Shonn Wiley is Anthony in Sweeney Todd by night, choreographer by day. Kevin Sprague photo.
Shonn and I met at Dottie’s on Pittsfield’s busy North Street, which is the unofficial headquarters for all things Barrington Stage. You can even see some birdcages strung on a lamppost outside that look like they came from Sweeney Todd. We had about a half hour before it would be time for him to head to the theatre for the matinee. He plays Anthony, one of the two young would-be lovers in Sweeney Todd, and one of the few characters to escape that musical’s ending massacre alive. In addition to performing, he also undertook the choreography for that show, plus acts as the dance captain. Recently it was announced that he would also being contributing the choreography for Pool Boy, a new Nikos Tsakalakos (music) and Janet Allard (book) musical to open later in July on Stage 2.
Shonn Wiley. Larry Murray photos.
Wiley has acted on Broadway, appeared in films and now is at a crossroads of his young life as two careers beckon. His story is one of coincidences, serendipity and good fortune. He is a typical all-American boy who grew up in Adrian, Michigan in an almost typical all-American family. His story is especially resonant this Fourth of July weekend.
To begin with Wiley is lucky in that his dad wasn’t horrified at the thought of his son being a dancer.
“Actually, sometimes I think he is living his life vicariously through me. As it happens, he is quite the tap and ballroom dancer. He started me taking classes at five. But for him it was a missed opportunity. My dad and I have been trying to figure it out. Had he followed his dream he would have ended up in New York about the same time (1976) as the famous dancer-choreographer Randy Skinner. Instead he served in Vietnam.”
Skinner is well known to Broadway audiences, having received three Tony and two Drama Desk nominations. We wondered if he was a major influence.
Shonn Wiley can be a stage chamelean.
“If there is anyone I try to emulate today, it is Tommy Tune. And as a kid back in 1986 it was George M. Cohan. Early on I forced my mother to take me to our local theatre group (Adrian Michigan’s Croswell Opera House) to audition for George M. since Yankee Doodle Dandy was my favorite movie at the time.
“Since the first third of the movie was this little snot-nosed kid playing the great Cohan, I assumed that was how it was on stage. So I brought a costume and boom box and did my number by myself on stage. They asked me how I learned to dance. I told them my dad taught me, so they asked him to come and audition, too. We both ended up in the show. As a result from 1986 until I graduated high school, we did shows there together.”
Wiley unhesitatingly credits the Croswell and its longtime artistic director, Robert Soller, with giving him a solid foundation in theatre. To him, the Croswell was a place to work with people who were dedicated to their craft, even though they weren’t professional theater people, and “a second home” where he could spend lots of time doing something he loved. “It didn’t matter if I was in the ensemble or in principal roles or building sets,” he said. “There was a great sense of how collaborative theater is, and what a community it is.” He will be returning there this fall to perform and to help them raise funds.
All this time Wiley was still being a typical high school teen, playing basketball, running track and playing football. “I actually had the opportunity to do a professional theatre gig but chose to stick with my basketball team instead,” he mused. He was living the real High School Musical before there was the Disney-fied High School Musical. “And,” he adds, “It was a tough decision to make, sticking with my friends or advancing my career.”
Wiley reflects on his choices in life...
When you think about it choreography and coaching are very close to the same thing. You devise moves, they require preparation, and their execution must be precise. “So true, like in the middle of the game a coach swaps some players and goes to a different strategy, it’s a form of improv. In theatre, the actors have certain skill sets just as players do, and good directors, like coaches, use them to best advantage.”
I wondered if that affected choreography. “Definitely. Some dancers are great turners, or have amazing extensions, or can do close and complex footwork, and these are part of making a piece work on stage,” he noted, “and with Sweeney Todd, there was also the problem of limited time to prepare something for the stage.”
Wiley had the ability to compensate for some of that by having been a member of the performing company from the outset, taking on the choreography a bit later. He already had seen the other dancers at work, and knew the context of the show. “It’s a credit to the actors in the company about how dedicated and hard working they were willing to become.”
In addition to Sweeney Todd, Wiley is also taking on the role of choreographer for Pool Boy, which is soon to play on BSC’s Stage 2. One can only imagine the enormous demands on his time playing on stage eight times a week in Sweeney Todd, and preparing a new show at the same time.
Wiley in Crazy for You.
“Julie Boyd (who directed Sweeney Todd) and Daniella Topol (who is directing Pool Boy) had the basic concepts of how the musical numbers should go, and had even roughed out the basic ideas as rehearsals proceed. Then I come in and fill it all out, add the details, balance the stage and make it look as natural as possible within the flow of the show.”
This is one reason, in my review, that the choreography was hard to pick out – except for the Minuet – from the rest of the show. This close collaboration with the director makes the formal dancing seem an organic part of the whole. It is what happens when different creative skills work from a shared vision.
Choreography is not all top hats and canes. When Wiley did My Vaudeville Man “I worked with choreographer Lynn Taylor-Corbett. She brought me on to do the specialty work, the tap. That’s my area of expertise from having watched all those period movies with my dad, and recreating the routines with him. She let me help with the other numbers as well, and I ended up being the associate choreographer for the Festival and co-choreographer in New York.” Their combined work received a best choreography nomination from the Drama Desk that year.
“So with Sweeney Todd, as with Pool Boy, there are not big dance numbers to blow the audience away, that’s not the place for them.” Rather they are in service to the story, to fill it out, make it more involving for the audience. “You have to work from character,” says Wiley.
“Especially with Pool Boy , there will be several dance moments in it, but it is all about telling and advancing the story. As an actor,” he noted, “that’s all you really want, making the work as interesting as possible.”
"It's all about telling and advancing the story..."
I wondered whether being a major character on stage whose gorgeous tenor is heard in ten songs in Sweeney Todd and at the same time being dance captain and choreographer isn’t a bit overwhelming. Shouldn’t an actor be focused on his role? “It’s a challenge that I wasn’t thinking about when I took on the task. At the same time I am impressed by the depth of focus by all involved in the show. They are very consistent and so I don’t have much to worry about.
“The hardest part is working on Pool Boy all day, and then going in and singing in Sweeney at night. At least with Sweeney I have been able to take the choreographer’s hat off, the show is set, but as dance captain it requires constant vigilance to keep everything sharp and precise. It’s very much multi-tasking. But I love every moment.
“Sweeney Todd has to be one of my five top musicals of all time, and it is Sondheim’s most complex,” Wiley enthused. “In one song he switches time signatures at least a dozen times, and it’s a challenge to figure that out. He also doesn’t give the singer any help in the orchestrations, so you don’t hear your notes – you’re not being doubled by anybody.”
Also with Sweeney Todd the characters are pretty sharply drawn, there’s not a lot of room for improvisation. “Julie and I talked about this, how black or white the characters are, no grey. My character, Anthony is pretty straightforward, (“you are young, you will learn”) and it is difficult to make him as three dimensional as I would like. When he is on stage, or moving forward the story in the musical, it’s mostly about being hopeful, and good, and being in love.”
Anthony is certainly the innocent and naive character in the play, and has only one thought in his head, to marry Johanna. Wiley conveys the impulsive, lovelorn young sailor to perfection. Of course Sweeney Todd has many layers, and even Anthony finally asks, in frustration, “Is there no justice in this city?.”
“Yet he spends the first three quarters of the show in love with the city of London, and with her,” Wiley adds. “In some ways Sweeney is about good, both of my character, and about Sweeney, who once had goodness in his heart before the great injustice was done to him, his wife and child.”
"Sweeney Todd" is one of the top musicals of all time...
Having covered what was happening in his life now, I asked Wiley what was coming up, what could he tell us that has not been announced yet. “My wife Meredith and I have been invited to work on our own show by Rob Berman, Musical Director of City Center Encores – she’s having lunch with him today to talk about putting it together. And if you can get to New York, she’s at Feinstein’s in August.
Another project that has involved him is Under the Street Lamp, a program that he and other former Chicago Jersey Boys have put together to help raise money for charity. They’ve raised over a million dollars so far.
Today, Shonn Wiley stands at the crossroads of opportunity, with his talents as a triple threat performer competing with his deepening abilities as an in-demand choreographer and organizer. In show business as in life, the possibilities are unlimited. Sweeney Todd and Pool Boy prove Wiley is no one-trick pony. He’s a thoroughbred ready for the crazy steeplechase that is American theatre. I’ve placed my bet. We have a winner here.
Shonn Wiley’s Life So Far
Shonn and Meredith.
Wiley met his wife singer-actress Meredith Patterson at a production of 42nd Street in Westchester, Both are extremely talented, and they are sometimes referred to as theatre’s “power couple”. She was cast as Peggy and Wiley as Billy. Then in 2001, Shonn made his Broadway debut in the Tony Award Winning Revival of 42nd Sreet. He was a member of the original cast and the understudy of the juvenile lead Billy Lawlor, a role he performed numerous times. Shonn and Meredith were then asked to star in a groundbreaking production of 42nd Street in Moscow. They were among the first American actors to perform in an English speaking musical in Russia.
Wiley has appeared in the teen-slasher movie Redhook (2009), Co-Starred in Stairway to Paradise opposite Kristen Chenoweth for City Center Encores!, stars as the male lead in the movie Tiny Dancer (2009), and helped develop the conspiracy web-series titled Code Name:. In 2008 he played the title character in Candide at New York City Opera. That same month he filmed a scene opposite Isla Fisher in the Disney movie, Confessions of a Shopaholic. Originally seen at the New York Music Theatre Festival, My Vaudeville Man was re-staged for off Broadway.
For more information, visit his website at www.shonnwiley.com
For tickets for Pool Boy and Sweeney Todd go to barringtonstageco.org
Read my review of Sweeney Todd and Shonn Wiley’s performance.
