Interview: Jeb Brown’s Not Dead

We're feeling great, honestly. The crowds have been enormously responsive. And there's always the question of whether or not something that's coming from a 300-seater like the Minetta Lane into a bigger theater... what's the transfer is going to feel like? And we're all feeling really good about it. There's an intimacy about it that hasn't been lost because of the work of our designers. I'm understanding that our sound reaches every seat and we feel pretty good about that. 

Did you find that a lot of changes needed to be made between iterations of the show?

They weren't that drastic. We definitely tightened things. I don't think a single song was changed- maybe a lyric here and a lyric there, because it's a year later. Some of the lyrics are shout outs to things that resonate in the moment. 

But then, because it is a bigger stage and a grander palette, we have more indications of where we are- scenic things that just help moments pop. It helps the travelogue element of the thing be a little bit clearer. It happens so quickly! We're in Los Angeles, we're in the Northwest..

I want to talk about the score. It is so good and it sounds like it's so in your wheelhouse. What's it like getting to perform this awesome score eight times a week? 

I'm just loving it. I got to tell you. I've always been most interested in the place where the musical theater and rock pop music intersect. So this is like a heavenly gig, because that's what we're doing. We're doing kind of a folk rock band on stage. There's a lot of different styles in this show, but it lives basically in this Americana seat. I've played in bands a lot of my life, so it's a comfort zone and it's really fun to put the two together. I'm feeling very, very lucky.  

I've also admired [David] Yazbek from the get-go. I was at a preview of The Full Monty, which was his first outing musically. He was an unknown! I sat there in that audience and just remember thinking, "Where is this music coming from?" And the lyrics in particular... "Who is that?" People were laughing at lyrics and they were character appropriate. They drove the story forward. Conversations were happening that sounded colloquial in song. He's just so, so gifted. I'm really delighted all these years later to be working on a Yazbek piece.  

And truly, nothing in this show sounds like anything else we've heard from him...

Right! I think that's partly Erik Della Penna, who he's collaborating with musically. I talked to Yazbek about this recently, and I think he said this is the first fully produced  musical that he's ever collaborated with somebody else on the music. And so you've got this Americana sound, which is  Erik's specialty- he's a guitar-based singer-songwriter who Yazbek has played with for years and who has a life as a musician all on his own. So it's Yazbek through the prism of this other thing... which is his band life.  

Am I correct in saying that you never leave the stage in this whole show?  

That is true! 

How do you maintain that presence the whole time?  

I gotta say, I've done my homework to figure it out. But also... my colleagues are so interesting to watch that I just feel like I have the best seat in the house! I'm right there every night all night long watching them do their thing. They're pros. It's a little different every night and I enjoy that. And it's really kind of fun to take it in as if for the first time. It's pretty easy thus far anyway.  

It must be cool to experience it it along with the audience every show...

Totally. I figure my character is a guy who knows the story and has told the story, but maybe he's never told it with an acting troupe before. He's sort of fascinated by what they're doing and what they're bringing to it. That's my way in.

Given that you are on stage for so long, what's the last thing that you do before you get the show going every night?  

I've got a great playlist backstage of about 10 songs that set me up. It's not one flavor. It's many flavors just like our show. And then I tune the guitar and I put it over my shoulder. I also always take 10 minutes to meditate every night because I feel it's really important in this show in particular. I don't leave the stage, so I need to take a beat to let everything else go and to be as in the moment as I can be. That's true of any acting job, but it's just really helpful to be invested in the immediacy of every moment in that way. 

The full off-Broadway cast in involved again. What has it been like to be back with the gang again?

We knew for a long while that [Broadway] would probably happen and we've remained in touch all along. We've still got so much juice! Our seven-week run was a total blessing and it would have been enough. But also we've got plenty more to give and plenty of people who want to see it and didn't get to see it. We got people who saw it multiple times downtown who've already been talking to us at the stage door to tell us that they wouldn't miss it. It's just been great to revisit it with all our friends. There is a shortcut there in just knowing each other and having done all that groundwork. We're having such a good time that it almost feels inappropriate. [Laughs]

There are so many weird (and I mean that in the best way) moments in this show that the audience is probably not expecting. What's your favorite to experience the audience take in? 

There are a number of things every night that you know it's going to get a big reaction, but you still find yourself giggling along. Thom [Sesma]'s 11 o'clock number gets a huge response every night that's just great fun.

The first thing that came to my mind though... there's a moment where Elmer winds up  literally in the closet for 20 years and the stage goes dark. [Laughs] It's just fun to listen to the audience in darkness. And I can stand there and giggle too because I'm also in darkness. I give great credit to our creators, who turned the tables on a lot of  theatrical assumptions.  

It seems that this is your 10th Broadway show! 

You're right about that. It's my 10th and I've been doing it since I was 10 years old.  I was in Cat on a Hot Tin Roof with Elizabeth Ashley and Fred Gwynne.

Is it wild to you that you've made this incredible life in the theater and I'm assuming doing the thing that you love the most?

That's an absolutely fair assumption. It is. It doesn't seem like that long a time, but I've watched era's change! I made my debut in a theater, the name of which has been changed twice since then. If I say I played the ANTA Theater, people don't even know what that was, because it became the Virginia, and it's now the August Wilson. 

I was also taken to the theater a lot in New York when I was young, so all along I knew what I was in on and how special it was. And although New York has changed and the world has changed, there's something about Broadway and about a bona fide theater district that is really remarkable. We might take that for granted in this city, but it doesn't exist anywhere else. So it feels very familiar when you dig in and you get comfortable in your dressing room and you're  doing a show every night, suddenly you realize, "Oh, I've been here before! I've been here for decades." It feels like home. But at the same time, you don't take it for granted. 

What are you most looking forward to in the run that's ahead of you and sharing this awesome musical with people?

When you're doing a show like this that has such wide appeal and that you can sell to your friends and relatives so easily with confidence, that creates a situation where you wind up getting through the show every night and then it's a parade of friends and family who come through to see it. Everybody's  interested! So you wind up connecting with everybody in your life. I love the idea of sharing it with a wide array of people in my own life. I don't have to say that this isn't for everybody.... I think it's pretty much for everybody. 

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