Interview: Joe Folladori of KATY PERRY CANDY DARLING MARY MAGDELANE at CATASTROPHIC THEATRE

On February 20th, The Catastrophic Theatre debuted KATY PERRY Candy Darling MARY MAGDELANE by Joe Folladori. Joe wrote the script, the songs, and everything you can imagine! It is directed by Tamarie Cooper, with Music Direction by Alli Villines. It runs through March 7th at the MATCH, and is selling REALLY well. BROADWAY WORLD author and Catastrophic fanboy, Brett Cullum, got a rare chance to talk with Joe and Tamarie about this production.  

Brett Cullum: I'm so intrigued by the title because Katy Perry, Candy Darling, and Mary Magdalene are three of my favorite women in history! You've got a pop diva, you've got a cult cinema icon, and a biblical heroine together. So what is this thing?

Joe Folladori: It is the story of how I met Katy Perry in real life, and I pitched it as such, and Tamarie said, “Well, can Katy Perry be in the title?” And I said, “Sure.” So we had one. I like threes. There’s the rule of threes in comedy, the Trinity, the Triforce, wherever angle… 3 is my favorite number, it's a magic number. So, alright, we got Katy Perry. Candy Darling had the same rhythm with her name, and I knew that it was going to, in some way, center around some of the music made about Candy Darling and her life, and not so much her life story, but details from it that have resonated with me. The song “Candy Says” by the Velvet Underground is one of the greatest songs, period, of all time, and so that was my second name. And then the third name, the rhythm was very important, so we had Katy Perry, Candy Darling, da-da-da-da-da. And so I went through names, and I also knew that a lot of the show would center around there, with a couple of musical pieces, and then a very, very long set piece involving Mr. Belvedere. So Katy Perry, Candi Darling, Mr. Belvedere. But then, we took out all of the Mr. Belvedere material.

Tamarie Cooper: That's the B-side. We'll do that some other time.

Joe Folladori: I really think we cut two hours out of this show altogether. But Mary Magdalene, the way they all, the thread there is they're all iconic women who have been viewed through many different lenses and are necessarily misunderstood. What they mean to different people, just what an icon means, kind of. And it's got a beat you can dance to! 

Brett Cullum: And you've written… this is a musical, right? I mean, it's… There are songs and things like songs?   

Tamarie Cooper: Here's the thing! Catastrophic, going back to Infernal Bridegroom Productions, has a history of doing shows with music. Even going back to one of our very first shows which was a rock opera called IN THE UNDER THUNDER LOOP. That had local rock bands starring in it. We did THE KINKS A SOAP OPERA, right? Then, of course, we did SPEEDING MOTORCYCLE.

Joe Folladori: I did BLUE FINGER.

Tamarie Cooper: BLUE FINGER, right, yes, BLUE FINGER. So, we have this history of doing shows that have bite in the music. I hate when you go to see even something like JESUS CHRIST SUPERSTAR, but you see these productions, and it's so sanitized, and the sound! We want something that rocks! Jason [Nodler] and I had been talking about how it's been since Speeding Motorcycle in 2019, when we've truly had a show like that that has really great pop music! We've been talking about finding a new original project. We were both in attendance at Joe's band reunion show, The Mathletes, and I've been a fan of Joe's music forever. Joe also writes music for me for my [Tamarie Cooper] shows. We were at White Oak, watching the show, and it was so great, and Joe's a great writer, and has such a great sense of pop melodies, and his lyrics are so witty, and so funny, and so poignant at times, and I just turned to Jason, and I was like, “Why are we not producing a show by Joe?” It was just one of those duh moments, and we both ran up to him after the show, all giddy. We were like, “We want you to do a show! We want you to do a whole show! A whole show!”  And so, in some ways, it is a musical, but it's a play with music, and it's great music, and it's loud, and it's just… I love it.

Brett Cullum: There is like a band vibe to this one. How did you get a group of actors that can act and do music? 

Tamarie Cooper: We really found, when we cast it, that when we put together people who everyone could definitely play an instrument, and also many of them are great singers, so it's been fun. One of the themes that comes out of the show is seeing a band come together and the dynamics that unfold in that relationship. Joe has written the roles for these people; all is sort of ridiculous at times, but heightened versions of themselves. It's great to see those inner workings of a band, and it's very funny, so there's a lot of comedy in those relationships. But music is really the forefront of it. It is also very personal, and Joe is really sharing a great deal of personal truth and experience that is all tied together to his Katy Perry adventure of seeing Katy Perry in concert multiple times, and meeting Katy Perry, and that story is broken up and unfolds throughout the two acts. So, it's very exciting! When I read his first draft, I didn't know the details of the story, so I was like, I gotta get to the part, what's gonna happen? What's gonna happen? I think it's a very interesting story.

Joe's really putting himself out there, and he is wearing all of the hats. He has written the music, he has written the book, he is on stage the whole time, acting, he is playing music, he's worked on arrangements, it's tremendous output from Joe. Allie [musical director] and I have said we are less directors and more midwives. Helping to birth this very personal production from Joe. 

Brett Cullum: So, I have to ask this. Are you a Katy Perry fan, Joe?

Joe Folladori: Oh, absolutely. Oh, no, unequivocally, without reservation. Yeah, she's fantastic, and she puts on a fantastic show. She's got hits; she can really sing. I wouldn't have seen her in concert multiple times if I weren't a fan. I first became aware of her back in the MySpace era, when she performed on the Warp Tour before she got big. And before that, she had sort of failed in the music industry for half a decade, and she wasn't a huge success. I feel like she paid her dues in ways that people aren't aware of. She was a little bit of a hipster thing initially. She wasn't my thing back then. I was very much into indie rock snobbery and, looking down on anything pop music, but sort of around Teenage Dream, a lot of that fell away, and I was like, this music is actually great! Katy Perry [‘effin] rocks.

Brett Cullum: It's pop, it's confection, it's glossy, it's pretty, and it's consumable.

Joe Folladori: Absolutely. It's not the only thing I would or could listen to, but it's functional and serves a purpose; it really does. Sometimes you want and need that, and fake plastic artificial music can lead to real emotions. That's not nothing. One of the themes of the play is that many cliches are that way because they're true and universal. They just happen all the time when we roll our eyes, but they can still hit you powerfully. And “you're a firework. Let your colors burst,” that's pretty simple. That's difficult to misunderstand, or at least not find some interpretation that lands. It's a gem. Katy Perry's great, I'm a fan. I like music, and I like good music. Katy Perry has some good music. I'm a fan.

Brett Cullum: Well, Tamarie, what about you? Were you a fan before this?

Tamarie Cooper: I'm like what you call the fair-weather fan in that I like the hits! I love good pop, and I've always been pop culture obsessed, so Katy Perry definitely has been in that orbit of it. What I'd love to do someday, now that we've had this relationship, is go to a Katy Perry concert with Joe, because, like, that would mean a lot to me at this point. It would be really cool to experience that with him. Part of that magic of seeing her live, that you are in a giant room filled with people who are all on the same vibe, there is that thing, that universal thing that brings people together. That's a great feeling: all of us singing and dancing to the same song at the same time.

Brett Cullum: What do you hope that people walk away with this? Like, what do you hope that when they're leaving the MATCH, what are they thinking about? What are they chewing on? What have you given them?

Joe Folladori: I like a big universal pop song. I like the idea that there are things out there that can connect every person in the world, and that we can all say, “That's great, I like that. This world is a really good place to be,” actually. I don't think we are creating that. I think what we're doing is pretty niche in a lot of ways, referentially, and I mean, there is a lot more about the Velvet Underground than there is Katy Perry in the show. I would love people to see this show and come out of it thinking, like, “Oh yeah, we're all the same thing. That person's really weird, maybe, and I'm identical to that person in all of the ways that matter.” There's a lot in it about identity, assumptions, and finding and acknowledging your own questions about identity.

Tamarie Cooper: There is a pretty great message you have towards the end of the show, just about really trying, trying to understand other people so that maybe they can understand you, and that we really are all the same. You know, there are a lot of similarities between people.

KATY PERRY Candy Darling MARY MAGDELANE runs at the MATCH through March 7th. CATASTROPHIC THEATRE tickets are always “pay what you can,” and are FAR LESS than tickets to a Katy Perry concert.