This transcript was automatically generated and might contain errors.

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

[0:08] Ben Rimalower: Today's guest, Johnna Murray, the original stage manager.

[0:12] Ben Rimalower: Once upon a time.

[0:20] Ben Rimalower: Johnna Murray stage managed the original production of Into the Woods from its early readings and workshops through the Old Globe and on to Broadway. She previously worked with James Lapine as production stage manager on March of the Falsettos and assisting him on Sunday in the Park with George on Broadway and at Playwrights Horizons, where she did double duty, playing the role of the waitress and understudying Frida. She also stage managed William Finn's America Kicks Up Its Heels, in addition to numerous other off-Broadway shows in both commercial and nonprofit theaters. For the Eugene O'Neill Theater Center's National Playwrights Conference, Johnna served in several roles from administrative assistant to managing director.

[1:05] Ben Rimalower: First, I have to thank you so much for talking to me because I have I've been dreaming about having you. It really has been so actor-heavy, this podcast. And um I obviously am excited to talk to them all too, but I really need some of the people like behind the table to give me another side of things. And of course, Lapine was my first chat, so I started off strong in that direction, but it's really just veered off into actor land. So I'm thrilled for this.

[1:39] Johnna Murray: Thank you for inviting me.

[1:41] Ben Rimalower: Thank you for accepting. And um, I guess I would just love to hear your entire experience. I think you worked with Lapine and Sondheim on Sunday in the Park with George before this. Is that right?

[1:54] Johnna Murray: Yes, I did. I actually met Lapine on March of the Falsettos at Playwrights Horizons. Talk about a fairy tale moment. I had an interview with James and with a man named Bill Camp, who was the manager and is still my husband. Uh and I worked with James throughout the eighties up until the nineties when Falsettos went to Broadway. So by the time we did the first read-through of what was to become Into the Woods, more or less, I had done March of the Falsettos at Playwrights Horizons. I went away and did Kingdoms on Broadway while they were at West Side Arts. I understudied Maria Tucci and stage managed. Whoa. If that's not two jobs, I don't know. But um essentially Equity said, "That's two jobs."

Oh, okay. Yeah. Just give me one. It's fine. Um but and then I came back and did Falsettos in Los Angeles and uh Midsummer in Central Park with James. Oh right. And Sunday in the Park with George in all of its incarnations. Uh oh, I understudied Nancy Opal when we were at Playwrights Horizons because otherwise they had no way to pay me. So I said, okay. And I played the waitress for the week that we did act two. So I had done a variety of things with James.

[3:09] Ben Rimalower: Clearly. So you were sort of on the assistant director slash stage manager track, kind of teetering based on like employment opportunities.

[3:19] Johnna Murray: I sh well I was mostly stage managing. I did some acting, um, and I assisted James. I had worked I started out when I was about eighteen as an intern at the National Playwrights Conference. So I always had an interest in new material. Um and I had done some singing. I had sung at Jan Wallman's on Cornelia Street, I had directed a production of She Loves Me in Ohio. This a little that, but um March of the Falsettos was really the first musical I did in New York.

[3:51] Ben Rimalower: Well, that's a pretty exciting and influential one to start off with. Um wonderful. And uh so uh and then did you do other shows with Lapine in between March of the Falsettos and Sunday in the Park?

[4:06] Johnna Murray: Well I did Midsummer Night's Dream. Oh, that was before Sunday in the Park, excuse me. That was before Sunday in the Park. It was between those and Sunday in the Park.

[4:15] Ben Rimalower: And so what was the difference going from those experiences into a Sondheim collaboration?

[4:24] Johnna Murray: Well, Steve had an enormous amount of experience and a very distinct and demanding work process for himself. Um so it was different in that regard. I had I don't remember not knowing who Stephen Sondheim was. I knew who he was by the time I was two in the nineteen fifties, you know. Uh I had of course gone to college and so I had played Marta and I had done side by side and you know, this not not side by side, but a review of his material. So I was extremely familiar with his material. Um and James was not. Uh so that was very interesting um being next to someone who came from such a different perspective on the whole thing. Um, Steve is brilliant. He was he was truly brilliant. He never thought he was finished.

I think James included my comment about that in the book. Uh yeah, he never thought he was finished. He always had more. Uh he killed his darlings, as the writers say. He wrote wonderful material that was either included only in a reading or never included. Uh and that was very interesting. And he and Lapine had a really excellent relationship.

[5:33] Ben Rimalower: Yeah.

[5:36] Johnna Murray: Um they had talked about a lot of things with Woods, um with everything, I'm sure, but certainly with Into the Woods. Um they wanted they knew they wanted to do a quest. Yeah. And in early conversations, I believe Steve was talking about things like Dungeons and Dragons, and James said fairy tales. And clearly they listened to each other and they found a way to fulfill some of the notions of each of theirs in collaboration.

[6:07] Ben Rimalower: So brilliant. So tell you know, one thing that I've just been endlessly, I mean, I could really go back with you to that first meeting at Playwrights Horizons. I mean, I I could I you know, if I had 19 hours, I'm there's nothing I'm not curious about in your experience. And beginning with the fact that you grew up knowing Sondheim, because I'm surprised by how many of the people didn't. No, but I mean knowing his work. Were your parents like big theater aficionados?

[6:34] Johnna Murray: Well, my father actually was contracted to write the theme song for the movie Bonjour Tristesse in the late fifties, uh by Arthur Lawrence. Wow. Then paid him out of his contract and gave the title song to Steve.

[6:51] Ben Rimalower: So amazing.

[6:52] Johnna Murray: How did your dad's my first story about Arthur Lawrence?

[6:55] Ben Rimalower: No, no, he's not our he's not our people, you know.

[7:00] Johnna Murray: Okay, but he according to uh to him, he he was uh concerned that Steve was, you know, doing this ill-fated show called West Side Story, and he thought he should throw him some more work.

[7:12] Johnna Murray: So the first time I was really, really aware of Sondheim's work um was indeed again because I had I did have a lot of theater people in my family. Yeah I was in elementary school with the Guilford kids, so obviously it's just this is Jack and Madeline's children.

[7:30] Ben Rimalower: Yes.

[7:31] Johnna Murray: Yes.

[7:31] Johnna Murray: Um those Guilford kids. And I grew up in Greenwich Village. You know, we all we all knew all the shows.

[7:37] Ben Rimalower: Oh, cool.

[7:38] Johnna Murray: We all went to all the shows and all of the You really were Martha.

[7:41] Johnna Murray: No, I guess Martha comes from the director called Karen Gustafson who was playing the auditions for company. My uncle Jonathan Lewis, uh Jonathan Lucas, he who won the uh the Obie for Paris and the original Golden Apple, that guy.

[7:54] Ben Rimalower: Oh wow.

[7:55] Johnna Murray: He was a good friend of Karen's and um we went over there and she actually played us some of the material, which I'm sure she wasn't supposed to do, but um that was the first time I realized that I needed to hear more.

[8:09] Ben Rimalower: And I mean it wasn't much more than ten years later that you were really on the inside of that. Um so uh tell me uh when was the first time that you knew that they were talking about this fairy tale Dungeons and Dragons quest fusion project?

[8:27] Johnna Murray: I don't know. I know that the first time I actually met Steve was the first read-through of the first the very first read-through of Sunday in the Park.

[8:35] Johnna Murray: Oh, yeah. And I conventionally with these and many other readings of things that happened and things that didn't read the stage directions.

[8:42] Johnna Murray: Yeah. Um and we hit it off right away, so that was all fine. Um, Into the Woods. I you know, I I try struggle to remember what order things happened in. But I worked a lot. I mean, I didn't just work with them. I did uh America Kicks Up Its Heels with the six or seven shows at Manhattan Theater Club. I worked at the Clurman, I worked at the Phoenix I um at uh the public. I d I just worked all the time. I worked all the time.

[9:10] Ben Rimalower: So and um so the first thing on the Into the Woods document I was working for Lincoln Center. I was doing uh um Andy Wok's production of Winter's Tale.

[9:22] Johnna Murray: Oh wow when we did the first read-through of of Woods.

[9:26] Ben Rimalower: So and so this is the this is the read-through of Into the Woods that I have struggled so hard to get any information about. I mean what I have I know Christine Estabrook was there. I had understudied her in Lady House Blues amazing I did get to talk to you but and I know yes I heard I I've heard the ones who've done Oh I love you for that.

[9:47] Johnna Murray: So um you're my partner in this struggle. I'm a stage manager I can't help myself.

[9:52] Ben Rimalower: Um so but I and I have a copy of it here.

[9:57] Johnna Murray: Oh I do not have a cast list.

[10:01] Ben Rimalower: Well let's piece together what you can I can tell you that there were some very interesting things in there that did not remain like Milky White actually spoke.

[10:10] Johnna Murray: Wow.

[10:12] Johnna Murray: And I think you've heard a little bit about Rumpelstiltskin I think Joyce mentioned that Rumpelstiltskin and and the pigs um just that they existed. Uh so the wolf the wolves were there. I think the wolves were there clear through the Old Globe production.

[10:27] Ben Rimalower: Yeah that sounds I know that there was the um this is not really telling you about the first read-through, but from the workshop I know that that um they had that little business with the the two wolves speaking with but that did exist back in this original one.

[10:45] Johnna Murray: Uh there's an exchange. Rumpelstiltskin actually talked to a lot of people. Um with the wolf about the the oh no, the wolves had their scene with the little pigs, and uh he also later talks with the witch and with other characters, so he was there was a lot of Rumpelstiltskin.

[11:05] Ben Rimalower: So the witch was in the first incarnation.

[11:08] Johnna Murray: Yes.

[11:09] Ben Rimalower: Because nobody has been able to tell me who read the witch in that reading.

[11:14] Johnna Murray: At one point I know I had, and I don't know where it is, I had this is not the the very first non-singers reading, but the the workshop reading. Um I did have a list of the people who were in it at some point, and I know that there was no witch listed.

[11:30] Ben Rimalower: Interesting, because I know at the playwrights workshop in 86 that Betty Buckley was the witch, and that was when it was um Joanna as the baker's wife, Ray Gill as the baker, and that was when Nancy Opal uh and Janet Schneider were the stepsisters and uh Mary Darcy and Howard McGillen.

[11:51] Johnna Murray: Yeah. Right. So we had the uh the Drood people there, and we also have uh Joy and Ray and BJ Ward was doing the line the later Merle Louise did. They were all with on Merrily with us.

[12:01] Johnna Murray: Oh I did Merrily with them before somewhere in the middle.

[12:06] Ben Rimalower: Oh, there's that. But that the but this first non-singers reading, the Christine Estabrook reading.

[12:13] Johnna Murray: I I my understanding is that that was in 85 at Playwrights.

[12:17] Ben Rimalower: It was.

[12:18] Johnna Murray: It was uh the script that I have is dated 111185.

[12:23] Ben Rimalower: That that wow, I can't believe that my guess was right.

[12:26] Johnna Murray: Oh, it does um and then it says it says right at the top playwrights horizons one day only. And Danielle Ferlin remembers having done that, and um she thinks that Robert Sean Leonard was Jack because she remembers when he she saw him again in the workshop that they'd already known each other.

[12:45] Johnna Murray: That's definitely possible. I I remember Bobby Leonard from the workshop, of course.

[12:49] Johnna Murray: Yeah, yeah. The Jackson, not the not the giants in the sky that eventually came to the different one came to that point. I think that's the version that John Cameron Mitchell recorded in those demos that were done later. It's more it's more pattery.

[13:03] Johnna Murray: Uh or you know, less it was very difficult song.

[13:06] Ben Rimalower: Yeah, yeah.

[13:07] Johnna Murray: Um so okay, so we're am I gonna let go of the we're gonna be able to think of any of the other.

[13:12] Johnna Murray: I mean, is it possible that Betty Buckley was the witch in that reading?

[13:19] Johnna Murray: It's possible. Or I I really don't, I mean, I honestly do not. I usually had to a little montage of all of us saying I don't remember.

[13:27] Ben Rimalower: I don't know I know, and you know, I went to the Yale library and looked through all of James's papers there like three times. I took the train three different times, thinking, oh well, there was that folder of stuff from the Into the Woods movie scripts. Maybe there's something accidentally shoved in there. I mean, I looked and looked, I learned more about the Falsettos movie that never happened than I ever dreamed I would know, but I still couldn't find the answers about the playwrights reading the the non-singing reading of Into the Woods in 85.

[13:58] Johnna Murray: Ira doesn't know, but Ira was the one that was able to tell me Christine Estabrook, and Ira thinks that he has archives somewhere that maybe he'll be able to get to, but he no he didn't know offhand.

[14:11] Johnna Murray: Right. And then um my only I'm hope I might try to go and look through the Sondheim papers um at the uh I think Library of Congress they are. Um because I'm just so curious now. I don't know what's gonna happen. This is my quest. I'm gonna find the answer and nothing's gonna change in my life, John. I have not looked because I never play cassettes anymore, but I have not looked through my pile of cassettes, so I will let you know who it sounds like.

[14:39] Ben Rimalower: And would you recall that when you it was the actors were merely reading the script, but was Sondheim singing any music in that reading?

[14:46] Johnna Murray: Yes, and lifty woo to the spit here. So there were I'm pretty sure it would have been Steve doing this. Assuming that this i is the script that it says it is. Uh I know I have heard him do it. Yeah. And uh which included quite a lot. I mean, it was uh I wish my son were not a fool, Bugs on her dogs, Into the Woods and Down the Dell, the Path is Straight, I know it will. Uh so all of that was in there there. A lot of the opening number is there. Uh and um the Bean song is there. The justifies the beans. No, uh The Witches Song. Oh, the the r like the rap, yeah. Rap is there. Yeah. W and it was wonderful hearing Steve do that. That was thrilling. And I don't think there's any music at all after that. Uh whether he did some underscoring or not, I don't know, but I I don't think so.

[15:44] Ben Rimalower: Fascinating. Um, and do I mean, do you remember your own feeling uh about this piece in that moment?

[15:52] Johnna Murray: I thought it was a terrific idea to combine the fairy tales and I of course was of the belief that Steve Sondheim can do anything. Yeah. I love LePine's dark humor. The fact that and there are some things in there there are some of the earlier versions, Cinderella wasn't quite as nice. Oh. She was I mean, she was still nice, but she went after the she wanted to have a festival and the steward wasn't cooperating, and she would say you know things to him, and the stepmother would come and say, Well, we now need a new steward. So there was a whole so that was there, and little Red Riding Hood, of course, maintained some of her edginess. But what um what this is actually there's there was a a saying now that's this is from the workshop, not from that original reading.

But there was um we'll have to give her someone. Yeah. Oh, right. That song, the witch trying to convince them to uh Yes, and so the witch says we'll have to give her someone. Well, maybe how about the baby? The baby, the baby. And then the next verse is we'll have to give her the brat, meaning little red riding. Yeah. Ends with Little Red Riding Hood says saying to the witch, we ought to give her you. Yes. So uh there's uh there was that edginess was always there with with little red, but very outspoken. Your virgins as well. And uh the um, you know uh your when the baker says your grandma your mother your grandmother's gone, she says, No, she's right there. And he he says the baker says, No, no, I mean I mean she's dead.

Oh, oh well, and little Red Riding Hood goes to pull the the sheet back, and he says, Don't do don't do that to her. So there was a lot of darkness in these tales, which I thought made it fascinating. And some of it remained, and some of it was effectively musicalized. You could tell by the the tone of the music. Totally. There was darkness there without having to hit it quite so much on the on the head. So they really again, you know, it was a brilliant collaboration.

[17:55] Ben Rimalower: That's such an interesting thing that you said. Jana, I'm already loving Talkati so much. I can't even I can't even safe, though. Um, I had a great remorse. I had a great chat with Doug Sills uh two days ago, and he talked about that the very first time he heard the wolf's music, it just produced such strong feelings in him, and he felt that there was just such like deep uh w reservoirs of feeling and and darkness and and passion and and just all there was so much there, and I and I think i in a way it I understood that in the same way that I understand what you're talking about, how they musicalized that that kind of darkness in the fairy tales. That feels really true to me.

[18:40] Johnna Murray: Yes, and I it was um such a gross thing for for me and for James. I th I I feel safe. But this back on Falsettos. My mother called me one morning when we were in rehearsal, and she said there's a piece about March of the Falsettos in the Times. You're really someone. And I I said, Oh, well, thanks, Mom. And uh, she said, Go read it and then call me back. So I go to read it, and it it nowhere does my name appear. My name didn't even appear in programs sometimes, you know. So I they didn't they didn't really know I was there, I was in the wings. Um, but it actually said James was quoted as saying, Someone asked I asked someone what a measure was. And that was my mother's joke, is you're really someone now.

That's hilarious. Um, thanks very much. But uh, yeah, so it was a huge growth pattern for for I think in seeing how and I I had done enormous amount of work. I mean, I had done several seasons at the National Playwrights Conference, starting out as an 18 year old who told they should hire to to becoming Lloyd's assistant. Um a job that was later called managing director of times have changed since the 70s. So um it wasn't just working with writers, it it's the the way music feeds in, the way under the brilliance of the underscoring and all of that. Um I don't think I ever had any doubt that it was gonna be. But I had also done Sunday in the park with them, and I'm the sucker who cries the first time she hears the lyric. I'm I'm you know, having trouble working because I'm I can't see through my tears, so um I mean there are Louise and there are George's, and I'm already crying, you know.

[20:21] Ben Rimalower: Well, uh I mean, as well as you should be. I mean, obviously you were someone who was really in the sweet spot of kind of you know, the ideal audience for this uh work. Um and and clearly you followed your passion in your career choices because this spoke to you so so, you know, meaningfully. But was there the sense then in the in that time in the process in that first reading, not just in terms of your experience, but did you feel like everyone knows this is going to be something? Or was there did it feel like they were fighting against uh impressions?

[20:57] Johnna Murray: Well, many of us in the room came with a history. Yeah. On Sunday in the park with George, there was an enormous amount of tension, and um I actually some of the crew on Sunday in the park was the same crew I'd been on the road with on Kingdoms on the way into Broadway. Oh wow I knew them very well and then one of them called me the mole and he'd he would tell me he said if you tell me something that was really good that you saw tonight then I will tell you what they've been saying back here. And there was a lot of tension in the cast they thought it wasn't working and um you're talking about at playwrights in Sunday in the park not no I'm no I'm talking about on Broadway. Wow. Before it opened I think there was a lot of tension there and I was convinced that you know this is the show that my grandchildren are gonna remember.

Yeah. I was just absolutely so sure that it was that brilliant um and I I have to say I still feel that way. I you were right you were right on that I I so but there was a lot of tension and then Marrily which was one of the most I mean I say that's having worked on beloved shows I adore all the falsetto's casts all of them um but uh the Marrily experience was so magical. You're talking about At La Hoya at La Hoya with James. We all got along so well the uh there was a lot of excellent work done some of it worked better than others I have a very funny Steve story from that actually um but uh we really thought we were gonna be bringing it back to New York we uh aura not goodbye when we left quite sure we'd all be seeing each other again and so we went into into the woods with with both sides of having seen both sides of that coin.

Yeah we want to hear that it might work and it might not I I don't know. I don't know that it was entirely clear. I think everybody was a hundred percent behind it. Most of us thought it was gonna work. Yeah. Um, but you never know. I you never know.

[22:57] Ben Rimalower: Let's say I want to hear that Steve's story, but I want you just to tell me first if my impression is right that I got, which was that um the expectation of Marilee moving from La Jolla to Broadway, or at least I guess potentially there was an off-Broadway budget drawn up. But that what that was one thing I found in Le Pine's archives was uh Schubert budgets for an off-Broadway transfer from La Jolla. But um, but if that uh was there the sense that Into the Woods was going to happen later after Merrilly in New York, and then when Merrill and New York f fell apart and didn't come in, that instead into the woods got sort of fast tracked. Is that is that does that jibe with how you remember it?

[23:45] Johnna Murray: Uh I don't remember discussing Into the Woods at all while we were doing Marilee.

[23:51] Ben Rimalower: Ah, okay.

[23:52] Johnna Murray: Um we I think we were back from Marilee when we did that first reading, actually. Were we not? Do I have my dates wrong? Uh you said 1185. So yeah, that sounds right. Yeah, we were already back from I don't remember thinking about woods while we were doing Marilee. But um, okay, so let me rephrase the question. I guess that maybe you've answered it, but is it possible that that first reading wouldn't have happened if that had been, you know, pre-production time for Merrille?

[24:24] Johnna Murray: Yes, if they've been busy doing something else, I suppose so it would have happened later, or who knows?

[24:30] Ben Rimalower: Yeah, interesting. Um it's so I I've talked about this so much. I don't know if anybody else finds it as interesting as I do. But I'm I because I so much of the lore about the Sondheim Le Pine collaboration is born out of the failure of the original Broadway Marrily and like Sondheim turning to a different collaborator and the nonprofit world and a wholly different approach to the art form in general. And then so it's so interesting to me to think about actually Into the Woods also coming from a Marily like misfire, you know. Um but anyway, now Marilee's coming back. Um but okay, so moving on. Uh thank you for indulging me in that. Tell me your funny Sondheim story from it's just out, you know, I was constantly asking them to give me the music, and I Sunday in the park with George, I was in a very different job, and Maddie Pinkus would give me the music to check the lyrics before she sent it on to Sondheim.

So I was used to having music in my hands, and as a stage manager, it is remarkably hard to get your hands on the music. So sure enough, there we are on Marrily, and I have no music, so I'm literally writing counts into my script, you know.

[25:30] Johnna Murray: Wow. So it would say uh whatever it is. Wow. Right? So I count it because Wendell Harrington had 4,000 million gazillion slides going. And of course there was scenery and lighting and this and that and the other thing. So sure enough, I'm sitting there one day, it's half hour, and I hear the band playing something that I had not heard. I mean, all familiar songs, but an arrangement that I had not heard. So click, click, click, and I call down and I said, Um, what is that you're playing? And they said it's new music for the curtain call. I said, You do understand that I have about 50 cues in the curtain call. So, could I have the music? Well, we don't have any music for you. I said, Well, how are we going to put it in if I don't know what the music is and I have all these cues to put in?

Is there anyone who knows the music who could help me here? And they sent Steve up. Well, to call the show. He's dying at four minutes, where it's still at we still have half an hour to go. He literally sang it and I wrote it down with dummy lyrics and counts. And I we'd every couple of verses I'd stop and I'd say, okay. So I have yesterday is gone, two, three, four, one, slow and two, slow, and and then it would go into another song, and I would write more dummy lyrics. And I wrote the whole thing. And I said, Okay, well, I'm gonna put this in, but don't be surprised if there's some glitches. And I I um told the stage managers on the side, I said, I'm going to cue you when to send the actors because I'm not gonna have them crashing into scenery because it didn't go at the speed I expected or something.

Yeah. So terrifying. But we we did put it in and Sondheim came back to me afterwards and he said, Could I come up and listen to you call the show sometime? Because that was the weirdest thing. That was just the I said, Well, thank you for singing it for me, because otherwise it could not have gone in. I mean, really.

[27:23] Ben Rimalower: Well, what a funny thing, right? And I I may I don't understand why stage managers of musicals don't read music or are expected, I mean aren't expected to and are not given the opportunity to if they can, but there you are. So anyway, well, I'm sure he very much appreciated that from you. I mean that well, uh, and also just to think that it was all done by hand, like so I never think of this happening with people of this caliber, but yeah, everybody gets called in when the Yeah. Truly tough get going. So, okay, now the next thing that happens after this Into the woods, uh actors only sort of no no singing reading at uh Playwrights Horizons in November of eighty five is this playwrights workshop in J May and June of 86.

[28:14] Johnna Murray: May to June of nineteen eighty-six. Um, I know I was on contract for three weeks. I don't know if the actors were on for two or three. Yeah. I don't I don't remember. But uh this is the cast we discuss with Betty Buckley and Ray Gill and Joanna Gleason and Mary Darcy. We think. I I I know actually it's Betty because she um I mean I haven't talked to her for this yet, unfortunately, but that's been documented that she did that reading and um that uh yeah. Um, but so and this reading they did sing the music? Yes, they did. It was not all the same music. Right. Um some of it some of it was there and some of it wasn't. And I do not have a script for that one, so I can't really like that. I they must have whisked them all away at once and somehow I escaped with the first one, but not that.

Yeah. Well, the first one is even more rare. Um, so but the uh the the two or three weeks of rehearsal that the actor you would have had with the actors, that would have been just them learning that music. It wasn't really staged in any respect, was it? There were people getting up and get and sitting down from their chairs, but it wasn't staged. Just that. And um was that like uh two weeks or three, you know, two weeks of rehearsal and then a day with an invited audience or I I think it was, yes. And um was it uh do you remember whether there was any potential at that point that this was going to lead to a New York production? Or was there already a sense of like uh the old globe happening or do you you know, was that a conversation you would have been a party to?

Uh if there was such a conversation, I was not party to it. Uh I was a lot more conversations when I was uh working as James's associate as opposed to stage manager. Sure. Uh understandably, yeah. But uh I think there was a sense that it was going to be completed, that it was already good and that it was going to be completed and it would eventually go to Broadway, but um if there were conversations about it at that juncture.

[30:33] Johnna Murray: And do you um and so then that was in June, and then I guess uh the first performances at the Old Globe were like November of eighty-six. But you rehearsed at least for the beginning of the process at West Beth in Manhattan, yeah. And um what what do you remember about that process or the casting process or anything with that? I don't really remember a great deal about it. I know that there was a lot of talk about Ray Gill, and I don't know why it was that he wasn't there. Yes, thank you. That it's mysterious to me. Um he was wonderful, he was a pleasure to work with. We loved working with him on Marilyn. We all loved working with him in the reading, and obviously he came back and did it later and I love Chip, but I thought that that wasn't James's first idea of role was not Chip and No, Ira talks about it too, but yeah.

That came from Ira, I think. Yeah, I mean Ira talks about sort of tricking them into casting Chip because they didn't have the option of Ray, but he didn't I he didn't know why Ray wasn't available then. Well, Ray had that fairy tale baker look to him. Yeah. Yeah. And um just uh he radiated kindness and was just I mean he was just a lovely man. Not that Chip doesn't radiate kindness, but he's kind of edgy and quirky upper west, they say um so okay, but so then um that uh was Chip and Joanna and Ellen Foley and uh this cast in uh San Diego. Then um I know that the then the pre-Broadway workshop was the following summer. It was uh what like June and July of eighty-seven. July of eighty-seven, predominantly July, yes.

So I guess I've heard little tidbits about what happened in between January and July, and they don't all sort of line up together. Different people have mentioned sort of uh these workshop sessions to audition choreographers. Uh I think I might have offended Lar Lubavitch when I phrased it that way. Um, but that had been described to me. Um does that ring a bell at all? I I'm sure that happened, but I was not uh part of all of that. And then also this different people of different people have in between, so yeah, oh right, actual jobs at the time. Different people have talked about like backers' auditions. Does that strike any chords for you? I know that there was something like that. There was an audition.

I don't know whether it was specifically for backers, but I would assume that that would be the reasoning. Yeah. But I was not part of that. I don't remember being in a on the casting. I I was in on casting for some of these things. I certainly remember Earth of Kids audition. I mean, well, no time like the present to hear that story. Well, I think Paul Ford has already told it very well. I do remember the first thing she did, she came out and she was wearing this big coat, maybe fur, I'm thinking. Oh fabulous. And literally twisted her arm in such a way that she pushed it into the chest to the stage manager who had escorted her on. It was such a move. I mean, and then she did last midnight with all that tremolo.

You know, it was spectacular. It was riveting. So that was a replacement casting because it was last midnight. This was on this was for Broadway. Yeah. Um because then I heard sorry. I've heard different stories about the um, for example, Patty Lupone's audition, but no one has actually been able to tell me was that before San Diego? Was that after San Diego? Was that be after the workshop right before Broadway, right before Bernadette? Do you know when that would have happened? I do not know. And if Paul and Scott don't know, then nobody knows, probably. Yeah. Um, well, maybe Patty will. Maybe Patty will. Patty would know. Um speaking of which I came across something in my Into the Woods notebook.

Yeah, that the entire Woods cast, and me as this their stage manager, and Betty Corwin of Lincoln Center. Yeah. Had signed a document about recording it. And I have no memory of it ever being recorded. But I did call that one. I'm pretty sure I called that one from the booth. So it could have been recorded, and I just don't remember it because I wasn't in the midst of it all with the cables and whatever. But uh I thought it was interesting that Yeah, I should I should look into that. I wonder if it's in the library. I would have I don't know, I stupidly would have assumed they just have the the broadcast version there, but maybe there's another class to see it there, but we all agreed to do it.

Whether we actually did it or not, I don't know. Right, yeah, maybe not. Um that's interesting. Um so uh I one thing that I'm confused about with this uh summer of 87 workshop is that like one person had described it to me as having um a couple weeks of rehearsal and then through an A version, a B version, and a C version with three different endings to try out in front of different audiences. Yes, and as far as I can tell with the what I have left in there, um the A version was probably I have nothing marked A version. So I could assume that by the A version we meant the script that we originally got. I do have a parts of a B version and parts of a C version, both for the end of Act One for scene five and of Act One and for Act Two, but then internally in some of them, I have new other new pages that came after that.

So in other words, I'll have a B version which is dated prior to the thing starting. Yeah, it has July pages stuck into it. Yeah, no, the work never stops. No, no, for sure. Maybe I don't I can't remember if RJ was around for the workshop or not, but he might. I don't know if he has an archive or not. Yeah, I I reached out to be the one who would have consecutive versions. The other person that someone had mentioned I should talk to is David Warren. Would he have been around then? I've always talked to David Warren. He's got a big thing. Okay, great. He knows everything. I then for sure will. Um, and uh, as you recall of those A, B, and C versions, someone that described it to me as there's one where the Baker's wife died, one where she stayed alive, and one where everybody died.

Is that right? I think that's what that would be an extreme representation. I don't um I'm she was still dying from the apple. She died from the apple in uh in the workshop and at the old globe. Yeah. Um as far as I recall. And you don't remember a version where she didn't die. I don't. Maybe she stayed alive longer. I certainly don't remember one where everybody died. I there may have been one where more people died. Thank you. Yeah. But I will say here's the work a workshop version. And this is um uh it's sort of an it takes two reprise, if you will. Oh, okay. In which little red standing there, obviously, with the baker and Cinderella and Jack says it takes four. That's very uh Trina in the opening number of Falsettos on Broadway for Jews.

It takes four of us, like you know. So so and then at the the last part of that is the baker singing, it takes all of us not to give up the ghost, at least most. Lovely. Such a sun time line. So sunheim. He cuts his darlings. He does. Yeah. I was I was mortified when they cut um in Sunday in the park when they cut the one on the left is right for me, so the one on the right is left for you. That's I understand that one of the British productions has put it back did manage to put it back in with his permission. Yes, Robert Westenberg was one of the And the cardboard cutouts. That's for you. You know, so it I didn't strike me, but Steve said, no, no, they're just not clever enough to come up with something like that.

I said, Well, maybe maybe she just it just came out of her mouth by accident. I'm glad you mentioned it wouldn't come out of it her mouth by accident. That's not who she is. I said, but that kind of stupidity is spreading like wildflowers, see? Movable, movable. No, she wouldn't sing that. So there you are. And he's always right. I uh John, my day job is that I um the programming director at this cabaret room, the Green Room 42. And um the other night we had a concert by Josie de Guzman, who was uh Maria in the 1980 West Side Story Revival, and she sang I feel pretty, and she talked about how Sondheim has often disowned those lyrics along the same lines as what you're talking about him cutting for Celeste.

She wouldn't be clever enough. And Josie said that she would respectfully disagrees with Mr. Sondheim because she feels that this is Maria very much priding herself on being an American now and a citizen and striving towards this sort of aspirational, elevated uh diction, you know. Fine enough to speak to herself with kind words. Yes, and I I loved that, and I I wish the same for Celeste number one. Oh, thank you. Yes, I'm sure she'd be pleased. So uh okay, that um I mean, God, you know, I with goes without saying I'm dying to get my hands on those pages that you've got in front of you, but we'll leave that for we'll talk. We'll talk. But um, so uh, and then of course, I if you've been listening to the podcast, you've seen me go through my um uh my journey of discovery learning about um I had always known that Betty Buckley had done that workshop.

Uh, and then you know, I still have a lot of questions about what happened there. But the thing that I learned in the podcast was that Burke Moses had been cast. Um, and I actually got to talk to him uh the other day, so that that episode hasn't come out yet. But I mean it was fascinating to hear his experience as a young actor going going through all that. Um, and then I know there were other less um, I guess contentious sort of casting shift just in terms of people's availability, like um, was it uh Suzanne Douglas who was the understudy but went on as the witch for the first week just because Betty wasn't available yet. Is that right? I have to say that Scott is quite right. She also went on quite a lot because Betty was late.

Ah, yes, that's been mentioned. The result of that was that I had to go just read in or sing in for her funzel. Hi for me, really. Well, you're you're a Marta. You're a Martha. I anytime I didn't it right. Anytime I didn't uh it wasn't necessary, I would just leave it be. But it was second midnight, of course. The there were lines in there that had it was confusing not to have someone singing, no one could confuse place.

[41:58] Johnna Murray: Sure. So but so uh but and then of course equity came in, she says, Do you never learn? Are you having two jobs again? I said, No, no, no. No, no, no, no, I'm just reading in because someone's out and they're rewriting, you know. They're like, This Jana is a real problem. She cares too much about the production, not enough about actual, like you know, work ethics for like the union. I'm just helping out. Um, so uh well, okay. So before even getting back to all the sort of casting of that moment, just in terms of the material, because you mentioned second midnight, but based on how what you said, I think you're talking about the second midnight as we know it in the show today. That's sort of just like the first midnight with the little um No, I was talking about I'll sing I'll sing a little for you.

[42:41] Oh, please.

[42:42] Johnna Murray: I don't understand it. Oh, yes. Doesn't every child reflect its mother? I don't understand it. Maybe if I'd ever seen another, and then the stepsisters, what did I do wrong? Mothers ought to trust you, and it goes on like that, and then it goes into the part that Philip talked about. The more you uh the more you protect them, the more they reject you, the more you reflect them, the more they respect you, and you'll hear that the the reflect was actually already in the Rapunzel part I just sent you. And then at the end of it, uh it well, it ends the it continues with that. At the top of that's the top uh top of scene three, act one scene three, top of scene four, the witch sings, what did I clearly say? Children must listen.

[43:32] Wow, and then it goes into a very short version of Stay With Me.

[43:36] Johnna Murray: Okay, so you've just entered lines of dialogue in between. So, yes, she's saying stay with me, but as far as I can tell, it was a very short version, and it was almost a segue with uh intermittent dialogue from the children will listen section.

[43:50] Got you.

[43:51] Johnna Murray: Um, that's fascinating to know. I didn't know for sure whether Stay With Me was in that workshop yet, and I also because I knew it was not in San Diego, and I also didn't know if that's full I'm obsessed with that big second midnight group number but I didn't know if that had already been in the workshop or if that wasn't until Broadway rehearsals but you've just answered that. It was and it was rehearsed a lot and this it's a Le Pine thing. We had a uh one of the promenades on Sunday in the park the company called it Ooh a Lily and we rehearsed it every day I'm gonna say we felt like every day.

[44:27] Maybe maybe twice we had lunch.

[44:30] Johnna Murray: I we just rehearsed it and rehearsed it and rehearsed and I don't know what it was but I always figured it must be triggering something for him as the writer to to yeah to to be or uh maybe it was for him as the director but I had this sense that there was something in there that was not leading in or not out there was something going on for him with this thing. Totally not Laure or Randall or any of the cast it was it was Le Pine's thing and I w it whatever he needed as far as I was concerned he should do. Absolutely writing and directing. If he wants to see it let's do it again fine.

[45:08] Totally but I don't get it always you know no but I but I I love knowing that about him it's so it's so interesting to think about James Lapine's process. I mean just because he's such a fascinating and influential artist.

[45:19] He is and such a nice man.

[45:21] Johnna Murray: Such an I I I love I haven't seen him since so much he got an award at uh Malay arts on Saturday. Yes, that's actually one of the places he talked to me about that they had done a presentation of the show at. Um because I guess he's been involved with them for decades. Since the seventies and it's the and uh he actually had a house in Columbia County for a while, which is how Bill and I got here and we Oh, that's where you are.

[45:48] And now we live in Kinder Hook full time, yeah.

[45:51] Wonderful.

[45:52] Johnna Murray: Um well you can take the girl out of Greenwich Village, but you can't take Greenwich Village out of the girl quite.

[45:59] Oh good.

[45:59] Johnna Murray: Well, even more important. And then uh so when you talked about the different endings, were there actually three different performances, or was it like Mystery of Edwin, you know, did they do all three endings at the end of one presentation? Do you remember?

[46:14] I don't remember, but I know that I have a note in the front of one of the acts that says that ending C is what's in place in the in my script, but I it doesn't I don't have any record of uh one does take a lot of notes as a strict match, but we give them all to the producers.

[46:32] Sure.

[46:38] Johnna Murray: Terrible. Or if they do keep them, they can't find them. Um so uh I do have actually uh the Broadway script for I was the first person to call into the woods on Bronx. Um even though I was the first assistant, Frank was had a lot a lot of seniority. Um but I was the first one to call the show and it we went through a lot of changes and it was very complicated.

[47:00] So I actually have a rough draft here because it was so by the time we opened it, I had made a copy, a clean copy for them.

[47:08] Johnna Murray: So I do actually have one here. Well, that's good. That's interesting to see.

[47:11] Yeah, I bet.

[47:13] Johnna Murray: And um, so then Paul had told me and Danielle seemed to remember that after the workshop there was a reading at a townhouse with the Broadway cast plus Bernadette in place as the witch. Does that ring a bell to you?

[47:28] No.

[47:29] Johnna Murray: But that doesn't mean that it didn't happen. It doesn't even mean that I wasn't there.

[47:39] Oh Bernadette P.

[47:40] Yeah.

[47:41] Johnna Murray: I'd worked with her on Sunday in the park and she's the sweetest person on the planet, you know. Generous woman I met ever, I think. So um it would have been another day at work, you know, in some ways.

[47:54] I I I don't remember I may have been doing something else.

[47:58] And is my impression right?

[47:59] I don't I don't think she she I don't think James had her in mind no during Old Globe or the workshop.

[48:05] Or even not even the workshop.

[48:07] Johnna Murray: I don't think so. So cause then there was very little time. I mean, if the final presentation of that workshop was in July, and do you know when you you started rehearsals, I would think in August?

[48:17] I don't know.

[48:17] Johnna Murray: I mean I could look it up because obviously I was on equity contract then, so I would have some idea. Um unlike Sunday in the park with George where I was on the equity contract while I was understudying and then whisked away to left to my own healthcare devices. But um it was it was quick though.

[48:36] Well it it was quick.

[48:37] Johnna Murray: So whatever they were not thinking and I think I wasn't there. I think I was actually up here because it was eighty seven when I bought my house. It was after we got back from the old globe that I bought my first house in Columbia County.

[48:51] Oh wow.

[48:52] Johnna Murray: And before the workshop, I had actually closed on the house. And I knew I was going into a situation where I was gonna be busy all the time. So I may have just not gone in for it.

[49:04] I mean they didn't need me there, so I may just not have gone.

[49:07] For that reading.

[49:09] Johnna Murray: For that reading. Yeah. But but in any case, if the workshop ended even early July and rehearsal started even early September, that was the sh short period of time that they went from not thinking of Bernadette to thinking of Bernadette.

[49:24] Yes, well they needed someone.

[49:26] Johnna Murray: They needed someone. We have to give her someone. She's fabulous.

[49:29] Yeah.

[49:31] Johnna Murray: Yeah. And um then in terms of um the issue of her sh only and I think this probably had to be some part of why it had been left un unexplored because I have my understanding was that she had some kind of film contract or something which is why her run in the show was so short and that, you know, uh 'cause she left in like March or something.

[49:53] Yes.

[49:54] Johnna Murray: No. Maybe even before then. Maybe even before we had maybe she had announced her departure before then because sometime I had a very difficult spring. I had a very difficult pregnancy.

[50:06] Oh I'm sorry.

[50:06] Johnna Murray: I was in and out throughout that spring and eventually uh in August of eighty eight I actually left the show. So I was not there for the end of the run.

[50:15] But I was there to put Felicia Rashad in.

[50:18] Johnna Murray: I was there putting Dick Cavot in. I think Carolyn Marlowe had been on as Jack's mother while I was there, but there hadn't even been that many understudies going on although they were great.

[50:29] Yeah.

[50:30] Johnna Murray: What extraordinary performers we had. I and it was thrilling because we never had quite enough people to have all the parts filled. So Marianne Kane and I were you know standing in for people so that they didn't have to play two at once.

[50:43] Although Bloom and Crantz you know was happy to play all of his at once sometimes. It was really, really fun working with them.

[50:50] Johnna Murray: Um and but we would rehearse a lot because they were all covering lots of different parts. So yeah I was there through all of that.

[50:56] Yeah.

[50:57] Johnna Murray: Um and so I so she can't have I mean I can't believe I left in March. I think it was a little later than that that I actually left.

[51:07] But it could have been March.

[51:08] Johnna Murray: I mean I I don't know exactly what dates. So um but I'm not sure where I was going with that. But I guess that was an early thing to be dealing with replacement castings in that run.

[51:19] Very early for uh a role of that magnitude.

[51:22] Yeah.

[51:23] Johnna Murray: Um and uh and what how do you remember navigating that um as stage manager, take uh with Felisha Rashad coming in, a big star in the lead role, uh so early in the in the run and pre before the Tony's and everything.

[51:40] Well, she's also a really lovely person, so um I I mean Frank was there to be handling a lot of this stuff while I was dealing with calling the calling of the show and technical difficulties and um other stuff that I had to really had to do because I I mean he he did learn to call the show he started calling the show uh at least once a week right after we opened and then Marianne did and eventually Dawson did.

[52:06] There were four stage managers on the show, and all of us could call, but I called the most and um and uh initially during previous all of them. So I was uh not necessarily dealing with all of that other stuff that was going on.

[52:18] Johnna Murray: Frank who had much more experience and was wonderful, uh, dealt with a lot of uh the more political stuff, if you will. But I mean, both of those women are so completely lovely.

[52:31] I was not aware of any problems.

[52:33] No, and then um, oh sorry, back to the material a little bit.

[52:38] Johnna Murray: Um the um you talked about stay With Me uh being in the workshop and a shortened version. So I assume that means it was later than that.

[52:50] Um when uh Lament or you know the Stay With Me uh Yeah, it's when it was expanded and reproduced.

[52:56] Yeah.

[52:56] Johnna Murray: Yeah. Like uh would that have been for the first Broadway rehearsal or sometime later than that in previews even, or do you know?

[53:04] I don't remember.

[53:05] Johnna Murray: And then what about like um children will listen? Was that a song at the end of the show?

[53:12] Uh to start a Broadway rehearsal, or do you remember when that came in?

[53:17] I was gonna say not at the it was not at the end of the it was not the conclusion of the show was not entirely in place when we started Broadway rehearsals, I'm quite sure.

[53:27] It had already been used outside of the second midnight in the workshop.

[53:33] Yes, which was singing it right before Stay With Me.

[53:36] Yeah.

[53:37] Johnna Murray: I don't remember it being at the end until later.

[53:40] Uh-huh.

[53:41] Johnna Murray: Would that have happened maybe?

[53:47] Right.

[53:47] Johnna Murray: Yeah, people have talked about that. Which is why that it was double cast. And it didn't turn out that way and it was separated out. I guess when Dick Cavot came in, there's separated back out into two potentially being two roles in certain circumstances.

[54:02] Um but it was purposeful originally that they were double cast because grandfather and grandson.

[54:08] Yeah.

[54:08] Johnna Murray: Um I don't really know. I I it was a pro key bike myself without uh I mean obviously they weren't far apart in any case, but is was is it possible that children will listen becoming this song at the end of the show was somewhat in tandem with second midnight being cut.

[54:30] It's possible.

[54:32] Johnna Murray: And uh certainly I would imagine that when the second midnight came out and it came back reconfigured as the aphorisms. Um that it would have been it would have there would have been more built up at the end for children will listen.

[54:47] Whether they knew that it was coming before we did or not, I could not say.

[54:51] Johnna Murray: Um but we also had uh a a curious set, I will tell you. Um because we had that telescopic tower that came up and we had that huge sweep, the platform that we call the sweep, that sort of angled platform.

[55:05] And I I can't remember the sequence of events either, but I you know the show must go on.

[55:12] Johnna Murray: I had never stopped a show. I had stopped I stopped a show once once before when someone had a heart attack in the audience for a different show.

[55:20] Wow.

[55:20] Johnna Murray: Uh so I had done it once where and and then I had stopped during Marilyn um La Jolla, I stopped it because the fire alarm went off.

[55:29] Oh and actually evacuated and came back.

[55:31] Johnna Murray: So I had in fact stopped shows before because I think safety first, you know, yeah, safety first. I don't want to stop it either, but you gotta do what you gotta do.

[55:39] So in this case, it was the first time that I stopped a show because I simply ran out of actors.

[55:46] They were all trapped.

[55:48] Johnna Murray: Oh gosh. The tower was up and certainly Pamela as Rapunzel was in there, and I think Marnadette may have been there too.

[55:57] Johnna Murray: I'm not sure, but it went part way down, but it didn't go all the way down, which meant that we couldn't move the sweep over. We couldn't bring Granny's cottage down. Oh god. So I'm like flashing my little light and I've got Geminiani on the phone while I've got the crew on fifty-seven channels. And it was like it was like some parts of this were like singing a pattern song while you're playing the piano. I had so many cue lights and so many things to say that I didn't have time to talk about problems. Sorry, I'm busy. And poor Danny Furland was out there all by herself. The wolf, who could conceivably have played the scene downstage, was dressed as a prince from the waist down because he had the covers over him.

So he couldn't come down. Yeah. I and I start okay. There's nobody to play the next scene. No. I think we're not gonna have improv night here. I think I'll just stop. And it was early days and having the scene changes stopped by the computer if there was a collision. And a hairpin was enough to have the computer think it was a collision. So it was as soon as we found the little thing that was in the track, it was no problem. Yeah. It wasn't like it was a huge problem, but you did have to eliminate it and reprogram it to go again.

[57:22] Johnna Murray: But there was a curtain, right? Like for you to There was a curtain, yes. And yeah, so we bring in the curtain, and this was before I think this first one was before Dick was there, so we didn't have the Dick Cabot show. Yeah, right. The next time I stopped, Chip and Ben at the Baker and Jack. I should just the there was no room for me to stand downstairs because even though it's a really big theater, yeah. Barton back now, the Hirschfeld, that has tiny wings. So we literally and we had f things like four cows. We did not have room for four cows in the wings. No. Never mind a carriage. So we had some very tight cues where like the carriage would go up across with four people standing there, and it had to be called by the stage manager stage left because you really couldn't see well enough that it was off, and you only had about a foot and a half before it would crash into the wall if you didn't get it out of the way.

Plus the four people you had to get out of the way. And we're flying cows up and down and everything. I mean so I was upstairs at stage right, and about the witch and the wife had their dressing rooms on that side and everybody else was on the other side. So it was we were in our own little haven up there in a way. But the guys would come up to the second floor where I was sitting, and they had they would get into onto their branches and they would fly up and over and down onto the s onto the one as the line. Yes, for and then the giants killing to kill the giants, and it worked fine.

[58:49] Johnna Murray: Um until one day it didn't, and I called the queue and then I said, Brad, can you get them out of there? No. I thought oh. So get everybody going and they had to go find the electrician who does the house curtain, who was of course playing cards somewhere else, and then I tell them to put curtain warmers on the thing, and I tell Paul to play, and I tell Sound to turn on the god mic, and I said, we're having a technical difficulty. What's a curtain warmer? Uh the lights on the curse. Uh oh. And so they bring out the cherry picker and it's not high enough. So but Artie was very, very tall. One of the stage hands actually came out and lifted them out. So that then, back then Was there a thing where when you had to undo the telescoping tower and the sweep, did they all have to go like backwards in order? Like was there some weird process you had to follow to kind of untangle, or could you just then reset?

[59:54] Johnna Murray: We well, the things did not collide because they were on they were computerized already. So they didn't collide, they would just stop. Yeah. It's the same thing that they had with Starlight Express, which was hysterical, you know. Right. They would actually practice before half hour that if this light didn't go on to green, they had to back up and go the other way because they had one dangerous day when the gate didn't go up because it wasn't in place properly and they all boom boom boom crashed into each other. So we weren't the only show having some of these problems getting the glitches out of this automatic stopping thing. But yes, once it was set to go, it wasn't that they had actually collided into each other, it was that something was in the track or something else went wrong or who knows what.

[1:00:41] Johnna Murray: Um this is off topic sort of, but did you do the tour at all? I did not go back after I left in after eighty-eight, yeah. Did not go back. The kid came out fine, he's great, he's still great. Nozzle tab. Um thank you. We my husband got a job working in Europe for half the year, so we were going back and forth back and forth to Europe. So the next show I did after that was actually in ninety-two, Falsettos. I just and I did I didn't stage manage it, I just put the first act on its feet. What you're experiencing with us now. Yeah, so um, yeah, that was that. I mean, that could be a whole podcast onto itself for sure.

[1:01:22] Johnna Murray: But um the reason I asked about the tour was because I when I talked to Doug Sills the other day, he said that he was Rapunzel's prince and he was covering Cinderella's prince, but that when he would go on Cinderella's Prince when Chuck Wagner would be out, Doug would not play the wolf, somebody else would cover the wolf. Um I did not work on it, and I certainly do not know, but altering that wolf's costume is no joke. Gotcha. If they were a different size, yeah, might be the answer right there because I know now and then we had to alter it and it was there it is. That first scene of Into the Woods, the wardrobe department is busy doing the show cues. Yeah. There's not a lot of staff left to be doing alterations once the show was in real time. Everyone is changing their clothes all the time. I mean the mysterious man and the narrator, they're changing their clothes all the time.

[1:02:25] Johnna Murray: So, um so it's a busy half hour if that's when you find out, or even if you know so I that would be a hypothesis that is not a fact. I would I'll take it. No, that sounds totally reasonable. Um and uh oh god, I mean I guess um anything else that you want to share about any part of this process. I mean, it's just so endlessly fascinating to me. Marianne Kane, the stage manager, she was one of the assistant stage managers. Um she was the best at the blocking, she was often the one helping the understudies find their paths backstage, and she's fabulous, and you should talk to her. I think I tried, but I'll she's the one. I believe she's living in California now. Um but um I think she's the one we had these four cows and I think she's the one who named them.

[1:03:19] Johnna Murray: And of course there was Milky White. Yes. Who is the regular old cow who didn't do any tricks. No. And then there was Holy Cow. Holy cow is the one that had the hole so you could and it had the little puppet so that to make the tongue. So Oh yes. So they could feed the objects and it would come through we had I don't know if they w it was always called How Now but we had How Now How now who had the Yes she is I don't remember what the dying cow was called but the dying cow had a little it was like a knife in its foot and it was run by remote control and they would press it and the thing would push the cow over.

[1:04:03] Johnna Murray: Oh wow. That was its trick. But I actually have a note in the calling script that says with this and with the um the golden goose or whatever it was the the lay the he laying hen. Yeah that that the static on the headset is from the remote control. So that whoever was calling the show wouldn't be worried that they were about to lose communication because they were right underneath me and they would start doing these I was like it was horrible. I used to get the New York Times press room occasionally on the headsets too. So look how progress they've made since then. Yeah God This is like I remember hearing um I think it was during Sunset Boulevard in London in nineteen ninety-three that the sudden proliferation of cell phones was messing up everything backstage. Yes. I wasn't even necessarily in the audience just in town, you know Yeah we'd hear us occasionally we'd get we'd hear the police car walkie talkies going by and stuff it was it was not helpful.

[1:05:05] Johnna Murray: No. Oh well get off my channel please New York Times I don't I have no idea if they could hear us or it would you know yeah well maybe you could get a scoop on I have no idea if they were listening for it critics oh um old Globe I this is like a sort of an aside. Yeah not sure it's of any interest interesting questions I know you've already talked about but there was uh the song just the same as last night was in through the old globe and it in it contains the line he's a very nice prince.

[1:05:38] Ben Rimalower: I don't know that song at all.

[1:05:39] Johnna Murray: I don't know anything about that. It is not quite the same song. I don't even know if I have no old globe it was already there. The final version of Nice a very nice prince. Just the same as last night. Interesting. So would that have been a playwright to horizons then? Must must have been uh must have been one of the readings yeah before it was completed. Was it a duet for Baker's wife and Cinderella?

[1:06:04] Johnna Murray: It uh it was yes speaking of that John uh I Oh and Back to the Palace was still in in the playwright in the workshop. Yeah longer workshop as well. Yes. The um the version uh I have the B version here. Oh and then I also have the C version. Oh C has some pages that are dated July, so they must have gotten mixed together to some degree. Oh and I do have a scene five that says A version that's dated June of eighty-seventh. So great.

[1:06:45] Johnna Murray: It's very confusing.

[1:06:46] Ben Rimalower: Yeah, for sure.

[1:06:47] Johnna Murray: You can't really tell what was changed for. Um can you imagine if next week you had to stage manage that workshop all over again and just make sense of these pages now.

[1:06:57] Ben Rimalower: Sorry I'm not available.

[1:07:00] Johnna Murray: No I was hard. I don't know. On the um Broadway cast recording there are longer versions of some songs. A very nice prints, any moment, um The Lament that have more material than what is in the script as published.

[1:07:21] Ben Rimalower: Um was that stuff that was cut in previews and just included for the cast album?

[1:07:26] Johnna Murray: Probably but I was not there for the recording of the cast album.

[1:07:29] Ben Rimalower: Oh interesting.

[1:07:30] Johnna Murray: But I will say that a show that I did with Sondheim and not with Le Pine because you know what a do-gooder he was was to benefit the Manhattan Theatre Club poetry series and it was called Sung and Unsung Sondheim.

[1:07:46] Ben Rimalower: Wow.

[1:07:46] Johnna Murray: And it was Charlie Kimbrough and Patricia Elliott. Wow introduced by John Guare doing readings of the lyrics as poetry to Fascinating. I mean if you were trying to do a benefit for poetry what would how would you draw the audience, you know I I don't know but it seemed like a really good idea and the house certainly was full and what a wonderful group of people to work with.

[1:08:11] Johnna Murray: Um and uh I don't know that I have much to tell about that, but there were some cut there was some cut material in there, and there were a few lines that were fun lines that were not exactly the way they had been in, for instance, company. No thrown in to to humor the people who didn't know in the house, you know. But it was it was great.

[1:08:31] Ben Rimalower: It says a lot about poetry that in that world, Sondheim is like commercial, like box office magic, you know.

[1:08:40] Johnna Murray: Yes.

[1:08:41] Ben Rimalower: If you want if you want if you want to sell some tickets, you gotta get Sondheim's name in there somewhere.

[1:08:46] Johnna Murray: Well, in the New York fundraising world at that time, it was certainly the case.

[1:08:50] Ben Rimalower: Well, if for certainly if the audience is you and me, that would still be the case.

[1:08:54] Johnna Murray: Um wow, I mean, uh, I I really I can't tell you how incredible this has been for me. I'm so grateful to you for this. Um you're uh just a font of uh singular singular font of information.

[1:09:10] Johnna Murray: But quite a lot of things I don't remember, I'm sorry to say.

[1:09:13] Ben Rimalower: Well, that's some that I never certainly. By all means feel free to edit as much as you want.

[1:09:20] Johnna Murray: Thank you.

[1:09:21] Johnna Murray: Thank you.

[1:09:21] Johnna Murray: And I I have no idea what is of interest and what rings true.

[1:09:30] Ben Rimalower: Thank you for listening to Giants in the Sky, how Sondheim and Lapine went into the woods on the Broadway Podcast Network. Look out for episode 29 with John Bell, Sondheim's intern at the Old Globe.