LESLIE KRITZER
Leslie Kritzer, one of the most exciting musical theatre actresses to emerge in the past decade, is back onstage in the new Off-Broadway musical Rooms: a rock romance, which is currently in previews at Off-Broadway's New World Stages/Stage 2. Kritzer — who was a standout in another New World Stages production, The Great American Trailer Park Musical — plays ambitious singer/songwriter Monica in the two-hander, which co-stars Doug Kreeger as a reclusive rocker named Ian. The musical — penned by Bright Lights, Big City's Paul Scott Goodman with direction by Scott Schwartz — will officially open Off-Broadway March 16. During Rooms rehearsals, I had the pleasure of chatting with the multi-talented Kritzer — who boasts a thrilling, rangy belt and terrific comic timing — about her current stage role as well as her recent Broadway outing in A Catered Affair and her participation in the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts' Broadway: Three Generations concerts. My brief interview with Kritzer, whose honors include a Clarence Derwent Award (for her performance as Serena in Legally Blonde the Musical) and a Special Achievement MAC Award (for Leslie Kritzer Is Patti LuPone at Les Mouches), follows:

Question: How are rehearsals going?
Kritzer: They're going amazing. I started rehearsing by myself first, and then Doug [Kreeger] came in on Monday because he's done the show before. So it's just been amazing — especially to have him now — it's just flying. I think it's going to be incredible.

Question: It's a two-character piece, right?
Kritzer: Yes.

Question: Is it one act?
Kritzer: One act, straight through.

	Leslie Kritzer and Doug Kreeger in Rooms
	photo by Andrea Fischman

Question: How did this role come about? How did you become involved in the show?
Kritzer: I had started working on this show four or five years ago and had done some small readings of it with [director] Scott Schwartz and [composer-lyricist] Paul Scott Goodman. But through various scheduling things, the show has had its own incarnations out of town, and I was doing other things, and then it all kind of came full circle. So I'm lucky enough to be able to do it!

Question: Tell me about the character you play.
Kritzer: I play the character of Monica P. Miller, who is basically a young Scottish Jewish girl who lives in the suburbs of Glasgow, Scotland. She's a university student but mostly wants to become a star — a rock star, any kind of star, she just wants to be famous. She is talented, and she's a great singer. She's an actress, she's a singer — she's kind of a Bette Midler type. She can do anything, so she kind of wants to break out. She really wants to aspire to get out of Glasgow and see bigger things and see the world and become famous. She meets Ian, Doug's character, and though a series of events they have this relationship together as writing partners and then it develops from there.

Question: Have you ever written music?
Kritzer: Yes, I have actually. I'm a pianist, so I have written music — not that I show anybody, really, but for myself.

Question: What's the score to Rooms like?
Kritzer: Well, I'm obviously biased because I'm in it, but it's a real rock score. It combines different genres of rock: It has a little punk, a little grunge, a little hard-edge. You hear Pat Benatar, you hear Joni Mitchell, you hear Sid Vicious. You hear a lot of the music from that time period, which is basically '76 through '80 or 1981. . . . Paul has done an incredible job, as well as Jesse Vargas, who did the arrangements, and Matt Hinkley, our musical director, of really crafting this music to combine the perfect combination of theatrical rock music. It has a good combination that also furthers the story, and I just think it's brilliant. I really do. I love singing it. Every time I go into rehearsal, I just get more excited every day. . . . In Trailer Park and Godspell I got to sing kind of a rock score, but it was very comedy-esque, of the comedy world. In this, I get to be funny, but I get to really sing in this, so it's kinda cool. I didn't get to do Rent like a lot of my friends, so this is like my little Rent! [Laughs.]

Question: Tell me about working with Scott Schwartz as a director.
Kritzer: Well, I did Bat Boy, [which Scott also directed]. I was a swing on Bat Boy when it closed, right after 9/11. I didn't really get a chance to work with him that much, but we did a reading of [Rooms] together a couple of years ago and became very friendly, and he was always wonderful. In working with him now, he's really an actor's director. He's so efficient with his time, he's so open. Especially with this experience, me coming in new, he just wants me to bring anything I want to the table. He's very supportive. He really knows this piece inside and out and has made this process incredibly enjoyable for me and not stressful at all. They always say that the tone of the show trickles down from the top, the top being our director, and he has just been incredible in every sense of the word. He's just amazing, and he's one of my new favorite directors who I ever worked with. [Laughs.]

	Doug Kreeger, Leslie Kritzer and Rooms director Scott Schwartz
	photo by Andrea Fischman

Question: Who do you think is the audience for the show? Who do you think it will appeal to?
Kritzer: Obviously, I think people who are fans of Spring Awakening and Rent, because it's that kind of music, and even Wicked. The music is so good. But it's not just for young people — people my generation, younger than my generation — I think everyone will enjoy it. The music is really good. I'll even go as far to say that if I heard this music, I'd want to buy the album. That's how I felt about Spring Awakening. I don't think there's one audience. I think my mom's going to come to this and love it. Even though she loves me doing Funny Girl and On the Town, I think this is a different kind of thing, and she'd love it. It'd be easy to say, "Well, the young people will like it," but I think it's a show for everybody, and it has a lot of heart. It's not just about singing rock music — there's a really good story. It's about relationships and love and how career gets in the way and all that stuff.  Continued...