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Broadway Beat Sneak Peek at BILLY ELLIOT
Jun 18, 2024
Broadway's Imperial Theatre welcomed the smash hit Billy Elliot on November 13th with music by Elton John, book and lyrics by Lee Hall and directed by Stephen Daldry. BroadwayWorld and Broadway Beat were there to capture all the excitement!
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Cute as spotlight shining bride gonna have a brand new show tonight with Li and Glam on the marquee
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The Tony nominee starts being brightly. See them Glow sell out nicely
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So it's time to applaud the wrong way th brightly. Not
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like a week on the world's most famous street. Please take a seat through the van
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You the on my Hello
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I'm Richard Ridge and welcome to Broadway Beat our behind the scenes
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Look at the very best of what the New York Theater has to offer. This week
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we bring you highlights from the 22nd annual Easter Bonnet competition where over 20 Broadway Off Broadway and touring productions participate in this wonderful
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two day event which benefits Broadway cares, equity fights aids, but we start things off with a look at Billy Elliot
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The musical which is based on the popular film written by Lee Hall and directed by Stephen Daldry
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It comes to Broadway's Imperial Theater on November 13th. The musical continues to play to packed houses in London and Australia and is played to
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over 2 million people worldwide. Billy Elliot, the musical features a book and lyrics by Mr Hall music by Elton John and direction by Mr
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Daldry. We were introduced to the three boys who will create the title role in the Broadway production
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And Elton John himself was on hand for a very special performance of one of the show's musical numbers
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Here's a look at Billy Elliot, the musical. I can't really explain if the world is
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the fear you can't control. I suppose it's like forgetting
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who you are and at the same time, something makes you whole
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It's like some music lay in your head and I'm listening and I'm listening
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and then I just live inside
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and me wide open, impossible to like
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of the de Elector sparks in and
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I'm free. Um
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When I saw the filming, can I was completely wiped out, I had to be helped out sobbing from the screening because it mirrored in
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a way my personal journey and my professional journey because my father really never approved of what I was gonna do either
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So, um uh and I have the letters to prove it. Um You know
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why don't you get a decent job? That's disgraceful. Rock and roll is horrible. Who do you think you are
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Blah, blah, blah. So I was always trying to prove something to my father
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And this journey of Billy's reminded me of what I went through and the story is so moving
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my grandma was a, was such an important figure in my life
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Um And within the hour as Stephen has said we were talking about maybe doing it for a musical
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Actually, it wasn't my dear. It was my partner David Furnish idea. He said to me
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you gotta do this as a musical. You gotta do this, a musical. And I thought the music in the film was so great
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It was t rex music and it fitted the film so well. But um I thought it would be so easy to write because of
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the characters involved. Um And the Miners story was such an important part of the historical fabric of Britain at that time
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Uh And when it happened that it was such an easy thing to write
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And it was one of the most joyous experiences I've ever worked on because as Stephen said
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we forged friendships. I knew Stephen kind of before that. Um But not very well
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And I have to say that everyone who's worked on the show from Eric Fellner and working title down has been an absolute joy to
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work with. It's been a real team effort. Um In the, in the greatest sense of the word um at the working with the talent
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seeing the boys come through, seeing their journey, seeing them grow up
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seeing them leave the show, which is one of the saddest things you'll ever see seen their last night when they get too big to
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play Billy. Um It's really very moving and every time I see the show and I've seen it a lot of times I've seen a
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lot of times in, in Great Britain, I've seen it in Australia and now I'll be seeing it here
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It never fails to move me. Um It never fails to make me feel happy
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sad and it never fails to remember uh to, to remind me of the journey that I've come through as well
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Um So I am so delighted to be able to stand here
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I never thought when we had that conversation backstage at the party after
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can that this would be the juggernaut that it's turned out to be the most logistical nightmare of rehearsing three boys
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three sets of girls. It's like Groundhog Day and I don't know, it's taken over Stephen's life completely
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He has no room to make movies anymore. He's just Billy Elliot. There'll be Billy Elliott catch up soon
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but it's, it's one of the greatest joys of my life. And um I'm thrilled to be here today talking to you and being here
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as part of the Billy team. Thank you. Take me and told me
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Chen raise me and told me through the night
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and the darkness will come a day when we will fly. Come on
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son, get over it. It's all. Thank you. Put down the whole
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lot. Oh, but there won't be time to sell it. Give it back
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Don't give it. Well, no. So
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I, I it's
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about a little boy who wants to um be a ballet dancer. I mean
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it's, you know, and the community is facing incredible collapse in opposition and the government are trying to shut it down and shut down that
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whole society. And this little boy against all the odds follows his little dream and somehow becomes a magical child for that community
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the like a talisman, the little Phoenix and then all the hopes and aspirations of the society get invested in this little boy
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It's sort of, I don't know, I find it incredibly moving. It's incredibly moving as well because the kids are so you're asking a kid
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to do something so hard, that's never been done before. And it's such a struggle for the child to get to be in the show
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and to be in the show and then to achieve the show night after night, it's a mountain
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the child has to climb. And I think you can feel that when you're watching it, you can feel the
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the struggle and the hardship and the, just the sheer sweat that the kid has to go through and it's so heartbreaking
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I find it heartbreaking because it must be tough for you to find them
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And then when they grow up and they sort of move on, I know it's heartbreaking. I just heard you talking to Colin
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I mean, it's when the kids leave, it's just, it's terrible for them and it's terrible for us
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you know, which is why we keep in touch and, you know, we have our own little, you know
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post billy community of the boys who have left the show and it's, um
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it's, it's fantastic. They all stay in touch, you know, and it's, but maybe you become part of a family
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I really hurt. Oh, so
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come the misstep, Michael it, killing that you three
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Ok. It, you
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look gorgeous. They have to go through one of the most difficult journeys I think of anybody in any show ever
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And it's, and of course, it's physically absolutely exhausting for the kids. I mean
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you know, they can't do one show after another. They do really need a day off before they can do it again
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I'm Trent Kal and I'm from Long Island, New York. I'm David Albers and I'm from Canada
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I'm Kriel Kish from San Diego, California. You guys were so wonderful today
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Tell me what this experience has been like working on the show, getting ready to come to Broadway
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I'm so excited, excited about being on this show because I just get to be with all my friends and family in my hometown
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I think it's extremely exciting. I mean, it's like I'm living my dream right now
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So I think it's so exciting to get to be on Broadway and perform
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It's just an amazing experience. Tell me what your audition was like to play this incredible role
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Well, I went through two auditions and it was really tough. The first one they saw me at a ballet competition that I went to
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and they called my teacher. So I went to the audition and later on
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I got a call back and then I went through a 10 day callback audition where all of us were at
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And it was just a great experience to meet other kids from the United States and seeing them in different strengths
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like I'm a ballet dancer and there is many different kids with different strengths
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like hip hop and acting. So I think it was just amazing
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And what was, it was really tough. It was a lot of auditions for me
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And I think the tough part was to mix tap singing, acting
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ballet, all those things together and make the role that's called Billy Elliot
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And I think it's really exciting and a wonderful, unique experience. You've done the show already in London
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right? So what if I talk about that and what you've told the guys? Well
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I think it's a really tough part because you have to sing
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dance and act all at the same time. But I love being on the stage and I think if I had to give any advice
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it would be have fun. And if you forget a line, just people make mistakes in real life
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So just cover it up and I pray. Oh, great. Yeah
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that's funny. Yeah, the
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22nd annual Easter Bonnet competition which benefits Broadway cares. Equity Fights Aides recently took place at the Minskoff Theater
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This two day Broadway spectacular, which features over 20 Broadway Off Broadway and touring productions
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singing, dancing and Donning original Easter Bonnets. The competition marks the culmination of six weeks of intensive fundraising activities and several awards
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are given. This year's Easter Bonnet featured the return of 104 year old original Ziegfeld girl Doris Eaton Travis
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Since 1988 BCE FA has raised and distributed over $140 million in the fight against A I Ds
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Here's our look at the 22nd annual Easter Bonnet competition. Know
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about from bread. Hey, he
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and mhm
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oh, project runway designers. Do you have any advice for these contestants in their bonnets
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I say a rosettes. You gotta use human hair, darling
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It's for the Broadway community. So gotta make it work together and this is Broadway
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You gotta use a little bit more rhinestones. But above all, you have to make it
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work plan. I just got right. The
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party must be great. No. So
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I thanks. Hi there, I'm Eric Potter and I'm Eric
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Dean Davis and we're both from naked boy sing. Our number today is called off Broadway lament and it tells the woes of the fact
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that we do two shows off Broadway a week. So we have to have regular jobs
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Some of us wait tables, some of us work as personal trainers
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So um we've expressed it in our number today. Um I wrote the number and um
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Craig Lowry and I designed the bonnet for the number two. So we hope you like it
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Buns, buns, buns, buns, buns, buns bos, read your mix with them
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We all. But
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my resume says all brunt
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Hi. My name is Heather Wright. I'm with Spring awakening and I'm Skyler Astin also with Spring awakening
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And our skit today is what would happen if the kids from Spring awakening auditioned for Greece and actually sing the songs from Greece in
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the way that we perform in the show every week in a sort of perverse nasty way
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right? I'd say so. And it's, it's exciting because we get to do a different kind of genre cause we're
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we're kind of a genre defining musical ourselves. So we get to go to the more traditional style but bring our really edgy angsty ness
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and hopefully it'll be well received. Um We're trying, we're trying to do it in a positive light so it should be exciting
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And for you viewers, this isn't how I always do my hair. It's uh it's for the show
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So that why I fundraising at the theater, I mean, you guys must raise so much money
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Talk about how generous the audience have been and what you've auctioned off at the theater for BCE FN
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Yeah. Well, we, we've tried to become uh pretty creative this time around. We've um decided to like start selling props from the show and
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we even like we script of the show Duncan and Stevens autograph full scripts
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We sold those. Yeah, we still, I mean, we have the general like the play bills and the posters and the programs but
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but uh we even had some, some crazy wacky gifts that we received
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uh that we just uh figured would maybe like auction off with obviously the consent of the people that gave it to us
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Hey, would you mind if we actually sold this? And we would give them a shout out at the curtain speech
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And um I know we like add uh we ordered a couple extra um cast jackets accidentally
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So we sold some of those really just like anything we could grab our hands on that we think would be of interest to anyone
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else. And um so Leah Michelle and John Graf and Blake Bashoff gave guided tours backstage for a nice chunk of money for people who
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wanted a private tour with our three kind of principal characters. Uh took time after the show to do that and our audiences were just
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really generous with just giving out of their pocket. We raised as much this time as we have for any of our collecting season
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So we're really, really thrilled. Met a girl crazy, the
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cutest so away to the right. Oh
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I am Stephanie Clemens and I'm from in the Heights and this is our second year participating in the Easter Bonnet and we have something
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really fantastic planned. Last year we did a spoof on fiddler. And this year we're doing a little spoof on in The Heights on in
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the Heights version of Les Mis. And it's going to be called and we're doing it to the music of one day more
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And our fantastic Lin Manuel Miranda wrote it and the cast has collaborated on some fancy choreography and direction and basically our characters will be
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playing characters from Les Mis like I
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like that and s
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what Washington Heights
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Hi, I'm John Bolton and I'm in curtains currently. Tell me what you're doing here today at the Easter Bonnet
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Well, today I have the wonderful honor of accompanying Miss Doris Eaton Travis
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The world's only 104 year old Ziegfeld girl, we'll be doing a little singing in the rain or as Doris calls it swinging in the
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rain and she's fantastic. 104 is the new 28. So what was the rehearsal like today with her
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Uh Kind of amazing. It was basically like Doris, whatever you need
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I, I will facilitate and just, I mean, not only is she 100 and four but she's like sexy
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She's like put together and amazing. It's like, I'm not sure I want her to drive me anywhere
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but she's a wonderful, fantastic person and I'm thrilled to be here
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I'm saying in the rain, just see in the rain, what fields
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I'm happy again. I'm laughing at clouds, dark up above the suns
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in my heart. And I'm ready for love. The
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first prize for the most Fabulous Bonnet presentation goes to Sunday in the park
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Bye for me. Ok
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And the winner of this year's top fundraiser award raising $277,740
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Wow. Ladies and gentlemen, the amazing company of rent. There's, now
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there's all care live in fear
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Oh, yeah
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No, they want you. All right
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