Check In From Away Episode 30

AUDIO	VIDEO	
STEFFI DIDOMENICANTONIO: Hi, everyone. I'm Steffi D. 	Lisa and Steffi appear in different chat windows on screen	
LISA HUMBER: And I'm Lisa H. 		
STEFFI DIDOMENICANTONIO: And welcome to Check In From Away. 		
LISA HUMBER: This week, we are celebrating the 25th anniversary of 2 Pianos 4 Hands. 		
STEFFI DIDOMENICANTONIO: Thanks for joining us. 		
[MUSIC PLAYING] 	CREDITS SEQUENCE
TEXT: Check In From Away with Steffi D. and Lisa H.
Steffi and Lisa’s windows slide together and they mime clinking their mugs together.	
		
Hey, Lisa, guess what? 		
LISA HUMBER: What? 		
STEFFI DIDOMENICANTONIO: Today is a very special day here on Check In From Away. Do you want to know why? Because we are speaking to the creators and the stage manager of arguably one of the biggest shows to ever come out of Canadian theater history, called 2 Pianos 4 Hands. 		
LISA HUMBER: That's right, Steffi. They are celebrating their 25th anniversary this year. Not only has the show been produced in over 200 cities worldwide, it has played to nearly 2 million people. Richard Greenblatt and Ted Dykstra, who created the show and who we're chatting with today, have also performed it nearly 1,000 times. 		
STEFFI DIDOMENICANTONIO: They have us beat at Come From Away, Toronto, because we did the show 850 times. Also, speaking of pianos and hands, I've always wanted to learn how to play piano. But I never learned. 		
LISA HUMBER: OK. It's never too late. You can always teach an old dog new tricks, Steffi. 		
STEFFI DIDOMENICANTONIO: Are you calling me an old dog, Lisa? 		
[CHUCKLING] 		
LISA HUMBER: No. You know what? OK. Truthfully, I want to know. This is the most important question I'm going to ask all day. 		
STEFFI DIDOMENICANTONIO: OK. 		
LISA HUMBER: Would you rather have two pianos or four hands? [CHUCKLES] 		
STEFFI DIDOMENICANTONIO: OK. I'm going to go ahead and say four hands because I live in Toronto, and there's no space for two pianos here. There you go. 		
[MUSIC PLAYING] 		
[PIANOS PLAYING] 		
		
TED DYKSTRA: You're too young to use the pedal. 		
RICHARD GREENBLATT: Contrary motion this time. 		
TED DYKSTRA: So the one hand would go the one way, and the other hand would go the other way. Oh, I don't think so, sir! 		
RICHARD GREENBLATT: Come on! Will you please stop yelling at me? 		
TED DYKSTRA: I'm not yelling at you. I'm feeling strongly about what I'm saying. 		
RICHARD GREENBLATT: The bench is too close. Thank you. 		
[APPLAUSE] 		
		
So I'm Richard Greenblatt, and I co-created 2 Pianos 4 Hands with Ted Dykstra. We also mostly directed it throughout the last 25 years, with a couple of exceptions. We performed it almost 1,000 times-- the two of us. And for some reason, I played the part of Richard, and Ted played the part of Ted, although we could have been the other way around. But that's the way we decided to do it. 		
TED DYKSTRA: Hey, I'm Ted Dykstra. Along with Richard Greenblatt, I co-wrote 2 Pianos 4 Hands, which we've done 900 times together around the world and which continues to be produced around the world. 		
BEATRICE CAMPBELL: Hello. I am Beatrice Campbell, and I was the stage manager for many, many years of 2 Pianos 4 Hands by Richard Greenblatt and Ted Dykstra. And I was involved from pretty much the beginning. I've got to tell you, man, if there is a horseshoe attached to my life, it has got 2 Pianos 4 Hands written on it. It has always been a great joy. It has rarely been a challenge, though there have been-- there were challenging times, of course. With any show, there are. But what a gift. What a gift, as a stage manager. 		
[MUSIC PLAYING] 		
TED DYKSTRA: It's a really hard show to describe. I don't think I've ever done it to my own satisfaction. It's loosely about two guys who have had classical piano as a big part of their life, as children growing up, and what that is, what it's like to have that in your life, and what it means when you let it go on the day that you do let it go. But it's not a story-story. It's not a play-play. And it's not a musical. So it's really difficult to describe. That's why the title 2 Pianos 4 Hands is the best we could come up with, because at least that's true. There are two pianos, and there are four hands. 		
RICHARD GREENBLATT: We sometimes say it's an examination of a lifetime's obsession with piano and with music as well, although it goes far beyond that. We knew we had a success on our hands when people would talk about how the show directly related to their lives, and they had never taken a lesson in their lives. 		
So for some people, it was a sport or another art form or being prime minister or whatever it might be-- the idea of dreaming and striving and potentially hitting a wall beyond where you go, and finding out what that means. So especially if you spent a lot of time in your youth working on something, and then you have to come to terms with the fact that-- for the sake of argument, if you're playing hockey, and you go, oh, crumb. I'm never going to make it to the NHL. 		
But that said, what do you do with all of that? And so does that mean you never play hockey again? Well, we don't believe so. It's just as great to play in a Wednesday-night beer league as it is, practically, to play in the NHL. So in the same way, we celebrate about being two of the best piano players in the neighborhood-- is something to celebrate as much as it is being a world-class concert pianist. 		
BEATRICE CAMPBELL: A lifetime of love for an art form that, regardless of what level you achieve, it has great influence and power over your life. And it's about laughing, too. The show is about the comedy of humans and how things that are difficult are funny, and things that are funny are difficult, too. 		
[MUSIC PLAYING] 		
RICHARD GREENBLATT: I'm actually writing a book about the show. It's called Two of the Best In the Neighborhood. And it's a personal anecdotal history of the show. So as I'm going through our history of it, I just passed our run at the Royal Alex, which we did in the summer of '98. And it was one of the wildest runs of our 1,000 shows in that there were scalpers outside of the Royal Alex. There was a woman with a sign saying "will pay anything for tickets." 		
Our contract was only for seven shows a week, so our understudies did one. And then a week or two into the run, they decided to add another show with the understudies. So our understudies did two a week-- one on Thursday afternoon as well. And that run sold out as well. That show sold out as well. So it was one of those things-- I would look out into the audience, and I'd see one empty seat on row L or something. And I'd go, how come that seat is empty? 		
TED DYKSTRA: A man waiting for us after the show-- an older man. He was just kind of quiet. And he said, I don't really know why I'm here, but I had to meet you guys. And we go, that's fine. He goes, the piece that you play in the encore, the duet for two pianos-- I played that with my wife all the time, and she passed away last year. And I just wanted to say hi. So just things like that-- a million, billion things like that happened all the time. 		
And we got to meet great people, and did The Rosie O'Donnell Show. And I sat in the dressing room-- makeup room-- with Wayne Gretzky here and Peter O'Toole here. And I was alone with them for 10 minutes. And just things like that happened just like-- and it's bottomless. I've been reading this book and going, oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. So it was incredible. It was amazing. 		
BEATRICE CAMPBELL: Everywhere else, they've always played the same encore, which is "Sheep May Safely Graze." But in Japan, they had learned a new song, which was, I think, called-- it's not called this exactly, but the cherry-blossom song, which was a very familiar-- known to the Japanese people. And so they had learned this cherry-blossom song that they would play when the encore was called for. And it always got a great reaction. It was their gift. It was a way of them giving a gift back. 		
And on the last night, they started the encore. And the crew, unbeknownst to us, had, on their dinner break, I think, come in and loaded drops-- petal drops-- across the top of the stage and gotten cherry-blossom petals-- fake ones, but cherry-blossom petals-- above each of the pianos so, as they were playing the cherry-blossom song, these petals started falling from the sky. I don't think-- I actually said, I can't-- I was crying, trying to take pictures from the wings. Not appropriate, but whatever. It was so beautiful and magical and was such a wonderful way to end the show. 		
But that was an extraordinary thing to watch that, to see people care that much. It wasn't just because they were trying to be nice. It was because they loved the show, and they wanted to do something special for Richard and Ted, who magically kept it together, like, we kept playing while like, what is happening? And I hadn't known about it, either. So it was a real-- that was an extraordinary thing. 		
LISA HUMBER: Wow. 		
[MUSIC PLAYING] 		
RICHARD GREENBLATT: We were in Winnipeg, and we were literally just lifting our hands to start playing at the top of the show. And he heard, behind him, a little old Jewish lady going, oh, 2 Pianos 4 Hands. It was like she just got the idea. And we were liter-- and said it loudly. And so, of course, everybody cracked up, including us. And it took us a little while to continue. 		
TED DYKSTRA: We go out in the audience in the Kiwanis. I play a kid who can't remember the music and goes, can I go get my music? And then Richard goes and gets it for me. And he goes out. He goes, Mom? Mom? And we would plant a woman or a man in the audience-- it'd be Dad if it was a dad. And Bea, our stage manager, would tell us before the show. You've got a dad tonight, or you've got a Mom tonight. 		
And so Richard would go, Mom? Mom? And then the mom would give him the music book, and he'd come back on stage with it. And there were a lot of times-- and Richard will be able to tell better stories-- that the mom decided she wanted to be part of the show. And he'd go, no, Richard. No. You can't have your-- and it was just like, oh, please stop. Please don't. 		
STEFFI DIDOMENICANTONIO: Oh, no! 		
TED DYKSTRA: Please stop now. Yeah. So we had that happen a lot. We had a million mishaps. 		
BEATRICE CAMPBELL: The show started. And it had been a bit of a scramble. It had been short set-up. And I don't know. It was a bit of a scramble. And I forgot to set some bread and some whipped cream that Richard used during shadow-play backstage. But I had, more importantly, also forgotten to get a mom with the music in the audience. I would go out before every show and ask someone in the audience to play mom during Kiwanis. 		
So I snuck out of the booth. I pushed my book over to the technician and said, just press go wherever you like. It was simple lighting cues. It wasn't a complicated time. And then, because it was opening night, I could see the production manager, Krista Hansen, who was also a stage manager, sitting a few rows in front of the booth. 		
So I snuck down. And I went, (WHISPERING) come here! And she snuck out. I said, I just need you to go and call cues while I run backstage, set the props, grabbed the book, and came out, and then told her how to be mom. And she snuck back into the audience. No one ever would have known. It's the only time anything that insane has happened in my career. But I still am like, [SIGHS] can't believe that worked. And then she played mom. Richard and Ted never knew anything about it. 		
[MUSIC PLAYING] 		
TED DYKSTRA: We had occasion to do a show called So You Think You're Mozart? And So You Think You're Mozart? was written by the late Paul Quarrington, who was a Canadian novelist. And it was about a little boy practicing Mozart. Mozart comes out of his piano, teaches him that playing music is cool. And the kid learns a lesson and plays a piano concerto based on hockey night in Canada theme. 		
		
BOY: Probably want me to do that a couple more times. 		
MOZART: That would make an excellent fantasia. 		
BOY: Fantasia? 		
		
TED DYKSTRA: But they needed-- they composed original-- Louis Applebaum, the Canadian composer who wrote a lot for theater, composed the music. And there was a lot of Mozart playing in it because Mozart comes out and plays. The kid plays Mozart. And so they hired me and Richard. And I knew that Richard played. And he knew that I played. 		
When we sat down and played for each other, it was like, oh, you're as good as I am-- because we're good enough that, as actors in Toronto, you probably won't meet a working actor/director who plays the piano classically as well as we do. So we were very proud of this, obviously, and very competitive. 		
So we started sizing each other up. Well, what's your story? What'd you do? And the same stories that one teacher-- for, like, 10 years, from the time you were seven to 17, and the competitions, going to music camp, and then, in the end, just letting it go and sliding into the theater. So it's not the story of the show. 		
We made up the story of the show because neither of us ever had a big, traumatic quitting like we do in the show. What we both had was a realization that we were performers before we were piano players-- ahead of being a piano player. So when we did well in competitions, it was because we liked being in front of people. It wasn't necessarily because we were great piano players. 		
So we had all this in common. And Andy McKim was a friend of ours. He was the associate director of the Tarragon Theatre. And he'd been with us on a couple of occasions in bars, probably drinking a lot. And we'd start talking about it and say what a great show there was there, what the potential was. And finally, I think he'd heard enough. And he just said, stop talking about it and do it. I'll give you a room at the Tarragon. And come in and come up with some stuff. 		
RICHARD GREENBLATT: In the early days, we would talk and tell stories. And the real germ of the idea came because we had this parallel existence, even though he was from Edmonton and I was from Montreal, and I'm about eight years older than he is. But we had so many of the similar experiences just growing up as young piano players. And we'd gotten pretty well to the same level. And we each had one teacher, basically, for our whole time. So we had a lot in common. 		
So we would just start talking and telling stories. And then we'd go, oh, that's a great idea for a scene. And we'd improvise it, usually. Sometimes, it would be transcribed by the stage manager, sometimes not. And then, at a certain point, we would go and sit in front of a computer and literally pound it out. And it was almost like, OK, I'll say this. And OK. Great. And I'll say this. And OK. And then I'll say this. And then bit by bit, it flotted into place, and because we were going chronologically. 		
And then, finally, when we got to the very end, and we had to figure out what this thing was all about, we had a little bit of a conflict there in terms of, we had different ideas of what it should be about. And then I remember, at a certain point, we said, well, we don't have to solve this. This is not something that needs to be defined as "this play is about." We just tell the story and let the audience, obviously, decide what it's about. And each of our agendas can be dealt with. And the fact that they don't mesh perfectly-- that's actually a good thing, as far as I'm concerned. 		
And I've done a lot of collectives, or what's now usually called devised work. And I've directed many of them-- about 15 of them. And you always know that, sometimes, the conflict-- or, the dynamic in the room is what makes the drama. And in Ted's and my case, we've always defined it as the dynamic between competition and complicity. So just by finding somebody else who had experienced the same things we had, it was like, oh my god. There's somebody else who's also an actor, right? And so you did all of that stuff just like me. How great that I could find somebody else. 		
But then there's another side of you that's going, wait a second. Is he better than me, or am I better than him? Or are we both the same? And what's he better at than me, and what am I better at than him? And so that kind of push and pull between the competition and the complicity was, I think, a lot of the dynamic in the show, which served us. 		
[MUSIC PLAYING] 		
TED DYKSTRA: We both agreed, early on, that there should be no props in the show that couldn't fit inside a piano bench. 		
RICHARD GREENBLATT: For two preview performances, we finished the show with a rock-and-roll ending. So we got to the last note of the Bach, and we wanted to have flash pods. But we couldn't do it, because the set would go on fire, never mind two $35,000 grand pianos downstage of them. So we had blinders pointed directly at the audience. And so we got to the last note and just did this [VOCALIZING] rock-and-roll ending. 		
And then, finally, our consulting director, who was Andy McKim, came to us. And he said, can we just try finishing it like it was written? And then we'll just do a blackout and just see what happens. So we went, sure. Let's just see what happens. And so we finished it. And then the lights came up, and-- 		
The ending was great in the sense that people still loved it, but it was an instantaneous rise to their feet as soon as the lights came back up. And it was clearly-- it was kind of disrespectful to the music. And we were being bad and rebellious and stuff. But it was really silly. It was a silly thing. And thank God it only lasted two performances. 		
LISA HUMBER: So it's so funny because Ted and Richard never once mentioned that there was a production with two women that went on tour. That tidbit, I love. I was like, you just dropped that bomb. And I was like, I want to hear more about that. 		
BEATRICE CAMPBELL: Yeah, I don't know-- they'd have to tell you how that came about. Certainly, in the beginning phase-- the beginning of the show-- it was hugely popular. But it became quite evident, quite quickly, that it wasn't just anyone that could do the show. 		
You really had to know how to play the piano. So you had to really have chops there. And then you had to be able to act really well and have skills in comedy and drama and keep it-- and be part of a team. It really is a tennis match. You've got to be able to hand it off to someone and then receive. And it's not improv in any way, but it has that feeling at times. 		
And so it became quite evident that it was going to be hard to cast multiple productions of the show. And so I think someone must have said, what about women? I know a couple of women that play the piano really well or something. Or they sort of got that idea. I don't know what came first. But yeah, we did a tour. And it worked. I think they also-- they took a minute to say, is this going to work? But it absolutely worked. We had Rachel and Thea instead of Richard and Ted. And yeah. 		
[MUSIC PLAYING] 		
TED DYKSTRA: I miss theater because it's what I do best. And it's always a privilege to get paid to do what you love. So I miss the privilege of my job. That's what I miss. But I do also realize that it's a privilege. And I think this year has helped that. So while I do miss it, I also am grateful for the chance to reflect on that. 		
RICHARD GREENBLATT: Why it's relevant is because it fulfills a basic human need that we have, as human beings. It's, we need to gather together to witness art. But it's not just art. We need to gather together to witness a political speech or hear live music or go to a museum. Or it could be-- but the idea of being in a real place with real people in real time is just part of being human. 		
So that's not going to disappear. And I sometimes feel that, in the impending apocalypse, which seems to be closer now than it ever was, theater is really going to be valuable, because it can, first of all, respond directly and immediately to whatever is going on in the world, and cheaply. 		
BEATRICE CAMPBELL: I miss theater because I miss humans. I miss breath and sound and communication and community. And there have been extraordinary ways that we have all, I think, found community and connection as much in this time. But there is just-- and it doesn't mean we're all going to get back to theater and be like, yeah! Oh, this schedule is awesome! Yeah, we'll make two weeks work. And it's not going to change who we are, as humans, in terms of how we'll respond to still making the impossible happen-- what seems like the impossible. 		
But yeah, I miss theater because I miss humans, and I miss that energy. I miss that energy that comes from the emotion. I miss emotion-- emotions other than just being kind of sad and lonely. 		
[INTERPOSING VOICES] 		
		
[MUSIC PLAYING] 		
STEFFI DIDOMENICANTONIO: Thanks for joining us on this week's episode of Check In From Away. 		
LISA HUMBER: We'll be Bach in two weeks. Cheers. 		
STEFFI DIDOMENICANTONIO: Cheers. 		
Lisa and I were wondering-- the most important question of them all is this. Would you rather have two pianos or four hands [INAUDIBLE]-- 		
RICHARD GREENBLATT: [LAUGHS] Two pianos. 		
STEFFI DIDOMENICANTONIO: But that means you have no hands. 		
RICHARD GREENBLATT: Oh, no hands. 		
STEFFI DIDOMENICANTONIO: No. So you have the two pianos. But I guess you can't play them, because you don't have hands. 		
RICHARD GREENBLATT: Right. Four hands. 		
STEFFI DIDOMENICANTONIO: But then you have no pianos if you have four hands. 		
RICHARD GREENBLATT: Yeah. Well, there's lots of pianos in the world. 		
[CHUCKLING] 		
That's a conundrum. 		
STEFFI DIDOMENICANTONIO: Hm. 		
RICHARD GREENBLATT: That's a-- well, then, in that case, I'd say four hands, because who cares if you don't have a piano? But the idea of-- you can, I don't know, pick your nose and make dinner at the same time. 		
[LAUGHTER] 		
STEFFI DIDOMENICANTONIO: Yeah. Also, I want to clarify, I'm not sure if you have four hands on two arms or if you have four arms and four hands. I don't know. Yeah. 		
RICHARD GREENBLATT: I'm thinking half a spider. It's like-- 		
[INTERPOSING VOICES] 		
STEFFI DIDOMENICANTONIO: Yeah. 		
LISA HUMBER: [INAUDIBLE] 		
STEFFI DIDOMENICANTONIO: Yeah, that's about right [INAUDIBLE]-- 		
RICHARD GREENBLATT: We actually, at a certain-- I don't know if Ted told you this story. One of our weird stories is, when we opened in Ottawa at GCTC, it was the first stop on our tour. And on opening night, these poor souls were dressed up in-- these people had an extra set of hands. So they actually had four hands. And some other people had two keyboards somehow strapped to them. And these were their outfits for opening night. And they were the servers for the reception. I don't know these-- 		
And the worst part of it was, GCTC, in those days, had no backstage space. So they were getting into position during our last pieces. And they were huge costumes. There was no space back there. So all you could hear was [NOISE] And then there was a band who had a drum kit trying to set up. And we were still playing the show, including our encore, which is really quiet and beautiful. And all you could hear was [MIMICS CLAMORING] 		
		
It's tons of that. 		
[MUSIC PLAYING]