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[0:18] Michael Fatica: Hi, you're listening to The Shows We Need from The Ensemblist. I'm Michael Fatica.

[0:23] Michael Fatica: It's 2021, and the theater industry is still shut down. Cool, cool, cool, cool, cool, cool. It's easy to wallow right now and just guess when it'll all come back again. You hear there's a vaccine, it'll be soon, but 2020 taught us anything, it's not to expect anything. It got even more real when Mean Girls said that they'd be closing their doors on Broadway last week, which makes you wonder what other shows might be doing the same. Instead of just guessing, we thought it'd be more productive to take a look at where we are in the world and start talking about what kind of theater do we need when it all comes back. There are so many answers to that, and I do not pretend to have the right ones.

But in this series, we're going to pick apart material, look at the casts of shows, who created the shows. To start, I want to look at Jagged Little Pill, which opened in December 2019. This show, with music by Alanis Morissette, arranged by Tom Kitt, touches on a lot of social issues, which in turn gets people talking after they see it. I talked to Kei Tsuruhanetani and Mark Kimmelman about the process, how it's affected them, and lots more. Here's our conversation.

[1:54] Michael Fatica: Hi, can you please tell me your name, your preferred pronouns, and where you're calling from?

[1:58] Kei Tsuruhanetani: My name is Kei Tsuruhanetani. I use they, them pronouns, and I'm from Osaka, Japan, originally.

[2:06] Mark Kimmelman: Mark Kimmelman, he, him, his, and I'm calling from New York City.

[2:11] Michael Fatica: Kei is a member of the ensemble in Jagged Little Pill, having previously been on Broadway in Miss Saigon and The King and I. Mark is one of the associate choreographers of the show and a very popular choreographer and teacher at New York Dance Studios, Steps, and Broadway Dance Center. Very quickly, what have you two been up to since the Broadway shutdown in March?

[2:29] Kei Tsuruhanetani: I actually, the biggest thing I think is that I enrolled in online college to get my B.A. at SUNY Empire College, so that's been kind of interesting. I've actually felt this pouring of creativity, especially since the summer that I'm trying to really acknowledge and tap into, and luckily in New York right now we can get studio space and get in there and just like dance it out.

[2:53] Michael Fatica: Amazing. Okay, on to Jagged Little Pill. The original album by Alanis Morissette came out in 1995, and I definitely remember loving this music. Were you a fan before getting involved with the show?

[3:05] Kei Tsuruhanetani: My god, yes, of course, of course. That album I think is like quintessential for most people, and it does something inside you that you can't even put words to, you know? It just makes you feel so many things, and it's raw, and it's unpolished, and a word that they often use about the show is like perfectly imperfect. There's a great quote Alanis says, it gives you permission to feel everything. I'm curious, which came first when creating the show? Did the team have this story and found the album, or was it the music that inspired them?

[3:44] Kei Tsuruhanetani: They knew they wanted the music. The producers and Tom Kitt approached Alanis, I think now it'd been like nine years ago, and they approached her, and I know that she was interested in it if the music could be taken to the next level, and there's a great quote in the hardcover book that came out last month about the show that she said, not only did it go to the next level, but it went to the next galaxy. Like she was interested in it becoming a musical if it could just be a full collaborative, like passion and empathy, and it took years for them to then bring the creative team together. This show deals with so many truly hot-button topics, sexual violence, adoption, prescription drug use, identity, sexuality. I want to know how this was handled during the rehearsals and creation of the show. Did you talk about the gravity of it, the responsibility of telling these stories?

[4:38] Mark Kimmelman: What do you think, Mark? Well, in order to really give the show the passion and weight it deserves, we couldn't really shy away from anything. These topics needed to be handled head-on, and it was of utmost importance that we approached these many themes with respect and openness and vulnerability. But we also had these focused times each week called impact trainings, where we invited people in from organizations in the city to come and take a few hours out of our rehearsal time, which you normally don't get a creative team or producers who allow you to do that, but it was so important to them that we did. And we were given the opportunity to ask questions and have a moderated conversation where we learned about these themes, but also in turn learned about each other.

So we would have people from sexual violence organizations that stand against sexual violence, and we each had to present what we learned around addiction. Those things that we don't talk about, it was so vulnerable, but it was also kind of freeing to talk about our own sexuality or our own addiction. And it was open to people beyond the company and the creative team. I think it was like front of house was invited, marketing, whoever wanted to come could come, because we also weren't trying to be experts on these themes. It's just recognizing that they exist and showing care for them and trying to create an environment where we could present it as best we could.

[6:24] Michael Fatica: That's incredible that they invited everybody in the building. I feel like that's really rare in a Broadway theater.

[6:29] Mark Kimmelman: We were not telling this story in New 42. We were telling it at the Broadhurst and on Broadway. And, you know, people would be at the stage door sharing their experience, and we would have little cards that we would be able to give to these people and be like, you know what, I might not be able to advise you on this, but here's some people who might be able to answer this question for you, or someone that you can talk to. And if anything, just opening up that dialogue.

[6:56] Michael Fatica: That's awesome. How do you feel like you benefited from that process?

[7:00] Kei Tsuruhanetani: So we started three years ago in 2017, the first workshop. I had no idea about pronouns or like anything. And now, with the help of this show and from castmates, and now my dear friends, and I identify as non-binary, and I use they, them pronouns. And that's a huge step for me, actually, because English is my second language. I sometimes mistake he, she just in general, or like, I can't really, I don't know the plural they, and like, I just didn't, it was just confusing. But then when it became something about castmate, and like somebody I care about, then it takes another layer. And then I kind of figured out that I've been uncomfortable in the body I was assigned to, which is male at birth. And what do I do? Like being gay or identify as gay guy was hard enough. And then I thought I was done. Yeah, but it wasn't.

[8:15] Michael Fatica: So you were able to realize that about yourself through doing the show? Wow.

[8:20] Kei Tsuruhanetani: And, and in that sense, like it was liberating for me. And at the same time, it kind of revealed my own transphobia. Like, I, I'm terrified to be feminine. I'm terrified to see somebody being feminine. And that revealed how I've been contributing to a misogynistic system. And it's, it's hard. It's, it's liberating. And it's freeing, but being free is hard.

[8:57] Michael Fatica: Do you feel like the creative team took your gender identity into account when creating your role in the show?

[9:01] Kei Tsuruhanetani: Indirectly? Yes. I was just wearing, you know, pants and hoodies and try out at the ART. But on Broadway, I am wearing full out skirt and crop top. It takes a lot of me to be able to just stand there in the bare stage and the overture and just face the audience with what I'm wearing for sure.

[9:16] Michael Fatica: I mean, that is inspiring and will be inspiring to so many people who are struggling with identity. And speaking of identity, the choreography in the show, I remember had so much strength and power, but didn't really feel gender specific as musical theater knows it. Mark, when creating the movement, did Larbi, the choreographer and your team intend on that? How did that process work?

[9:51] Mark Kimmelman: Definitely need to shout out Ebony Williams, the assistant choreographer, our dance captain, Kelsey Oram, and you know, other dancers in the cast, Kay and Heather Lang, who are really, you know, vital in the creation of this movement. The music really represents human emotion that is not specific to gender. So it has to represent a world.

[10:49] Kei Tsuruharatani: It's clear that table, get up, and like, go crazy. As the creative team kind of found that idea, you know, the ensemble is called the conscience. You know, they really represent the conscience of this piece, and they're given so much importance to the telling of it. So like, rather than feeling like you're backing up a vocalist all the time, you really feel like such an important part of it because the movement really lets people, similarly to the album, it lets people witness this raw feeling that Lovie's, you know, brilliant choreography.

[11:23] Marc Kimmelman: Totally. I'm remembering the movement duet on the couch set to "Uninvited" with Elizabeth Stanley going through an episode with prescription pills and Heather Lang physicalizing what she's going through. It's definitely something I don't feel like I've seen on stage, and it was such a cool marriage between a principal actor and a dancer sharing that same emotional space.

[11:59] Kei Tsuruharatani: Honestly, like, you know, give Heather her Tony, for God's sake. You know, it's like, you feel like, and those are the moments that people talk to me about and want to talk about, and they're dance moments. And like you said, they're, you know, they're very unique to this show. And I love giving notes, because for this show specifically, you know, of course, it's like, be on your number and sharper this or that. But most of the notes given are about intent and thought, and making sure that it always feels provocative, and like, right on the edge, and daring. And Larbi was giving notes, like, till opening night. It's like, it always has to have nuance and, you know, new intention around it so that it feels as risky as it did when they first created it.

[12:59] Kei Tsuruharatani: Kay, does it feel like you all as dancers were considered when creating the movement? Is it representative of this cast?

[13:07] Kei Tsuruharatani: We each have our own movement, and he was really happy to incorporate that into it and make it cohesive to each other. I think that was possible because his way of approaching or his way of movement was soft. And I think that that's like a strength that I would like to pursue in dance.

[13:28] Marc Kimmelman: Soft is an interesting way to describe it, but maybe that's because I'm so conditioned to hear the word strength and think as a male dancer that we need to exude masculinity. And strength comes in all physical forms, right?

[13:48] Kei Tsuruharatani: That's, you're so right. It's being so hard. And I didn't understand why it was so hard for me to go to audition and, you know, go to men's audition. And, you know, sometimes it's a show is about such a strong guy in the suit. And it just, I just hated that. And, and I didn't know why. And I always thought it was something was wrong with me or like, I have to, you know, go to gym more.

[14:18] Kei Tsuruharatani: You're perfect the way you are. And that is the special thing about the show, right? That it creates space to talk about these topics. Another huge issue that is in the conversation this year is racial inclusivity. And it's a hard thing to talk about and to understand. I'm curious if you think from inside Jagged Little Pill that is this a racially inclusive show? From the outside, I mean, there appears to be a lot of representation on stage, but the creative team is mostly white. I'm curious what you think about that.

[14:48] Kei Tsuruharatani: Such a difficult conversation, like what that what's inclusivity and what's diversity. And as appearance, yes, like Jagged Little Pill cast are diverse, and it's inclusive in a way, I think, but I don't think it's something that's so solid, you know, like, once you say it's a diverse cast, it's not.

[15:13] Kei Tsuruharatani: What do you mean by that? It's so hard for me because the past shows I did, I was with Asian people all the time in Saigon and King and I and there were people like non-American people as well. And I kind of took that for granted. I don't want to sound like I do not like this cast or I would not appreciate it. I do. And at the same time, there are times that I feel so alone and lonely because I'm the only immigrant. I'm the only Asian person and all the intersectionality that plays so differently for everybody and that plays out. I don't know what diverse cast really means, to be honest, and I don't know if it is in Jagged Little Pill. And I think that's OK.

[16:08] Marc Kimmelman: That is OK. It's an ongoing conversation, an important one. What kind of conversations have you had after the show? Any big reactions from fans, family, friends?

[16:23] Kei Tsuruharatani: The most memorable response was a friend who's adapted. Asian friends who were adapted and white family and the way he appreciated the show and saying he had never seen anything like that, dealing with interracial adaption in a way. He felt really, really seen by the show. That was, I think, the most touching response I've heard.

[16:59] Marc Kimmelman: What about you, Mark? Every show, you know, like you feel it. It's undeniable. Now we're just so used to being able to turn the channel after five minutes if we're like not into something. But theater, you sit there, it's two and a half hours. And like in the first 10 minutes, if you're like, oh, I don't know if this is for me, like an hour later, you don't realize how it's affecting you, but it is. And we are showing you that it's okay to feel this way. And you're not alone in this. And I stand at the back of the show often or with my co-associate, Abby O'Brien, and the energy from the audience is palpable. And people raise their Me Too fingers in the air with us. And you watch parents watching the show with their kids or seeing LGBTQ couples together or seniors standing up and just hugging each other emotionally. It's every show you really feel that intense connection with the audience.

[18:00] Marc Kimmelman: And my favorite thing about the show is that people want to talk about it. I get calls at like midnight after people have seen it who you wouldn't have normally communicated with, but they want to just talk. They want to just express how it made them feel or ask questions about it. And I think that's the best part. It really just has an effect on everybody. And people just want to share that.

[18:33] Marc Kimmelman: We didn't go in depth on the actual material of Jagged Little Pill, even though this album is a great listen. But in my opinion, this show is important because of the amount of people who can enter the theater and leave feeling like they can relate to the struggles of one of these characters. We're a country divided. We're a people divided. And if somebody can walk into a theater and learn something about the person sitting next to them, then I consider that a win.

[19:00] Kei Tsuruharatani: I saw a concert of Jagged Little Pill virtually in December with some of the cast. And I remember there was a part where Lauren Patton's character was talking about having had a sleepover with a girl. And she asked other people to write in, people who are watching the show, fans to write into the chat and say whether they had experienced that sort of sleepover or if they experienced something like that. And I wonder how many of those people were telling this screen that for the very first time. And that is awesome. So let's keep making people think. More later!

[19:39] Michael Fatica: If you're inspired by Mark Kimmelman's love for dance, like me, check him out at Broadway Dance Center, Steps, or at Metro Movement, where you can look for Club Kimmelman on Thursdays. See you there!

[19:57] Michael Fatica: Special thanks to Kei Tsuruharatani and Mark Kimmelman for sharing their stories with us. The Ensemblist was produced today by me, Michael Fatica, Jackson Klein, and Mo Brady. There are two great ways you can help The Ensemblist right now. One is by leaving us a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. The other is by becoming a Patreon member at patreon.com slash The Ensemblist. Please follow us wherever you listen to your podcasts on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or at bpn.fm, the home of the Broadway Podcast Network. You can also follow us on Instagram. Thanks for listening. Until next time!