Sondheim's "Company" Opens Friday with Megan McCormick and Stevie Nichols

Broadway recently dusted off Stephen Sondheim’s musical “Company”. As one of the earliest musicals of the 20th century that featured a large group of main characters with intertwining stories, Company has been called Shakespearean yet truly modern in its New York storytelling. 

This June, Albuquerque Little Theatre debuts Company to close out its 96th consecutive season. Cast members Megan McCormick and Stevie Nichols take AlternateStages behind the scenes of Company’s opening week.

tickets:

Https://AlbuquerqueLittleTheatre.org

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:04

Look at how pretty we are.

SPEAKER_00 0:07

You definitely have a filter on there. This season our podcast is available on video too. My conversation today is with two stars of the musical company at Apple Crickety Little Theater. Opening Friday, June 12th. Hi, this is Robert John Mark. I'm really excited to announce this second theater of the alternate theater podcast. We'll be talking to influential theater leaders at the national level, including Broadway, academic theater, creative writers, and many other. Don't worry, let's still continue to put multiple theater objects and public theater objects in future episodes. I'm up for the paint here now so you don't miss these new work. We're so glad that's coming on. This is our first studio session of the podcast. Thank you guys for being here. Um audiences probably know you from your past work at many other theaters, but you want to give a brief uh personal biography of your creative talents uh before we begin.

SPEAKER_02 2:08

A brief biography. I started in my uh 20s and 30s singing karaoke bars and in the shower. And then was lucky enough to start doing real theater at Albuquerque Little Theater. And so for the last, what would that be? 16 years, I've been doing musicals as as often as I can.

SPEAKER_00 2:30

So you started at ALT. So this is a homecoming story. It's wonderful to have you back. Um, as someone who did another show with you in this season, City of Angels, I just love watching you on the stage. So let me say that.

SPEAKER_01 2:44

Thank you, Rob. Likewise, just wait till you see her, Jenny. Just wait. It's beautiful. That's the word that I keep using. I watch it as many opportunities as I can when I'm at rehearsal. She's just so genuine and so it's it's a beautiful Jenny.

SPEAKER_00 3:04

Yeah, just gonna be and your creative personal.

SPEAKER_01 3:08

I mean, I did a lot of finger painting in kindergarten. I don't know, I was a cheerleader, so you know, choreography. And then I went to New York and tried my hand out there, and here I am back in Alpha Kirby.

SPEAKER_00 3:24

Tried your hand uh is short for completed a conservatory program, worked professionally for a minute, yeah. For a minute, yeah, it was amazing. Toured toured nationally and musicals and plays and emphasis on Shakespeare.

SPEAKER_01 3:40

Love, I love the card. Um, but I found myself doing a lot of a lot of musical theater in Albuquerque, you know, meeting some wonderful people, having a great time.

SPEAKER_00 3:50

So that's that's and is this your first ALT show?

SPEAKER_01 3:53

No, my first ALT show I was 12. The Little Prince. The Little Prince. Oh my goodness.

SPEAKER_03 4:01

Yeah, that's wonderful.

SPEAKER_01 4:02

Yeah, yeah. So I've been on the boards of ALT many times, but this is special to me because I just this is an amazing cast. I mean, I think Stevie would agree. It's an amazing group of amazingly talented people. Um so I hope that we can deliver and that that all of the technical aspects will work to give the audience what is really at the heart of this amazing group of people.

SPEAKER_00 4:28

Yeah, I think you will because I happened to see an Instagram reel photo shoot you all did last night, most of everybody wearing black, and you were in some rooftop venue, and it was a fabulous reel. I I had such FOMO. I I was like, I have to see this show because it it does look like a very top-notch professional cast. And uh are you having fun?

SPEAKER_02 4:51

We are such a fun. Yeah, such a fun. I think it's a testament to how much fun we're having and how much we have grown together. That wasn't uh that last night's reel was created from something that wasn't called by our production team. We just got together on our own because we needed that time together.

SPEAKER_01 5:13

There's a line in the show where one of the characters played by Tiana Yatsi, who's amazing, by the way, um, says, I just want to go dress in all black. She's talking about being in New York and she wants to dress in all black and she wants to go black black shirt, black scarf, black glasses. Go to a bar, I'll sit, I'll drink, I don't want to cry. And I had had a particularly difficult rehearsal, and I put on our group chat, like, let's do that. And then everyone was like, Yeah, let's do it. We didn't cry though. We left. We left immediately. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 5:47

That's why it seemed like such a professional reel, because you were all wearing black. We were like New Yorkers.

SPEAKER_02 5:52

Like New Yorkers. Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 5:54

Sometimes you walk down the street in New York, but everyone's wearing black, and you're like, is this a fossil? And so that was a self-generated reel. So you're not just triple threats, you're quadruple threats if you add in sort.

SPEAKER_01 6:09

I'm gonna Stevie's the triple threat. I get put in the back of the dancing numbers and I'm fine there. Okay. Stevie's the triple thread. So yeah.

SPEAKER_00 6:20

So uh you mentioned Shakespeare. Some people have called Sondheim the Shakespeare of musicals because he writes such kind of danced lyrics. I mean, there's a lot in those lyrics. Yeah, yeah. What's your experience been? Uh first of all, have you worked on other sound times? And is it true that Sondheim uh material is different? As I've been taught to believe, though, never having worked on a sound time outside of auditions.

SPEAKER_03 6:48

Really?

SPEAKER_00 6:48

I've just been never done a sound time. But what what's what's the experience been? Is it like toothsome language or is it just kind of like fine and I like that.

SPEAKER_02 6:58

Toothsome language. It is this is the hardest production I have ever put my mind and soul and body into. Really? Yeah. You've done very hard things. I've done some hard things in my 16 years with musical theater. But it is, I wanted to audition because I wanted the challenge of Son Time. I knew that the music was going to be challenging and that the lyrics would be challenging. I did not know the extent of that challenge. Um I was also, you know, like we were Melody, who's our music director, she put us in.

SPEAKER_00 7:32

Oh, and is that the perfect name for a music director?

SPEAKER_02 7:35

Yes, right.

SPEAKER_00 7:36

Melody Melody.

SPEAKER_02 7:39

And I'm I'm even thinking, like, I will never do another music villain group, unless she's involved because she has just been that.

SPEAKER_00 7:47

Melody Gallagher.

SPEAKER_02 7:48

Melody effing Gallagher. I love you, Melody Gallagher. Brilliant.

SPEAKER_00 7:54

I've done a show with her and I'm pretty. She's amazing.

SPEAKER_02 7:56

She's the heart of we've talked about this. She was the caramel filling of your production.

SPEAKER_00 8:01

And that's full of yeah, little women. Yeah. And she was the phenomenal.

SPEAKER_02 8:05

We've all talked about you for like 30 minutes, Melody, if you're watching this.

SPEAKER_00 8:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 8:09

But she's been brilliant. She gives us little tricks because it is tricky and it's not, it doesn't follow. I mean, I'm not like a musically trained person necessarily, so I don't know the words, but we have chords and they are dissonant, they are resonant, they are weird, and it's not, it doesn't make it where they go, where you're even if you're a soprano, you don't sing the melody. Um, it's just been really, really challenging. And she is there with us every step of the way to help us like find the little tricks, the little, you know, like to reference another song so that you can remember your your notes and your steps.

SPEAKER_01 8:45

And it just wonderful.

SPEAKER_00 8:47

Yeah, that is a great movie.

SPEAKER_01 8:48

She's made an extremely challenging score. Like no one has committed suicide. Well, and also it's not, you know, you want to on some days.

SPEAKER_00 9:01

It's not like a traditional uh boy meets girl musical, and a lot of townspeople in the back singing and about a clam bake. This is a this is an ensemble piece. So all of you have significant others in the show. It's about a bunch of New York couples, if I remember correctly. And they're all trying to solve one particular problem that they share. Can you tell us about that?

SPEAKER_01 9:30

Their single friend, their single, their single friend Bobby, who's played by Stafford Douglas, who is absolutely brilliant, such a genuine, amazingly connected, uh versatile and and nuanced actor. Like he's an actor, right? Above anything else, he's an actor. Um, so if just seeing him, like if everybody else disappeared, even just watching him in the show would be worth your ticket because he's pretty much absolutely and I did a little research on Stafford.

SPEAKER_00 10:04

He has some Hollywood credits, right? He does whatever a screenplay to his credit of a movie that got made. Yes. Um and yeah, so some big guns of this.

SPEAKER_02 10:15

That's right. He took him maybe at 13 or 14 or something year hiatus from musical theater to pursue film and maybe some stage acting, but he's mostly been focused on film. Um, so this is this is another it's a welcoming of him back to to ALT, back to musical theater. And um, I think we were really, really lucky.

SPEAKER_01 10:36

Oh, we're so lucky. Yeah, he's definitely the glue, and everybody he sets the bar really high. So we're all trying to kind of nut that energy and that genuineness that he brings to everything.

SPEAKER_02 10:47

And he's the Bobby, too, like two in our lives. Bobby is his character's name, but he's our Bobby. Bobby, baby, Bobby, Bobby, Bobby. Not Barbie, not Barbie, no, and not Rob, not Rob, not Rob Martin from the chat room.

SPEAKER_00 11:02

Right. Robert Martin. Yeah. Um, so uh who else is in the show? Like scads of other people. Yeah. Not to put you on the spot.

SPEAKER_01 11:11

No, we have fabulous words scads.

SPEAKER_02 11:14

So yes, yeah, scads.

SPEAKER_00 11:15

So you mentioned Tiana.

SPEAKER_02 11:16

Yeah, she plays one of the girlfriends. So there are five couples who Bobby is friends with, and then there are three girlfriends that he's he's seeing throughout the show. Okay. Tiana plays one of the girlfriends. Do you want names? Are we gonna name drop?

SPEAKER_00 11:31

If you want, I know Drew is in it.

SPEAKER_01 11:33

Drew uh Drew is my husband, and he's wonderful, one to work with, has a ton of energy. I don't know where he gets it. I've never seen a break of red hole.

SPEAKER_00 11:44

Is that what it is? Let me just call it Dartmouth. I went there, Stevie went there, Drew went there.

SPEAKER_01 11:48

It's great, and then Matt Miller plays your husband.

SPEAKER_02 11:50

Yes, the uncomparable, in incomparable. What a voice. What a voice.

SPEAKER_00 11:55

Amazing.

SPEAKER_02 11:55

Um, and he's getting some some acting challenges with this show, right? He's he's he has a complicated character. He does, uh, and so we won't say much.

SPEAKER_01 12:05

He really does, but you gotta like him, but also like not, yeah. Matt has a really big acting challenge.

SPEAKER_02 12:12

You're right. Yeah, and he's he delivers it flawlessly. He's growing every single day. We play opposite each other on stage, so it's fun. He's so funny. Um and I'm really excited for you guys to get rid of it.

SPEAKER_00 12:25

A lot of comedy.

SPEAKER_01 12:26

Matt and and Stevie's scene is my is my favorite. That's really, really well done. It's just beautiful. I saw I'm gonna say it again. That's beautiful.

SPEAKER_00 12:40

He might have given me some before we did. Say who you play in the show and say who your character's partner is in the show. You said Matt, but Matt plays who?

SPEAKER_02 12:53

Matt plays David, and you play and I play Jenny.

SPEAKER_00 12:56

Okay, and Megan, you play. And I'm Sarah.

SPEAKER_01 12:58

Sarah. And Drew is Harry. Drew is Harry. Okay. And we have ways of we have some stuff that we work through physically. We get a little aggressive in our scene.

SPEAKER_00 13:11

Um yeah. It sounds like that involves adult equipment.

SPEAKER_01 13:15

I mean, it doesn't, but you know, whatever. And you have some stuff that you work through that you you can do with some, you know, therapy, some medicinal therapy. Medicinal therapy. Okay. Yeah. So there's physicality, medicinal therapy.

SPEAKER_00 13:29

This is a date night show.

SPEAKER_01 13:31

Yeah, it's definitely not not for the kids. And it's not like X-rated, but it's it's it's got mature themes.

SPEAKER_00 13:37

It's mature themes.

SPEAKER_01 13:38

You won't appro you appreciate it if you're not an adult.

SPEAKER_00 13:40

So that's exciting. Yeah. I mean, I love a I love a family show, but I also would you call it a think piece, a field piece.

SPEAKER_02 13:49

It's both of those things. I think that if you're an adult human and whether you've had a relationship or not in your life, go and you see this show, you're gonna see yourself in at least one. It's a comedy. I don't want to say that it's farse because it's not, it's comedy. It's like over-the-top comedy at times, but it's so real. The stories that we're telling are so real, and it's actually been really kind of therapeutic for me in a lot of ways. Like to look back, I was previously married, look back at my marriage and my divorce and the the relationships I've had since then.

SPEAKER_03 14:30

And it's it's therapeutic to watch our characters on stage interact with one another in their own marriages and in their own divorces and in their own, you know, stories that we're telling.

SPEAKER_00 14:41

Um so it's really a piece about marriage and other long-term relationships.

SPEAKER_01 14:47

Yeah, yeah, friendship, marriage, relationships in general, and how you, you know, how you navigate those. From my perspective, it's kind of like, you know, Bobby, these are sort of Bobby's memories. So like every scene is kind of the way that Bobby remembers it or Bobby imagines it. So that kind of gives the actors freedom to be a little bit over the top and a little bit crazy. Like, did these things happen exactly as he's remembering them, or is he remembering like the highlights and the nuances? Um, so that makes it fun for the audience and fun for the actors. But at the end of the day, at the end of each of these scenes, it's tied in in this crazy, like real bow, right? And and it just brings it all home. Um it's a very interesting way to kind of look at relationships too, from someone who's never really had one, but who's all whose friends are all in one. I think it's it's so definitely eye standard to a lot of relationships. Yeah, 100%.

SPEAKER_02 15:41

Yeah, and maybe pulling pieces from each one, hoping that he can have that someday.

SPEAKER_01 15:46

Yeah, there's even a moment where he talks about, you know, a Jenny kind of Sarah, a Sharon kind of Susan. Like he just he's there's no Sharon. There's no Sharon. But um, he, you know, talking about like all of these women that that are in his life and are part of his life, and he loves them for certain reasons, and he's trying to find this woman, it's like a mixture of all of them, right? So or is he?

SPEAKER_00 16:06

Or is he or is he? Interesting. So there's a character that nobody plays but everybody plays, which is New York City.

SPEAKER_01 16:14

Oh, yes, you're right.

SPEAKER_00 16:16

Oh that's a character of his play. Yes. Um what what does New York mean to the story? And could you take the New York out of it and just have it set in, I don't know, Tempe, Arizona?

SPEAKER_01 16:28

I guess you could, but New York's such a heartbeat going all the way through it. Um, it's written late 60s, early 70s, I believe. So um there's some stuff that's a little bit dated, but at the end of the day, you're right, New York is like kind of a starring, takes a starring role. So I don't know, I wouldn't want to see it said any other way.

SPEAKER_00 16:50

But in New York, at least when I lived there, it was true that you had friends from every walk of life. And so I think that's kind of an important way of setting this piece up. You were mentioning the Jenny-ish kind of Sarah, whatever that song was. Yeah. That's one of the iconic songs.

SPEAKER_01 17:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 17:09

There's also another hundred people that just got off the bus.

SPEAKER_01 17:13

Train. Train.

SPEAKER_00 17:14

Hilarious song. Tiana. You could drive a person crazy, which is a wonderful trio. For those who were at ALT's Winterfest last year and watched these two performing in numbers from other shows. Wendy that show, that that number, the trio, was I believe the the winner at Winterfest and helped get this show on. On the season.

SPEAKER_01 17:39

It's a great number. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 17:41

Great number.

SPEAKER_01 17:42

My favorite number, can I just say you didn't ask, but my very favorite, like one of my favorite songs in the whole world is Being Alive.

SPEAKER_00 17:49

Uh huh.

SPEAKER_01 17:49

Of course. And of course, that's like the song.

SPEAKER_00 17:52

The transformation culmination.

SPEAKER_01 17:54

I watch it every night. I cry every night. I cry every night.

SPEAKER_00 17:57

What about uh Ladies Who Lunch? Like let's talk about I know the Barbara Streisand version of that song.

SPEAKER_01 18:07

But More Barbara Barbara.

SPEAKER_00 18:10

She's she's amazing.

SPEAKER_01 18:12

She unlike I've ever seen her before. I don't have any words. I remember going up to her and going, I didn't know. Like I was trying to say a compliment, but like it was coming out all backwards. I was like, trying to say, like, I didn't know you could do that. I've seen her and she's brilliant, right? Like, she's a great actress. I've seen her because she's impeccable. Yeah, she has this belt and this power I've never seen her do before, and just this control, this vocal control. Holy crackers. Yeah, yeah, it's amazing. Do not leave before that number.

SPEAKER_00 18:43

And I guess I always thought that number was hard on an actress's voice because Elaine Strich did it originally. Uh has the voice anyway. Yeah. So the song didn't make her voice trash, but yeah, but I bet Lori vote books technique than Strichy.

SPEAKER_02 19:01

Yeah. And she's found her own placement.

SPEAKER_01 19:03

I will tell you, Lori's rendition of Ladies Who Lunch. Like I've seen Patty Le Pone do it. We've all seen Elaine Strich do it. I've seen numerous people do it. Her I'm not just saying this because, you know, because I like her and she's lovely. Her rendition is so perfectly placed in her voice and so powerful. It's every bit as powerful as the screaming and as the sort of this of Patty Lepone, but it's also sonorous. Like you want to hear it. It's beautifully done. Yes. Um I it's yeah, it's amazing.

SPEAKER_00 19:36

It's also a great um piece of satirical writing, the way that song pokes fun of herself and all of her friends.

SPEAKER_02 19:48

New York social like I joke, I don't know if I've made this joke to you, but you and I and our roles as Sarah and Jenny, I think that we are like we are the ladies who lunch. That she just literally ladies who lunch right here. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 20:01

Taking all my classes, reading all my magazines, and you raising your little children, probably all going to the fence of Mahler. Mahler!

SPEAKER_00 20:10

I remember hearing the song and having to look up.

SPEAKER_01 20:13

What is Mauler? Mahler. Now I know. Another fun part of that scene when she is killing it and you can't take your eyes off of her, but I've watched it, you know, many times, and I've it's fun to watch Stafford watching her.

SPEAKER_00 20:25

Like it's just so is he on stage the whole time watching all of you? Because they're his memories.

SPEAKER_01 20:31

That's cool. Yeah, he doesn't get a break. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 20:34

Um, let's talk about the creative staff. Uh, you mentioned Melody Gallagher music director. Is there a choreographer?

SPEAKER_02 20:41

Yes, Mr. Lou Becker Becker.

SPEAKER_00 20:43

Lou Becker.

SPEAKER_02 20:47

Yeah, he is great.

SPEAKER_00 20:48

And director is Teresa Becker. Oh, she's good.

SPEAKER_01 20:53

Yes. Theresa is amazing.

SPEAKER_00 20:55

Yeah, yeah. I I always think her shows are so unrealistic.

SPEAKER_02 20:59

She likes Teresa. You know, we've gotten close, this cast, right? We've just spent quite a bit of time outside reversals. We are like we we love each other. But we we talked through some of these things. We have people in our cast who we have one young actor who has never done a musical theater production before, but but has seen everything that Teresa Carson has directed in town and wanted to be part of one of Teresa's productions. So she, you know, her her reputation precedes her, but she's bringing in people who really want to work with her because they know that they're gonna learn and grow.

SPEAKER_01 21:31

Um and do and I think another person, even who their very first audition ever in their whole life was for the show. For this show. Yeah, it's kind of cool.

SPEAKER_00 21:39

Plus the veterans, so New Blood is a is a big deal. I mean, I will say every show I've seen of Teresa's are iconic pieces of writing. Um, so no surprise that she got this one. Um I think it's fabulous. Um it's opening this Friday, June

SPEAKER_01 22:01

We run three twenty-eighth or twenty-ninth, three weekends.

SPEAKER_00 22:04

So some matinees. Matinea's are big with our Albuquerque audience.

SPEAKER_01 22:08

Fridays and Saturdays at 7:30, Sundays at 2, and then on the 25th, we have a Thursday performance at 7:30.

SPEAKER_00 22:13

Do you have a Saturday matinee?

SPEAKER_02 22:15

Me too. It's on the 20th, the Saturdays. It's like the 20th, the second album. I did not know that. So thank you. This is welcome.

SPEAKER_00 22:25

I believe that's what's known as the two show day.

SPEAKER_03 22:27

Whoopsie!

SPEAKER_00 22:29

Or as we used to call it, four and forty-eight. The four show weekend. Um and tickets are available at albacronittheater.org. Um 505-242-4750. That's great. Um tickets are going fast, right? And uh should people try to sit in the balcony or in the orchestra?

SPEAKER_01 22:50

Or I don't think there's a there's really not a bad seat. ALT is not a giant theater and this is well staged. Um, you know, me personally, I don't like to be way out on the ends, but there's not a bad seat.

SPEAKER_00 23:02

You know, okay, good. Well now it's time for lightning round. Um, all my guests have to answer lightning round. First, uh, what was your very first role performing anything anywhere in front of an audience?

SPEAKER_01 23:16

Shiny the mirror at Sandia Prep High School. They did a production of San of Snow White and the Seven Dwarves, and I was the mirror, and and their her name or his name or their name was Shiny.

unknown 23:28

No.

SPEAKER_01 23:28

And I was hooked.

SPEAKER_00 23:29

I I played a mirror in a snow white. How old were you?

SPEAKER_01 23:32

I was like in fifth grade. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 23:36

Um, in my uh rural Baptist church production of maybe, maybe like Christmas story, but I was an angel and I sang, I see a star, a bright and shiny star. It went on.

SPEAKER_00 23:53

How old were you?

SPEAKER_02 23:54

Probably like four.

SPEAKER_00 23:57

That's so cute.

SPEAKER_02 23:58

There's video albums.

SPEAKER_00 24:01

What show did you do just before this?

SPEAKER_02 24:03

Oh gosh, Mary Puppins!

SPEAKER_00 24:05

Mary Puppins with me. Um, so so much fun. One of my favorite shows ever.

SPEAKER_02 24:12

And I did a fundraiser at Musical Theater Southwest called Little Actor Andy. Andy, it was the parody of Little Orphan. Andy Bain Line.

SPEAKER_00 24:23

We're gonna miss Andy when I'm going to deny it. Okay. Yeah. Keep in touch, Andy. You better. Um, okay, and that's great. Now, here's the hard question. Again, don't think about it too much. What is a show that was either the show you were most challenged, or you most hated, or you learned the most from doing in your career.

SPEAKER_02 24:54

Prior to this one, because this is the most challenging show I've ever had. This is hard, it's hard. Every aspect of it the acting, the singing, the dancing, the keeping up with my fellow actors who are all brilliant. But before that, I think that it was cats at Albuquerque Little Theater. And here's why. Because you get to be an effing cat. And so that's challenging. And like your like body is is you have to be in control of your body the whole time for two and a half hours, the extent of that full.

SPEAKER_01 25:22

Your body hasn't hurt at the end of that. Like, I just can't imagine.

SPEAKER_00 25:27

And that was 2014.

SPEAKER_02 25:29

I had at mass. I had some ass strategically placed all inside my unitar just to just.

SPEAKER_01 25:37

I also had some nice ice things today in place strategically. I did. Gotta keep cool up there.

SPEAKER_00 25:44

Gotta keep cool.

SPEAKER_01 25:45

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 25:46

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 25:47

For me, it was like I think about this all the time. I was working for a company called Interactive Entertainment. They were actually the my first professional job. They hired me for a Shakespeare festival. They also had like a um what do we call it? Renaissance fair that was running like at the time. So we during the day we would go out and we'd be characters in the fair, and then at night we would do the Shakespeare Plays. I had worked with them a couple of times and they decided to do this um Ed Ground Post haunted Halloween village in Baltimore. So they hired me and flew out there. I was really excited. I didn't know what I was gonna do, and then they gave me the script for the Telltale Heart. And it was just the Telltale Heart, like fully ripped out of the pages of an Ed Ground pole. Like that was it. And I was like, huh. Like, and I thought, what is I don't know what was the point? Like, and then they're like, oh no, that's you. And I went, What do you mean that like you're just gonna that's the script? So I was the narrator for the Telltale Heart, which I what you don't ever think about that it's a man or a woman because it doesn't say it has it's never they never let you know. So I was like, well, okay, once I wrap my mind around that, it could be a woman. Then I was like, okay, well, now I have to memorize this whole thing, and now I have to make this funny and like make it real and make it whatever. And I was terrified every single day in rehearsal. I cried a lot, and it turns out to be one of my favorite things that I've ever done. The narrator of the Telltale Heart, right? So super fun. Yeah, I will never forget it.

SPEAKER_00 27:10

So fabulous. I love that you connect hardest with most rewarding.

SPEAKER_01 27:15

Oh my god, for sure.

SPEAKER_00 27:16

Because that's kind of the point of the question. So yeah, awesome. Um, and so okay, um, we're gonna go to bucket list, but before I ask you that, I'm gonna ask you uh, would you be willing to move the show to the Kennedy Center in Washington, DC?

SPEAKER_02 27:33

You know what? You know that it's called the Kennedy Center?

SPEAKER_00 27:35

They're they're hiring, they're booking. Yes. Um, and don't you do karate in this place? So maybe you could be in the UFC cage match for the 250th.

SPEAKER_01 27:46

It's not real karate for anyone that actually does karate. It's just Sarah.

SPEAKER_00 27:50

You couldn't do a cage match, knockout.

SPEAKER_01 27:52

Not really. But I would always I would put I would put the show up against. I've worked in the theater and it's you know, it's been a hot minute, even though I'm only 18. But like it, I would put the show up against a lot of professional theater. It's it's that good. I think you know, we have our challenges at ALT. Um, but the cast, the production company, it's it's really, really good.

SPEAKER_00 28:17

Yeah. So for our national audience, don't sleep on Albuquerque. Just because many actors are not paid, and we won't ask you if you are, doesn't mean they're not committed at a professional level. Every show here, actors are committed at a professional level. So 100%.

SPEAKER_01 28:32

And even more so, I think. It's like they're they they're it's a hundred percent hard.

SPEAKER_00 28:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 28:36

And uh I'm just gonna add, I know you said you didn't want to know, but our cast actually came together and we're paying the theater to be to get to be part of this production. Oh, how wonderful. Oh, how wonderful. I don't think we're paying the theater, but we all donating to make it happen. We we pledged to give a monthly uh donation to the theater for up to a year or for a year. We've all pledged to a year, and so um it's part of our sort of campaign that begins.

SPEAKER_01 29:04

And uh some of the people sold ads for the program just to try to generate some buzz and get some, you know, theater is not what it once was. It's we've it's funny because Albuquerque is a small city. We have we are oversaturated with theaters and performance art, but it's also not something that the typical Albuquerquean does, right? So it's it's very um we we've had we've struggled to get audiences in the doors, and we've seen kind of a decline of of audiences, especially since COVID, um, and and theaters are suffering. And the people that that like Stevie and I and people in my cast who love it and know how life-altering it can be and how really it's not digital, right? And it's not streaming, it's a live exchange and it's an experience. And I don't think it's gonna go away. It's having a it's having a moment right now that's not great, but it's gonna always be here. We're trying to keep it alive, right? So this company came together, this company, and really said, we're gonna try to support this theater and we're gonna try to get the word out. We're gonna try to do the things that um maybe aren't typically done when you just come in and sign up to be a volunteer actor. Um, and I'm so I'm so moved by the efforts of this company.

SPEAKER_00 30:16

To buy a theater ticket because these folks need your beating heart in their theaters.

SPEAKER_01 30:21

Well, and it's not just us, it's not the need just for people who have performance in their genes, it's a need for society, it's the need for the world to connect, to be together in the same room, having the exchange. Something could go wrong. Someone could fall off the stage, somebody could trip. It's it's that the stakes are so high in live theater, and you are experiencing it in a room full of people. You have to be out of your home. You it's an exchange. Like I said that before, but I'll say it again. So it's not just about us, it's about the audience too. You don't have one without the other. And I people go to dying art, it's it's it's never gonna be dead. Shakespeare did it a million years ago, and we're still doing it now, and we're still gonna be doing it 4,000 years from now because it's the first true art form, um, performance art form. So yeah, it you can't, if you haven't been to a production, a local live theater production, I feel bad for you. It's not expensive. Um, there's so much good stuff happening out here. Not everything is great, not everything. It's it's community theater by amateurs for amateurs, right? Like some of it's experimental, but some of it is fabulous. And any way you slice it, if you've never done it before, you absolutely should get out and do it.

SPEAKER_00 31:33

Absolutely. And uh many of us in the digital age feel all the feels, but home alone. What Megan's saying is you could feel all the feels with other people who are feeling all the feels, and it's okay. In fact, it's celebrated to feel all those feels together and to come home with a common experience.

SPEAKER_01 31:52

It'll feel different than a movie, it'll feel different than sitting watching Netflix, which I'll probably do after this. I'm not bad mouthing any of that, but it's it's a unique, singular experience, and it's for everyone, even if you think, ah, I don't want that. You know, I don't want to do that.

SPEAKER_00 32:09

And for those who don't actually make theater, tell us what is the commitment. Is it about 200 hours of rehearsal or like what you your time is put in a huge scale to get any one show off the ground?

SPEAKER_01 32:26

Yeah, that's a lot of time.

SPEAKER_00 32:28

You're giving up five, six nights a week.

SPEAKER_02 32:30

Six nights a week for about three to four hours each night.

SPEAKER_00 32:34

Six, seven weeks of that.

SPEAKER_01 32:35

That's right. And then your weekends for yeah or for here, for a month, you're you know, you're it doesn't really feel like a sacrifice though. I mean, the people that do it love it, we love it, and there's nowhere we'd rather be.

SPEAKER_02 32:46

We can't imagine like not being able to go to the theater every night after work. Like most of us have day jobs, and then we go to the theater in the evenings, and it's home.

SPEAKER_01 32:55

Yeah. But it's a significant contribution. It's definitely a significant and you know, it's not paid in community theaters is volunteer.

SPEAKER_00 33:04

Well, for this audience who's buying tickets right now, thank you for your service. Um I hope you're buying tickets again, almaciclittle theater.org or 505-242-4750 to get your tickets to company starting June 12th and running through June 28th. 28th. Yeah. So Steegan and Meavy, I mean Deegan and Stevie or Stevie and Megan. Thank you for the couple of things. I'm glad we have a name like that now. Alternate stages. And um, oh, we forgot a um a lightning round question. Oh uh, what's a bucketless show that you hope to do someday? Dreamroll. Could be film or TV, could be a remake, could be a book on tape.

SPEAKER_02 33:55

Well, I would like to do funny girl before I age out. I mean, maybe I have already aged out, but whatever, it's Albuquerque. Um and I would really like to do cats again in the reinvention that was just um The Jellico Ball. The Jellico Ball that was that came out this season on Broadway.

SPEAKER_00 34:12

So would you play the same cat you played last time, or is it a different could.

SPEAKER_02 34:16

Yeah. Um, the Jellico Ball is all about queer ball um drag ballroom and the scene in New York City in the 1980s. And so the character that I had was Demeter, and she's the one who sings McCavity. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 34:31

Yeah. Some little theater nerd or theater geek is planning a production of the Jelico Ball for Albuquerque in 2028. Please consider staging for Demeter.

SPEAKER_01 34:42

There, I don't know if anyone could beat her.

SPEAKER_00 34:45

Camp Demeter, Camp Beater, Demeter. Your buck of this role, Megan?

SPEAKER_01 34:56

Maybe Lady Macbeth.

SPEAKER_00 34:58

Okay, can can we say the Scottish play name? We're not in the theater. Okay. So we can't Okay. Maybe Lady Macbeth. Maybe isn't that coming up around town too? Or someone somebody's Shakespeare event on a train, maybe.

SPEAKER_01 35:16

Yeah. It's you know, it's all about the vision, right? Like you, you can be in or out of a director's vision. Um, but for me personally, I think it would be such a challenge that's been done and done and done.

SPEAKER_00 35:28

You want to take my dog to the audition with you? And then out, out, damn spot could be about the dog. Go fee.

SPEAKER_03 35:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 35:36

My dog is not named spot.

SPEAKER_01 35:38

Um right, but that's a that's a that's exactly the thing. Out, damn spot, out, out, I say. It's not out out damn spot, by the way. It's out, damn spot, out, out, I say. But she should already off book. No characters, but like that you hear you've heard it so many times. And I think the a huge challenge would be just to do that without being like super cheese ball, right? Like, and to really find the truth in in that moment when she's fully coming out of the line, she's dreaming, is she not dreaming? She's completely like that shit. Sorry. But like, yeah, I think um, and then obviously her character at a time when you think about when Shakespeare was writing this, and she's this woman is like, my husband's a child, he can't step up, he has a little daisy. I'm gonna take a charge. And she has a moment where she says, unsex me, like I'm gonna just be a dude because I'm gonna stand. Like, I think it's fascinating in this day and age to try to like put all of these pieces together and then also all of the things that you know about what she says and try to make that a genuine performance. Probably the biggest challenge that I could ever think of as like an actor. So, yeah, kind of look at this thing. I might completely, if I got the chance, just be shit. Like it would, it might suck. But I did it. Right. Megan, you'll never stop. A lot of them are bad. I don't know.

SPEAKER_00 37:01

I I I would love, I would love to see you wash that man right on there. Yeah, that would be that would be a great role for you.

SPEAKER_01 37:10

I'd probably start laughing in the middle if you were in the audience because we have this conversation.

SPEAKER_00 37:14

Thank you for telling us about company and for sharing and opening your. Yeah, I'll be there. Um, and uh if you uh if you see it, put some comments into our webcast notes and uh not mean ones though. No, not that we'll filter the mean ones. There won't be any ones. Anyway, I'm so looking forward to it. Um, you guys are two of my favorite talents in town, and Sondheim never fails to please me anyway. Um thank you Robbie for joining us with alternate stake.

SPEAKER_02 37:46

Robbie, Robbie, familiar, Robbie, Robbie, Robbie.

SPEAKER_01 37:52

Yeah, you'll know what we're talking about. We say Bobby, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 37:57

Thanks, guys. Bye-bye.

SPEAKER_02 38:00

Bobby, Bobby, baby, Bobby, booby, Bobby, bobby.

SPEAKER_00 38:05

Your name is Rob. I have to have the chairs all set, so to show my beautiful set dressing, which was these callilies, which you're now blocking. You're blocking the callilies. Anyway.