I have been involved with 'Spring Awakening' for six years. I am 20 now - I just turned 20 in August - and I originally auditioned when I was 14 years old. I auditioned for Michael Mayer, Duncan Sheik and Steven Sater.
'Grease' was my Broadway debut. That was eye-opening. At the same time, it was very familiar. It was a Broadway show, but it's kind of the same as doing a show in Minnesota. It's the same type of rehearsal process. You are doing 8 shows a week, but I worked at a theatre in Minnesota that did 11 shows a week.
I was doing a Broadway play, and I was really new to this business. The Broadway play was my first job, literally. The play next door was a musical called Falsettos. The director got hired to direct this Michael J. Fox movie and was looking for a kid who could play brash and salty and mean [in Life With Mikey].
When Peter Schneider first approached me about adapting 'Sister Act' for the stage, it wasn't a slam dunk to say yes.
Into The Woods was... a lot of running around in the woods! I can't wait to see the show again. People didn't realize it back then, but kids still come up to me-young people-and they talk about it. It really made its mark.
'Story of My Life' was essentially a two-man musical play. In hindsight, I don't know if there was room for a two-man musical on Broadway.
The good thing about Broadway is that you don't have to worry about an airdate. It gets done when it gets done.
I don't like Tommy on Broadway at all. I like the music, I'm pleased with Pete's success but I don't like what they've done to it.
I've been working on this feature script for Master Class, a play by Terrence McNally that won a lot of Tonys.
A few years after I graduated, I was doing a play in Boston and was asked to audition for Christophe Durang's play, 'Vonya and Sonia and Masha and Spike,' and I got the part. We were performing in Lincoln Center when, during our weekly meeting with producers, they that said they loved our show and wanted to take us to Broadway.
I'm inordinately proud of Smash, on so many levels. The complexity of producing that show, every week, is just incredible. As a television producer and as a Broadway producer, which I once was, I am in awe of what we can do on that show, every week.
It's interesting that the wondrous 'Hamilton,' which I could not be more ecstatic about, has taken a long time to perfect to bring it to Broadway. And it wouldn't have been possible if it was developed in the commercial theatre from the get-go.
'Blackbird' is the only one I've ever wanted to redo. It just haunted me, this play. There was a sense of unfinished business because at the time we did it at Manhattan Theatre Club, there was real momentum to move it to Broadway.
San Francisco has just blown us all away. I also understand Angels in America didn't do well there.
'Evita' obviously would always be very special to me because it was the first major musical that I did on stage and created in the U.K. with Hal Prince directing.
We do have American Idiot picked up by HBO and I wrote the record and concept to it. [We have] the writer Rolin Jones and [director] Michael Mayer [who also directed the Broadway production], so we'll see what happens.
It remains an incredible struggle for women in theater, and, in particular, playwrights and directors, to get their work seen and to not only get seen, but to get it to Broadway.
I'm delighted that 'The Sound of Music' is doing so well. Of course, it's an infallible piece of material. Even when second- and third-rate road companies were doing the play, they did enormous business.
Launching a Broadway show is like no other endeavor. It's taxing because you're present - it's not like cutting a movie and test focus-grouping it and filling out forms.
I worked on the workshop of 'Topdog/Underdog' before it went to Broadway. My minor in school was theater, so I'm based in that, and then I moved to Los Angeles.
I would absolutely be interested in doing a Broadway production if it was the right project. But my dream is to be writing pieces of theater for my best friends and putting on plays in New York City and seeing our vision come alive. I just hope to always be creating.
The Color Purple received four Tony nominations; the play is highly looked at and it's a must see for everyone. I just want to carry on what Jennifer Hudson has done and help the team get to the finish line.
My parents were in 'Brigadoon' on Broadway when I was a couple of years old.
It took me a while to figure it out, but to have a real hit on Broadway, you have to get the respected Broadway people to like it. But then the production also has to appeal to the most middle-class people who know nothing about Broadway and who come to see it later.
'Turn Me Loose' was Off-Broadway, and now we are making a concerted effort to figure out how to get it to on Broadway.
