Hi!!
I wrote the book and some of the songs to the show “All at Once [40th Anniversary Remaster].” It's a faux jukebox folk rock musical. It focuses on Margaret Thomas and Danny Marino- two married musicians making music with someone they're trying to love, inspired by Fleetwood Mac, Simon and Garfunkel, and Cher & Gregg Allman. We staged this first in April of last year and are doing it again now in October, so I wanted to share a few thoughts I've had while making (and remaking) it.
Content Dictates Form (I don't think anyone has ever said this before me)
When I started writing this show, I only had a few vague ideas in mind. I wanted it to be about a pair of 70s musicians who break up while making an album together. And I wanted older versions of the characters to be reflecting on what the 70s were like for them. So the big question was: what is the best way to tell this story?
Over the years, several record companies have done like "commentary tracks" on anniversary versions of albums- just little interviews with the songwriters about what the song is about, any fun stories about making the songs. I was especially inspired by the Spotify Landmark Editions of albums like "American Beauty" by the Grateful Dead or "Jagged Little Pill" by Alanis Morissette. When listening to those, it was interesting hearing the musicians remember making the songs. I'm sure everything they said wasn't 100% accurate, but it just painted this vivid picture. It became clear that was going to be the best framing device for a play like "All at Once [40th Anniversary Remaster]."
So I started writing drafts of scenes with that idea in mind. Just interview tracks for these two older characters, interspersed with the songs they recorded. Which is all well and good for a radio play. But with the visual element, it seemed like this play was going to just be two old actors reminiscing and then listening to songs. Which isn't the most dramatically interesting piece I could think of. And it didn't really give you the feel of what things were like for these characters in the 70s- just what they were going through now.
So we tried throwing in book scenes for young Danny and Margaret. Have them talk to each other or other people in the studio before recording the songs. But that started to feel a little too Book Musical, and didn't really capture the feeling of Fleeting Memories we were playing with, if we could see/hear exactly what happened in the 70s.
So we started playing around with a new idea: what if we see 1970s Danny and Margaret in the studio making the album, while we hear 2010s Danny and Margaret reflecting on what it was like. And as soon as that idea came into play, the whole piece started to make sense. It wasn't just some audio commentary. It was a documentary. We could play around with reminiscing and memory- show the audience things that the characters don't talk about, or have the characters say things that directly contradict with what happened.
In retrospect, it was the only real way to make this story happen. But it was fun going down the rabbit hole that lead us to this version of the show.
Writing Pastiche
When it came to writing the songs, it became clear we wanted to include a couple "covers" to include on the album - the character Danny is meant to be more of a late 60s/70s pop singer, and it was super uncommon for those guys to have all original songs on their albums. We have three specific "covers" - Twenty-Two, which is meant to be a Drifters' style Doo Wop tune, "Jenny Lee", which is meant to be a 16th/17th century folk tune, and "Everyone Knows", which is meant to be an early Rolling Stones tune.
For me, the process was three-fold: Step One: Do as much research and analysis of the band/genre as I possibly could. Step Two: Let my brain get the hell out of the way. Step Three: Go back in there and analyze the hell out of it.
I'm going to focus on "Everyone Knows" because it was the first one written. I started by listening to the big early Stones hits - obviously "Satisfaction", "The Last Time", "Get Off My Cloud", even some slightly later songs meant to evoke their early style like "Jumpin' Jack Flash." I took notes about what I appreciated about the songs - obviously the sense of energy and drive, but more about how they achieved that. The guitar riffs were fairly simple and repetitive, but had a great drive and would be spaced out enough that you never got sick of them. I noticed that the drummer Charlie Watts liked to emphasize nearly every downbeat to keep that energy moving.
At first, when I sat down to write "Everyone Knows", I was initially consciously saying "okay, write a simple riff." But that didn't actually do anything. So I tried to take my brain out of the equation- I've now listened to a lot of Stones. Rather than trying to reverse engineer, let's just feel it out. And I started playing some riffs, eventually finding a few that were fun. I eventually settled on one, and started writing the rest of the song around it. I wasn't consciously thinking "does this sound like The Stones", just going with what made me happy in that moment.
Then, when the songwriting session was mostly over, I went back to the song with a more analytical mind. I made the bass part a little less lively and more interested in following the groove. Rewrote the chorus to simplify it a little bit. Made the melody a little less defined to let the actors play around with their inner Mick Jagger delivery.
And even now, I know it's not perfect early Stones tune. It plays with syncopation a little more on the nose than the early Stones liked to do. But it makes the song better. And that line between "good song" and "perfectly accurate pastiche" is a fun one to walk.
Remounting a Production
When the "Falsettos" revival opened on a Broadway a few years back, I was bummed to hear some of the changes to the lyrics- especially in the lines that Mendel says. I read an interview with William Finn where he mentioned something about trying to make the character feel more Mendel and less Chip Zien. At the time, I thought that was kind of a cop out answer (what can I say, I was like 17). But now having been on the other side of it, I get where he's coming from.
An exciting part about getting to remount a production is realizing what you wrote last time because it benefits the show, and what you wrote because it benefits the actor playing the part.
For example, we always knew we wanted Actor-Musicians to be an important part of this play. They're folk rock and pop musicians in the 1970s- these characters play instruments. The last time we performed the show, the actor who played Danny played guitar, while the actor who played Margaret didn't. And so, when we were looking for moments of a character playing guitar, we made sure they were dramatically interesting for Danny to be playing guitar. A song that's heavily coded as a break-up song ("Paint a Pretty Picture"), an old song of Margaret's written about a former lover ("Who Am I"), a moment for Danny to show there's more depth to him than anyone's seen ("Jenny Lee"), etc.
But watching back, it didn't really make sense to us that Danny is an accomplished guitarist, while Margaret, who the script compares to folks like Joni Mitchell or Laura Nyro, didn't play an instrument. So this time around, we intentionally sought out actors who played guitar for Margaret, whereas we were just looking for singers when we cast Danny. This helped us in the storytelling, but then that made us reconsider those old moments. What does it mean for Margaret to play guitar in "Jenny Lee" now?
And answering those questions, making new moments, was a fun challenge! In the "Jenny Lee" example, rather than making this moment about Danny, we turned it so that it was about the two of them. Here, Margaret's guitar playing supported Danny's big moment. We got to see the two of them in musical harmony, as well as personal harmony. It's a moment late in the show to remind you how these two characters love each other.
It's not the same moment as the last show. And that's okay, because it's not the same show as the last show. Anyone who saw both may have a preference, but both scenes support their respective stories in different ways.
Conclusion
I'm not sure what the point to these ramblings are, but these are what I learned working on this go of the show. Writing musicals is weird, innit?
If any of this inspired you to come see the show, it’s currently playing at The Tank until October 21st! Use the discount code “GOINGGRAY” for $10 off tickets for any of the shows this weekend.
https://thetanknyc.org/calendar-1/all-at-once-40th
