Celebrating 15 years of appreciating and spreading awareness of an American art form.
In The Musical, Sunday in the Park with George, painter Georges Seurat represents lyricist and composer Stephen Sondheim and his own journey through the creative process. For the creative team at Musical Theater Heritage, this theme resonates loud and clear. The musical runs March 28-April 14 at the Off Centre Theatre in Crown Center.
For 15 years, founder George Harter has pursued with great vigor to keep the American musical alive and in front of many audiences. Harter, who worked at the classical radio station, KXTR, offered the radio program A Night on the Town, organized around the American musical for the first hour and soundtracks the second. When Harter transitioned out of KXTR, he found singer Nathan Granner and Chad Gerlt, now MTH’s executive producer for the live shows, and took Harter’s radio show concept and started producing musicals in front of a live audience at the Belger Arts Center in the Crossroads.
Never fear, Harter and Gerlt still produce A Night on the Town as a weekly syndicated radio show, sponsored by the historic Algonquin Hotel in New York City. In Kansas City, the show can be heard on KPR, at 91.5 FM, Saturday nights at 9 p.m. The program is heard in Dallas, Atlanta, south Florida and on New York Public Radio. To accompany these musical radio shows, several times a year, Harter and Gerlt take fans on organized trips that include Broadway shows, fine dining, four nights at the Algonquin Hotel and fascinating insights into the history of Broadway and the American musical.
The format for the live musicals is different than most staged musicals. The actors have minimal props and costumes. There is very little in the way of scenery with perhaps a picture depicting the key figure in the musical. In the case of Sunday in the Park with George, Seurat’s painting, A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte, must be depicted on stage in some fashion. Other than this minimalist approach to sets, the singers place their music on a music stand and sing in a microphone to the audience rather than giving the audience the side profile. They really don’t engage each other, says artistic director Sarah Crawford.
Gerlt has taken a larger role, producing the live shows. This year will include Stephen Sondheim’s semi-autobiographical tale, Sunday in the Park with George and the illustrious Hello Dolly! Plus the Christmas Spectacular will again be part of the holiday season at Crown Center. “When George presented the idea of the musicals and boiled them down into the concert format, I realized we had a theatrical bullion. It’s like a cube with lots of flavor. The key is to make the audience part of the performance. We only have seven rows of seats so there is engagement.”
Tim Scott, who has been helping MTH with publicity also acts and sings around town. He has performed in several shows for MTH and will take on the role of Seurat and Seurat’s great-grandson in the second act. “Staging this musical will be a treat. It’s been at least 30 years since a theater has taken it on.” Katie Karel Fay, another veteran with MTH, will play Seurat’s lover Dot. She looks forward to the challenge of Sondheim again. She recently was part of the MTH cast for Sweeney Todd and the lead in Evita. “There is something totally freeing about this format,” she says. “We let the audience in. Imagination is key for all of us. It’s liberating.”
While the director and the leads extol this format, founder Harter wants the audience to know that this is not an easy task to be almost counterintuitive to acting and perform straight ahead. “We have almost had to qualify the experience with ‘we promise a great evening out, full of entertainment despite the format.’ In the end, why do people want to see a musical; it’s about the songs. Success is having an audience walk away singing.”
With Sunday in the Park with George, Scott and Fay see relevance to MTH’s past, present and future as well as the message Sondheim was sending to funders and critics alike. The first act looks at Seurat painting while the second act takes place 100 years later where an American artist named George seeks attention to one of his pieces that commemorates the centennial of his great-grandfather’s masterpiece. George’s grandmother Marie shares memories of her father with the gathered patrons, critics and museum staff. “The second act really struck me as relevant as people seek funders and supporters.
Harter says an early supporter for MTH was J. Kent Barnhart, the executive director at Quality Hill Playhouse. Barnhart asked Harter for help with the Broadway through the Decades series. “I learned the chronology and did a lot of research, but it was such a joy to know that there is this constant stream of creativity in that 32-block area called Broadway. That’s why the American musical deserves its due.”
For many, musicals are the soundtracks of their lives, Gerlt says. “Music is so powerful. When I found music after beginning a career strictly as an actor I discovered there was such a rich way to communicate,” Scott says. “I relate to Georges as I can be single-minded about my work. I understand losing focus. Seurat was so in love with his art form and revolutionizing the way he painted. Sondheim has been criticized by his peers, just as Seurat was. This was not for commercial success for Sondheim, just as Seurat was not known for selling his art.”
Fay says good musicals are like singing poetry. “It’s what you really want to say,” she says. “I like Dot. She’s much more in touch with her feelings and she wants more from Georges. People discount musical theater. You are finding the connections to the emotions of the character. Just be open to the experience.”
Crawford had been a fan of Harter’s radio show and saw some of the early shows at the Belger. She knew she had to be a part of MTH. “We have made our own rules with the shows. We really could do almost anything here. This production will have a larger musical ensemble. We are still up and coming.”
Gerlt says MTH is a little like the tortoise in The Tortoise and the Hare. Each year, they continue adding to attendance. In 2008, attendance for the shows totaled 3,200 and last year, they surpassed 9,000. “We produce three major shows, the Musical Mondays and now the parlor series. Since 2009, we have received six accolades.” Crawford has been called several times to ask how MTH staged an all-female cast of 1776. “We are passionate about what we do. Musical theater is something we enjoy and we get anxious to share it,” she says.
