NEW YORK — NEW YORK (AP) — Lea Michele was a child actor backstage at the Imperial Theater on Broadway when she first heard the song from the musical “Chess” on the stereo. Some three decades later, she finds herself singing the same tune in the same theater.
“Rejoicing” and a Broadway veteran who began her professional career in “Les Miserables” at the age of 8, she returned, now a mother and a bankable star, to her old stomping grounds, which coincidentally is the very theater where Chess debuted in 1988.
“The Imperial Theater really has a soul. Every show that's ever been there is absorbed by the walls. It's a little creepy, but very powerful. Other theaters can seem a little sterile, but there's not that feeling here,” she says.
She remembers exactly where she was sitting when she first saw Les Misérables (orchestra on the left, six rows), listening to Paige O'Hara as Fantine sing “I Dreamed a Dream” in the musical she soon joined, playing Young Cosette and Young Eponine.
“I was on the show and I told my parents, ‘I love it. I want to do this for the rest of my life.” And it’s really very emotional to be here 30 years later, still working, thank God, again in this theater,” she says. Icing on the cake? The electrician upon his return simply said, “Welcome home.”
“Chess,” opening November 16, is set primarily in Bangkok and Budapest during cold war, tells the fictional story of two chess grandmasters—an American, played by Aaron Tveit, and a Soviet, portrayed by Nicholas Christopher—fighting each other to win for their countries, a task complicated by the arrival of the woman they both love, played by Michelle.
“In many ways, this is the most complex character I've ever played,” says Michelle. “She's a woman. She's strong. I don't have comedy to lean on as a crutch or as some sort of protective cloak.”
The show reunites Michelle with Tony Award-winning director Michael Mayer, who directed both of her films. Spring Awakening “in 2006, as well as in “Funny Girl” in 2022.
Mayer also has wonderful memories of the Imperial Theater. It was here that he saw his first Broadway show, Pippin in 1976 with Ben Vereen. He sat in the back row of the mezzanine, eight seats from the right aisle. “I sat there and everything went back to normal,” he says.
Poetry show Tim Rice and music by Bjorn Ulvaeus and Benny Andersson from ABBA, began life as a concept album in 1984 and includes the chill-inducing “Anthem,” the pulsating pop of “One Night in Bangkok,” which peaked at No. 3 on the Billboard Hot 100, and the rhythmic “I Know Him So Well.”
The musical, which first premiered in London in 1986 and was extensively revised for a Broadway production in 1988, has a cult following, but the Broadway production was a flop, running for fewer than 90 performances. Over the years, attempts have been made to revive it with concerts and new productions. For the latest version, screenwriter Danny Strong wrote a new story.
Michelle is aware of the series' controversial legacy and the many questions about its performance. She compares the noise to when she launched “Spring Awakening” and people will wonder what Germany in 1890 would look like with rock music and teenage sex.
“I think we're really excited for people to see what we've been able to do. We're not ignoring the history of our show, but we just know what we have, and I think it will all really make a lot of sense once everyone sees it.”
The relationship between Michelle and Mayer developed and deepened over the 25 years that they knew each other. He says he watched her grow up and doesn't feel like a father anymore. Now they are the same age.
“I feel like we're not just colleagues, but dear friends. I'd almost say we're family at this point,” he says. “I met her when she was 14. We've been in each other's lives for many, many years. And to be able to work together and have that kind of shorthand was amazing.”
As proof, he mentions that the night before he had an idea about a big change he wanted to make. “Leah woke up at 3 a.m. this morning with an idea,” he says. “We blurted it out to each other this morning at the beginning of rehearsal, and it’s the same idea.”
Michelle's thoughts go back to her days as a child at the Imperial Theatre. Other girls in her dressing room played songs from Broadway shows such as “Miss Saigon” and “Bye Birdie,” including a song from “Chess” called “Heaven Help My Heart.” Now this is one of her songs.
“After 30 years we're back at Imperial. It's crazy,” she says.
