INTERVIEW: Jason Veasey on the life-changing ‘Strange Loop’
Photo: A Strange Loop features, from left, Jason Veasey; James Jackson, Jr.; Jaquel Spivey; L Morgan Lee; and Antwayn Hopper. Photo courtesy of Marc J. Franklin / Provided by press agent with permission.
Jason Veasey has had a long journey with the Tony-winning musical A Strange Loop, now playing on Broadway at the Lyceum Theatre. He has been associated with the show for a decade, and he is so excited that Michael R. Jackson’s Pulitzer winner is enjoying a successful run in Midtown Manhattan.
The musical tells the story of Usher (Jaquel Spivey), who is a Black, queer writer who has decided to write a musical about a Black, queer writer. And this character he is forming in his mind is also writing a musical about a Black, queer writer, and so on and so on. The meta-musical is the current talk of the town, having won critical praise and that coveted Best Musical award at the Tonys.
Veasey, whose previous credits include The Lion King and TV’s High Maintenance, plays Thought 5. That’s another unique aspect of the musical: In addition to Usher, there are six “Thoughts” circulating in his mind and providing narrative structure throughout the evening. At any point these “Thoughts” can become real people in Usher’s life.
“I have been with the show since 2012,” Veasey said in a recent phone interview. “I got an email from a guy named Michael R. Jackson saying that I was recommended to him by our mutual friend, Randy Blair, and he would love for me to come in and sing some stuff for the show that he’s writing called A Strange Loop. But in the meantime, he had sent some links of YouTube clips of his music. None of it was Strange Loop music, but … I watched them and was bowled over by the material and the irreverence and the stuff that he was talking about that I had not seen in musical theater before.”
A few days later, Veasey turned up at the musical theater building on NYU’s campus, and the meeting turned out to be quite informal with Jackson. They talked for 35-40 minutes, and the actor never had to sing a solitary note. Jackson apparently just wanted to get a vibe for Veasey as a performer and a person.
“Because of the irreverence and things he was talking about, he had experienced a lot of actors dropping out at the last minute,” Veasey said about that first meeting. “They were either scared to do the material or scared to upset industry people, so he wanted to make sure that I was someone who wouldn’t leave and abandon him. And I’ve been with the show ever since.”
He added: “I also think at the time maybe a lot of those people were not really fully on the other side of their journey with their identity or sexuality, so that could have been scary. … I had already been on the other side of that journey, and I’m also a little bit of a rebel. So I responded really well to being able to sing music that spoke in a way that I had not seen before, so I was all for it.”
Since that introduction 10 years ago, Veasey has been on a wild ride. As the piece was developed over the course of many readings, he got used to its message, its characters, its unique storytelling format and ultimately its irreverence. He found the subject of representing Black, queer lives on stage, and the fascinatingly unique way the narrative unfolds, like a breath of fresh air amongst jukebox musicals and other corporate properties in the theater world. This musical was original. This musical gave authentic voices to the cast and creative team. This musical could change the theatrical landscape.
“By the time we got to staging it and physicalizing things, so many things felt already realized, and just adding movement or staging was like a cherry on top,” he said. “And we had [director] Stephen Brackett and [choreographer] Raja Feather Kelly, who I think is amazing.”
Even in the early days, Veasey knew that the creative team had something special on their hands. He vividly remembers leaving some of the early development meetings and immediately calling his mother.
“I said, ‘Hey, Mom, I just did a reading of this show. I don’t know what my involvement with it is, and how long I’ll be with it, but this show is something special. And something is going to happen with the show,'” he remembers. “And I got asked back to do a second reading, maybe a few months later, this time with music, and after that I said, ‘I root for this show no matter what my involvement is in it.’ Again, I think this is extremely special, but after I did the music, I said, ‘I need to do whatever I can in my power to make sure I stay with the show.’ … I need to make sure that I continue with the journey. I was lucky enough to be able to do that.”
Eventually A Strange Loop was picked up by the off-Broadway company Playwrights Horizons. Then, a run at the Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company in Washington, D.C., occurred in 2021. The buzz kept building, and then the Broadway transfer was announced.
“Once Playwrights happened, I thought, wow, what a lovely cap to a very long journey because I thought Playwrights was going to be the last situation,” Veasey said. “And then after Playwrights and the Pulitzer happened, that’s when I think I realized, OK, if anything happens after the Pulitzer, this is going to be a life-changing trajectory type thing for me.”
And that premonition has proved true.
By John Soltes / Publisher / John@HollywoodSoapbox.com
A Strange Loop, featuring Jason Veasey, is now playing at Broadway’s Lyceum Theatre. Click here for more information and tickets.
