24:07] Pamela Winslow Kashani: So I felt pretty good that we were gonna do all right. And yeah, and then once we opened, it was gosh, what a thrill. Total thrill.

[24:20] Ben Rimalower: I mean, there must have just been like so much press attention and celebrities coming all the time.

[24:25] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Oh yeah. Oh yeah, I met Catherine Hepburn. I mean, oh my lord, these people were coming backstage. Um, it was great. It was great. Dick Cavot was uh played the uh narrator for a while. He was super funny. He had a bunch of famous friends that he would create in backstage.

[24:44] Ben Rimalower: And um, yeah, it was for a New Jersey girl young kid fresh out of college. It was it was an absolute personal fairy tale for sure.

[24:56] Pamela Winslow Kashani: And when when do you remember when you recorded the cast album?

[25:01] Ben Rimalower: Yeah, I think it was February of 88.

[25:03] Pamela Winslow Kashani: So a couple months ago. I have a photo of me and Bernadette Peters singing Stay With Me.

[25:09] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Oh, and uh oh gosh, I just cherish it so much. And I remember Bernadette, God, she's she is such a class act. She always had her cases of Evian wherever she went, yeah, and she had her humidifier and all that stuff. And I remember the day of the recording. She, of course, had her cases of Evian being brought, and she had her humidifier and all that jazz going on. And of course, she sounds phenomenal in the recording. Yeah, oh god. I mean, uh, that's so great. Avion is like so ahead of the curve. I mean, 87, 88, people weren't really so much tuned into like bottled water the way now everybody drinks bottled water, you know. Yeah, it was very surprising to me. I had never had bottled water in my life at that point. Was it plastic bottles or glass bottles? I think she had the big like leader, tall, thin Evian plastic bottles.

[26:08] Ben Rimalower: Yeah.

[26:09] Pamela Winslow Kashani: I love okay. Bear with me one more question of the minutiae of Bernadette's water. Did she drink it from the bottle or from a glass?

[26:18] I never saw her with a bottle off stage.

[26:21] Ben Rimalower: Yeah, that's right. She always had it in her little sippy thing.

[26:26] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Right, right. Yeah. Um, and so was that your first recording during that cast album?

[26:33] I think it was.

[26:35] Ben Rimalower: Yeah, I think it was.

[26:37] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Well, that must have been exciting. Um yeah. Oh just can you imagine the full orchestra there and this gigantic sound stage room and oh board.

[26:48] Ben Rimalower: Yeah.

[26:49] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Um, and uh well, and I guess before I was gonna ask you about the Tony Awards, but Bernadette left even before you got to that point. What when did you know that Bernadette was leaving?

[27:00] Uh probably like the day after she left.

[27:04] Ben Rimalower: Oh, really?

[27:05] Pamela Winslow Kashani: I mean, I I didn't get any fair warning from her or anything. I she just knew you know, she contractually she left. Um, but then I got to the one of the nice things about playing Rapunzel is I really got to know that actor playing the witch really, really intimately and spend great time. So Felicia Rashad was just phenomenal as well. And and we we really um we we she really went there in Stay With Me. So it was um, you know, it wasn't ever gonna be Bernadette, but she she brought her own personal stamp to it and she was great. And I think Nancy Dusseau and I did it a bunch of times.

[27:49] Ben Rimalower: So you were you were still Rapunzel when Nancy came in?

[27:53] I came back and I came Cinderella.

[27:58] Ben Rimalower: I might have been playing Cinderella.

[27:59] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Yeah, I definitely have a play bill with Nancy as the witch and you as Cinderella.

[28:04] Ben Rimalower: Right. So did did you not when when did you leave the show?

[28:08] I left the show 14 months after opening, I guess.

[28:13] Uh so that's like that's like January of 89 or 88.

[28:18] Pamela Winslow Kashani: That's that's exactly right. In January of 89, I went on a vacation, and then two weeks into my vacation, I got a call that Kim Crosby got a movie, and would I be interested in coming back and playing Cinderella full time?

[28:33] Ben Rimalower: Oh, so you so you had not been leaving, you had just been going on vacation.

[28:36] Pamela Winslow Kashani: No, no, no. I was I had left and I was taking like four weeks off. But I had officially left the show.

[28:43] Ben Rimalower: Got you.

[28:44] Pamela Winslow Kashani: And then two weeks later they said, Hey, you want to come back? And I said, Oh yes, I do.

[28:49] Ben Rimalower: How wonderful.

[28:51] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Yeah, yeah, it was great. Had you gotten to see the show ever at that point?

[28:56] Ben Rimalower: Had I seen the show, yeah.

[28:58] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Yeah. Um would did you sit out to watch it or when when I did.

[29:03] I I did sit out to watch it, I think, before I went in to take the role of Cinderella.

[29:09] Um was it amazing to see this thing that you had built like as this fully like a ladway show?

[29:17] Oh, are you kidding? Yeah. I mean, to be a part of it, even now, all these years later, it just and the reverberations of it. The effect that this show has had on so many people's lives.

[29:30] Ben Rimalower: Yeah.

[29:30] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Um, it's staggering. So okay, when you so you went back in as Cinderella. Um, did you then stay for the rest of the run of the show on Broadway?

[29:39] No, I did not.

[29:41] Pamela Winslow Kashani: I when when Kim had finished her film, yeah, she came back into the role and I left.

[29:46] Ben Rimalower: Okay.

[29:47] Pamela Winslow Kashani: And then you came back again to film the video.

[29:50] Ben Rimalower: And I came back again in I believe May of nineteen eighty nine.

[29:54] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Yeah. For that two-week period to do the show for PBS. I mean, you must have thought that your time in the role was over, and it must have been such a wonderful surprise to get that offer.

[30:07] Ben Rimalower: It was, it was just incredible.

[30:10] Pamela Winslow Kashani: So both times I came back were so joyful and exciting and and different than the time before.

[30:19] Ben Rimalower: Yeah.

[30:20] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Um and uh and a bunch of you had left and were coming back just for those two weeks for the video.

[30:27] That's right.

[30:28] Ben Rimalower: And um do did was that your first time filming anything for for the screen?

[30:35] Pamela Winslow Kashani: I had done a bunch of commercials.

[30:38] Ben Rimalower: Oh, okay.

[30:38] Pamela Winslow Kashani: So I had done some some on camera stuff. But uh as far as something on stage like that, I don't think people weren't doing that.

[30:49] Ben Rimalower: No, no, it's become much more common, partly due to the success of Into the Woods that you know really became part of the home video market, and kids bought the VHS and then the Laserdisc and then the DVD and Blu-ray, and then just over the generations, you know.

[31:07] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Um what did you ever do any other productions of Into the Woods after the original Broadway production?

[31:15] I never did, I never did, but I would like to.

[31:19] Ben Rimalower: Yeah, I would have I would have thought you would I wouldn't have been surprised if you said, Oh, I played the Baker's Wife, I played the witch, I played, I mean, even you know, Cinderella or Florinda or anybody. I mean, you know, so you I could see you anywhere in that show, and um certainly now and you know, over the years prior to now.

[31:36] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Um, were there not were there times that you um uh thought about it, you know, when you heard that it was being revived or you know, doing done in a regional theater or anything like that. Did you was that a thing?

[31:48] Yeah, yeah. It's happened a couple of times, but it just didn't work out, or it just wasn't the right time.

[31:57] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Yeah. Um, but I I would definitely be open to either I would think to play The Witch or to play The Baker's Wife would would make sense at this would be a great full circle.

[32:11] Ben Rimalower: Um do you um have you been to see many productions of Into the Woods over the years?

[32:18] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Many, many, many, many.

[32:22] Ben Rimalower: And I have to say, I listened to another one of these podcasts, and you mentioned that your cousin Joshua played Cinderella's father Irvine High. Is that right?

[32:33] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Yeah.

[32:35] Ben Rimalower: I I'm pretty sure I spoke to that cast.

[32:38] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Oh, wow.

[32:40] Ben Rimalower: To see their show.

[32:40] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Yeah. This would have been like 1992 or 1993.

[32:44] Ben Rimalower: Oh, no, no, no. This was this is way, way further in the future. This was in like 2000.

[32:49] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Oh, yeah, no.

[32:50] Ben Rimalower: Joshua's probably already 40 by that point.

[32:52] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Oh, never mind.

[32:53] Ben Rimalower: And I I missed him.

[32:54] Pamela Winslow Kashani: I missed him.

[32:55] Ben Rimalower: But they even in the 90s.

[32:58] Pamela Winslow Kashani: That's amazing. I do love to mentor, and I do get inspired when I'm around young theater enthusiasts. So any opportunity I have, I go and speak to the casts, and they do um, they have great questions, and I realize how bad my memory's getting.

[33:16] Ben Rimalower: I have to write this stuff down.

[33:18] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Yours is pretty good.

[33:19] Ben Rimalower: Yours is pretty strong. I mean, you know, a lot of people were quite a bit older than you at the time of Into the Woods, and now it's been so many decades, and there's so many questions I have that people just don't remember.

[33:31] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Um I'm curious, when did you start branching out so that because for people that don't know in your career now beyond being an actress and singer, you also are a writer, and I think you direct also, is that right?

[33:45] I'm a composer, yeah.

[33:47] Pamela Winslow Kashani: And I'm a lyricist, I'm uh producer, and I have yeah, I produced several Broadway shows with my husband, our company's Apples and Oranges.

[33:58] Ben Rimalower: Oh, great name.

[33:59] Pamela Winslow Kashani: We helped to produce our first show was Hair The Revival.

[34:03] Ben Rimalower: Oh, wonderful.

[34:04] Pamela Winslow Kashani: A Tony nominated revival.

[34:05] Ben Rimalower: You I assume you're a Tony nominated winning actually.

[34:08] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Oh, that hey, excuse me.

[34:10] Ben Rimalower: Well, that was a fabulous production, moved from Central Park, really fantastic.

[34:15] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Am I remembering wrong wrong, or was it at the former Lee Martin Beck?

[34:19] Ben Rimalower: It was look at that.

[34:21] Pamela Winslow Kashani: It was at the Hirschfeld, yes, yes, yes, so amazing.

[34:26] Ben Rimalower: Another full circle there, yeah, yeah.

[34:29] Pamela Winslow Kashani: And then uh we did Memphis.

[34:31] Ben Rimalower: Oh, wonderful.

[34:32] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Also, and in the tradition of Into the Woods filmed for television.

[34:36] Ben Rimalower: Yes, yes, uh-huh, yeah.

[34:39] Pamela Winslow Kashani: And then An American in Paris.

[34:42] Ben Rimalower: Brilliant.

[34:42] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Also, at the palace where I did Beauty and the Beast.

[34:42] Ben Rimalower: Oh, right.

[34:42] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Yes, yes, right.

[34:42] Ben Rimalower: Beauty and the Beast.

[34:50] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Um, and that was um also Ann Hold Ward costumes.

[34:55] Ben Rimalower: Oh, I know.

[34:55] Pamela Winslow Kashani: God, don't you love her?

[34:57] Ben Rimalower: Yes, oh my god.

[34:59] Pamela Winslow Kashani: But she won the Tony rightfully for Beauty and the Beast. I mean, that those costumes, yeah.

[35:04] Ben Rimalower: Unbelievable.

[35:06] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Also very heavy and difficult to move around in.

[35:09] Ben Rimalower: But I understand the feather skirt that I had.

[35:12] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Oh, yeah.

[35:13] Ben Rimalower: Oh Lord.

[35:14] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Absolutely stunning.

[35:16] Ben Rimalower: But I don't I don't think she would have gotten to that beast costume without having done the wolf in Into the Woods.

[35:22] Pamela Winslow Kashani: I mean, that's that's the progression of if she told me the term and I can't remember it now, but it's some kind of a fabric with hair stitched into it that's stretchy and breathes, and I I don't know.

[35:34] Ben Rimalower: It's like very uh, you know, uh uh cutting edge what she was doing with those those pieces.

[35:41] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Wow, I bet.

[35:42] Ben Rimalower: Yeah, I wouldn't have the the faintest idea where to start there.

[35:45] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Yeah, but it's but that's why it looks so cool.

[35:47] Ben Rimalower: I mean, you know, it that's not that's not like a party city like Halloween wolf costume, you know.

[35:54] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Oh no, no, no, no.

[35:57] Ben Rimalower: And uh I think you know about the the anatomically correct costume that first uh graced the stage in previews and had to be altered, yes.

[36:07] Pamela Winslow Kashani: I mean, it's mind-blowing because I remember the first time I saw that video thinking that it was like rather well endowed for like a costume and a show, you know, and to know that that was like not the original like oversized thing that had to be edited is pretty crazy.

[36:23] Ben Rimalower: Oh yeah, it was uh definitely all you could think about when that scene was going on.

[36:28] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Yeah, um is that is it true that like people were like just like breaking because it was so distracting?

[36:35] I don't know because I wasn't on stage at that time, but uh I think back in the wings we were dying, yeah.

[36:42] Ben Rimalower: So that before when you were just playing Rapunzel before you went in because Cinderella's got more to do in act two, but Rapunzel died. Is it 20 minutes into the second act?

[36:52] That's about right, yeah.

[36:53] Pamela Winslow Kashani: But what did you do 22 years old um in your dressing room for the next hour?

[37:00] Well, I couldn't scroll on my phone.

[37:02] Ben Rimalower: No.

[37:03] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Right?

[37:04] No phone, no internet.

[37:06] Yeah, I I would knit.

[37:07] I'm a knitter.

[37:09] Ben Rimalower: Oh, wonderful.

[37:10] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Or I would just um be mischievous backstage and social and visit people and yeah, chillax and all that stuff, yeah.

[37:19] Ben Rimalower: I love it.

[37:20] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Yeah.

[37:21] Ben Rimalower: Um, and um so okay, of all the productions that you've seen of Into the Woods over the years, were there any moments you had watching them that sort of made you realize the impact of the show that you had that you had started originally, you know, what how when did it even maybe it wasn't watching them, maybe it was the movie or the video or something else, but you know, when did you sort of become aware of what a legacy this was that you created part of, you know?

[37:51] Pamela Winslow Kashani: I think very early on.

[37:52] Ben Rimalower: Yeah, I did. Uh there was a time when we were in previews, we were just about to open, and James Lapine took us back to the upstairs lobby of the Martin Beck and gave us an essay exam.

[38:11] Pamela Winslow Kashani: The whole cast.

[38:12] Ben Rimalower: Wow.

[38:13] Pamela Winslow Kashani: And I don't remember the questions, but I think they were like four or five essay questions, and he had us literally write them out and hand them in.

[38:42] Ben Rimalower: And so that makes it so timeless.

[38:45] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Yeah.

[38:46] Ben Rimalower: There's always a threat.

[38:47] Pamela Winslow Kashani: There's always an existential threat, a real threat.

[38:51] Ben Rimalower: Yeah.

[38:51] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Um something that endangers us in ways we can't fully express and we don't know the answers to.

[39:01] Ben Rimalower: And so the fact that they went there, I really applaud them for that.

[39:09] Pamela Winslow Kashani: And I think that's what keeps the show constantly reverberating in people's minds.

[39:16] Ben Rimalower: I know I felt when I saw the revival that it felt the second act which always felt like a departure from the normal fairy tale now felt just like the actual really true life part that just, you know, in the light of the pandemic and everything in the world it just seemed like very real to see these people running around existentially threatened.

[39:40] Pamela Winslow Kashani: You know it didn't feel like a stretch.

[39:44] Ben Rimalower: It felt just like relatable.

[39:46] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Yeah and with all the mental health issues happening with people, um younger, younger people now it's more relevant than ever.

[39:56] Ben Rimalower: I have a 20 year old son and they look at things differently.

[40:00] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Yeah they and they take care of themselves better than we did.

[40:05] Ben Rimalower: They own up to their fears and they get the help that they need and they help each other in ways I don't think we never got that deep.

[40:16] Pamela Winslow Kashani: We were just musical theater kids trying to get a job.

[40:19] Ben Rimalower: Yeah.

[40:20] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Um I think they have it figured out a little better than we do, which gives me hope.

[40:26] Ben Rimalower: Um you have a 20 year old son and do you have do you have any other kids?

[40:31] Pamela Winslow Kashani: I have just the one.

[40:32] Ben Rimalower: He was little were you excited to show him Into the Woods?

[40:36] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Oh yeah.

[40:38] Ben Rimalower: Yeah yeah yeah yeah.

[40:39] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Oh he he was amazed by it.

[40:41] Ben Rimalower: Yeah.

[40:42] Pamela Winslow Kashani: And then I was on Star Trek so that was probably a little more exciting for him.

[40:46] Ben Rimalower: Right.

[40:46] Pamela Winslow Kashani: You know his mom was on the bridge of the Enterprise.

[40:49] Ben Rimalower: That that was cool to him.

[40:51] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Well look at that.

[40:52] Ben Rimalower: It was cool for a little while.

[40:53] Pamela Winslow Kashani: That I mean that's a whole other fan base that that is great for you to be connected to maybe I hate to say it but maybe even wider and larger than the Sondheim fan base.

[41:05] Ben Rimalower: It's true.

[41:06] Pamela Winslow Kashani: It I mean television just has a wider draw and science fiction and all that.

[41:11] Ben Rimalower: Yeah yeah well that's so cool.

[41:14] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Um actually now that I'm thinking about it it's too bad Sondheim never did like a science fiction musical.

[41:19] Ben Rimalower: He would have been the right person for it.

[41:21] Pamela Winslow Kashani: He would have been the perfect person to do that.

[41:23] Ben Rimalower: Yeah.

[41:24] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Yeah.

[41:24] Ben Rimalower: Oh my gosh.

[41:25] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Um now I'm just my heart is filled with regret. Well you are a composer and a lyricist so maybe you can give us a Sondheim science fiction musical maybe your son can consult, you know.

[41:38] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Uh that would be amazing.

[41:40] Pamela Winslow Kashani: I have been told that I am a little Sondheimy in my writing.

[41:45] Pamela Winslow Kashani: But I wouldn't say I'm super Sondheimy but I do I do like my interior rhymes and um my play on words and like Sondheim I enjoy word puzzles and things like that.

[41:57] Ben Rimalower: So my brain kind of goes in that direction.

[42:00] Ben Rimalower: So when are is any of your um music on Spotify or people can listen to it or Apple Music or anything like that?

[42:08] Pamela Winslow Kashani: It's let's see.

[42:09] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Winter Lights is my latest, and it is going to be live again in December.

[42:16] Ben Rimalower: Oh, wonderful.

[42:17] Pamela Winslow Kashani: In Orange County, California at a science center, believe it or not.

[42:20] Ben Rimalower: It's a theater inside a science center, but it's a science-based musical.

[42:25] Pamela Winslow Kashani: A science-based music.

[42:26] Pamela Winslow Kashani: It's a family-friendly, STEM-loving, uh young women supporting in STEM musical.

[42:34] Ben Rimalower: Yeah.

[42:35] Pamela Winslow Kashani: How cool.

[42:36] Pamela Winslow Kashani: I've got to send my c my other my my cousin that played, I can't believe I'm talking about them.

[42:36] Pamela Winslow Kashani: My cousin that played Cinderella's father at Irvine High.

[42:44] Pamela Winslow Kashani: His sister lives in Rancho Santa Margarita and has two teenage daughters.

[42:47] Ben Rimalower: So they should go see.

[42:48] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Oh amazing.

[42:49] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[42:50] Pamela Winslow Kashani: We'd love to see them there.

[42:51] Ben Rimalower: Yeah.

[42:52] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Oh well, I'll get I'll get the info from you.

[42:54] Pamela Winslow Kashani: We will get the album out probably later this year.

[42:58] Pamela Winslow Kashani: We have it all recorded.

[42:59] Pamela Winslow Kashani: I just haven't mixed it yet.

[43:00] Ben Rimalower: Oh yeah.

[43:01] Ben Rimalower: Well see, that's takes forever.

[43:03] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Creator's work is never done.

[43:06] Ben Rimalower: But uh, well, everyone should come see you uh in New York at the Green Room 42, and they can hear you sing our little world, and I assume lots of other great songs tell stories.

[43:17] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Thank you.

[43:17] Ben Rimalower: Yeah, October 20th is gonna be a great time.

[43:21] Ben Rimalower: Yeah, this this will be out before then for sure.

[43:24] Ben Rimalower: Um well, it is so great to talk to you, Pamela, and this is so fascinating.

[43:28] Ben Rimalower: I mean, really, I said the same thing to Danielle that just the having the young people who are just like sponges in the process, and in fairness, we're just younger and are younger now.

[43:39] Pamela Winslow Kashani: It's so great to be.

[43:40] Ben Rimalower: I mean, just every question I asked you, you just had an answer to, you know, it's wonderful.

[43:46] Pamela Winslow Kashani: I love it.

[43:47] Pamela Winslow Kashani: I love it.

[43:47] Pamela Winslow Kashani: I made a little list of things to remember to tell you.

[43:50] Ben Rimalower: Oh, can I love to know the list?

[43:53] Pamela Winslow Kashani: I told you most of them.

[43:56] Pamela Winslow Kashani: The one, the two things I didn't tell you about were the times when the set fell apart.

[44:01] Ben Rimalower: Oh, yeah, please.

[44:02] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Let's hear about that.

[44:04] Pamela Winslow Kashani: So in previews, the tower, well, to go back a minute here.

[44:10] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Yeah, yeah.

[44:11] Pamela Winslow Kashani: They were gonna build a full length tower, full height tower under the Martin Beck stage.

[44:19] Ben Rimalower: But they found out that there was a river under Eighth Avenue.

[44:22] Pamela Winslow Kashani: They were gonna drill a hole in the go back down.

[44:27] Ben Rimalower: Right.

[44:28] Pamela Winslow Kashani: So they had to be creative.

[44:30] Pamela Winslow Kashani: So they built this tower that I don't know if you remember it, but it would telescope, it would twirl and it would rise at the same time, and then it would like undo and lock where the window would be facing front.

[44:43] Ben Rimalower: And it actually looked very cool doing that, right?

[44:46] Pamela Winslow Kashani: It was not just an across.

[44:49] Ben Rimalower: And what a launch to get in the basement, you know, get into the little module there at capsule and then be, you know, transported up on the stage.

[44:58] Pamela Winslow Kashani: It was absolutely great, great to do, but it kept breaking down.

[45:03] Pamela Winslow Kashani: I mean, it was sometimes it would twirl and then stop at the wrong place, and then the window would be facing upstage, or sometimes it would like snap and it would like get a skew, and then uh the curtain would have to go down.

[45:16] Ben Rimalower: And I mean, this happened over and over and over again.

[45:19] Pamela Winslow Kashani: So just wanted to say that that was just so what were the workarounds?

[45:24] Ben Rimalower: I mean, I know they talk about women that played Alphabet and Wicked that in some shows that are called the no-fly shows that Alphabet will just have to do defying gravity, like standing on the stage.

[45:35] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Um how did you cope with that?

[45:39] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Yeah, um, they they couldn't really do that with Rapunzel.

[45:42] Pamela Winslow Kashani: I had to be in the tower, yeah.

[45:44] Pamela Winslow Kashani: So they literally had to take the curtain down, you know, and I'm there with Bernadette and the crew guys, you know, we're just hanging out.

[45:52] Pamela Winslow Kashani: We're like, oh we gotta fix this thing and then they would they would do it.

[45:55] Pamela Winslow Kashani: I I don't remember it ever not happening where we would just go back and redo it again and it would work.

[46:02] Ben Rimalower: Got it.

[46:02] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Yeah.

[46:03] Ben Rimalower: And is the people talked about you mentioned um when Dick Cavett had come in as the narrator for a short time that he would just go out and like sort of do his Dick Cavett like schmoozing thing.

[46:14] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Oh yes.

[46:20] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Oh yes definitely yes Rapunzel tower creak and then Dick Cavett doing his spiel.

[46:26] Ben Rimalower: Exactly exactly and then there was another um ill-fated afternoon when Bernadette and I were upstage left ready to do stay with me and it starts with the music starting and I scream because I scream 56 times a week I might add uh I don't know why I screamed that much but I guess that was did you have the training to not hurt your uh voice in the scream somehow yes I mean yeah just from the diaphragm and you know not not tension and whatever I screamed I I don't I wouldn't want to scream now like that I wouldn't risk it but uh then I was just fearless and I just that's a good scream.

[46:26] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Oh well thank you so much it's pretty blood curdling.

[46:26] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Yeah.

[46:26] Ben Rimalower: Yeah exactly yeah yeah so I would scream and then um Bernadette would drag me by the hair from upstage left all the way down to downstage center where there was this just one pool of light, you know, she'd throw me into the light and then she'd start singing.

[47:26] Ben Rimalower: So one afternoon I scream, Bernadette pulls me by the hair, and the woods were these panels, you know, they they kind of moved.

[47:35] Pamela Winslow Kashani: There was a cue, and then the they would like they were on these um these tracks, and they would just go back and forth and and shift and make it make the scene different.

[47:45] Ben Rimalower: And they were run by a computer in 1987.

[47:48] Pamela Winslow Kashani: So one day she's dragging me, and literally there's nowhere to get through the trees, right?

[47:57] Ben Rimalower: So then she drags me again and I scream, and then we find ourselves we're center stage and there's nowhere to go downstage.

[48:04] Pamela Winslow Kashani: So she dragged me again, I screamed again, and then we are like practically upstage stage left, and we realize there's nowhere, and then we're starting to crack up.

[48:13] Ben Rimalower: And then she like pulls me off stage, and the curtain comes down.

[48:16] Pamela Winslow Kashani: We're like, um, I guess that scene's not gonna happen tonight.

[48:21] Ben Rimalower: Yeah, no, they had to reset the whole thing and oh my god, do the computer and go back to up upstage left and and wow do it again.

[48:31] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Yeah, and uh how did she actually pull you by your hair?

[48:35] Ben Rimalower: How did that work?

[48:36] Pamela Winslow Kashani: She did.

[48:36] Pamela Winslow Kashani: I mean, she sort of I would it was sort of like sword fighting on stage.

[48:42] Pamela Winslow Kashani: She would pull and I would my body would go with her, yeah.

[48:45] Pamela Winslow Kashani: But she wasn't actually causing me pain and ripping my wig off.

[48:50] Ben Rimalower: Yeah.

[48:52] Pamela Winslow Kashani: And um and what about like the like when like he would climb your hair or she would climb your hair?

[48:58] Ben Rimalower: Um, or like when the baker's wife cuts it.

[49:01] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Like, like is it actually attached to your head during those moments?

[49:04] Pamela Winslow Kashani: It is not.

[49:05] Pamela Winslow Kashani: So, in those two moments, I was in the tower, yeah.

[49:08] Pamela Winslow Kashani: And my wig was behind me and draped, so it looked like the hair was my connected to me, but it was connected to a really strong hook on under the window, and then would just go over the window there.

[49:24] Ben Rimalower: And so that was the illusion.

[49:25] Pamela Winslow Kashani: And then she would yank it, and I would just, of course, my body would pretend.

[49:30] Ben Rimalower: Yeah.

[49:30] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Oh, that's so fun.

[49:32] Ben Rimalower: Yeah.

[49:32] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Yeah.

[49:33] Ben Rimalower: Cool.

[49:34] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Well, I'm glad you added that for me.

[49:35] Ben Rimalower: Thank you.

[49:36] Pamela Winslow Kashani: And thank you for making a list so we didn't miss it.

[49:38] Ben Rimalower: Oh, yeah, no worries.

[49:40] Pamela Winslow Kashani: Yeah.

[49:41] Ben Rimalower: All right.

[49:41] Ben Rimalower: Well, this has been so great, Pamela.

[49:43] Ben Rimalower: Um, thank you so much.

[49:50] Ben Rimalower: Thank you for listening to Giants in the Sky how Sondheim and Lapine went Into the Woods on the Broadway Podcast Network.

[49:57] Ben Rimalower: Look out for episode 28 with Jana Murray, the original stage manager.