Review: Rachel Bay Jones at Theatre Raleigh

In 2017, I was fortunate enough to have attended the Tony Awards. Rachel Bay Jones was among the winners that night for her performance as Heidi in Dear Evan Hansen. On July 7th, I saw her perform in person for the very first time. Following a successful kickoff to Theatre Raleigh’s new concert series with Norbert Leo Butz two weeks ago, they’re continuing to bring Broadway stars to the triangle area to perform for one night only. With Rachel Bay Jones in particular, she treated the audience with laughter and tears in the De Ann S. Jones Theatre.

Throughout the night, she told quite a bit of stories about not only her career, but also her upbringing. Rachel was raised by parents who happened to have been actors themselves. She also recalled how her dad gave her advice at one point to become an actor, win a Tony Award, and get a farm. As of now, she’s only accomplished the first two goals. Rachel’s main stem debut happened at almost 20 years old in the ensemble of a stage adaptation of Meet Me in St. Louis back in 1989. After that, she went on tour with Grand Hotel, then lived in different parts of North Carolina for a while before eventually returning to New York. Vocally, Rachel Bay Jones got to display some killer singing. Prior to some of her songs, she offered some background.

When she was first asked to audition for Catherine in the 2013 Broadway revival of Pippin, she originally didn’t want to because she felt she was too old for that part as it’s usually played by an ingénue. However, since the musical is a play within a play, the creative wanted to try out having an older actress take on the role as someone who’s been playing it in the circus troupe for a while. Then, she went into an amusing rendition of ‘Kind of Woman.’ Rachel also understudied Patti LuPone in a flop stage musical adaptation of Pedro Almadóvar’s film, Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown, back in 2010. She told a story about the difficult process in doing so, and that she went on for her three times. Then, she went into a great song titled ‘Invisible.’ Other highlights of the evening included Rachel taking a crack at Stephen Sondheim’s ‘In Buddy’s Eyes’ from Follies and her big solo number from Dear Evan Hansen, ‘So Big, So Small.’ Both of which were very stunning.

Rachel also shared some nice duets at different points. The first was with a guy who was actually sitting in my row. His name is Scott Treadway, who is an old friend of hers from Flat Rock, North Carolina. They sang a very funny song about professional comedians. As Scott made his way back to his seat, I whispered to him “That was great!,” which he then kindly thanked me. Rachel went on to do another with her pianist, Randy Redd, who she actually met many years ago in a production of The Music Man they appeared in together. However, there was one big surprise in store for everyone. Rachel heard that a certain somebody was coming to the show, which then led to her planning a duet for the two of them to do. That somebody was a Wake Forest native who has not only gone on to Broadway, but also the movies and television, Ariana DeBose. The two of them actually worked together on the Pippin revival, where Ariana came in as a replacement in the ensemble during the run. As for their duet, it was the classic mashup of ‘Happy Days are Here Again’ and ‘Get Happy,’ made famous by Barbra Streisand and Judy Garland in 1963.

For those who haven’t checked out Theatre Raleigh in Concert yet, please do so. I think they’ve been killing it so far. This is the closest thing Triangle audiences have to cabaret in New York City, most notably 54 Below. You get to spend a pleasant evening sitting a few feet away from Broadway stars in an intimate setting. Although some of our local talent will be getting their own chances to shine coming up.

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