Hadestown: Teen Edition

The world we dream about

I’m finding it really difficult to find the right words to say goodbye to Hadestown. This show and this cast have been the very best that live theater can be; a moment, a happening, an emergent experience that was so much more than the sum of the parts. The cast, crew, and I worked together for almost four months, and during all of that rehearsal it’s a challenge to see the whole. You’re concentrating on each song, each scene, going over music and choreography and blocking and learning each part, but it isn’t until just a couple of weeks before opening night that we really started putting things together, telling the story as a whole piece. 

Even then you’ve still got lights, and special effects, and timing for all of them. Props and costume changes to practice. There’s so much trust in the process and the various visions that combine to make the whole that’s required, all the little things that come together at the end. This is true for every show, and there was magic in my previous shows as well…Cabaret was my first experiment in getting something out of my head and onto the stage, and Little Shop was an amazing collaborative effort that became something very special. 

Hadestown feels like that, but more. Not just magic but Magic, like Orpheus summoning the flower with his song, this sudden and amazing discovery of something new in the world. 

This was my first time directing a teen production (all of the actors were 13-19 years old), and the experience of their willingness to throw themselves at challenges took me aback. No matter what we asked of them, they conquered and rose above. Insane harmonies? Crazy stunts? Punishing choreography? Not a problem. Their ability to be vulnerable in their characters, to connect to each other and the audience, to understand the story, and to trust the vision of myself and the other production crew…it was an amazing thing to be a part of. I wouldn’t have wanted any other cast for this show. Each and every person in this cast was perfect, and I am lucky to have gotten to work with them. 

The show itself? Rave reviews, with comments ranging from audience members telling me that it was the best show they’d ever seen at the MAC, all the way to a few people saying they enjoyed our production more than the Broadway tour they saw in Nashville. Audience members the final weekend were asking me if I was sure we couldn’t do another weekend of shows because they were sad they couldn’t see it again. Audible gasps from every audience for The Scene (IYKYK), and both applause and tense silence at all the right moments. I told the cast early on that my intention was to try and make a show that just tore the heart out of the audience, and I think we succeeded in that beyond my wildest expectations. 

…And the one we live in now

To quote Orpheus from the show, “Now what do I do?”. Every show is an obsession, so much time and energy to make it happen, and when it’s done there’s just a hole where it used to be. The cast has scattered to their respective schools, some away to college, others homeschooled, but everyone moving into Fall and out of Summer. Persephone has gone again, taken that train way down below. 

Next season, I’ve got another show to obsess over (hopefully). But right now, it’s really sad to let this one go. Theater is by its nature a temporary thing, transient in its existence. It’s a collective dream that we share with an audience a few hours at a time, and eventually we wake up, tear down the sets, take off the costumes, and leave the theater the way we found it. Hopefully the audiences that witnessed our work were changed just a little bit from seeing this show. I know I was changed by directing it, and I hope the cast and crew all took something meaningful away from the experience. I’m gonna miss my cast and this show for a long time.