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[0:00] Aaron Albano: You're listening to Fosse Verdon from The Ensemblist, the only podcast that shows you Broadway from the inside out. I'm Aaron Albano. And I'm Mo Brady.

[0:22] Mo Brady: Welcome listeners to our mini-series recapping episodes of FX's Emmy Award winning limited series Fosse Verdon. In the show, we see an inside look into two characters as they grapple with the concepts of power, the meaning of love, and the value of entertainment in art. We're going back episode by episode to see how this love letter to vintage Broadway tells us greater truths about the industry.

[0:44] Aaron Albano: So let's dive in and talk about Episode 5, Where Am I Going? Aaron, give us the stats.

[0:49] Mo Brady: Where Am I Going? premiered on May 7th, 2019. It was written by Charlotte Stoudt and directed by Tommy Kail. The total viewership dipped about 32,000 viewers from the previous week, coming in at about 878,000. The live viewership fell to 312,000, while oddly, the DVR viewership rose to 565,000. This bottle episode had very little music in it. It was almost like a normal TV show.

[1:15] Aaron Albano: The only featured song we had was an uncanny rendition by Michelle Williams of Where Am I Going from Sweet Charity, with music and lyrics by Cy Coleman and Dorothy Fields, honestly proving why her star turn as Gwen Verdon earned her an Emmy.

[1:28] Mo Brady: And what happened in this episode, Mo?

[1:30] Aaron Albano: Three months after checking himself into the Payne-Whitney Psychiatry Clinic, Bob and his new girlfriend Annie are hosting a party for Neil Simon following the death of his wife, Joan. But joining them at their Southampton rental for the first time are Gwen and her new beau, Ron. In their first moment alone, Bob asks Gwen what she thinks of Annie, telling her, "Nicole really loves her." But all Gwen wants to talk about is Chicago, scheduling a meeting with producers and telling him they have a theater for the show. However, Bob is more interested in making his next project a biopic on Lenny Bruce starring Dustin Hoffman. Not only does that put Gwen's plans for Chicago in jeopardy, but it concerns Ann, who knows that his doctors suggested he take a year off work or he'd end up right back in the clinic.

[2:19] Mo Brady: The conversation comes to a head after their dinner to celebrate Joan, where Patty and Gwen both challenge Bob about his motivations for rushing Lenny to the screen. During those adult conversations, Bob and Gwen's daughter, Nicole, cycles through the rooms of the house wearing a midriff and refilling cigarette cases.

[2:37] Aaron Albano: After dinner, Gwen courts Ann to be on her side, persuading Bob to postpone Lenny. But it becomes clear that they are both on different sides, Gwen wanting him to work on Chicago and Ann wanting him not to work at all. When Gwen puts Bob's feet to the flame, he replies, "You want to know the truth? I'm finished with these corny, bullshit musical comedies." It isn't until Gwen admits she's not sure that he'll be alive to direct in two years and throws Hal Prince's name into the ring that Bob agrees to kiss and make up. Well, it's a kiss that leads to a lot more than a kiss.

[3:11] Mo Brady: In the early hours of the next morning, Gwen and Ann have a heart-to-heart over croissants, Gwen giving Ann her blessing because Bob has introduced her to Nicole. She also tasks Ann with keeping him from going off the edge, promising, "He'll give you what he gave me, Ula, Charity, Roxy." But while Gwen has seemed to win Bob over into directing Chicago, Bob proclaims that he'll be doing both Chicago and Lenny at the same time.

[3:39] Aaron Albano: We're halfway through. This is like the second act.

[3:50] Mo Brady: That is so weird. And in our podcast about musicals on stage, we just get this hour of intense drama where there is no dancing and very little singing.

[4:01] Aaron Albano: Well, it was interesting. I was reflecting on last episode. We really got an act one finale at the end of episode four. And now the show has taken a significant shift. First off, can we raise a glass to Joan Simon, R.I.P. Joan.

[4:18] Mo Brady: R.I.P. Joan. I feel like we're still going to get a lot of Aya Cash in flashbacks and stuff, but all I thought was like, wow, I wish because I love Nate Corddry, who plays Neil Simon. I wish we had gotten to see more of their relationship on screen.

[4:32] Aaron Albano: Sure.

[4:32] Mo Brady: Instead of just hearing about it.

[4:34] Aaron Albano: A lot of that relationship was really Joan telling us about things from her hospital bed.

[4:39] Mo Brady: Doing it well and making us invest in it without even seeing it.

[4:43] Aaron Albano: But well, maybe season two of the limited series is Joan and Neil.

[4:48] Mo Brady: Joan slash Neil.

[4:49] Aaron Albano: It's Simon slash Simon.

[4:51] Mo Brady: Simon slash Simon. Before we get into like other stuff, how do you feel about the one musical number we got in this episode?

[5:00] Aaron Albano: Well, I can tell how you feel about it, Aaron. You're like oozing all over it.

[5:04] Mo Brady: I am.

[5:04] Aaron Albano: You are here for it.

[5:05] Mo Brady: I am. I absolutely was.

[5:07] Aaron Albano: What about the performance of Michelle Williams as Gwen Verdon singing Where Am I Going was so exemplary to you? I'm curious.

[5:16] Mo Brady: OK, I think where it really hit me, and I didn't do this the last time. A, I didn't have this kind of critical eye on the show anyway. Watching where she's where she's going with the song, I think she does it very well, especially you and I especially have all these conversations about how Hollywood should just trust musical theater actors to be able to carry Hollywood shows. But this was a moment where I was like, yo, Michelle Williams knows what she's doing in this medium. And so I remember thinking that when I watched it initially and watching it again. And then as I was typing up notes for our talk today, I was like, I wonder how her Gwen was because I know she carried the number, but how was it like characterially?

[6:04] Aaron Albano: You were searching to see if she was doing an impression or more of like something in the style of Gwen Verdon, but her own character.

[6:14] Mo Brady: Yeah. What'd you find?

[6:15] Aaron Albano: At this point, like five episodes in, her Gwen has become very believable as an interpretation of a role. When she tackles something very iconic in Gwen's catalog, I was like, all right, this is very specific. How did she do? And I went to Spotify, looked up Where Am I Going and clicked play. If you haven't done this, listeners and Amal, you should.

[6:53] Mo Brady: I feel like there's quite a difference between like an impression of doing Gwen Verdon and your own interpretation of the character of Gwen Verdon. And it's a very fine line. One can brink on parody. One is what we see on Saturday Night Live. The other, there is a truth and almost honoring of her legacy. And I would say, especially with this number, Michelle Williams is way more in that category than the impression parody category of her portrayal of Gwen Verdon. It's like all the other biopics we see, they hit really well when the essence of the real-life person they're portraying is found. And I think that if there was any question, whether Michelle was doing that, it was laid to rest with this interpretation of Where Am I Going? It made me wish I had seen her in Cabaret, which I just like came and went. And I didn't even think about going up to Studio 54 to see it.

[8:03] Aaron Albano: I mean, I saw that Cabaret, but again, it's that moment of when you hear a movie star's in a Broadway show, you're like, okay, fine. In hindsight, you're right. I do wish that I had seen it. I questioned when we were there. And that's my own fault, because my own bias has gotten in the way of possibly seeing very good theater. I will admit, this episode was not one that I was particularly looking forward to go back to because as you probably know, I like the singing and the dancing and this episode has very little of it.

[8:37] Mo Brady: Right. So in my first viewing, this felt like a necessary part of the story, but it wasn't something that I was particularly excited about. But looking at the series through the lens of our theses, this is such an exciting episode because really the conversation about who is the puppet master is coming to a head. We have so much back and forth about who is puppet master, Bob or Gwen. I mean, there's like so many times it goes back and forth in this episode. I don't even know where to start because I feel like this entire episode is about our first thesis. Is Bob the puppet master or Gwen? Tell me if you disagree. I feel like this episode is the episode that answers that question.

[9:20] Aaron Albano: And what's the answer?

[9:21] Mo Brady: We'll get there.

[9:22] Aaron Albano: Okay. So we start off with Gwen being the puppet master. And as it goes back and forth, Gwen lies to Fred Ebb saying Bob is 100% committed to putting up Chicago next season while he's basically comatose in the psychiatry clinic.

[9:37] Mo Brady: Sure.

[9:38] Aaron Albano: In the first moment alone, Bob asked Gwen what she thinks of Anne telling her Nicole really loves her. And it feels like he's like asking for her approval, right? It feels like she's in the position of power.

[9:50] Mo Brady: Absolutely. 100%.

[9:51] Aaron Albano: And then the puppeteering really becomes forward in a way that like is almost too much. Like you can see Gwen...

[10:00] Mo Brady: What did you think of that dinner scene?

[10:42] Aaron Albano: But what's amazing about it is like the misdirects of the episode are wonderful because throughout we think that all of her nagging about Chicago is just self-serving. She wants to be back on stage. She wants to be a star again. She wants them to be together and doing something. What fascinates me is as you go through the episode we're sort of revealed the real quote-unquote real reasons she's pushing so hard for Chicago.

[11:32] Mo Brady: There's one moment in the episode where she says the royalties from Chicago will leave Nicole set for life. I won't leave her with nothing. And through the episode we watched when Nicole smokes and throws up and Gwen freaks out about her smoking. All the flashbacks we see in that section are of her conversation with Joan Simon before she died. The one we know about where she's like choose Nicole, pick Nicole, you need to be there for Nicole. And she's spent the whole night talking about Chicago in our minds. So the show has led us to believe that she's also freaking out because she's let her friend down. She hasn't heeded her final words and then she reveals that like she's pushing for Chicago for Nicole. It shines a whole new light on her fight for Chicago. But what kills me as a parent is like why can't she just say that? That to me is the best reason that is presented in the whole show.

[12:50] Aaron Albano: Yeah, but to you and me and viewers of the show, correct 100%. This will set our daughter up for life. Game over. The end. We watched in a previous episode how Bob has told Gwen that taking care of Nicole is a personal favor to Gwen. So Gwen doesn't know the epiphany he had before trying to kill himself.

[13:06] Mo Brady: Oh, sure. We do. Gwen does not. So all of these tactics are specifically designed for Bob Fosse. She's working him from every angle. She wants to do Chicago now because he's dying. She has now like taken control of his legacy because she knows he's not going to. And so her whole argument is it'll set Nicole up for life. You'll be a legend. It can be us on Broadway again. Our triumphant return to Broadway will be this grand moment for you. And then on top of that, she says to Anne, she admits that Bob not working is unrealistic. So she's doing the next best thing, which is to have him work on something where she can be in the room and keep an eye on him. And when she's not in the room, Anne's in the room. And she's saying, yes, it's a job, but if you do the job, then he'll give you what he gave me.

[14:13] Aaron Albano: Right. All of these leading roles, all these iconic roles in the musical theater canon. Which arguably he doesn't. Thinking about that statement, he'll give you what he gave me. Anne Ranking didn't get those.

[14:21] Mo Brady: No. Not in the same way. Interesting. Not in the same way. I mean, this is another conversation, but that's why this is Fosse-verted and not Fosse-Ranking. It does make me dig even deeper into the interestingness of Anne playing Roxy in the revival. It's not only interesting because they were both romantically involved with Bob, but because of this conversation. This relationship. He'll give you what he gave me. And literally one of the things that Bob ends up giving Anne is the same exact thing that he gave Gwen, which is the role of Roxy.

[15:00] Aaron Albano: Oh, no, I've definitely been thinking about that move in the revival a lot. In the first watch and now. But I think it's that moment where everything changed when Bob's mortality entered the show. It's almost where like thesis two becomes a different question. I don't know what it is. But things change when you know the person you love is going to die. Once upon a time, Gwen and Bob were at odds. Now, Gwen's love for Bob overshadows all the things that he did to her.

[15:33] Mo Brady: This is what I want to go back to in terms of the puppeteering. Gwen is doing her damnedest to work at every angle to keep Bob healthy, which the way that she knows how to do that is by having him work on Chicago. Bob is bristling against that, right? Even though it seems like he understands what she's trying to do. When asked about Chicago, he says Lenny's his first priority. He hasn't even told Gwen about how the project Lenny is moving forward, right?

[16:07] Aaron Albano: Yeah. Gwen finds out offhandedly that Dustin Hoffman's been cast, even though he just said moments before that the script was still in edits, right? And when he finally admits or deflects and says, I don't want to do Chicago in one year, in two years, in 100 years, I'm finished with these corny bullshit musicals. Gwen says, I wish you would have told me that before I spent 10 years trying to get the rights.

[16:34] Mo Brady: Yes. Yeah. Like, yes, it feels like Gwen is the obvious puppeteer, but Bob is bristling against that.

[16:41] Aaron Albano: Oh, for sure. It's where I think the conversation shifts because once upon a time, our thesis was who's controlling who. Now, I think our answer to that, for me, is pretty clear. And now the question has become, how much does the puppet want to be a real boy versus stay a puppet? Whatever the post-dinner scene is with Anne and Gwen and Bob, Gwen uses all of her puppeteering on Anne as well.

[17:08] Mo Brady: Oh, yeah. That's sort of where the power struggle has shifted to. You said the dinner scene was the most dramatic for you, but this was really the crux of it all for me. I kept writing down quotes. I guess the dinner was more the most volatile scene. There was drama in the whole hour. And I think maybe the reason I love this scene so much is that it really is the crystallization of our question about puppeteering, right? Gwen says to Anne, this is the problem with Bob. He's so sweet and so charming. He tells you everything you want to hear, but then you realize he's just a liar and will say whatever it is to get what he wants.

[18:47] Aaron Albano: Yeah. She knows him. And I guess that goes back to what you were saying is that, like, she's come in. She's working every tactic. He's deflecting. He's trying to get her off of his scent. And she's like, I've got you pegged, buddy. I mean, like you said in the synopsis, the way she gets him finally is to threaten his ego by being like, well, maybe I can just call Hal Prince if you want to do. And like, why didn't she just do that in the first place? I mean, we would have lost a great hour of television, but like, man, it's so much easier, right? I mean, but again, like in hindsight, you can like how many times have both of us just played out fights that could have gone way quicker. But in the heat of the moment, they were not like I don't really like drama. I don't really live for drama. And so that's not really my lifestyle.

[19:39] Mo Brady: This whole episode is Gwen working out her plays. And why I think she is the puppet master full stop is that she's the only one who has all the plays to play. And B, it works. It doesn't work exactly the way she wants to, but she gets a commitment for Chicago. Patty tries and tries and they try their best, but it's not it. I mean, you never once think that either Anne or Patty are going to be able to convince Bob.

[19:57] Aaron Albano: Yeah, it's when we're like, yeah, this is the unique relationship. This is why this show is centered around these two.

[20:16] Mo Brady: To keep up to date with next week's recap, be sure to watch episode six of Fosse-Verdon. All I care about is love. You can find episodes on Hulu. The Ensemblist was produced today by me, Aaron Albano.

[20:28] Aaron Albano: And me, Mo Brady. There are two great ways you can be helping The Ensemblist right now. One is by leaving us a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. And the second is by becoming a Patreon member at patreon.com slash The Ensemblist. Please follow The Ensemblist wherever you listen to podcasts on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or at bpn.fm, the home of Broadway Podcast Network. You can also follow us on Instagram. Thanks for listening, everyone. Until next time.