A return to 'Spring'

Through The Temple News, I was invited by the Spring Awakening publicist to attend the show a couple weeks ago as a part of their college press publicity. I brought Kym as my guest and we were given third row seats! As my third time seeing the show, I had never sat so close before. The show is even more intense when you're sitting that close. It was just incredible, and really great to share it with Kym. It's amazing to share Spring Awakening with friends your age.

The PR guy told me that he could get me an interview with one of the cast members. Just a few days later, I was interviewing Lilli Cooper, the 17-year-old actress who plays Martha, the girl that sings the chilling "The Dark I Know Well." It was a fantastic interview. In only 25 minutes, she gave me five typed pages of information. I also was more nervous for this interview than most that I've done. That's what happens when you're a huge fan. Lilli was well spoken, interesting, and professional. It was also great to hear how happy and passionate she is about the show. I think she knows how lucky she is.

My interview piece was published in The Temple News today, as well as my review of the show. You'll find the articles posted below, but if you'd like to read the articles on the TN site, you can read the interview piece HERE and the review HERE.

And appropriately, it just so happens that today I bought all my friends from PL and myself tickets for Spring Awakening for January 2. Fourth time and counting.

Dealing with the dark in 'Spring Awakening'

17-year-old actor Lilli Cooper chats exclusively with The Temple News about rocking out in a Tony-winning Broadway musical.

By: Jesse North

Posted: 10/23/07

Spring Awakening isn't just a show that dares to set new precedents in musical theater. It also proves that teenagers can win Tonys, too.

This year's winner for Best Musical, along with seven other Tony awards, features a critically acclaimed cast of young actors - only two of the actors are over 24. Eleven teenagers grapple with their sexual awakening in a society that not only believes sexual urges should be suppressed, but that children should be seen and not heard.

The Temple News spoke with 17-year-old Lilli Cooper, who plays Martha in the show. Aside from providing most of the beautiful harmonies in the show's numbers, Cooper's character provides a shocking moment in "The Dark I Know Well." In this rolling, ominous song, Martha reveals that she is sexually abused by her father.

"Sometimes if I've had a bad day, I get pretty emotional during the song," Cooper said. "There are a lot of times when I have tears in my eyes."

She noted that even though the story takes place in the 1890s, sexual abuse is still a modern-day issue.

"The show has really helped a lot of young girls that I've met to tell their own story and talk about what they've been going through," Cooper said. "It's almost like a therapy."

Although Cooper and the cast perform the show eight times a week, which she describes as exhausting, she is also a senior at the Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Music & Art and Performing Arts. Being a Broadway star and a high school senior is a task not too many Broadway actors have to contend with. But Cooper manages to pull it all off and garner standing ovations every night.

Though she doesn't have much time for friends outside of the show, being 17 and in one of the hottest and most acclaimed shows on Broadway is worth the effort to Cooper.

"Sometimes I just have to step back and look at my life right now because I'm experiencing such amazing things," she said.

The privilege to take part in a show marked as having significant social relevance is what really astounds Cooper. "We like to talk about the different reactions we get from the audiences," Cooper said. "There are people who can be appalled by it and there are people who are so amazed that they're crying. We're just amazed that we can do that to people. It's not just us, but it's the story we're telling and the way it was directed and written. Every aspect of it, we think is so well toned, and we're all really proud of it as a piece."

You'd think that performing the same show eight times a week for more than a year now would make the story grow irritating. but Cooper says otherwise.

"There are definitely days where I walk to the theater and I'm exhausted, but when I get onstage, my adrenaline is really pumping," Cooper said. "Having a new audience every night really makes the show new. It often feels like we're doing it for the first time every night."

The cast has certainly come a long way since its off-Broadway days. "We all shared one dressing room - the boys and the girls were all in one room. We basically spent all hours of the day with each other," she said. As is expected from their onstage chemistry, the young cast is a tight-knit family, Cooper said.

As a family, being at the Tonys was an incredible experience to share, she said. "When we won our first Tony, it was the most amazing feeling ever. And then we just keep winning!" Cooper said.

Cooper expects to depart Spring Awakening next September, when she will be a freshman at an as-of-yet undetermined college. But the experience of originating a role in a hit show that worked its way up from indie theater to the majors will stay with her.

"It [started off as] a small, little workshop," she said. "I had no idea it would be this big."

Jesse North can be reached at jesse.north@temple.edu.

Daring, hit musical will spark Broadway evolution

Spring Awakening, set in 1890s Germany, is 'groundbreaking' in its portrayal of teenage sexuality and rebellion.

By: Jesse North

Posted: 10/23/07

REVIEW - On a Broadway of shows too timid to deviate from safe applause, Spring Awakening has defied every convention of the blockbuster formula. More importantly, it has drawn the line for the next evolutionary step in the American musical.

Spring Awakening follows a group of teenagers in 1890s Germany experiencing sexual awakening, which their parents keep them completely in the dark about. But more tragically, they are grossly mistreated and underappreciated by the adults in their lives.

The way the show depicts teenagers is revolutionary. The stereotypes and superficiality have been left out, leaving raw characters who bare a shocking amount of heart and soul.These are individuals who actually convince you that they are a force to be reckoned with.

And they do it all through their handheld microphones.

Director Michael Mayer has championed his young actors to become bona fide rock stars. When actors like John Gallagher Jr. and Jonathan Groff coolly remove the mics concealed within their schoolboy jackets, they transform into powerful leaders with importance dripping from every word.

Spring Awakening appropriately takes its songs a bit deeper than just breaking out into musical rapture in public. All the songs exist within the characters' own minds, adding heightened intellect to the onstage happenings. At times, the teenagers seem like a Greek chorus.

This is what makes the teenage characters of Spring Awakening so groundbreaking. Rather than being painted as trivial, unknowing youngsters, they display an unprecedented amount of wisdom and intellect.

Gallagher, who plays Moritz, with hair as electrified as his personality, flunks out of school. Or, rather, is cheated out by two conniving teachers. He nervously confronts his father with the news, yet is as sweet and considerate a young man as anyone could imagine. Without hearing him out, his father hits him repeatedly across the face. The moment is gut-wrenching and, without dialogue, Gallagher displays immense heartbreak.

Spring Awakening is a call to the adult world that the youth should not be discredited or underestimated.

The set may lack Mary Poppins' multi-storied house, but it has enough flashing fluorescent lights to outshine the competition. The 11 young actors execute the intricate choreography with invigorating accuracy. And there may be no special effects, but the incredible acting and vocals of the performers will evoke enough laugher and break enough hearts for you to forget all about pyrotechnics.

Jesse North can be reached at
jesse.north@temple.edu.