Interview: FROZEN's Caroline Bowman is Ready to Let It Go at Peace Center

It's not every day that you talk to Elphaba, Elsa, and Evita. Unless you're talking to Caroline Bowman, because she's been all three.

Bowman currently plays Elsa in the national tour of Disney's FROZEN, the hit Broadway musical, gliding into Greenville's Peace Center April 6-17.

Based, of course, on the 2013 animated film, the stage version incorporates many new songs while also delivering the hits your kids couldn't stop singing.

Caroline Bowman has racked up an impressive list of credits, having starred on Broadway as Elphaba in WICKED, and Nicola in KINKY BOOTS, where she was a member of both the opening and closing casts. Her national tours include EVITA (Eva Peron), SPAMALOT (Lady of the Lake), GREASE (Rizzo), and FAME (Carmen). Since 2019, she's starred as ice queen Elsa in FROZEN.

BWW asked Bowman to tell us more about herself and how the stage version of FROZEN expands on the movie.

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When you look at some of the roles you've done you see that she's playing Elsa, she played Elphaba, she played Eva Peron. So the first thing that comes to mind is this person has an amazing voice. You have to have an amazing voice to play those parts. These are some big iconic roles that have some amazing, iconic numbers in themselves. How do you handle those? What was your training?

Well, growing up I started as a first soprano. I was in choir and I sang soprano stuff and I realized I wanted to sing more musical theater and I wanted to belt. But my choir teacher growing up was very against belting, did not want us belting at all and I was a rebel and wanted to do my own thing. So I didn't really have a voice teacher honing that side of my voice, I just listened to singers like Sutton Foster and of course Idina Menzel and emulated them, and tried to manipulate my voice to sound like them, which is what a lot of young singers do before they find their own groove. And then I was tapping into the power of my voice. Then I had a great voice teacher in college who is all about teaching how to belt, and singing healthily and maintaining these hard things eight shows a week. She taught me how to utilize the voice I was given and then, I don't know. It kind of worked.

I guess so!

I think I always knew what I wanted. I knew what roles I was attracted to. I wasn't sure if I could do it but then I was like, well, let me try. So it's trial and error, I guess. And I'm pretty good about vocal rest and doing what I need for my body and my voice. I also take voice lessons every two weeks. I actually have a voice lesson today, so I'm never done!

Oh wow.

I'm constantly working and I talk with my voice teacher and I say, "OK, this is what happened these last two weeks, this is how I'm feeling today" and we kind of do voice lessons based on that. I'm also doing a balancing act because Elsa does such heavy singing, like "Let It Go" and her big song in Act Two, "Monster," and it's really high belting. I balance it out with singing soprano songs. I think of myself as an athlete, and we all are theatre athletes, so you're stretching other muscles that you're not really using to maintain the muscles that you are using all the time. So I stretch my voice in different ways in my voice lesson and I warm up for the show with a complete operetta soprano range, so I think of it as like a hamstring stretch before I go on a run.

Tell us a little about the show itself, how it how it is similar to and different from the film.

It's the same story of FROZEN as the film, but we have like 12 new songs that are not in the movie, and that's just to tell the story better and to deepen the story.

And I really think it does. So what I always say is that it's the FROZEN you know and love. But then we take an even deeper look at these characters. There's narration, so the ensemble are part of the storytelling, where they're vocally telling the story of these two girls and how it started. I think our version makes it even more accessible to adults in a way. The kids are going to come and love the story because they love FROZEN and they know it and they know they're going to hear the songs that they love. Then there's just so much more to the story that I think adults really appreciate because it's an intense story, it's a traumatic story.

It's about these two women coming into their own and then knowing that their love for each other is the most important thing and the most powerful thing there is. And, yes, there's Disney magic. There's the infamous song, "Let It Go." There's "Love is an Open Door. But then there's also this really deep story that we tell about these sisters loving each other and coming back together and owning their power and stepping into that. I think the older people in the audience really enjoy and appreciate it.

Talking to some friends, I know there's a sort of in-between demographic of kids who think of themselves as "too grown up" for FROZEN so might think they don't want to see the stage version. How would you address someone like that?

You will not be disappointed. Seeing this show live is so much more magical than watching the movie. I mean there's real magic happening right before your eyes, things happen and you're like whoa, how? And then there's artistry with the dancing and what these dancers do with their bodies to tell the story, how we make the whole stage freeze before your eyes and then the iconic ice dress that I wear literally looks like I'm wearing sparkly ice. It is so beautiful and there is just a big difference in watching these characters that are alive, that are human right in front of you, than watching the cartoon on your TV. It's just so much more.

I love the movie. I understand some people might be a little sick of it.

But it's not this. If you're sick of it, come see our show. Trust me, it's gonna reinvigorate your love for FROZEN.

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FROZEN runs April 6-17 at the Peace Center in downtown Greenville, SC.

Tickets are going fast, so reserve your seats today by calling the box office at 864.467.300 or online at peacecenter.org.