♪ Come, Paradise Square ♪
- "Paradise Square" is one of the most-nominated musicals
at this year's Tony Awards,
with 10 nods, including Best Musical
and Best Featured Actor for A.J. Shively.
Let's send it out to Charlie Cooper.
- Thanks, Tamsen.
I spoke with "Paradise Square"'s, A.J. Shively
about what the show and his first Tony nomination
means to him.
(upbeat Irish music)
You were just nominated for your first Tony Award
for your role in "Paradise Square."
Talk to me about that feeling.
- You know, I, I can't even describe it,
'cause it really hasn't processed yet.
It doesn't seem real.
I'm doing this dance track
and to be to be recognized for this job in particular is...
I've worked so hard, and it's just so meaningful.
It's really...
It's, it's hard to believe it's...
I'm still in disbelief, yeah.
- It is crazy because so much of this performance
is so dance-based.
You don't have a dance background.
Did it blow your mind when you learned
that dance would be a part of it?
- Well, so I joined during the developmental phase.
I joined in a workshop in 2018,
and I didn't have a dance audition.
They were like, there might be a moment of Irish dancing.
I was like, oh yeah, I took tap class in college.
You know? Sure, why not?
I got a C. I wasn't very good in it, but like, you know.
I work hard.
And it's just transformed into,
I'm a principal dancer on Broadway. It's insane.
It doesn't make any sense.
- Even without necessarily a dance background,
you have Irish roots.
So it's almost like it comes naturally.
How much more does the story speak to you?
- Well, this is how, and when, my family came to America,
that side of my family came to America.
You know, I hear the Irish whistle at the beginning.
I hear the fiddle playing, you know,
the Irish harp, and, like, it's in my bone marrow.
I just feel it resonating.
But the dance in particular.
I have the benefit of having literal world-champion
Irish dancers as my Irish choreographers,
Jason Oremus and Garrett Coleman, who are both in the show.
To learn the cultural history and the heritage,
that it's not just, you know,
bouncing with your arms by your side, but, like,
what that came from, what it means
and that, that kind of, the Irish pride.
It feels wonderful, you know?
Yeah, it makes it that much more impactful,
that much more special.
- You talk about all the learning
that you did throughout this process.
And I feel like there are so many people
who come to see this show who walk out
feeling like they too have learned so much from it.
Can you kind of speak on that?
- Yeah. I never knew about this period of American history.
You know, it's like the Tulsa Massacre,
it's like Seneca Village,
which was concurrent with this society in Lower Manhattan.
It's not that it wasn't written down.
It's just, it wasn't spoken about.
It was not taught.
It's been such an important journey, I think,
because that wheel of time keeps turning.
And if you go back and look at the pamphlets
that kind of turned that socioeconomic anger
into racial anger,
that language, that discord, is almost verbatim
what you see today in the online media,
in, like, Reddit chat boards
and those kind of things.
I think it's extremely important
that we air this dirty American laundry.
And also, I think it's extremely important
that we honor this community,
that this was happening in America in the 1860s,
that you know, that...
There's a lyric in our show,
"We were safer separated,
but love left us no choice,"
that humanity will come together.
It will be tested, but it will come together,
and it will stay together.
And we certainly feel it in the cast.
And it's our goal every night
to include the audience in that feeling,
to feel part of that community.
- How do you prepare your body for a role like this?
No, seriously.
- It takes a long time.
Well, I mean, so there's the years
of, like, being one on one with Garrett and Jason,
who I mentioned earlier,
just learning how to Irish dance,
you know, which is painful both physically and mentally.
My calves look completely different
than they did when I started this process.
On the daily basis, you know, I start warming up two hours
before curtain just to make sure I don't hurt myself.
I've got compression tights that I wear
to kind of keep all my muscles happy.
I started reading "Runners World" magazine
and, like, seeing what endurance athletes do.
So, you know, I've got, I've got all the supplements
and, like, the protein bars that they eat.
I eat during intermission. I eat as much as I can.
- [Charlie] Yeah. - Yeah.
- Uh, random question.
So I know that you were doing this for a long time
and then you went into architecture,
and then you came back into this.
Aren't you glad that you, like, fell back into this?
- I am, I am. Yeah.
So I did, I did child acting,
and then I hit my growth spurt and was,
that didn't work out anymore.
And, yeah, and I was, like, okay, kind of,
I did the actor thing,
and I was really, really into architecture.
I, you know, that fits
that same kind of, like, perfectionism,
like, you do theater over and over again to get it right.
And, like, getting the things to line up
and the algebra that I really enjoyed.
And when it came time to actually apply to schools,
first of all, I realized architecture is just as competitive
as acting is,
but that, that the bug had bit.
- What would something like a Tony win mean to you?
- Oh, man.
Well, just, I mean, being nominated, being recognized.
You know, it's bizarre 'cause I've worked on this
the same way that I've worked on everything, you know,
every show I've done.
And it's kind of almost embarrassing,
'cause it's like, Oh, people were watching.
And to win would just,
I don't even think it could improve
on just the recognition
and that there are so many first-time nominees this year
and so many people who have been doing such good work
for so long, New York theater actors,
tried and true, you know, treading the boards for years.
It's such a privilege to be nominated
with these people and to win would just, you know...
I would get to thank people on TV.
That would be, that would be great.
(gentle fiddle music)