Marc Shaiman: From Composer to Sidekick: My Broadway Journey
How did a composer who has picked up a Tony, a Grammy and an Emmy—not to mention five Oscar nominations—end up onstage playing Martin Short's 14-year-old sister? It's just the latest twist in Marc Shaiman's brilliant career. As co-conceiver and composer of Martin Short: Fame Becomes Me, Shaiman was persuaded to appear on stage as himself and a couple of other roles in support of Short's unique take on the celebrity Broadway revue. Instead of spending his summer watching the umpteenth performance of his hilarious Hairspray score or composing the music for another Hollywood blockbuster his credits include Rumor Has It, The American President, The First Wives Club, Patch Adams and, most memorably, South Park, Shaiman was on the road preparing for his Broadway debut as a performer. Here, the multitalented music man tells us about his path to the Great White Way, and his favorite distraction, the Internet.
So, as usual, I have waited till the last minute to write about my experience creating and performing in Martin Short: Fame Becomes Me, for one of my favorite websites, Broadway.com.
This means I will have to write this essay now, instead of logging on to all my other favorite websites. How will I survive?
Like the glorious YouTube. Until you are a composer getting to see 4,975 different show choirs sing a song you wrote, you haven't lived. Not to mention Joan Crawford giving an impromptu drunken interview at LAX or Bette Davis singing a twist record she recorded called "What Ever Happened To Baby Jane." Or the Andrews Sisters/Supremes medley where they sing each other's songs. Heaven!
Of course, there was the period where I finessed the entry on me at Wikipedia.org, the online encyclopedia that anyone can edit. This exercise helped combine my two favorite pastimes, procrastinating from work and talking about myself!
Then there are a few websites that we needn't go into right now. Let's just say a credit card is involved.
I can also say that we are trying to bring to Broadway the kind of show that used to be a mainstay, the revue. Although, it's also very much like a Variety Show. Although, with its truly astonishing cast, it really is like a "New Faces Of '06". On the other hand, it's actually more of a sketch comedy show. And with its complete original score, I guess it really is a musical. Whatever it is, our only intent is to entertain an audience.
It's been quite an experience, trying out a show like this on the road. They liked us OK in San Francisco, with Variety giving us a pretty great review saying we were 75% there. At that point, the show had Marty being crushed at the end of Act One by his symbolic angst-filled snowball, his "character's" desperate attempt to replicate Billy Crystal's boulder of pain from 700 Sundays. It also featured the brilliant Mary Birdsong as Marty's "real" wife, who, for no good reason, had an Ivana Trump-like accent.
For some reason, these two things seemed to confuse the audience. Have you ever seen 1,200 people staring up at the stage, all with the tilted heads of befuddled German Shepherds? I have.
Then we went to Toronto and played a theater the size of Rhode Island. This isn't great for this kind of comedy. The wife and the snowball were still in the show, even though every member of the crew at some point pulled Marty, Scott or me aside to say "lose the snowball." But we had finessed the show and were quite happy with its progress. Marty announced every night to the audience that I was the man who wrote "Blame Canada." Well, I guess you can blame me, cause the critics there HATED US. Not since my mother was told she couldn't take the rolls off a restaurant table and put them in her purse have I witnessed such anger.
Our friend Nathan kept saying, "Wait till you get to Chicago, Chicago is a great town for comedy and musicals." He had had a small success there a few years back, some musical about a shyster producer. Anyway, enough about him. Except to say he was RIGHT. Chicago loved us! Now I know why Sammy Cahn wrote "My Kind of Town, Chicago Is." Buoyed by this fabulous reaction, our morale was lifted and we went about shortening the show in preparation for going intermission-less in New York. The snowball and wife were sent out to the alley, never to be seen again. Although, I bet there is some very well dressed homeless woman or man in Chicago tonight, wearing an Ivana Trump knockoff.
And now we are on Broadway. My dreams of acting have been met with three roles, besides "playing" myself. I have four lines as "Estelle" Marty's 14-year-old sister in pigtails and housedress, I brilliantly play a silent audition pianist and then I stand in for Marty in a hospital bed as he plays Jiminy Glick. At the end of this scene I show more of myself than I ever dreamed possible.
Who knows what the critics will say, but, thank God, the audiences have been a joy, laughing and cheering like we always dreamed they would at this kind of show.
OK, I have exceeded my 700-word limit and I can't hold off any longer. I must surf…