This transcript was automatically generated and might contain errors.

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

[0:06] Ben Rimalower: With me, Ben Rimalower.

[0:08] Ben Rimalower: Today's guest, Colleen Fitzpatrick, Broadway understudy.

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

[0:18] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I was a replacement understudy to the roles of Florinda, Lucinda, and The Baker's Wife in the original Broadway production of Into the Woods.

[0:27] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I understudied all the female roles in the original Broadway cast of Stephen Sondheim and James Lapine's Passion, eventually taking over as the mistress.

[0:35] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And my many other Sondheim credits include Anyone Can Whistle at Carnegie Hall, The Roundabout Theatre Company revivals of Company and Sunday in the Park with George, the Public Theater's New York premiere of Road Show, The Kennedy Center and Broadway revival of Follies, and the City Center Encore production of Merrily We Roll Along.

[0:55] Colleen Fitzpatrick: My other Broadway credits include Cats, Jerome Robbins' Broadway, Lestat, 110 in the Shade, Bye Bye Birdie, and Kimberly Akimbo, in which I stand by for Victoria Clark in the title role.

[1:11] Ben Rimalower: I've been wanting to meet you for so many years.

[1:14] Ben Rimalower: I think I told you that I grew up in LA, and some of my friends that were performers had studied with Arthur Joseph, and he used to talk to me and them about you, and it was right when you were in Passion.

[1:28] Ben Rimalower: So we were all like, "Oh my god, oh my god, she's so wow."

[1:32] Colleen Fitzpatrick: That takes me back, let me tell you.

[1:34] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Yeah.

[1:35] Colleen Fitzpatrick: But I'm so old now, anything takes me really far back.

[1:38] Ben Rimalower: I feel you.

[1:39] Ben Rimalower: But I didn't realize at the time that Passion was not—I mean, you've done so many Sondheim shows now at this point, but it was not the first Sondheim show that you did.

[1:48] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Oh no.

[1:49] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Uh-uh.

[1:50] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Yeah.

[1:50] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And I was very excited to realize that Into the Woods.

[1:55] Ben Rimalower: Well, Into the Woods was the first one you did on Broadway.

[1:57] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I don't know.

[1:57] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Maybe you did other.

[1:58] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I guess I would love to know your whole kind of journey with Sondheim.

[2:02] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Were you like a Sondheim nerd growing up?

[2:04] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Like how did it get started?

[2:05] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Not at all.

[2:07] Colleen Fitzpatrick: You know, I'm from Lancaster, Ohio, grew up extremely poor, and I learned how to sing.

[2:13] Colleen Fitzpatrick: My mother loved music.

[2:14] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And so we always had music during our dinners.

[2:18] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And I learned how to sing by singing along with Julie Andrews on all of her records of the musicals that she did.

[2:26] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And you know, Marnie Nixon and all that.

[2:30] Colleen Fitzpatrick: That's how I started to sing.

[2:32] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And I've had such—my whole life has been Mr. Toad's Wild Ride.

[2:39] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I kind of became professional at the age of 16 because I didn't have a college scholarship.

[2:48] Colleen Fitzpatrick: My mom entered me in the Miss Teenage America pageant, and I had just finished playing Eliza Doolittle in the high school play.

[2:56] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And I won the whole thing.

[2:59] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And that's kind of got me on the path to school at SC.

[3:04] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And then, you know, one thing led to another.

[3:07] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I was in a rock and roll band for many years, pretty famous out west.

[3:11] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And then I eventually made it back to Broadway when I was 28 and stood in line to—I wanted to be on Broadway.

[3:21] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I always did want to be on Broadway, but my path took me other ways first.

[3:25] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And I stood in line at the Majestic Theater to understudy Betty Buckley in Cats.

[3:33] Colleen Fitzpatrick: That's how I started.

[3:34] Ben Rimalower: Wow.

[3:35] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Because it was three months, I think, when they had opened, and Janet Hubert was leaving, who was her original understudy, and I got it.

[3:44] Colleen Fitzpatrick: So I did that and then I left that.

[3:46] Ben Rimalower: And then were you in the company otherwise playing another cat when you weren't on for Grizabella?

[3:53] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Oh babe, I'm not a dancer.

[3:55] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Although I've done dance shows.

[3:57] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I don't know why.

[3:58] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I think because I make them laugh.

[4:00] Colleen Fitzpatrick: But no, we were—I was one of the four lead understudies that sat up there above the Coke sign overlooking the orchestra, and we sang every single group number because the dancers were out there killing themselves on that stage.

[4:14] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Yeah, and so I left, and then my first show that I auditioned for for Steve and Paul Gemignani, and they are really responsible for most of my career, was the original company of Sunday in the Park with George.

[4:29] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And I had been asked to come in as Celeste number one.

[4:33] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And even though I had grown up singing soprano, I had just been belting for two years, and I came in and they took me all around the world.

[4:42] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Steve, you know, never came to any auditions except the final callbacks.

[4:48] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Steve wasn't there.

[4:50] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Paul was like going, having me go up a minor third, and then down a fourth, and then this, you know, like he always did.

[4:56] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And I didn't get it.

[4:58] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And I was devastated because Celeste number one is a high soprano.

[5:02] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I left, and my really great voice teacher, Dee Markwood, who in New York for many years was an opera singer, and she—and I was devastated because I wanted to work with Steve so bad.

[5:13] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And she said, "I know how we're gonna get you the first show.

[5:16] Colleen Fitzpatrick: We're gonna teach you how to sing Mozart," and that's exactly what she did.

[5:20] Colleen Fitzpatrick: We studied Mozart arias because the tessitura, it—Steve does the same thing.

[5:27] Colleen Fitzpatrick: You know, his recitative lines are even in Into the Woods, which was my first show, is way up there.

[5:33] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Just repeated little notes, you know, all that.

[5:36] Colleen Fitzpatrick: So I got to audition for Into the Woods, and I made it all the way to the final callback, and all I had to sing for my final callback was "Into the Woods, into the woods, into the woods, and out of the woods and before dark."

[5:54] Colleen Fitzpatrick: That's all I sang, and I got the job.

[5:56] Ben Rimalower: Because that's very Mozardian.

[5:59] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Yeah.

[6:00] Colleen Fitzpatrick: God, no one has pointed that out to me before.

[6:03] Colleen Fitzpatrick: That's so interesting.

[6:06] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And my teacher really—and still to this day, and you know, I do think I'm the only person that's done like—I don't know, over 10 things with Steve.

[6:18] Colleen Fitzpatrick: You know, I'm—people know who I am, I guess, in the business, but I'm no star, but I have worked with Steve probably more than anybody else has.

[6:26] Ben Rimalower: Let's go through them.

[6:29] Ben Rimalower: I mean, I want to do a deep dive on Into the Woods, but so you did—you did Into the Woods on Broadway, Passion on Broadway.

[6:36] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Uh, then the road—let me go back.

[6:37] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I also went out on the road toward the end of the—I think the last six months, and played the stepsister and then covered the Baker's Wife on the original road tour.

[6:49] Ben Rimalower: Oh, how cool.

[6:50] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Okay, yeah, yeah.

[6:51] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And then I did Passion.

[6:54] Colleen Fitzpatrick: See, I even forget them all.

[6:55] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I did Passion, I did Follies, I did Road Show.

[7:00] Ben Rimalower: The Follies you did was the revival at the Marquee, right?

[7:04] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Yes, but we started at the Kennedy Center, Marquee, then Bernadette didn't go with us to LA, and that's when Vicky Clark stepped in.

[7:13] Ben Rimalower: Right.

[7:14] Ben Rimalower: At the end of that.

[7:15] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Vicky Clark, who you're heroically standing by for now on Broadway in Kimberly Akimbo.

[7:21] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Yeah.

[7:21] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Yes.

[7:21] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And I've had the great fortune to go on.

[7:24] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I think I'm up to like 28 or 29 months.

[7:26] Ben Rimalower: Wow.

[7:26] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Oh, that's so great.

[7:27] Ben Rimalower: Oh, I'm so thrilled.

[7:28] Ben Rimalower: I told you my friends from San Francisco said that you were absolutely fabulous.

[7:33] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Thank you for passing that on to me.

[7:37] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Because those kind of comments from our fans, you know, just the fact that they love the show and that I've been able to touch them in some way is so important to me.

[7:46] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I love the show more than life.

[7:48] Colleen Fitzpatrick: But I can't even remember all I've done with Steve, and I've done multiple concerts for him.

[7:55] Ben Rimalower: Well, you also did the revival of Sunday in the Park, right?

[7:58] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I sure did, yeah.

[7:59] Colleen Fitzpatrick: From the chocolate factory.

[8:00] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Yep.

[8:00] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Oh, Danny's brilliant production.

[8:06] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Oh my god.

[8:07] Colleen Fitzpatrick: That beautiful.

[8:10] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Oh my god.

[8:11] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And I mean, I love that first production, the original production of Broadway.

[8:15] Ben Rimalower: Of course.

[8:16] Colleen Fitzpatrick: But the fact the projections just changed the story in such a way because it absolutely made it—you saw the creation of it.

[8:26] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I mean, I just—I loved it.

[8:28] Colleen Fitzpatrick: That first black brush stroke in the first song.

[8:32] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I think when we first saw it in Texas, we all sat there and gasped.

[8:38] Ben Rimalower: I bet.

[8:38] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Yeah, it was incredible.

[8:40] Colleen Fitzpatrick: It was truly incredible, remarkable.

[8:42] Ben Rimalower: So okay, going back, you bring your Mozardian training to singing the—you know, everyone talks about it like it's like a Disney song, that opening number of Into the Woods, but it's like Mozart.

[8:55] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I love that.

[8:56] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And so you've got to stop.

[8:57] Ben Rimalower: Yeah, yeah.

[8:58] Colleen Fitzpatrick: You know, it's interesting because you know, and I'm gonna—pardon me, stop me if I start talking around in circles.

[9:07] Colleen Fitzpatrick: But a lot of Steve's recitative, like I said, is very Mozarty in the sense that it really does hang on a tessitura, whether it's a man or a woman, a lot of the times.

[9:20] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And I am, I'll admit it, I'm very, very Catholic in my taste about how people sing Sondheim because I've done so much work with he and Gemignani, who is a stickler, because Paul started as a drummer first, and so he's extremely rhythmic.

[9:40] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And both he and Stephen did not like people to sing the material being overly sentimental.

[9:49] Colleen Fitzpatrick: There's always sentiment when a song is well done, but they don't like sentimentality, and frankly, me neither.

[9:56] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And you know, get on and off the notes cleanly, don't over-sing it, don't hold over the bars, sing it exactly like it's written.

[10:05] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And Richard Adler was the one that taught me that because I worked with Richard Adler so many times in my career as well.

[10:11] Colleen Fitzpatrick: He would constantly say, "If you sing the punctuation to the punctuation and pay attention to exactly what's written note-wise, the composer and the lyricist that are really great give you the clues, exactly what you have the skill to know."

[10:33] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Well, that's the acting itself.

[10:34] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I think probably a lot of people working in musical theater can barely even read, you know, every good boy does fine.

[10:41] Colleen Fitzpatrick: So I think that it's a huge advantage that you bring to the table, you know, that you're able to look at that and read it as if the same way you read the script, you know.

[10:54] Colleen Fitzpatrick: But let me tell you this, Ben, and I really believe this for any of your young listeners out there, and I say this all the time: you have to do your research.

[11:02] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Whoever you're doing, or you're working with, or not only the text, but the music, and you have to look back.

[11:10] Colleen Fitzpatrick: That's where the gold is, not melismas and how you want to sing it yourself.

[11:15] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Part of that's your responsibility, part of that is the musical director's responsibility and the composers themselves.

[11:22] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And it's interesting that you bring that up because Janine Tesori, who is the composer of our show, Kimberly Akimbo, she talks in the same—we just had a rehearsal with her.

[11:22] Colleen Fitzpatrick: She talks in the same way that Steve and Paul Gemignani talk.

[11:41] Colleen Fitzpatrick: You can't just blast through a number.

[11:45] Colleen Fitzpatrick: There are right angles to it.

[11:47] Colleen Fitzpatrick: You have—and she says the same thing: sing it exactly like it's written.

[11:51] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Get off the note.

[11:52] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Stop at the end of the bar, dot dot dot dot dot.

[11:55] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Because you lose all meaning of the piece if you don't.

[11:58] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And I'm a stickler for that, man.

[12:00] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I'm totally Catholic about that.

[12:01] Ben Rimalower: Now, when you talk about the tessitura, I understood that to mean the vocal range of the role.

[12:06] Ben Rimalower: Is that what you mean by you write?

[12:09] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Well, it's like—it's in its—and that's the way my teacher described it.

[12:13] Colleen Fitzpatrick: You know, if I'm singing lower and low, you know, it's very legato and it's very smooth and it's moving around in a very easy manner.

[12:24] Colleen Fitzpatrick: The intervals are easy.

[12:26] Colleen Fitzpatrick: But Steve, it's like—it's very tightly written.

[12:32] Colleen Fitzpatrick: You know, it's not—he was a mathematical person.

[12:35] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Music is math anyway.

[12:37] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I'm probably talking out my butt, but it was very mathematical the way in—I'll just take Into the Woods as done.

[12:45] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Yeah.

[12:46] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And it starts—and by the way, to take a left turn myself, the first downbeat is bam, bam, bam, bam, bam.

[12:54] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And it's a metronome, and everybody better get on.

[12:58] Colleen Fitzpatrick: At that tempo, or you've ruined the piece.

[13:03] Colleen Fitzpatrick: It is a metronome from the beginning, immediately in that—whatever, however long that number is, and what the stepsisters say, "la ta taods, into the woods, ba-ba-b, bop, bop, but up, up, bop, bop, bop, bop."

[13:20] Colleen Fitzpatrick: You know, and it should be that clean. It's not legato. It's not, and you've got to be able to negotiate those tight kind of intervals. And weirdly enough, into the woods, into the woods, into the woods, and out of the woods and home before dark is one of the hardest ones because your mouth wants to do too much, and then you're behind. And it literally is. It is singing is, in my opinion, and what my teacher taught me, and she was an opera teacher. Singing is talking on pitch. That's it. I mean, that's funny thing to hear coming from someone with a like a legitimate like soprano voice that you know seems pretty far from how most of us talk, you know. But it is, you know, and you can believe me, you know, I've belted for people with Steve.

I only sang soprano. This piece is very contemporary, Kimberly, and so I'm all over the place. But everything is connected through my passage and everything because of the way I was taught. And my teacher believed that there's only one voice, whether you're singing low, middle, or high. And it just moves straight up the scale. We're getting in the weeds now, Ben.

[14:41] Ben Rimalower: Yeah, no, I'm fascinated. Okay, but so let's go back just so you do this training and it works. You get the job.

[14:48] Colleen Fitzpatrick: So was after the show had already been open for a bit.

[14:52] Ben Rimalower: Within yes.

[14:54] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And you know, I never think linearly, but when Lauren Mitchell, who's been a dear friend of mine for, you know, since the show, when she left, they actually put out calls to replace her. And I went in then, whenever Lauren left. I don't know, uh it might have been a year into it. But I was in the show for over a year, yeah. And um, I made it down to the final callback, as I said, and I'm and by the way, as I'm and I was so freaking nervous, and I walked out, you know, and Steve was sitting in the dark, and I didn't know he was sitting there, thank God, in the dark. And he he said, Hey, hey, because I sang my own piece first. He said, What note was that? Because I I I used the same belt song, mixed song for twenty eight, 30 years, and I said everything I want.

I said it was a mixed F. He goes, very impressive. It's from a failed show called I Had a Ball. Oh Karen Morrow made the song famous. Yeah. And Larry Moss around a uh a mixed voice F, right? Yeah, yeah. Well, that's where I live. You know, that's why I did, you know, because Betty's memory note is a I mix in our show. I don't have to flip up into a soprano. And I'm, you know, wailing on that our disease song like crazy. Well, when Sandra was very impressive, he was probably equally impressed by your voice and your knowledge of obscure musical theater.

[16:33] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Maybe. I got that show because Larry Moss, the great acting coach of Hillary Swank and many, many other people, he started as a musical theater um coach with a class in New York City, and Larry was my coach for many years. And Larry was the one that gave me that song because he had studied. Here's for your young kids in the audience if there are any, Daniel Craig, which has the one of the best books ever on auditioning. David Craig. Excuse me. Did I say Daniel? Oh, yeah, not James Bond. David Craig. And it is a genius book about how to act a song. Yes, yes. So um, okay, uh, so you that was your own piece, and you impressed Sondheim, and then what happened?

[17:20] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And then I that same audition, that same audition, I sang the end of the woods thing, and I went home and waited. And interestingly enough, I didn't get the show immediately. And I went, wait, what happened? And there was another girl, and I'm not gonna name her, who they who James wanted instead of me because he was looking for somebody who could really cover the baker's wife, even though you were gonna cover the girl was gonna cover both step uh sisters. And when I got home, we got a call from Joanna Merlin's office, the great casting director ever, and she called my agent and said, Listen, we love Colleen. Just sit tight, just sit tight. It's not gonna happen right away. And what happened within two weeks?

Um, obviously they didn't like what this other girl was doing, and they hired me as well. And the other girl barely, I think she went on once, and I did two weeks. I was supposed to replace Lauren when I went in, and Terry Burrell, who was the understudy, really wanted to move up, and they did move her up. I think that was the right decision.

[18:31] Ben Rimalower: Yeah.

[18:32] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And but when I finished my two weeks of rehearsal, the stage manager came to me and said, Hey, you tomorrow's your last day of rehearsal, and you're gonna be on for 14 days as Florinda. And I went, What? We all, all the other studies were on cost. Gotcha. Yes, and so when they hired me, I was contracted to to play, you know, to understudy all three the baker's wife, Florinda, and Lucinda. Because Terry moved up instead of them putting me in the role.

[19:12] Ben Rimalower: Who else was in the show at this time when you went in? Like what do you was this when Nancy Dusseau was the witch?

[19:18] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Nancy, Nancy was further was Nancy my last witch. See, I get confused. The only person at that time that had really left was Bernadette. And I and um was Joanna still there? I think she was there, but it could have been Cynthia was in there. Cynthia Sykes by then. I don't know. But they all came back. Um, the two that had left, because we then filmed it. And the every single person of the original cast, but really, I think to the end of the show, most of us stayed. Most of the original cast stayed to the bitter end, because why would you leave a show like that?

[20:00] Ben Rimalower: Yeah. Shows with content are rare and becoming rarer still.

[20:05] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Yeah. Well, you've done a lot of them.

[20:08] Ben Rimalower: Um I have, it's my forte. You don't you don't have a dumb resume, Colleen.

[20:13] Colleen Fitzpatrick: No, I don't. It's kind of weird. Uh it's kind of weird. I that's why I'm so poor. You know, I've never really had the long-running show for 20 years or something where I could have with cats, but it was killing me. I had to get out.

[20:24] Ben Rimalower: Yeah, yeah. Well, you know, I had to get out. I I I think you're you've had an enviable run.

[20:32] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Um, thank you so much. I've done some pretty interesting things. So I'm so okay. So you said you stayed through the end of the run.

[20:40] Ben Rimalower: I sure did. Uh so then is that when you joined the tour after after the proposing?

[20:46] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Yeah, yeah, there was a break. There was a little break. I can't remember what I did. I'd have to, I should have had my whole resume here, and I could have told told you. But then I was, you know, I was married as well at the time, and so they just eventually called me and said, Hey, do you want to do the last six months of the tour? The tour made a tremendous amount of money for them, the original tour.

[21:08] Ben Rimalower: Wow.

[21:08] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Um, because they didn't make money on Broadway.

[21:12] Ben Rimalower: Right.

[21:12] Colleen Fitzpatrick: You never do with the Sondheim show. That's not why you do them, you know. Uh and um and then the tour just made them a ton of money. People came out all over the country. All over the country. It was amazing. And weirdly, you know, back then, you know, as in all first run Sondheim shows, the first time they're done, people never get the second act. In these Sondheim Lapine shows. And the second act for me is my favorite act. You know, I mean it's just was that harder on the road playing the second act.

[21:55] Ben Rimalower: Pardon me. Was it harder to um feel that the audience was connecting with the second act on the road compared to on Broadway?

[22:04] Colleen Fitzpatrick: No. No, uh-uh. No. They the you know with Steve's shows, people are listening so hard you really can't tell. Because now we have all this experience with his work. But the first time they come out and not to divert from into the woods oh my god and I'm gonna say that was one of the most thrilling casts I've ever had the opportunity to observe and to work with because I went on a lot and it was my first show. So they blew my mind but um you know it's it's always a privilege and a terror to do Steve's work the first time because you know they are extremely challenging for the actor but also the audience. And back then into the woods was a real challenge, you know, for people. Now it's like, oh God, let's do it.

And every high school does it. So it's part of the canon of musical theater, not even just of Steve's shows of musical theater. So people go, Oh yeah, I know that show. Yeah, let's go see that. But back then, you know, it's it the concept of it, it takes a radical turn in act two, you know. And for me, when if I wasn't on, and all of us understudies went on a tremendous amount. I don't know why that was, yeah, but we did all of us, every single one of us. We had a uh like a you know parents use a marker for how tall their children get. We had we had a wall that we ticked off every time any of us were on. And all the understudies every role was like double covered, yeah, in that show. Uh had to be, you know, were you the first cover for the baker's wife?

[23:57] Ben Rimalower: Uh no, Kay was, and then I was second, yeah.

[24:03] Colleen Fitzpatrick: So did you wind up going on in that role?

[24:04] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Oh, yeah. Oh yeah. And I love doing it. Yeah. I it was I mean, just doing any of Steve's work is such a privilege. It's an education about how you pull everything that you can into your work because it's it's there for you and to mine it and everything. It was, and yet we had a lot of fun. I mean, you know, people were naughty on stage and into the woods. I specifically remember remember and the hydraulics of the the hill slope, you know, would break occasionally. And I remember Kay, uh, I was with her, I was doing Lucinda and she was doing Florinda and we tripsied across the stage on one midnight cross and at some point in the show and there was a croissant that fell onto the floor from under her bald gown.

You know, I mean they're you know typical you know and those costumes those female costumes for the mother and uh the girls yeah oh my god they were like so heavy that was back in the day when you had massive budgets to create gorgeous costumes and we had like football stuffings in each sleeve and then on the panniers and in the butt and it was just so so heavy we weren't allowed to sit down in those duchess satin gowns.

[25:38] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Wow we would make an exit let's say stage left and our dressers would be standing there next because you couldn't pass around this in the back of the stage there we had to go underneath the stage to cross from stage right to stage left and our dressers would undress us down to the pantaloons, the corsets and the shirts and we would cross underneath the stage in our underclothing costume underclothing and then the gowns would be put on on the other side of the stage.

[26:11] Ben Rimalower: How did the gown get there?

[26:11] Colleen Fitzpatrick: The well the our dressers would carry them down.

[26:16] Ben Rimalower: Well that's really like being uh you know a lady of the court in those days.

[26:23] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Oh my god, yeah, it was crazy. But that it was a relief on a certain level because at least if we weren't on, we could take them off and and not sit on a chair but rest on a stool or something like that.

[26:33] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Yeah, I mean even just to go up and down the stairs, it must have been a huge difference.

[26:37] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Oh yeah, because yeah, oh my god, tremendous.

[26:40] Colleen Fitzpatrick: They I don't even know how much they weighed, but it had to be over 38 pounds.

[26:45] Colleen Fitzpatrick: They were from because it was Duchess satin, and then the big crinoline underneath with whale bones and this and that and the other.

[26:53] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Now, let me ask you a technical question about the music for the stepsisters, especially as someone who was covering both roles.

[27:00] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Like they it seems to my you know, um ignorant ear that they're singing in unison a lot, but is it actually in harmony?

[27:10] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And is that tricky to when you go on in one role, remember which part you're singing?

[27:17] Colleen Fitzpatrick: It it isn't because you know, you just drill and drill and drill and drill.

[27:23] Colleen Fitzpatrick: The hardest thing for me that I recall, yeah, um when the mother is is doing is twisting Florinda's hair and her head.

[27:34] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I don't know, right?

[27:36] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And then Lucinda has to laugh, but it's a musical ass.

[27:39] Colleen Fitzpatrick: But the the but that there was nobody that could do it like Lauren Mitchell.

[27:45] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I mean, and I would struggle to do that, but it was Lauren Mitchell, who is one of the smartest people I know and one of the kindest people I know, and she's now a big big time producer for many, many years.

[27:59] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Yeah, she um she just had a command of style of style and also quick, you know, everybody that Steve every time I uh I'm backing up a little bit.

[28:13] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Every time I auditioned for another Steve Sondheim show slash Paul Gemignani's show, I'd see the same people.

[28:20] Colleen Fitzpatrick: It was almost like it was kind of a rep company because we all sang on and off the nose, like Steve liked.

[28:30] Colleen Fitzpatrick: That's just all there was to it, whether you were male or female.

[28:34] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Now all of this that I'm saying is my opinion, but I mean it is borne out by we saw the same people over and over and over again.

[28:41] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And depending on the show, you might work with those people twice, like Tom Aldridge, who I adored.

[28:47] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I did Into the Woods and Passion with Tom.

[28:50] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I I what an actor and a consummate gentleman and just oh my god, he was just incredible.

[28:57] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And many others, you know, so I'd see them a lot, you know, and that and it would it made it like a family in a weird way.

[29:06] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Yeah.

[29:06] Colleen Fitzpatrick: You know, as a matter of fact, when I did Into the Woods, and if I wasn't on every single night, I would go down to the first leg of stage right and get as close as I could to the downstage side of the leg, and I would just like right out of the light, and I would watch Tom and Chip do no more.

[29:36] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Which to me is the best number in the entire piece for me.

[29:42] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Yeah, it's just so simple, but it is so profound, and they're both of their acting, they were never the same, and yet it was so deep for them.

[29:59] Colleen Fitzpatrick: It I was so impressed as a young actor.

[30:02] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I think I was 30.

[30:03] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Then I just couldn't believe what I was witnessing.

[30:07] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Yeah.

[30:08] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Really.

[30:10] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I just it just tears me up every time I hear it.

[30:16] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Huge fan.

[30:17] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Speaking of this repertory company, so I mean you mentioned Tom.

[30:21] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I know that Marin Maisie had uh over in Into the Woods as Rapunzel.

[30:26] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And then of course, uh, you know, her great her great splash in passion, where she was so uh, you know, irreplaceable, singular.

[30:35] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Um and I covered her in passion.

[30:39] Colleen Fitzpatrick: You know, I I was on stage as the mistress and the maid, and then I covered she and um Donna.

[30:47] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Wow as Fosca.

[30:48] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I d I was covering them both.

[30:49] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Wow.

[30:50] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I had understudy rehearsals twice a week every week.

[30:52] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Oh my gosh.

[30:53] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Um yeah, it was fun.

[30:55] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I learned a lot on that show too.

[30:57] Ben Rimalower: So tell me more about the understudies in Into the Woods.

[31:00] Colleen Fitzpatrick: So I mean, you're essentially had that speaking.

[31:02] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I mean, that's like a mini repertory company within the report.

[31:05] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Oh my god, yeah.

[31:06] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Right.

[31:06] Colleen Fitzpatrick: You know, I'm just thinking back.

[31:08] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I mean, geez, and I'm gonna forget people.

[31:11] Colleen Fitzpatrick: My dear friend to this day, Jeff Blumencrantz, yeah, who covered five roles, and I okay, he if somebody tells him, he's gonna go, no, I didn't go on that much, but I swear to god it he he went on some over a hundred times, something crazy.

[31:29] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Because he covered everybody in the show practically.

[31:32] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And uh geez, we had what was her last name, Cindy.

[31:36] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Cindy, I can't remember her last name because a lot of these people I've never seen again.

[31:41] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Myself, Jennifer Chatfield, um oh my god, I can't even remember them all.

[31:41] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I can't.

[31:47] Colleen Fitzpatrick: But it was there were like five or six of us.

[31:49] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I mean, let's not forget we're talking about 1980, what, four or five, something like that?

[31:55] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Nine, yeah.

[31:56] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Yeah, it's it's a long time ago.

[31:58] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And you were doing the full show on stage twice a week for understudy rehearsals.

[32:05] Ben Rimalower: You mean with passion?

[32:06] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Yes.

[32:06] Colleen Fitzpatrick: No, sorry, and into the woods.

[32:08] Colleen Fitzpatrick: No, just once.

[32:09] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Just once.

[32:10] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Once a week.

[32:10] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And I'd rotate.

[32:11] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Yeah, and I'd like to and you'd rotate in your roles.

[32:14] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Yeah, that's right.

[32:15] Ben Rimalower: So was there enough different covers that you could if you played Lorinda, who played Lucinda?

[32:22] Colleen Fitzpatrick: It would be Jennifer.

[32:24] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Jennifer.

[32:25] Ben Rimalower: And then if you played the Baker's wife, who played the stepsisters?

[32:30] Colleen Fitzpatrick: We would have one stepsister.

[32:32] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I mean, but that's no different.

[32:35] Colleen Fitzpatrick: That's no different with any show.

[32:36] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I mean, even in Carly Akimbo, when we're doing understudy rehearsal, we hardly ever have a full cast.

[32:44] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And the only time is when they bring in vacation covers.

[32:48] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And they when they're putting them in and they'll do it.

[32:50] Colleen Fitzpatrick: But yeah, we're bouncing all over the place.

[32:52] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And that's that's that was typical.

[32:54] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Sure.

[32:55] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I mean, I think it's into the woods is just striking because uh it's such a like um vivid ensemble cast.

[33:03] Colleen Fitzpatrick: We all know, you know, there aren't that many musicals like Into the Woods, where so many of us could name all the characters and probably sing all their parts, you know.

[33:12] Ben Rimalower: Right.

[33:12] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And isn't it terrible?

[33:13] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I can't tell you the name of all the understudies.

[33:16] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I'm sure you know decades later.

[33:18] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I don't.

[33:19] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Decades later.

[33:20] Colleen Fitzpatrick: But um Yeah, decades later.

[33:22] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And then so when replacements would come into the cast, for example, when Nancy Dusseau came in, since she was not the witch when you started correct um would she have those understudy rehearsals as part of her uh sort of process to gear up toward getting on?

[33:22] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Well it would be called if well no what they do is they have put ins for people you know the whole cast right in the lights and Nancy is also a friend of mine uh such a pro.

[33:53] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Yeah I I thought she was hilarious as the witch heard that Betsy Jocelyn we went through Betsy as the witch first or Nancy and oh my god who was the other one who was the Ellen Foley was my witch at one point and Felicia Rashad right after Bernadette and so we went through a ton of witches yeah ton of witches and then Betsy again on the road yes yes and she was great she was great very different from Bernadette but you know Bernadette Bernadette you know there's nobody like Bernadette um and um and really we only had I believe I'm correct other than Joanna Gleason then we went to Cynthia Sykes and then I think Kay took over I think Mary Gordon Murray did it for a minute in between for a minute because she went to the tour.

[34:50] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Right right I mean it was a hot second yeah and then and then Kay Kay really took over for it.

[34:59] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Yeah.

[35:00] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Yeah, I would have loved to have seen her.

[35:02] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I'm sure she was wonderful.

[35:03] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Yeah.

[35:04] Colleen Fitzpatrick: She's not even in the business anymore.

[35:06] Colleen Fitzpatrick: See, you know, sometimes great artists, great souls they they don't want to stick around.

[35:11] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Well, they want to get well, they want to get married and have children.

[35:13] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I believe that's what she did.

[35:15] Colleen Fitzpatrick: She's down south.

[35:16] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Well, there that's great too.

[35:17] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I'm probably doing.

[35:19] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Um I I'm I'm still so fascinated by the stuff you said about the Mozart and the Tessa Torah.

[35:24] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I wonder if you have other kind of like um musical musings about Sondheim.

[35:29] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I would love to hear anything you've got to say.

[35:32] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Well, I just think I just think that, you know, uh, and I know this is about into the woods.

[35:39] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Yeah.

[35:40] Colleen Fitzpatrick: But so many of his pieces are almost like retitative, right?

[35:50] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Right.

[35:50] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And a big aria.

[35:53] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And I mean, think of and he always gives his leading ladies huge aria's.

[35:59] Colleen Fitzpatrick: You know, whether it's Mrs.

[36:01] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Lovert making her meat pies, the introduction to that, Fosca I Reed.

[36:07] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Yeah.

[36:08] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And even that is hi da da da da da da di da da da da da.

[36:16] Colleen Fitzpatrick: You know, all those crazy intervals that I almost kind of remember it.

[36:20] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Yeah.

[36:20] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Um, but it's it has to be sung extremely accurately.

[36:25] Colleen Fitzpatrick: As if you're doing retitative from an opera, in my opinion, because that's the way I learned how to be a better singer.

[36:35] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And at my advanced age, I still sound extremely young.

[36:39] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I I can say that.

[36:41] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I'm playing a 16 year old now.

[36:43] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And the reason is because of the precise nature of how you're singing.

[36:49] Colleen Fitzpatrick: So you don't stress your your chops and your your larynx and your little, you know, vocal folds are vibrating at what?

[36:58] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Something like a thousand times a second or something crazy, they get degraded, and so you want to stay within the framework of what Steve has written, and the more accurately you can sing it, whether you're a male, look at buddy's numbers and follies.

[37:15] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Holy crap.

[37:16] Colleen Fitzpatrick: You know, it's just talk it is talking on pitch.

[37:20] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And a lot of times Steve will put music for a character, like the steps, way high because that's the voice he has for them.

[37:31] Colleen Fitzpatrick: That is the character's voice he's he's decided to use for them, and so they're always up there, you know, and he has a range for each character, and you have to really honor that and really you know, like I said, be accurate.

[37:48] Ben Rimalower: Well, that must make it hard to find somebody that can cover multiple roles.

[37:52] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I mean, if the stepsisters are up high, and then the baker's wife is like more of an alto range, I mean, you know, um that well, let me tell you the interesting thing about that, because um, you know, every every show except Follies, because it was a Kennedy Center production originally, and they spared no expense.

[38:13] Colleen Fitzpatrick: You'll never see another follies like that because the Kennedy Center had like buckets of money, yeah.

[38:20] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Um and that's why it was beautiful and all that.

[38:22] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I mean, it's just physically gorgeous, and we had that monster orchestra, but every show and concert that I did.

[38:31] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Oh no, I take that back.

[38:33] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Paul didn't do roadshow either at the public.

[38:36] Colleen Fitzpatrick: But most of my work was with Paul Gemignani, and Paul Gemignani, when he would audition people, and I think this is one of the reasons that Steve's shows were cast so well.

[38:47] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And they you could sing multiple areas of your voice well.

[38:53] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And this is a famous story, but it's absolutely true.

[38:56] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Paul, when he would audition people, grades the singers.

[39:00] Colleen Fitzpatrick: You're just oh yeah, you'd never heard that.

[39:02] Colleen Fitzpatrick: From A to F.

[39:06] Colleen Fitzpatrick: F being failed.

[39:07] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Yeah.

[39:08] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And this is, and I'm and I thought it was ingenious, but it was made his auditions really scarier than hell.

[39:18] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Because you would be singing what you came in with your own number, and then you'd be singing stuff from the show.

[39:23] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And then he'd say, Hey, can you sing happy birthday?

[39:27] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And I'd say, What?

[39:28] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And then he'd look at Paul Ford or whoever, Mark Mitchell, and say, and can you put that in the key of whatever?

[39:34] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And then you'd sing a little bit, and then he'd go, okay, take it up a fifth.

[39:39] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Okay, now down a minor third.

[39:41] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Now can you go up a sixth?

[39:43] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Now, and all over the place because, and let me tell you something, and that's why I did not get the original Sunday.

[39:50] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Yeah, he is looking for your weakness.

[39:54] Ben Rimalower: Wow.

[39:55] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Wow. But that's a very smart thing to do because he was listening. Gemini is a brilliant musician. I adore him to this day. I still keep in touch with him. And he was extremely demanding. I mean, he either liked your sound or he didn't like your sound, you know. And fortunately for me, he liked my sound, and Steve liked my sound. And you can see in those original companies, there were certain actor singers, no offense to those actors, that have never ever, and would have never done a show with Steve and Paul. Their voices just weren't something that they used.

[40:33] Ben Rimalower: Yeah.

[40:36] Colleen Fitzpatrick: No offense. Um, I'm curious. Uh, you know, if just I just love to know like what are the Sondheim songs that you like to sing most in your voice.

[40:49] Ben Rimalower: Oh my god. I know that's a weird question. You just made me want to know.

[40:54] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Um, you know, I I you know, I I don't even know how to answer that, because my mind, I think when I think of Sondheim music, you know, I'd love to literally, I know I'm old now, but I would love to do Desiree, and I think I would be able to do Desiree. I love her music. Um I think when I was doing Passion, it was such a joy to sing Fosca's opening number. Um because it's so deep, it's just so deep. And for me, the number in the bedroom, which they they took out so much dialogue in that scene when Fosca is asking Giorgio to write the letter, and you miss because they they took it out, but the Victorians really were fascinated by death, even in Europe, and people would cut off the braids of people, dead people and save the hair and stuff. But she asked him to write the letter, and that section in there that I think part of the lyric is a love as pure as breath, as permanent as death, implacable as stung.

[42:16] Ben Rimalower: Yeah.

[42:16] Colleen Fitzpatrick: A love that like a knife has cut into a life I wanted left alone. There is nobody on the planet that could have ever written those lyrics. That's for sure. And it's absolutely reductive. It's the bars are perfect for the sound, for the the the sentence that is or the phrases that he wrote and the idea that he wrote. And it's a freaking miracle.

[42:42] Ben Rimalower: Yeah.

[42:44] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Into the woods, I think really I just sing along. I still put on his albums all the time and just see what I feel, you know, about what I know now as I've gotten older and I listen to these lyrics. And because of my life experience, what I know, what I've gathered. And I still, again, no more. No one is alone, you know, things like that. They're just finishing the hat, you know, all of that stuff. I wish I could be George, you know. I mean, there's so many things that you would just want to play. And of course, Sally, Sally and Follow.

[43:23] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Because now you wet my appetite. I'm so, you know, I think about "Finishing the Hat" as such a hard, rangy song.

[43:29] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Yeah. And I've heard some women sing it in a lower key, you know, so that it's more of like a kind of belt number. Um, like it's not a belt number.

[43:38] Colleen Fitzpatrick: But I'm very curious where you would choose to sing it.

[43:42] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Oh, I would sing it in the original key. Oh, you know, I mean, of course I would. Hell yeah, man.

[43:54] Colleen Fitzpatrick: But it would be the key to that, it has to be light, you know, and Mandy was just such a master at like just on and off the note so lightly. Just think like a little bink bink bink, like a mallet, tiny little mallet on and off the note.

[44:11] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Yeah. And I love that. You know, I love that accuracy when I hear singers with his songs. I don't like any heavy-handed treatment by singers of his material because that's not what he wrote.

[44:27] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Yeah. Um, okay, then I cut you off because I just had to know the answer to that. So then you were moving on to Sally and Folly's.

[44:35] Ben Rimalower: Sally, Sally's, yeah, I mean, shoot, you know, she's just such a great character.

[44:43] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I I would love to play her for me just to hear the original company and the great dead too early, Dorothy Collins sing the sun comes up. I say about you. It's her phrasing. Her phrasing is perfection, it's right in the pocket of what he wrote that is so mind-blowing. I you know, and by the way, you can even see her do it on some variety show on YouTube. And I occasionally watch it and go, man, perfection. She's barely doing anything. And you understand exactly where that woman is at. And that's that's her, and that's also Steve's writing.

[45:39] Ben Rimalower: You know, you know, it was just wow.

[45:44] Colleen Fitzpatrick: That's all I can say. Yeah. I've had a lot of great experiences. I into the woods is very dear to me because it was my first introduction to him.

[45:56] Ben Rimalower: Yeah.

[45:57] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And set me on a path really for the rest of my career.

[46:02] Ben Rimalower: Yeah, clearly.

[46:04] Colleen Fitzpatrick: You know, and it's not even about my career, but what I was able to learn at the seat of honestly, and I say it without any ridiculous, like of the seat of these greats. Steve.

[46:21] Ben Rimalower: Yeah.

[46:22] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Jonathan Tunick, even more so than Jonathan for me was Paul Gemignani, who had who is such a voice of his pieces.

[46:32] Ben Rimalower: Yeah.

[46:32] Colleen Fitzpatrick: A great partner, a great partner for actors and singers in the pit who could really save you, help you have at breath. You know, nowadays, I think, as a matter of fact, I know this is true because my musical director told me Kimberly Akimbo is the only musical on Broadway today that does not have an orchestra that's using a click track.

[46:57] Ben Rimalower: Wow.

[46:58] Colleen Fitzpatrick: And click tracks for me are the death of any breath in music and true feeling. It's just a steady click. And you know, that for me, I I can't help it. You know, everything sounds so similar.

[47:16] Ben Rimalower: Yeah.

[47:18] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Yeah. But I'm of that other generation, you know.

[47:21] Ben Rimalower: I mean literally, I'm of another generation of musical actors and singers, you know.

[47:27] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Well, I I I I I love knowing that it there's a full circleness to it, and you know, in in the way you've described your experience uh and the musical uh you know uh of uh the musical world of Kimberly Akimbo and certainly you know those artists that you're working with. I mean I mean you talk about doing follies with Vicky Clark and obviously Janine Tassori, like many composers, is very much in the school of Stephen Sondheim, and you know, would be the first, I'm sure, to trace so much of her inspiration from his work.

[48:00] Colleen Fitzpatrick: That I don't know, but I mean I'm so lucky to work with her on this piece, which I think is just incredible work uh by she and David Lindsay Bear. And I I had worked with Janine before, and that's where I met her and Chris Fenneck because I did Mother Courage with Meryl Streep at the public.

[48:19] Ben Rimalower: Right, right, in the in the park, Delacourt, yeah, which was another astonishing experience because of the cast, but also the material and who was working on this thing.

[48:31] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Yeah, and uh George Wolf and Tony Kushner was he did the at a sick, yeah. It was crazy, but Janine literally took the actors that George hired, and of course she was in the room, and she wrote the score while we were rehearsing.

[48:52] Ben Rimalower: Wow.

[48:53] Colleen Fitzpatrick: That was wild. But she's very she's like I said, she is a stickler, stickler like Stephen. And really, if I could say anything to musical theater uh singers, it would be to sing it as it's written, and that does not tie you down, that actually gives you more freedom, swear to God.

[49:17] Ben Rimalower: Swear to God.

[49:20] Colleen Fitzpatrick: That that makes intuitive sense to me, but explain what how that plays out, that it gives you more.

[49:26] Ben Rimalower: Well, I think that you know, when your focus, and this is my opinion, and it's my own training. When your focus is on yourself and how loud you're gonna sing or how big your note's gonna be, or how long you can hold it, or whatever, even if that's just in the back of your mind, it takes you away from what the composer intended. And when you really think about the job of a singer-actor, your focus is on what they wrote. You are communicating to the audience what their intentions were in their writing. And I am a big big believer in that.

[50:09] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Uh, Janine was talking about something very similar in our rehearsal. Um, because when you do that, your work actually becomes more defined by yourself and the composer. You're working in tandem with the composer, whether he's dead or he's alive, uh, and gender, it could be she or he. Um, you're in tandem with them. You were a partner with them, and you were communicating what they want you to communicate. And when you know that, to me, you're on solid ground, and then you have even more time within a bar or a line or to make the composer's point, not your point. It's not about you. The composer's point, and there's so much freedom in that about how you're going to express that within the parameters that you've been given.

[51:08] Ben Rimalower: That's so well said.

[51:09] Colleen Fitzpatrick: That's so well said. Thank you.

[51:11] Ben Rimalower: I mean, and I really believe that. Even if you're singing a very quick retro to TV type song.

[51:17] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Yeah.

[51:18] Ben Rimalower: Then you go, wow, that's not that fast. I got all the time in the world.

[51:22] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Because I'm getting on and off that, you know, it's it's even in her stuff. Hello, sister, it's me, your sister. Guess where we are? We're on safari. You know, but it's on and off, really fast. But you understand exactly what you're hearing as the audience member.

[51:38] Colleen Fitzpatrick: How do you sound so beautiful just throwing that away mid-

[51:38] Ben Rimalower: Oh thank you?

[51:43] Colleen Fitzpatrick: I don't know. I'll tell you what. My teacher who's long dead always said, if you can talk in the morning, you can sing. And I think she's absolutely wow.

[51:50] Ben Rimalower: I do. Colleen, you you're a marvel. Thank you so much.

[51:53] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Thank you.

[51:54] Ben Rimalower: Me, I really, really enjoyed hearing it. And I know the listeners will too.

[51:59] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Oh, I hope so.

[52:01] Ben Rimalower: I um I wish you the best with the rest of the run of Kimberly King. Get to see you go on. And uh I'm happy that we've uh added your into the woods story to the uh annals.

[52:13] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Oh, me too. My my first adored show of Steve's. I I love his work so much and loved him too.

[52:21] Ben Rimalower: We all do.

[52:22] Colleen Fitzpatrick: We all do.

[52:23] Ben Rimalower: Yeah, yeah.

[52:23] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Thank you.

[52:23] Ben Rimalower: Have a great rest of your day, and I hope I talk to you soon.

[52:26] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Thank you, Ben.

[52:27] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Take care.

[52:29] Colleen Fitzpatrick: Bye.

[52:38] Ben Rimalower: Thank you for listening to Giants in the Sky: How Sondheim and Le Pine went into the woods on the Broadway Podcast Network. Look out for episode 34 with Joshua Ellis, Broadway press agent.