Eric Woodall From The North Carolina Theatre

We sit down with Eric Woodall, Producing Artistic Director of The North Carolina Theatre as they head into their Ruby Anniversary - 40 years of the closest experience to Broadway in Raleigh!

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Welcome to the Carolina Podcast Network.I'm Trevor Marini. Today we're highlighting the
North Carolina Theater and the Broadway gemsfor North Carolina Theaters Ruby Anniversary coming up
in the twenty twenty twenty twenty fourthseason, and I'm excited to welcome Eric
Woodall, producing artistic director of theNorth Carolina Theater in Raleigh. And Eric,
I did my research though Ruby Anniversaryis forty years. Yes, that's

(00:23):
right, Charlo, Thank you somuch for having me. It is.
North Carolina Theater has been around forthirty nine going into our fortieth season,
which is quite amazing for our professional, nonprofit theater to exist and thrive.
Well. Congratulations. Forty years ishuge entertaining the Triangle audiences with the wonderful

(00:43):
productions that you put on. Andalthough you haven't been the director for forty
years, you did perform there earlierin your career. Correct, I did
it back in the very early days. It was founded by Dan Jones and
was the first thing that was reallygoing in downtown Raleigh at that time in
the eighties that had really dried updown there, and Dan created this theater

(01:04):
company so that there would be entertainmentin downtown Raleigh. Part of the theater's
mission even originally was to bring inyoung people from the area and provide opportunities.
And so, as a high schoolstudent in Vincent, North Carolina,
I was able to audition and endedup doing shows at NCT with Broadway stars
and so it really it was reallywhere the bug bit. Do you remember

(01:27):
the first couple of productions that youacted in. What were those? Oh?
Yeah, well, the first onewas Jesus Christ Superstar and literally they
had live doves that flew all throughMemorial Auditorium and landed on the cross.
It was opulent. I mean Icall it sometimes bigger than Broadway because Memorial
Auditorium is such a large theater twentythree hundred seats. It really is larger

(01:49):
than a Broadway house. So thesets were gigantic. I remember I was
so blown away just being able tobe on the stage. And then the
second one was a show called Georgem which was a patriotic show and they
had to learn to tap dance justto even be in it. As a
kid, I wasn't very good,but they didn't kick me out. So

(02:13):
you say bigger than Broadway, talkabout that a little bit. What goes
into the planning stages of a productionin terms of technical, logistics, audience
appeal, casting, How does itall come together? Well, the North
Carolina Theater as a company does notown a theater. We don't have a
physical space. We rent it fromthe Martin Marietta Center. We rent the
Raleigh Memorial Auditorium, and next seasonwe're going to be renting the Fletcher Theater,

(02:38):
which is six hundred seats, whichwe're excited about. But because of
that, we start a year toa year and a half in advance planning
all of the elements. You know, where are we going to rent the
lighting equipment from the sound equipment?You know? Are we building the sets
and costumes? Are we renting themfrom somewhere? And then auditioning and the
creative teams. So we actually dothe shows in twelve days, which is

(03:01):
unbelievable. We put them all together. I call it add water and stir.
But it's not that we just beginit, you know, a day
before the twelve days, like itreally does take at least a year in
advance to be prepared for each preachproduction, for each production. Wow,
and how many productions would you sayon an average season. We've been doing

(03:22):
five for many, many years.We did four productions at NCT, and
then NCT went into business with BroadwaySeries South and started producing some of the
tours. We've gotten away from that, so now we produce all of our
own projects, and we currently aredoing five and next season we are set

(03:43):
to do four. So it soundslike you're juggling a year in advance,
a lot of things for five differentshows coming up for the next season.
My calendar right now, I haveto when I when I open up my
laptop, I have to make surewhat year I'm in, because I've been
currently in twenty five, twenty six. Because that's me planning and starting to
when I can get the theater spacedowntown and also what shows I can get

(04:03):
the rights for. That is aton of planning. And your next production
coming up is Beautiful, the CarolKing Musical. It's October tenth through fifteenth.
It'll finish off your thirty ninth season. What inspired you to bring Beautiful
to the stage. Oh, mygoodness, Well, it became available the
rights and so we jumped on it. We are the first theater company in

(04:24):
this area to be able to produceit. It came through a few years
ago as a tour, but asan independent theater company to produce it.
We are the first in the area, so I jumped at that opportunity.
It's the number one produced show aroundthe country right now because people love it.
It's like Mamma Mia, It's likeJersey Boys. It's music that people

(04:46):
grew up with. You know,Carol King influenced so many different artists,
Caucasian, African, American, youknow, people from all all walks of
life and all ages. And youcan't believe as you're watching the show all
of the songs that she is responsiblefor writing all of the hits. So
I wanted to bring that to theaudiences. You know, people love musical

(05:08):
theater, but when musical theater canmix with pop music that you've grown up
with, it's it's just a winwin. Well, that sounds like a
great way to end the thirty ninthseason and then next year, of course,
forty years of Broadway Gems in Raleigh, the Ruby Anniversary. I imagine
you might have some surprises in store. Can you shed some light on the
upcoming season? I can a littlebit. We're so excited about this Ruby

(05:30):
anniversary because we've made the decision todo all of our shows in the Fletcher
Theater, which is six hundred seats. It's going to create a more intimate
experience. It's actually much more ofa true Broadway experience than being in a
much larger space. It feels likeyou are up there, living and breathing

(05:51):
with the artist. It almost feelslike you're in the show with them.
And you know, we've got someWe've got some great shows we've got We
start with Elf this Christmas, andwe go into Rent. We have Once
in This Island, and then wehave Camelot, and we're going to be
doing the shows in such a newway. I believe that if you take

(06:14):
shows that people know, you shouldtell those stories today in a new way.
It doesn't mean that it has tobe one diff right, you have
to stay true to the material,But if there's a reason to have a
revival, there needs to be anew a new plant, a new twist.
You know. I worked. Iwas lucky enough in New York to

(06:35):
work on a lot of the Broadwaymusicals and a lot of Broadway revivals,
and I did two revivals of Laymson Broadway. I did worked on a
revival of The Saigon, lots ofdifferent revivals, and there's always a reason
that producers and directors want to bringa show back. We can think,

(06:57):
oh, it's just to make money, it's just to do that. I'm
saying that's not a part of itat the time, but it is what
are the audience is today going tolearn from this or how are we going
to entertain them today? And itcould be different than it was in the
eighties or seventies or sixties. Therecan be a new way to tell it.
So we're really going to do thatwith shows like Rent and Camelot,

(07:18):
through the casting, through the directing, through the design, and you know,
my mission for NCT now is reimaginedwith every act, so that everything
we do has a reimagination to it. People could argue, why don't you
pick titles that we've never heard of? Some people like that, some people

(07:41):
don't, you know, And soI try to try to push the envelope
a little bit. But I thinkif people can have that connection to knowing
a little bit about a show orknowing the music from a show, we
can get them in the seats andthen we can start to show what we
do that's different. Well, seeingand hearing you talk about the anniversary,
it can tell how passionate you areabout it. So I have no doubt

(08:03):
it's going to come through on thestage. I'm excited to see it.
Also tell us about the North CarolinaTheater Conservatory and some of the ties between
the school and the main stage.I know that NCT is devoted to training
locally young people talk about that.Oh my goodness, we're so passionate about
our North Carolina Theater Conservatory. Andagain, it's really what kicked off NCT

(08:26):
becoming a theater company was the dedicationto giving people a place to go who
might not feel that they fit in. You know, and everybody's not going
to go be a Broadway star,but folks are going to be able to
have the chance to maybe feel moreconfident when they're giving a speech at school
or you know, it could carryover into job life, you know,

(08:50):
later on things that are learned.So the connections are We're dedicated at North
Carolina Theater to bridge the two entities. For instance, just with Mary Poppins,
which we just recently produced, thereare two children in that show and
when I went to cast those twochildren, I saw so many amazing young

(09:13):
people that I ended up casting eleven. I just couldn't. I couldn't not,
you know, and I could havedone twenty two if we were able
to facilitate that many. There wereso many incredible young people. And I
feel that it's kind of like thegraduate school element to our training program.

(09:35):
You know, if you have workedreally hard and you've grown and you're able
to be in a professional show,let's get those kids that opportunity, which
is amazing. And Mary Poppins justwrapped right, it did, so I
think we actually had a couple ofthe children actors up here, yes,
a couple of weeks ago, tobe on the radio with Erica DeLong on
G one oh five. So thatmust have been a cool experience. They
loved it. They loved it.They came back just raving about the experience.

(09:58):
They felt like stars. So Igotta imagine that's one of the major
differences between the North Carolina Theater andone of the many other theaters in the
area. Well, one of themain differences is that we are a professional
theater, and I don't say thatwe're professional in a way of saying that
we are better than we're different.There are incredible community theaters in our area,

(10:20):
and the lines often do get blurred, like what's the difference between some
of these theaters in North Carolina theaterWe pay everyone who is a part of
it. We're not doing this asa hobby, even our young people.
It's fantastic to have your regular jobduring the day and then volunteer to be
in a show for free, youknow, in the various theaters around town.
That's wonderful. That's serving a differentpurpose. We are doing it for

(10:43):
the profession of theater, and Ithink that really does set us apart.
It can make it more difficult becausewe are you know, the funds we
have to raise are greater because weare paying everyone who's working backstage, everyone
who is on stage, everyone allaround. Because it's a job. We
put these shows together in such anincredibly short amount of time that we feel

(11:09):
that people must be paid for whatthey do, and they come to us
as trained artisans. So that's oneof the things that really sets us apart
as well. Eric would all,it's been great talking to you today.
Thank you so much for coming in, thank you for having me and please
check us out. Yes, Ericwould All, producing artistic director for the
North Carolina Theater. We're talking abouttoday, you know, the fortieth anniversary,

(11:30):
the Ruby Anniversary. Next season.There's still time to get in on
this season. October tenth or fifteenth. Beautiful the Carol King Musical. Ticket
start at just forty dollars. Goto nctheater dot com to purchase. Today
I'm Trevor Morini for the Carolina PodcastNetwork. Thank you for listening.