Education Director Monique Caldwell chose “Hairspray the Broadway Musical” for Florida Rep’s current Conservatory production because it’s a story that needs to be told.
“This is a right now message. Like, right now,” said Caldwell. “We need more love right now. More peace right now. More hope right now. In all of our communities.”
The musical takes place in Baltimore in 1962, before the Civil Rights Act, during a period when segregation was mandated by Jim Crow laws. But as rehearsals began, Caldwell realized that most of her young cast was unaware of how those laws affected not only Black people, but white people as well. Recognizing that the Conservatory’s mission is one of education, Caldwell came up with a plan.
“I created a slide show that showed all the kids how both white and black people protested against racism back in the ‘60s,” Caldwell said. “Some of them had never seen these pictures before. They thought Martin Luther King was just for Black people. I was like, no. I helped them understand that those who came before us understood that if everybody’s not free, everybody’s not free.”
In the story, Tracy Turnblad likewise formulates a plan of action to integrate the Corny Collins TV dance show.
“If kids see us dancing together on TV, they’ll realize we’re not so different after all. We just want to have a good time,” says Tracy at one point during the show.
It’s what actually happened one day during rehearsals.
“Our cast, it started out very separate, but as we began to work together, the groups, even in our off times, became more and more colorful,” Caldwell noted. “And one time, they were sitting together in a huddle, learning music, all together, and I stopped them and said, ‘Guys, this is a beautiful picture. This is beautiful …. And they’re like, what? And I said, ‘Look around you. You’re in one group in a huddle learning this music. This is beautiful.’”
Experiences like that make the action on stage that much more believable … and poignant.
Remaining shows are Friday, May 23 at 7 p.m.; Saturday, May 24 at 7 p.m.; and Sunday, May 25th’s closing 2 p.m. matinee. For tickets, telephone 239-332-4665.
ABOUT THE MUSICAL
After a successful run at Seattle’s 5th Avenue Theatre, “Hairspray” opened on Broadway on August 15, 2002, in the Neil Simon Theatre. A year later, it won eight Tony Awards, including Best Musical, out of 13 nominations. It ran for 2,642 performances before closing January 4, 2009.
The musical, which was adapted from John Waters’ 1988 film of the same name, also enjoyed national tours and a West End production, which was nominated for a record-setting 11 Laurence Olivier Awards, winning four, including Best Musical.
The musical was adapted for film in 2007.
ABOUT THIS VERSION
Caldwell saw the 2007 movie but doesn’t think it does justice to the story.
“I’m not saying [the filmmakers] didn’t do a great job,” said Caldwell, “but for me, the crux of the message of this show is about togetherness and I wanted to bring that to this community … to bring a message of hope to this community. And I think even in the audience it’s going to reflect what’s onstage. You’re going to see so many people of different colors and backgrounds, and I wanted to do something that was historical.”
The musical takes place in Baltimore in 1962. That’s where Tracy Turnblad is attempting to realize her one desire – to dance on the popular "Corny Collins Show," a local TV dance program based on the real-life Buddy Deane Show. When Tracy’s dream comes true, she is transformed overnight from social outcast to sudden star. She decides to use her newfound power to not only dethrone the reigning Teen Queen and win the affections of heartthrob Link Larkin, but to integrate the TV network... all without denting her 'do!
But in Caldwell’s opinion, the story of acceptance and rejection, inclusion and exclusion, isn’t confined to 1962.
“I told them to look at themselves,” said Caldwell. I asked them, ‘Where is there still work to do, even in you? Because this cannot just be a show, people. It can’t. This is not just about a show. This is about where do we go from here. You are the baton. What are you going to do with this?”
As this remark underscores, the education imparted by the Florida Rep Conservatory is not confined to scene work, diction and elocution, blocking and choreography. It extends to instructing the case that as artists, they are actually empowered to be a voice for social change.
“I showed them in the pictures that most of the people that were doing the protesting were young people,” Caldwell continued. “They were college students. They were the change agents. They were afraid, but they did it anyway. And I said, the same goes here for you. You are the change agents. Let’s take this message and go beyond the stage.”
ABOUT THE MESSAGE
Maliyah Mattis plays the part of Motormouth Maybelle. She came to understand this aspect of the show in her very first music rehearsal for the show.
“I sang ‘I Know Where I’ve Been’ and, oddly enough, I didn’t know how I feel about singing it,” Mattis explained. “As I sang through it once, our wonderful music director, Miss Roz [Rosalind Metcalf] said, ‘Oh this is great. I don’t know why you were freaking out. This is a really good, empowering song and you’re going to reach so many people, whether that’s why they came in to see the show or not.’”
Mattis stopped short and thought about what Miss Roz said.
“It really made me think I could really use this song to press the message of ‘Hairspray,’ because while there’s a bunch of fun bits in the show that really keep it entertaining, we have Motormouth as one of those characters who keeps retelling the message of the story and why the story of ‘Hairspray’ is being told. So I love that I am able to use my art, my voice in the three songs that I have to deliver that message [to the audience].”
In the show, the character of Tracy Turnblad is the poster child for rejection and exclusion. She’s played by Brielle Midler, who describes her character this way:
LEAD ACTRESS SPEAKS
“Tracy is the biggest and loudest and proudest girl you’ll ever meet. She has dealt with a lot of things in her life, even from her own mother. She’s too big. She’s too loud. She’s too this. And I think that aspect of her really plays a part in her wanting everyone, no matter what they look like, what race, what color, anything, to really want to be accepted [just like she’s been accepted onto the Corny Collins Show].So when she meets Seaweed and she meets Motor Mouth, and all these incredible people that aren’t allowed to do what she does because of her skin color, it infuriates her a little bit because she knows it’s not right.”
Midler, too, thinks that actors like she and Mattis can be change agents through shows like “Hairspray.”
“I think as Generation Z and generations that are in the show, I think we’re really going to be the catalysts to start creating change, especially with what’s going around in the world right now,” said Midler. “I think we have a lot more power than people think we do, and we’re not afraid to stand up and say what we actually feel. I think we are a lot more open to a lot of different things that some older generations may not be comfortable with and the world needs to start figuring out that everyone is loved and should have the same rights as anyone else, no matter what they look like, who they are, anything. And I think shows like ‘Hairspray’ really show that it just takes a few people to really start a revolution and show the world what’s supposed to be.”
Most analysis of “Hairspray” focuses on segregation, integration and the racial divide. But body image and fat shaming are also implicated by the show. Midler has found playing a plus-size character to be a liberating experience.
“So Tracy, her whole life has been body shamed, and fat shamed just for looking different,” said Midler. “As a girl growing up in Florida, I’ve dealt with the same thing, and I think playing Tracy is a really beautiful thing for me because I’ve been getting a lot more comfortable with this is how my body looks and it’s beautiful even if it doesn’t look like the girl next to me.”
Midler believes that it’s important to see people that look like her being accepted and lauded both on and off the stage.
“A lot of kids now and teens growing up maybe don’t have those kind of role models that could tell them how beautiful they are even if they don’t look like what society says they should,” Midler added. “I think it’s such a beautiful thing because everybody accepts Tracy for who she is because she is talented and it doesn’t matter if she’s skinny or if she’s curvy and that’s exactly what Motormouth represents, and I think that’s really beautiful.”
RECRUITING
From an entertainment standpoint, “Hairspray” has also provided the Conservatory cast and crew the unique opportunity to produce and act in a show that has great music and choreography.
The cast excels vocally. That’s no accident.
“This was the first Conservatory for which we did a lot of grassroots recruiting,” Caldwell noted. “We went to the universities, as well. Some of our students are FGCU students. Some of our students go to performing arts schools. For a lot of our Black ensemble, I did a lot of reaching out into the community and helping them to see that this is a really important story to tell, but we needed it to be authentic. We needed it to have an integrity. So we just recruited, recruited, recruited and did a lot of promotion for this and a lot of students came out and were really excited to tell the story.”
Caldwell acknowledged that it can still be challenging to cast roles of color in the Fort Myers area.
“A lot of the schools in the urban neighborhoods don’t offer performing arts classes. But then again, even schools that do hadn’t heard of Florida Rep when I became Education Director in spite of being located just 10 or 15 minutes away,” said Caldwell. “So we’ve been working hard to change that. So when I say grassroots, I mean grassroots. We’ve been going into the schools and doing free audition workshops, helping them see who we are, that our doors are open for everyone, and letting them know what is available to them.”
Caldwell says that the theater community’s perception of Florida Rep’s culture is beginning to change. The youngsters who are now auditioning for spots in the Conservatory and the Rep’s other educational programs are no longer intimidated by the education department’s former reputation as the “Harvard of theater in this area.”
“When they come, they see, yeah, we have a great program,” said Caldwell. “The kids that are in this program now are saying. ‘Tthis is like home to me. I feel safe here. I don’t feel beat down here. Yeah, Miss Monique, she can get on me, but she loves me.’ And so we are a welcoming, inclusive, open-door-policy type of theater education, and the kids, they own it. This is their home. This is their place.”
Caldwell is the Florida Repertory Conservatory Education Director. Her duties include overseeing all of the children’s programming, summer camps, classes, workshops and productions.
Support for WGCU’s arts & culture reporting comes from the Estate of Myra Janco Daniels, the Charles M. and Joan R. Taylor Foundation, and Naomi Bloom in loving memory of her husband, Ron Wallace.