By Andrew Gans
19 Sep 2008
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| Elena Shaddow |
News, views and reviews about the multi-talented women of the musical theatre and the concert/cabaret stage.
ELENA SHADDOW
Singer-actress Elena Shaddow, who made her Broadway debut during the original New York run of the epic musical Les Misérables, is about to mark another first: her New York Musical Theatre Festival bow. Shaddow has been cast as Cassie Purdy in Idaho!, "The Comedy Musical" that will play a limited engagement Sept. 25-Oct. 4 at Off-Broadway's 37 Arts Theatre. Directed by Matt Lenz, the new musical penned by Buddy Sheffield and Keith Thompson — described as "a tale of love and sex on the prairie baked to bawdy perfection and set during the 'Golden era' of Broadway" — also features Rob Sutton, Beth Curry, Jay Rogers, Ramona Keller, Blake Hammond and Stacy Todd Holt, among others. Shaddow, whose Broadway credits also include Sweet Smell of Success, the Tony-winning revival of Nine, the 2004 production of Fiddler on the Roof and Andrew Lloyd Webber's The Woman in White, also played the role of the love-struck Clara in the national touring company of Adam Guettel and Craig Lucas'The Light in the Piazza. These days, the young artist is especially busy, combining her stage work with her newest role as mom to seven-month-old baby girl Adelina Rose Harrington. I recently had the pleasure of chatting with Shaddow about her current work for NYMF as well as her roles in Les Miz, Nine and Piazza; that interview follows.
Question: How did you get involved with Idaho!?
Elena Shaddow: Well, I, like anyone else, had auditioned, but prior to that I worked in college with the guy who wrote the music to the show, Keith Thompson. He had contacted me about a reading that they were doing in New York last fall . . . but I was out on tour with The Light in the Piazza, so I couldn't do it. And then this all came about for NYMF. He wrote me an email, and he said, "Would you consider coming in to audition?" And I, of course, said, "Yes," and the rest is history. [Laughs.]
Question: Had you done a NYMF show before, or is this your first?
Shaddow: No, this is it — my first time being a part of NYMF.
Shaddow: It's the same as any production contract. It's six days a week, ten to six. It's a full rehearsal schedule, but it's just truncated. It's very short — two weeks.
Question: How are rehearsals going so far?
Shaddow: Great. It's very fast and furious. We're already up on our feet running scenes.
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| Elena Shaddow with Idaho! co-star Rob Sutton |
| photo by Richard Termine |
Shaddow: I play Cassie Purdy, Cassandra Purdy, and she is the mail-order bride who arrives in town of . . .The town that I arrive in is this tiny little Podunk town in the middle of Idaho. I play this mail-order bride that arrives to marry the wrong man, and then I fall in love with the right man. That's pretty much my character. She is the regular old ingénue, very innocent and sweet.
Question: I take it that Idaho! is a send-up of musical comedies?
Shaddow: It definitely it. It is 100 percent an homage to the golden age of those musicals from the fifties, but it's a new book musical, and it's kind of naughty. It's definitely a little subversive, which is great. It's fun for us actors to get into it — we make fun of our own art form.
Question: Tell me about the score.
Shaddow: The score is actually really beautiful and complex and very fun. It's completely original, all original music. There are big production numbers, and there are very sweet solos, and sometimes it goes from honoring the Rodgers and Hammerstein style all the way to Sondheim to a very original style of writing. It's pretty great — it's really interesting and it's really fun.
Question: Do you think the show could have life beyond the Festival?
Shaddow: Absolutely. I think there's definitely a market for the [show], and there is a niche that this style of this show fits into. I would say it follows in the footpath of [title of show], where it's a little tongue-in-cheek and it comments on itself a little bit, but in a great way. I definitely think that there is a place for this kind of a show right now in musical theatre. I'm hoping. I'm keeping my fingers crossed. [Laughs.]
Question: Since we haven't spoken before, I want to go back a bit. Where were you born and raised?
Shaddow: I was born in Cleveland Heights, Ohio, and raised in a little town called Chagrin Falls, Ohio. It's like a picturesque little white-picket fence town with a waterfall running through it.
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| Elena Shaddow and Rob Sutton |
| photo by Richard Termine |
Shaddow: I was a kid. I did kids' theatre, so I'd say about 8-10.
Question: Were there any singers or actors that you admired at the time?
Shaddow: I think I was so all over the map, I don't necessarily think I had any. I think I started getting my talent crushes as I got older, maybe in high school or college. Bernadette Peters has always been somebody that I've admired. She is just incredible to me, unique and special. She is always somebody that sticks out. Of course, as I get older, and as I grow, my list expands, expands, expands, so I'm in love with every performer I meet. Now I'm in love with Christine Andreas and Vicki Clark and Kelli O'Hara. I idolize all of them. I really do. I'm a dork. [Laughs.]
Question: When did you know that performing would be your career?
Shaddow: I would say that toward the end of high school, I was pretty much set that this is what I wanted to do for a living. I applied to three different schools and got into NYU, and that was it. I wanted to go to New York. I got a music degree, and by my senior year of college, I was in Les Miz.
Question: Do you remember your first night making your Broadway debut?
Shaddow: Oh, of course. Who doesn't? Oh, my God, that's it! That's the moment you dream about your whole life. I just remember getting onstage, and I had chills. I literally had chills going up and down my spine. I was like, "Oh, my gosh, I am on a Broadway stage performing in front of 1,200 people." It really is the most incredible feeling that I've ever had. When you step on a Broadway stage for the first time — I don't care if you're the second [chorus person] from the left — you are thrilled, 100 percent thrilled. It's really exciting. It was pretty fantastic.
Question: After Les Miz what was next for you?
Shaddow: I went on to do Sweet Smell of Success, where I understudied Kelli O'Hara. It was my first original musical. That was another fantastic experience and very educational to say the least. [Laughs.] It was such a controversial show, too, which I didn't even realize at the time. . . . It came at a time when New York City had just gone through 9/11, and the city didn't really want dark shows at that time. . . . It definitely has a darker tinge to it, and people either loved it or vehemently hated it. [Laughs.] I didn't even realize that that would happen. I was just so excited to be a part of this brand-new show. . . . but I loved the show as well. That was definitely very educational. That was the year of Millie. That was the year that Thoroughly Modern Millie won a million Tony Awards. [Laughs.] . . . And we closed shortly after that.
Question: Do you have a favorite Broadway experience so far?
Shaddow: I would have to say it was Nine. That was incredible. It really was the most beautiful show that I have ever been a part of, aside from The Light in the Piazza [on tour]. It was just so special. We all became so close. We were like sisters. There were 14 women and just Antonio, the only male. We were like this little family, and it was just so beautiful and lush and sensual. I feel that that show made me embrace being a woman as opposed to a little girl. It really did. It made me grow up. I was the youngest one in the cast at the time. I was looking up to all of these gorgeous "Glam-azons," and I was like, "How the heck did I get to be a part of this show?" This little girl from Ohio that's so Podunk, and I was a part of this beautiful, gorgeous show, so that, for me, was pretty special. Continued...
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