After 30 years of teaching musical theatre I am finally going to publish all my “musings, anecdotes” and what I know works best on the musical stage. Anyone with whom I have worked…send me your thoughts and ideas!

Here is a beginning…

Musical Theatre requires special skills and those skills must be honed through the examination of writing which has been tested and refined through the years. Students must first be exposed to the rich history of material which has been expertly constructed by writers, composers and lyricists who have worked tirelessly to invent and reinvent that which we know to be truly remarkable craftsmanship specifically for the musical stage. While I applaud new efforts by contemporary writers, I firmly believe that by breaking down the craft of experts, students can truly begin to understand the complexities of what they are performing and channel that knowledge into the further accumulation of the requisite skills required for successful dissemination of all musical material to an audience. With knowledge there is power, the power to grow and the power to change. To that end I strive to unlock in each student the acting of the music and the singing of the story.

 

As a teacher, I am challenged by the current “norms” popular in performing for the musical stage. If one is a knowledgeable practitioner of Musical Theatre, most especially in the professional theatre, one begs to ask the question: Has acting in musical theatre developed into a process that seeks a programmed response from an audience? Slick, precise, mechanical, lacking spontaneity, technical. Unlike acting in general, the actor in musical theatre must balance the technical with the spontaneous. Precision is key to effective performance, precision in singing, musicality, physicality, choreography, thought, gesture and idea. But that precision must be achieved through the honesty and truth of the moment. Much of musical theatre is technical, but that technique must not be seen or overshadowed by the truth of the moment. The actor must quiet the thoughts of self (what I am now doing as an actor right now will achieve the desired effect I wish on the audience) in favor of the thoughts of the character (what I seek is the strength of my will on the other characters to achieve what I think I want). The audience thus, should experience the character (as opposed to the actor) in action. Even celebrity (on all levels local to international) must be checked in favor of truth.

 

A philosophy of the current and the future:

Musical Theatre is experiencing a resurgence of status and recognition in the United States. From the phenomenal popularity of Glee, live musical broadcasts (The Sound of Music, Peter Pan, The Wiz) High School Musical, and any number of accapella and dance crazed television and films, performing in musicals has become as popular (and lucrative) as playing sports. Community, identity, originality, expressiveness, inclusiveness and ability (singing, dancing, acting, expression, challenge, belonging) are all key to this resurgence.

 

My experiences as a director and performer have always fueled my teaching. Most recently, I have been directing musical theatre in Lithuania. The resurgence of the cultural popularity of musical theatre in America has also fueled a desire on the international level. Cultures around the globe are hungry for this truly American export of entertainment. What must happen for a non-American and virtually non-English speaking audience on the local level in embracing this export is the same as when producing musicals for an American audience: the desire to make it culturally significant in the present, so the experience becomes not one of an American ideal, but one that can speak to the culture of the local and ultimately the universal.

 

There are key factors which make musical theatre a culturally American export. Understanding these factors can contribute to the success of the experience of the import for a local (and non-American audience). Universality of idea is key to the success or failure of the musical theatre venture in a non-American culture. Social, political, economic and spiritual/religious influences are all factors in the appreciation of the musical theatre form and experience, but the universal nature of man is what makes the experience truly become local (as opposed to foreign). American Musical Theatre (in a non-American culture) should influence and inspire that universality, and not dictate a cultural way of perceiving the world which is primarily American. Some of these universal factors specific to musical theatre are in the actual singing, acting, dancing and choreographic nature of the form. Each culture defines these in various norms based on the notion of what is popular and acceptable as entertainment.

 

The challenge lies in the translation of these skills into a foreign culture which is unaware of the uniqueness and “Americanness” of the form itself. When the Moscow Art Theatre performed for the first time in the United States, a group of American theatre artists experienced an opportunity to make something culturally foreign to them, become truly American in form and content. For American Musical Theatre artists expanding their reach into foreign cultures, this must be the reverse. Each culture must be challenged not only to experience and embrace the form as originally performed, but also understand the underlying concepts and ideas of the form, if they are to adapt and make what is culturally imported into something which can eventually become driven by the host culture itself.

 

Primary in this cultural exchange is language itself. The world teems with a richness of language, dialect, accent and word choice which is unique to each country. It may be obvious to say, but American Musical Theatre was written for the American “ear.” What we hear dictates what we think. Translating those thoughts and ideas into something which can be perceived as culturally present is paramount to performing the musical in a different language. Even the word “love” (the most important word in the canon) can have any number of different meanings which can change the interpretation of the word for the actor and the audience unless the translation is clear.

 

Then there is the question of musicality. The music of American Musical Theatre has developed from a potboiler of influences; Americans have imported musical influences from all over the world and spun them to sound “American.” Lest we forget that working in translation can be quite a challenging experience for a culture not influenced by this “American” sound. How we sing a word is tied directly to how the word has been placed in the music.

 

I have found that by working in translation, I am more keenly aware of how the American form works and is structured to tell the story with truth and universal appeal. This is not to say that all that which is “American” about the form should be lost I the translation. What makes the form popular is indeed the American-ness of the form itself.

 

These reflections are part of a more detailed account of my reflections on my current work as a translator of the form as an international artist for a more expanded outlet. I intend to continue musing and writing on these reflections until I have the opportunity to express them to a more diverse and larger audience.