With Joel Grey and most recently Alan Cummings fingerprints all over the iconic role of the Emcee in Cabaret I had my hands full in creating my own take on this landmark role. Oddly I am front and center for most of the musical numbers but never really interact with the main characters—it’s clear my role is symbolic representing the decadence of Berlin Café society but one can’t play a symbol. I’m a showman in a very decadent era and since there was a lot of decadence in the air I’m sure the MC had to really work hard to be more outrageous than anyone else. Before there was such a thing he was a performance artist (think Lady Gaga) and sought to shock with outrageous costumes, makeup (on a man!), cross dressing, even dancing with a guerilla at one point. Knowing he was prepared to break a lot of boundaries allowed me (with guidance from my director of course) to be boundless in my performances as well.
When someone mentions the musical Cabaret, their first response is usually, “Oh, Liza Minnelli right?” I have to admit I was not that familiar with the show myself when I first saw it several years ago.
A young actor, who was in Charleston Stage’s production of Glass Menagerie, was cast in a touring production of Cabaret at the North Charleston Performing Arts Center. It was a Tuesday night and I had been working on a series of school shows in the morning and classes all afternoon. By the time I arrived at the theatre, I was thinking I might sneak away after Act One. That didn’t happen. After the final scene of Act One, I was sitting stunned in the audience thinking, “What just happened?!” and “Why don’t I know about this show?”
In preparing for this production, I wanted to learn even more about the stories and the era that molded this remarkable script. Cabaret is based on the 1951 play I Am a Camera by John van Druten inspired by Christopher Isherwood’s book The Berlin Stories. Reading Isherwood’s stories reminded me a bit of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. At age 24, Isherwood, who had attended British prep schools and Cambridge, set out to teach English for a short time in Berlin. He stayed several years. Through his stories, the reader travels ‘through the looking glass’ along with Isherwood to the decadence of the waning Weimar Republic Berlin. The sexual freedom, glittering parties and scintillating adventures he experiences are far from Isherwood’s pastoral childhood as the son of a British army officer.
A theme that became very important to me in creating Charleston Stage’s Cabaret was the idea that the cabaret performers manufacture their own reality in the midst of political unrest. Throughout the show, there are characters that understand what is happening politically and those who simply refuse to believe anything will really change. At one point Cliff says to Sally, “Some day, I’ve got to sit you down and read you a newspaper. You’ll be amazed at what’s going on.” Sally’s response is dismissive, “You mean—politics? But what has that to do with us?”
Eventually, of course the Nazi party’s rise to power becomes impossible to ignore and everyone is forced to deal with it. I hope Cabaret offers you a glimpse into a different world in a different time that was not so very long ago.
By Carol Furtwangler, Post and Courier Reviewer, Friday April 9, 2010
“Brilliantly Directed . . . Not a Character was less than ideally realized . . .not a voice less than outstanding . . .”
When a theater company attempts a show as familiar and popular as ‘Cabaret’ that company had better make a Big Splash.
That is exactly what Marybeth Clark did, brilliantly directing a dozen multitalented dancers and a leading cast of six of the most effective performers ever seen in Charleston.
Charleston Stage’s latest singin’ and dancin’ extravaganza proved a showcase for every element of stagecraft. Barbara Young’s glitzy and funky costumes, Julian Wiles’ lighting, and Stefanie Christensen’s scenic design all caught the spirit of 1930’s Berlin, degenerate, decadent, its populace indulging in all manner of sin, as the Weimar Republic faded and the Nazi party rose to power.
Not a character was less than ideally realized, and not a voice was other than outstanding. Musical director Amanda Wansa and her six-piece orchestra were consummate professionals. Brian J. Porter made the Emcee’s role his own, sashaying about in purple leather pants and oh, the shoes. Justin Tyler Lewis made an endearing Cliff, while Sarah Claire Smith’s rendition of Sally Bowles was spot-on. Kyle Barnett played a friendly turned-menacing-Ernst, while Jan Gilbert as Fraulein Schneider showed her excellent grasp of comedy and drama. Demetre Homer as Herr Schultz evidenced the calm of the Jews before the horror of the Final Solution.
Charleston Stage’s last Mainstage production at the Sottile is well worth your support.
It’s not often in a musical one gets to play a character based on a real person but there’s little doubt that Cliff is really Christopher Isherwood – the real life author who went to sample the decadence of Berlin nightlife in the 1920’s.His Berlin Stories captured not just the story of a young author but an entire age when, as he says, “the world was coming to an end.”Thanks to Isherwood we see how people turned their heads not seeing – or not wanting to see – the nightmare unfolding before them.In one of his stories Cliff says of himself, “I am a camera,” and one of the challenges is to play Cliff as a young man who doesn’t know how the dream (or nightmare) will end. And one who is eager to explore the freewheeling sexual world of Berlin nightlife in the 1920’s—a world that excites and repulses him at the same time.
We’re taught as actors to “be in the moment” – to discover things as if they’re happening for the first time.Because we, the performers, know how this story turns out, playing each moment is key to making it real and alive each night onstage.When Cliff meets Sally for the first time, he doesn’t know where their interaction and relationship is leading. Moreover, Sarah Claire and I have to play it as if there are many possibilities of where it might lead.And that’s the fun of it. Few people live their lives in a constant, general wash of woe, misery, or tragedy. Few interesting people, at least. Rather, people live their lives from one tiny moment of joy to the next. Cliff, therefore, lives for the jolts of happiness that punctuate the sometimes tragic and often shocking events that take place in 1920s Berlin. Ultimately, that punctuation marks Cliff as both interesting and memorable and makes his story worth telling.
by Sarah Claire Smith, Sally Bowles in Charleston Stage’s Cabaret
These great actresses who have all played Sally Bowles cast long shadows.But I learned early on in my career that one can’t copy another, no matter how amazing their performance.One can look at the performances of these three great Sally’s (you can find clips on the internet) and see all three created totally different takes on this great character.While I’m honored to perform a role played by some of the theatre greats, I know their great Sally’s came from within themselves and that’s what I set out to discover . . . As I began to study the role, the actual script of “Cabaret” , the play “I am a Camera” and “Berlin Stories” I found that there are certain characteristics about Sally Bowles that are set in stone. I went through the play and wrote down all the things that were said about Sally and the things Sally said about herself. These observations were quite enlightening. Sally desires to be fascinating, mysterious, ravishing, and sublimely seductive. She describes herself as a strange and extraordinary person. I quite agree. She paints her fingernails green, talks quite frankly about men and sexuality, and lives life as if she was onstage at all moments. Some of these behaviors come from a need to shock people to remove attention from her reality. When Cliff asks her about herself she clams up. Letting people in to the true Sally is something that almost never happens. She has created a character on top of herself and lives it quite convincingly. But there is more to this shocking gal, much more. Behind those green fingernails is a scared little girl who has dreams outside of her reality. Also within her is the ultimate desire to be on the stage. I can relate to that. There is something magical and “beautiful” about the theatre, or the Cabaret in Sally’s case. But in the end does the life in the Cabaret treat her well? …You will just have to come as see what becomes of Miss Sally Bowles.
Acting is one of my personal favorite things. To truly get to know a character, inside and out. To take on another person’s skin, fears, and joy – It’s a gift. Each actor brings something different and unique to a role just as each person brings their own unique life experience to their everyday life. I come from a different life experience than Sally, but I think it makes it even more exciting to play her. My goal is to bring the most honest, specific, and alive Sally I possibly can to that stage every night.
By Amanda Wansa, Charleston Stage Resident Music Director
I am very excited to be working on this show. I Assistant Music Directed it in the summer of 2007 and appeared in it as (don’t laugh) a kit kat boy, and was thrilled to do the show every night. Most of the musicals of 1966, the year Cabaret appeared, were pretty lightweight . . . they included It’s a Bird, It’s a Plane, It’s Superman! and On A Clear Day You Can See Forever, but Kander and Ebb had other things in mind.They created a musical that not only told a serious story, one based on real events but they also chose a unique structure for this groundbreaking musical mixing realistic scenes with cabaret scenes.Kander’s score is unique, while it contains one of the great showstoppers of all time “Cabaret” many other songs are really musical scenes, where the show doesn’t stop for a song, the songs are woven into the play itself. At the time it was a bold experiment but one that paid off giving us one of the most unique and most moving musicals ever. I have the privilege of being able to hire a fantastic LIVE BAND, comprised of a trumpet (Dan Bellack), trombone (Billy McSweeney), bass (John Kennedy), drums (Brian Widlowski), reed (Jack Pettit – playing not one, but TWO saxophones and a clarinet), and pianist (Alex Hennessey). I will conduct in the pit and play 2nd keyboard, also known as the “synth.” Audiences may recognize the skill of John on bass and Brian on drums from this year’s Joseph…Dreamcoat. Our orchestra is comprised of very talented musicians, all skilled in pit music as well as jazz, so I can guarantee some creative flair from time to time that audiences haven’t heard on recordings of the show or in other productions!
The music of Cabaret is exciting because of its range. We have fast-paced, show-stopping dance numbers like “Money,” “Don’t Tell Mama” and “The Telephone Dance”, sexy jazz numbers like “I Don’t Care Much” and “Willkommen”, and heart-warming ballads like “Married” and “Don’t Go.” This show presents thought-provoking situations with both humor and serious consideration. The musical underscoring of the scenes adds to the story, and, as I play live piano for rehearsals, I’m reminded each day how smart Kander and Ebb’s score really is. I think audiences are going to love the return of a live orchestra and all the pizazz and punch that it will bring to Marybeth Clark’s wonderful direction, Julian Wiles’s innovative design, and all of the actors’ passion. Come to the Cabaret!!
Barbara Young, Charleston Stage Resident Costume Designer
Often designers look for a “hook” for the design of a production . . . something we can “hang” the design on. When working on a show that’s had many classic looks from the Bob Fosse Film to the most recent Broadway revival with Natasha Richardson and Alan Cummings, it’s even more important to find the right “hook”. Director Marybeth Clark wanted us to find our own look and especially avoid the black and grunge look. But that black and grunge look was a great one because it captured the decadence of the period so well. We knew we wanted costumes for the Kit Kat Klub that were just as decadent and risqué but we wanted them to be colorful as well. Artistic Director Julian Wiles suggested we look at images from Baz Luhmann’s Moulin Rouge. Though set in Paris and a few decades before Cabaret, it did give us a more colorful palate to work with. It also suggested that in addition to the costumes themselves we could create great looks with dazzling eye makeup, racy stockings and fantastic footwear. And as Marybeth requested, we let our imaginations go wild creating some of the most dazzling costumes of the season, each and everyone designed and constructed in Charleston Stage’s costume shop giving this Cabaret a look like no other.
By Julian Wiles and Stefanie Christensen, Set Designers for Cabaret
Director Marybeth Clark wanted us to start from scratch in creating the scenery and costumes for Cabaret and so instead of looking at other productions of this classic musical we went back to original sources. Descriptions in Christopher Isherwood’s Goodbye to Berlin(on which Cabaret is based) were our start and of course we looked at images from 1920’s German and European cafes. Also, from reading the script it was obvious there were two worlds in Cabaret . . . the real world of the rooming house, Cliff’s Spartan room, and the fruit shop. The night club in the show, known as the Kit Kat Club was more of a fantastical world and a romanticized memory of how Cliff remembered this haven of hedonism. And so we created two worlds scenically, the rooming house, Cliff’s room and the fruit shop were made to look as realistic as possible while we decided on a more abstract and dream like world for the Kit Kat Klub. We speculated that perhaps the Kit Kat Club had once been a warehouse and from that idea came the idea to use reproduction 1920’s light bulbs as a backdrop. To complete the look we used a variety of industrial materials from wire cages to chains and married these to traditional cabaret elements like a glitzy curtains and red velvet bentwood chairs. Our hope is that we will be giving audiences a Kit Kat Klub like one they’ve never seen before but one in which Cliff and Sally would feel right at home.
The lighting for Cabaret began at the photoshoot. Here for the first time I got to see the costumes and makeup and to experiment with different lighting angles on them. It was quickly clear that by using lighting from below (the kind of lighting that old fashioned footlights created) we could create an old fashioned and somewhat ghostly eerie look. Most of the scenes in the Kit Kat Klub rely on this type of harsh lighting. For the more realistic scenes of the play more naturalistic lighting was used. By using two completely different lighting styles I hoped it helps make it clear that Sally and Cliff live in two different worlds—the everyday world outside which is being overtaken by the Nazi’s and the exotic and fantasy underground cabaret world to which they and many others escape.
In my various roles as a performer, director and instructor, I have been lucky enough to work with many bright young people. Teaching and performing with them has been an incredibly valuable experience, and I’ve found that I often learn just as much from them as from my elders. One revelation I have had in my experiences with young actors and young audience members is a simple one, but one that is often forgotten: Children are little people. They have thoughts, ideas, feelings and experiences just like adults, and in many cases, in more vivid tones than those of our older brains. Because of this revelation, I’ve learned that in my acting I must never condescend to young people.
There are, of course, some adjustments to be made when working on a children’s theatre piece. Major themes in the piece are often portrayed in the script in big, broad strokes that I must then interpret with big, broad physical and vocal choices. I must adjust the pace so that younger ears can follow the plot and development of the piece, and I must pay special attention to the clarity of my diction and intent. Those things aside, I can’t say that I make any specific, outstanding choices when playing to children. Instead, I try and focus on being as clear in my intention and as passionate in my delivery as possible in the hope that my love for the art of theatre will be apparent, and that that passion may affect even one young mind and heart.