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Boston Globe
11-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Boston Globe
A question of identity in Berkshire Theatre Group's ‘Out of Character'
From the time he was five, the actor has been battling anxiety and obsessive compulsive disorder. Back then, his therapist suggested he give that 'internal voice' a name. The boy named it Meredith, after the mean fiancée in the 1998 remake of 'The Parent Trap.' Said the therapist: 'Anytime you hear her, just remember — it's not you. It's Meredith.' Advertisement 'And Meredith has been kicking my ass ever since,' says Stachel in 'Out of Character,' his candid and engrossing one-man show at Berkshire Theatre Group. There was a time, not too long ago, when public figures — be they actors or athletes or elected officials — kept their mental-health struggles secret. Those days are now, if not gone, at least numbered. A few months ago, Red Sox outfielder Stachel's mental-health struggles are only part of 'Out of Character,' which is directed by Tony Taccone. The actor also speaks at length about his attempts to come to terms with his complicated identity – quite literally, who he is. The son of a Yemenite-Israeli father and an Ashkenazi Jewish mother — they divorced when he was young — Stachel concealed his Middle Eastern heritage for years. Advertisement When the 9/11 attacks occurred, Stachel was in fifth grade in Berkeley, Calif. A classmate called him a 'terrorist' during basketball practice. Stachel felt ashamed of his father, who bore a resemblance to Osama bin Laden. Stachel was ostracized for the rest of that school year. When he was sent to a private Jewish day School, Stachel recalls, 'I was the only brown kid there.' At recess on that first day, a classmate told him: 'You're too dark to be Jewish!' By the time he got to NYU, Stachel had begun pretending to be of African-American or Latino heritage, going so far as to perform monologues in acting class written for Black or Latino actors. When he was cast as an Egyptian character in 'The Band's Visit,' Stachel started to feel able to embrace his true heritage. He's had a lot on his plate, psychologically speaking, but Stachel's tone for most of 'Out of Character' is far from doleful. He's able to find humor in the bumpy journey he's been on, even on Tony night, when a TV executive praised his performance in 'The Band's Visit' as he headed toward a urinal, adding: 'You're like the Arab George Clooney.' Or the time he appeared on 'Law & Order: Special Victims Unit.' (As anyone who has ever perused the performer bios in a Broadway Playbill knows, it can seem that Advertisement As Stachel was about to do a scene with The entire set was waiting. It didn't stop the sweating. 'I became the most expensive delay in 'Law & Order' history!' Stachel says. In telling his life story, Stachel benefits from his brio as a performer, particularly his musical-theater skills. He is in constant movement in 'Out of Character,' able to wordlessly communicate — or punctuate — in a way and on a level not many solo performers can achieve. OUT OF CHARACTER Written and performed by Ari'el Stachel. Directed by Tony Taccone. Presented by Berkshire Theatre Group. At Unicorn Theatre, Stockbridge. Through July 26. Tickets $75-$90. At (413) 997-4444 or
Yahoo
22-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
‘New York audiences like weird': ‘Dead Outlaw' cast and creatives on their ‘freight train' of a musical
'It really feels like the most personal show to me,' reveals David Yazbek about his new musical Dead Outlaw. The composer has written music and lyrics for six Broadway productions and has earned Tony Award nominations for each one, winning for The Band's Visit in 2018. Of his latest effort, Yazbek says, 'The reason why the story of Elmer McCurdy has stuck with me for decades is because it works on a lot of different levels, and the deepest level for me has to do with mortality and desire.' Yazbek and many of the cast and creatives of Dead Outlaw recently sat down with Gold Derby and other journalists at the 2025 Tony Awards Meet the Nominees press event. The darkly comic Dead Outlaw chronicles the life and truly bizarre afterlife of McCurdy, a man born in Maine who moves West and unsuccessfully tries his hand at a life of crime before getting gunned down by a sheriff's posse. McCurdy's body was never claimed at the mortuary, and subsequently traveled around the United States for 60-plus years and displayed in wax museums, sideshows, Hollywood films, and amusement park rides before finally being identified and laid to rest in Oklahoma. More from GoldDerby 'Fallout' gets early Season 3 renewal ahead of Season 2 premiere in December 'Barbershop' TV Series ordered at Prime Video with Jermaine Fowler starring 'Shrinking' acting Emmy submissions include Jason Segel, Harrison Ford, Jessica Williams, and these 4 guest stars The score's cowriter Erik Della Penna, a first-time Tony nominee this year, says that while the score encompasses many different styles of American music, the songs came 'organically.' 'I don't think there was a whole lot of searching going on. … We went pretty deep into the story and deep into the themes of the story based on who we are, where we were born, and at these advanced ages, so a lot of the themes are biologically on the horizon,' describes the musician and lyricist. SEE Julia Knitel describes tackling triple roles in 'Dead Outlaw' and performing 'a perfect musical theater song' in the 'weirdest' show Dead Outlaw reunited much of the Tony-winning creative team behind The Band's Visit, which is one of the most awarded musicals in the honor's history, taking home 10 trophies. Librettist Itamar Moses, who was named a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for Drama this year for his off-Broadway play The Ally, notes how the process of creating this musical mirrored that earlier work because he, Yazbek, and director David Cromer 'trust one another and have similar tastes.' Even so, he describes how the two musicals could not be more different: 'They're almost exact opposites. The Band's Visit takes place over one night, and Dead Outlaw covers a hundred years. The Band's Visit's all about these quiet, dialogue, spare scenes and people sitting ... and here, we're barreling ahead like a rock concert and like a freight train through all of this time." Andrew Durand, who earned his first Tony nomination for playing the title character, loves the range of the show. 'You get these explosive moments — there are big, exciting, theatrical moments – and then you zero in on these little, intimate, almost play-like moments.' One of those explosive moments is the song 'Killed a Man in Maine,' in which Elmer drunkenly weaves a tall tale about committing a murder, though there is no evidence that the real McCurdy ever did. 'I've really come to love that number, because it used to scare the hell out of me. I would do it and I would blow out all my gas on that number and then I'd have the rest of a show to do. … I've figured out how to incorporate it into the rest of the show.' For Featured Actress nominee Julia Knitel, the Tony Awards embrace of Dead Outlaw echoes what she's finding amongst audiences every night. 'From the time of our first performance, the audiences have really been on board. New York audiences like weird. We forget that it's okay to be different. … It's refreshing to have something that you've never seen before. New York audiences are smart, and I think as soon as they walk in, they realize this is not your typical musical.' Dead Outlaw earned seven Tony Award nominations, the second-most of any musical this year behind Buena Vista Social Club, Death Becomes Her, and Maybe Happy Ending, all at 10. In Gold Derby's current odds, Dead Outlaw ranks in second place for Best Musical and second place for Best Original Score, which would mark Yazbek's second victory. Moses has a commanding lead in the Best Musical Book category, which would be his second victory out of two nominations. Director Cromer and featured actor Jeb Brown both rank third in their respective categories, while Knitel ranks fourth and Durand fifth. SIGN UP for Gold Derby's free newsletter with latest predictions Best of GoldDerby Sadie Sink on her character's 'emotional rage' in 'John Proctor Is the Villain' and her reaction to 'Stranger Things: The First Shadow' 'It should be illegal how much fun I'm having': Lea Salonga on playing Mrs. Lovett and more in 'Stephen Sondheim's Old Friends' 'Death Becomes Her' star Jennifer Simard is ready to be a leading lady: 'I don't feel pressure, I feel joy' Click here to read the full article.
Gulf Today
13-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Gulf Today
Broadway's Andrew Durand reveals the secret to stillness
One of Broadway's more impressive performances this season is by Andrew Durand, who is a kinetic force in the first half of 'Dead Outlaw' and absolutely motionless in the second. For some 40 minutes, he's a corpse, standing in a coffin. 'Some nights I want to scream. Some nights I want to rip my skin off — that pressure that you can't move starts to get to me. And so there are nights that it is very challenging,' says the actor. Durand stars in the musical as Elmer McCurdy, a real-life alcoholic drifter-turned-failed bandit who was shot dead in 1911 but whose afterlife proved to be stranger than fiction. His embalmed body becomes a prized possession for half a century, transported across the country to take part in carnival sideshows, wax museums, Hollywood horror movies, roadside attractions and, finally, a prop at an amusement-park ride in the 1970s. 'You watch him have this successful career as a corpse,' says Durand. 'I think it just makes people really think about their own humanity: What's important while we are alive? What do we do with the time that we have while we're alive?' The musical — conceived by David Yazbek, who wrote the 'Dead Outlaw' music and lyrics with Erik Della Penna — reunites Yazbek with book writer Itamar Moses and the director David Cromer, who collaborated so winningly on 'The Band's Visit.' It's Durand's first time as the lead on Broadway, following roles in 'Shucked,' 'Ink,' Head Over Heels' and 'War Horse.' He spent many years with the Kneehigh Theatre Company, a troupe where the ensemble was highlighted. 'My favourite thing about theater is the collaborative nature,' he says. 'It's a big moment for me, and I'm excited about it. But, yes, I'm trying to remain grounded.' Durand, who hails from Rossville, Georgia, has been with 'Dead Outlaw' from the beginning when he was cast in last year's off-Broadway premiere. That's a lot of standing and not moving. 'It's different every night in terms of how easy it is on my body. Some nights I just sail through and I'm like, 'Oh, I didn't have to blink once and it was fine.' And then other nights my toes are falling asleep and there's tears running down my face.' While in the first half he's a hard-drinking, hard-fighting, table-jumping restless soul, he says he sets small goals during his time as a corpse, like waiting for the exact moment when a co-star walks in front of him so he can blink or swallow. He also plays word games in his head. 'I'll think of a word like 'pencil.' And then I'll try to think of a bunch of other words that start with the letter 'P.' And then if I find myself saying 'pickle,' then I start to think about foods,' he says. 'It's just like stream-of-consciousness things to keep me distracted from what's going on.' His nights would be easier if the show just replaced him with a dummy, but Cromer, at the first workshop, approached Durand and nixed that notion. 'He said, 'Just so you know, if this show happens, I'm not going to make a dummy version of you to put in that coffin. I think it's very important to have the actual performer in that coffin so that we are constantly reminded of his humanity.'' Cromer has been amazed at how Durand has created a character of straightforwardness and truthfulness simply from studying a photograph of McCurdy. 'Andrew Durand as a performer is a guy who you give him whatever the prompt is and he goes away and brings you 10 times more than you asked for and has completely created, well-thought-out version of things,' says the director. 'Dead Outlaw' is not Durand's first time playing a corpse onstage. He portrayed a dead man as a teenager in a community playhouse production of 'Arsenic and Old Lace.' Years later, he's just trying to serve his new work. Associated Press
Winnipeg Free Press
01-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Winnipeg Free Press
Living together in peace and harmony
When civil war broke out in his native Syria, it wasn't often that Majd Sukar left his Aleppo apartment. In the fall of 2010, he had moved to the city from a small village called Homs, intending to lead the standard life of a university music student. Sukar was prepared for obsessive solo practice, but not like this. 'I had six months of peace in Aleppo, then the whole country went to protest on the 15th of March. By the end of that year, the country was falling apart,' says Sukar, 33. Ruth Bonneville / Free Press From left: Grace Budoloski, Elliot Lazar and Ryan Abdullah Hooper with Majd Sukar playing the clarinet on the balcony during rehearsals of The Band's Visit. 'The only certain thing — the only thing I was sure about — was the clarinet.' Trained as a pianist and as a classical Arabic vocalist by his grandfather, an Aramaic priest who guided Sukar through the intricate melodies of Syriac Christian hymns, the musician gravitated to the clarinet, using the instrument as a reeded passport across war-torn borders. Under threat of ISIS bombardment, he ventured to internet cafés to watch videos of the Romani-Turkish player Hüsnü Senlendirici and Greek virtuoso Vasilis Saleas. 'I had to teach myself. Most of the time, the clarinet is your friend,' he says. Fourteen years later, Sukar, who now lives and plays in Toronto, where he trained at Humber College, is still enamored with an instrument that feels right at home whether in Armenia, Tunisia or Krakow. One never can predict where a career in music will take you — for Sukar, it brought him to Winnipeg to appear in the final production of the Winnipeg Jewish Theatre's 2024-2025 season. In casting the role of Simon in The Band's Visit — a cross-border musical that won 10 Tony Awards in 2019 — director Dan Petrenko needed to find an actor who fit a precise description: fluent in Arabic, fluid in jazz improvisation, skilful and soulful with the clarinet, and crucially, available to work. 'There was pretty much one person in Canada we found who checked off those boxes,' says Petrenko, whose mandate at WJT has been marked by a commitment to politically relevant musicals; Pain to Power, a musical grappling with Kanye West's antisemitism, had sold-out runs in both Toronto and Montreal earlier this spring after premièring in Winnipeg in 2024. 'It sadly is becoming more and more relevant,' says Petrenko. Sukar had only appeared in one production as an actor: a November production of Toronto's Theatre Passe Muraille called Mafaza. Meaning dry, barren desert and etymologically connected to the Arabic root for 'winning,' Mafaza featured four Palestinian and Syrian artists reflecting on the themes of grief, justice and healing in the context of the Middle East. With Abdul Wahab Kayyali, Sukar composed and performed music that drew on his own experience. Petrenko, who before joining WJT was founding artistic director of Toronto's Olive Branch Theatre, caught wind of the performance and was confident he had found his Simon. After reading The Band's Visit script and listening to the music, Sukar was convinced to let his clarinet carry him to Winnipeg. 'I loved the story, which reflects that in the Middle East there are so many people who just want to live in peace. They aren't involved in war. They aren't involved in blood and I believe that's the kind of message I have in my mind, that everyone could live together in peace and harmony.' Ditto for Omar Alex Khan, who plays Tewfiq, the stern conductor of the titular band, an Egyptian police ensemble from Alexandria invited to play in Israel at a newly opened Arab Cultural Centre. Ruth Bonneville / Free Press Majd Sukar plays Simon, the clarinetist, in The Band's Visit, playing at WJT until May 11. 'I was struck by the music and the songs, but also I loved that it's about a group of Israeli people and a group of Arab people, but it isn't a political show. Yes, it's about these groups of specific people in this show, but there's a universality to it. It's about any group of people, who, like all of us, are trying to figure ourselves out, understand our feelings, figure out the world, trying to survive,' Khan says. To develop his character, Khan wrote a three-page diary entry as Tewfiq, outlining his multiple motivations. 'A director taught me to make three lists: what the character says, what the character does and what the character wants.' Tewfiq, like Sukar and the show's cafe owner, Dina (played by Israeli-Canadian actor Anat Kriger), would like to build a life in music that isn't defined by conflict. 'I think it's the perfect show for nowadays because it talks about humanity, not sides,' says Kriger, who studied musical theatre at Toronto's Randolph College. But the actors, like the work they bring to the Berney Theatre until May 11, are more than aware of the current political climate in Israel-Palestine and have leaned into the show's emphasis on shared culture as a hopeful olive branch. During Elections Get campaign news, insight, analysis and commentary delivered to your inbox during Canada's 2025 election. Dina and Tewfiq's bond is solidified by shared musical and filmic inspiration during the gorgeous number Omar Sharif. The characters find common ground in their affection for the Oscar nominees's early films, including The River of Love, a 1960 feature referenced throughout Itamar Moses's Tony-winning book. Members of the cast watched the film, based on Anna Karenina, together shortly after they began rehearsing. 'It's a tragic story, but it's Dina's favourite,' says Kriger. Ben WaldmanReporter Ben Waldman is a National Newspaper Award-nominated reporter on the Arts & Life desk at the Free Press. Born and raised in Winnipeg, Ben completed three internships with the Free Press while earning his degree at Ryerson University's (now Toronto Metropolitan University's) School of Journalism before joining the newsroom full-time in 2019. Read more about Ben. Every piece of reporting Ben produces is reviewed by an editing team before it is posted online or published in print — part of the Free Press's tradition, since 1872, of producing reliable independent journalism. Read more about Free Press's history and mandate, and learn how our newsroom operates. Our newsroom depends on a growing audience of readers to power our journalism. If you are not a paid reader, please consider becoming a subscriber. Our newsroom depends on its audience of readers to power our journalism. Thank you for your support.
Hamilton Spectator
28-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Hamilton Spectator
Broadway's Andrew Durand, who plays a corpse in ‘Dead Outlaw,' reveals the secret to stillness
NEW YORK (AP) — One of Broadway's more impressive performances this season is by Andrew Durand, who is a kinetic force in the first half of 'Dead Outlaw' and absolutely motionless in the second. For some 40 minutes, he's a corpse, standing in a coffin. 'Some nights I want to scream. Some nights I want to rip my skin off — that pressure that you can't move starts to get to me. And so there are nights that it is very challenging,' says the actor. Durand stars in the musical as Elmer McCurdy, a real-life alcoholic drifter-turned-failed bandit who was shot dead in 1911 but whose afterlife proved to be stranger than fiction. His embalmed body becomes a prized possession for half a century, transported across the country to take part in carnival sideshows, wax museums, Hollywood horror movies, roadside attractions and, finally, a prop at an amusement-park ride in the 1970s. 'You watch him have this successful career as a corpse,' says Durand. 'I think it just makes people really think about their own humanity: What's important while we are alive? What do we do with the time that we have while we're alive?' 'My toes are falling asleep' The musical — conceived by David Yazbek, who wrote the 'Dead Outlaw' music and lyrics with Erik Della Penna — reunites Yazbek with book writer Itamar Moses and the director David Cromer, who collaborated so winningly on 'The Band's Visit.' It's Durand's first time as the lead on Broadway, following roles in 'Shucked,' 'Ink,' Head Over Heels' and 'War Horse.' He spent many years with the Kneehigh Theatre Company, a troupe where the ensemble was highlighted. 'My favorite thing about theater is the collaborative nature,' he says. 'It's a big moment for me, and I'm excited about it. But, yes, I'm trying to remain grounded.' Durand, who hails from Rossville, Georgia, has been with 'Dead Outlaw' from the beginning when he was cast in last year's off-Broadway premiere. That's a lot of standing and not moving. 'It's different every night in terms of how easy it is on my body. Some nights I just sail through and I'm like, 'Oh, I didn't have to blink once and it was fine.' And then other nights my toes are falling asleep and there's tears running down my face.' While in the first half he's a hard-drinking, hard-fighting, table-jumping restless soul, he says he sets small goals during his time as a corpse, like waiting for the exact moment when a co-star walks in front of him so he can blink or swallow. He also plays word games in his head. 'I'll think of a word like 'pencil.' And then I'll try to think of a bunch of other words that start with the letter 'P.' And then if I find myself saying 'pickle,' then I start to think about foods,' he says. 'It's just like stream-of-consciousness things to keep me distracted from what's going on.' He's no dummy His nights would be easier if the show just replaced him with a dummy, but Cromer, at the first workshop, approached Durand and nixed that notion. 'He said, 'Just so you know, if this show happens, I'm not going to make a dummy version of you to put in that coffin. I think it's very important to have the actual performer in that coffin so that we are constantly reminded of his humanity.'' Cromer has been amazed at how Durand has created a character of straightforwardness and truthfulness simply from studying a photograph of McCurdy. 'Andrew Durand as a performer is a guy who you give him whatever the prompt is and he goes away and brings you 10 times more than you asked for and has completely created, well-thought-out version of things,' says the director. 'Dead Outlaw' is not Durand's first time playing a corpse onstage. He portrayed a dead man as a teenager in a community playhouse production of 'Arsenic and Old Lace.' Years later, he's just trying to serve his new work. 'I look at it as just another challenge of the performance that I'm trying to give, you know? And so I take it just as seriously as any of the songs I sing.' Plenty of corpses Durand finds himself in a Broadway season with plenty of corpses, albeit none as taxing as his own work. There's 'Operation Mincemeat,' about a real World War II mission in which Allied soldiers dressed up a corpse to divert their German foes, and there's 'Floyd Collins,' a musical about a cave explorer who slowly dies underground. Then there are all the dead people at the end of 'Othello.' 'I think it's just an odd coincidence,' says Durand. One of his nightly rituals is to get on the empty stage at the Longacre Theatre about an hour before the curtain goes up to celebrate living — not death. 'I like to take a little moment of peace and a breath for myself to look out into the empty seats and have a little bit of reverence and respect for what theater is and that in just a half-hour, there's going to be a thousand people out there who have agreed to buy in on this story that we're about to tell them.'
