Ryan Vasquez 'Plays Two Sides of the Coin' by Alternating Roles in The Wrong Man

Ryan Vasquez can currently be seen in the Ross Golan's twice-extended world premiere musical The Wrong Man as the Man in Black and Duran, usually played by Joshua Henry, at certain performances. With the acclaimed show coming to an end on November 24, Vasquez stopped by Broadway.com's #LiveatFive to talk to Paul Wontorek about bringing the concept album to life on stage, his Phantom dreams and more.

The Wrong Man is a sung-through musical based on the concept album by Ross Golan, a songwriter who has worked with the likes of Ariana Grande, Justin Bieber, Selena Gomez, One Direction and more. "The album is 15 years in the making because Ross never recorded it," Vasquez said. "He released it because he was getting flown to Australia and all sorts of places because people had heard of The Wrong Man and wanted to hear it. He only ever performed it live for all this time. It's a unique birth of this thing we created."

Before jumping into the new work, Vasquez could be seen on the Hamilton stage playing one of the leading roles. Tommy Kail, our director who also did Hamilton, came into my dressing room when I was on as Hamilton and told me about the reading," he said. "It was super low-key but the moment you hear the music you're like, 'This is it.' [Musical director] Alex Lacamoire and Tommy weaseled Ross into entertaining an adaptation of his album and here we are. Obviously, I worked with Lac and Tommy on Hamilton and Josh [Henry] was our Aaron Burr on tour. It's like a family affair."

Similarly to his time in Hamilton, Vasquez can once again be seen taking on different roles depending on the day. "The show is about a man wrongfully convicted of murder and the staging is born out of the idea that it can happen to anybody," he said. "Tommy initially wanted to be flexible in who's selected to go through this so once a week it's me. It's an odd thing because a lot of people come and see me as this irredeemable Man in Black and they come back and see me as the innocent man. It's cool to see two sides of the coin."

Having previously appeared in Wicked and Waitress along with Hamilton on Broadway, Vasquez has his eyes set for another fan-favorite musical. "I've probably seen The Phantom of the Opera 20 times," he said. "It was the first professional show I ever saw when I was in first grade. After the show there was a talk-back and someone asked how the Phantom disappears and they said that was the one thing we cannot tell you. I immediately was like, 'I'm going to play this role just so I can know.' I want to play the Phantom, it'll still be around give me some time."

See Vasquez in The Wrong Man, playing at the Robert W. Wilson MCC Theater Space through November 24.

Watch the full #LiveatFive episode below!