THE LEADING MEN: Chad Kimball, Brian Childers and Abe Vigoda
By Tom Nondorf
November 4, 2009
Chad Kimball of Broadway's Memphis and Brian Childers of Off-Broadway's Danny and Sylvia are November's Leading Men. We also have a special visit with the great Abe Vigoda.
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KIMBALL'S CRAZY LITTLE HUEY
In the "Broadway Musicals Named After Cities Associated with the Blues" category, Chicago has now been joined by Memphis, and as Huey Calhoun, the bold and brash denizen of Beale Street, Chad Kimball has been blowing people away with his electric performance and unforgettable drawl. As the "cracker" who sees the dawn of a new music called rock 'n' roll happening in his midst, the Seattle-born Kimball is playing the role he felt was right for him from the moment he read it. Kimball first milked his time on Broadway as the cow in Into the Woods. He was in both Lennon and Good Vibrations in 2005. Now he is ruling the Shubert Theatre alongside leading lady Montego Glover.
Q: Congratulations on opening Memphis on Broadway. Has it been pretty exciting for you so far?
Chad Kimball: It's so exciting. Probably the most exciting thing is to see the way the audience reacts. A lot of people don't know what the show is about, and they find themselves pretty smitten, I think.
Q: Give me an insider's point of view. What's it like in those last moments on the stage during the curtain calls? Is your top emotion unbridled joy or relief of making it through the show?
Kimball: [Laughs] I'd say it's more along the lines of unbridled joy. Then I take the long walk upstairs. Then I get to fall over [Laughs]. But honestly, to see the reaction of the audience, the joy that comes from that is why most of us got into theatre.
Q: You've said you felt a kinship with the role from the very beginning.
Kimball: Yeah. Without any hubris, when I first read it, I had a sense of it, and after winning the role, I flew home to Seattle for a week to visit my family, and I read through the entire script and I thought, "How am I going to do this?" When we started rehearsing, it just kind of came out, it fell onto the stage, and for some reason I felt like I knew who Huey was — one of those kismet moments for me.
Q: What do you think makes Huey so brave? I mean, he has a lot of cojones to do some of the crazy stunts he pulls off in pursuit of his dreams.
Kimball: [Laughs] I don't know if it is so much bravery as a real part of his genetic makeup, which is all about going for it. He's mastered the American spirit of knowing you can go and do anything you want, and he doesn't see the obstacles that other people see. That's the lovely part about him. He is either ignorant or chooses to be ignorant to the racial boundaries, the societal boundaries… He's poor, but that doesn't stop him. His love of the music really drives him. He is singular in that sense. Gosh, if we could all be that way! Find a passion and just go for it with abandon.
Q: You've been involved with this show for years now. How have you seen Huey evolve over that time?
Kimball: Looking back, [there was a great] advantage of being able to come to a production six years ago, and then leave it for a year, then come back to another production of it, then leave for two years and come back and always have the character in the back of your mind while involved in other endeavors… Montego and myself, we grew up as people and were able to bring that growth and the lessons we learned to the stage. That kind of process and advantage is really fantastic, to be able to marinate in the roles for so long and get them as juicy as possible [Laughs].
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| Chad Kimball in Memphis |
| photo by Joan Marcus |
Kimball: It was when [director] Chris Ashley called me on a Sunday morning, and he was in New York and I was in Los Angeles, and I rolled out of bed and saw that I had missed a phone call at 8 AM. And I thought, "Who is calling at 8 AM?" And I called him back, and he said, "We're going full steam with the show, and we want you to be a part of it." And that's when I thought that this thing is going to happen. You try and protect yourself a little bit, because you never know in theatre. And also the fact that they stuck with Montego and I all the way to Broadway when so many shows are going to film and TV stars. To do the old-school trick of casting people who originated the roles is really, really something.
Q: Did you have to do any research or were you into early rock 'n' roll and soul from that time period?
Kimball: I was. Probably not as much as I am now. But talk about fun research! This music is great, and you can feel the burgeoning of that city in the music of the time that was being played around Memphis. The research was fun. We actually went to Memphis a month before rehearsals and got to do some "research" on Beale Street late at night.
Q: I think the sets really add to the whole show experience.
Kimball: The great part about the set is that…every aspect of the show complements every other aspect of the show, which is to say that [scenic designer] David Gallo has given [lighting designer] Howell Binkley a playground, and Howell has given Chris a playground, and everybody is giving the other creative departments room to play, and that is so important. I don't think the set overwhelms anybody, but it is seamless, and it's fluid, and it moves, and I would love to see it in action [laughs]. I can't usually see it, but it is gorgeous with deep, rich colors that really evoke an emotion for that time. It's a pleasure to be working on that set every night.
Q: I never thought about that, how you are really too close to the set to see it in full.
Kimball: Sometimes I don't even know what I'm wearing!
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| Montego Glover with Chad Kimball in Memphis |
| photo by Joan Marcus |
Kimball: You mean, "Hockadoo"? Yeah, it is! It's a lot of fun. I run into people sometimes on the street and I hear "Hockadoo!" It's a word that [author and co-lyricist] Joe DiPietro made up, and it's just stuck. Now we have T-shirts that say "Hockadoo!" Yeah, a nice little catchphrase. Maybe it will make it into the dictionary. That will be the day.
Q: A little Kimball history, please. Who in your life encouraged you the most to start acting?
Kimball: My cousin Marty, actually. He lived in New York. He passed away in '95 of AIDS. He was about 15 years older than I. He was a dancer who went out on tours with West Side Story and Evita. I just remember being so enamored of what he did and the magic of the theatre. So he really inspired me to get involved. It has been bittersweet because he wasn't able to fulfill his dream fully here. I feel that in a way I have been kind of able to take his torch and run with it. I also went to a great high school, Roosevelt High in Seattle, which had a great drama department, and it didn't hurt that my parents always let me live my dream and supported me. That was very important.
Q: You also attended Boston Conservatory here on the East Coast.
Kimball: I did. It's funny, the other day I was thinking about things I learned there. Sometimes when you are in school, you wonder why are they teaching this or that. Cut to ten years later, I'm pulling out all those old manuals and notes from classes, and a lot of it that I didn't get then is very useful now.
Q: What are the tricks to pacing yourself in a role as active as yours when a lot of us would be collapsing at intermission?
Kimball: The biggest thing for me is sleep. And, I didn't realize how important relaxation during a performance is, even if the scene you are performing is a tense scene, there are always ways to relax, and I am still finding them. Relaxation and breathing are two huge things for me. Six years ago when we first did this show at North Shore, I was younger [laughs]. In this process, I've been achy, and wondering what's wrong with my body and then I realized… Oh! I'm older! [Laughs].
Q: David Bryan wrote the songs for Memphis. Did you ever think you'd be collaborating with the keyboardist from Bon Jovi on a Broadway show?
Kimball: I think about that after I'm hanging out with him, but when we're hanging out, he's so down to earth, so laid back, and such a gentleman. That's something to say for his spirit. But, yeah, man. He has entertained many millions of people.
Q:Did he work closely with the cast?
Kimball: Work closely doesn't do it justice. David and Joe are so easy to work with and so open to allow us actors to give our two cents. They ask for our thoughts and our understanding of character. Just a true collaboration. Two people who love the show and want it to work and set aside their egos — if I've ever even seen them have egos — to get it to work and make it successful.
Q: Lastly, can you give me a "Hockadoo!" for the road?
Kimball: "Hockadooooo!"
[Memphis is now playing the Shubert Theatre, 225 W. 44th Street. For more information, go to www.memphisthemusical.com.]
KAYE 2
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| Brian Childers |
Question: Has this show been a wild ride for you?
Brian Childers: It has been. It's been a long journey! I've been with the project from the very beginning, since 2001 in Washington, DC. I was asked to play Danny. It was just a reading; we didn't know what we had. We opened, then it was a big hit, and we took it to a festival in New York in 2002, and then nothing happened. Years later, two producers wanted to revive it, and we finally opened in May Off-Broadway at St. Luke's. That's the Reader's Digest version of it.
Q: Were you familiar with Danny Kaye before your involvement in the show?
Childers: No, actually. I was doing a different show in DC, and the director, Jack Marshall, who is the artistic director of the American Century Theatre, saw me in this other show, and he had the script of Danny and Sylvia, and he felt he couldn't do it without finding someone to really capture Danny. When he saw me in this other show, something triggered a light bulb. He came backstage at intermission and said, "You're going to play Danny Kaye." I was like, "Great!" But I had no concept of the scope of Danny's work. When I started to do the research, it was like, "Oh dear God, what have I gotten myself into?" I have subsequently become a Danny Kaye fan, and I'm still studying him now. I'm engrossed in his life and work.
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| Brian Childers in Danny and Sylvia |
| photo by Carol Rosegg |
Childers: "Tchaikovsky" alone was tough! I was okay with the patter. I had done some Gilbert and Sullivan, but this is much more focused than that. I had to get that into my body so I could do it if I was sleeping. The stuff that was really tricky was his gibberish. We like to say that Sylvia knew how his tongue worked [laughs], so she wrote gibberish for him. I would take a tape recorder and record the song and slow it down and write it all out and then put it all together very fast. That was a great challenge.
Q: Have you had any people who knew Kaye come see the show?
Childers: Carl Reiner came out, and he did the movie "Skokie" with Danny, and he was very complimentary to me. He was like, "You're a phenomenon! That's amazing!" He didn't believe anybody could do what Danny did. Shirley Jones came and saw the show. John Cullum, Fred Willard…Rue McClanahan was there opening night. The thing about the show that people seem to love is it is a throwback to a better time.
[Danny and Sylvia plays the St. Luke's Theatre, 308 W. 46th St. Performances are Wed. Sat. and Sun. at 2 PM, and Sat. at 8 PM. Call (212) 239-6200 or visit www.dannyandsylvia.com for more info.]
LEGENDARY VISIT
The Lamb's Club, established in 1874 in NYC, bills itself as America's First Professional Theatre club. I highly recommend a visit, should you ever get a chance to attend as a guest at one of the functions at their 51st Street location. There is an incredible amount of theatrical history on display. Irving Berlin was a member, Fred Astaire as well. Today, you might run into Joyce Randolph of "Honeymooners" fame, or as I did recently, 89-year-old Abe Vigoda, still sharp as can be. We all know Abe as Fish from "Barney Miller" or as Tessio from "The Godfather" films, or his many cameos on "Conan" before Conan went Hollywood. But, of course, I wanted to talk to Abe about his theatrical origins.
Q: You've had a distinguished career. What is your very first memory of performing?
Abe Vigoda: It was when I was six years old, in the first grade. A teacher came into the class and was casting for a play entitled Candle-Light by Siegfried Geyer. Everything was cast except one role, a character named Baron Von Rischenheim, something like that. "Who would like to audition?" she asked. Thirty boys raised their hands. I did, too. She looked around the room, she stopped at my face and said, "I think you'll do. You look old." That's when it started.
Q: Where did it go from there?
Vigoda: Then I was auditioning for Butler Davenport on East 27th Street. He had a theatre of his own. A man who resembled an old English-type Scrooge type of person. He was a serious classical actor and director and producer. He was on Broadway for many years and spoke with a classical tongue and produced classical plays. I was a young teenager at the time. It is now called the Gramercy Arts Theatre, but it was formerly called the Butler Davenport Theatre. Later on I joined Actor's Equity Association and did a pageant in Madison Square Garden, Salute to the Nations, a play about the Spanish Inquisition. They had me play King Ferdinand. It was a musical, and in the cast were people like Mimi Benzell and Richard Tucker from the Metropolitan Opera.
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| Abe Vigoda |
| photo by Aubrey Reuben |
Vigoda: In 1960, I played the lead role Off-Broadway at the St. Mark's playhouse in a Strindberg play, The Dance of Death. I did a lot of Off-Broadway. The following year, Joseph Papp auditioned me to do Richard II, and I found myself working regularly. I did Mr. Praed in Shaw's Mrs. Warren's Profession, and that was rather successful for me. It seemed I had a bent for the classical theatre. I was not born in London, I was born with a classical tongue. I don't know where it came from. I think it's innate. I visited London years later with my wife, Beatrice, and, though I had never been there, it looked very familiar to me. What do they call that, déjà vu?
Q: Did you ever do other musicals?
Vigoda: Not till after "Barney Miller" began. I loved dance. I always wanted to be a tap dancer. I wanted to be a singer. Perhaps that's the reason I joined the Lamb's Club. I wanted to hear the old songs. Every Friday they sing, and I hear the old songs my mother used to sing in the kitchen. After I was known from "Barney Miller," Guys and Dolls came along with Bing Crosby's wife [Kathryn Crosby] and Hugh O'Brian. I played Nathan Detroit. It was a marvelous tour, and I enjoyed it terrifically.
Q: What do you love about theatrical acting?
Vigoda: The stage is like building a house. Without a foundation it will crumble. There are many actors in television and film who never did stage and they get a break. But they don't always last long because they don't have the foundation of what it takes to create a role. That's why Paul Muni, Edward G. Robinson, Humphrey Bogart became movie stars. They had stage experience. Even Cary Grant came from the stage.
Q: Would you return to the stage yourself?
Vigoda: As I speak to you, I'm a little enthused, talking about my life in the theatre. I've been thinking of doing An Evening With Abe Vigoda. I would open up with a song. [Sings] "S'Wonderful…S'Marvelous…that you should care for me…" Right now, I feel fine. But you have to do eight performances a week. I don't know if I could do that. I could do six!
[Abe Vigoda once played Abe Lincoln in Tough To Get Help, alongside John Amos. The show was directed by Carl Reiner and opened on May 4, 1972, at the Royale Theatre…and closed the same day. Learn more about the Lamb's Club at www.the-lambs.org.]
HITHER AND YON
New Brent Barrett Christmas album, "Christmas Mornings," is out, as you may have read (available at www.kritzerland.com). Orchestrations by the great Larry Moore, who is a friend I'm happy to congratulate as he also contributed additional orchestrations to just-opened Finian's Rainbow. Broadway, baby! As for Barrett, he will be at Birdland on Dec. 13 and 14 (birdlandjazz.com)…Starting Nov. 27 at The Downstairs Theatre at Sofia's (227 West 46th Street), the Late Night Catechism folks preview Sister's Christmas Catechism. Opening night is Dec. 3. Go to www.entertainmentevents.com for ticket info…Al Martino, a wonderful song stylist, and, like Mr. Vigoda, part of "The Godfather" films (as Sinatra-esque Johnny Fontane) passed away in mid-October. "Spanish Eyes" was his big track. Great stuff…Fans of the mellow side of '70s pop, say your prayers and seal your crofts, as The Band That Saved Your Life, featuring vocals by yours truly, will be playing at Bar 9 on Nov. 17 at 7 PM. Readers of this column get in free, as will anyone else, for that matter! Bar 9 is at 807 9th Avenue, between 53rd and 54th Streets. Stop by and say hello. Next column: December. Can you believe it?
Tom Nondorf can be reached at tnondorf@playbill.com.