The Official Adam Pascal Love Thread, part ten- Page 107

[Chloe]

Posted: 6/24/06 at 8:20pm

Happy birthday! Sometimes the technical gllitches just make the show more memorable. I'm glad you enjoyed it.

[Chloe]

Posted: 6/24/06 at 9:54pm

Since it's such a slow (but, um, interesting night), I'm falling back on pictures.

[xoxRogue]

Posted: 6/24/06 at 9:58pm

Yes, interesting....O_O

I love the pictures.

Posted: 6/24/06 at 9:59pm

Where did you find those?

From what I gather, George Mason University and Boston University seemed to have the best turnout. Not a surprise considering their size, I suppose.

[Chloe]

Posted: 6/24/06 at 10:04pm

Here's the website. There are a few little videos too, but the quality is very low.

I'm guessing that a lot of the turnout depended on how much publicity was done. Some really got the word out and others didn't seem to.
Adamislove

Posted: 6/24/06 at 10:09pm

I like the one with the shaker.

If he doesn't officially record What I Did for Love, I'll cry. I don't know if anyone cares, but I actually have a video clip (on DVD) of Adam performing that song years ago. His 2006 tour rendition was a huge improvement -- a lot more "Adamized."

[Chloe]

Posted: 6/24/06 at 10:15pm

I know he did it at his second appearance at Joe's Pub back in 2004 - is that when you mean?

[Bohemian1232]

Posted: 6/24/06 at 10:18pm

Happy Birthday! Mine was yesterday, and I saw Q too.

[picturetaker9211]

Posted: 6/24/06 at 10:24pm

Wow thanks for the pics Chloe! Adam looks so crazy/intense/wild.

Posted: 6/24/06 at 10:28pm

I know he did it at his second appearance at Joe's Pub back in 2004 - is that when you mean?

No, I wasn't even aware of that. Do you know how his version in 2004 compared to his 2006 version? I was actually referring to an appearance at the Supper Club around 2001, where he sang What I Did for Love but with considerably less intensity than a few months ago.

However, now that I think about it, the difference might have to do with his surroundings. The Supper Club seemed to be a bit more cabaret style than one of his concerts.

[luvtheEmcee]

Posted: 6/24/06 at 10:30pm

In November '04 at Joe's Pub? No, he didn't. He sang Maybe This Time, though.

[Chloe]

Posted: 6/24/06 at 10:36pm

Whoops, sorry, I don't know why I got those songs mixed up.

I was just looking for an article written about Adam in the NY Times, I think by Anthony Tomassini, around the time Aida opened. I can't believe I don't have it somewhere, but so far no luck.

[jeremykushnier1fan]

Posted: 6/24/06 at 10:38pm

I've been trying to find that article for a while now. Btw, happy birthday=)

[picturetaker9211]

Posted: 6/24/06 at 10:41pm

I found that article last night, but I believe you may have to pay for it. I'll try to find the link for it.

Posted: 6/24/06 at 10:42pm

What was the article about, Chloe?

[Chloe]

Posted: 6/24/06 at 10:42pm

It's guitargeek's birthday, just in case anyone got confused, and Bohemian's was yesterday, I believe.

I know I've seen that article on a Rent site somewhere.

Posted: 6/24/06 at 10:45pm

I'll PM you my username/password for the NY Times archives.

[jeremykushnier1fan]

Posted: 6/24/06 at 10:50pm

If any links are found please do post =)

How's everyone doing tonight?

[Chloe]

Posted: 6/24/06 at 10:50pm

It's the one subtitled "The Reluctant Broadway Star," I believe. It's about Adam's return to Broadway , and toward the end Bernie Telsey is quoted about Adam's emotional availability. Since you mentioned it earlier, I wanted to quote the article.

Posted: 6/24/06 at 10:55pm

I hope this is the one you were looking for!

SECTION: Section E; Page 1; Column 2; The Arts/Cultural Desk

LENGTH: 1239 words

HEADLINE: He's a Singing Star, but Not in Quite the Way He Planned

BYLINE: By ANTHONY TOMMASINI

BODY:
Since his childhood in Syosset on Long Island, all Adam Pascal ever wanted to be was a rock singer. He dreamed of fronting his own band and writing his own music. Though Billy Joel was his idol as a singer, hard rock became his passion.

But while pursuing that fantasy an unexpected detour came along called "Rent." Though he had never acted, Mr. Pascal was cast in the lead role, the H.I.V.-infected punk rocker and recovering addict Roger Davis, in the original 1996 production of Jonathan Larson's breakthrough musical at the New York Theater Workshop. When the show moved to Broadway later that year, Mr. Pascal's work landed him on the cover of Newsweek (a steamy photo with his co-star, Daphne Rubin-Vega) and earned him a Tony Award nomination for best actor in a musical.

Though gratified by the success, Mr. Pascal assumed that "Rent" would be his first and only theater gig. Surely now, he thought, offers from record companies would come.

It didn't work out that way. Mr. Pascal, the reluctant Broadway star, finds himself again in a lead role of a new musical, the Disney-produced "Aida," loosely based on the Verdi opera, with music by Elton John and lyrics by Tim Rice. Mr. Pascal plays Radames, the commander of the Egyptian Army, who is engaged to Amneris, an Egyptian princess (Sherie Rene Scott), but falls in love, fatally it turns out, with Aida (Heather Headley), a Nubian princess captured and enslaved by the Egyptians. Directed by Robert Falls, "Aida" opens in New York tomorrow at the Palace Theater at Broadway and 47th Street.

Mr. Pascal had to be persuaded to take the role. But during a recent interview at the theater, he seemed excited to be involved with the show and at peace with his quixotic career. Moreover, a collection of 12 of his rock songs is being released on the Internet by Sh-K-Boom Records in late spring.

"It's all music I've written myself," he said, out of breath from having bounded up four flights of metal stairs to his ramshackle dressing room at the former vaudeville house. A session of notes with the director had detained him. "This record is the first time I've allowed myself to write music purely, without trying to direct it to a certain audience," he added. "Whether people like it or not, I feel a huge sense of accomplishment."

As Roger in "Rent," he was praised for the volatile anger, exuberance and punky charisma he projected. On this busy day, dressed in black jogging pants, an Army-green thermal undershirt and a cap from God's Love We Deliver, the organization that brings hot meals to people with AIDS, Mr. Pascal, 29, was all optimism and openness. Yet recalling the frustrations he faced after "Rent" rekindled his exasperation with the pigeonholing that pervades the rock and pop industry. "For a while there I worried that I had fallen into this strange trap," Mr. Pascal said. After he left the cast of "Rent" in late 1997, he formed the short-lived five-piece Adam Pascal Band, which had a burst of success playing rock clubs around Manhattan. "We were doing great," he said, "playing to kids, 400 and 500 kids at a time, who really dug the music. But a lot of rock people, producers and managers, looked at me and said, 'He's a theater guy.' We couldn't get them to come hear us."

Instead he accepted innumerable invitations to try out for roles in television and film. "It was a miserable experience," he said. "I went into these auditions where people had big expectations of me. Everyone would say, 'I'm such a big fan, I'm really happy to meet you, blah, blah, blah.' Then I'd do this bad audition. My lack of experience came through. I felt like I was letting everyone down, including myself. I realized I'm not interested in the Hollywood-actor-boy thing. What I can offer is my singing."

That he can. When Bernard Telsey, the casting agent for "Rent" (and for "Aida"), discovered Mr. Pascal singing in a grungy rock club in 1995, he knew immediately that he had found an ideal Roger. "Adam is raw, sexy, exciting, available," Mr. Telsey said recently. "He really reaches audiences. So it's worth whatever course a director has to go through to get him to do what you want."

Michael Greif, the director of "Rent," was equally floored when Mr. Pascal auditioned. "He showed up with the tools, that incredible voice, the ability to focus on intention," Mr. Grief recalled. "He had never done a play, but he had great instincts, huge accessibility and could go very deeply from profound despair to extraordinary joy."

That "incredible voice" was apparently a natural gift, evident from the time Mr. Pascal was 11 and first tried singing with a makeshift rock band some young friends had gotten together. With no formal musical training, Mr. Pascal picks out his songs on the guitar. He has never taken voice lessons, though he got some tips from a professionally trained singer who was a colleague at a New York fitness club where Mr. Pascal worked as a personal trainer. (It was a job he kept for several months after "Rent" opened, fearing that, as he put it, the "whole thing might burst.")

He credits Tim Weil, the musical director of "Rent," with giving him a helpful regimen of warm-up scales and exercises. From Mr. Weil he also learned the importance of enunciation, something that most rock singers ignore in favor of the trademark rock mumble.

"Enunciation is a musical theater trick," Mr. Pascal said. "If you're having trouble getting a note, Tim told me, instead of pushing, just say the word clearly and the note will be there." Mr. Pascal regrets the strain he put his voice through in smoky, blaring rock clubs. "Now I'm better aware of what I can and can't do," he said.

What he can do vocally has been widely hailed by critics. His voice is by turns plaintive and powerful, melting and earthy. And he can modulate his sound, singing with focused, lean tone one moment and thick, trembling vibrato the next.

He is unfazed that his two Broadway roles have been based on operatic characters. He has never seen Puccini's "Boheme," the inspiration for "Rent," or "Aida." Nor has he listened to recordings. "It's kind of irrelevant," he said. "I didn't want to taint my ideas about what 'Rent' and 'Aida' were about."

Though no opera fan, he is "a fan of these wonderful opera stories," he added. "Good stories are hard to come by. It's important to keep telling them in new ways."

For now, Mr. Pascal is happy with the progress of his career. And his life: his wife of just over a year, Cybele Pascal, is a playwright finishing a master's degree at Columbia University. As for his rock 'n' roll fantasy, Mr. Pascal said that his recording's release on an Internet rather than a major commercial label does not bother him.

"To get a distribution deal is difficult, to say the least," he said. "Besides, they take all your money. The fans I have from 'Rent' stay in touch on the Internet. So this is the best way to reach them." And he is thrilled, he said, to be part of a cutting-edge innovation in the music industry. "If a situation came along where we could get the record into the stores, we'd do that as well," he said. "But it's not a reason to sell your soul to a distribution company."

If rock stardom eludes him, so be it, Mr. Pascal declares. "I have allowed myself to realize that I love doing musical theater," he said. "As long as I can do exciting new projects, I'll probably continue."


http://www.nytimes.com

GRAPHIC: Photos: Adam Pascal and Heather Headley in "Aida," opening in New York tomorrow. (Joan Marcus/"Aida")(pg. E1); Adam Pascal, who plays the Egyptian warrior Radames in Disney's musical "Aida," will also have a collection of his rock songs released over the Internet. (Sara Krulwich/The New York Times)(pg. E5)

LOAD-DATE: March 22, 2000

[To The Stage!]

Posted: 6/24/06 at 10:57pm

I'm having a good night, thanks for asking jk1f. I'm getting excited for tomorrow, i'm going to the Celebrate America event at Hofstra and i'm meeting Mel there. Should be fun

I think I remember that article Chloe. I'll try and search for it also.

EDIT: Nevermind, I think Lexi found it.

Updated On: 6/24/06 at 10:57 PM

[jeremykushnier1fan]

Posted: 6/24/06 at 10:59pm

Thanks for the article post I have a huge headache! But, I did see Martin Short: Fame becomes me, and that probably made my summer.
Updated On: 6/24/06 at 10:59 PM

[Chloe]

Posted: 6/24/06 at 11:03pm

That's it, thanks Lexi. This time I'll be sure to save it.

The reason I thought of it, as I said, was your comment about Adam's emotional availability. The combination of "regular guyness" with that availability is what's so unusual about him.

[picturetaker9211]

Posted: 6/24/06 at 11:03pm

Thanks for posting that article!

Posted: 6/24/06 at 11:11pm

No problem, Angela.

I guess that's kind of the reason why it bothers me to see Adam labeled as a fratboy -- I think he has some very fratboy-esque qualities, but I don't think your typical fratboy writes incredibly emotional songs and can convey so much emotion through song.