BWW INTERVIEWS: Notes from New York's Paul Spicer

Notes from New York at the Duchess Theatre, running from May 6 to 17, seems to have been organised really quickly.

Absolutely.  You just have to do things sometimes when you have the opportunity to have a theatre for two weeks. They said fill it, what can you do?  We said, well, we know what we'll do, it's fine. It's making sure you get everyone on board at the last minute - everyone's booked up. We've been lucky. Loads of people are involved and they're flitting in and out, which makes it a nightmare logistically!

And two shows as well...

The Last Five Years is sort of there. We know what it is. We went through the whole rehearsal process the last time, when we did it at the Haymarket, and we did it for three consecutive Sundays. We're bringing back the original directorial team. So that's fine. It's tick...tick...BOOM! that's new. It was at the Menier before, I saw it, and it was absolutely brilliant. I was absolutely bowled over by it. I actually auditioned for it at the time, so I really fell in love with the role, but I was about seven years too young! Having cast it this time round I completely knew why - I know now. I had to sit there and cast it. There are these people coming in that are brilliant, and they're too young - he turns 30 at the beginning of the show. It's a lovely piece, and I'm excited. It's one of those small-scale musicals that are so unique. There's nothing like it. I saw Priscilla last night and in comparison - well, you can't. It's intimate, personal, and has a really strong book, and a really strong score.

There seem to be a lot of smaller musicals springing up around the place.

Do you think that's something to do with the recession?

Perhaps people simply don't want to pay £60 for the big shows.

Yes. You feel like you're involved with it with the small-scale ones. Obviously there's been a success with Jet Set Go! That's really exciting. I'm absolutely thrilled. It's what we've been harping on about for five years. Suddently we're in a climate where people are interested. Five years ago, people were like no, no way, it's risky, nobody knows about it, can't be bothered, tried and tested.

The Perfect Pitch showcases are good for that too.

They're brilliant, and they do some amazing work, and they'll continue to do so. I saw a couple of shows there. Through The Door has such a following already.

It's a very American-style show, with the lyrics and book as its strong point.

Which is cool. It's a weakness with a lot of new musicals - the tunes might be there, but if you don't have that marriage... Also Saturday Night has been going great guns. I think this is the time for it.

And so it's good that it's not long till your shows open!

Yes. Everyone knows it's Challenge Anneka theatre, but you know what? Everyone was like, "I've got a month off - why not?"

It's such a strong cast at such short notice.

We were shocked! We were like, wow, people just want to do it. That's the thing. It's a 450-seater house. You've got to adjust the finance of that. I co-produce as well as act in it, so I'm in on the whole machinations. People just want to do it for the work as opposed to the money. We've got some great, talented people on board - not just cast, but creatives.  I can't wait to get back to The Last Five Years and rediscover things we never had the chance to.

Rediscovering in what sense?

In the way that you as an actor see one project as one thing. I've only ever gone back to one thing before, Taboo. I went back to it after about nine months and played the role again, and I brought something else to it that I didn't even think was there. I found another level. I'm looking forward to that, and so is Julie [Atherton].

Julie must be the hardest-working woman in musicals.

I have to tell her to stop sometimes. She'll go, "Really?" We're very close friends, we go back years and years, and she wants to do everything because she's so passionate about it!

As well as Julie, you've got some other great people involved - Paul Keating was magnificent in Little Shop Of Horrors, and Leon Lopez was outstanding in Rent Remixed.

When you work with people on every level, whatever you do in life, as long as they're straightforward, easygoing and realistic, you can move mountains. What's brilliant about Leon is that he's so online. He's constantly proactive, and I like proactive people. It's great to have him on board; he's constantly talking about the show; he's always working.

What should we look out for in The Last Five Years?

What I love about The Last Five Years is it's so stripped back. If there's too much going on, it distracts from what's being said. It's really delicate, and you have to be really careful. You've got to treat it like an orchid, almost. Our production is very stripped back. Julie and I have a really funny little thing on stage, I can't explain it, it's just something that we found when we first worked together when we were 22. It's a massive chemistry, even though we don't see each other throughout the whole show except for ten minutes in the middle. The process of thought that has to go into it, because you're constantly talking to somebody who's not there, once you've got it then it's really clear to see. At the Haymarket, a lot of my friends who aren't into musical theatre got obsessed with the show. They wanted to know more about the characters. That's job done, as far as I'm concerned. It's fictional, but you want to know what happens.  That's what you can expect - you'll be bowled over by the emotional effect of it.  I know we are!  It's like a rollercoaster ride of a show. By the end of it you're emotionally exhausted.

Often, critics seem to dislike musicals as an art form, but they like the sort of shows with lots of characterisation and straight script, just not the songs - like Jason Robert Brown's Parade.

Yes, I saw it at the Donmar. I didn't come out of it feeling like I loved my life, but there's a place for that in theatre. It's Jason doing something else. He can write in different ways, which is nice; he's got a lovely sense of the musical. In Parade, there are showstoppers, and then there are almost filmic parts, which I think people are really into at the moment. Directors are going for that kind of look. That's something The Last Five Years tends to take on. It's so stark, it's so simple in its way. At the Duchess Theatre where we're doing it, just a flicker of the eyebrow and they know what you're doing. 

What about tick...tick...BOOM!?

Once again, Hannah [Chissick, the show's director] really wants to go for the characters as opposed to anything else. The band will be involved, on stage, very much present. It's a one-man show - Leon and Julie interject, but it'll be centred around Mr Keating as Mr Larson. In the audition room, the energy he has smacks you in the face. It pings everywhere. It's almost hard to watch, but then it should be, I think. In tick...tick...BOOM!, Larson wasn't fitting in, he wasn't making the grade, he was not where he wanted to be. It started as a rock cabaret, just him at the piano, and it was all angst, because he never quite found his way until later when he started to adapt La Boheme. For Paul, it'll be a big deal, a massive undertaking, but he's got that angst and that energy, and I'm sure it'll smack everyone in the face.

What shows do you fancy doing next?

We've got about a million things to do this year!  Obviously we're always keeping one eye on the new stuff that's around, as that's where Notes from New York comes from and I want to keep that bubbling over. Christmas in New York, that will be announced shortly, which will be fun. We're also dealing with recordings of things, and at the end of the year there'll be a project that's pretty huge which we're trying to lock down now.  It's a big year ahead of us.

What current shows have you seen recently?

A Little Night Music. It's always nice to see Sondheim, isn't it? Hannah Waddingham is quite unique, in so many ways. Alexander Hanson is a classy actor - I would adore to have his CV. The night I was there, I was sat next to Cameron Mackintosh and Nica Burns - it was really odd! Having come up as an actor, I've now crossed the boundary and I'm in that company - it's really overwhelming and strange!  The Menier are contracting people at the top of their game. Even casting someone like Jessie Buckley - she's absolutely perfect for her role - and good for them. I was surprised, I thought that as she'd come from a TV show, and she might not go with that, but they've got their finger on it. She looked like she'd been doing it for years.

I saw Graham Norton's first night in La Cage Aux Folles. I'm always sceptical, but he brought a warmth to it, which I thought was quite lovely. He trained as an actor and you can tell. For a first night, it was jolly good.

I'm excited about Legally Blonde coming in. It actually stands up as a musical. Even if it wasn't a film, it could have just turned up as a musical and everyone would have gone and bought it straight away. It works. They've written it so brilliantly.

There is a snobbery about musicals that come from films.

Yes. I understand it if it looks like you've just been shoehorning square pegs into round holes, but if you reinvent it, that's fair enough. That's completely valid. I think people will see that.  I'm looking forward to it.

Sheridan Smith has been confirmed as Elle now.

She's kept down to earth, and that's fantastic. When I was a child, my first ever audition for anything was for the National Youth Music Theatre. Me and Sheridan were in the finals for Bugsy Malone, and we had to do an improvisation - I was the wind, and she was the water, or something. I remember meeting her then and thinking she was really special and would go far.  She has got stage and screen duality and a lot of people don't have that.  If you're looking at the Maria Friedmans and the Ruthie Henshalls, they're respected and loved. Who's coming up who could be that kind of person?  Sheridan's one of the few of her age. She'll be there as long as she wants to be there.

How do you feel about celebrity casting to attract in the audiences?

As an audience member, there's a split between the general public who'll go and see someone from Corrie; as a producer, that's nice to know, and to look at the figures and know you can pay everyone. But it means sometimes those choices sell the heart and soul of the show. I'm not one of those people who think it's killed it - it brings in audiences. Look at Leon. He's been on TV, he's released singles, he's done Soapstar Superstar, but he's got the talent to back it up. There's a level you can reach without feeling like you can't sleep at night. I think it depends what it is and where it is. You do have to have an eye on the commercial sometimes, and that's just the harsh reality of musical theatre. In our own little tiny ways, we want to evolve it and keep its heart and soul. 

To post a comment, you must register and login.