Stage Whisper
Whisper in the Wings Episode 574
(upbeat music) - Welcome everyone to a fantastic new Whisper in the Wings from Stade Whisper. We are joined by an amazing artist from a company we had on our show recently and they do incredible work. Joining us today, we have the executive and artistic director, Aubrey Therian, who's here to talk to us about epic players theater presentation of a neuro-inclusive cabaret entitled "Radist Summer Bops". It's happening Monday, July 22nd at 7 p.m. at Joe's Pub. And you can get your tickets and more information by visiting publictheatre.org. We recently had Travis Burby on from epic players to discuss their production of Romeo and Juliet and it was so, so wonderful. The work that this theater company does. And so we're so excited that they're back this summer with this great cabaret. We cannot wait to dive more into it. So let's welcome on our guest Aubrey welcome in to Whisper in the Wings from Stade Whisper. - Thank you. Thank you for having me Andrew. I'm really excited to chat today. I am so excited that you're here. I'm so excited to learn more about this great, great cabaret that you've got in store for us. Why don't we start first? I'd like to just remind our listeners a little bit about what epic players theater is. Can you first tell like remind us about who you are, what you do? - Yeah. So epic players is a neuro-inclusive theater company. So our mission is to elevate neuro-divergent and disabled artists in the theater world, provide professional opportunities, make sure they're talented, seen and heard on elevated platforms around the city and the nation. We also, we've been in New York for about eight years and we just opened a company in LA as well. So we're really excited about that. And we serve over a hundred artists who identify as neuro-divergent or disabled. And our hope is to share their talents with the world and encourage people to hire and cast and uplift neuro-divergent and disabled voices and more work in theater. - That is so amazing. Ah, I love this work that you do. This is incredible. So let's turn to this upcoming show, this neuro-inclusive cabaret entitled Greatest Summer Bops. Tell me everything about this show. What's in store for listeners? - Yes, well we are, we are super happy to partner with Joe's public public. We've been there for several years now. And this is kind of the start of our 2024-25 cabaret season. So we do a series of three cabarets each year and they are neuro-inclusive. So there are a group of artists working with Broadway professionals to put on an amazingly entertaining cabaret and kind of shatter stereotypes of sharing the stage together and what that looks like and what talent can look like and what shapes and forms it can take. So each cabaret is themed. This theme is Greatest Summer Bops. So these are the songs from your childhood or the Greatest Summer Songs of Now that you listen to that you can't stop listening to over and over and over and over and over again from late May to end of August. And then they disappear forever. I'm not like that. So that's what we're exploring. Lots of music throughout the ages, all different genres. And we're partnering with some wonderful Broadway guests as well like Stephanie Torrens from Wicked and Jelani Remi from Back to the Future. And we have a cast of 18 neuro-diverse artists who will be featured and amplified. I love that all though. That's amazing. The collaborations you've got in store are incredible. I would love to know, you know, what inspired you to create this cabaret and how did you pick this year's theme, The Greatest Summer Bops? Yeah, so we, cabarets have been a part of our company for a really long time. Our players love to sing, our artists love to sing, our artists love musical theater. And if you think about it, access to musical theater for neuro-diversion and disabled artists has been highly minimal throughout history. I would say there are neuro-diversion coded characters, for sure. But it hasn't been really an accessible pathway to our community. And I think that is for a variety of reasons, whether it's supporting, whether it's finances, whether it's, you know, the stigma of what disability is. So providing that outlet for our artists has been really important for us, plus using it as a training ground, using it as a place where people can build their skills, where they can invite producers, passengers, et cetera, to see their skills in action, where they can liaise with the Broadway community and learn about that particular person's trajectory and career and the obstacle they've faced and any advice they have. So that's how the cabarets were born. Typically, how we choose themes, we're a very artist-led company. So our company decides the themes for us. They vote, they give us feedback on what they wanna do. This cabaret was always gonna be a summer-focused cabaret. People wanted to have fun. We just did spring awakening, which is beautiful show, but also kind of a bummer. And we really wanted to do something like light and fun and something people wanted to kind of like dance to and bop to "Hence Greatest Summer Bops." So that's why we show summer mobs and it programmed really easily. People brought in their favorite songs, auditioned with them of the summer and we got a show. And then the fall, we're doing another cabaret in the fall and it's gonna be our 90s themed cabaret. We're very excited. - Girl, you are hitting all the right buttons on my head. I'm just like, as I love a good summer bop, they never go away, they never get old. So I'm curious to know, I mean, at the time of this recording, we are literally 10 days away from the cabaret. What has it been like developing? - You know, this is the cabaret we've had the shortest rehearsal period on. Typically we have an adaptive rehearsal schedule. So instead of rehearsing every day for a couple hours a day, for four weeks, maybe we'll rehearse once or twice a week for a few hours for like six weeks. And this is to give our artists the opportunity to do other things and be flexible with their calendar. You know, a lot of them have jobs. They fought for our programs. They fought for and we can't ask them to change that for us. You know, we want this to be a symbiotic relationship. So we've been rehearsing since the end of June, twice a week and it's come together really well. We have a really brilliant music director, Eric Feigen. He is also an autistic artist and a brilliant songwriter composer, arranger, musician. And he's been able to really take the suggestions our community has made plus like the one billion summer bops that are out there and turn them into these amazing arrangements and mashups and medleys that you're going to see in the show, which has just been really fun to teach and to learn and to hear come to life. So it's been a great development process. We have our band, we have our Broadway guests. We're ready to go. Yes, that's all we love to hear. That is fantastic. So with this incredible, inclusive and diverse show that you are creating, is there a message or a thought you hope that audiences take away from this event? - I always hope when people come to our show that they leave incredibly entertained and going, wow, I didn't know what I was going to see. I didn't know what to expect and that was amazing because I do feel like sometimes there is a stigma or stereotype around when you hear you're going to see a quote unquote disabled show or inclusive show. I think people associate that with going to see a charity. We're going to see a recital. And that is not what Epic does. We put on professional performances that are highly entertaining. And we showcase the amazing talents of this particular community. So that is what I hope the reception is. And then I hope it would translate to audiences seeking out more inclusive theater and also arts makers to make more inclusive theater and to consider more nerd-avergent and disabled artists for the projects they're doing. - That is a fabulous idea. I'm so happy to hear that. And it also leads to my final question for this first part, which is who are you hoping to have access to greatest summer bombs? - I know people who want to have a good, are looking for something to do in the city on a Monday night in July who want to have a great time and be highly entertained and sing along to the greatest songs of the summer come. I think we have a really amazing community of audience members who also support nerd-avergent and disabled artists. And we have a lot of theater goers who have followed us and love our work and want to see a good show. So I really hope people, especially people who want to go, kind of want to understand what neurodivergent theater is. I keep saying that word over and over again. And I think people have like a 50% understanding of what that word means. And if you are curious, you should come see the show. It will give you more of a definition and understanding. (upbeat music) - Well, for the second part of our show, we love giving our listeners a chance to get to know our guests a little bit better. Pick your brains, if you will. And I want to know, what or who inspired you? What playwrights, composers or shows have inspired you in the past or are just some of your favorites? - I think I'm always very inspired by the arts makers that I'm surrounded with. I know that's kind of a boring answer, but I'm constantly inspired by kind of the village of people that work with us here at Epic and the other arts collaborators that I've learned from and picked up things from and kind of seeing how we work together to make this happen because it's hard. And it was easy, everybody would do it. So it takes, I think, select humans to want to try. So I think probably the people I work with are who inspire me most. And I work with artists who, you know, also some of them have real significant challenges and they're memorizing Puccini operas by Hart and Italian and they're playing Sondheim by memory, full scores and they're conducting in an arranging, brilliant pieces of music and putting it on for producers, directors, et cetera. Like, you know, those are the folks who I think inspire me and it gives me courage. You know, I was an actor for a long time. I don't really have stage fright acting, but I have a lot of stage fright singing and to see our actors kind of get on stage and like sing their hearts out and learn and grow and have zero fear and just a lot of the onstage like gives me courage to, you know, if I have to step in or if I have to do something or if I have to model a song or whatever, like I can, they can do it. I am going to be like Christine and be very brave. I can do this. - Yes, yeah, it's inspiring. It's so inspiring. I wish I had their fearlessness. I love seeing performers like that to breathe the roof for them. Let me ask you, I know you've been very busy with this show, but have you seen any great theater lately? You might be able to recommend to our listeners. - I saw a great show at Signature Theatre the other day and I feel like it just closed. All of me. I feel like it is closed so I can't recommend it to see it, but I could recommend your viewers to follow it. It was a really beautiful play. It's called All of Me. It features two wheelchair users who use assisted technology to communicate and it's essentially a rom-com. So it's all about like how they need and they want to like talk dirty to each other and I want to like date and sometimes about the obstacles but the obstacles are usually like kind of man-made and perceptive. So like they're more about this person's parents didn't think they were able to do this or it has a very kind of Kimberly a Kimbo feel to it in a way. It's kind of like a family drama, but it's highly entertaining. Kira Cedric was in it and she was this great toxic mom. It was super funny, really moving. So I think it's going to go places. It was by the new group presented it at Signature Theatre. - Yes, yes. I was like, I recognize that title. Where do I know it from? And the minute you said Kira said, we're like, oh yes. Yeah, I now I remember. So, oh, that's so good to hear. I hope there's life in that show afterwards. I heard nothing but great things. Well, I want to ask you now, what is your favorite part about working in the theater? - My favorite part about working in the theater is that it allows me to constantly consider different perspectives and constantly grow as a communicator, if that makes sense. My role has changed from an actor into more of a director and a producer. And I have to, because of that, I liaise with so many different people who work in theater on the back and on the front end and the administrative side of the producing side. And it's, I think my favorite part is knowing how all of the cogs fit together and learning more about how I can effectively communicate with people and grow that part of me. 'Cause it's such a collaborative thing. And when you're an actor, yes, it's ensemble-based. It's collaborative, but a lot of the pressure falls on you. You have to memorize lines, you make the choices, you're coming in, it's you on that stage. But when you're working to build the macro project, it's not just about you, it's about every, it is about all the actors, it's about all the technicians, about it's all the musicians, it's about the audiences, it's about the community, it's about the mission. And so understanding each community's perspective has really given me a lot of, of just insight on myself and how I can be a better, more collaborative artist and also how we can change theater for the better. I think theater sometimes can, has been historically toxic in a way, like you need to be perfect and you need to be this and you need to be that. And I don't think it needs to be that way. I think that we can build maybe a more nurturing model. And it's been wonderful to kind of see the other people agree with that. And we can find a better way. That is such a lovely answer. Thank you for that. And it leads into my favorite question to ask this, which is, what is your favorite theater memory? - My favorite theater memory today, I'll say today. One of my favorite theater memories outside of Epic was when I saw this brilliant production of "Twelfth Night" at the actors theater of Louisville. And I love Shakespeare. I love Shakespeare. I think it's my favorite form of theater. I think it's such universal stories. I think you can learn so much, you can learn so much. I just love Shakespeare, but this was a musical version. And the company had written their own songs and every single member of the cast played an instrument and the center of the stage was his grand piano. And Viola would go to the piano and play and sing her song and Olivia would, yes. And Oberon, whatever. And it was the most entertaining, brilliant production I had ever seen of that show. And it made me just want to do this more and decide, you know, we don't have to do things a conventional way. We can put our own spin on it. So I think that was my favorite theater memory outside of Epic. And I think inside of Epic, I don't know. I think it was probably during the pandemic when we were able to continue to produce in a way that I don't think many other companies were on a virtual level. And we had just one amazing night of shows, you know, online shows where all of these audience members came and afterwards, everybody wanted to kind of be a part of Epic and, you know, I got email from a player, but just like, thank you so much for continuing this. It's been, you know, my home and my lifeline during this time that you don't know how important this is to me and us. And I think that's, yeah, speaks to what we do. - Those are beautiful. Oh my gosh, I love those. Thank you so much for sharing them. Well, as we wrap things up, I would love to know, do you or Epic Players Theater have any other projects or productions coming on the pipeline? We might be able to plug. I know you did mention there's a cabaret coming in the fall, but any other things coming? - Yes, so our cabaret's in the fall '90s themed, be there, be square, a sweet stay in the '90s. And then we're also doing an inclusive production of a Christmas Carol. And it's another, you know, this is another kind of opportunity for us to play a bit and decide what we want this version to be. We're gonna create it ourselves. So it'll be new and neurodivergent. So, and may include some songs from up, it's Christmas Carol, may or may not. But that will be at Theater Row, December 10th through 15th, which will be really exciting. And then we're doing "Susical the Musical" next spring. Yeah, that will be exciting as well. So that's what we have in the pipeline. And we'd love for everybody to come see it. - Well, you got a fan of me right there. I mean, you're hitting all the right buttons. I know what I'm gonna be planning for the fall, for December and for the spring now. I've got three shows for sure I'm gonna make happen. This is wonderful. And it leads to my final question, which is if our listeners would like more information about greatest summer bots, or about you, maybe like to reach out to you, how can they do so? - They can go to our website, www.epicclairsnyc.org. And we have all the information there about our upcoming shows, about auditions, if anybody would like to audition. We always are auditioning for company members as well. We have about 125 artists nationwide, and we'll continue growing. So if anyone is looking for a home, we are in our inclusive, which means you don't necessarily need to identify as neurodivergent. You just really like being part of this community. So you can find out information there. And also our emails are on the website as well. And if you're in LA, you can reach out to our LA people as well. - Fantastic. Well, Aubrey, this has been such a delight, such a great time. If this is any indication about what this cabaret is gonna be like, I cannot wait for this, this is wonderful. So thank you so much today for your time and for speaking with us. - Of course, thank you for having me. - And come to the show, bring your wife, I want to meet her. - Yes, yes, yes, yes. My guest today has been the amazing executive and artistic director of Epic Players Theater, Aubrey Therian, who joined us to talk about their upcoming presentation of a neuro-inclusive cabaret entitled "Radus Summer Box." It's happening Monday, July 22nd at 7 p.m. at Joe's Pub. And you can get your tickets and more information by visiting publictheatre.org. We also have some contact information for our guests, which we'll be posting in our episode description as well as on our social media posts. But I'm telling you, head to publictheatre.org now. Get your tickets while you still can. We're gonna be there. We're gonna be there. We're making it a stage whisper nine out of the theater. This is our kind of jam. This is the perfect summer escape from the heat. And yet just like a party, this is gonna be a great night. It's greatest summer bops happening Monday, July 22nd at 7 p.m. So until next time, I'm Andrew Cortez, reminding you to turn off your cell phones, unwrap your candies, and keep talking about the theater. In a stage whisper. Thank you. (upbeat music) If you like what you hear, please leave a five-star review, like and subscribe. You can also find us on Facebook and Instagram at stagewhisperpod. And feel free to reach out to us with your comments and personal stories at stagewhisperpod@gmail.com. And be sure to check out our website for all things stage whisper and theater. You'll be able to find merchandise, tours, tickets and more. Simply visit stagewhisperpod.com. Our theme song is Maniac by Jazzar. Other music on this episode provided by Jazzar and Billy Murray. You can also become a patron of our show by logging onto patreon.com/stagewhisperpod. There you will find all the information about our backstage pass as well as our tip jar. Thank you so much for your generosity. We could not do this show without you. ♪ I'm way more perilous where I don't care ♪ ♪ Anywhere near your town makes me there ♪