Divorce! The Musical continues Thurs.-Sat., 8 pm; Sun., 2 pm; through June 28. Tickets: $34.99. Hudson Mainstage Theatre, 6539 Santa Monica Blvd., Hollywood. 323.960.1056 or visit divorcemusical.com

When world premiere musicals open in LA they are usually at the Ahmanson (Minsky’s and 9 to 5) or at the Kirk Douglas (Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson). Most of the yearly scattering of new musicals premiering in the 99-seat houses run a few weeks and are seldom heard about again. An exception is Louis and Keely at the Sahara which played a lengthy run last season in two 99-seat theatres and now has extended life at the Geffen Playhouse. Another long-running hit is Erin Kamler’s Divorce! The Musical which will have played 84 performances over 21 weeks when it closes at the Hudson on June 28. Very likely it will be going elsewhere.

Plans are solidifying, according to producer Rick Culbertson, to bring the five-actor musical to New York. “We have hired a general manager (Alchemy Production Group), formed an LLC and started raising money,” he says. “My estimate is that we will open by fall of 2010 or spring of 2011.”

Culbertson is also producing Kamler’s Runway 69 in development at New Dramatists. “Runway is a longer process and is several years away from production.” He met Kamler when he was acting (“I am no longer”) and she cast him in a reading of Runway 69 in 2006. “Also, we are developing a show called The Jews of Calabasas. Hopefully we will open that in LA within 18 months following the same path as Divorce! And we’re in the extremely early development stage with a few shows focusing on Southeast Asia.”

Erin Kamler wrote the book, music and lyrics for Divorce! and is a three-time winner of Stephen Sondheim’s Young Playwrights Festival. Her plays have been staged at the Public Theatre and Playwrights Horizons. She is in Bangkok for part of the summer during research on two planned projects so we emailed her some questions:

LA STAGE: Is your musical based on your own experience with divorce?

ERIN KAMLER: While not based on my actual experience, I certainly drew from the emotions of my two divorces, mainly the drastic sways that happened for me between anger, loss, sadness and, ultimately, forgiveness. I also drew from some of my experiences of the legal process and dealing with family law attorneys.

Erin Kamler, Composer/Playwright

LAS: You wrote both attorneys to be played by women, opening the doors for competitive bonding. What was your basis for that choice?

EK: Having been through a divorce in which both lawyers were women, I experienced some of the competitive bonding you mention firsthand. Women can be particularly cruel to each other when they’re trying to succeed, especially in a cut-throat business like family law. During my second divorce, I was amazed by the stunts the lawyers I worked with were pulling on each other. I wanted to explore and sort of “explode” that experience.

LAS: Did you have songs that were cut during rehearsals?

EK: Yes, there were a couple of songs I wrote that I thought I wouldn’t be able to live without but in the end, it’s good they were cut. One song, “Mediation,” was just all wrong so I ended up rewriting the whole thing on the Monday before previews. That was intense but I think the show is better for it.

LAS: Your musical director/arranger David O is also a composer. How did you and he work together?

EK: David is a dream to work with–patient, creative and, most importantly, a great listener. He was able to extract the many layers of the show’s subtext and weave them into his arrangements. The result is that the instruments “play with” the characters and contribute to the dramatic arc of the story in a sense becoming characters in themselves.

LAS: How did you find your award-winning director Rick Sparks?

EK: I had never worked with Rick before and only saw two of his previous productions but I fell in love with his clean, balanced visual staging and his ability to communicate comedic moments clearly and deftly to an audience. He was both an excellent director and dramaturg, really helping shape the arc of the story as I wrote and rewrote the show.

LAS: What changes, if any, will you make before a New York production?

EK: There are moments when I think the show could be funnier; places where I still hope to get laughs but nobody seems to get the humor. Those moments definitely need to be addressed for New York.

LAS: Why are you in Bangkok this summer?

EK: Some writers can create brilliant works of genius without ever leaving their houses. I am totally not one of those writers. I draw my inspiration from life experience, which means I have to go to places and do things like work interesting jobs in order to create. When I was 16, I lived here in Bangkok as an exchange student, learned Thai and fell in love with the culture. Wanting to reconnect with those roots, I’m now working on a master’s degree in International Public Diplomacy with a focus on Southeast Asia. The research I’m doing this summer is part academic and part creative: I’ll be working with kids in the north who are at risk of being trafficked, writing a paper on child trafficking, presenting another paper at an academic conference in Bali and, ultimately, writing a show that relates to these experiences.

LAS: What other projects do you have currently in development?

EK: I’m just beginning work on two projects about Southeast Asia, one will likely be a straight play about Thailand, the other a musical set in Cambodia. In addition, I’m working on The Jews of Calabasas, a one-act musical about three women living in California’s Israeli Diaspora, and Runway 69, a full length musical about a strip club in Times Square, which is in development at New Dramatists in New York.

LAS: How do you balance so many projects at once?

EK: It is hard but you just do it. I have to be able to multi-task and manage my time well. I also have to be able to put certain projects on hold while focusing on others (for instance, this summer I’m focusing on the work in SE Asia rather than rewrites of Divorce! or Runway. In the fall I will turn my attention to working on Jews. As the New York production of Divorce! draws near, I will turn my attention back to it. I think it’s fairly normal for writers to take on several projects at a time; you just have to be able to switch your focus when needed. Also, I don’t have kids or a garden.

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Rick Sparks worked as a Broadway performer before directing and producing his first show in LA, Psycho Beach Party by Charles Busch. Since then he adapted and staged They Shoot Horses, Don’t They? and a year later a rock-and-roll version of A Clockwork Orange, both at Greenway Arts Alliance. Other directing credits include Don’t Talk to the Actors at Laguna Playhouse and Clutter at the Colony Theatre. His attraction to comedy inspired him to direct, co-write and produce Highballs Ahoy! and last year’s cult hit Dead Bride Running. Along the way he has garnered a host of awards for producing, writing and directing including an Ovation for Best New Translation/Adaptation for Horses that he co-wrote with Gary Carter. He has received two directing awards from LA Drama Critics Circle (for Horses and Orange) plus one from LA Weekly (Horses). We caught up with Sparks last weekend while he was opening School House Rock Live Too! at Greenway.

LA STAGE: How do you keep a musical like Divorce! in top-notch shape during a four or five-month run?

RICK SPARKS: It’s ironic how hard one works to get a show up for opening night with hopes it becomes a hit and can run for ages. Then when it does, it’s scary that the work only continues without a let up, doing maintenance, publicity, putting in understudies.

In the past I’ve had many actors joke how they half expected I would give them notes on closing night! I admit for years I was too hands-on long after opening. (I just hated to have my name attached to anything I perceived as sloppy.) Over the years, my heavy hand has lightened due to maturing as a director; realizing actors are better left to fly between tune ups. Also now I’m juggling more projects at the same time.

LAS: How often do you check on the show?

RS: During the first three months of Divorce! I averaged visiting one show per weekend and followed with notes via email. Since then, with the exception of restaging the show for two benefit performances (a gay and lesbian version), several late night rehearsals to put in understudies as well as sending an email reminder of mid-run lethargy inoculations to the cast, I’ve been pretty much away from the Hudson this last month. The actors jokingly said I was cheating on them. But now that School House Rock Live Too! has opened, I can happily return to the Hudson to the beloved Divorce! family.

LAS: Is the original cast still with the show?

RS: At this point we have had all our original actors out for one or more performances.  Most of the understudies were with us at the start of rehearsals as “mice in the corner” observing.  Then, after opening, David O worked with them musically and I had rehearsals at my house with them for staging and text work. Then prior to each of them going in for a role, we would run a full tech put-in to give them the full experience.

LAS: How did you find them?

RS: The wonderful casting director Michael Donovan is gold. He brought them into casting sessions. I’d only worked with two of the actors before: Gregory Franklin and I were actors together over 20 years ago in Kabuki Medea that played Chicago and Washington’s Kennedy Center. Gabrielle Wagner had been in an aborted project of mine last year. Although there wasn’t a role for her at first, she was so talented we cast her as an understudy. Close to tech week when an original cast member had to drop out due to scheduling problems, Gabi pulled a Shirley MacLaine and stepped in. She’s awesome.  As is the rest of the cast:  Lowe Taylor, Rick Segall and Leslie Stevens. Truly one of the best groups of actors I’ve ever had the honor to direct. They were all willing to roll up their sleeves and “do the work.” We approached this first as a straight play, reading and working all vocals as straight text. We did numerous table reads and much improv work to build a back story. Not usually what occurs on a musical.

LAS: Do you usually both direct and stage your musicals?

RS: Yes, I find it easier to choreograph and stage myself so I don’t feel sheepish about stepping on another’s creativity if I don’t like the way a number is looking.  (I’d rather be upset with me if I screw up.)  Plus, being an ex-dancer and very visual, I love it. The geography of the show is one of my favorite puzzles to unlock. When I was a Broadway performer, I was always amazed how the shows seemed to be choreographed by an assistant, with a “choreographer” sitting on the sidelines watching. This year, trying to give up some of my “old hands on” crap, for School House Rock Live Too! I hired an assistant I told for the first time I’d give up a lot of the musical numbers to her. Well, old habits die hard. I found it next to impossible to let them go and stay in my seat. In the end she built about two small musical sections and one number full of hip hop work (foreign to me) out of 23 musical numbers.

LAS: Is this the first time you have done a totally new musical?

RS: hummmm…Is it? No. I did the Equity Workshop of the Vincent Van Gogh musical, Poet’s Garden, years ago. I helped shape the script, ran several performances, then didn’t continue with its other incarnations. And a few shows I co-wrote/produced and directed although not considered musicals had several musical numbers peppered in (Highballs Ahoy! and Dead Bride Running).

LAS: Tell us about working with Erin and David O.

RS: Such a great experience with both of them. Terrific artists!  Erin’s so smart, receptive to ideas and creative. And… she creates amazingly fast on her feet. At one point we all decided a musical number wasn’t working and Erin came back 24 hours later with a perfect and complex new number. She has a huge future in this business. And David is a true pro. His arraignments of Erin’s exquisite music are delightful and he’s been wonderful at keeping the singers spot on every show. It’s so helpful having him on piano for most shows. All that AND he looks like a 1950s picture of Jesus with the most beautiful blue eyes. By the way, let me take a moment to speak about Rick Culbertson, the show’s producer.  He’s one of the best I’ve worked with in ages and it’s his first time at the rodeo.  He’s a natural, not to mention a true gentleman–a great combination.

LAS: What inspired you for the concept of the versatile set?

RS: I’m in love with levels as they give me endless opportunities to keep the geography of a show from looking stagnant. Although the Hudson’s a small stage, I noticed it had a good high ceiling. At that first theater “walk through,” I immediately imagined the band elevated with playing area in front, stairs that climb down to the deck and a space underneath that could work as an ever changing “garage.” (The garage idea is stolen from myself from a set I designed years ago on a Tallulah Bankhead play at the old St. Genesius Theatre.) Due to worry of a story component that had the opposing lawyer’s offices ping-ponged back and forth, I also knew I’d need them mobile. In order to make all these requirements realized, the remarkable genius and tireless energy of Danny Cistone was hired to design the set.

LAS: What other projects do you have planned?

RS: While looking for my next directing project, I’m currently writing my next play (already a producer’s nightmare due to the huge cast). Its subject matter is a fresh and undiscussed subject of American history. Within the next two years I hope to have it mounted. Also, my producing partner, the wonderful Eileen T’Kaye, and I are still pitching my adaptation and staging of They Shoot Horses, Don’t They? to theaters across the country. It is still one of the most thrilling theatrical experiences of my life. And I’m certain that due to the zeitgeist of today’s depression era obsessed with reality shows of people in combat and misery, it’s the perfect time for a remount. The trick is that it presents some producing foibles due to its large cast and need for an unconventional theatre (non-proscenium) space. I know in my gut some real smart producers/theatre will come along and revive the piece. Any takers?

Feature Image by Craig Schwartz