7 Stages of Musical Theatre Insanity
(For R.C. & J.M. – with great affection)
You just needed some green beans for your pork chop dinner, when right there, between the hominy and the peanut butter is the woman of your dreams. What to do with the song in your heart that is fighting to burst forth? Naturally, you do a spontaneous tap dance with the clerk and three other customers and then grab her hands for a harmonized duet, allowing the melodic strains to take you both to the peaks of brand-new, but absolutely true, love.
At least, that’s what you’d do in Musical Theatre. In real life, bouts of unplanned singing tend to be met with the side-eye from grocery store clerks. There’s an old saying that goes, “Behind every great musical, there is an equally great, but clearly insane, Director.”
That’s not true. I just made that up.
In reality, the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. Below is a rare glimpse into the mind of a Director as he (or she) trips through the following psychological land mines with varying degrees of success.
Ashley Raymer-Brown 