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[0:00] Eli Tokash: Hello everyone and welcome to episode 154 of Take A Bow.

[0:04] Eli Tokash: I'm your host, Eli Tokash, and this week, boy, do we have an exciting episode for you folks? I am so excited to share this with you all.

[0:12] Eli Tokash: Uh, we have some of the funniest people that I've ever talked to and ever seen on the internet or whatever before on the podcast.

[0:22] Eli Tokash: And I'm so excited to share the conversations that we have with you. They're working on a cool project, and uh it was an honor to help promote it for them.

[0:30] Eli Tokash: We have LEWBERGER on the podcast today. That's right. We have LEWBERGER, the iconic uh theater group, theater musical comedy geniuses who we all know and love, literally.

[0:42] Eli Tokash: Uh, you've probably seen them on the internet, or you saw them in Beetlejuice, um, as Keith Habersberger literally made his Broadway debut for one performance as mover number three, and he came in, stood on stage, and walked off with the movers.

[0:56] Eli Tokash: It was iconic. If you haven't checked out that video, go check it out, especially if you love Beetlejuice because it's more Beetlejuice content that we all uh miss so dearly here on Broadway.

[1:06] Eli Tokash: And it's with Alex Brightman, Elizabeth Teeter, and all of our faves are in the video, so go check that out. Uh and that's with the Try Guys, though.

[1:14] Eli Tokash: So uh we've got uh they're doing everything, and they're so impressive. And the fact that they were get it willing to give me uh half hour out of their day was uh was a dream and uh a real treat.

[1:27] Eli Tokash: So um we're gonna talk all about their project. It's called LEWBERGER and the Wizard of Friendship. Uh, and now they're releasing a cast recording.

[1:35] Eli Tokash: They obviously just did the show off Broadway, uh, for those of you who don't know. Um, and it's very, very exciting uh for them and uh for for all the things that's to come with that uh project.

[1:47] Eli Tokash: So um there's that. But first, and before we turn it over to them and get some more uh thorough explanation and talk more about the show, we gotta talk about some Broadway news because there are some um noteworthy things to talk about this week.

[2:03] Eli Tokash: Uh unfortunately, like, and actually, like I mean this unfortunately, and I mean this genuinely. Bad Cinderella is closing on June 4th, bringing an end to uh Andrew Lloyd Weber's 43-year-long streak of shows on Broadway.

[2:22] Eli Tokash: That's crazy. Uh it's historic for the reason that uh Andrew Lloyd Weber will not have a show on Broadway. It's historic as it'll go down is one of the shows uh that was a flop, um, unfortunately, because I I listen, I saw it.

[2:39] Eli Tokash: I had uh I enjoyed my time seeing the show. I I enjoyed the show. Um I'm gonna actually bring on uh one of the cast members on the show to talk about their process with the show and um you know, talk about closing and and everything that they've been dealing with lately in the media because it's been ruthless, y'all.

[2:59] Eli Tokash: Um, but uh, you know, that it's it whatever, you know, that's just the way it goes, and there's always a show this season that kind of gets picked on, and it seems like it was Bad Cinderella this weekend, or this season.

[3:12] Eli Tokash: Oh my god, this weekend. Um, but yeah, that so it that's craziness and uh very unfortunate. But I look forward to talking to the lead uh one of the leads in that show to talk about that process with you all uh a little bit more.

[3:29] Eli Tokash: That's coming up soon. But uh yeah, that also is uh a noteworthy for another reason because that means that the only show, the only musical that is left that did not get a nomination this season, but is still performing is A Beautiful Noise.

[3:50] Eli Tokash: And A Beautiful Noise is selling. I mean, if you look at the Broadway grosses, they're selling at above 75%. So um who knows, maybe this season's Finding Neverland, you know, who did not get a Tony nomination, not one, um, but still happened to have a little bit of a life on Broadway, performing over a year and change.

[4:14] Eli Tokash: Um, you know, maybe it can still have success, and hopefully uh they they are able to, because uh, you know, it it's a lot of work. You know, it's been really cool to see uh the performers uh of the people in the community support those the unfortunate news that we've heard about Bad Cinderella and and the hate that it's kind of been gaining on through reviews and social media and all the things.

[4:42] Eli Tokash: It's just like completely uncalled for in the grand grand scheme of things. Uh because you know, it's people who are putting in just as much effort to mount a Broadway show than all the other shows, you know.

[4:53] Eli Tokash: So um they don't deserve the hate, y'all. Be nice, choose kindness. Um okay. That's my brand on that. I need to move on.

[5:01] Eli Tokash: Uh Harmony. Harmony, for those of you who don't know, is the Barry Manilow musical um performances are gonna begin. They announced their Broadway transfer. Performances are gonna begin on October 18th, 2023.

[5:14] Eli Tokash: It's gonna be directed and choreographed by Tony Award winner Warren Carlyle, who also choreographed me in A Christmas Story. Um, and uh for those of you who don't know, he also was uh director choreographer of The Music Man uh when he was here with Hugh Jackman and when it was here with Hugh Jackman, Sutton Foster, um, all of those wonderful people.

[5:34] Eli Tokash: So um very excited for that. But due to its off Broadway success, it does appear uh that it's going to be bringing over a lot of their cast members. Uh, because it was confirmed that Chip Zen uh will be coming to Broadway with the show, which is very exciting.

[5:44] Eli Tokash: It was confirmed that Chip Zen will be coming to Broadway with the show uh in the Broadway transfer. So that's very exciting for the cast. That also means that you know, Funny Girl is closing in September.

[6:04] Eli Tokash: Maybe we see Julie Banco back on Broadway literally three weeks later in Harmony. Um so as we know, Julie Banco did do Harmony when he was off Broadway. Um and they had an incredible cast.

[6:17] Eli Tokash: So more more to come there. Uh the full cast obviously has not been confirmed yet and announced, but the lead they announced that Chip will be coming to Broadway with the show. So very exciting stuff there.

[6:34] Eli Tokash: Um and last but not least, I want to talk to you about this chess cast at the Muni. So I feel like it's fair to say, like there's no confirmation on this, uh, but I will say it like on record because I I do think uh that it's gonna happen.

[6:53] Eli Tokash: You know, I think we can all foresee a chess revival coming to Broadway next season. And if it's not next season, it's gonna be the following season. But it's very it it's in the near future and it's sooner rather than later.

[7:08] Eli Tokash: We all know that the writer himself, Tim Rice, has said that and he's trying to get it to. So all of these chess casting, I think is very um very important that we kind of look into as we could see maybe some hints for the Broadway cast.

[7:25] Eli Tokash: Um so I want to shout that out for this reason that reason, but I also want to shout it out because it's Jessica Vosk. Jessica Vosk is going to be leading chess as Florence um at the Muni this season at during uh July 5th through the 11th.

[7:42] Eli Tokash: And uh so that's very soon. So if you're in the St. Louis area, go check it out, or if you're not and uh you want to go visit, go visit the Muni because you should.

[7:53] Eli Tokash: Uh, but I also want to add that who else is in it. Uh Jared Spector will be playing Frederick, John Riddle will be playing Anatoly, and Taylor Lauderman will be playing Svetlana.

[8:06] Eli Tokash: We also have a Take A Bow family member, Tally Sessions, uh performing he's gonna play Alexander. Um, and we also have Rodney Hicks, and we have Philip Johnson Richardson.

[8:18] Eli Tokash: Um, those are the principals in the show. So, you know, these performances could easily influence the Broadway cast, and chess is a very um hard show to cast. So when in if done well, it's noted, and um, I think it's something that we could keep our eye on uh for sure.

[8:39] Eli Tokash: So congratulations to everyone involved. Uh obviously, can special shout out to Tally Sessions, uh special shout out to Jessica. Um, as she is uh not uh I guess an honorary Take A Bow family member.

[8:53] Eli Tokash: I have talked to her on red carpets and stuff, so I guess she's been on the pod, but I want to get her on for full time and uh my dear Funny Neverland castmate.

[9:01] Eli Tokash: But uh, anyways, that's all the Broadway news I have for you folks. Uh thrilled to uh talk to you guys. Thank you for allowing me to get the extra day uh and listen to us here on a Friday, if you are listening to us or on a Friday.

[9:17] Eli Tokash: Uh if you're not, hey, thanks for the support on every day. And before we get into the interview, I just want to send out a friendly reminder about our Take A Bow YouTube channel.

[9:25] Eli Tokash: Uh you can find us at Take A Bow Podcast on YouTube and on social media, all the things. Uh this is a great uh episode to watch because there are multiple of us, so you won't have to guess like who's talking or anything like that.

[9:37] Eli Tokash: Uh you'll get to see some facial expressions, all the things. It's a fun watch. Um, so if you want to just listen to the podcast, that's great.

[9:45] Eli Tokash: But do know that you do have the option to watch it. And uh you if you want to watch it again, do so. And I highly encourage and recommend it.

[9:54] Eli Tokash: So without further ado, I think it's time. I'm so thrilled to say, LEWBERGER, curtain up.

[10:15] Eli Tokash: All right. I mean, this episode is going to be bulkers, and I don't know if I've ever been more excited, to be completely honest. I've never had an episode with multiple guests, so I'm very excited to start it out with a banger.

[10:27] Eli Tokash: Uh, we have a Jack of All Trades and Alex Lewis, who can literally do it all. He's an actor, singer, comedian, musician, you name it, does it all. We have an Emmy Award-winning songwriter and producer extraordinaire, Huey Stonefish, and we have Try Guys, Broadway star and writer, Keith Habersberger.

[10:45] Eli Tokash: So welcome to Take A Bow, LEWBERGER. How are we doing?

[10:48] Alex Lewis: Thanks for having us. We're doing great.

[10:50] Huey Stonefish: Oh my god, this is uh this is a treat.

[10:53] Keith Habersberger: I've seen your guys' content everywhere on YouTube, on TikTok, all the things.

[10:58] Eli Tokash: Uh so I know myself and my listeners are very excited for this episode and to chat about your off-Broadway show uh is releasing a cast album. So there's so many fun things to talk about and perfect for for my listeners, and we cannot wait to chat about it.

[11:16] Eli Tokash: So the way I usually like to start these things is I like to ask, you know, where did this all start? Not even like the show itself. Where did we start?

[11:26] Eli Tokash: Like why how did we get into performing? How did we get into writing, telling stories, entertaining others? How how did that all start and what made you know, how'd we get to where we are today?

[11:35] Alex Lewis: Well, we all have lots of different ways that we started doing music, doing storytelling, doing comedy.

[11:41] Alex Lewis: You know, for me, I uh I started playing guitar when I was a freshman in high school and got really into songwriting, and then you know, we all did theater and those types of things in uh our early years. I went to Berkeley College of Music, got a degree in songwriting, Keith was studying French horn in college, and then became a theater major. Alex was studying through the study of life and being an LA person and all the comedy schools and all that stuff. Alex is really hitting those comedy schools hard. So we all just really found those passions. I was at the Second City, these guys were at BuzzFeed, we all formed to create a comedy band, and here we are.

[12:17] Alex Lewis: Oh my gosh. And it's kind of led to where we are today and led to you guys writing and starring and producing and all the things of an off-Broadway show. Um, so let's just get right into it. I mean, y this show became so successful. I mean, it's pretty much sold out every night, and uh it's called LEWBERGER and the Wizard of Friendship, the musical. Uh talk to me uh about you know what it was like to just perform in like an off-Broadway world in New York City on a stage. Like, how cool was that?

[12:50] Keith Habersberger: Yeah, I mean, it was uh super cool to be able to put on our own show, but also really I mean, the performing is always fun. I love performing and we all love performing for an audience, but I think the thing that was most impactful from doing the show was uh the amount of work that went into it. Uh both the lead time of work for you know four or five months, uh preparing for it, even just finding a space and finding the people who are going to work alongside us to build the show and then the actual rehearsal process. We you know, we really had two weeks uh before the show opened to actually work with the cast and hang up the projector and hang the lights and work with our choreographer, Nico de Jesus, and so that's a really short timeline, and in that those two weeks, I'd say uh the three of us and Brian Wool, um, who is our opening act when we're on the road, who also was in our show, were pulling twelve hour days at the theater, but then normally three to five hours more at night just fixing music, fixing projections, fixing the script, uh, you know, as you're rehearsing, you're gonna find the problems in the show and you're gonna want to make them better.

[13:59] Keith Habersberger: And uh, we just kept wanting to make the show better and better and better, and we were all living together, so it was kind of like um being in college in that we were really just breathing this show exclusively. We weren't working on anything else. Um so doing all that made the performing of the show that much better because now you're not just, you know, uh as an actor being able to deliver lines and getting laughs, but you're producers and you have jokes in the music and you have jokes and the projections and the whole show and its success and even your cast's successes uh in their delivery of songs and dances and lines is is so much more gratifying.

[14:36] Alex Lewis: Yeah, I mean, it was it was just really cool to also see sort of the genesis of what we do uh in like a in the place where it probably kind of is the most appropriate. Um, you know, what we do generally is is this musical comedy concert performance, but it is, you know, we like to say that what we're doing is musical theater. Um we're touring it almost feels like the national tour of a musical oftentimes. And in this situation it was like, well, this is where musical theater happens, and so it's it just felt like this is exactly uh where we've always wanted to go.

[15:12] Keith Habersberger: I love it.

[15:13] Alex Lewis: Yeah, totally. It so you could totally see that sense of you know, like a reward every time that you guys were on stage and every time you guys, you know, y had that success of of a show every night. It's gotta be so cool. I gotta add like no sleeping, right? No just no nothing was going on while that was going on, right?

[15:31] Keith Habersberger: No, we'd we'd pretty much get to the, you know, around between seven thirty and eight thirty, I think you were getting up and then we rehearsed. We we were scheduled to rehearse till eleven PM every night and we only did I think once or twice. But then basically, we'd go home, you know, we'd send the cast home and everyone home, and then we'd go back, and I know one night we were like, Oh, we hate we should really make these uh recordings for when we see the hard pieces, which actually are gonna be on the album. And so I think it was from like twelve thirty at night to 2 a.m. we were like writing songs, recording them, and then the next morning I woke up and finished producing them and then finished mixing it, and then I think it was in the uh in the in the system by the next day. And there was something like that every day. If it wasn't Keith like fixing the projections, making new projections, Alex doing rewrites, like whatever the case may have been.

[16:18] Alex Lewis: Yeah, I don't think there was a single day in the six weeks that all of us had a day off together.

[16:24] Keith Habersberger: Right. Like if there would be times where we have a day off, but I was actually in the booth, or we'd have a day off and Huey was recording the entire cast album with the cast and our some of our guests, or we'd have a day off, but Alex has to run the guitar center because we don't have the correct uh DI box that we need for the performance we're doing on Saturday night, and we forgot that we were gonna need that. Like there was just never a time where any of us were like, uh, we have nothing to do today.

[16:52] Alex Lewis: Right.

[16:53] Keith Habersberger: Yeah, that's so real. But it's great that you guys you know, you know, it seems like you all compliment each other's strengths and and weaknesses so well, you know. You guys can all pick up on what the other can't.

[17:05] Alex Lewis: Oh, yeah. These guys have great, great way of complimenting my uh my weaknesses. They my weakness and compliment them right away.

[17:14] Keith Habersberger: I love it.

[17:16] Alex Lewis: Yeah, we we've I think you know, putting on a show of any size, um, but of this size for us especially, you have to be able to both divide and conquer things, but then you also need to unite and conquer other things. Um and you really do need to lean on one another. Uh even the simplest thing of like, can somebody right now just go and get us some water? It's yes. No, it's no small lift. You've got to travel across New York and carry a kid. Like, it's just not as easy to get up.

[17:48] Keith Habersberger: Right? You just need you need to really work together and everyone needs to make sacrifices kind of all the time.

[17:53] Alex Lewis: Yeah, there was a lot of running back and forth between the Airbnb and the theater and stuff, and just all day. You know, it was crazy. Well, on one of my first days there, I spent about two hours trying to set up a bidet for our Airbnb.

[18:09] Keith Habersberger: Oh my god.

[18:11] Alex Lewis: I like almost destroyed the bathroom. It was really funny.

[18:15] Keith Habersberger: That's amazing. That should have been a video.

[18:18] Alex Lewis: I feel like I would have loved to watch that.

[18:22] Keith Habersberger: Amazing.

[18:23] Alex Lewis: So let me talk to you guys about this recording process of the album. Because you guys have some really cool people on the album, including yourself. You know, you have Broadway stars such as Alex Brightman and Wayne Brady, and there's so many other really cool people. So talk to me about what it was like to not only record it, but to like work with them even further, you know, and or during this process and kind of share it with them.

[18:49] Keith Habersberger: It was really cool to get some of our personal heroes to be on the album. Um and to I mean, some of the coolest part was just, you know, having the idea to ask them and then them enthusiastically saying yes. Uh and and you know, some of these people we've we'd formed, you know, some type of friendship with or whatever the case may be, and so you're hoping. But there's so many reasons for people to say no to things and to not do things with people, even people they admire. So, you know, hearing Wayne Brady um singing our songs, Alex Brightman, you know, being in the studio when Deshaun Wesley was creating his own, you know, verses for uh our album, it was just really cool. And to see, you know, our hard work that we've spent uh more time than any of us could even possibly imagine on it, and then to give it to these true um you know, titans of comedy of musical comedy, and see them put their spin on it was uh was rewarding.

[19:45] Alex Lewis: That's awesome.

[19:47] Keith Habersberger: So cool. Did you have to like rewrite anything for them to like fit their voices, you know, or like anything like that? Like, was there any changes made through the process?

[19:56] Alex Lewis: There was collaborative, uh it was very collaborative process, all of it, because obviously when you're working with people like the people that we work with, you you want them to give their input, you want them to sing the lines how they think they should be sung. So certainly um we were making changes together in the room. But I will say I think uh in addition to that, you know, the respect that we have for them and wanting them saying, Hey, if you think you should change this, you should change it. I think uh what was really cool was them feeling that way back towards us, and you know, having someone like Wayne Brady be like, No, I want to do this again, and I want to sing this line exactly as you guys wrote it.

Uh so it's like that balance, you know, Wayne's going, I want to sing it exactly how it's written, and we're going, Well, we want you to change it to what do you think it should be. And so, you know, with all of us being uh really wanting the other person to have input, I think we came away with some really, really cool stuff.

[20:47] Keith Habersberger: Uh yeah, and especially because a couple of the songs, especially for what Wayne was singing on the album, uh, these are songs we actually haven't performed as LEWBERGER outside of the show. So we're not so married to how it needs to be because I honestly don't know. I've never tested I Keith have never sang this in front of an audience to know what the laugh lines are, what the the melodic, you know, the best version of how to sing these rhythms and melodies are. Like with all the other songs, we get this experience of traveling across the country, performing them, tweaking them ever so slightly every single night, and then when we record them on the album, we know the best way to perform the song.

But for you know, Modern Tortures, which is the Wizard of Friendships like actual solo comedy song. It I don't know the best way to perform that. Even when we were doing the show with our cast, and we have uh Nia, who's super super talented playing our wizard on the stage, she would be like, How do you want me to do this? I'm like, Nia, I need we have to figure this out together. I don't I don't know.

[21:49] Keith Habersberger: Right.

[21:49] Alex Lewis: Uh and that's sort of super fun about putting up a show with a cast where you get to say, like, I don't know, try something out. Let's see. We don't necessarily have all the answers. Uh we have to find the answers together.

[22:02] Keith Habersberger: Absolutely.

[22:03] Alex Lewis: Um I I love that because it's it's throwing me back to like, you know, I I've been in a couple Broadway shows myself, so it's like taking me back to all of these times where we had those processes, and the my favorite ones were the collaborative processes, you know, when you were working together. Because when I was on Broadway, I was 11 years old. So like I couldn't do everything they said or any like, you know, like I had my own perspectives, and we made different perspectives and stuff. So like when I felt like you know, we were in the room, I'm sure it was enjoyable not only for you guys, but also for the performers, and including you know the singers on the album, Wayne Brady and Alex Brightman. Not a big deal. Never heard of them. Uh just kidding.

[22:41] Keith Habersberger: Um so I I gotta talk to you about the song that's out right now. It's called It's a Stupid Idea to Put on a Broadway Show. I think it's absolutely brilliant. I I can't believe that it's a song, but then I listened to it and then I was like, oh my god, that's absolutely the greatest thing I've ever heard. Because it puts it into perspective for literally everybody and in such a brilliant way, and not in like a a harmful way. Um like talk to me.

[23:08] Keith Habersberger: The full album comes out on Friday, June 23rd. Um, and I'm I love that song, and so I'm curious to hear, you know, is there a song that each of you are married to that you just are so excited for people to hear?

[23:23] Keith Habersberger: Yeah, I feel like some of the songs, I mean, I know that all of us are really excited for everybody to hear "Giant Bird in a Man Suit," because the production on the song is just so unique, both for us and our sound, but also what Deshaun brings to that song. I almost am like, gosh, I want to make sure everyone gets to the entire song and gets to his second half of the entire song. Like the second half is just him absolutely crushing it, and it becomes such a vibe. It almost is funny, but it's more funny how cool it is rather than funny because the lyrics are funny. It is just actually so musically satisfying and fun. It's more about fun than funny in that song, and I'm just really excited for people to hear it.

Oh my god, I'm obsessed. I can't believe it. It's got just such great synths on it too. It just has it like when the hook comes in, it's so fat. Like the sound is just so cool, and it's such a silly song. It's about a giant bird masquerading as a human. It's full of ridiculousness. Like some of our songs are, you know, a list of great jokes cobbled together in a song, sort of like the Disney Princess song that people know so well from. But this is so absurdist and fun and really like what you should listen to the song and be like, what was that? I really enjoyed it, but what happened? Yeah, what was that? I need to play it again for sixteen more times, which is what we did. But yeah, I mean there's so much cool production on the album, you know, "Wicked Waltz," which is a song we've been performing for a long time that I won't even describe the song.

I'll just let people listen to it. But you know, there's really great orchestration in that one that I'm really excited about. I love listening to that because something that is a running joke throughout the show that is really true is like the music is so serious and the songs are so silly and dumb to a certain extent. So that's one where the music is just very, very serious and the lyrics and Keith singing over top it are just so, so silly. So I'm excited about that, Alex. You know, there's a song called "Depression" that Alex sings that everyone loves when we perform it, and the production on that is really cool. So there's just every song is different, you know. We really do a lot of different genres of music.

That's something we pride ourselves on, and we think it keeps the listening experience really fresh. We also have narration through the album, so we have Brian Wool who played Flim Flam the Sausage Man in the original version, and like Keith said, comes on tour with us, and he's traveling to Amsterdam to go do comedy, so he's really a great storyteller, and he sort of is narrating the story of the Wizard of Friendship throughout the album. So I'm excited for people to get a little taste of what the show is as well.

[26:10] Alex Lewis: Yeah, you know, in that vein, the album almost works not only as a cast recording, but a little bit like a concept album in a way, because you get to hear where you are in the story. Because you know, one thing especially, one thing especially with the songs themselves, if you just heard this as an album and we didn't tell you that it was the songs from Wizard of Friendship, you know, aside from the Wizard of Friendship theme song, which is also one of my favorite songs on the track when Grady first comes in, and it's like very 80s and really cool. But aside from like that song and Flynn Flame the Sausage Man and Modern Tortures, I don't think you would necessarily know that these can be listened to in a vacuum, all the songs.

So one thing that's really cool about the narrations is you hear where you are in the story, and you hear it, and Brian does a really nice job of painting the picture of how the show kind of feels outside of the music. So yeah, I'm excited for that as well. It really, like I said, it makes it feel a little bit more like a concept album while still being able to listen to all the songs on their own.

[27:35] Keith Habersberger: Yeah, and I'm curious to ask, like, talk to me about the process that like was, you know, you put on this show and you figured out the show, and then you had to, you know, translate it onto an album. And especially like with your guys' show, you know, there's a little bit of improv and there's some audience engagement and interactions and stuff. So what is like right? Just a tad.

[27:49] Huey Stonefish: Just a tad. So like a little bit of improv. Huey was allowed to improve one joke every night.

[27:55] Keith Habersberger: I love it. I love it. It was a 10-minute long joke, but each joke was forty-five minutes.

[28:02] Huey Stonefish: Well, you gotta fill the space, right?

[28:04] Keith Habersberger: Uh, so talk to me about what the process was in kind of translating that onto an album and kind of picking, you know, where you could have that kind of fun and where you could, you know, just sing the song or something.

[28:19] Alex Lewis: Well, we made the album and the show in conjunction with each other and as pieces of each other. So we were making the album knowing that we were going to be using the tracks for the show. And so that did make the album process, you know, a little, that would mean that every now and then in a song we'd be making the song for the record, you know, for example, to bring it up again. There's a spot in the middle of "Wicked Waltz" where Keith holds out a hilariously long note. And like point earlier, we know because we performed that song on stage that no matter what happens, when he's done holding out that long note in the middle of the song, there will be an applause break. It's just too exciting.

We all just want to scream and cheer for him at that moment. So in the record, obviously that's not two different tracks, it's just one track. And if you're applauding, you'll just rewind. But in the show, you know, we actually built that as two separate tracks and built the new track with just a one bar count in so that no one is lost for the music. So there was a lot of stuff like that happening. But then what was really cool was after we were done with the show and we'd already recorded all of the songs, it was then going back through the album and going, okay, now we've made the album, we've done the show. How do we actually make this album closer to the show? As opposed to making, you know, the show closer to the album, and that's where the narration came in. That's where some of the heart piece sounds came in. That's where the other aspects of the show really put themselves onto the album and made this album such a more magical experience.

[29:48] Keith Habersberger: Yeah, and even the narration, I mean, it was actually done and finished two days after the show closed, which is when we got Brightman in to he had like an hour that he could give us one day. So, like, let's go in, let's do it. And while we were there, we were literally sort of typing out a summary and being like, okay, let's tweak this a little bit. We were literally going section by section and just taking grabbing stuff from the script and summarizing it and changing it around, and then, you know, still directing Brian just to give the type of performance just because we're truncating so much and we're changing things, so we have to deliver it a little bit differently than we did the show.

So it was still, you know, even the very last bit of work was highly collaborative. We were all in the studio together, making sure every little line was doing its job, serving its purpose, and it's, you know, when you're making an album, especially when you've made some albums before, what you really don't want to have is listen back and be like, ah, if only we had done this. You know, you really don't want to do that as a creator. And because you can look back at your last albums and be like, ah, I really wish we had just done this, or just taken one more hour to get this. So we're really, really trying to do everything we could not to have that feeling now. And we don't. I really think that, you know, nothing is perfect, but I think we're as close to perfect as we can get right now with this project.

[31:19] Keith Habersberger: I love it. I'm so excited for the full thing. I literally, it's gonna be playing on repeat. I can't wait.

[31:25] Alex Lewis: Uh yeah, seriously. So talk to me about like the show itself. Like, how did this whole thing just like, what, why did you guys write this? Like, what did you guys just want to perform on Broadway? Like, what was that, you know, what inspired you guys to make this show?

[31:43] Keith Habersberger: Well, the original conceit of it was, you know, during 2020, we put out a comedy special, and it was great. It was our concert, which, you know, always a good time, everybody loves, and we were sort of thinking, like, you know, what are we gonna do for our next special? And we were really inspired by the fact that, you know, you had the Bo Burnham special that came out, "Bo Burnham: Inside," kind of redefining what comedy specials could be. You had, you know, things like John Mulaney's "Sack Lunch Bunch," and there was just, it was, you know, I think that was sort of where we regrouped and went, okay, you know, what we do is very different from stand-up, obviously, but it's also very different from even other comedy music acts, I would say.

We're very theatrical, so you know, we kind of put our heads together and said, well, maybe it would be fun if during the taping of our next special we were thrust into a musical, and so that's kind of how the idea was born. And that's what happens in the show. We get in a fight on stage during the taping of our second comedy special, and we break the Wizard of Friendship's heart, and he sends us to the land of No Friendia.

[33:02] Huey Stonefish: Yeah, it's so good. It's so freaking silly. Like, I am obsessed. Great, amazing.

[33:09] Keith Habersberger: Um, I have to ask you guys, because I know this is going a little bit outside the show, but it's sticking with this theme of like musical theater and theater. I'm obsessed with "I Know the Lyrics and He Doesn't," your little sketch you do on TikTok. And certainly like specifically obsessed when you're like doing it with Broadway stars in their theater and you just don't know the words. Like I think it's just brilliant. Um, it's just so funny. Um, so I've gotta ask, like, do you like, I don't know, like because Alex, I was shocked to hear that you didn't go to school for theater because it seems like you're the one that knows all the words. So like what, how did that thing like come about? And like, did you guys ever think it would like become this bio sensation that it's kind of become?

[34:01] Alex Lewis: Yeah, well, um, thank you. I, uh, that's very kind of you to say. I, I have been trained. I, I am like trained in certain aspects, like singing in choirs, and I have a voice coach. But the reason I know about musical theater so much is because I have always loved it, and I, you know, since I was a kid, I've always listened to all the new albums that came out and everything, and I'm just obsessed. And I've been doing, you know, community theater, I've been in a million musicals in my life, but, um, yeah, the way that I know the words and I don't came about was, uh, we were at Huey's wedding, the three of us, and, um, yeah, I, uh, a song, um, like kind of, I thought of the song "Me and My Shadow" by Frank Sinatra and Sammy Davis Jr. And I said to Keith, "Do you know the song 'Me and My Shadow'?" And he said no. And I said, "We should make a video where like, you know, we're doing," I described basically exactly what we do in those TikToks.

[35:03] Keith Habersberger: I said we should do like I we kind of just did it at the wedding. I was like, like the wallpaper sticks to the wall, and Keith improvised something like, uh, yes, it's you know, go ahead, Keith.

[35:15] Alex Lewis: I mean, I it yeah, it was like it was somewhat inspired by how people on TikTok literally do duets sometimes musically with each other where one person's playing stuff and someone is singing the actual lyrics. And we just at the time we were starting on TikTok and we knew that TikTok succeeds when a channel has a very specific format that is repeatable, that looks the same, that is the same joke because when you that's what you want from a TikTok channel. I want this person to do this thing. That that's what it is. Um and we hadn't found ours yet, and we thought this could be one. It was one of a few that we were experimenting with at the time, but it really hit and it it sort of captured what we were good at, which was a knowledge of musical theater from Alex, the ability to learn music unbelievably quickly from Huey, who is literally I mean, every single one of those, you know, it's about sixty to ninety seconds before Alex is like playing it off of his phone and Huey's like, uh yeah, yeah, I can do this close enough.

And sometimes we pulled up some cheat music, or sometimes he's reading guitar chords on a piano, and I'm just basically listening to the musicality of what they're doing and ignoring all the lyrics they're singing as they're trying to figure it out, or they're not even singing lyrics, he's just singing do do do do do do so that I kind of know at least musically what the song sounds like. Um because I need to be making up jokes and uh but but you know, it's just we sort of go for it and often it's a one take. We're like, okay, that was pretty good. Next one, and we're just, you know, trying to crank out fifteen or twenty in one setting. Uh, because you know, we all have so many things going on.

We'll try to block shoot them and then release them, or we'll play plan to do it uh in um in a theater in our show. We'll have people on guests, or we'll go to the stage where kinky boots is happening and try to knock out as many as we possibly can and uh and yeah.

[37:11] Keith Habersberger: So freaking cool.

[37:12] Alex Lewis: I know. Little shop of who is Chicago funny like you did 'em in the lobby, the funny girl. Like I was like, this is it's so good. It's so brilliant, you know. I just love it all. So uh, you know, big like I said, big fan. Uh and the theater kid inside me loved it. Um listen, I I I love everything that's going on. Again, I wanna say Friday, June twenty-third, full album is out of the Wizard of Friendship, and uh it's cur there's currently one song out. It's a stupid idea to put on a Broadway show. Everyone go stream it on all the digital platforms. Um is there anything else that you guys uh you know wanna mention or wanna shout out? Um this has been a treat, seriously. Thank you.

[37:55] Hughie Stone Fish: Yeah, you know, we're always posting stuff online. We have a Patreon where we post everything early. The album is going up there early. We posted stupid idea before it got up there. So that's just a spot for people who, you know, really want to get inside the LEWBERGER world and we'll post stuff when we're all hanging out, or whatever the case may be. So we have a Patreon, we got our socials, we're really excited for the album. I think Keith was gonna say something as well.

[38:16] Keith Habersberger: Yeah, I was gonna say that while we were doing this entire process, just like we sort of documented the build-up to making the show uh that went on the Try Guys YouTube channel. We documented it while we were doing the show, so we're working on cutting together some sort of piece that shows what it is like to actually do it itself. Uh we're not exactly sure the link if it's gonna be full documentary or more of a uh almost an episodic short docuseries, but we're working on because we realize the importance of people just understanding how much work goes into even our little 99 seat theater run for a month show and you can see how much effort and how much work and how much thought goes into it so you really can appreciate you know a show uh that's going up on Broadway for real or touring uh across the country and it I don't think a lot of people understand the amount of work that goes into it so we're trying to help showcase uh how hard it truly is yeah and we'll also we'll also be dropping um two more singles in the month of June as well as uh a couple music videos so look out for those and then we'll probably release a couple more music videos once the album drops as well and uh we'll be on tour or very small tour in November um but we'll be going to Ohio uh Illinois and Minnesota and potentially more dates but those three are confirmed for now.

[39:37] Eli Tokash: Love it. And I'm sure with the June singles drops, you know you'll be posting down social media or whatever it may be. So why don't you shout those out just quickly so that they they know where to look for that.

[39:49] Keith Habersberger: Absolutely we're LEWBERGER on Twitter and Instagram and then I think we're Lew Burger comedy on TikTok, although we don't generally promote stuff on TikTok because we all know oh it's Lew Burger music on TikTok but you know promoting on TikTok doesn't really work. They'll throttle the view count and not let you promote anything outside of TikTok. But uh you'll see it on Instagram and and Twitter and uh and all the just listening to us and you haven't looked at how LEWBERGER is spelled. Every vowel is an E. Otherwise, it's spelled how you expect. L-E-W-E-R-G-E-R. Every vowel's an E.

[40:25] Eli Tokash: I love it. Well, I gotta wrap up. It's Tony season, so I've got to wrap up and ask all the guests what is their favorite musical of the season.

[40:33] Keith Habersberger: A strange loop.

[40:36] Alex Lewis: That was last season.

[40:38] Keith Habersberger: We saw it, but we saw it this year.

[40:39] Eli Tokash: So okay, fair enough. It won best musical, so you win.

[40:43] Keith Habersberger: We were lucky to see Sweeney Todd, and it it is fantastic. But um we also have to shout out Anne Juliet, um, our choreographer is the assistant dance captain, and Juliet, and it certainly is a blast. It's pure fun, it's silly, it's colorful. Um, it's a great time. I mean, it's so like just right there, like such apples and oranges comparison, you know.

[41:07] Eli Tokash: Right.

[41:08] Keith Habersberger: They're both phenomenal, and they both deserve like Sweeney Todd and Anne Juliet uh for this season, I would say both definitely deserve to win best musical. But like, how do you compare Sweeney Todd and Anne? Like the I it's just crazy.

[41:22] Alex Lewis: But I do well, they're not they won't be in the same categories because Sweeney Todd is gonna be a revival, and Juliet's a new musical. So there's an opportunity both can win.

[41:33] Keith Habersberger: That's I forgot about that. You're right. Okay, so then those are my two picks.

[41:37] Eli Tokash: Great. Fingers crossed. We'll mark you down. Cool. Thank you guys so much. This has been an absolute pleasure, and you guys have so much to take a bow for. So thanks for coming on.

[41:41] Keith Habersberger: Thank you.

[41:49] Alex Lewis: Yes, yes, Alex.

[41:51] Hughie Stone Fish: Yeah, thank you guys.

[41:52] Eli Tokash: I took a vowel. I took a vowel for this listening. Take a bowel, LEWBERGER!

[41:57] Eli Tokash: Oh my god. What an absolute blast it was to have them on the show. Uh, you know, if you're on any of the theater social medias and whatever, uh and I'm sure that's you know how a lot of you found Take a Bow, um, then you probably know who LEWBERGER is. So to be able to talk to them today, get to know a little bit more about them, and get to know a little bit about their production and their works and their process and all the things. It was really, really, really cool for me uh to do that. And hopefully you all enjoyed it too. Uh here's some behind the scenes and all the things. So we obviously focus on the theater side and all of that, but there's so much that we could have talked about because they are so brilliant and uh talented in all their facets that they do.

Um, but it's really cool to see how they all really complement one another and the group just works so well because you can see that in their content, you know, you can see that in their works um that they produce because it's just done so so well. Um, shout out to them, congratulations on uh a successful run off Broadway. We always say off-Broadway is the melting pot for original works. It's not um, you know, it does it's never gets its proper credit because it's like, oh, it's a small theater in New York. And it's like, no, like some of the most um like risky shows happen off Broadway, and that's all the original shows. Like they all come from off-Broadway and then come to Broadway. You know, we see it with all these Broadway shows with Kimberly Akimbo and whatever.

And if it's not off Broadway, then it's in a regional theater, and that's off-Broadway, is literally like a regional theater in New York. Um, so huge shout out to them. Congratulations. I can't wait to see what comes next with this process. Um, as they did hint like a documentary or a docuseries or whatever it may be. Um, but seriously, the music is absolutely hilarious. Their song that they have out right now is absolutely brilliant. And if you ever wanted some sort of perspective on why ticket prices are so expensive, or why I say, you know, bad Cinderella doesn't deserve the hate. Um, and all these things, listen to that song because they do it in a way that is so blunt, but uh funny, like and not like in like a oh, like I didn't mean to offend you type way.

It's just in a lighthearted, entertaining and fun way, and it's just absolutely brilliant. And that's literally their all of their content. So huge uh, you know, I look up to them and huge fan of theirs. Um, and hopefully you all enjoyed hearing that and enjoyed the rest of their content that's to come. So um thanks again for for coming on, LEWBERGER. Uh can't wait to continue to follow along on whatever's next on your journey.

[45:01] Eli Tokash: And thank you all for listening to another episode of Take a Bow. Um, I appreciate you all again listening and giving me the extra day. Finals weeks was crazy, but we're done. And we are gonna be cranking out some very, very fun episodes. I have four recordings next week with all very, very exciting people, guys. And uh I'm so excited to share it with you guys. Um, okay, so that's all I'll say. And more to come. And I can't, I just can't wait to share it all with you. So stay tuned. We have so many cool things coming up. And uh until then, I hope that you all have amazing weeks. So, bye everyone. Have a great week.

[45:46] Eli Tokash: I'm so kidding right now. For this episode's curtain 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 from Dory Berenstein, Brittany Bigelow, Katie Rosen, Alan Seales, and the team at the Broadway Podcast Network. Next in line to Take a Bow is Tessie Tokash, who edits the audio and all the visuals for this podcast. A special thanks to patrons Brian Thompson, Pat McNamara, the listeners at PCC, as well as all the other patrons for their continued support. If you're interested in becoming a patron, go to Patreon.com slash T A B. And if you enjoyed this week's episode, don't forget to subscribe on the platform that you're currently listening to this on. Also, feel free to give us a follow on Instagram at take a bow podcast. Take a Bow's logo is designed by Giselle Bustos, and the music is by Nikki Torsha and Cormac Collinon. Bye everyone. Hope to see you next week.