RICHARD FAWKES

The History of The Musical

READ BY KIM CRISWELL

4 Cassettes / 4 Compact Discs

NON-FICTION

UNABRIDGED
AUDIO-ORIGINAL

NA422714 / NA422712

THE MUSICAL – A SINGER’S PERSPECTIVE

Kim Criswell

I can’t remember a time when I wasn’t in love with musical theater. Mind you, it wasn’t a particularly easy obsession to acquire, growing up as I did in the American Deep South. It was to be many years before I made it to New York to see my first Broadway show, but nevertheless, by the time I was five years old, I was hooked. Like many others, I fell in love with musical theater through film musicals, recordings, television specials, and the yearly school play.

I can still remember how excited I was the first time I saw the film version of ‘The Sound of Music’ (and what I would have given to be one of those Von Trapp children!). That LP never left the turntable, unless it was to put on my other favorite: ‘Mary Poppins’. I had never seen anyone as extraordinary as Julie Andrews; I spent most of my formative years trying to sound exactly like her. This was just great by my parents – she was a terrific role model for a little girl, you could just tell she was ‘nice’, and what lovely diction she had!

It did become a little strange, however, when I finally got to play my dream role (Maria Von Trapp) in the school play when I was 15. Although my Julie impersonation was pretty darn good when I was singing, it was alarming to hear me segue to a thick Tennessee twang for all the spoken lines. It was a peculiarly schizophrenic interpretation, and a performance that only a mother could love.

By that age I had of course found many other fabulous stars to admire and emulate. Judy Garland, Barbra Streisand, Ethel Merman, Fred Astaire and Ginger Rodgers, Mary Martin, Jimmy Cagney, Cyd Charisse, Gwen Verdon, Chita Rivera, Gene Kelly, Shirley MacLaine, Gordon MacRae, Shirley Jones: they all kept me spellbound when they were on the silver screen or TV. For some reason I didn’t notice how ridiculous it was to dream of a career in musical theater – I figured, everybody has to come from somewhere, and why can’t a Broadway star come from Chattanooga, Tennessee?

At 15, I had my first big break – I was hired to sing and dance in a theme park show at Six Flags Over Georgia in Atlanta. As it turned out, it was a wonderful training ground. Not only was I singing show tunes, surrounded by other musical-theater-mad kids like myself, I was also introduced to the discipline of doing the same show over and over again – we regularly did five half-hour shows a day, and sometimes did as many as ten. I couldn’t help developing some of the skills that I would later need when I found myself playing the same role eight times a week for a year and a half. I also found out, the hard way, that my vocal cords were not made of cast iron, and there is always a price to be paid when you push yourself too far. That lesson turned out to be extremely important in later years.

By the time I was ready to make decisions about college, my mind was absolutely made up: I wanted to study musical theater. I was accepted into one of the first, and best, degree programs in the US for such training: the Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music’s Opera-Musical Theater program. It turned out to be four years of musical theater saturation: acting, voice, piano, dance (ballet, jazz, tap), stage crew, costume crew, makeup, theater history, music theory, sight singing, and vocal coaching. Coaching was the most beneficial class of all for me, because it was where we were taught (forced, sometimes) to sing and act at the same time, and were encouraged to stop imitating others and figure out what we had that was unique and special. This was where I had to say good-bye to Miss Andrews, which was just as well – I was starting to look rather more like Miss Merman, with a personality to match. It was an incredible environment to learn in, and was probably the most competitive situation I have ever encountered. We did two major and several minor productions every year, and the audition process was much more nerve-wracking than any Broadway or West End audition I can remember.

During spring break of my senior year, I finally made it to New York and my first Broadway show. A group of us went up from school, and we saw nine shows in seven days. It’s all a blur now (it was even a blur then) but I do remember the thrill of seeing ‘Sweeney Todd’ in previews – and Angela Lansbury in person! I was in heaven. Upon graduation, there was really no choice to be made – it was New York or bust.

After spending the summer in the chorus at Pittsburgh Civic Light Opera (where we did six musicals in seven weeks), I was a member of Actor’s Equity and couldn’t wait to head for New York. My friend George and I packed our things and drove a rented truck to the Big Apple, where he already had an apartment and needed a roommate. Then came the business of trying to get a job. Of course we didn’t have agents yet, so we had to go to the dreaded open calls. That meant getting in line at some hideous morning hour, just to sign a list, which then meant you could come back and audition a few hours later. They also had a particularly barbaric system called ‘typing out’. When you finally got in the door, often they would line up a group of you and go down the line saying, ‘Yes, yes, no, no, no, yes, no, no!’ – based on nothing other that what you looked like. I found out the hard way that I was not the chorus type: I was never, never typed in. Still, it was always a thrill to walk into an audition room and see, behind the table, the very people that I had studied in college – Hal Prince, Tommy Tune, Bob Fosse, Jerome Robbins, Stephen Sondheim, Jule Styne, Jerry Herman, Andrew Lloyd Webber!

Despite my apparent lack of chorus suitability, I managed slowly but surely to get auditions and work. My first job was a dinner theater production of ‘Kismet’, where I was in the chorus but understudied the lead. Then I found myself cast in the chorus of ‘Annie’ in the 3rd National touring company (the show was so successful that there were five US companies at that time). One thing led to another, I found an agent, I did my first Broadway show (‘The First’- a flop), then my second Broadway show (‘Nine’- a hit!).

Things have continued from there until I find myself where I am today: living in London, sometimes doing eight shows a week in the West End, sometimes recording yet another musical theater album, most commonly singing musical theater music in concert in venues the world over. This music is finding new fans every day – I have found myself doing concerts in places as far flung as Iceland, Italy, Israel and Brazil, and the reception is always enthusiastic for what is to many of them a new kind of music. It has certainly stood the test of time, and continues to change almost daily in a multitude of fascinating ways. I can’t wait to see what this millennium of musical theater will bring!

KIM CRISWELL is one of the most exciting performers of our time. She has appeared extensively in musicals on Broadway, Los Angeles and London’s West End. She won a Helen Hayes Award for Side by Side by Sondheim and an Olivier nomination for Annie Get Your Gun. She has made over 25 recordings including Annie Get Your Gun, Wonderful Town (with Simon Rattle), The Lorelei, Anything Goes, On the Town, The Slow Drag and her TER solo album Back to Before. Her recital duo with Wayne Marshall is internationally acclaimed through performances throughout Europe including La Scala, Milan.

RICHARD FAWKES is a freelance writer and film director. He wrote the multiple award winning The History of Classical Music and The History of Opera for Naxos AudioBooks and is a regular contributor to Opera Now, BBC Music Magazine and Classical Music. He has written several books on opera, including a history of opera on film. He has also written the librettos for two operas one of which, Survival Song, was nominated for an Olivier Award. His credits as a film director include The Original Three Tenors, a documentary about Caruso, Gigli and Bjorling.