Hello America and
the world, we're in some
final tech rehearsal and we've
been getting lots of amazing questions
from Twitter, because our
process is so strange
and unique and so we
would like to answer some of them,
so let me go around and try
to answer some of your questions with some of our cast.
We have a question here from @Aviva,
she says if you could
play any other character on Broadway, who would it be?
On Broadway?
On the whole Broadway?
yeah, it specifically says on Broadway, so no off Broadway, no Regional.
Well okay.
Oh!
Easy, one of the kids in School of Rock
I haven't seen it.
Like [bleeping] badass. I can't cuss. Is ass a curse word?
I don't know, that's a good question.
you let us know in the comments.
Hey Alex, Hey You're
looking so smart in your little fall outfit today.
Well I'm a really intelligent guy
my clothes reflect that
we have a question from at SARAHELYSE17 Slay
Sara? We have a history
She asks if you could
play any other role in Spring Awakening
what would you play?
Adult Women hands down
I have all my choices prepared
especially for a Sunday night
when I can really like blow
out my voice, yes.
Great, thank you.
So Cath is interpreting once again,
for Amelia and this is a question
from @mulderscully_ for the
deaf actors, is there a
show that you would love to do
an ASL version of with Deaf West?
legally blonde perfect thank
you, I just think she
should do Violet my gosh
we want her to do Violet I think she would be amazing.
Deaf West
Violet would be amazing.
A Deaf West
Violet because we were
talking about this her scars and she always felt
aashamed by them but
lately, she felt great and
I'm like, that's what Violet is about!
I think they are very fierce.
Is there any show you'd like see Josh.
Into the woods that's my
goal my baby if anyone takes it I will murder you.
Children will listen one way
or another, yes.
Or maybe Rent.
I like that hey Marlee
we have a question from a fan.
What show would you like
to see an ASL version for Deaf West
any other show?
In ASL, I would like to see Cats.
I love that
idea thanks you guys, thanks for your input.
This is really cool sometimes we
rehearse just with signing and music with no singing
to get the signing right and it's really really cool. So here's a treat.
This is the question from
@pupica325 for the
deaf actors what sparked your
interest in acting and who inspired you?
My dad was very theatrical
and I maybe looked up to
him, and when
I realized I really wanted to
have a career not just to do it for fun.
There is a person called Monique Holt
She's incredible an professor, actress,
writer, sign translator everything.
She helped me and inspired
me not thinking about
money and living but thinking
about what is your passion, what
was your goal and at that point I said acting.
So don't think about the
money, don't think about whatever
or what people want you to
do, do what makes you happy.
Do what your joy is what
your love is and everything
will follow Thanks guys, that was beautiful.
Hi, Robert Ariza
hello this is the
question, A, which role
are you most excited to do
and then B, if you could
cover any track that you don't
cover who would you cover?
I think I mean it's kind of
typical but I think I'm most
excited about going on for Melchior just because
it's the most challenging
thing I've ever had to learn.
There lots of signs there, yes
and I'm not a natural
signer, I'd learned when I
started rehearsal for this so that
will be exciting, should that day come.
In terms of female characters
I think Ilsa, I'll say
that too I wanna be Ilsa.
question is what is it
like being one half
of a single character, what's that
experience like as a voicing actor?
It's hard because like
you have your own ideas about what
you think how
a line should play but you
are watching somebody to check their
timing and like today
I got a note, "Hey Josh is doing this thing. "
But I had no any idea because I was
standing behind him, so I didn't
know so I have to go find
him and ask him what is
your invention on this line that's me too.
Two words.
So you really have to like confer
them on really everything?
Yeah it's, two become, two heads are better than one kind of thing.
It's really hard.
It's really, really hard, for
all the reasons that he said
are totally accurate, in my
case, recently we were
having a lot of trouble with
jokes, I guess in
the case with an actor
like Daniel, who is profoundly
deal there's like a sense of
comedic timing that comes from
hearing human speech, that
we're all like used to and
stuff like that, and in
order to make like a
certain line that's written to
play a certain way and be
a laugh every night, because the show has a few of those.
You really need to figure that out,
so it took us like many shows to
get this one joke in particular
down, which is the obsessed with,
mesmerised by penis and vagina,
well I am.
So we had to play together
with figuring out, like, Okay well,
he started by doing something like
this and we realized this sign
kills the joke no matter how
tight we are, and things like that.
So working with Daniel
to find like 30 different
ways to land this joke
until we finally found it and
then it like erupts with laughter
and then you have to wait every night to see
what happens see what happens and
Daniel will come on stage and
be like, did they laugh?
And I was like, Yes.
They totally laughed tonight.
But yes, stuff like that
is a crazy challenge and then
following someone's lead while also
giving your own input and coming
together to make one thing,
it's crazy and I can't
imagine I will ever do it again
and unless,
Deaf West wants me back for something else.
There's no chance of that?
No.
No, all right.
Thanks guys.
Here's Katie Boeck the voice of Wendla
We're at intermission of this show right now.
It's going very well I think.
And you room is looking so cute.
Thank you.
I went a little crazy
Katie, the question is,
for the voicing actors what
is it like playing one person
with another actress, like playing the same character together.
What's the experience of that like?
It's It's so awesome
because at least for
me I get to do
what I love to do,
which is sing, and play guitar,
and talk and it's
like there's not just
that, there's this whole other element
of ASL that comes into
the mix, and I just
think that it's like
8, 000, 000 times more
the character that now that it's being shared.
I left my dirty socks in the counter in the background
I just think it's great,
I think people walk away
with a deeper understanding of
what the character is about because it's
being the whole
story of the character is being told in such a deeper way.
Yeah like internal life is playing out externally.
Yeah I have the fun part I
get to reveal a lot
of what her subconscious is thinking
and that's not something you
always get to do if you
were the only person that gets
to express the feelings that character
and all of that is sort
of all in your mind and
me being her mind and her
spirit I get to kind
of play around
a little bit more and I really enjoying that part of it.
Here we have Lauren Luiz washing brushes.
Washing brushes our very own
Melita being domestic during intermission here.
Do you have any interesting rituals pre-show.
Interesting?
No.
But what are your rituals pre-show?
I like to listen to
music, lately I've really been into Billie
Holiday, just because I feel
like she understands me, right
now and then we play ninja on stage.
We do I'm really terrible at it. Me too
I still don't quite get it. No one is worse than me.
Your question is if
you could play any other role on Broadway, what role?
How does that question keep happening?
I just asked her the other day.
Ohh!
I don't know and
Anything that's like sexy and fun
A little mischief maybe.
We call her Sexy Lexie
She wrote that herself.
I did not! Thanks
ladies bye, bye
I got a question, How
is the experience different, being in Spring Awakening and versus Les Miserables]?
The experience is completely different for a lot of reasons.
It's a hell of a lot shorter
which you think like,
more show, more fun, but not all the time.
Not when you're doing it eight times a week.
Also I would say this music
is way more in my wheel
house way more the
kind of music that comes out
of me naturally, whereas in Les Miz I
had to like really work and push
to get that big operatic sort
of I mean as operatic as
I can get, that kind of
sound does not come naturally
to me, the biggest difference I
think is that was a show
that I auditioned for and
was cast in after
like many auditions and stressed
about, and then was in
a room with people that I
didn't know, a team
that I didn't know, trying to convey
what they were trying to
get out of me, their vision
of Marius and mine and coming
together and creating something we can both agree on.
Whereas here this is
a show that I helped
conceive and put together
with literally with my
best friends and the love
of my life and we we're all in the room
together just trying to make
the play better, so much
less focused on myself and like
how I'm doing and if they
like me or not, I'm just
sort of like trying to
contribute what I can to the greater good.
And we all started out
doing this for free, like
literally when we did the
first workshop of this that
I worked on before Les Miz
we were in a
stripper fitness studio, that smelled
like cat pee rehearsing I
swear to God, and we
performed it in this little dance
studio for like friends and
family and the board of Deaf
West to like to see
if the idea would even work, everyone was working for free.
We actually, Michael and I
bought props and stuff and like paid for the
keyboard, things like that
we like put our own money just
to get the idea on it's feet
so we really, really believe
in this, so the fact that we're
here on Broadway is a totally,
totally different experience than the
standard route of auditioning for something and like being
cast in something and like being taken care of in that way.
This feels way more like homegrown and personal.
So both experiences were really sweet,
I'm really happy to
be here now, I'm happy
that you at home are
joining us, segue, so thanks
for tuning in, I'm gonna go
eat some Buffalo Wild Wings cuz they're right across the street from our theater.
Good night. Thank you.