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How excited are you to be here on Tony Day
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Started with you on opening day. Yeah. It was great. It was great
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I love this musical, as many people do. Tell me what it means to you for all the wonderful nominations you've gotten for Paradise Way
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Well, it's incredibly gratifying. Obviously, after nine and a half years of a lot of work, a lot of work by a lot of people
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dedicated to this incredible story. With a little bit of emotion, I think back to my mentor in theater, Hal Prince, and all
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the things that he taught me as well over the years. One of them was, if you're going to produce a story in musical theater, make it relevant
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Make it say something. Make it important if you can. I've taken that to heart in all the shows that I've done
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This one, maybe, has been the most difficult of all of them, just to fully realize
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Audiences that come to your show love this show. They are on their feet at the end
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You tell a story. You entertain. What that means to you? They're not only on their feet at the end, they're on their feet in the middle of the
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second act, too, with this incredible performance by Joaquina of an amazing song by Jason and
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Nathan and Mossy. It's one thing to see an audience rise to the occasion, but to see them rise in the
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middle of an act, to see them there saluting the actors, the moment the curtain drops
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and this spontaneous reaction every night, and the screams are getting louder and louder
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and louder for the actors. And all that means is that the show is performing, and it's having a profound effect on an audience
