Idol on Broadway: Diana DeGarmo Learns the Ropes at Hairspray
Sure, she sang in front of a bazillion people on her way to becoming American Idol's Season Three runner-up, but 18-year-old Atlanta-native Diana DeGarmo is still a Broadway neophyte. That will change when she starts as Hairspray's Penny Lou Pingleton best friend to central hair-hopper Tracy Turnblad and love interest of fine looking cat-like black boy Seaweed J. Stubbs on February 7. While the show claims you can't stop the beat, it is not hard to be off it, so DeGarmo must go through rigorous preparation before she steps on the stage of the Neil Simon. Broadway.com had the opportunity to track DeGarmo through her two-week rehearsal process. Want to know what it was like? Read on!
Good Morning, Baltimore: The First Day
"This is a completely different universe," DeGarmo says, arriving nervous, excited and a bit frost-bit for her noontime rehearsal start at the Neil Simon Theatre on Tuesday, January 24. After a few cursory introductions backstage, DeGarmo enters the conductor's room—a small space with a piano, two chairs, and two dressing-room mirrors—to begin one-on-one work with associate conductor Keith Cotton.
DeGarmo is saddled with a cold and cannot sing out, but she and Cotton still get through what he refers to as "the entire Penny track." Cotton offers some notes commenting on the timing of certain lines and the delivery of others, but leans towards the complimentary, remarking DeGarmo clearly "has the range and the chops" to pull off her musical moments.
At 2pm it is onto dance rehearsals at 8th Avenue studios with Cotton, Michelle Kittrell swing/dance captain, Rusty Mowery swing/production dance supervisor/dance captain and stage manager Lois Griffing who will be on hand for each rehearsal. Kittrell and Mowery, who combined have put in over 100 Hairspray cast members, first set about teaching DeGarmo the dance vocabulary to "The Big Dollhouse" and the first half of "You Can't Stop the Beat." DeGarmo's tapping needs work, but she is hardly going to be permanently punished for her foibles at this point in the game. "We like to start with the most dancing at the beginning, so there is the longest amount of time to let that soak in," Kittrell explains.
"I have to work on my soul-ness because I will be dancing with all the funky black kids," Degarmo voices at the end of the day. "I'm not a dancer, I'm a boogier, so I've got to step it up."
And Put Words On Them: Vocal Progress
On her second day of rehearsal, DeGarmo, still sick, is back in the conductor's room, this time with musical director Lon Hoyt. Degarmo sits with a highlighter as he talks her through her parts. In the last session, DeGarmo did not cover "Big, Blonde and Beautiful," in which Hoyt says she sings: "You're onstage so it makes sense for you to join in." Other tips she receives include "Sound very white when you say 'in my ivory tower,'" "Yell out on 'You're so twisted, too,'" "Don't be afraid to be sweet and sour" and "Make sure you're on the echo [in 'You Can't Stop the Beat']." Each is greeted by a nod, a chuckle or a response of "10-Four."
I Get My Best Dancing Lessons From You: Mastering the Moves
During that first dance session, DeGarmo was taught the majority of Penny's major choreography moments. There is still the second half of "You Can't Stop the Beat" to learn, which Kittrell and Mowery teach onstage at the Neil Simon a few days later. DeGarmo masters it quickly, but has a moment of panic when Kittrell reminds her that, during one portion of it, she has to lead a line of actors. "I don't want to lead anything!" she cries out. "Ahh!"
The group next goes through the simpler moves of "Mama, I'm A Big Girl Now," "I Can Hear The Bells" and more. While DeGarmo is taking to everything exceedingly quickly, it is going to take some time for her to master which hand she must lead with when. "I'm going to be kicked off the show, I can feel it. They're going to vote me off," she jokes after a confused moment.
In addition to standard staging, Penny has a lot of improvisational time—Mowery often instructs her to "just do what feels right to you here." "Always try to give to Tracy, not take away," Kittrell adds. "Other than that it's a lot of fill-in-the-blanks for you."
I Better Hurry: Starting Scene Work
With some song and dance under her belt, DeGarmo, who came into the rehearsal process knowing almost all her lines, begins scene work. Onstage at the Neil Simon, Griffing reads the lines of all characters other than Penny, as Mowery talks DeGarmo through some basic staging. DeGarmo decides not to take notes, even though a pen and paper is offered to her, saying, "I'm absorbing it all in my head for now."
On Friday of her first week, DeGarmo's gang grows—joining them at the theater are Tracy understudy Michelle Dowdy and Seaweed understudy Rashad Naylor. "After the last time, my brain felt like it was completely coming out of my head, but I'm going to get it," DeGarmo puts forth at the start. Soon enough Mowery compliments her memory as she recalls a good amount of the staging she learned previously.
During this session, a considerable amount of time is spent on each segment of the tuner with particular attention paid to blocking, which is understandably easier to learn with more people onstage, allowing DeGarmo time to work out some of her unique Penny improvisations. She decides that for "Mama, I'm a Big Girl Now" she will use the container of 45s around her neck to shield herself from her mother's scorn and that during "I Can Hear The Bells" she will try to hear those bells inside the same prop. Also, her Penny is going to whistle silently, of course.
I Am Now A Checkerboard Chick: The Penny Look
Of course, DeGarmo will not be sporting her own look during Hairspray—she must get fitted for costumes and wigs. It's all standard first-week stuff. Her face lights up when she sees herself in the opening Penny wig: "Now I really look 14! I've actually always wanted to be a red head. Should I lighten my eyebrows to match?" As soon as she raises the question, two staff members immediately say such a move is not necessary.
End of Act One: The Midway Point
DeGarmo enters the weekend proud of herself, commenting that if someone stuck her onstage now she could do a substantial "82.5%" of the musical without major error. On Saturday, Sunday and Tuesday Monday is her day off, it is all about drilling the same steps repeatedly in a studio setting with a mirror. Each of these days, DeGarmo, who has also been watching the show and studying her script, has three hour sessions with Griffing, Mowery and Kittrell. Associate Director Matt Lenz, who usually puts in replacements, is in Las Vegas with Hairspray there, so these three people are DeGarmo's team until the end.
By now, DeGarmo's voice is almost totally back and thus these sessions are the first in which she gets to sing at full volume and dance at the same time. Her team offers nuggets of specific advice throughout the day: "Remember it as knees, knees, butt, butt," "Don't shimmy all the way down or you won't be able to jump up," "Take a deep breath before you try to jump and belt," "Really wail on your high note" and "Scoot your dress down before you get off the bed in 'Without Love' or it will be around your neck" are some choice comments. They also go over the bows—in order to get them right DeGarmo must remember things like "On the word 'fantasy,' we're all fans of Tracy, so we bow."
"I'm really beginning to sweat," DeGarmo says. "But to do the dance and the vocals is great. It's good we have the mirror here so I can see what I'm doing wrong." Not that she is doing much incorrectly—the Hairspray folks keep commenting about how quickly she is getting it all down.
Welcome to the '60s: Understanding Penny
As part of the rehearsal process, Griffing sits down with DeGarmo to discuss 1960s Baltimore and Penny. Griffing tells DeGarmo that she will give her the Hairspray film and something John Waters wrote about the Hairspray characters in his book Crackpot. Griffing then asks DeGarmo what she believes her character to be about. "She really wants all the best for Tracy," DeGarmo asserts. "She is kind of clueless—she thinks she is hip and happening, but to the rest of the world she is a nerd. She is innocent."
Griffing tells Degarmo it is important not to think of Penny as dumb, before adding: "You know your stuff and I know you are creative. Just find your own Penny."
I, Too, Feel Not Good: The Trouble Spots
There are three things that DeGarmo is finding especially challenging—playing the harmonica a bit in "The Big Dollhouse", hitting a high note in "Without Love" after jumping into Seaweed's arms and the choreography in "You Can't Stop the Beat."
"Don't play with your gum when you're doing the harmonica and you'll be fine," Mowery tells her. But, after finishing her tiny harmonica moment panting, she knows that it's all about learning by repetition. "I need to take a deep breath," she states. "So I'll practice. If I pass out in my apartment hopefully someone will find me."
DeGarmo has been told that she very well may come offstage after "Without Love" huffing and puffing. "'Without Love' is the thing I'm most nervous about. In most of the show, Penny is kind of following other folks. In 'Without Love,' she is such a big part of it. But I'm excited because it is a great song and it is Penny's chance to be highlighted, break free and show her blackness. I have to work it out."
"Now I am up to 95% ready," DeGarmo enthuses. "The last 5% is mostly the last song, but also a lot of the stuff you can't really do without all the other people."
Hello, Mrs. Pingleton: Putting It All Together
On Wednesday of her second week of rehearsals, DeGarmo is promised studio work with a Tracy, a Seaweed and an Edna. Unfortunately with current Tracy Shannon Durig ill, Dowdy is on for the matinee and thus Mowery must again play Tracy. Naylor and Edna standby Blake Hammond are there and they do some scene work, but Penny needs her Tracy. "I'm ready to be onstage with a friend," DeGarmo declares.
The following day, a mere five days before she will perform in front of a paying audience, she finally gets to practice at the Neil Simon with props and a troupe of her future co-stars: Tevin Campbell as Seaweed, Stephen DeRosa as Wilbur, Andrew Rannells as Link and Julie Halston as mom Prudy Pingleton. Durig, and current Edna Turnblad, John Pinette, are both out, leaving Dowdy and Hammond to perform their roles. The session, in which they all perform in street clothes, goes astonishingly smoothly. "You're really on your game," Rannells compliments DeGarmo after the first few scenes. Cotton, who is playing the piano for the rehearsal, then comments that Campbell and DeGarmo are "syncing up nicely" vocally.
There are naturally some aspects to work out—she has never done the staging of 'The Madison" before, there is a lot to coordinate during her bedroom scene and then there is that pesky "Without Love" jump. "I'm skinny, but I'm strong, I'm going to have you," Campbell assures her. "Oh, I trust you, I just don't trust myself," she laughs. After a few tries, Campbell recommends she squat before her hop, which immediately helps.
It is going so well that DeGarmo is literally racing through it—in a scene where she pulls Wilbur DeRosa to a television screen she really makes him run. "I've decided I'm going to be hyperactive Penny," she jokes.
I Have To Go Watch You Audition: Shadowing a Star
In order to prepare for her official put-in rehearsal the following day, DeGarmo trails departing Penny Tracy Miller during the Thursday evening show. It helps her get a feel for everything that will be going on around her. "I learned where my props were positioned and where I stand so I didn't get hit by a piece of set or a person," DeGarmo says of the experience. "Tracey was great about telling me what to do. And I was surprised that people were goofing off backstage. That was cool."
I Was Lost 'Till I Heard The Drums: The Put-In
The Friday of her put-in rehearsal featuring the full cast, sets and costumes, DeGarmo arrives at the theater to start getting into costume about an hour before she is scheduled to hit the stage.
For the second day in a row, all Penny scenes are executed. There are a few issues that require onstage re-dos: DeGarmo runs in too quickly for part of the "Dodgeball" scene; there is a tentativeness at the end of "The Legend of Miss Baltimore Crabs," she does not take out her harmonica at the right time having never before pulled it from her costume during "The Big Dollhouse" and she goes to the wrong set of jailhouse bars later in that same number. These are only tiny stumbling blocks though, the whole process is swift. "My daughter is adorable," Halston gushes. "She is sharp," Hammond adds.
You Can't Stop My Happiness: Ready for Broadway!
With the put-in rehearsal behind her, DeGarmo is truly in the final stretch. Griffing, Kittrell and Mowery sit down with her to go over the scattered notes they took during the big event. It's mostly minor stuff like: "Tilt your head back more when you turn on the bed."
Between shows on Saturday and Sunday DeGarmo rehearses steps onstage. Drilling in the proper surroundings helps her grasp the moves and soon she has down cold how long she should shake and shimmy it with all of her might. Her rehearsal journey is complete.
"No one from outside this world has any idea what Broadway people go through—it should be a reality show," Degarmo says. "If I were an ensemble member, I'd die because they have to learn everything; my part is thankfully smaller."
"The rehearsals have gone by so quickly, but I liked the process," she continues. "I am glad to have my first Broadway performance with such a great character. I feel good. I feel secure. I'm really ready for the first performance. Let me hit me hit that stage, I wanna take my bow!"
Want to see Diana DeGarmo's perfected Penny Pingleton performance? Get tickets to see her in Hairspray through May 14!
