INTERVIEW: Tony winner Jessie Mueller on her journey of reflection through the pandemic
Photo: Jessie Mueller, a Tony and Grammy winner, stars in One Voice: The Songs We Share on PBS. Photo courtesy of Ellman Studio LLC / Provided by PBS with permission.
Jessie Mueller, the Tony and Grammy winner best known for her roles on Broadway, is set to appear on a new PBS series called One Voice: The Songs We Share. The show, under the direction of Maestro Luke Frazier, explores American songs that have become so popular that they’ve entered the musical mainstream. The debut episode, set to air Friday, May 28 at 10 p.m., will be centered on Broadway show tunes, and Mueller will host the evening.
Mueller, who starred in Beautiful: The Carole King Musical, Waitress and Carousel on Broadway, will be joined by Amber Iman from Hamilton and Soul Doctor, tap dancer Luke Hawkins from Harry Connick, Jr. — A Celebration of Cole Porter and Xanadu, Alexis Michelle from RuPaul’s Drag Race, Sam Simahk from My Fair Lady and Carousel, and pianists Steven Mann and Ray Wong. Frazier leads the evening along with the American Pops Orchestra.
“Luke Frazier, the maestro, reached out to me,” Mueller said in a recent phone interview. “He reached out to me and just said, ‘Hey, I’m doing this private concert series with PBS, and here’s what we’re thinking. And it’s going to be a series. … Would you be interested in doing something like that?’ I was like, ‘Yeah.’ Then I thought, how is it happening? He was like, ‘No, no, no, let me walk you through it.'”
Mueller’s immediate hesitation was because of the COVID-19 pandemic that has wreaked havoc on the world and closed her beloved art form of live theater. She didn’t know how Frazier and company would be able to pull off these musical sessions, but if there’s a will — and some masks and hand sanitizer — there’s a way.
“We filmed just outside of DC at this beautiful theater in Hagerstown, and I drove out there and walked into the theater,” Mueller remembers. “It was the first time meeting a bunch of people. I worked with a few of the performers before. We’re all masked, but we all had this look in our eyes and this energy in our eyes. And we were all saying, oh my gosh, isn’t it nice to be back in a theater. I don’t remember the last time I was in a theater.”
The staging was somewhat flipped compared to Mueller’s past roles on Broadway. The cameras were on stage with the performers because there was no physical audience at the Maryland Theatre. She said that because of this intimate view the PBS audience will feel like they were on stage with the performers.
“We felt like we were being hugged by the audience,” she said. “It was a really beautiful thing, and it was a really cool thing to share with everybody because they just kept commenting, oh my gosh, I can’t remember the last time I was in a theater. Doesn’t this feel great? It had been so long, but it just felt so oddly at home, even in a theater I’ve never been in before. There was something that felt so comfortable about it all. … We really all felt very safe. That was super-important to me because it was one of the first times I had gone outside of New York City for work since the lockdown.”
This lockdown has been difficult for the theater community around the world and in particular in New York City, which at one point was the epicenter of the viral crisis. Broadway has been shuttered since March 2020, with shows scheduled to start again this fall. Mueller was actually performing in Tracy Letts’ play The Minutes when those fateful days happened last year. She has spent the past 15 months being reflective about the theater industry and what changes she would like to see in the future.
“Someone was mentioning to me, a friend of mine who is not in the business, she was saying, ‘Yours is the only workforce that has completely stopped and hasn’t come back yet,'” Mueller said. “And it kind of hit me. I was like, ‘Oh, yeah, you’re right.’ My partner and I have been very fortunate, but I know for a lot of people in the business, it’s been really, really tough. We were just having conversations yesterday actually about our health insurance. I was thinking about it and thinking, oh gosh, I need to check on that. I need to check when my health insurance runs out because it might be running out in June. Things like that are running through our mind a lot, but thank goodness we’ve remained healthy. We’re both fully vaccinated.”
She added: “In a lot of ways, it’s been really good for me personally I think to take a step back and have a break, even though it’s a forced break, to really kind of reevaluate things. Honestly, I think it’s been really valuable also to take a step back in terms of looking especially at the theater and where we’re at, how it’s been run and maybe how we can do it better. I think if there’s a blessing that’s come out of it, I think that might be one of them, that, as a collective, we’ve taken a really hopefully honest and hard look at what we’ve been doing and how we’ve been doing it, and realizing that it’s difficult to sustain. You know, I think we’re seeing that everyone is doing their best to make it come back.”
Mueller wants to be hopeful for the future of the theater industry, her chosen artistic home, one that has given her opportunities in high-profile shows, but she understands that some of the corrections that need to take place are not easy fixes. Still, in her mind, progress needs to be made.
“Sometimes you talk about a fix, and it seems like you do A, B and C,” she said. “This is years and years and years and years of doing things one way that need to be reflected upon and altered, so I want to be hopeful. I want to be really hopeful, and I want to be a part of better change as much as I can. It was interesting. I was working with some students online, as we do at this time, Zooming with students, who are just graduating from a theater program, and it was fascinating to hear their questions. But at the end, I was hopeful. It was kind of a moment selfishly that I needed. It could have gone one of two ways. I could have looked at these young people, eager and ready to start their careers, and thought, oh my gosh, what bad timing. I’m so sorry for all of you. Nothing is happening. Get out while you can. But I had a hopeful feeling about it because these young adults were so bright, so energized, and I just thought to myself, thank God, we need you guys. We need you to come in and reinvigorate this industry and also help keep us really honest. … Thank God we have young people who are still excited and want to come infuse the industry with their energy and their fairness.”
The opportunity with PBS was a welcome one, an open door to perform live once again, even though there was no audience and COVID-19 protocols were in place. Mueller admitted that she’s not necessarily eager to get back to the eight-shows-a-week routine; it will take time and reflection. “In so many ways, I haven’t missed it,” Mueller said. “I’ve been doing some recordings and things like that because it’s easier right now. Yeah, in terms of an audience, I still don’t have the itch of, oh my God, I can’t wait to get out there again.”
In the same breath, Mueller is simultaneously eager to get back to Broadway and perform in The Minutes again. The Letts’ play has won her over and makes her hopeful for a return to the stage. “I do miss that energy exchange, that live energy exchange, but for me personally it’s been really nice to take a step back,” she said. “And I hope that I’m recharging so that when the opportunities arise, I’ll be ready for it.”
This time of reflection has given Mueller the chance to connect her past with her present and future. Her childhood was one of watching artists struggle and soar; her parents were actors, and the theater world was on her front doorstep. She remembers those lessons today.
“I had a little bit of an inkling of what this might be like and what it might feel like to devote myself to a life in the arts, but honestly what I’m experiencing now, it’s better than I could have imagined,” Mueller said. “I’m really digging where I’m at right now, and I’m also loving and appreciating that I have the choice now to have some balance between my work and what I love about my work and also my life, and making sure that I’m devoting time to the people I love and fixing up a house and gardening and having time to go watch other people perform. That’s the kind of stuff I guess I really dreamed about was having a full life, and I feel like I’m just starting to be able to have that and appreciate that. That is such a blessing to me.”
By John Soltes / Publisher / John@HollywoodSoapbox.com
One Voice: The Songs We Share premieres on PBS Friday, May 28 at 10 p.m. with a “Broadway” episode hosted by Jessie Mueller. Immediately following the premiere is a “Sacred” episode hosted by Michelle Williams of Destiny’s Child. Click here for more information.
