This transcript was automatically generated and might contain errors.

[0:00] Eli Tokash: Hello everyone and welcome to episode 127 of Take A Bow.

[0:05] Eli Tokash: I'm your host, Eli Tokash, and this week we have such an exciting episode for you. I'm not even saying that to like say it. Um, I usually always open my shows like that, but this week literally is the perfect episode for literally anyone involved in theater, or even if you are someone that loves theater, you get to learn about how um a show happens and and what exactly happens backstage during a show and all of the incredible things. We've had one other stage manager on this podcast before, Cody Renard Richard, and he's now uh booked and busy. Now he's doing the production stage management over at Parade, and uh he did Into the Woods and all these wonderful things he's he's moved on to do. But Trip Phillips is another iconic stage manager in our industry, and he was the production stage manager when I did Funny Neverland on Broadway.

And since he's done Mr. Saturday Night, the Billy Crystal musical. Um he was a production supervisor on the Plaza Suite with Sarah Jessica Parker and Matthew Broderick, and he's working with literally everyone. He did War Paint with Patty uh Lapone and oh my god, all of these fantastic stars. Uh so we get to talk about what stage management is, what really happens behind the scenes and how it all works, and it's a perfect uh opportunity to like brush up on that knowledge after talking to Cody a long, long time ago during the pandemic. It was actually about uh almost a hundred episodes ago, so almost a hundred weeks ago, y'all. And uh just thrilled to get this stage manager Tripp Phillips on the show today to talk to me more about what that's like.

This is great for anyone to know, actors, audience members, performers, all the things. If you've ever gone to a show and you've been like, oh my god, it's so annoying. Why are they stopping mid-show? And and that's had to happen to you. Well, first of all, I'm sorry, but second of all, you will learn why and I guess how that whole thing works. And we go through uh a couple experiences that this particular stage manager uh had to go through and how they dealt with the the situation at hand. So very, very, very cool and interesting conversation coming your way. But first, as always, we gotta start out with some Broadway news.

[2:22] Eli Tokash: There's lots to get to, very exciting stuff. We'll start out by saying happy first preview to a beautiful noise and some like it hot, some like it hot, um, had its first preview and performance before I'm recording this with y'all. But tonight, when I'm recording this, is a Beautiful Noises first preview. So break a leg to both of those shows and everyone involved in those shows. Uh, I know that their runs are gonna be so successful, so amazing. They already have a ton of buzz and so much love going around already from their out-of-town tryouts, and just like some like it hot already has an audience because it's it's not particularly new. It's new to Broadway, but not so much new in general, I guess.

But uh very exciting stuff nonetheless, and I cannot wait to see both of those shows. Both of those shows are gonna be absolutely amazing. And uh, speaking of beautiful noise, makes me think about Will Swenson, of course, who's the star who's playing Neil Diamond. He was on Take A Bow. Well, let me tell you something. Take a bow may have gotten the biggest guest on the podcast we've ever had. Very, very excited. It wasn't a full-length episode, but we were able to get none other than Audra McDonald. Yep, that's right. Will Swenson's wife, Audrey McDonald, is coming on the podcast. That's probably gonna come out next week because I'm just so excited for it. And it's uh it'll line up with her new show that's coming out, Ohio State Murders.

So that's a play that's going to be coming out at the James Earl Jones Theater. It'll be the first show in the newly named theater. Uh so very exciting stuff there. Had a wonderful time talking to Audrey McDonald. We'll also uh talk to Kenny Leon in that episode, who's the director and a couple of other cast members and all of that great stuff. And boy, was it a treat. I I gotta tell you. And if it doesn't get you excited to see Ohio State Murders, I don't know what will. So we'll get more into that next week, but I wanted to tease it a little bit because it's exciting stuff.

[4:27] Eli Tokash: So with that being said, I'm still literally on Cloud9 because I just got done talking to Audra, and we were able to do so in person. So it was just uh incredible. Seriously, I'm I'm so thrilled. And she was so kind enough to take the time to talk to us and uh talk about her new show. So very exciting stuff, and uh more very exciting stuff that uh Take A Bow was able to do this week was we were able to attend the gala performance of Parade at City Center. So we got to see the opening night over at City Center. Fantastic. I love Parade. I've said it on this podcast before, especially when I interviewed Caroline Carmelo. I said it was one of those shows that I feel like just wasn't theater wasn't as I don't want to say confrontational because I feel like theater's always done a wonderful job in relaying messages, but I feel like parade is so different where it really attacked it head on and didn't really sugarcoat anything.

So parade is parade is awesome. I love parade, and I I mean this cast is ridiculous. So you already know what I have to say about it. Between Ben Platt and uh Jennifer Laura Thompson, Michaela Diamond, Gaiton Madarazzo, Jay Armstrong Johnson, John Dawsett, the cast is just spectacular. There's no other word to use but brilliant. And uh thrilled for them. And I cannot wait to see this show on Broadway very, very soon because I'm calling it here on Take A Bow First, that we will see a similar transition that Into the Woods had from City Center to Broadway with Parade. I think Parade will definitely be coming to Broadway here. Just seeing Jason Robert Brown on that stage and his love for the show that he wrote and the fact that he's just orchestrating it and taking the reins.

I mean, the passion's there from everyone. And if this show doesn't come to Broadway, I will be shocked. It'll be for a limited run, just like Into the Woods, but it definitely needs to come back to Broadway. Parade's awesome. Everyone should go see it if they get the chance to at City Center. It's fantastic. But if not, don't stress about it too much and come see it when it comes to Broadway because I think it's definitely happening. There's talks about it, but nothing's confirmed.

[6:38] Eli Tokash: Moving on, speaking of talks and nothing being confirmed, Jimmy Fallon, they announced Cameron Crow, who's the director of Almost Famous here on Broadway. He also directed the movie, announced that Jimmy Fallon will be having surprise performances on Broadway in Almost Famous, reprising his role that he portrayed in the movie. No exact dates, like I said, no exact dates have been announced yet. And uh that I'm sure those will come at a later date. But Cameron did confirm that it it was gonna happen eventually. Um that it was something that him and Jimmy have been talking about for a while. I think Jimmy Fallon on Broadway would be absolutely incredible. I am here for it. I will do everything in my power to be at that performance.

But yeah, Jimmy Fallon on Broadway. Well, I I'm excited for it. I don't know. It'll be interesting. Hopefully, maybe we'll see more of that. And maybe crazy thought here. Maybe Jimmy Fallon and James Corden will both be on Broadway at the same time because there are rumblings that James Corden could be coming into into the woods to finish off the run. I don't know and don't think it's gonna happen, but there have been chats about it. And to have them both on Broadway at the same time would be pretty insane, if you ask me, it'd be pretty incredible. Um very exciting stuff there.

[7:56] Eli Tokash: So more news here, which is more of an update, which I'm very thrilled about, which is why I'm mentioning it. I have an accessible theater update. Into the woods has begun to offer rush tickets at a price that is pretty reasonable considering the show. They are selling rush tickets at $59. I know it's on an uh expensive side, all things are on the expensive side nowadays, just with the upprice in economy and the upcharge that has been going on to put on performances and all the things. So usually rush tickets are like 49, like $50. This is $60. I mean, $10. I mean it is what it is. Into the woods, great. Um, same with a beautiful noise digital lottery, $55, which is uh not the same as a rush ticket.

Rush tickets are in person. You stand in line before the box office opens and you get a ticket for 60 bucks. And then with the beautiful noise digital lottery, it's a um online thing. You go to telechargerus.com and uh you you find a beautiful noise and you're you will enter into the lottery. You all know how the lottery works. I'm just explaining it. But uh the 55 bucks. So you're not guaranteed uh as you are when you go to the theater, and you can kind of guess if you are gonna get a ticket or not to to stay and do whatever. But it is a digital lottery and it's worth just putting in for. Into the woods has a digital lottery as well. There's a bunch of shows that have it. So if you guys are interested in seeing theater for a reasonable price, I mean it's still pretty expensive, but it's cheaper than most options.

Definitely check out all the digital lotteries. You got luckyseat.com, you got telecharge rush, you got all these things. So there's plenty of resources that you can go search that out for, but uh definitely trying to find theater at an accessible rate uh and cost always. So huge news there. Uh, and something that caught my eye. Last thing here for our news section, and then I'll turn it over to Tripp Phillips. Patrick Page will be playing his final performance in a Hades town on December 30th. Now, I love Patrick Page. I've mentioned that I worked with him in a production of Oliver at the Pittsburgh CLO. Huge fan of his just from performing with him and following his journey since. I'm mentioning this particularly because Patrick Page appears to be an upcoming guest on Take About, which I am so excited for because he has a brand new movie coming out called Spirited.

It's uh it's a ha uh it's Halloween. Oh my god, Halloween's on my mind, y'all. It's a Christmas movie with Ryan Reynolds and Will Farrell. So I'm very excited for it. It's gonna be major and uh definitely worth noting. So I thought I would let you all know. Uh, but yeah, December 30th. I loved Patrick Page's performance in Hades Town. Absolutely incredible, absolutely unforgettable. That voice, anything he does is like unforgettable because it's just like, how do you do that with your voice? Awesome stuff. So that's all I have for you folks in this week's news section. We're gonna turn it over to Tripp Phillips because this episode is just so so fascinating, and you will all be at the edge of your seats. He's a great storyteller. So without further ado, Tripp Phillips, curtain up.

[11:17] Eli Tokash: This week's guest is an unsung hero of Broadway. He has been the backbone of over 20 Broadway productions. He's done it all behind the scenes from stage managing, production stage managing, assistant stage managing, production supervisor. I mean, you name it, and he's done it. I can't wait to talk to him about it all today. Everyone, please welcome to Take A Bow, Tripp Phillips.

[11:39] Tripp Phillips: Hi, Trip.

[11:41] Tripp Phillips: Ewai, how are you? Thank you for having me.

[11:43] Eli Tokash: Oh my gosh, thank you for coming on here. I'm so excited. This is our first time reconnecting since Neverland, I believe.

[11:49] Tripp Phillips: It's been a minute.

[11:50] Eli Tokash: It has been a minute. I mean, it's crazy how the time passes. And when we left, all you guys were like pre pre teenage boys, and now you're men, young men, and that's very cool.

[12:00] Tripp Phillips: It's wild. You didn't skip a beat either. You were like, you knew I was second year college. I was like, look at you. You you know it.

[12:06] Eli Tokash: You're on it always. You're so organized and all the things, and that's one something that I've always admired about your your style of stage management and uh management in general, I guess.

[12:16] Tripp Phillips: Um, but before we get into that, I usually like to start out in saying or asking more so how you got involved in the theater. Like, why did you why theater and why stage management?

[12:31] Tripp Phillips: Yeah, it's funny. I I grew up in a very small town in the South. And um when I was 10 years old through a series of events, I ended up getting cast in a summer production of The Wizard of Oz as the mayor of the Munchkins. You know, not just any Munchkin, but the mayor of all the Munchkins.

[12:47] Eli Tokash: Amazing.

[12:48] Tripp Phillips: And uh I really I hadn't really found myself at that point. I was a really shy, withdrawn, quiet kid, and I love the theater, I love that world. And um since I was 10 years old, that's all I've ever done. I've never really in my entire life, professional life, or um, I've never had a di a job that was not in the theater, either working or teaching or doing something in the theater world. And so I was very lucky about that. Um I I acted first, which is what you do as a kid usually because that's what the opportunities are, you know. But I but I soon realized that I I much more enjoyed the behind the scenes part. And so I, you know, it was a community theater, I could do everything. I did a little bit of lighting, I did stage managing, I did some directing when I was older, uh, a little bit of everything, and um went to college, stayed in the South for the college, and because I wasn't quite sure where I was gonna channel all of this, and I got I got an MFA in directing.

Um and I think that's one of the things that makes me, I don't want to say unique, but valuable to productions is I do have a director's background and a director's ability, and I can maintain shows and rehearse understudies and put in replacements and do all that kind of thing, which um some stage managers are great, technical stage managers, but they're less good at dealing with actors or less comfortable with dealing with actors, and that's something that I feel like I'm fairly good at. And uh, you know, I came to New York a few a few years after college and I sort of looked at the opportunities. I knew exactly one person who was involved in the theater business here in New York who happened to be in a show called The Who's Tommy at that time on Broadway.

This was 1994, and he introduced me to that show, stage manager Frank Hartenstein, who became my mentor and really helped me figure out how to do this and how to get the foot in the door and all that sort of stuff.

[14:28] Tripp Phillips: And within two years, I was stage managing Broadway shows and distant directing and that kind of stuff. And you know, I started a little bit older than a lot of people do because I had a life, a short life doing other things before I came here, doing other theater things, ran a small theater in Pennsylvania, did some stuff like that. But I just thought when I really think about it, stage management, I can sort of divide up into three. If it's a pie, it's like three slices. One is the administrative side, which is the scheduling and the report making and the liaison with the various departments, all that sort of stuff. And one is the technical side, teching the show, running the show technically, being on top of that, and the other side is the creative side, which is even though it's not necessarily my creativity, it is maintaining the vision of the director and the creators of the show, and then taking that to if it's a long-running show to new cast members, even if it's a short-running show, you've got to have the understudies ready as soon as you can and as fully as you can. And stage management offered me a unique opportunity to combine all three of those parts of my ability.

[15:33] Eli Tokash: Now, let me ask you this: is there a slice of that pie that you like the most?

[15:38] Tripp Phillips: You know, it's interesting. I don't really know that there is. They all have different challenges, they all have different rewards and different benefits of doing them. And it's, I'm an organized person by nature, and I've always been like a list maker and very pragmatic in doing things, and that comes in really helpful for sort of taming the innate chaos that theater is, that creating theater especially at this level in New York when there's a lot of money and a lot at stake riding on these productions. So the organizing comes easily, the technical side learning about automation and cueing and computers and all that stuff came over time and it evolves all the time. It's vastly different than it was 27 years ago when I started in New York.

It's vastly different than what it was the year after because it's always changing and then the creative side again I had, I have this background and I directed a lot before I came to New York and I love that and there are times that I miss doing that on my own. In fact, I'm actually working on a project on the side that I hope to direct here at some point on my own. Oh, I'll talk about later maybe but it's something that all those facets of the job of what the job of production stage manager is on Broadway they all come into play and I'm lucky that I like doing them all and I think I'm reasonably good at doing them all and so that's what's allowed me but a lot of staying power because besides the pandemic when the entire industry was shut down it really outside of that in 27 years I've only been unemployed maybe six months cumulatively in that whole time and that's very lucky you know it's lucky but it's also for a lot of hard work that I do as well.

[17:16] Eli Tokash: Exactly, it's totally because of the quality of your work that you do backstage. It's just unbelievable literally you came into Neverland and it was like a whole new show. Everything suddenly it was, it seemed like we finally got like our stuff together, you know, like everything was on track and everything was much more organized and comfortable.

[17:36] Tripp Phillips: Yeah, I appreciate that. And I think I hope that's true. I think that's true. I mean, I feel like you have to when you have a, I once did 42nd Street for four years, which was the longest show I've ever done. And that was an enormous show with 60 equity contracts and 25 in the orchestra and a huge crew and all that sort of stuff. That was the first show actually that I took over as PSM in New York. And I just feel like you have to be really generous with sharing the information with actors and letting them know when people are going to be out and letting them know what the policies are and just keep in the loop. And some shows I find do that better than others. And I felt when I went into the show that you were one of the stars of, I felt like maybe there was more information that could be shared with the actors and a more for lack of a better word, organized way to impart that information and to keep the show running in a successful way.

[18:27] Eli Tokash: Right. So we're talking about all these wonderful things that you have done throughout your career and the jobs that are required within the role, the tasks and all the things. So talk to me because on your resume, I mean, you look through it, as I mentioned, you're a production stage manager, you're an assistant stage manager, you're a stage manager, production supervisor, all these wonderful things. Can you talk to me about like what it is a stage manager does, and then we'll go through the list of like the other roles, such as a production supervisor and a production coordinator that you did and all these things. But we'll start out at Stage Manager. What is a stage manager from your perspective?

[19:05] Tripp Phillips: Yeah, well, I mean, a stage manager, it's hard to define in a sentence or two what a stage manager does because it's such a big job and it's such an all-encompassing job. But you know, generally speaking, we have on a larger show, we have a production stage manager, a first assistant, a second assistant, sometimes a third assistant. We have production assistants as well, who are usually junior stage managers, you know, in training. And basically I do the PSM first. That's because that's easier for me to define, I guess. I'm sort of the, I consider myself the right hand of the director or the person who usually sits beside him or at the next table over in the studio, and who helps him bring his vision to the stage, dealing with all the practical aspects of that, like doing the daily schedules and notating the blocking, coordinating any number of things like costume fittings, press events, all this kind of stuff, just sort of being the central clearinghouse for organization for the production.

And ultimately, you know, I've worked with dozens of directors in New York, a lot of very well-known, very successful directors. And you have to, I have to adjust my approach for each director a little bit because they're going to need me to serve in different ways than some than the other director may need. The jobs are more or less the same. But for example, some I've had directors that I work with, they literally want me to say, okay, tomorrow let's do this, this, and this, and give them a schedule about what we should do. Other directors will write down a schedule and hand it to me. And sometimes it's somewhere in between the two. So that's just one example. But it's being, the work starts usually a few weeks before the first rehearsal, and there's a good deal of pre-production, which you have to do so that on the first day the actors walk into the rehearsal studio, they have scripts, they have scores, they have schedules, they have calendars, they have the paperwork they have to fill out, all that kind of stuff.

And then it goes from then on to opening, and then there's a whole, you know, through the rehearsal period in the studio, the technical period in the theater, most musicals, particularly preview for four to six weeks now before they open, and then a show opens, and then you go into a whole nother phase, which is maintaining the show. Because you do the same show eight times a week over many weeks or many months, or sometimes many years, the show will change a little bit every show. Sometimes for the better and sometimes frankly not for the better. And so what I have to do in with my director's eye is sit out there in the theater and take notes and try to keep the show as tight, as clean, as perfect for lack of a better word, as you can, so that each audience that sees it is getting the maximum experience. And all of those things and more are what the PSM does besides the more prosaic things like calling the show, you know.

[21:42] Eli Tokash: Right.

[21:43] Tripp Phillips: Normally when I'm a PSM, I'll usually call a show maybe four times a week, and I'll be out front watching a couple of times a week to take notes, and I'll be in the office doing administrative stuff a couple of hours, a couple of shows a week. Sometimes like on Neverland, we were constantly in rehearsal because it was people coming and going. And part of that was because of the nature of the show, because there were several, you know, there were four boys who were lead parts, and the boys will grow out of the parts, among other things. And so you have to replace them. But also I came into that show about eight months after it opened, I think, and so people were just starting to leave, which is what happens.

They get other jobs and they go. So a lot of times I would actually be not a lot of times, but sometimes I would be in rehearsal during a performance at a studio, or one of my assistants would be. But the PSM position is the one who works most closely with the director on the day-to-day mounting of the production. And I would even say that like you become the director, the on-site director almost. Because the director after opening. Because obviously the director's not going to be there every day, they're doing their thing, whatever. So you kind of step into that role on top of the admin, the technical, all of the things that the stage manager does.

[22:56] Eli Tokash: You're not at all.

[22:57] Tripp Phillips: Right. And some directors come by more often than others. It really depends on their personal preferences and on their own schedules and all that sort of stuff. I've had, I did one Broadway show for two years that I literally saw the director twice during those two years. I've done other shows with the director might come by as often as once a week. I mean, it really depends. But regardless of that part of the question, the person who keeps an eye on the show all the time is a PSM. Sometimes, you know, British shows, shows that are produced in New York by British producers have a resident director, someone who is separately assigned to maintain the show. But generally speaking, I'm the person who does that with a dance captain and with a music director or his associate.

And I'll watch the show and I'll write down any number of things of interpretation things for actors or a prop that's looking afraid, or a sound effect that doesn't seem to be playing loud enough, or whatever it might be. Just literally, I try every time I watch a show, I try as much as I can to see with fresh eyes and ears. So I can think if I'm an audience member seeing this for the first time, oh, I didn't quite hear that line. Actors can be sloppy with diction, for example, and right all these kind of things that go into play that to try to make the show as tight and as I said before, as perfect. And that's funny because there's not a perfect show because we're human beings will never have perfect shows, but we have to strive for that always.

[24:20] Eli Tokash: Right. Perfect as we can. And adding to that, I think that a production stage manager, especially as you said, like once the show opens, you really become like kind of top dog on site, you know. So everything has to be filtered through you. Oftentimes, you know, like you mentioned, you go and you watch the show and you're taking notes and everything like that, and you have to give them to actors, you know. With actors, actors really shouldn't give other actors notes and everything. So they'll go through you. So the process of like taking and giving notes, what is that whole thing like, and how do you approach that, especially like with this day and age, with like the mental health that goes on in our industry and all of that?

[25:01] Tripp Phillips: Yeah, it's a good question. I tell these young stage managers that I speak to. Sometimes I speak to them at I do seminars at Columbia or Yale School or one of those Yale School of Drama, one of those things. And I tell them, and this is absolutely true, as a young stage manager, if you're relatively smart and you work hard, you can learn the skills of stage management. You can learn what you have to do as a stage manager. What's harder to teach and what's more intangible is how to talk to actors and how to get from them what you need from them without alienating them or pushing them away or whatever. And I'm very lucky, I think, in that over the almost 30 years that I've done this on Broadway, I've worked with a lot of great directors, and I've learned in most cases, a great way to talk to actors, and in a few cases, maybe how not to talk to actors.

And the trick is if there's a trick, there the trick is just speaking to each of them individually and knowing how what they respond to, what they need. Some actors are fine, you just give them technical notes and you say, hey, look, you're not in your light there, you're out of the pool of light, or hey, you're not being loud enough, or hey, you're not saying your final consonants, or whatever. And other actors, you have to jump into the minutia of the performance and why it is they're doing what they're doing. And I tell these young students that the part of learning how to talk to the actors, keeping them on your side, having them know that you're on their side is one of the trickier things that I think just takes experience and hopefully an intuition and intuitive understanding about how to do that.

Because, like in Neverland, for example, you know, when I have kids that range from age to 14 or 8 to 14, is of course, you know, I'm not going to talk about the nuances of their performance. I'm just going to say, hey, you're, you know, I can't understand that word, or hey, in your light, or hey, this is, you know, you need to pull this back a little bit, or whatever. That's different than you speak to leading actors who are more seasoned. And it's just, I think it's not a one-size fits all approach. It's really figuring out how does this actor function? What do they need for me? How can I get what I need from them without pushing them away in any way? And that's what you have to figure out.

[27:05] Eli Tokash: Right. So another thing that you mentioned earlier was calling a show.

[27:10] Tripp Phillips: Yeah.

[27:11] Eli Tokash: Explain that a little bit because some people may not know what that is.

[27:14] Tripp Phillips: I don't know. That is the show in a lot of sense, calling the show. So explain that in like what it is that that entails.

[27:22] Tripp Phillips: Yeah. So one thing I want to say, if you ever want to go back to the Playboy website and Google me, they actually did some video of me calling part of War Paint, the show I did on Broadway a few years ago. And it's interesting to see because you know, we sit sometimes on one side of the stage, sometimes on a jump on backstage somewhere, and we have this bank of monitors of all sorts of TV monitors that are like front of house and conductor and infrared so we can see if it's a blackout and that sort of thing, sometimes overhead and side wing shots to watch the scenery as it slides in and out. And there's a series of cue lights. And basically, when we when it comes time to start an evening or matinee performance, I or whoever happens to be calling one of my assistants, we sit there, we check in with everybody, and then we basically run the show at like a pilot drives a plane.

So each time that a there's a scenery move, you turn on a cue light, and that warns the operator. And the second that you want it to go, you turn it off and they hit the go button. And then the automated scenery or the curtains or whatever it might be fly or they track on, they winch on and off. And all that is stuff that you've worked at during tech so that the machinery makes it possible to be very musical, which is so important in a musical, so that everything lands at exactly the right beat of music. And you're doing all that with your hands, turning these switches on and off, and then you're giving all the light cues verbally. You're saying lights 59, go, light 60, go, all that sort of stuff.

[28:49] Tripp Phillips: And those are for a guy who's on the headset, the electrician who's on a headset. And uh on a typical Broadway musical, we have I would say normally somewhere between 500 and 800 light cues.

[28:59] Eli Tokash: So you're saying go a lot in the course of things.

[29:02] Tripp Phillips: Yep. And and also you have sound cues and you are turning the light on and off to uh cue things like sound effects and all of that. You cue the conductor at the top of each act when it's time to start the overture and the on track, or however the show when the act begins. Um, and a lot of cues I take from the conductor, like the cutoffs and all that sort of stuff, or the count ins for you know, uh starting up songs to take all of that from the conductor, and he takes a few cues from me. I just was doing Mr. Saturday Night, and there were a couple of times in the show where I cue the conductor to play because he either couldn't see something or it was something I needed to get him to do at exactly the second I was calling light cues or scenery cues or whatever.

[29:40] Eli Tokash: So you're doing all of that, and there that's a whole separate fun skill to do.

[29:44] Tripp Phillips: And one of the things you have to do is you have to be quick of mouth and quick of brain so that if something goes wrong, you can try to quickly fix it. And I would say the majority, certainly not all, but the majority of little issues and problems that we have in running a Broadway show, the audience doesn't normally know because we can normally cover those. I mean, of course, occasionally something goes terribly wrong and you have to stop the show from scenery faulting or actor being sick or whatever. But generally speaking, we can uh fix most of those little problems that come up along the running of the show.

[30:15] Eli Tokash: And all of that stuff is really fun to do.

[30:18] Tripp Phillips: And if you have the process of doing two or three weeks of tech rehearsals and then a month of previews, then it becomes very second nature to you because you you've rehearsed it many times. I actually personally find it's much harder to go into a show that you didn't set up and learn how to call it, which I did with Jersey Boys on the Road and Memphis on the road, because you listen to a tape and you have the switches and you rehearse and all that, but you can't really you don't have the process of practicing it during tech as we do when we're figuring out a show.

[30:48] Eli Tokash: Right.

[30:48] Tripp Phillips: So whenever we're doing a show, uh I or one of my assistants will be the person in the seat there calling all the cues, uh either by switches or verbally. And then normally speaking, one or two of the assistants, always at least one, often two, or on the deck being the deck stage managers and seeing that everything goes as it's supposed to go downstairs on the stage with uh the scenery and the props, and if there's any actor issues or anything like that that need to be dealt with during the show.

[31:14] Eli Tokash: Unreal.

[31:15] Tripp Phillips: There's fully a show going on behind the scenes behind in front behind the show. We said on certain shows we've often said we should charge admission to this back here happening because it's really fascinating. When Billy Crystal did this musical Mr. Saturday Night this year, which was his first time ever to do a broad musical, he was just fascinated by what was happening backstage, and particularly he had one really fast change, quick change, and his own dresser plus another dresser and a hair person were all there, and in a few seconds they basically changed him.

[31:43] Eli Tokash: So he he had us, he wanted us to take a video of that in the wings with our phones, and then he shared that on his social platforms because he was fascinated by how we do that.

[31:51] Tripp Phillips: And like to us, it's like, oh, it's Thursday, and we do this all the time. I mean, this is what we do.

[31:56] Eli Tokash: Right.

[31:57] Tripp Phillips: All this magic happens behind the scenes. And if it's done right, it looks effortless on stage, but it's far from effortless. It takes the effort of many, many people doing very high quality work to make it happen.

[32:08] Eli Tokash: Truly, it's unbelievable.

[32:10] Tripp Phillips: It takes a whole village. There's probably more people backstage than in the cast in most shows, to be completely honest.

[32:16] Eli Tokash: Yeah, there usually are unless it's a really big cast show, that's often the case.

[32:19] Tripp Phillips: And when I did 42nd Street, which I mentioned was the first show that I started as the assist assistant, and then I took over to PSM during the run.

[32:27] Eli Tokash: Right.

[32:27] Tripp Phillips: So there were 56 actors on that show, um, 48 doing the show and six swings and covers and four stage managers, 25 in the orchestra. We had 19 dressers, 12 stylists, six carpet, six props, uh, five electrics, four sound. This just enormous team to put this show on.

[32:46] Eli Tokash: And uh I just, you know, I was sort of pinching myself a little bit because it's like when do you, as a first-time PSM on Broadway, get to be in charge of a show of this size?

[32:55] Tripp Phillips: Right. And people don't do shows of that size for the most part because they can't afford to do them anymore. It's very rare that you have shows that big anymore.

[33:03] Eli Tokash: Right.

[33:04] Tripp Phillips: So let me ask you this. We we're talking about the calling of the show and everything like that. I want to I want to make you think back to your Broadway debut, which was How to Succeed. And I want to ask about how that process and how that everything worked behind the scenes that in that show a couple years ago, just a couple.

[33:23] Tripp Phillips: Um compared to you know, your latest show, Mr. Saturday Night.

[33:28] Tripp Phillips: Yeah, well, I was a lowly PA on that show on on How to Succeed, uh production assistant. And I and then later I was a uh a sub-ASM for a little bit of the run. I I had come to New York the year before, and I actually the first big show I did, which was not technically a Broadway show, but it was bigger than a Broadway show, was the first year of A Christmas Carol down at Madison Square Garden. This was the Lynn Ahrens um uh Alan Menken, Mike Ockrent Christmas Carol that was done down at MSG for um I think 11 or 12 years every Christmas.

[33:58] Tripp Phillips: Um and I had done a production assistant type job on that as well. And you're you're in the room and you're learning how these things work, and that's what I did on How to Succeed. I was in the room learning how it worked, um, and was there through the opening night and then and then luckily was able to come back a little bit later in the run.

[34:14] Tripp Phillips: Um and I'm just observing and taking it all in like a sponge, really, because no matter how much you study theater outside and and college degrees and all that sort of stuff can be very beneficial in some ways, but you don't really learn how it works in the room until you're in the room. You just don't learn.

[34:30] Eli Tokash: Right.

[34:30] Tripp Phillips: Because doing Broadway production, and you know, because you've been in Broadway rehearsals, is um it's just different than anything else. It's uh the stakes are very high, the people you deal with are at a very high level of expertise and experience and and background and all that sort of stuff.

[34:46] Tripp Phillips: And on that show, I literally was just learning. And Frey Karnstein, my my mentor, whom I mentioned who gave me a lot of my work in the early years, was a PSM on that show. And I remember you know, s automated scenery on Broadway started sometime in the 70s in a very primitive kind of way, and it evolved over the years. But I remember, for example, on the opening night of How to Succeed, which I believe is in March of 95, we the curtain was held about 40 minutes because the automation console broke down on opening night.

[35:15] Eli Tokash: Oh, wow.

[35:16] Tripp Phillips: And I have this vivid recollection of Des McAnuff, the director coming out on stage and explaining to the audience we were waiting and what had happened and blah blah blah. And you know, backstage, several members from the shop and the carpenters and all were frantically trying to fix the automation console because that show is very, very technical, very highly automated with a lot of moving pieces and parts.

[35:34] Eli Tokash: And not that that doesn't happen now occasionally, because it still does, but it doesn't happen that often, and it doesn't usually take that long to fix because they've worked out so many of the bugs of that over the years.

[35:45] Tripp Phillips: And the same thing is true, like we didn't have moving lights. You know, it used to be for lighting designers, you would uh have to put a special one fixture to make any kind of light that you wanted on the stage. And now we have these computerized automated moving lights, which are basically, if you have a hundred of them, it's like having a hundred follow spots that you can want, and you can make them any size, any color, any pattern, any shape, all that sort of stuff.

[36:09] Eli Tokash: But all that means it takes that much longer to tech the shows.

[36:12] Tripp Phillips: Right. I was just gonna say, is that a good thing or a bad thing?

[36:16] Tripp Phillips: And I what I love is when you get I I love making shows very musical and making the transition seem seamless. So that and I remember sitting at tech rehearsals and going, uh, that's arriving literally one second before it should musically or whatever. And just trying to make it be perfect so that because when the automation is working, the technology is working. If I, as a calling stage manager, call it on the right beat of music and the automation operator pushes a button when the light goes off, then it's going to be perfect every time, barring any unseen machinery failure, which as I say does happens occasionally, but not too often anymore.

[36:52] Eli Tokash: And I think also I'm not like a musician in that I can't sing the way you can sing beautifully and I can't play instruments, but I'm but I can read music and I'm musical. And that makes it much easier to find the counts and to find out that all that with music.

[37:08] Tripp Phillips: And that's something that has has served me very well over time because I can say, all right, this is four bars, this is 16 counts, this is you know 11 seconds or whatever, and we can we can figure out how to program the automation accordingly. Because when you program automation, you not only have the distance, like this is plus I don't know, uh say uh 60 inches, it's gonna move five feet this way, but it's also it's gonna take seven seconds, it's gonna be uh two seconds of A cell, uh three seconds of travel and two seconds of D cell so that the automation speeds up, you know, it starts slower, it speeds up and then it slows down, so that if you have props on you, you don't send them flying uh or you you don't uh see it jerking, you know, the automation jerking.

[37:50] Eli Tokash: Right.

[37:51] Tripp Phillips: Just a whole bunch of specialty things like that that you have to do it for a while.

[37:55] Eli Tokash: That is fascinating.

[37:57] Tripp Phillips: Like seriously, and you don't realize, like as an audience member, you don't realize that this is happening, you know, like backstage. You don't realize that the second uh something moves, it's really someone just saying go and flipping off light switch, you know, like it no one realizes that, and then someone pressing a button to make sure it moves. Fascinating stuff.

[38:13] Eli Tokash: And I it's why I love that that kind of stuff. I loved watching you guys uh when I wasn't on, because the kids' dressing room when they weren't on was right next to the calling booth. So I would always like peek in and and see what's going on or see what's happening backstage. It was my favorite part.

[38:28] Tripp Phillips: But uh I want to ask you, because you you mentioned that the best way to learn is through experience type thing. Is there for someone like who wants to do what you do, like was there a mentor that you had, or or like what advice would you give to someone who who's trying to go down that field?

[38:47] Tripp Phillips: Yeah, I mean, we're very good on that, uh, about that on Broadway. As I mentioned, Frank Kartenstein was my mentor, and I came to New York with a lot of experience and other theaters, but have never worked on Broadway at any level. And he took a chance on me as a PA, which frankly, as a PA, if you're not a great PA, it will be irritating, but it's not gonna hurt the show in the big scheme of things, if you know what I mean.

[39:08] Eli Tokash: Uh because you're doing they used to be called gophers, like go for coffee, go for uh at the drugstore, uh, you know, go buy some spike tape at the uh hardware store or whatever.

[39:20] Tripp Phillips: But we give them more responsibility now, but the PA positions are usually often not always, but they're young stage managers who have usually just finished college or finished a training program, and it's an entry-level type position. It's not a unionized position, and they come in and they basically do whatever needs to be done, which means often you know, grunt work like putting spike tape down or pulling it up, or running to get coffee for the director, or uh stapling and hole punching things, or whatever has to be done.

[39:50] Eli Tokash: Uh, but they're in the room and they're learning how it's done.

[39:52] Tripp Phillips: They're learning how the theater works, how the professional theater works. And that's for these young people, and I get resumes and emails literally almost every week from young people who are wanting to do this. And I often, whenever I can, and they seem promising, I try to give them work. I just finished this uh uh on Friday, uh this fully mounted lab of this new musical, which was quite which was actually by far the most sort of challenging, large scale uh lab that we've ever done.

[40:22] Tripp Phillips: And I had uh a PA that worked for me on Mr. Saturday Night who's terrific, and I think she's gonna make a really great stage manager. So you give them these opportunities. Now, my first assistant, Jason Hindling, has been with me since 2006, and we've done like a dozen Broadway shows together and many other things too.

[40:38] Tripp Phillips: But the PAs, if they're good, they quickly graduate to the ASM, the assistant stage manager position.

[40:43] Eli Tokash: Right.

[40:43] Tripp Phillips: Uh, and then you have openings for new PAs. And for those young people who are out there, I would say work in the theater, get some experience, send out your resume, send out your email, get a theatrical index, email everybody that you possibly can. And at some point, someone will be looking for a job.

[40:59] Eli Tokash: I mean, we'll be looking to hire someone to do this job, and then come into the room and do the very best that you can.

[41:04] Tripp Phillips: And I usually know within a day or two whether the PA really has what it takes. I know whether they're smart. When I came to New York, I always tease that I was the oldest PA in New York because I came later. I came in my late 20s. And because of that, I had more experience and I was the best PA you would ever have because I was always thinking, what can I do that will help uh the room and and that will save some work for somebody.

[41:27] Eli Tokash: And if you do that as opposed to sitting around being on your phone when you're not giving a specific task, right?

[41:32] Tripp Phillips: You'll impress people and you'll get more work. And so that's how to enter the stage management world. And then, as I say, if you're good at that, you become an ASM, and then you become an SM, which is the first assistant and a PSM, if you want to. And they're also stage managers, like my wonderful assistant Jason. He loves being a first assistant, he's fantastic at that job. He'd be much he's much better at that job than I would be, because my skill sets, my particular skill set uh really uh matches up with what a PSM does.

[42:00] Eli Tokash: Right.

[42:00] Tripp Phillips: He's uh he's great on doing all the things on the deck and on taping out the the scenery designs on doing all these things, uh tracking every prop, literally every prop that's gonna be in a show. He's great at doing all that stuff. And um, some people want to be PSM and some people want to be an ASM or an SM, and whatever you want to do, if you do it really well and and uh and you're nice to deal with at the same time, then you're probably gonna get work.

[42:24] Eli Tokash: Right.

[42:25] Tripp Phillips: Fantastic. That's it's so so great. Always go above and beyond for anybody listening uh to start out in the industry and and hopefully make a name for yourself in some type of way, for sure.

[42:36] Eli Tokash: That's great advice.

[42:37] Tripp Phillips: So I saw on your your resume and uh through my research and everything that you and on your Instagram, of course, uh that you were a production supervisor uh for Plaza Suite, which everybody knows was just recently on Broadway, Matthew Broderick, Sarah Jessica Parker, all these incredible people. What exactly is a production supervisor and how does that kind of differ from a PSM?

[43:03] Tripp Phillips: Yeah, it's interesting how that came about. We first did Plaza Suite in 2020, the first of the year.

[43:08] Tripp Phillips: Um we rehearsed in January in New York, and then we were in February at the Colonial in Boston, where we had a very successful uh three-week run there, and I was the PSM and Jason, my regular colleague, was the assistant.

[43:19] Tripp Phillips: Uh huh. Then we came to New York and we had a two-week hiatus while they loaded in the set and got everything ready technically, and then we had four days of tech rehearsal prior to what would be our first preview because we already tech the show. All we had to do was basically teach the new crew, right? And then on March uh 12th of that year, we had uh well, we're supposed to have an invited dress rehearsal that night, and the first preview the next day on the 13th, and of course, that's the day that the world shut down, uh, at least as far as the theater world goes, on March 12th. Originally of 2020. Originally I was supposed to do Plaza Suite as a PSM through July. I think we were going to run through July, a limited 18-week run, and then I would have a few weeks off, and then Mr. Saturday Night was to start in September of 2020.

Oh, wow. We had already done a lab of Mr. Saturday Night back in 19. So, anyway, uh, initially we were told, well, this will be probably a three to five week hiatus, and the broader will be back. And of course, that ended up being 18 months and sometimes longer for various shows. So when the when the industry came back, Sarah Jessica wasn't available in the fall because she was doing the reboot of Sex in the City. So we reset though, the producers reset those dates to be the first of this year, the first of uh 2022. And Mr. Saturday Night had already set its dates to be there, and so they were almost not quite exactly overlapping, but very close, so that I could not both. Um, and it was a very hard decision to make.

I love Sarah, I love Matthew, I love John Hickey, the director, and we had such a great experience doing that back in 2020. But Mr. Saturday Night was A, a musical, which pays considerably more than a play, and B was an open-ended run, which was going to presumably run longer than Plaza Suite. And after not really working so much, you know, during the pandemic, I had to take the business uh the better business offer, and that was gonna pay more and presumably run longer. So, what we did luckily at the last minute, I mean, literally two weeks before Mr. Saturday Night was supposed to start rehearsal. We had a four-week delay on the first day of rehearsal because Billy Crystal and our producer thought there was a big COVID surge, we're gonna wait another month.

Right. So I was able to go back into the rehearsal studio with Plaza Suite just as we started the production and basically be there for the three weeks of rehearsal, uh studio rehearsal to get Matthew and Sarah back on the on the show. And I'm the one who knew the blocking and the prop business and all that stuff better than anybody else does because it's my job to know that, you know. Right. They didn't really remember all the ins and outs of it. Oh, I pick up my purse on this line and I take off my gloves on this line because it's very specific stuff in that show. Absolutely. So I did that. Um, Jason, my colleague held the PSM contract, and then run of the show, which was from the end of February till July, very successful run, in spite of the fact that the two stars got COVID and they had both shows.

Um I I was there for part of the tech when I could be. I would go by uh usually once a week and watch a Wednesday matinee when I could and take notes because this Saturday Night didn't have Wednesday matinees. Um there were understudy rehearsals that I would check in on when I could. And basically, as a uh production supervisor, which I also was on the Gentleman's Guide National Tour, uh the assistant director on that one, and I actually physically remounted a lot of that production in terms of teaching the blocking and all that to the actors. But on that show, um as well as on Plaza Suite, I would go in and I would then send my notes to John Hickey and to Jason and say, here's what I thought, and here's what I think could be adjusted or whatever.

And on the Gentleman's Guide Tour, the producers very kindly, in fact, this was during Finding Neverland because when I did Finding Neverland, and the general manager came to me and I said, Well, yes, but and I had all these caveats, and one of them was that once a month I have to go out and look at the national tour of I usually for three days, and they were very nice about accommodating that. So I would usually fly out to whatever city they were in on a Wednesday, watch the Wednesday night show and take notes, rehearse the understudies on Thursday, watch a second show Thursday night and take notes, and then fly back to New York on Friday. And I did that for a number of months. Um, and the only difference with Plaza Suite was it was four blocks up the street, and I would there whenever I could and watch the matinee or watch a show that was uh happening at a time when my other show wasn't, and give notes and and just sort of be available for consultation as needed.

Right. Fascinating. I mean, just to hear about your like days through through a typical Thursday, I guess you would say at the theater or Wednesday, go into multiple shows. This is crazy. That also like made me think about how, you know, as a BSM and the stage manager in general, I guess, you guys are always the first one there and the last ones to leave. Yeah, it's something you may have seen on my social media a few days ago when I was at Johnny and June down at Pearl Studios and on a Saturday morning early, I took a picture of me in the room and said, Well, here I am, usually the first in the room and the last to leave. Yeah, yeah. True. I mean, that's normally true. I mean, occasionally someone might beat me there, or occasionally I might take out a minute early, but that's very unusual.

Because what happens is for us, we're always there an hour before rehearsal starts. That's the bare bit. So if it's a 10 a.m. rehearsal, we're there at nine. I'm usually there at 8:30 or something. Um, and we stay after the day is over until the work is done. And that means making the schedule for the next day. That's one of the first things you have to do and get out to everyone by email. Uh, in the old days and the 90s, we had a rehearsal hotline, and actors would call a phone number to get their schedule that way, you know, before people had email and stuff. That's the way that things have changed. And we would send the performance reports by faxes. You know, that was how that was. Wow. But uh at the end of the day, we make the schedule, we prepare for the next day.

We perhaps call the prop guy and say, look, we've got to have this for rehearsal or whatever. We answer the emails, we clean up the room and get it set up for the next day, all that kind of stuff. And then often, depending on how complex a show is and and uh what stage of the game we're in, then I come home and I may have something to eat, and then I'll sit on my computer for another hour or two in the evenings and do work ahead, do emails, track automation, which you have to do for shows. I mean, all the things that we have to do. And I have two very distinct schedules in my personal life. One is when I'm in rehearsal, which means that I must make I'm a night person by night by nature, but when I'm in rehearsal, it's like you must be in bed by midnight so you can get up at seven.

You have to so you can then go for 15 hours or whatever. Oh my god. And and you're up early and in the studio early. And then once the show is up and running, outside of things like the Today Show or something when you have to get up at a ridiculously early hour. Basically, you're not going into the theater until maybe noon for a matinee or 11:30 for an understudy rehearsal or something like that. Occasionally you don't have to go until the evening show, which is might be five o'clock or something. So it's a very different schedule. When I come home, I don't feel like I have to force myself to go to bed right away because I don't have to be up at the crack of dawn the next day. So for someone who's a night owl, a show schedule is actually a very good thing.

I mean, I really like that. Um, but this past spring from February, end of January until the Tony's in June was a very, very hectic time for me because I was always at one or the other show. Um and also when you open a musical normally immediately after that, you do things like make the cast album, you go on various uh TV shows. We were on the Today Show um and something else. Um you then, of course, if it's at the end of the season, you have all these rehearsals for the Tony Awards, and then you perform on the Tony Awards. And then also that time right after you open is the time you're most vulnerable for actors being out sick because you've just finished a long rehearsal process with long days and tech days and preview days and press promotion days.

And then you're you're sort of paradoxically the least well covered because the all the understudies haven't been as well rehearsed as they will be, say, in another three weeks. Right. There's always I always think it's a hurdle. There are these series of hurdles that you get over on every show. And the first one is getting to the first day of rehearsal. When you when you gather all this information from these disparate sources, where are we going to rehearse? What's the rehearsal scenery going to be? What's the staff going to be? What's the schedule going to be? All of that. And then you get you get to the first rehearsal, and then you get out of the studio is the second hurdle, and then you get through the tech process is the third hurdle hurdle.

And the fourth hurdle is you get through the preview period, which is I say can be a number of weeks, and then finally you get to the opening night, and then you have the next hurdle that comes after that, which is doing, especially for a musical, doing these post-opening things, which almost invariably include press and promotional appearances to sell tickets, but also like making the cast album, and if you're lucky, doing a number on the Tony's and all that sort of stuff. And getting the understudies ready at the same time. And then once you get through that, which is maybe a month or so, six weeks after the opening, you can go now we can just run the show and hopefully have a minute to ourselves again.

We're not like eating and breathing and sleeping the show. Right. Well, that's what we thought with Neverland, but that never happened. You know, it was Neverland. We don't rehearse on Tuesdays because I I if you rehearse on Tuesdays, people who rehearse have to be paid overtime because it's the day after the day off. Right. So on a regular show, uh, in my experience, I would rehearse on a Tuesday very rarely. The entire time I was with Neverland, which was six, seven months, there was only one Tuesday that I didn't rehearse the entire time. There was one show and there was one Friday that was a regular understudy rehearsal that was not a put in for someone. And that's literally yeah. I mean, it's it's literally every day, every week.

I have to say, we loved you guys, the kids, because you always got us out of school. You're like, yeah, and I and I bring little pie company treats for pies for treats. That's what I always try to do. Yeah, it was fantastic. We were like, do we have a rehearsal this week? Please tell us we have a rehearsal. Oh yeah. I love kids. I love kids, particularly you guys' age, because you're you're old enough to watch your young adults. You've been in the theater, so you're smart kids, and yeah, I love kids that age, and I have so it's really fun to work with them. I always enjoy that. Oh, you're so sweet. Some people don't like it. So I pre you you can tell who does it and who doesn't. So you we can always tell you you had to get it.

Of course, but they're but they're a fun challenge. They're not like some actor, you know, there's someone who's just they're just learning, they're kids, they're sponges, and and uh you boys on Neverland. That was one of the highlights of that show for me, was I think that was one of the highlights, you know. Thank you. You talk about challenges, and and a lot of what you do is uh, you know, facing those challenges and putting out fires and things like that, whether it is between you know, people or sets and all of the things. Like, what's the craziest run-in that you've you've had to solve as well? Well, there's so many things that you solve, and some of them are basic prosaic issues of running the show or uh figuring out technical solutions.

I had one show, and I won't I can't say the name or or the stars involved, but there were two leading actors who just did not like each other, and unfortunately that exacerbated after opening night because one of them got great reviews and one of them didn't get great reviews. Oh god. And so I felt like every day I was a referee coming to work and hearing one complain about the other, yeah, complain about the their counterpart. And it was that was one of the few times it's like I really dreaded going to work because I usually love going to work, and that was a show that I was very happy that uh it was a limited run anyway, but it actually closed a couple weeks before it was supposed to, and I've never been so happy for a show to close.

Oh it's not because the show wasn't good because it was, but it's the two of them were making everyone so unhappy on that show. And that that's very rare. That's once in 30, almost 30 years that that's happened to me. Um, but you know, all kinds of crazy things happen during the during shows, especially during long runs. And you have during 42nd Street, one of our leading ladies, poor lady, ran off stage and was literally throwing up in the wings, and you have to stop because she's sick. And during Gentleman's Guide, I was watching one night from the back of the house, and a side exit door on the not on the street side, but on the alley side opened, and some sort of crazed, uh drug addicted homeless person ran in to the theater and started like shrieking and tearing through the theater.

I'm never had anything like that. And I had to go backstage, ran backstage and get on the microphone and stop the show. And it literally took four of my big stage hands to tackle this poor guy, you know, and wait till the cops to get there and take him away. That sort of thing. And during 42nd Street, we had some crazy person in the uh mezzanine who was literally yelling back to the audience, um, to the actors rather, all night would be yelling responses to them. And anytime anyone would start to walk in toward her, she would just yell all the more, you know. Oh my god. And you try not to stop the show, but sometimes you have to uh for medical emergencies or whatever, and uh outside of occasional technical problems.

So there's just any number of things like that that come up when you do a show eight times a week, just right the vagaries of what everyday life are and also the unexpected that happens. Uh you can expect the unexpected at some point. It's just uh hoping that you can be a quick thinker and deal with it. You know, we were doing Plaza Suite in Boston out of town. There was uh twice in one show, and actually this happened in Carousel in New York also. There was a medical emergency in the audience when some poor audience member had to be taken out on a stretcher or had to wait for the paramedics. And unfortunately, because we're in the theater, it gets too noisy. You have to stop it because people can't, the audience can't watch the show if there's all this hubbub happening in the right, you know.

And the whole cell phone thing uh has added a whole level of irritation. I mean, they're wonderful people and they make our life so much easier, but unfortunately, too many people don't know how to turn them off when they go see a private show. And you know, it's been in the news recently. That's often an issue. Yep, absolutely. Well, you always manage to stay cool, calm and collective, and always figure out a way to to problem solve and keep everyone else calm somehow during it all. So I applaud you for that. It's funny. When I was a kid, I had a really bad temper and I had to get older. I didn't have it. And my mother always says it took me a few years to season out of that.

[57:35] Tripp Phillips: I can literally count on one hand, and I think it would be two, maybe three times in 30 years. I've gotten really angry about something, like really, really angry about something. In general, I don't do that. In general, I don't know myself, and I don't think it helps the situation, you know. You know, it's better to try to be calm and cool. And sometimes that's easier said than done, obviously. But thank you for the nice comments. I try to be calm and cool whenever I possibly can.

[57:59] Eli Tokash: Oh, for sure. Particularly in my role when you're trying to be sort of a facilitator and a soother of fraught nerves, not a cause of additional fraught nerves or anything.

[58:09] Tripp Phillips: Sure, for sure. I totally understand, but it's so true. Your energy, you can't stay calm, you don't give off of that, any of that like nervousness energy that people can feed off of.

[58:19] Eli Tokash: It's so true. All right, Trip. One last question for you. Recently, especially, I mean, you've worked with some incredible people, Sarah Jessica Parker, Matthew Broderick, Billy Crystal. Um, and then you have like the Jesse Mueller and Joshua Henry and Carousel, and then of course you have me, like, no, just kidding. Uh Christine Everson.

[58:36] Tripp Phillips: I agree. Of course. I mean, like, literally, you've worked with everybody. So I'm curious, because of your incredible resume and the people that you've worked with, who have you always wanted to work with that you haven't been able to, or it could already be someone that you have worked with that was always your dream to work with, and you were able to check off that box.

[58:59] Tripp Phillips: Yeah, that's a great question. Um, I love working with Patti LuPone, for example. Patti LuPone is a Broadway legend, and yeah, you know, Patti has a reputation for being difficult and all that, but she's really not. She's difficult if you are bad at your job. You know, if you are lazy or dumb or something, she's gonna have a problem with you. But if you're good at what you do and you work hard and you work well, we were golden from the first day because she just sensed that I knew what I was doing and I was gonna do it well, and I was gonna protect her interest as well as the interests of the show, and so it was good to go. Um, and she's a professional's professional. I mean, she's, you know, she’s it.

Uh Sarah Jessica Parker too, and Matthew Broderick, who I knew first from How to Succeed, all those shows. Uh, both of them are very big stars and uh very well known internationally, and yet they are the nicest people you would hope to meet. And when we started Plaza Suite, I would go down to their beautiful home in the village maybe three days a week and run with them as they started to learn lines and help them drill them on lines and all of that and wow, meet their family and meet their cat and their dog and gay people and they're lovely, lovely kind people, and that's really wonderful to me.

[1:00:07] Tripp Phillips: And I think when you, when I first came to New York in the early years and months, I would be a not really starstruck because I don't think I was terrible, but certainly when you're around people that you've heard of and that you know of, you kind of censor yourself. You're trying, you're aware of what you're saying, and you're trying to make the right impression or not make the wrong impression. And I've gotten past all of that. I got past that pretty quickly. Uh, because when you get into the room with someone, whether it's Billy or Sarah or Patti or whomever, uh, again, we're all working on the same project. We're part of the same family putting something together. And I have to say, to be totally honest, the people that I'm the most intimidated and intimidated, even that is not the right word, but then the most in awe of are the Stephen Sondheims of the world, who's oh yeah.

I have a picture of me with him on an opening night of a play. But the Stephen Sondheims and the Terrence McNally was a dear friend of mine before he passed away. And uh these people that have Joe Mantello, when we first started working together, I was so in awe of him because he's such a brilliant director. Um and many others as well. Um, but you just, uh, I'm in awe of them because I've always been a behind the scenes person, and I I'm certainly in awe of what actors can do. I can't do that. I couldn't begin to do what you guys do on stage. Uh, but I'm also always so um aware of who wrote those words and who wrote those, uh that dialogue and who directed that and who choreographed that and who came up with that brilliant design and all of that.

And when I do a new musical like Mr. Saturday Night or War Paint, uh it's so wonderful for Scott Frankel and Michael Cory to bring in a brilliant new song at rehearsal never heard before and it's like wow this is a perfect lyric it scans perfectly to this beautiful tune that Scott has written and then hear Bruce Coughlin or someone orchestrate it it sounds fantastic or see Jonathan Tunick take Richard Rodgers' beautiful music from Carousel and reorchestrate it for 25 parts 25 and it sounds magnificent and get to hear that eight times a week you know all that kind of uh when I was a little kid in Arkansas and we first came up to New York when I was uh 16 my mom and I and we saw a week worth of Broadway shows that I had saved for for a year to do and there was one little newsstand in my hometown that got the New York Times the Sunday New York Times Wednesday every Wednesday they would get the past Sunday and I would go by it and read the arts and leisure section and decide what shows I wanted to see when we came up here once a year.

Um but I just never thought that I would be behind the stage and that I would be working with all these people who are great um heroes of mine and sure um I'm very very lucky to have found that and to been able to make a life in the theater that's very satisfying to me.

[1:02:45] Eli Tokash: Oh Trip, that is awesome and that's a perfect way to round out this episode. That story is fantastic. All of these stories have been so entertaining, so um educational and so like so great. Like the way that you're able to tell them with such like you could tell you're genuinely love it and it shows in your tone and how you tell the story. It's awesome. So I appreciate you sharing this all with me today.

[1:03:09] Tripp Phillips: It was my great pleasure and you had you're an excellent interviewer so thank you for the good.

[1:03:09] Eli Tokash: Oh my god and I just I think the program you're doing, the Take A Bow is fantastic and I'm glad to be a little part of it.

[1:03:19] Tripp Phillips: Thanks for having me.

[1:03:19] Eli Tokash: Oh my god thank you so much well you absolutely deserve to take a bow I always said that you stage managers should always come out with us during the bow so I'm glad that you were able to come on here today and take your bow for sure. So thank you so much Trip. Take a bow Tripp Phillips I cannot thank him enough for coming on here and going through some stories. I told him afterwards that when I do schoolwork and stuff like that now and I'm doing like any assignment or even auditions and stuff I only use a light blue or green highlighter because in the schedules so in Finding Neverland the boys had the boys all played multiple roles we had one role in particular that we played most of the time but then we'd alternate some of the other ones so I mostly played Peter and when I started out playing just Jack and uh at that time I was light blue.

So I was so used to seeing my name and everything involved in who I was like I everything involved with performing for a year span only in like light blue. And then I uh Aiden Gem left the show left Neverland and I took over for Peter and suddenly my name changed to green and at first I was really upset about it but then I was like oh you know I can kind of I can live with green green's fun so then I got used to seeing my name in green. Well now all I do is use green or light blue highlighter or like a turquoise highlighter. And I said that that's always because of Trip. He it was never a certain color before he came to the show. It was just like you gotta like search and do really do it. But Trip was always so organized, always loved his color coding and all the things.

And I always uh I always say that to Trip that I've carried his uh tactics and his lessons with me and carried his legacy at Neverland with me because that's all I do. Um very, very cool stuff. He really appreciated that story. And I just wanted to come on here to tell it because I didn't get to tell it on record, but uh yeah, it was it was a fun one. Great stuff again. Thank I'm so thrilled he talked just through calling a show and the different roles that he has, in particular the production stage manager. I mean, that's like the top dog when the show opens. It's a very important role, and it's something that a lot of people could be interested in that they didn't even realize. Because, you know, there's a lot of people listening, I know that are interested in becoming directors.

So if you're interested in becoming directors and you also like other sides and like admin work and stuff like that, you definitely want to look into the production stage management route because you basically are the assistant director. I mean, in a lot of ways, you are so especially like when the show opens, you really become the director. So very, very fascinating role, a very important role that is not recognized as much as it should be. And thrilled that Tripp was able to come on to talk about it and uh educate everyone a little bit more on the role and the jobs that are out there for behind the scenes. Speaking of jobs that are out there for behind the scenes, last week we had a casting director on from Telsey and Company who casted me in Finding Neverland, actually.

Very, very wonderful human being. He was also a professor of mine at Pace University, where I go to school. Patrick Goodwin. He was fantastic. One thing I want to say, just like you could call this, I guess, the triple E segment, the Eli's Entertainment Experience segment that I'm bringing back for today's episode. I want to mention that when you go in, uh if you're an actor, right? And you're listening to this, I just want to say that when you get an audition, yes, you are auditioning, but at the end of the day, you're really going into a room to create a relationship with a casting director. Because the casting directors are the people that get you into the room. They're the people that are gonna get you in front of these creative teams, these directors, these writers for movies, for theater, for anything.

They are the point of contact between you and the manager. So, yes, your manager may submit you, and uh you may get it from that and everything like that. But a lot of the times and majority of the time, it's the casting director making a list, as Pat kind of subtly explained to us on the podcast, that he makes a list and he'll reach out. And uh, our point of contacts are our managers and agents, or you know, whoever that may be for you, maybe it's yourself. And they're the ones that's gonna really bring you back. And those are the auditions that you probably have the best shot at because they've already put in a good word for you and everything like that. So um, when you go in for an audition, make sure you are there to be yourself and to really create a relationship with the casting director and understanding that they're a human and they have feelings, so you can ask them about your day.

You know, it's it's often stressful to walk into an audition and think about anything else other than like, oh my God, I have to say these lines right, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. But you also have to remember that you have to say, hello, how are you? Like, uh, and they'll they'll ask you, oh my gosh, thank you for coming in. Yeah, thank you for having me. Like, this is wonderful. How have you been? Like, what is going on in your world? Like, I'm sorry, this has been such a hectic day and experience for you, but you're you're crushing it. Like, that sort of thing is so important and so memorable for the casting director, it's gonna make them want to work with you. So, um, highly recommend doing all of that when going in for an audition, and which is why I'm so pro in-person auditions because I love creating relationships with people and I love uh making those first impressions instead of you know sending in a tape of me doing lunch because I feel like we can't make that relationship.

So that's my little uh spiel there for today's episode. And I just wanted to talk about it and also remind you all that you should totally give a listen to last week's episode with the casting director. I'm so thrilled to everyone who listened because I have gotten nothing but amazing feedback on that episode and uh all these episodes very recently. So I appreciate everyone for the kind words and for the support. And uh I can't wait to continue to provide you all some entertainment and continue to grow this thing. So thank you all so much for listening to this week's episode all about stage management. Next week, I guess we'll be exiting the behind the scenes chat. But with that being said, considering the wonderful feedback that I've gotten with these episodes, I will absolutely be entering more behind the scenes folks into the episodes more on a regular basis.

You know, I won't take a month to do it out of the year, and that's it. You know, I'll be incorporating them all. I'll be giving you all a little mix, and uh, this is our stage management. And next week we'll go back to performing. I do have a few behind the scenes people that I can release, and I will be releasing shortly, but uh there's a few episodes before that that I just want to get out, and it's timely, so it's important to get out at that time. So, with that being said, again, thank you all for listening. Thank you all for the incredible support and continue to tell your friends, spread the word and all the things. I can't appreciate you all enough, and I will see you all next week. Bye, everyone. Have a great week.

[1:10:36] Eli Tokash: For this episode's current call, I would like to recognize a few people who also deserve to take a bow. This podcast would not be possible without the help of Dory Bernstein, Alan Seales, Kimberly Garrett, and the team at the Broadway Podcast Network. Next in line to take a bow are our fabulous editors, Jessica Warren, who edits the audio of the podcast that you just listened to, and Tessie Tokash, who edits the videos and visuals for this podcast. And how about a bow for our executive producer, Chris Greiner? And our final bow are extra special to the patrons Brian Thompson, Pat McNamara, the listeners of PCC, as well as all of the other patrons for their continued support. If you're interested in becoming a patron, go to Patreon.com slash TAB.

If you enjoyed this week's episode, make sure to subscribe on the platform that you are currently listening to this on, or go check out our YouTube where you can watch the episode. You can also subscribe, like, and comment on there as well. If you're more into the regular social media and want to follow us, you can do that at Take A Bow Podcast across all social media platforms. The music of this podcast was made by Nikki Torsha and Cormac Collinon, and the logo was created by Giselle Bustos. And that wraps up this episode's curtain call. Thank you all again for listening to this week's episode, and I can't wait to see you next week. Bye everyone. Have a great week.