KRISTIN CHENOWETH: The Hollywood Interview

This article originally appeared in the April 2003 issue of Venice Magazine, when Kristin was still making her first inroads in Hollywood. She was just starting the production of Wicked.

by Terry Keefe
Kristin Chenoweth has just been through an experience that would make most performers have a nervous breakdown but she didn’t bat an eye. When we meet, she’s at the swank Renaissance Hollywood Hotel where ABC is presenting all of its newest shows and specials to the press. One of their crown jewels this winter is The Wonderful World of Disney’s production of Meredith Wilson’s "The Music Man," in which Kristin stars as Marian Paroo opposite Matthew Broderick, who plays con man Harold Hill. She recounts, “Yesterday, there was a room full of critics. There were 400 of them. And the producers of The Music Man asked me to sing, which they don’t usually do. I sang ‘Till There Was You.’ It was so fun. There’s just something about a live audience. I do great under pressure.” That shouldn’t be a surprise. Kristin has come to Hollywood via her conquering of Broadway, a place where there are no second takes if you make a mistake.

Now, how she got to Broadway - that’s a story in and of itself and it’s the stuff show biz dreams are made of. Kristin grew up in Broken Arrow, Oklahoma and attended Oklahoma City University where she earned a bachelor degree in musical theater and a master’s in opera performance. Opera would give her one great opportunity in the form of a fully paid scholarship to Philadelphia’s Academy of Vocal Arts, but that opportunity would lead to another very different one. Remembers Kristin, “Two weeks before the Academy of Vocal Arts program started, I moved to New York just to help my friend move into his apartment. He went to an audition [for an off-Broadway production of Animal Crackers] and I said, ‘You know, I'm just going to go to see what it's like.’ And I went and I waited 7 hours because I wasn't even a member of the union. But I was so fascinated by the process, with people coming in and out, and I signed up for the Non-Equity list.” At the very end of the day, Kristin finally got in for her audition, which she nailed so incredibly that the casting people asked her with wide eyes, “Who are you?!” Kristin replied, “I'm just here for fun. I'm from Oklahoma and I'm going to be an opera singer." They said, "Well, do you have an agent?" She said, "No, I don't have an agent." And they said, "Who would we call if we want to offer you this part?" Kristin answered, “Well, I guess my dad.” Sure enough, she got the part and her father was the one who negotiated her first contract. It would be a difficult decision to forgo the Academy of Vocal Arts to take on Broadway, but it proved fortuitous because she quickly found herself booked solid for the next two years doing all types of theater, from an off-Broadway production of The Fantastics to productions at the famed Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis. Kristin would eventually make her debut on Broadway in a production of Moliere’s Scapin. Then in 1997, her role as Precious McGuire in the musical Steel Pier would earn her an award from Theatre World. And looming on the horizon was a well-intentioned but oft-harangued boy named Charlie Brown.

You may remember the character of Sally from the Peanuts comic strips by Charles Schulz. As Charlie Brown’s sarcastic little sister, she sort of served as an ongoing Greek chorus for everything her older brother did and provided some of the strip’s best laughs. But for whatever reason, the character wasn’t included in the original musical of You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown. When a revival of the show was planned for the 1998-99 season on Broadway, the producers decided to write Sally into the show, with Kristin creating the role. Rave reviews followed and Kristin was soon catapulted upwards faster than Charlie Brown when Lucy yanks the football away from him. She would sweep the Tony, Drama Desk, and Outer Critics Circle Awards as the season’s “Best Featured Actress in a Musical.” That would lead to her being cast as Miss Lily St. Regis in an acclaimed ABC television adaptation of Annie in 1999, and she would also be offered her own sitcom, “Kristin,” which would appear briefly on NBC in 2001. Somewhere in the middle of all that she found time to release a critically lauded CD entitled Let Yourself Go.

“Let yourself go” would also be good advice for her character Marian, the single librarian from "The Music Man," who can’t quite bring herself to see that the love of her life might have just stepped off the train in the form of Matthew Broderick’s Harold Hill. With her portrayal of Marian, Kristin proves her mettle in a dramatic musical role, something she had been looking to do for some time. Says Kristin, “I'm usually known for the comedic roles. This was so different. I knew I could do it. But I'm so glad the producers thought of me for this part. I also wanted to take the role because of the acting. It's a very dramatic and very intimate piece. And the love story is so strong in our version. I loved what the producers had in mind for it - they wanted to make it realistic.” And realistic it is indeed. As directed by Jeff Bleckner, the style of "The Music Man" doesn’t scrimp on the flash you want in the musical numbers, but it also feels quite real, unlike the fantasy “musical land” of many such adaptations. When Harold Hill steps off the train into Marian’s town in Iowa at the beginning of the film, you feel like you’re really there, and the characters are also very well-developed in between the songs, so that they’re much more than archetypes. The result is a delightful reinvention of The Music Man which preserves the great tunes of the original but also feels more contemporary. And Kristin is really given a chance to show all of America why she is so beloved on Broadway. Her lovely voice soars and you’ll be rooting for the lovelorn Marian from the first scene.


Had you done The Music Man in any form before, like in high school or college?
Kristin Chenoweth: Never, never. It seemed to kind of come into my life all of a sudden. I did "The Music Man" the movie and then I did it at the Hollywood Bowl. I had just come from this intimate camera thing and then to the Hollywood Bowl, which is one of the bigger places in the world [laughs]. And I'm a creature of the theatre, but the director was like "Okay Kristin, you need to bring it [motions for 'playing it bigger']." I had been [playing it smaller for the camera] for four months in the movie version, but finally I got back there, back to playing it to the last row.

Was it a hard adjustment originally to have to bring the material "down" for the small screen?

It wasn't for me. I think The Music Man is a much more intimate piece than people realize. I think Robert Preston (who played Harold Hill in the 1962 film adaptation) is amazing and I loved what he did obviously, it's classic. But I think the material stands out to be played in a much smaller way. I know that one of the things Matthew and I wanted to do was to really bring out the love story rather than just saying "Here it is!" We really wanted to make it heartfelt. I really wanted people to root for Marian to be with him. I wanted people to go, "Be with him! Give up all your beliefs and everything and go for it." And I think a lot of women, especially today, can relate to that. Being afraid to let go. I know in my own personal life I've had that issue. Trusting and being afraid to let go when you realize you really do love somebody. I also really wanted to play it that she hadn't found the right guy, that she wasn't going to settle. Instead of "poor Marian, she's the old maid." And again, I think a lot of women are picky and they don't want to settle. Why should they? Why should anyone really? They want their intellectual equal.

Did you and Matthew spend much time talking about the characters before the production began?

Oh yes. And we did six weeks of rehearsal before. You know, any time you're doing a musical, it's not like you just show up and do the scene. Half the time with musicals you spend in rehearsals just doing the numbers. For me, it was just singing a lot. There was the song "My White Knight," which wasn't in the original movie, and I wanted to really work on that a lot so it was more conversational. So it wasn't just [mimics a musical drumbeat intro] and then [sings] song! So it came from the character. My natural inclination, because I'm a Broadway person, is to really "sell it," just sell it. And I guess in that way I did have to pull back because this is a different character than Lily St. Regis [does Lily voice] who is so out there. It was a challenge for me, and I think a good transition for me to play the leading lady. It was important for me to do.

The musical is making a comeback in Hollywood. It seems like this is a good time to be you.

I'm very excited. For me, it's like "C'mon, let's have that trickle-down effect from Moulin Rouge! and Chicago just keep on going." Because it has been frustrating for a performer like me who is very unique, and who sings and dances. Even on Broadway. Because not a lot of the new stuff I'm really right for, i.e. Rent. I can do it, but I don't really see myself that way. I'm really a product of the old-fashioned musical. I love doing stylized work. I just have an affinity for it. I think there are some people who are contemporary and do great in that and I like working in it, but there's an element of "old-fashionism" in me. I have an album out which is 30s and 40s music. It just seems so logical that I would do that record because if I believed in reincarnation, that era would have been a time I lived.

Are there any particular musicals you'd love to help make into films?

Mmm-hmm! On a Clear Day You Can See Forever. Because as much as I love the Barbra Streisand movie, I think there's room now with the fantasy - she goes back in time, it would be really cool to film that stuff. We could do so much with it, with the camera. I hate to even touch Oklahoma! but you know, it's 2003. It's a different time. I'd love to do Oklahoma! Pajama Game is another really fun show.

The stars of Broadway used to be the biggest stars in America. Do you ever think that maybe you were born in the wrong era?

Yeah, I do. It's kind of frustrating because I do see myself in that way. And other people do too - I get asked that a lot. I do feel sometimes, "Gee, why couldn't I have been born 50 years prior?" But there's a reason I'm here now and the way I see it, maybe these (Hollywood musicals) are going to come back. Maybe I'll get some opportunities to do some cool things for film. I'm all for people doing more musicals on television also. Because I grew up in Oklahoma and I didn't get to come to New York whenever I wanted. I never even saw a Broadway show until I was in college. My parents took me to the road touring companies of the shows and to the ballet. That was my fix. When they played The Sound of Music or The Wizard of Oz (on television), I was like, "Nobody mess with me, man. The Sound of Music is on. Everybody get out, I'm having my cookies and I'm watching the show!"

Besides the fact that the music is great in them, is there anything about the older musicals which you identify with personally?

Yeah, I think you can be sexy but I think it's even sexier to have an innocence about you, not to give it all up. And that's very popular of that time. Not a slam against any singers today, but it's just so all out there. That's why we have weight obsession, and 10 year olds are wearing hardly any clothes. I'm not trying to get on my soap box, but I just think the public is speaking and we do long for a more innocent time. We live in a time, as you know, when the world is completely up in arms. We really don't know what's going to happen. So things like Music Man, I think people are just going to eat it up. We have "Who Wants to be a Millionaire?", "The Bachelorette," "Joe Millionaire," "Fear Factor." I mean, how many of these shows can we have? Don't we have enough reality in our lives already? How about a little fantasy? Where the stories actually make sense and hold up, you know?

Tell us about how your involvement with the role of Sally in Charlie Brown originated.

This was the revival. They had done it in like '67. They had the role of Patty in there normally, not Peppermint Patty, just Patty. Kind of like an amalgam of all the girls. And when I auditioned, I go in and sing and the director looks at me and goes, "Look, I have an idea but I can't tell you about it right now because it has to get ok'd by Charles Schulz. But I can't tell you about it until you tell me if you're going to do the job or not." [laughs] So I went home and thought about it and my intuition said, "Do this job. Doesn't matter what you play, do this job." I show up the first day of rehearsal and they give us all this paraphernalia, as part of the Schulz estate, for our characters - books, hats, etc. and when they got to me they laid down Sally and said, "You're going to play Charlie Brown's little sister Sally." Basically I got to go through all of the comic strips Charles Schulz ever wrote and pick my own material.

And Sally had some great material in those comics!

Fabulous material, little did I know. We went out of town and did three or four cities before we did New York. I had that luxury of trying things out and doing it out of town. What was so funny is that I would read a strip and think, "This is going to be a huge laugh. Huge." I'd go out there and do it and it'd be crickets. And then I'd read another strip and go, "I don't know if that's going to work." And it would be a huge laugh. By the time I was in New York, I was good to go.

Did you ever meet Charles Schulz?

I didn't. But he sent me flowers when I was nominated for the Tony Award. He called me. I was like "who's on the phone?" I couldn't believe it. He said, "I want you to know I've heard from everybody how special you are and that you really bring this character to life." And there was something in his voice that broke my heart because he was thanking me. And I was like, "Well, thank you for writing it!" And then when I won the Tony, he called me and then he passed away not long after that. And his family called and asked if I would sing at his memorial. I was in the middle of something, I can't remember what it was I was doing, but I took a day off and I got in trouble for it too. Not in trouble, but they were not happy. But I was like, "You know what? I'm going. This man is, first of all, an American icon. And he means a lot to me and I never met him." That's one of my biggest regrets in life, that I didn't get to meet him.

What did you sing at the service?

[sings briefly] “Happiness is/Two kinds of ice cream” - I would say it wasn't my best because I was very choked up. But it didn't matter because his spirit was there, you know?

Did you get any negative feedback from Broadway people when you went off to do your sitcom “Kristin?”

Not that I was doing it, but that there was an abandonment of Broadway. Which I thought was stupid because if I have a sitcom, more people will know who I am and when I come back to Broadway, more people will buy tickets. Everybody knows I'm a singer and I'm a musical theater person. Everybody. And I will always be that. That's my soul, my heart, all that stuff. And I will never abandon theater because it's just my favorite thing to do. But it's like this year I could have done Thoroughly Modern Millie or Music Man. What am I going to choose? Music Man, because more people are going to see it. And it's not just to advance my career, it's because more people out in Idaho are going to see the show than will ever see me on Broadway. There are some Broadway stars who stay strictly on the stage. But I'm an actor, why wouldn't I want to do all of it? I've just signed another deal with Universal to do another pilot. I was just asked by a journalist downstairs,"Why would you even consider doing another sitcom? Because you don't need it." And I said, "Because I like it. It's fun work! It's a challenge every week to do a new script." I want to work and I love working on TV. I do concert work everywhere, I'm doing the Kennedy Center. Jennifer Lopez does it all, why can't I do different things?

What's coming up next?

I'm going to do a new Broadway show called Wicked, it's the back story between Glinda the Good Witch and the Wicked Witch of the West. And I play Glinda the Good, who's not really so good. She's got a lot of issues, that girl. [laughs] Of course, that makes it fun to play. So that's my next big year commitment. We'll open on Broadway next Halloween.

You seem to be on the verge of pulling off a career few have done before, with success on both Broadway and in Hollywood. Is there anyone whose career you look to for inspiration, who you’d like to emulate?

It's hard because the people I want to emulate are Barbra Streisand and Julie Andrews. It's hard because it's a different time. But I do think there's a way "to do it all." Someone like Julie Andrews because not only was she given this voice from God, but one thing I really like about her is she's a really good actress. Not just The Sound of Music, but Victor/Victoria. She's so funny and she's not just a singer, she's an actor. Also in her personal life she's a real person, she's a gem. I've had the opportunity to meet her a couple of times. I did the Kennedy Center Honors for her, when they were honoring her. That was very intimidating. But she's somebody who I would like to emulate because she's done it all. I do a lot of things which are written for me. I'm not easily fit into a slot, so you can either look at that as good or bad. I'm not going to be Belle in Beauty and the Beast. Although I've played roles like that, really where I seem to shine are in shows where I got to originate the roles. That's what every actor wants really, because then they don't have to follow in anybody's footsteps.