Scene to Song June Newsletter
"But it wouldn't be as nice as a summer in Ohio"
We’re approaching Scene to Song’s sixth anniversary on June 25th! Last year I did another live show for the fifth anniversary. This year, I’m planning to release some older episodes, and I’m really excited for people to revisit them. I know folks can always search the back catalogue, but it will be so much easier when the episodes appear at the top of your feed.
I’ve been on a Jason Robert Brown kick, as you will see from this email. Maybe that’s because I just had a great discussion with guest Nick Navari about The Last Five Years in the latest episode. And a few days after that episode was released… The Last Five Years is announced for Broadway! I like to think that Scene to Song is on the cutting edge of musical theater and that the episodes are so prescient. I feel validated. You can prep for this Broadway production by listening to our discussion and letting us know if you are Team Cathy, Team Jamie, or Team Neither Was Ready for a Relationship in their Early 20s. The Instagram poll results said 73% thought they were NOT READY!
I’m going to release one episode this summer, but I’m not sure yet whether that will be in July or August. It will be a surprise.
And if you are not yet subscribed to these emails and want to be, subscribe here:
— Shoshana
Recent Episodes
Episode 111: Jason Robert Brown's The Last Five Years
In this episode, writer, composer and director, and the Producing Artistic Director Nick Navari discusses Jason Robert Brown's 2002 off-Broadway musical The Last Five Years, touching on why Jamie and Cathy are together, the form of the show, the film version, and comparisons to Jason Robert Brown's most recent musical, The Connector. We also talk about the song "I Could Be in Love with Someone Like You," which was cut from The Last Five Years.
Music played in this episode:
"Shiksa Goddess" from The Last Five Years
"Moving Too Fast" from The Last Five Years
"A Part of That" from The Last Five Years
"If I Didn’t Believe in You" from The Last Five Years
"I Could Be in Love with Someone Like You" cut from The Last Five Years
Meet the Guests!
Nick Navari is a Pittsburgh born and bred writer, composer and director, and the Producing Artistic Director at The Strand Theater. His first original musical, Local Singles, for which he wrote the book, music & lyrics, will open Off-Broadway at The Players Theatre for a 5-week run in January of 2025 after several productions around the country. He has also written and produced a running segment for the EMMY nominated Fan Nation television series on CBS Pittsburgh, played over 150 shows at the dueling piano bar Howl at the Moon, and has directed and music directed musicals all over the Pittsburgh area. This fall, he will attend the Berklee College of Music to earn his Masters in Writing and Design for Musical Theater at the BerkleeNYC campus. He is a graduate of Kenyon College with degrees in Economics and Law, an Ambassador for the Pittsburgh CLO, and a staff writer for The Broadway Beat.
Hometown: Pittsburgh, PA
Current Town: Pittsburgh, PA
What are you Working on Right Now: Finalizing the orchestrations for the Off-Broadway transfer of my musical Local Singles!
What do you have coming up: I'll be moving to Manhattan in a few months to start writing my next musical at Berklee, so all of that is to come!
Book, TV, film, or Theater Recommendation: The last three books I've read have been Shakespeare or Shakespeare adjacent- Timon of Athens, Julius Caesar, and James Ijames' Fat Ham. All are great if you're into that!
Where can we find you online/social media: nicknavari.com, @nnavari, or grab a ticket to my show at nicknavari.com/local-singles
Musical of the Month
Mr. Saturday Night by Jason Robert Brown, Amanda Green, Billy Crystal, Lowell Ganz, and Babaloo Mandel
Happy 54th Birthday, composer/lyricist/writer Jason Robert Brown, born today, June 20th! Brown has so many musicals to celebrate with, but I’m choosing 2022’s Mr. Saturday Night because, fun fact, Mr. Saturday Night has so far been the only Jason Robert Brown musical to play during the month of June in its original run! Every other Broadway production closed by May, or started earlier in the season and closed earlier. Even his off-Broadway musicals never played their original runs in June.
Mr. Saturday Night is also the only show thus far on which he has collaborated with a lyricist. Brown worked with lyricist Amanda Green to write the score for this musical based on the 1992 film of the same name about a comedian named Buddy Young, Jr, decades past his prime, as he attempts a second chance at fame and his family. For years I dreamed of a Jason Robert Brown music-only score, and I finally got my wish. Not that I don’t like his lyrics, but I love to see what happens with collaboration, and if I had to pick, his music has always been ever so slightly stronger than his lyrics for me. I thought this collaboration was successful.
I am sure most people saw this show for Billy Crystal, but Shoshana Bean's character Susan really struck a chord with me, as she felt like a Jewish woman not seen before in musical theater. Susan is 40, not married, not successful, has a history with substance abuse, is still figuring out her life, and is dealing with unresolved issues with her parents. It was so refreshing that her first song, her I Want song, "There's a Chance", is not about finding a guy but about a job she thinks she'd be really great at and how her sticking with that job, should she get it, will allow her to stabilize her life in all areas. Mr. Saturday Night has a lot of funny lines, but the complex familial relationships are what really make this show, and Susan is at the heart of that.
So I’m celebrating Brown’s birthday with this show, but feel free to celebrate it with The Bridges of Madison County by listening to episode 47 on Jason Robert Brown and Marsha Norman's The Bridges of Madison County or with Parade by listening to episode 60 on Jason Robert Brown and Alfred Uhry's Parade. And of course there is the most recent episode, episode 111 on Jason Robert Brown's The Last Five Years. There is even a discussion on Brown’s song “I’m Still Hurting” from the Last Five Years in episode 10 on Plot Twists in Musical Theater and a discussion on his song “Someone to Fall Back On” from the film Bandslam in episode 16 on How the Films of Todd Graff (Camp, Bandslam, and Joyful Noise) Work As Musical Theater.
Also in June…
June 2: Happy Birthday, composer Marvin Hamlisch (1944)! Celebrate his work by listening to episode 75 on Marvin Hamlisch, David Zippel, and Neil Simon’s The Goodbye Girl
June 3: John Kander, Fred Ebb, and Bob Fosse’s Chicago opens on Broadway. Celebrate by listening to episode 48 in which we discuss the song “Class.”
June 7: Happy Birthday, composer Charles Strouse (1928)! Celebrate Strouse’s work by listening to episode 56 on Adaptations of Comics in Musical Theater.
June 9: Happy Birthday, composer/lyricist Cole Porter (1891)! Celebrate by listening to episode 40 on The Songs of Cole Porter: Two Things Can Be True at Once.
June 10: Happy Birthday, composer Frederick Loewe (1904)! Celebrate his work by listening to episode 15 on The Musical My Fair Lady.
June 12: Happy Birthday, composer/lyricist Richard M. Sherman (1928)! Celebrate by listening to his work on episode 72 on Disney Parks Music as Musical Theater.
June 14: Happy Birthday, composer Cy Coleman (1929)! Celebrate by listening to episode 61 on The Musicals of Cy Coleman.
June 28: Happy Birthday, Richard Rodgers (1902)! Celebrate by listening to discussions on his musicals in episode 35 on The Great White Way and Whiteness and White Identity in Musical Theater and episode 18 on The Women of Rodgers and Hammerstein.
June 29: Happy Birthday, Frank Loesser (1910)! Celebrate by listening to episode 12 on “Musical Worlds” in Musical Theater, Featuring Frank Loesser.
June 30: Oliver! opens in London (1960) and Happy Birthday, composer/lyricist Micki Grant (1929)! Listen to a discussion on the character Bill Sykes in episode 73 on Evil Characters in Musical Theater and celebrate Micki Grant with episode 71 on Black Women in Musical Theater History.
Find more musical theater history for June at musicals101.com.
New Musicals!
While Scene to Song mainly looks at musicals already part of the canon, I definitely want to highlight new musicals and musicals in development.
Sunface (or music-for-robots)
I did not see this show at Ars Nova ANT Fest the other week, but as an ANT Fest alum I enjoy seeing that they continue to incorporate musicals, or musical-like concerts, as part of the festival. This one looks particularly interesting.
Creative Team: Mikey Rose
Synopsis: A cyber-folk concert and celebration of humanity that follows Sunface, a misfit, malfunctioning robot curious about “how to human” in a fully robot world.
Development History: Part of Ars Nova ANT Fest on June 11, 2024.
Find out more about Sunface on Mikey Rose’s Instagram.
Something Wonderful
Some additional recommendations for June:
Article: “The ‘Bye Bye Birdie’ songwriters are in their 90s — and still best friends” in the Washington Post. “Bye Bye Birdie was more than a hit — it won the Tony for best musical, became part of the golden-age canon, routinely gets revived at high schools across the country and is coming to the Kennedy Center this month as part of its Broadway Center Stage series. And while for Adams and Strouse its creation is a fading memory, the show is a flash point in a friendship that has lasted three-quarters of a century.”
Cast Recordings: Suffs and Lempicka. The 2023-2024 Broadway season has come to a close, and cast recordings are being released. This past month I bought (yes, I still buy music) Suffs and Lempicka, two scores I couldn’t wait to hear again. And because I saw Suffs off-Broadway in 2022 and not yet on Broadway, it had been quite a while since I heard it—and there have been changes! I’m glad there are more cast recordings on the horizon.
Hosted by writer Shoshana Greenberg, Scene to Song brings on a guest to talk about a musical, musical theater writer, or a topic or trend in musical theater. The theme music is by Julia Meinwald.
You can write to scenetosong@gmail.com with a comment or question about an episode or about musical theater, or if you’d like to be a podcast guest. Follow on Instagram at @ScenetoSong, on Twitter at @SceneSong, and on Facebook at “Scene to Song with Shoshana Greenberg Podcast.”
Shoshana Greenberg is a lyricist, librettist, singer, and theater journalist. Her musicals include Days of Rage with Hyeyoung Kim and Lightning Man with Jeffrey Dennis Smith. She has also written the opera “The Community” with Kevin Cummines. Her songs have been heard at venues from Lincoln Center to the Duplex, where she performed her one-woman show Not Coming Back. She’s written for American Theatre Magazine, is a contributing editor for the publication Musical Theater Today, and created and hosts the musical theater podcast Scene to Song. She holds an M.F.A. from the Graduate Musical Theatre Writing Program at NYU and a B.A. from Barnard College.