"Shuffle Along": Re-imagining Broadway history
Folks were wild about "I'm Just Wild About Harry" back when the Paul Whiteman Orchestra recorded it in 1922. Now, a revival of the musical that launched the song is Broadway bound, and "Sunday Morning" will be following its progress every step of the way. Maurice DuBois will be our guide:
The curtain is going up on something new ... that's something old: A Broadway show celebrating what it means to make it to the top.
For months now, the cast of "Shuffle Along" has been hard at work perfecting a show that was the talk of the town nearly 100 years ago.
This new version, opening next year, is a re-imagining of one of the earliest hit musical comedies starring, written and directed by African-Americans.
"And then history stepped in and said, 'Thank you -- and maybe we'll remember you, and maybe we won't," said Tony Award-winning director George C. Wolfe.
In fact, history did NOT remember "Shuffle Along." But the legendary Josephine Baker launched her career with the 1921 show, which also featured a young baritone named Paul Robeson, and a score by the team of Eubie Blake and Noble Sissle, including hits like "I'm Just Wild About Harry."
Six-time Tony-winner Audra McDonald said it was important for her to do this show. "This is a part of my history, and I didn't know it," she said.
That's just one of the reasons McDonald joined the cast, well before Wolfe had even finished the script.
"Shuffle Along" will be his 18th Broadway show -- and, he says, it doesn't get any easier.
"Musicals are hateful," he told DuBois. "Musicals are horrible, horrible things to work on because they're just hard."
Particularly hard because Wolfe is actually telling TWO stories. There's the original plot -- about a less-than-honest mayoral election in a place called Jimtown, USA -- and Wolfe is also telling the behind-the-scenes story of the real-life actors and writers whose lives changed because of the musical's success.
In the months of workshops and rehearsals gearing up for "Shuffle Along"'s opening, Wolfe and company have learned what works and what doesn't.
"I actually threw some tap shoes on a few months back just to see what would happen," said actor Brian Stokes Mitchell. "And my timing was very awful, you know? But it came back after a while!"
Mitchell won a Tony Award in 2000 for "Kiss Me, Kate," as did cast-mate Billy Porter in 2013 for "Kinky Boots."
Porter says choreographer Savion Glover has added hurdles they haven't faced before.
"I learned how to tap traditionally," Porter said. "I can say this: I learned how to tap from the white folks! I was at a ballet bar. It was very technical. Now, it's like learning a whole 'nother language."
Glover, who's considered the world's greatest tap dancer, makes it look easy. But Audra McDonald says it's not.
"I have not tap danced for over a decade," she said.
"I'm watching the rehearsals," said DuBois. "I'm seeing energy, I'm seeing intensity. I'm also seeing certain actors trying to keep up with a certain dancer out front."
"Absolutely. I'm sure one of the actors you're seeing trying to keep up is me!" she laughed. "Because Savion doesn't necessarily say, 'This step is a left flap-ball-change-shuffle.' He goes, Ba-da-da ba-da-da ... it's just call-and-response with him. That's how he teaches."
Glover says he thinks the cast is up for the challenge.
"I'll say, like, 'Oh, I can simplify that for you.' And they say, 'No, give me the harder one. I wanna learn that,'" Glover said. "That makes me feel great!"
Glover and Wolfe go back a long way. Twenty-three years ago, Wolfe directed a teenaged Glover in his musical, "Jelly's Last Jam."
And in 1996, Glover won a Tony for choreographing "Bring in 'da Noise, Bring in 'da Funk" -- another Wolfe show.
Now 42, Glover says he's not just older, he's wiser: "In our early years of working together, I was there, I was present. But the need to want to learn more wasn't there. Versus this time, I'm learning as we're working."
Despite the long days, hard work and high stakes, Wolfe often takes time out to be a mentor and friend.
"Never rush through failure," he tells one cast member.
He wants his actors to "connect" with the characters they portray.
"They have secrets," Wolfe said. "Everybody in the cast, they have secrets. And we all have secrets having lived on the planet. And we know things about love, and loss, and our parents, and our children, and our dogs, and what really matters, and what doesn't matter. And if you can create the correct environment, everybody brings all of that."
So far, it seems to be working. "Shuffle Along"'s journey to Broadway is well underway. Official rehearsals begin next month.
In 1921, "Shuffle Along" proved white audiences would line up for a black show. Nearly a century later, Billy Porter says the people who created the musical have given him both a role, and then some.
"It is such an honor and such a gift to be able to actually exist inside of your dreams," he told DuBois. "This is actually the dream. I am living the dream. It's extraordinary, it really is."
As the cast rehearsed the song "Love Will Find a Way," Wolfe critiqued each cast member: "Good, good, good, clearer, clearer, cleaner, clearer, cleaner, better, good!"
For more info:
- "Shuffle Along" at the Music Box Theatre, New York City; previews begin March 15, 2016; opens April 28, 2016 | Tickets