INTERVIEW: Jason SweetTooth Williams has learned to ‘Be More Chill’
Photo: Be More Chill stars, from left, Jason SweetTooth Williams, Will Roland and George Salazar. Photo courtesy of Maria Baranova / Provided by BBB with permission.
Be More Chill, the new Broadway musical from the mind of composer and lyricist Joe Iconis, is redefining what a Midtown Manhattan show can look like in 2019.
First off, the musical is original, and that’s saying a lot in today’s theatrical market, which is saturated with adapted content. The show follows a high school student named Jeremy Heere (Will Roland) who decides to take a chill pill to make him cooler in front of the girl of his dreams, Christine Canigula (Stephanie Hsu). The problem is that the pill comes along with a sidekick — an internal computer called the Squip (Jason Tam). Add in a loyal best friend with a scene-stealing music number (George Salazar’s Michael Mell and “Michael in the Bathroom”), and Be More Chill has the unique sci-fi and comedy elements to be a memorable experience for audience members.
The show has built a tremendous following over the last few years — first at its world premiere at the Two River Theater in Red Bank, New Jersey, and then at its off-Broadway premiere last year.
And that following is enormous: more than 25,000 followers on Twitter, approximately 20,000 likes on Facebook and millions of views on YouTube.
One of the hardest working members of the cast is Jason SweetTooth Williams, who plays Mr. Heere, Mr. Reyes and “Scary Stockboy.” Williams has taken a unique journey to the Lyceum Theatre, where Be More Chill is currently playing.
“My journey to the show was a little different from most because I’ve known Joe Iconis for about 15 years now, and he and I collaborated on a bunch of projects,” Williams said in a recent phone interview. “I was in a very early workshop of Be More Chill before the New Jersey production and was part of that. When it went to Jersey, I actually wasn’t in that production. There was another actor named Paul Whitty who played the role that I play now in the show, and I was a huge fan of the show. I went to see it a few times out in Jersey and loved it of course. Over the years, when it seemed it was getting popular online I was talking to Joe, and he said, ‘We may actually be doing it on Broadway.’ I told him, ‘Listen, whatever I have to do to be a part of this, you let me know, and I will do it.’ And he said, ‘Don’t worry, your name is in the mix of course.’ The way things work in this business, I ended up getting the part and stayed with it from off-Broadway to Broadway. I was sort of with it early on and then took a break from it and then back with a vengeance with it.”
Williams and the company were hopeful that last summer’s off-Broadway premiere would lead to a longer life for the material. They were aware that the musical had struck a chord with audience members, in particular younger theatergoers who were eating up the songs on YouTube.
“We were really hopeful because we knew that there were so many fans out there that were rabid for the show, but this trajectory to Broadway had never really happened before as far as I know,” Williams said. “I felt like a lot of people didn’t know how to translate the massive numbers online into practical applications in the real world and translate it into getting money for producing and everything. As hopeful we were, we were still skeptical that it was something we couldn’t figure out how to do.”
The producers, Williams said, didn’t miss a beat. They knew they were sitting on something special, and they kept marching forward, blazing their own trail to the theater district.
Thankfully for Williams the producers had their dreams realized, and that meant the actor was able to fulfill his own lifelong dream.
“This is my Broadway debut,” he said. “I mean it’s special to everybody, but for those of us that have never been on Broadway before, this is a massive deal. They secretly called a rehearsal to look at our automation on stage, and we thought, that’s weird. We haven’t had any issues with the automation, so I wonder why they would call this big meeting. When we arrived at the theater, we saw there were some cameras set up there, and some of the general management team was there. We thought, oh, something’s up here. … Our producer gathered everybody and said, ‘We’ve loved working with you off-Broadway, and we’d like to take you all to the next step, to the Lyceum Theatre.’ We all burst into tears and gave a nice long hug to Joe Iconis. It was a day I’ll never forget.”
The team would be sticking together for a long time. Joe Tracz, the book writer, and Stephen Brackett, the director, were going to join Iconis — all for their Broadway debuts.
Williams was elated, and now the show has been running strong for several months. Eight times a week the cast run around the stage of the Lyceum for two-and-a-half hours, bringing palpable energy to a theater district in desperate need of that energy.
Williams, in particular, tracks many miles during a performance.
“My backstage life is as active if not more active than my onstage life getting into each character,” he said. “I was really grateful for the rehearsal time that Stephen Brackett gave to each character. Even the characters that seem smaller on the stage still require the same amount of prep and actor-y work that goes into making them specific, especially when I’m playing other roles. I want to make sure I can separate them for the audience and for myself.”
To achieve this separation, Williams has a different vocal affectation for each character, and that immediately helps him differentiate between the three roles he’s portraying.
“For example, the father character who I play, he’s much more of a gravelly voice,” Williams said. “It also helps to get a little age for me. Will Rowland, who plays my son in the show, he’s actually in real life only a couple years younger than me. To separate our age, I try to give him a deeper, gravelier voice. The drama teacher character I play, he’s much more of a flamboyant character, so I pitch him a little higher with my voice and give him a bit more energy in the body. He’s really separate. Also because the costumes are so different, I’m putting a lot of different facial hair on for each character, and I don’t have any hair in real life. So I’m putting on wigs, so immediately once you feel those things on your body, you can’t help but sort of feel like a different person.”
In the opening number of Be More Chill, “More Than Survive,” Williams plays three different characters, so he’s truly playing a juggling act at the Lyceum.
“We have an amazing dressing team,” he said. “I come running off stage, and they’ve got everything ready. They throw me around and throw things on me, lift things off me. It’s all down to a choreographed science, but it’s kind of an amazing thing to see. I wish someone could film all the quick changes because I think it would be something that people would watch on repeat and just be like, ‘How did they do that?’ I just love to meet people after the show, and they find out that I’ve played all these characters. They’re shocked. They’re like, ‘You were the teacher and the dad and the guy who sells the script?’ I think that’s the best compliment that I could receive as a character actor, that I’ve somehow fooled everybody into thinking that I was multiple people. I’m very proud of that.”
By John Soltes / Publisher / John@HollywoodSoapbox.com
Be More Chill is currently playing the Lyceum Theatre in New York City. Click here for more information and tickets.
