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[0:00] Mary Dina: Hey everyone, welcome to Page to Stage. A conversation with theater makers. We're your hosts. That's Brian. And that's Mary. Join us as we focus the spotlight back on the theater maker to uncover their process. We speak with folks in the industry that often aren't heard from, such as stage managers, producers, crew members, marketing professionals, and everything in between. We hope you enjoy this episode.

[0:26] David Loud: Hi, my name is David Loud, and I am a Broadway music director. Welcome.

[0:31] Mary Dina: Thank you. I just want to say before we really jump into things, it is an honor to have you with us. It's because Brian and I met working for Broadway Teachers Workshop, which is where you do these beautiful arrangements for the attendees, the teachers who attend those workshops every year. And for anyone who's listening who doesn't know, basically what David does is take a composer or a lyricist and puts together how long would you say it is, like 10 minutes?

[1:00] Brian Sedita: No, it has to be more than 10 minutes, right? Like 40, an hour?

[1:03] Mary Dina: A while and just talks about their life and what they were doing. And I know that it is a huge, it's probably, I think one of the most favorite pieces from all the attendees, but it's definitely for Brian and I when we were working there. It was always so exciting to see which person you were going to be, you know, talking about next year after year.

[1:26] Brian Sedita: Yeah, the summer that I worked there, you did the Sondheim.

[1:29] David Loud: Oh, the Sondheim Prince Collaboration.

[1:31] Brian Sedita: Yeah.

[1:32] David Loud: Yes. And that was really, really great. That was a complex one.

[1:35] Mary Dina: I imagine.

[1:39] David Loud: That's one of my favorite things in the world to do. And those lectures I also give to my students at Manhattan School of Music where I teach now. And I love illustrating the points I'm making with the actual songs and having Broadway singers sing them and try to keep it as fresh and interesting as possible. But that's one of my favorite things in the world to do.

[2:01] Mary Dina: In that particular presentation, you showed pictures of yourself in Merrily We Roll Along, where you began your career.

[2:06] David Loud: That's right.

[2:07] Mary Dina: Talked about how, you know, the production wasn't originally a critical success. So I'm wondering if we could begin our conversation by, since that was one of your first, that was your first professional gig.

[2:20] David Loud: Absolutely. What was it like beginning your career with that sort of experience? And then how did that shape what followed?

[2:26] David Loud: Well, I have to say I recommend starting with a huge flop. It was a terrible thing to go through at the time. It was very disappointing and difficult. But in retrospect, I now appreciate when I have success in the theater so much more. And I don't take it for granted. And I think knowing how painful it can be when a show doesn't work and closes before you thought it would, and your new show business family that you've found is dissipated and you never see them again sometimes. That was a devastating thing to go through, and you have to know that that happens in the business, I think. This business is tough. We were always told when I was growing up, you know, don't go into the theater unless you absolutely have to. And I don't think that actually scares anybody away because people who want it really want it. You can tell them how terrible it is over and over and over, and they still just want it. In retrospect, it was a healthy thing to start with a big flop.

[3:36] Mary Dina: And so that was in your performing days. When did you make the transition to behind the piano?

[3:43] David Loud: Well, it was really in Merrily that I, you know, I was having a great time up on stage, singing and dancing, but it was clear to me looking around at the talents of the other people in that company that I didn't have everything that I needed to be a professional actor in musical theater. You know, there's Liz Callaway on my left singing songs like in that angelic voice of hers with no break anywhere. You know, actors like Lonnie Price, Terry Finn, Jim Walton, who were just so skilled, and that wasn't me. But the music director of Merrily We Roll Along was Paul Gemignani, one of the great sort of statesmen of Broadway music directors, and he had such a force and such a command from his spot on the podium.

He sort of taught us how to follow a conductor just through the magnetism of his personality. You couldn't take your eyes off him, which is the point. You must always be aware of the conductor if you are in a musical. And he taught us that. We didn't know because we were so young. We were all teenagers in that cast. After Merrily closed, I thought, you know what? I want to be Paul Gemignani when I grow up. And so I stopped pursuing, I what hadn't really been pursuing a career as an actor. It was a fluke that I was in Merrily, but then I started pursuing jobs as the music director and assistant music director.

[5:24] Mary Dina: What did those early days of pursuing a career in that look like? You were already in the industry in a way, but it was now this completely different way that people had to see you.

[5:35] David Loud: That's right. That's right. And that's always really tough. If you are a musician, you know, musical theater musician, you can make a living in the business as an audition pianist, as a coach for actors and singers and dancers. What I really wanted to do was be working on shows, so I was always trying to, you know, find conductors to assist or small enough theaters that would hire somebody without too much experience like me. I did non-equity summer stock one summer as the assistant music director and got to learn 12 shows doing that. And then they asked me to come back as music director the next summer. I got to learn another 24 shows. And another 12 shows that second summer. And so I just kind of taught myself what I needed to know to be a music director. And I was lucky enough to work for some very skillful conductors and music directors that were exciting to learn from.

[6:40] Mary Dina: So it sounds like it was really like you were kind of learning as you go and figuring out like what the quote unquote like right step would be just by doing the thing.

[6:51] David Loud: Absolutely. I mean, when I came to New York, Merrily was in 1981. I was 19 when we were rehearsals, and I don't think anybody from that cast had gone to a conservatory the way most of the kids who come to be on Broadway now, they've done a four-year program at Cincinnati or Carnegie Mellon or different conservatories. We just came and hung out and tried to figure out what the theater was and how you got a job and you talked to your friends. There was more of sort of an oral tradition of people learning the business from each other rather than being taught in a class how to have their audition books look perfect and pristine. It was a little rougher tumble time back then. But yes, I did just have to figure it out by myself.

[7:45] Mary Dina: I love that. I feel like there are just with the nature of our podcast we hear a lot of people's origin stories and how, you know, what inspired them to get going. And I feel like a common thread, Brian, I think you would agree, is that people often don't know what they're doing when they're doing it. They really just figure it out, you know, they'll make mistakes along the way. But I think that's so special because everyone's journey that much more unique and that much more rewarding, I think.

[8:16] Brian Sedita: So I'm curious, a lot of the musicals that you have music directed are really rich in the storytelling through the song. How much of your role as a music director is also an acting coach?

[8:16] David Loud: I would say it's one of my favorite parts of being a music director is working with actors on how to interpret the song. And I firmly believe that the music director has a place in that conversation. It's not just between the actor and the director how they're gonna sing the song. I think the music director is gonna be part of that discussion. When I teach a song, I try to teach it from the point of view of the character that we're trying to create here. You know, it's not just about learning notes, it's about how would this character sing this phrase? How does this lyric reflect what the character's going through and what do we need to bring out? What's important to emphasize? It's really my favorite part of working in musical theater is making a song live and realizing what a composer has created with the instrument that we have in front of us, which in this case is an actor.

[9:26] David Loud: The music director on a Broadway show is responsible for every piece of music that happens in the show. I attend all the auditions and I make sure that the voices that are hired are appropriate for whatever the musical is, whether it's an operetta and needs, you know, six sopranos who can sing high C's, or if it's a pop show and they have to be able to belt up to a D or a D flat, whatever it's gonna be. I'm the person who says that actor has a perfect voice for this show, or I don't think she's really right for this. You know, she can't really, she won't be helping us. Then I teach the music and work with the director on how music is gonna function in the show. You know, is there gonna be underscoring in the scene? How are we gonna get into this song? Are we gonna blare in or sneak in? There's many different ways that music can, that dialogue can become song, and that's always my job.

[10:24] Mary Dina: At what point are you being brought on as a music director to work on a production? And who are you being brought on by?

[10:31] David Loud: Usually in the developmental stage, you know, there's a team of writers, they want to do a reading of their show, so a producer produces a, you know, say a two-week reading of a show. Well, depending on the composing team, sometimes I'll work on the arrangements. You know, sometimes if they're full service, if they write complete accompaniments and vocal arrangements, then my job becomes simpler. But often I am working with the writing team on the arrangements as well. I'm not there when they're having the original ideas, you know, for how to create the songs themselves, but I'm there usually for the first time they're read out loud by professional actors. Most shows go through a series of readings and workshops, and then maybe an out-of-town tryout, and if they're lucky, you know, six years later, maybe you get to Broadway.

[11:30] Mary Dina: During the show's development process as a music director, it seems like you'll influence the score that maybe will eventually become published or used in subsequent productions. Can you give us examples of maybe something that has come to fruition based on your input in the room?

[11:53] David Loud: Sure. Well, as I said, it depends on who I'm working with. When I work with Lynn Ahrens and Steve Flaherty on Ragtime, they write everything that they want into the score. There are, you know, the vocal arrangements are all worked out, what the chorus is gonna sing. Dialogue is usually timed to the music already. They're very precise and clear about what they want. I've done a number of shows with John Kander and Fred Ebb. More recently just with John Kander, because Fred died a couple of years ago. But working with them is very different because John Kander will write a VAMP and a melody and hand the song over to me and I'll figure out how it's gonna work in the show. We're gonna start with a chorus and then, you know, we might maybe modulate here because that'll be better for the leading man.

I'll be structuring the numbers in consultation with John always, but there's much more of my creative work in a score like that. We did The Visit together and we did The Scottsboro Boys together with Kander and Steel Pier on Broadway and Curtains on Broadway, and my imprint is large in those shows, just in terms of the vocal arrangement and the structure of how the songs are used theatrically.

[13:23] Brian Sedita: So I'm imagining with those theater makers who you're working with show after show, year after year, you develop a kind of shorthand with each other. So I'm curious as to how that shorthand really helps embellish each next project. Is it helping you get to the point faster that you're trying to make? Does it make it richer? Is the experience just easier overall? Like what do you see that shorthand doing for you there?

[13:52] David Loud: Well, people in the theater like to work with people they know. And it makes sense. I mean, that first day of rehearsal, and you look around the room and you don't know people, and you might be together for the next, you know, two years if you're lucky. It's very comforting to be working with people who you know how they work, you know their language, you know their taste. I would say that it takes a long time to be able to read someone's mind and know, you know, oh, this is the kind of embellishment that John Kander would like. It took me a long time to figure that out. And I know now, you know, pretty much always how to do work that, you know, he's gonna approve. And he always has his contributions, which are always breathtaking and wonderful. Having done as many shows as we have together, I do feel like I know his taste and it does help.

[15:01] Brian Sedita: Interesting. We are the music directors really are the collaborators. We're collaborator central. We have to work with the director, we have to work with the choreographer, we have to work with the composer. Sometimes we're working with the, you know, the set designer, making sure that the music is gonna exactly fit the set changes so the scenery comes in and stops right as the music goes ding and then everything looks great. Sometimes we'll work with the costume designer and we'll, you know, time how long the costume change is, you know, it's gonna be 17 seconds. We have to get 17 seconds of music in here, and then make sure that it's 17 seconds every night so that the actor can make the costume change. We have our fingers, hopefully, in every little pie that's going around the theater. The better you know the people you're working with, the easier that all that collaboration becomes.

[15:55] David Loud: In addition to music directing, you're also an arranger. And as the vocal and dance arranger, you've created so many arrangements over the years, including The Visit, Scottsboro Boys, Sondheim on Sondheim. Can you share with our listeners what an arranger does? And then is that in line with what an orchestrator does? And maybe where do those two cross paths, and maybe where do those two different?

[16:15] David Loud: That's a great question because people don't really know often what the difference is between those jobs. The arranger, when you arrange music, you're figuring out the style and the way a melody is going to develop. Maybe you're working out what a group of backup girls are gonna sing if that's how it's structured. Maybe you're working out what a chorus will do, maybe working out harmony between the leading man and the leading lady. And you work with what they're gonna sing and how they're gonna find their notes and what the harmonic lines are gonna be. And then that gets written down, usually as a piano vocal, you know, the piano part with the vocal lines on top of it. An orchestrator then looks at that arrangement, looks at the piano part, and figures out how to translate it to, say, a 19-piece orchestra.

Who's gonna play this note and how, who's gonna play this note? And are we gonna have lots of strings, or is it gonna be mostly brass, or do we need lots of woodwind colors? You know, choosing the palette that the orchestra is gonna paint with. But the orchestrator is the person who translates the piano part into what 19 people say are going to play. And orchestrators on Broadway shows have to work incredibly fast because often work is not done on the musical numbers until well into rehearsals. And it all has to be done before the first preview. And you try to bring the orchestrators in to see the numbers once they're choreographed so that the orchestration can match the choreography. It's a real sort of a death race at the end of rehearsals trying to get ready for that first orchestra rehearsal.

[18:18] Brian Sedita: I love that visual, it's very helpful. I never thought about it like that, but I mean I definitely didn't realize that orchestrators have a very limited window of time.

[18:29] David Loud: You could orchestrate a show before rehearsal started, but everything would change in rehearsal. You just have to redo the whole thing. I'm curious to what your specific process is. Are you looking at eight individual songs at a time and arranging from there, or are you looking at the whole show and kind of figuring out if there are any kind of themes or like looking at like a start to finish look at like kind of like an outside show that I'm working on? If I'm working on a Broadway show that has a story and development and characters that, you know, have to be expressed in a certain way, then really it's about the text and figuring out how the song is going to function in the show, what the director needs, what the choreographer needs, you know, is the chorus available to be in the number if there's going to be a lot of vocal work.

If I'm doing a show that is just more like a musical concert where I'm, you know, say creating an evening of arrangements of songs by Burton Lane, you know, who wrote Finian's Rainbow and On a Clear Day You Can See Forever, then I want to present his music as faithfully and beautifully and creatively as I can, finding the line between doing exactly what he wrote and also putting my touches on it, which hopefully are designed to freshen up something if we've heard it too many times, and also make it as appealing as possible to the ears of today.

[20:22] Brian Sedita: I'm gonna recall that Sondheim Prince presentation you did at Broadway Teachers Workshop, but I still tell people about the arrangement you did of "Broadway Baby." I loved it, it was haunting, it was a beautiful, beautiful arrangement.

[20:40] David Loud: Thank you. I sort of slowed it down a little bit and took a little of the sort of old woman gusto, which is traditional in that song, out of it, and turned it into almost sort of a scared little lullaby of sort of wondering about the business. And yeah, thank you for mentioning that. That was a fun one. I was pleased with the way it came out.

[21:07] Brian Sedita: Yeah. So you've worked with some brilliant and legendary people in the theater industry, you know, real Titans of the theater. How do you develop your own unique process when you're working with such great people that I'm sure you want to, you know, take and pick and choose from everybody, right?

[21:30] David Loud: Yeah, I mean I love to learn, and I love to be educated in how something could be done better if I have a certain way of doing it. I got to work with Sondheim several times over the course of my time working on Broadway, you know, first as a teenager, and then later as the music director, and then on Sondheim on Sondheim as a, I mean, I really arranged a lot of the material that we presented in that show. I mean, I would have thought that he would have been terrified to have one of the Merrily kids suddenly music directing his work. But he was so kind and so excited and sort of open to my input and collaboration. It really floored me how graciously he allowed me to make that transition.

[22:25] Brian Sedita: That's gotta be surreal, full circle for you.

[22:28] David Loud: Yeah, to have started your career like that, and you know, in what your career had blossomed into becoming, then working with him again in that way so intimately.

[22:40] Brian Sedita: Yeah, yeah. And being able to see from two perspectives, which has gotta be so interesting.

[22:46] David Loud: He is one of the heroes of my life, and he's a hero who never disappointed me on any level. Not artistically, never personally. He was always so kind and so supportive. I've never heard a note of his that disappoints. And I think I always laugh when people say like, you know, don't meet your heroes. But honestly, like, you should try to meet them. There aren't many like that. I mean, I put him up for Mozart, Michelangelo, and Shakespeare. I mean, this is a man that you can learn about life from if you look at his lyrics. I think he taught me how to be an adult reading his musicals. I think of the way in Company he defines marriage as having two contradictory thoughts at the same time: you're sorry, grateful, you're regretful, happy.

That is so profound and interesting and something to learn from. I think of lyrics like in Sweeney Todd when she says, "A seaside wedding could be devised, me rumpled bedding legitimized." And you suddenly know, oh, they're sleeping together even though they're not behaving in the play like they're sleeping together. That lyric tells us that little fact that they've slept together already. And I don't know, I think he is as great a playwright as he was a composer and a lyricist.

[24:20] Brian Sedita: I love that. I am such a huge fan of Sondheim, and so I love that tidbit. Thank you for sharing that with us. I'm curious, based on all the shows you've worked on over the years, do you have a particular favorite genre that you like working in, or a genre of music that you really lean in towards?

[24:25] David Loud: When I was a kid, and you hear this over and over from people, I listened to the record collection that my parents had in the living room of My Fair Lady and Guys and Dolls and Bells Are Ringing and West Side Story and the great Broadway musicals that most middle-class families had recordings of. And that's the music that I long to work on. I love working on that music, and that's not really where Broadway is anymore, which is frustrating for me and disappointing occasionally. But I would say that working on a show like Ragtime, you know, certainly satisfied that itch of mine. And composers like I'm so lucky to work with teams like Bock and Harnick on She Loves Me revival and Kander and Sondheim who are writing in that tradition, if not in that exact kind of way. But that's where my heart lives. I mean, I'll do a pop musical if you force me to, but I'm probably not your best choice for that job.

[25:14] David Loud: Amazing. I wanted to talk a little bit about your memoir that came out earlier this year, just even last month. In fact, it came out yesterday.

[26:17] David Loud: Okay, maybe went on pre-sale um in February then.

[26:20] Mary Dina: Yes, it did.

[26:21] David Loud: Um so it's called Facing the Music.

[26:24] Mary Dina: Um, and it is what you call a Broadway memoir.

[26:26] David Loud: And I when I was first of all, when I read the the prelude, I was immediately hooked. That story had my heart palpitations. I was like, well, this is totally a theater. I mean, yes, it was obviously a Broadway story, but I think anyone who's ever worked in theater Broadway or not can relate to that like heart racing moment where you can't find your score. It was a terrible night. Oh my gosh. I really appreciated that as just like the jump right into this memoir. And so um I'm curious as to what was it like putting, you know, pen to paper, so to speak, um, and sharing your story in this medium.

[27:09] David Loud: It was it was hard. I I mean, I did I wasn't in that uh practice of sitting down every morning and writing and seeing what came out and then rewriting and rewriting and rewriting and rewriting. I just um it took me six and a half years. I had I had given a little commencement address up at a school, and this woman came up to me after the speech and said, I think this could be a book. And I thought that was very nice, and I went on to the next person who wanted to say something nice to me. But that woman uh went and found my husband and said to Pedro, um, David didn't take me very seriously, but I am a New York publisher and I really think he should make this into a book and I I will publish it.

And so Pedro convinced me to call her, and I went and met her in her very nice downtown chic office, and and all of a sudden I was writing a book for the next six and a half years, and she published it after all of that. I mean, it was such a wonderful way to write a a first book with that kind of confidence. She wasn't gonna publish it until it was good, so it did take a long time. And she found me a great editor and she gave me the title. I'd been calling it A View from the Pit, which I thought was very nice and clever, but Facing the Music ultimately turned out to be a more perfect title for it.

[28:39] Mary Dina: And how I'm sure very surreal to be right to be working on it in what ended up being its final drafts um over the last two years when theater was at a standstill. Um we we all hungered for it so much in that time. And you'd get little glimpses of it, you know, in those terrible Zoom musicals that we pretended that we liked for a while, and people missed it so much. And we didn't know, I mean, who knew before the pandemic that having a singer sing at a piano with you live was the most precious thing in the world. I mean, I knew it was the most precious thing in the world, but I I so took it for granted and to have it taken away for so long was it was just awful. And so was writing your memoir during the those last two years, um was that did it make it more special? Were you able to really like dive in deeper with what you were writing?

[29:39] David Loud: Which was nice. Yeah. Um by then I was really rewriting. I had written a much different book to start, much longer. And Judith, who published it, Judith Regan, she said, You're hiding on every page. And I took those notes and did a rewrite and then handed it in, thinking I'd get A plus 100. And it came back with like 500 more questions. So I wrote and I I got upset then and I threw the book into the bottom of my closet and didn't look at it for a couple months. And then I picked it up again and thought, oh, these questions are quite extraordinary. And I rewrote it a third time, and that was sort of during the pandemic. And the questions were, you know, what did you feel feel about this? How did how did this affect you?

What was your reaction when this person said this? And that was that was hard work to dig up the truth of putting my emotions into all the stories I was telling. And then I started paring it down to a much more focused book and kind of discovered what the book needed to be. It was a it was a difficult process, but ultimately I'm very very proud of the way it turned out. And it's it's certainly more than it would have been without the help that they gave me.

[31:07] Mary Dina: And what do you hope people take away from your story?

[31:11] David Loud: And just like Mary said, that even if you're not a theater person, you'll be able to relate. Well, I think any story, if it's true and specific, is universal. We can find ourselves in in anybody's story, I think. Um, you find things that that they feel that you felt, and if you keep it specific and truthful, then I I think anybody can see themselves in it and sympathize and hopefully learn you know the little lessons I've learned myself living life and having challenges, you know, health challenges or emotional challenges. Um I mean, I always think of Sheldon Harnick who who wrote um Fiddler on the Roof. He wrote the lyrics for Fiddler on the Roof. And they did Fiddler in China. And he went to see the opening in China, and guy came up to him and said, How could you how did you write a musical that was so Chinese?

You know, this is Fiddler on the Roof, the most Jewish unChinese musical ever written. But because it was so specific, you know, people in an opposite culture could see completely their own stories up on stage there.

[32:47] Mary Dina: That's fascinating.

[32:49] David Loud: Some of the reactions that I've been getting now that people have been reading the book, it's such a it's such a compliment. But people have said to me, when you're telling your stories, it feels like you're telling my story in a way, and that's such a compliment. It's exactly what you, or at least what it seemed like we admire about Sondheim's work or the great composers, the great uh playwrights when they tell a story that is so impactful or holding up that mirror, you could you it's not us on stage, we're not those characters, but it's still so resonant.

[33:27] Mary Dina: I'm I'm learning that that is true, yeah.

[33:29] David Loud: Well, we're gonna put the link to um to your book in our show notes for our listeners who want to have a a little bit of a deeper dive into the life of David Loud.

[33:39] Mary Dina: That's terrific. Thank you. Mary, would you like to move into our lightning round portion?

[33:44] David Loud: Yes. Let's do it. David, what is one thing in the theater industry that confuses you?

[33:49] David Loud: Why jukeback musicals are popular? I do not enjoy them.

[33:52] Mary Dina: What are three adjectives that describe your ideal working environment?

[33:57] David Loud: Supportive, quiet, and with good acoustics.

[34:05] Mary Dina: I don't think that's an adjective.

[34:07] David Loud: That's all right. Um, is there something in your process that you find unique to you?

[34:13] David Loud: I do find that when I when I make those big arrangements where I'm putting three different songs together and weaving them together, I can go into that process without knowing where I'm going. And the music leads me to the end, generally. It's always feels like a big risk to me to do that. And I think, well, why why maybe I should plan it out this time? But then I I usually don't, and it always works out.

[34:41] Mary Dina: I know we're not responding to these to these answers, but I will just say what you what you just said there very much reminded me of the story you tell in your book about what and really ultimately what you had to do for the first several maybe half of the show where you had to you know conduct blindly.

[34:58] David Loud: Right. And you're just you know, literally following your heart and following, you know, trusting yourself and just kind of letting letting that take take the lead. Are there any books or resources that you find helpful to you in your process?

[35:14] David Loud: Well, one of my favorite books in the world is Act One by Moss Hart. It's a book that you should keep away from children who you don't want to turn into, you know, Carneys and circus people. It makes you want to go into the theater. And it made me want to go to the theater. And I've read it many times and I make all my students read it, and I made anyone I ever dated in my entire life read it. And there are other books like that that I love. Um, Alan J. Lerner's On the Street Where I Live is a great book to read. Ted Chapin's book, Everything That's Possible that he wrote about when he was an intern at Folly is a magical book and very interesting. Jack Vertell's book, um, Secrets of the Broadway Musical is quite helpful in giving giving us and and my students.

I teach it in my in my history clour course, um, just a language to use to when talking about how musicals are structured, you know, knowing what an I want song is, what a conditional love song is, things like that.

[36:26] Mary Dina: Um, what is one job in the theater industry that you would trade jobs with for one week?

[36:31] David Loud: Well, I that would be fascinating. I'd love to be a director for a week, be in charge. Absolutely, very fun.

[36:39] Mary Dina: What's one hobby that you have outside of theater?

[36:42] David Loud: I have to have a lot outside theater. But I do love to to walk. I don't really have a hobby outside the theater, I would say. I have all my eggs in one basket.

[36:54] Mary Dina: Easy.

[36:54] David Loud: There you go. Um, okay, great. And our final question for today is what's the last great piece of theater that you saw?

[37:02] David Loud: When I think of like the great theater that I've seen, it's the theater that I get lost in. That's what I pray for when I go to a show to lose myself for two and a half hours and go there, go somewhere somewhere else. And it doesn't happen very often. Um the most recent musical that did that for me reliably was um a light in the Piazza at Lincoln Center Theater by Adam Gettel uh with Victoria Clark, who's an old friend of mine. Uh her performance as Margaret and that just was the most magical thing in the world. And when I would watch a light in the Piazza, I would get very tense about 20 minutes in because I would think when can I see it again? I have to I have to see it again. And then I would calm myself down saying, you can buy a ticket, you can see it again, and then I could relax and watch the show.

[38:02] Mary Dina: Thank you so much for joining us for this episode. This was uh excellent conversation.

[38:07] David Loud: Oh, what a pleasure to talk to you guys.

[38:09] Mary Dina: And um, where can our listeners find you and your book?

[38:12] David Loud: Facing the music is available at Amazon and Barnes and Noble, and uh I'm sure any place that find books are sold. And it's called Facing the Music by David Loud. It's a Broadway memoir, and it it came out uh yesterday, which was Steven Santheim's birthday. I thought that was a very good omen. And uh I hope you like it if you're buying it.

[38:33] Mary Dina: Alright, well, thank you so much.

[38:35] David Loud: Yes, thank you, David.

[38:37] Brian Sedita: Thanks everyone for listening to this episode of Page to Stage. To keep up with us, you can find us on Instagram and Facebook at Page2Stage Podcast. And if you're enjoying these conversations, we would really appreciate it if you could take a couple minutes to rate and review us wherever you're listening to this podcast.

[38:52] Mary Dina: Until next time.

[38:53] Brian Sedita: That's Brian.

[38:54] Mary Dina: That's Mary.

[38:55] Brian Sedita: We'll see you later.

[38:56] Mary Dina: Bye.