Broadway vet and cabaret mainstay Marty Thomas is here for a show he first saw on Broadway when he was 11 and thought everyone was just really good friends at Dreamland in Saigon.

Topics include: How one pronounces “Alain Boublil;” Double-tape deck stereos; Branson, MO; changed lyrics; And why cast Jonathan Pryce in the first place?

Seriously. It’s a lot of pigs.

Featured Songs: “Out for Blood” and “I Remember How Those Boys Could Dance” from Carrie - Original Broadway Closing Night Soundboard (1988)

D.C.’s theatre’s favorite son is here for our first live cast recording from a show that couldn’t be recorded any other way.

Topics include: film composers, meeting Ann Duquesnay at the buffet, Planet of the Apes, one-note cues, Terence Blanchard, Michael Camen, Frank’s first solo show, and Frank’s second solo show.

A one-man show/documentary, a voice memo, and something you should all be reading this week.

Featured Songs: “Corner of the Sky” from Pippin - Original Cast Album (1972) • “Magic to Do” from Pippin - New Broadway Cast Recording (2013) • “Who Lives, Who Dies, Who Tells Your Story” from Hamilton - Original Broadway Cast Recording (2015)

Jordan is the founding artistic director of 4615 Theatre Company and is here to talk about the Elton John musical with a script by Lee Hall and directed by Stephen Daldry that is based on a movie directed by Stephen Daldry with a script by Lee Hall.

Featured recording: Billy Elliot - Original Cast Recording (2006)

TL;DR: Go buy Broadway Soul, Vol. 2

Featured Songs: “New Music,” “What Would I Do If I Could Feel?,” “Some Enchanted Evening / All I Do is Dream of You,” “Falling in Love with Love / Mr. Pitiful,” “Sugar Daddy” from Broadway Soul, Vol. 2 - Kyle Taylor Parker (2021)

Emily is the Arnold and Deanne Kaplan Collection of Early American Judaica Curator of Digital Humanities at Penn Libraries, as well as Web Manager for Contingent Magazine and the Director of Communications for the National Emerging Museum Professionals Network. So, naturally, we’re talking about Newsies!

Topics Include: does anyone like Dear Evan Hansen?, what Broadway looks like, Octet, sounds made while dancing, and when it’s okay to be snobbish.

A sexually explicit Godspell-esque musical next to Averno’s latest side-by-side by Sondheim’s Pacific Overtures.

Featured Songs: “Ketchup” and “Nova Phone Home” from Over and Out - A New Musical (2020) • “I’m Gay” from Let My People Come - The Original Cast Album (1974)

Alex is a dramaturg, writer, and arts administrator in the Washington, D.C. area and she’s here for Jonathan Larson’s musical bout turning 30 in 1990 that she discovered when she was 14 after having not been alive in 1990.

Topics Include: Cats (but just for a second), unfair comparisons to Rent, 8th grade, St----- S-------, and is Jon a good guy?

Was Ratatouille a watershed?

Featured Songs: “El Tango de Roxanne” from Moulin Rouge! - Music from Baz Luhrmann's Film (2001)

Music theatre historian and YouTube educator par-excellence, Emily Clark is here for a show so fine! In three-quarter time!

Topics Include: Cats, Frid, Hermione Gingold, Cats, the never-endingness of “Liaisons,” Disco Sondheim, Bob Fosse’s The Phantom of the Opera, and Cats. We talk more about Cats than one might expect.

We’re kicking off 2021 with the first Broadway presentation of the new year!

Songs:

0:02:18 - “The Best Imitation of Myself” - music and lyrics by Ben Folds (1995)

0:07:35 - “Perspective” - music by Jerry Bock, lyrics by Sheldon Harnick from She Loves Me (1963)

0:14:09 - “I’m Happy as Can Be” - music and lyrics by Patrick Flynn, from How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Frog! (2020), sung by Alex De Bard

0:19:47 - “I Wish I Could Go Back to College” - music and lyrics by Robert Lopez & Jeff Marx from Avenue Q (2003)

0:24:27 - "America's Next Top 20 Something" - music and lyrics by Michael Finke (2017), sung by Alex De Bard

0:28:46 - "Everybody Says Don't" - music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim from Anyone Can Whistle (1962)

0:32:45 - "I Don't Want to Live on the Moon" - music and lyrics by Jeff Moss (1986)

Recorded 8/31/2020. Video available on YouTube!

Rebecca Luker passed today. So here’s the episode I was lucky enough to record with her back in July. Stayed tuned through the end for Rebecca singing one of my favorite Jerome Kern songs from the review The Land Where the Good Songs Go.

A meandering journey from Assassins to The Frogs to Bounce and back again.

Featured Songs: “Invocation and Instructions to the Audience” from The Frogs from the 2001 studio cast recording • “Addison’s Trip” from Bounce - Original Cast Recording (2004)

Actor/podcaster Jen Bevarelli is here for the semi-autobiographical music about not-Marvin Hamlisch and not-Carole Bayer Sager with a book by actually Neil Simon.

Topics Include: crying backstage, doing what you love, existing out of time, and living your authentic life. Y’know, light stuff.

A voice memo about Amy Adams and a DISCOVERY!

Featured Songs: “Hello There,” “Manhattan Beggar,” “One Thousand-Year-Old Man,” “Mr. Berger,” “Sheila Franklin,” “So Sing the Children of the Avenue,” “Washing the World,” “Exanaplanatooch,” “Eyes Look Your Last / Sentimental Ending”. from DisinHAIRited - Original Cast Members (1969) • “Temporarily Humbolt County” from Waiting for the Electrician or Someone Like Him - The Firesign Theater (1968)

Creative force of nature Morgan Smith (Averno Township) is here to talk about two of Patrick’s favorite topics: Heathers and the state of theatre in America.

Topics Include: why there is no theatre for teens, Beetlejuice, high school pressure then & now, and founding a multi-media empire in your 20s.

Excepting Alice.

Featured Songs: “Alice’s Restaurant Massacree” from Alice’s Restaurant - Arlo Guthrie (1967)

Director/theatre artist Meg Bunn is here for a show that revitalized her theatre exhaustion.

Topics Include: the glory of low stakes, the luscious voice of Katrina Lenk, the beauty of simplicity, and it's just a good show.