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[0:00] Joe Barros: The music of tomorrow is being written today. The music of tomorrow is almost ready to play.

[0:18] Jen Sandler: Experience the musicals of tomorrow today. Get a glimpse inside the blueprint of an original musical being developed in real time with New York Theatre Barn's podcast, The Musicals of Tomorrow.

[0:32] Joe Barros: The music of tomorrow.

[0:40] Joe Barros: I'm Joe Barros. And I'm Jen Sandler. And we're the hosts of The Musicals of Tomorrow. As the Artistic Director and Associate Artistic Director of New York Theatre Barn, we make space to speak in community with musical theatre writers and their creative teams.

[0:56] Jen Sandler: Lifting up songs from original culture-shifting musicals in development and introducing them to a global audience has become a major part of New York Theatre Barn's evolving story.

[1:06] Joe Barros: Each original musical's intention, content, and journey are unique and extraordinary to the storytellers who create them.

[1:14] Jen Sandler: We believe that there is no formula for musical theatre except authenticity.

[1:20] Joe Barros: This special edition episode will highlight two shows featured in this year's National Alliance for Musical Theatre's Festival of New Musicals. We spoke with NAMT's New Works Director, Mark Blankenship, to find out more about this year's festival.

[1:34] Jen Sandler: Hi, Mark. Thank you for being here.

[1:37] Mark Blankenship: My pleasure. Thank you, Jen.

[1:40] Jen Sandler: Mark, the National Alliance for Musical Theatre's Festival of New Musicals is one of the highlights of our year. Joe and I absolutely love this festival. And this year is the 33rd year of NAMT's annual Festival of New Musicals. Congratulations to you and the NAMT team.

[1:56] Joe Barros: Jen and I have both served on NAMT's preliminary festival committee, and I've been on the primary festival committee numerous times. So I love it and know exactly how it works. But many of our listeners may not know about NAMT and its iconic annual festival.

[2:10] Mark Blankenship: Yeah. So what is the National Alliance for Musical Theatre, and what is the Festival of New Musicals?

[2:16] Mark Blankenship: NAMT, in the larger sense, is an organization that is designed to serve as a catalyst for the future of musical theatre. And we do that in lots of ways, by supporting specific projects, by supporting specific artists, but also supporting theatre companies around the country and producers who make musicals happen.

[2:35] Mark Blankenship: And one of the places where all of those interests collide is in our annual Festival of New Musicals. Now, every year we receive submissions from hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of artists, and then ultimately we choose eight shows that we want to present to an industry audience. And we give those shows workshop presentations, and we invite our audience to not only connect with the material itself, but then to meet the writers after they've seen the presentations.

[3:01] Mark Blankenship: So the festival is really intended to be an opportunity to have an exciting interaction with people who are making wonderful work, and our hope is that that will lead to collaborations and conversations that go on for years.

[3:14] Joe Barros: And it has, because NAMT has given birth to iconic musicals like Come From Away, which turns 9-11 into a really positive and hopeful story, as well as Stephen Schwartz's Children of Eden, and a bilingual musical, Eastbound, which New York Theatre Barn developed and was featured in last year's festival.

[3:35] Jen Sandler: So why is this year's festival important, and how has NAMT transformed during the pandemic?

[3:41] Mark Blankenship: This year's festival is especially important because it would be very easy for new work development to stagnate during this time, and NAMT doesn't want that to happen. That is why not only this year, but last year, we kept our festival going, and we brought eight shows per year to the forefront, because we want to make sure that we keep catalyzing new musicals and their development.

[4:04] Mark Blankenship: This year's festival is very unique in its structure. It's a hybrid model. So we're going to be filming presentations of each one of our shows with live actors on a real stage, and then we're going to screen those presentations at an in-person screening here in New York City on October 21st and 22nd, but we're also going to make that screening available to anyone who cares to join us by streaming through Broadway On Demand.

[4:30] Mark Blankenship: So it's an opportunity for us to make the festival accessible to an incredibly vast array of people who may not be able to or feel comfortable with joining us in person, but who still want to see and experience these shows.

[4:44] Jen Sandler: And that's so exciting, and I will be there in person, and I'm so looking forward.

[4:47] Joe Barros: Fabulous!

[4:48] Jen Sandler: Yeah!

[4:49] Joe Barros: You know, we always say at New York Theatre Barn that limitation is creation, and I think what's been so incredible about the pivoting that NAMT has done is that because there are virtual elements to last year's festival and this year's festival, ultimately NAMT has opened up their door for a global audience, making musical theatre even more accessible than it's ever been.

[5:12] Jen Sandler: So, again, limitation is creation, and it's really a blessing in disguise.

[5:17] Mark Blankenship: Absolutely, and you know, the one thing we were saying after last year's festival, you know, there were shows that were done that we couldn't even picture on stage after because the way they translated on screen, you know, the show Co-Bounders we talk about all the time, Joe, and it's just the work that's done to make this festival become a virtual content was almost seamless, and we're so excited about how it continues to transform.

[5:39] Joe Barros: Well, we're really excited about that too, and it really feels meaningful to us to be able to use an overused phrase, to meet the moment, as it were. This year's festival is actually even going to be a little different from last year's because this year everything is being filmed on a stage because we really wanted to drive home that what we're celebrating here are stage musicals, not films that we just happen to be calling pieces of musical theatre, so we're trying to find this year that balance of creating an exciting filmed experience while also underscoring that our real goal is celebrating the life of these pieces of theatre, and it's one of those things that lives in a hazy grey area right now, and it's exciting to figure out how we're going to navigate through that and seeing already what some of the artists have done to respond to the structure of this year's festival is very exciting, and I agree with you, Joe, that these limitations have actually become quite liberating, I think.

[6:33] Jen Sandler: So what are the shows we will see this year in our festival? There's eight musicals. Can you give us maybe a one-sentence or less rapid-fire blurb on each?

[6:42] Mark Blankenship: This year's festival musicals include Azul, which is written by Jacinta Clousellis, Malice Ocker, and Tatiana Pandiani, and that is a bilingual musical about a young woman who is trying to come to terms with her own artistic identity and the identity of her father, who immigrated to America in his hope of becoming an artist here.

[7:02] Mark Blankenship: We also have a show called Fanny and Stella by Eamon O'Dwyer and Sivan, and this is based on the true story of Frederick Park and Ernest Bolton, who in the 1870s took London by storm because they insisted on living and performing as women, and Fanny and Stella tells their story in a very raunchy, sexually liberated and funny way.

[7:23] Mark Blankenship: We also have the musical Little Duende by Georgina Escobar and Robbie Hager. This is also a bilingual musical. It is a fairy tale, or at least so it seems, about a young girl who is trying to travel through a magical land to find her mother, but then we learn that the magical land is actually her escape from something far more sinister but also all too real.

[7:45] Mark Blankenship: We also have Maya, a musical by Cheeyang Ng and Eric Sorrels, which tells the story of a fictional woman inside of the actual revolution that Gandhi helped create in India in the 1930s.

[7:58] Mark Blankenship: We have the musical Missing Peace by Kyle Puccia and Kalani Kwepo, and that is a show about a Native American man who wakes up from a coma and has suddenly got a completely different personality, and everyone in his community tries to understand, did you or did you not leave behind the person that you were?

[8:16] Mark Blankenship: We also have Private Gomer Jones by Marshall Palin, which is based on the true story of a deaf Welsh sniper from World War I, and it uses interesting sound foley effects to immerse us in the world of this soldier who succeeded where no one thought he could.

[8:32] Mark Blankenship: And we have the musical Senior Class by Melvin Tunstall III and Greg Borowski, which was also conceived by Kevin Duda, and it is the story of a group of high school students in Harlem whose senior musical is canceled, so they decide that they're going to take matters into their own hands and rewrite George Bernard Shaw's Pygmalion with brand new songs, and the result is very fun and upbeat, is what I will say.

[8:56] Mark Blankenship: And finally, we have T.L.D.R. Thelma Louise Dyke Remix by Ella Rose Cherry and Brandon James Gwynn. It begins with characters T and L driving their convertible off the edge of a cliff and into a fantasy-driven, irreverent, queer rock world where a rock band of lesbian musicians takes them on an unforgettable adventure.

[9:21] Mark Blankenship: So it's a really very diverse array of styles, sounds, stories, and I am very excited for people to be able to experience them.

[9:30] Jen Sandler: Absolutely, and you know, I think this lineup, I don't know how you feel, Joe, this is one of the most exciting lineups I've ever heard for the festival, and to see these shows on their feet, I can't wait.

[9:40] Joe Barros: It is a really eclectic and diverse group of new musicals. It's very exciting, and we are particularly excited about two musicals in this year's festival, both Maya and Little Duende. We had the privilege of working on both shows in our New Work series, and we wanted to thank NAMT and the NAMT Festival Committee for making space for these stories and storytellers.

[9:59] Jen Sandler: Joe and I absolutely love the big I Want song from Maya, which is called There Will Come a Day, and Kuhoo Verma sings it on the demo. You're going to hear that in this episode, and she's amazing.

[10:13] Joe Barros: Absolutely.

[10:16] Jen Sandler: And we also want to shout out Brandon James Gwynn is in this festival, Ella Rose Cherry, Marshall Paylett, people we've worked with on other shows within our company, and we're just so excited are being highlighted in this festival.

[10:28] Joe Barros: So thank you again, Mark, for joining us and for telling us a little bit more about NAMT and the Festival of New Musicals. We can't wait to celebrate these shows with you next month.

[10:34] Mark Blankenship: Oh, it's such a pleasure. Thank you for having me.

[10:39] Joe Barros: And now on to our shows. We recently spoke with the writers of Little Duende, Robbie Hager, and Georgina Escobar, and the writers of Maya, Cheeyang Ng, and Eric Sorrels.

[10:51] Joe Barros: Our first musical is Little Duende, which has music and lyrics by Robbie Hager and book and lyrics by Georgina Escobar. In the mythical land of El Flan, a young Duendese must confront a mysterious entity after it kidnaps her mother by trekking north in the company of a disloyal god of yesteryear. In the journey, Adelita finds the truth about herself, her land, and the not-so-mythical dark world that hides behind a wall.

[11:19] Joe Barros: And now here's our conversation with the writers of Little Duende, Robbie Hager, and Georgina Escobar.

[11:26] Robbie Hager: Hi.

[11:27] Georgina Escobar: Hello.

[11:28] Robbie Hager: Hi.

[11:29] Georgina Escobar: Thank you for having us. This is amazing.

[11:31] Robbie Hager: We first got to know Robbie in our community as a powerful Mexican-American performer in shows like Spring Awakening, Bye Bye Birdie, How to Succeed, and Dr. Chivago.

[11:43] Jen Sandler: When Joe and I found out that Robbie was a writer, we were really, really blown away by it.

[11:48] Jen Sandler: Spring Awakening, the original Broadway cast recording, was really pivotal for me. It's my favorite album, and it was really life-changing for me.

[11:55] Robbie Hager: Oh, it's true.

[11:56] Jen Sandler: I didn't know you were going to say this on air, but it's true.

[12:00] Robbie Hager: Not to surprise Jen.

[12:01] Jen Sandler: I was one of those people that was obsessed with it. And it was a beautiful show, and I got to see it off-Broadway as well, I think, before you joined the team. And it was really special to walk downtown at that amazing church.

[12:14] Joe Barros: And what people don't realize is that the set was kind of designed to be like that original space.

[12:21] Jen Sandler: Georgina, you are a Mexican-American playwright who believes in creating impossible narratives for the stage. You're defining your work as sci-fem and frontera funk. Your work has been seen throughout the U.S. and internationally. You're also the recipient of the Theater for Young Audiences National Award from the Kennedy Center.

[12:45] Joe Barros: Among other exciting residencies and advisory boards. So we'd love to know, is this your first time collaborating together, and how did you both start writing?

[12:55] Robi Hager: Yes, it is our first time collaborating. But Robi, take it as far as how you start writing because we probably have very different processes.

[13:06] Robi Hager: Yeah, I mean, I usually come up with a melody and start playing around with that. And with this one, I got really inspired because I wanted to see, I wanted to write a Mexican musical. And I wanted to see more representation of Latinx actors on stage. That was a big, big thing. Also inspired to make sure we talk about what's really happening at the border. And this story really, really focuses on that. But I started just writing music. This was about like three to four years and just writing music without knowing what it was going to say without any words. I just listened to my instincts. And then I started working on the outline of what this outline wanted to be. And I'm definitely not a book writer. I'm still not a book writer. So then I was like, okay, I need to find someone. And I started asking around. And somebody said, you must email Georgina Escobar. You have to email her. Right up her alley. She loves this. So I did. And I'm so happy that she said yes.

[14:02] Georgina Escobar: Oh, no, it was great. I mean, the thing about it is that I love those kinds of challenges. And I come from a music background, first and foremost. And to me, when he shared the music with me, I mean, the writing kind of just came to life. It wasn't like we needed to break anything open or sit around and, you know, battle on themes or anything. The music just kind of tells its own story. And it is very, very Mexican in that way. And as far as like how I approach the writing, it really is project to project. It's whatever it demands, the audience, everything else. But when it comes from the heart, it always tends to have those same tendencies, right? Of why now? What is it that we want to say to the world?

And it's not about what I have to say, but rather, what is worth repeating? What is that realization to repetition? And what is the importance of our messages and messaging and how we craft those in a way that let us sort of peer between the blinds of reality, at least for me, to give us perspectives? You know, that's kind of what starts everything totally. And so what was it about Robbie's approach or the material that excited you to get involved?

[15:18] Georgina Escobar: It was, I mean, first and foremost, it was the music. Like he said, he didn't really he had a little bit of an idea, but he didn't have anything on pages. He didn't have any. He had the character and it was a strong female lead. So I was like, I'm in. And, you know, one of the things that we encounter a lot in our culture is, you know, people writing about Mexican characters and it's sort of the stereotype. And both Robbie and I are from Mexico. We're, you know, immigrants to this country and I'm a dual citizen. And I find that there's very little about those stories about the dual citizenship and sort of this kind of a privilege of having both passports and not even knowing what that means.

And especially now that I'm here in El Paso in the border, seeing those dynamics play out where we have the two passports. But right around the corner, we have kids in cages. So there's just this richness that was already in his instinct to write this musical, plus the music that just made me jump on it.

[16:19] Robi Hager: And I think when you first sent this show to us, Robbie, I wrote it down because it's so powerful. You said it's Disney's Pixar, Coco and Guillermo del Toro's Pan's Labyrinth, the same aesthetic tones that they need. And I think that's so cool. And I've never heard a show described that way. What inspired you to say that and to tell this story?

[16:37] Robi Hager: Well, honestly, a lot of it was my favorite directors are Darren Aronofsky, Tim Burton, Guillermo del Toro, and anything Pixar. As I started writing my music, that's who I started picturing as directing this and what it would look like. And talking to Georgina as well, we both have this love for the fairytale way of storytelling and almost post-apocalyptic kind of stuff. So we kind of like, in sync there, completely figured out like, okay, we're a match for this. Let's totally like approach it. But we have a strong story. We have the music, we have an idea of what it wants to be. Now we need to just go for it and then start seeing where it goes.

[17:17] Georgina Escobar: Yeah, it's so exciting that you would really, you know, put your baby out here. And that's really what New York Theatre Barn does. So with that, this is the first time the material from Little Duende has been presented in public. So we'd love to hear about the first song, Mi Amor.

[17:34] Robi Hager: Sure. The first song is Mi Amor, which means my love. And it comes at a moment in the show that due to certain circumstances, Adelita and her mother are separated. And La Mancha, as you would describe this evil dark fog, has at this point has kidnapped Adelita's mother, Silvia. And Adelita has just started her journey north, and just ended climbing up on board of La Bestia, which is translated to the beast, which is an allegory to the network of freight trains that migrants actually climb on. And it's very, very dangerous to get to the north. So this lullaby to me and to the show speaks to like the power of song and love between a mother and child that will forever connect them no matter how far apart they are.

[18:22] Robi Hager: Here's Mi Amor.

[18:27] ♪ Musical number: "Mi Amor" — performed by Robi Hager ♪

[21:22] Georgina Escobar: Oh my God, I just want to hug my mom now.

[21:27] Robi Hager: Yes, that's the point. My mom's up there, so that's for her.

[21:33] Georgina Escobar: The thing about Little Duende, by the way, which is another reason why I'm in love with it, and I said to Robi, yes, let's go there, let's get ugly, is that it fools you into believing that it's this Pixar, you know, happy ending thing, and then it gets twisted and Guillermo del Toro-esque. I call it the reverse Wizard of Oz, where she starts in color and fairies, and then it crashes into the grim reality of the North, right? Because one of the things we really wanted to investigate was the question of, you know, or burst the bubble, the myth bubble of the immigrant journey being from worse to better, and really question, like, but better for whom, and what is the North really like to those people?

[22:19] Robi Hager: I love the imagery of the reverse Wizard of Oz. Super, super awesome.

[22:23] Georgina Escobar: It really is trying to play with that sort of, what is it like to have that reality hit you in the second act, where you literally come back with your $14 drink, and you're like, am I in the same show? Like, that's what we want.

[22:38] Robi Hager: Awesome. Well, tell us a little bit about the next song.

[22:42] Georgina Escobar: Sure. Where to next? Robi, correct me if I'm wrong, but it happens in a moment of the show, again, where Adelita is being basically forced to go North. She doesn't want to. She has no choice. And she, her mother is very connected to the gods of yesteryear, you know, Huevo Coyote, Quetzalcoatl, Tlaloc, and she has sort of summoned them. And so here is Adelita trying to figure out, you know, does she follow this journey North, or does she follow her own path?

[23:25] Robi Hager: Dreams drift, howling in the night, as they wander out of sight.

[23:55] Georgina Escobar: Run far, far away and hide. Don't let evil find you in the night. There's a hope that never dies, and it's calling me to fight.

[24:22] Robi Hager: Since birth, I've wanted to be like the fairies flying free. But my feet latch to the ground, and I catch a distant sound.

[24:43] Georgina Escobar: The whispers of your lullaby, right across the sky. Te escucho.

[24:52] Robi Hager: Rumbo al horizonte y al atardecer. Hoping it's your voice I hear as the thunder fights with the rain. Tell me, let me fight for you, take away this pain.

[25:14] Georgina Escobar: What's the use?

[25:23] Robi Hager: Raindrops play like a sweet violin. Pearly bright stars glimmer in the night. Tell me, where should I begin?

[25:48] ♪ Musical number: "Little Duende" — performed by Kimberly Chatterjee, Robi Hager, and Kuhoo Verma ♪

[27:48] Georgina Escobar: We have one more question for you before we go. Why did you feel like you needed to write about a mother and a daughter tonight?

[27:51] Robi Hager: Well, I think the first reason was because of the situation of the border family separation. I think that really made it clear that I wanted to be about a parent and their kid. Then my sister got pregnant a year ago, and she's now a mother. She has a baby boy, Milo, who's a year old. And that was a huge inspiration of making it a mother-daughter relationship storyline. And I also wanted to encourage writers to write strong female leads that are not victims. I think that's another very, very important thing, which I think that Georgina is giving so much life to already. I will never hear the word mother ever again. My mother passed away when I was seven, and I am not having children. So to me, it's all in the writing, always for mothers, always, always.

Always, you know. In Mexico, you know, my mom is Mexican, and I think the relationship that I have with her is so, so strong. As we talk every day, there's such a strength. So yeah, so that's really what it made me make sure I write that.

[29:01] Teresa Attridge: Wow. Well, that is so powerful. I'm like a little, to use a Yiddish word, I'm a little verklempt over that. So thank you so much. Or a little misty-eyed, if you will. I get it from the father. I'm very emotional. Or I shouldn't say emotional, I feel things.

[29:20] Pauls Macs: Yeah, that's great. We love that.

[29:21] Teresa Attridge: It's a good thing, yeah. So thank you both so much for sharing the beginnings of the show. We can't wait to see, now that the seeds are planted, we can't wait to see what grows from this beautiful show.

[29:31] Robi Hager: Absolutely. Thank you for having us. It's been great.

[29:34] Georgina Escobar: Of course, and we can't wait to see what's next with you. We'll see you soon. Ciao.

[29:41] Pauls Macs: Our second new musical is Māyā, which has book and music by Cheeyang Ng, lyrics by Eric Sorrels, and a book by Ng and Sorrels. The show features direction by Arpita Mukherjee. India, 1930. When Gandhi's nonviolent independence movement arrives on Maya Mehta's doorstep, our heroine's life of poetry and privilege is turned on its head. With a score that fuses Western pop and Indian classical music, Māyā tells the story of how one person can make a lasting mark on a movement and about the ties that hold us, the illusions that bind us, and the truth that can finally set us free. And now here's our conversation with the writers of Māyā, Cheeyang Ng and Eric Sorrels.

[30:23] Cheeyang Ng: Hi, guys.

[30:31] Eric Sorrels: Hello.

[30:33] Cheeyang Ng: It's great to have you here. After we've worked on Eastbound, and I got to work with you both on another project, so it's great to have you.

[30:41] Eric Sorrels: The show was originally called The Golden Threshold, and there was originally a song called In Between Two Worlds, which has evolved into another song, which we're going to hear tonight. And that new version, Jen and I have been wearing out all week. We call each other Synchronet, and everybody will know why. So tell us what inspired you to create the show.

[31:04] Cheeyang Ng: Yeah, so initially, this was our thesis project at NYU. And at first, we set out to adapt a Shakespeare play, actually. And in our research, looking for places where we could ground this in a real time and place, we almost by chance discovered British India as an option, particularly a moment in that history where people would be resisting the British Empire, which happened periodically throughout all of the British Raj's history. And one that in particular that felt really salient was the Salt March in 1930, which Mahatma Gandhi led. And as we dug deeper and deeper, we realized that the Salt March and this really complicated relationship between the British Empire and India and what India would become, all of that was way more interesting than just an adaptation of a Shakespeare play.

And so we broke off from that, and now it's its own piece of historical fiction. And as we dug deeper, we came across a woman named Sarojini Naidu, who a lot of people in the West probably don't know very well, but she was a poet and an activist and a friend of Gandhi. And she was a major participant in the Salt March as well. And so as we learn more about her and her work, we wanted to write a story that shaped her and we wanted to model our protagonist off of a woman like her. So a fictional character, but infused with the elements that made Sarojini Naidu such a unique and special person. And in doing so, we would be able to infuse our own questions about all these things we were learning about the Salt March and how they relate to today and how an artist and an activist can fuse those two parts of themselves together.

[32:54] Eric Sorrels: Yeah, and at the same time, I think when we were writing, I was having like a very big existential crisis. And I think right now when we're in this pandemic and this civil rights movement, basically the same questions are popping up, right? It's a question of what can one person do, especially an artist, can one person change the world or not? And I think the question of where we fit in and art versus activism, I think that's something that is a big question in the show. We follow the story and the journey of our protagonist Maya and she is this one privileged girl who thinks that everything is rosy and everything doesn't really concern her, which kind of reminds me of today, even during the Black Lives Matter movement, there are so many people who are still sitting on the sidelines.

And as an artist, you often question, how can you make a difference when this movement is so much bigger than you? And so a lot of these questions are kind of explored in this piece. And even though it's set in 1930, I think there's a lot of resonance with what is happening today.

[34:10] Cheeyang Ng: Definitely. And I think the music is so special, it's about pop and classical. Can you guys talk a little more about the music?

[34:16] Eric Sorrels: Yeah, I mean, the very first song that we wrote for the show is called Outside Inside. We're not presenting that today, but that song took me like, I think a couple of days to write, even though the very first draft was two minutes. Because I had to really go study a lot of classical Indian music and more specifically Hindustani music. And I think understanding where Indian classical music comes from, infusing vocal percussion, infusing Indian ragas, which are basically like Indian scales and showcasing the voices of our amazing cast. I mean, basically, it took a lot of research, but immersing myself in another world of music was so beautiful. And then it's like finding the language of the show, right?

Understanding what Indian music is authentically, but also infusing it with my own voice, musical voice. And I think that fusion aspect is something that is really important to us when we were approaching the score, because as a writing team, we're really drawn to stories that take the West and the East and bridge them together somehow. And that's not just Māyā, that's a lot of the other projects that we've been working on. And we wanted the score to not only connect the West and the East, the way the situation does, but we wanted it to connect the past and the present because of how we feel the story resonates today. And ultimately, we also want to be true to the story and true to ourselves at the same time. So that's what we're going for.

[36:59] Cheeyang Ng: Yeah, I mean, I think that's something that Eric does really, really well, the fusion. And that's what he also does in Eastbound. So I think we're ultimately really excited to hear this first song. So can you tell us about that?

[37:12] Eric Sorrels: Right, so this first song is going to be There Will Come a Day, sung by Kuhoo Verma. And it's our first big introduction to Maya Mehta, who is at the center of this story. She's a Cambridge-educated poet, and she's back at home, but she's finally completed her collection, her first debut collection of poetry. And she's sending it off in the mail to the Cambridge University Press to be considered for publication. And she is thrilled. She's so proud of her work, and she's dying for the approval of these Western British critics that she has been looking up to. And so as she sends it off, she's envisioning the future that awaits her. And when she sings the song, the earth shakes. So buckle your seatbelt.

[38:43] ♪ Musical number: "The Banyan Tree" — performed by Kuhu Verma and Kimberly Chatterjee ♪

[40:28] Arpita Mukherjee: And at an open share about two years ago, almost two years ago, I basically went up to Arpita and said, I have the show that talks about the 1930 Salt March, and it's basically a kernel of an idea, and we don't really know where to go with it. We would love to work with you to help shape this piece and discover what it is. Wow, and Arpita, tell us more about how you came on and your work with the show.

[40:57] Arpita Mukherjee: Yeah, hi. Oh, my God, that song. Thank you for joining us tonight. Of course, of course, thank you. Thank you for having me. Yeah, that's how it happened, and then we met for Thai food, and we talked more about the idea, and I think they were going into the NYU graduate thesis presentation, so that was the first time. We had talked a lot, that we worked on the show together, and I think I was just thinking about all the development the show has had and how much it's changed, and I just really wanted to, I wanted to really recognize that Cheeyang and Eric have both been the kind of writers where they have always been open to even taking their darlingest darlings, like that song, which was "In Between Two Worlds," and, you know, being open to really digging into what the drama of the show actually wanted to be and what this piece really wanted to be.

So we worked on the graduate thesis together, and then we were really fortunate to get the opportunity to go to Live and In Color, which is run by Devan and Janki, who's the artistic director there, to have about two weeks, I don't know, it felt like a year, but it was two weeks up in Connecticut, where, I mean, I think the show completely changed by that time, and we had all our actors with us, Kuhu was with us, Jamin, who was in Rona's thing, was with us, we had our whole cast, and Kimberly, who we'll hear from, was also with us, so we had the opportunity to really talk in depth with the actors and develop the show really much more there. I think Act One took shape there, and then we were at Pace U Musical Lab, that was the time when we were all gathered, and that was when they really did the work of taking apart Act Two.

And all of that work, Act One, Act Two, culminated in February, we did an industry read at Hippocrate Theatre Company, which is the company I founded and I'm the artistic director of. Yeah, that was sort of like, I think we had all these plans, I mean, I think Cheeyang can talk about, or Eric, you can talk about what was supposed to happen, but that feels like, and we were just on this sort of train, but it's been a really exciting process to actually really discover all the themes and the piece, and for me, as a person who's from India and has lived in India for much of my life, it was sort of like really getting to know a place, because you know, in India, the history we're taught is mostly colonial, so it was sort of like learning that part of history from the voices of people like Sarojini and I do who were actually there, it was really exciting.

We had a meeting just last week and we started talking about, you know, taking apart the first 25 minutes again and figuring out really what the dramaturgy of the show is, right? I think following only seven characters, each character seems very necessary to take up a lot of space in the narrative, but also to the main point of the show, like what do we leave behind when we leave this world? I think as an artist, we sometimes, like I said, we don't know what the answer is, and I know that I find my answer through my art, and so that kind of really reflects in this piece. And you know, sometimes it is painful to take it apart and put it back together, but every time we've done it, on the other side, we've been able to move the story and the piece just a little bit forward, and so we're excited to do that again now this year in the ways that we can.

[44:40] Pauls Macs: You guys are such an amazing team. I love to hear that amazing stuff. And I know when the time is right, post this entire thing, we'll see the show when it's ready.

[44:50] Arpita Mukherjee: Absolutely, and we really can't wait for it. We'd love to hear more about your second song, which is a duet.

[44:55] Cheeyang Ng: The second song is called "The Banyan Tree," and it's sung by Maya, who is, again, played by Kuhu Verma, who sang the first song, and Harini, who is played by Kimberly Chatterjee. And Harini is a Dalit who is in the scheduled cast. She's untouchable. She's as far apart in terms of the caste system from Maya as is imaginable, and she used to be a servant for Maya's family. And now Harini is an active member of the Salt March and the movement for Indian independence, right? And so she's actually kind of the catalyst in the first act to bring Maya into that world. And she's the one who brings her into that world of Gandhi's philosophy and the Salt March and civil disobedience. And now by the time we've reached this point in act two, Maya is a completely different person from where she was at the beginning thanks to Harini's renewed relationship with her.

And so now they're here. It's the night before this final sort of moment in the Salt March, and they have these huge questions about what's next because the march is about to come to an end, but that's not really the end of everything. It's only actually just the beginning of real change, and they're starting to have some doubts, and they're starting to wonder how they can make sure that they leave something behind to make sure all of the work that they're doing lasts. And these are huge questions, you know? And so they're not afraid to confront those doubts in the song, and it's okay for them to wonder if it's going to be better or worse thanks to what they've done or if it's going to matter at all because the only way that they feel like they're able to move forward is by grappling with those questions, and what ultimately happens is they affirm the love and respect that they have for each other, which I think is really beautiful. So "The Banyan Tree" is sort of trying to capture all of that.

[50:40] Pauls Macs: Guys, we so love that. We so love that this show really is the future of musical theater and you're really creating something special. So thank you. We are so excited about this and we can't wait for more people to know about this beautiful show.

[50:55] Cheeyang Ng: Thank you.

[50:56] Arpita Mukherjee: Thank you so much for having us too. Good night.

[51:00] Pauls Macs: If you enjoyed The Musicals of Tomorrow, please rate, subscribe, and share. The podcast is co-produced and edited by Hector Flores Jr. Our theme song, The Music of Tomorrow, was written by Lynn Shankle and Sarah Cooper for their all-female identifying musical Perpetual Sunshine and The Ghost Girls. Join us next time for more of The Musicals of Tomorrow.