This transcript was automatically generated and might contain errors.

[0:08] Patrick Oliver Jones: Five years ago, a musical that defied convention and enchanted audiences with its simplicity and profound storytelling closed on Broadway after almost a year and a half of critical and audience acclaim: The Band's Visit.

[0:24] Patrick Oliver Jones: Composed by David Yazbek and written by Itamar Moses, The Band's Visit emerged from a crowded field of pop rock musicals in the 2017-2018 season as a masterpiece that transcended the contemporary Broadway norms.

[0:40] Patrick Oliver Jones: The dynamic duo of Yazbek and Moses crafted a musical that gave audiences a rare opportunity to immerse themselves in a narrative that embraced simplicity and emotional resonance.

[0:53] Patrick Oliver Jones: The Broadway gem also made waves during the 2018 Tony Awards, earning a remarkable 11 nominations and taking home 10 of them, including the coveted Best Musical.

[1:06] Patrick Oliver Jones: Now it faced stiff competition from big blockbuster shows like SpongeBob Squarepants, Mean Girls, and Frozen.

[1:13] Patrick Oliver Jones: But The Band's Visit found a way to touch hearts and minds that set it apart from those mega musicals.

[1:20] Patrick Oliver Jones: As we begin 2024, the Middle East is making headlines again, and is dividing people in this country and abroad.

[1:30] Patrick Oliver Jones: So I wanted to showcase an Arab-Israeli musical that resonated with a variety of audiences on a deeper level, exploring the complexities of human connection and bridging divides through the universal language of music.

[1:46] Patrick Oliver Jones: What you're about to hear is an encore presentation of Why I'll Never Make It of my 2018 interview with Jeff Theiss, the associate conductor and keyboard player of The Band's Visit.

[1:58] Patrick Oliver Jones: In this exclusive conversation, we dive into the intricate world of the musical score, its unique approach to storytelling, and how it goes beyond Middle East tensions to instead focus on our shared human experiences, illustrating the power of connection that can overcome even the most profound political divisions.

[2:19] Patrick Oliver Jones: Join me on this journey as we revisit the timeless beauty of The Band's Visit, a musical that continues to remind us of the profound commonality that unites us all.

[2:41] Patrick Oliver Jones: Well, here we are backstage.

[2:43] Jeff Theiss: Actually, we're back of house.

[2:45] Patrick Oliver Jones: Yeah.

[2:50] Jeff Theiss: Hello.

[2:51] Patrick Oliver Jones: Thank you for joining me.

[2:52] Jeff Theiss: Thank you.

[2:53] Patrick Oliver Jones: Of course. So The Band's Visit has been nominated for 11.

[2:57] Jeff Theiss: Eleven Tony Awards.

[2:59] Patrick Oliver Jones: Yeah, exactly. And two of those are orchestrations.

[3:02] Jeff Theiss: Yes.

[3:03] Patrick Oliver Jones: And also Best Score.

[3:04] Jeff Theiss: Yes.

[3:05] Patrick Oliver Jones: So as a conductor of this music, what is it like to play and to conduct this music on a nightly basis?

[3:11] Jeff Theiss: Right. I've been telling so many people if you've seen the show, you know that it's very still. Like there's a lot of silence in the show. And so silence, I think, plays as big of a part as the music in the show.

[3:23] Jeff Theiss: Um, but like I just I tell people that it's sort of my hour and a half of quiet time every day. Um, there's not a whole lot of your sort of traditional up-tempo musical theater things. It's yeah, it's a very mid-tempo to ballady kind of right.

[3:37] Jeff Theiss: Yeah, yeah. Say the back half of the show is very ballad-esque, you know, though with a little extra flavor thrown in there. But yeah, it's very the music has been described as enrapturing and people just I guess just like the show itself, people have had a hard time pinning down exactly what to say about it.

[3:59] Patrick Oliver Jones: Well don't well, yeah, because in listening to it, you know, because David Yazbek so there's a little bit of pop rock feel to like a song. So you still got those David Yazbek bass lines, right?

[4:10] Jeff Theiss: Right, you still and then there's that Middle Eastern flair to some songs, and then all of a sudden then you're into traditional like jazz ballads.

[4:18] Jeff Theiss: Right, yeah music.

[4:19] Jeff Theiss: Yeah. So you kind of run the gamut of a lot of different styles. Which is, you know, the thing that got me interested in musical theater, really in the first place was just the pure amount of different styles that you can get your hands on.

[4:31] Jeff Theiss: And this is, you know, klezmer and traditional Arabic music is just one more to add to that list, which is so great, you know, that we get to sort of introduce that.

[4:39] Patrick Oliver Jones: Now, is there a different style to playing that kind of music? Obviously, it sounds different to our Western ears, but is there a style, is there a feel to it that's different?

[4:48] Jeff Theiss: Right. I mean, as a white guy from Texas when they first brought me out.

[4:51] Jeff Theiss: As a white guy from Alabama, so I know you go, right?

[4:54] Jeff Theiss: Um when they first brought me on to this project for The Atlantic when we were downtown, I remember the first day that the onstage band guys came in, and I was like, What is that? And what instrument is that? And how is that tuned and how is that written out?

[5:08] Jeff Theiss: And so I mean, it's really cool that the onstage guys really a lot of their expertise in this style. I mean, Yazbek would write, you know, the melodies and have sort of a structure that he wanted, and then the guys would just sort of go to town on it.

[5:24] Jeff Theiss: And our music director, Andrea Grody also arranged a lot of things together, and then but it was it was amazing at sort of how collaborative the whole process was.

[5:32] Jeff Theiss: Yeah, it was a Yazbek idea that flourished with all these other minds and players getting into it.

[5:38] Jeff Theiss: Exactly, yeah. And the guys would be playing, and they would say, you know, traditionally we would do something more like this, and then they would play it for Yazbek, and he'd say, Oh, I like components of that, but our Western ear is gonna expect something else.

[5:50] Jeff Theiss: So, like a good example of that is in the concert at the very end. During the percussion solo, there's a 16-bar percussion solo, and eight bars of that is just the percussion by itself.

[6:01] Jeff Theiss: And then the back half, the back eight bars of that is everybody in the band goes dun dunk while the percussion keeps playing.

[6:24] Jeff Theiss: And the guys in the band would say, Well, you know, if we all do those hits, bump bump, like that's not something that would traditionally be done. And Yazbek said, Well, yeah, but our Western ears are gonna want to hear to have something to latch on to.

[6:37] Patrick Oliver Jones: Yeah, the Broadway musical audience is gonna need to.

[6:39] Jeff Theiss: Right, exactly. Yeah, and I mean it does, it adds a little bit of variety and a little bit of anticipation to that to the end of that percussion solo, so that you're like, oh, something's coming, something's about to happen, something new, and then we go back into the return of the d-da-da-da-da-da-da-da.

[6:53] Jeff Theiss: I was reading a lot of what other people were saying, and one of my favorite quotes was from an audience member who came and said, This is a show for humans who know how to feel.

[7:03] Patrick Oliver Jones: And so obviously there's a lot that comes to the audience or kind of washes over the audience throughout this show.

[7:09] Jeff Theiss: Absolutely. I mean, I knew it was so special when we were downtown rehearsing. We were rehearsing at Manhattan Theater Club for the Atlantic production, and Andrea, the music director said, I want you to go.

[7:20] Jeff Theiss: We were in just one of those little rooms, and she said, I want you to sit on the other side of the room and just, you know, take notes, you know, because she was playing at the piano, and um, so I went to the other side of the room and we ran the whole show.

[7:30] Jeff Theiss: This was towards the end of the rehearsal process. And just like so many of my friends have said, like, it sneaks up on you, and at the end you are so emotionally affected by it, and you can't describe why.

[7:42] Jeff Theiss: And so at the end of the run, Andrea and I would get together and she would say, So what notes do you have? And I would say, Well, about halfway through, I just stopped taking notes because I was just completely mesmerized.

[7:52] Jeff Theiss: And you know, I would, you know, be emotionally affected, and I would just say, you know what? Like, this is there's something really special about this, and I can't put my finger on it.

[8:00] Jeff Theiss: And still, I really can't. It's just it affects people because of that human level.

[8:06] Jeff Theiss: I mean, it's a story that we may not be familiar with in terms of any kind of political goings on or dealings in that part of the world, but just sort of the theme of like we're all brothers and we're all in this world together.

[8:06] Jeff Theiss: We're all in this world together, and we should all take care of each other if there's somebody in need, like you should do it, you know, offer whatever you have to help them out.

[8:30] Jeff Theiss: And so something, yeah, very universal about that. Because in last year's season, there was a similar show, Come From Away, which is that very same theme of bringing people in who are there unexpectedly.

[8:41] Patrick Oliver Jones: Exactly. And I've in a very quick elevator pitch way, I've sort of described to other people that we're the Arabic Come From Away.

[8:49] Jeff Theiss: Yeah. It's a little like, you know, there's definitely not as much choreography and not as much sort of high energy in at times, you know. So it's a very subdued Arabic Come From Away.

[8:59] Jeff Theiss: Yeah, and speaking of which, I mean, that is one thing that definitely sets The Band's Visit apart from the other nominees for Best Musical. They're big and flashy, they have big names behind them.

[9:09] Jeff Theiss: Not only the titles themselves are known and have been in the public for a long time. But The Band's Visit is so different from that, and it's kind of this sleeper musical that just keeps going, and people, as you said, they don't know why they feel the way they do, but they just want more of it.

[9:25] Jeff Theiss: Right, exactly. There's a Washington Post article about that said something like The Band's Visit, the little musical that could, or something like that. You know, and so yeah, and I mean, while those other shows are known quantities to the public, there, you know, they have name recognition, they have brand recognition already, and they are based on movies or TV shows in terms in case of like SpongeBob.

[9:45] Patrick Oliver Jones: But we were also based on a movie, which a lot of people don't realize.

[9:48] Jeff Theiss: Which I didn't realize until I started reading up on it, it's like, oh, this is based on a movie too.

[9:52] Jeff Theiss: Exactly. And when I was brought on, I didn't realize that it was a movie either. And I found, you know, you couldn't stream it anywhere, you know.

[10:00] Jeff Theiss: So I had to I went back to the dark days and like ordered a physical copy of it off Amazon.

[10:05] Patrick Oliver Jones: I know, right?

[10:06] Jeff Theiss: And so when I first watched it, just a couple weeks out before we started rehearsals, I was just like, How is this a musical? Because I was thinking in terms of like Mean Girls or SpongeBob or, you know, something high energy, right?

[10:20] Jeff Theiss: You know, a tap number, you know, kick line, you know, stuff like that. And I watched the original Israeli movie that it's based on, and I just thought, where's the kick line gonna go?

[10:29] Jeff Theiss: You know, yeah, where's the big production number? Where's the big production number? And there's not. We don't have one.

[10:34] Jeff Theiss: Um, which I think is really cool. And our producer Orrin Wolf also talked a lot about when we the feel he wanted to set up when you first walked into the theater.

[10:46] Jeff Theiss: I mean, we're on 47th Street right off of Times Square, you know, we're right across from Waitress.

[10:51] Patrick Oliver Jones: Yeah.

[10:52] Jeff Theiss: But you know, the hustle and bustle right outside the door, and then you walk in and there's, you know, music just so solo lines of our guys in the band, just um, and they said they wanted it to be like sort of a prayer from the minaret sort of, you know, like a solo violin sort of slow and just winding, and that our amazing George Aboud plays, and he's so incredible.

[11:15] Jeff Theiss: But it really sets the tone for the show. You know, you walk in from the hustle and bustle outside and you hear these sort of haunting, sweet, prayer-like melodies with the pre-show music, and you sit down and you know, and the even the projection that's happening on the scrim, you know, before it starts, yeah, um is sort, you know, has sort of like way like sort of a wave sort of feel to it, almost like a mirage, you know.

[11:38] Patrick Oliver Jones: And um so really just kind of okay, put the city aside.

[11:42] Jeff Theiss: Right, put the city.

[11:43] Patrick Oliver Jones: Let go of your day, yeah.

[11:45] Jeff Theiss: Now you're in the world.

[11:45] Patrick Oliver Jones: This is a quiet, yeah.

[11:47] Jeff Theiss: This is a quiet, which like I said, you know, going back to what I said before, this is this is like a dedicated quiet time for me, eight shows a week.

[11:58] Patrick Oliver Jones: So talk about your journey with the musical. When did you start with it?

[12:01] Jeff Theiss: Right. So there was no out of town tryouts or anything, and there were a lot of I believe there were a lot of workshops before I was brought on, and that was only Andrea in terms of um music team other than Yazbek uh and our contractor, Dean Sharon. And they were looking for uh an associate um for the show, and I had worked with Dean, our contractor, a couple years ago on Listrada Jones, and so he remembered me from that, so he gave me a call and said, Would you come in and and you know we'll see if you're a good fit for the show and in terms of what you'd be doing conducting wise? And and uh yeah, so I came in uh just right before we started the Atlantic.

[12:38] Jeff Theiss: Actually, I was up at Merry Go Round.

[12:40] Patrick Oliver Jones: Which is how we know each other.

[12:41] Jeff Theiss: Which is how we know each other, yeah.

[12:42] Patrick Oliver Jones: Yeah, from Merrygo Round Playhouse. And so in the interim between when you left Atlantic to when you opened here at the Barrymore, what was that process like? Was there some revisions? Was there a lot of tweaking at that point?

[12:52] Jeff Theiss: There was I played for like one sort of all one or two like all day choreography workshops where our um choreographer Patrick McCollum got some of his friends together and we just sort of experimented with like what could be going on during O'Marshaw Reef and you know and some other ideas that he wanted to implement downtown, but didn't we didn't have the time or the space or you know, I mean that's really all I touched on it when we were uh in the interim.

[13:15] Patrick Oliver Jones: Um was that with the knowledge that it was coming here to the Bear Moor at that time?

[13:19] Jeff Theiss: I didn't have that knowledge, but I think people that people higher up the Mucky Mucks.

[13:23] Patrick Oliver Jones: Yeah, I think they knew.

[13:24] Jeff Theiss: Um yeah, I mean, you know, I I wanted to believe, of course, that that was what was happening, but you know, in this business you also don't want to, you know, you put your eggs in one basket.

[13:32] Patrick Oliver Jones: Yeah, you can't so you just have to keep going like you know, like everything's normal, and yeah, um, and I did, and I went back to Merry Go Round and you know, did my normal stuff. But yeah, so we transferred almost the entire original company, and then we added our on stage percussionist, um Osama, who is actually from Alexandria, where the band is from in the show.

[13:51] Jeff Theiss: How about that?

[13:52] Patrick Oliver Jones: And so yeah, it bringing him in just added this whole um other sort of energy and authenticity.

[14:00] Jeff Theiss: And uh and yeah, of course.

[14:01] Patrick Oliver Jones: For sure.

[14:02] Jeff Theiss: Um we didn't have that on stage percussion downtown, and so it was even sort of even a quieter experience downtown because there wasn't that sort of driving, you know, like if if you've seen the show, you you you know he he plays so loud and so you know, with such gusto, and um it just really adds this whole other energy to it.

[14:28] Patrick Oliver Jones: And how many pieces did you add going from the Atlantic to here?

[14:32] Jeff Theiss: We kept everything this so I think downtown we had yeah, so same pieces. So we had eight downtown, and then we added Osama, which was the ninth person.

[14:40] Patrick Oliver Jones: Wow.

[14:40] Jeff Theiss: So four of us stay in the pit the whole time, two keyboards, bass, and drums. And then the other five guys from the pit split their time. They're the ones in the blue suits, so they split their time between down the pit and up on stage.

[14:52] Patrick Oliver Jones: Yeah.

[14:53] Jeff Theiss: And you'll know they're the eight oh two, they're the union guys because they don't have lines.

[14:57] Patrick Oliver Jones: Right.

[14:58] Jeff Theiss: So they're the ones that play and don't have lines. Except of course for George, a boot, our violinist and and ood player. He is actually an equity actor uh first. And he just happened to grow up with this music, and his father and his grandfather have played this music before him. And um, and so you know, he's was very immersed in that world already, and he speaks fluently and um so he has you know uh scenes um to himself and ha I don't know exactly how it works, but he's half 802, half equity.

[15:26] Patrick Oliver Jones: Yeah.

[15:27] Jeff Theiss: Um so he comes down and plays in the pit with us and and um then he's on stage and he just like rips these like violin solos that are just crazy. It's just like sort of this Arabic fiddling that's you know full of uh, you know, micro tonal stuff and you know, all that.

[15:42] Patrick Oliver Jones: So apart from the music which was nominated, obviously a lot of the actors were the it's best directed, so it's it's an it's an on-stage acting piece as much as it is a musical piece for sure.

[15:52] Jeff Theiss: Absolutely.

[15:53] Patrick Oliver Jones: It's uh and sort of my other half of my really quick elevator pitch to people who asked what it is, I say it's more like a play. I mean, there's still a song every scene.

[16:01] Jeff Theiss: Um, but it's and now we have one of our actors warming up. I don't know if you can hear that.

[16:06] Patrick Oliver Jones: Um but it is more like it has more of the feel of a play, and you know, uh David Cromer, our director, um, this is his first. Well, I don't know if it's his first musical ever, but you know, he's you know, this is um Yeah, he comes from the play world.

[16:14] Jeff Theiss: He comes from the play world, exactly.

[16:20] Patrick Oliver Jones: So it really has that play sort of mentality to it, yet with the song every scene. And I think one of the great things about bringing so much of the original cast um to the transfer is that when we started rehearsing for the transfer, we already knew what the show was.

[16:35] Jeff Theiss: You know, we had all done it before.

[16:37] Patrick Oliver Jones: Right.

[16:37] Jeff Theiss: We did a you know, we did a table read and we were all like, oh yeah, that that went really well. Just like being back in the saddle. But we but it afforded us the opportunity to really work transitions and to really dig deeper into the acting side, so it's not just and and because we're a one-act, and because there's no production numbers, it really afforded us the opportunity to really zero in on those elements, on those acting play-like elements.

[17:05] Patrick Oliver Jones: Absolutely.

[17:05] Jeff Theiss: Um so you know, we didn't have to, you know, devote whole days to giant production numbers, you know.

[17:11] Patrick Oliver Jones: So, yeah, I mean, I think just all those things sort of like really worked in our favor, and and we really focused on transitions alone. I think it just it's worth seeing the show just for the transition.

[17:23] Jeff Theiss: And and so, and so with that work, obviously, as as you said, it touches on some Middle Eastern issues that we in the West kind of hear about in the news, but we obviously don't have a first-hand experience of. What was their idea in in kind of bringing these these tensions onto the stage?

[17:39] Patrick Oliver Jones: You know, I can't completely speak for Cromwell, but the things that he said to us in rehearsal were that we don't want to make it about that. And our our playwright, Irmar Moses, uh we we uh in adapting the the film. Actually the film is not that way either. There's there's only one scene in the film where they first get to the cat the cafe and they're sitting at a table close to the wall, and there's a little picture of a tank that's been framed on the wall, and one of the guys from the band looks at it and he takes his hat off and he hangs his hat over to cover the to cover the picture of the of the tank. You know, it's only as big as his hat. And um I think that's a really great sort of symbol for what you know, just saying to putting that issue to rest.

[18:21] Jeff Theiss: Like the show is it's like that's there, that's a given, but now let's now let's talk about something deeper.

[18:26] Patrick Oliver Jones: Exactly. If you're coming in and you know that it's about a group of Israelis and a group of Egyptians, you already have sort of a a light understanding of what could happen.

[18:37] Jeff Theiss: You know, but that's not what the show's about.

[18:38] Patrick Oliver Jones: So it's definitely there in the fact that in the opening scene, George's character um says and be on the lookout, Ariel's character says, for what, and then he can't think of anything. And you know, and so that's sort of our way of sort of like so yeah, so so the direction really was to steer clear of that and just deal with with these people and interacting and and and how humans, right?

[19:03] Jeff Theiss: Right.

[19:04] Patrick Oliver Jones: And so and you know, you get visually too, I mean, the costume design, the the powder blue suits are so striking against the beige background that you already visually symbolically understand that.

[19:15] Jeff Theiss: These people are completely out of the state.

[19:16] Patrick Oliver Jones: They stand out.

[19:17] Jeff Theiss: They stand out, right?

[19:19] Patrick Oliver Jones: And so you already just on that level, you're like, wow, these this group of people is completely different from this other group of people. And um they didn't want to make it about that. It's not about the politics, it's about the human connections.

[19:31] Jeff Theiss: And so you see that there's a divide there, and what's the bridge?

[19:34] Patrick Oliver Jones: The bridges are humanity, the bridges, music is a common language. And I would say that that's probably the reason why it's so different from the other three nominated for best musical.

[19:44] Jeff Theiss: It is this very simple story, a very simple look at how people come together and how they interact.

[19:50] Patrick Oliver Jones: Apart from politics and all the other things that can divide us, but just how people come together.

[19:55] Jeff Theiss: Exactly.

[19:55] Patrick Oliver Jones: Yeah.

[19:56] Jeff Theiss: And it's it's it's really as simple as that, you know, and um it's not much longer than the original movie. I mean, I think the movie's an hour and a half, and I think we're an hour and a half, and you don't want to overstay your welcome.

[20:06] Patrick Oliver Jones: You don't want it to keep it in the in the idea of the show.

[20:10] Jeff Theiss: Yeah, you know, and so it's just a simple story, and it just takes one act to tell, and there's nothing, you know, at the end of the show, you can, you know, sort of if you want to continue the story on yourself in your head, you know, right?

[20:21] Patrick Oliver Jones: You can imagine what happens to these people, right?

[20:23] Jeff Theiss: Yeah, uh, which is one way one reason we wanted to put the concert in for this version was uh after the bows was sort of uh it could be represented as like you know, they got to where they were going, and this is what happened you know, and this is this the music that they played, yeah.

[20:37] Patrick Oliver Jones: Um so in that way you don't have to imagine like you can hear you know the conclusion of that part of the story, you know.

[20:44] Jeff Theiss: You know, when they get back, you know what happens? Does Holland and get expelled from the band?

[20:50] Patrick Oliver Jones: You know, I mean you can fill that in yourself, like his relationship with Tufiq has changed, the band leader, his relationship with the band leader has changed over the course of the hour and a half that you're watching the show.

[21:00] Jeff Theiss: Um, and it all takes place in about 24 hours.

[21:03] Patrick Oliver Jones: Yeah.

[21:03] Jeff Theiss: Um and was it like this from the beginning? Did people know, okay, we have something special, this could really resonate with people.

[21:09] Patrick Oliver Jones: I mean, they knew, yeah, we all knew that, like I said, when I was in rehearsal for downtown, I would just be like, wow, there's like there's something happening here.

[21:15] Jeff Theiss: Something is really cool.

[21:17] Patrick Oliver Jones: But you know, then again, you still don't know if it's gonna take off with people.

[21:20] Jeff Theiss: I mean, you know, there's lots of things that have been small things that have been wonderful that are wonderful and very special, and they don't last that long.

[21:27] Patrick Oliver Jones: I mean, look at Indecent last year, you know.

[21:29] Jeff Theiss: I mean, that I mean, didn't they post a closing notice and then they ended up extending it?

[21:33] Patrick Oliver Jones: Yeah, then it's like, yeah, it's like, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, I don't want to see it.

[21:36] Jeff Theiss: Yeah, exactly.

[21:37] Patrick Oliver Jones: You know, so it could have easily sort of gone that way, you know, in the sense that we were just uh a little jewel that happened and then we were gone.

[21:43] Jeff Theiss: Right.

[21:44] Patrick Oliver Jones: Um, but you know, I mean it's it would still uh be as special that way.

[21:48] Jeff Theiss: Um if it is this way, you know, as it is this way.

[21:51] Patrick Oliver Jones: Right. It's it's so much more than just this Tony nominated show. It's it's it's obviously got a lot of depth to it.

[21:57] Jeff Theiss: Yeah, absolutely.

[22:04] Patrick Oliver Jones: Thank you for joining me on this encore presentation of why I'll never make it from the second season with my friend and guest, Jeff Tice.

[22:14] Patrick Oliver Jones: I'm your host, Patrick Oliver Jones in charge of writing, editing, and producing this podcast.

[22:20] Patrick Oliver Jones: The next season of closing night is a few months away, so I hope you'll enjoy more bonus episodes like these between now and then.