Words From the Wings: SUFFS Music Director and Music Supervisor Andrea Grody

BroadwayWorld is bringing you Words From the Wings, a new series of interviews that take fans behind the scenes of some of their favorite Broadway stars' backstage routines!

Today we're chatting with Andrea Grody, who serves as Music Director and Music Supervisor for Suffs. Andrea told us all about her backstage routines, must-haves, and more!

Check out her answers, along with photos taken by BroadwayWorld's Jennifer Broski, below!

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What’s the first thing you do when you arrive to the theatre?

Say hi to the doorman! Jeff is there evenings and weekends, and Bobby is there on weekdays.

What’s the last thing you do before the show begins?

After the band is tuned and I tell stage management we’re ready to go, we have a few moments before the standby light goes on to start the show. That’s when I turn on my talkback microphone and say random silly things to the band. Sometimes we talk about the interesting audience members they can see sitting behind me in the conductor monitor. Sometimes I tell them what I made for lunch. We can get interrupted any second; I have started many a dumb story and had to stop after one sentence. It’s a nice moment of zaniness before a long period of intense focus.

What’s your must-have backstage snack?

Trader Joe’s Crispy Crunchi Mochi Rice Nuggets. They’re so addictive that the band calls them crack. We can go through a whole bag in one intermission…heck, I can go through a whole bag myself! They’re amazing.

Do you have a pre-show ritual that others may think is weird?

When I get to my dressing room, I change out of my outside shoes and put on a pair of thin ballet flats I only wear in the theater and which I used to wear for piano-conducting. But I wanted a pair of conducting shoes that had heels because it’s hard to hover my foot over the patch change pedals all the time. My trombonist recently told me about organ shoes, which have heels AND thin bottoms and are made for this purpose. They’re amazing! But the bottoms are suede, so they’re not meant for a lot of walking around. That means I now change shoes twice before and after every show: I put on the ballet flats when I get to my dressing room, and then I put on the organ shoes when I get to my station in the pit, and then I do the whole thing in reverse on my way out. 

What are five must-haves in the pit with you?

A notepad.

Several colors of page flags. I don’t have many breaks in the show to write notes down, so I put page flags on the score while we play and then write down what the note is when we get a break in a scene or after the show. They're easy to grab while I’m playing, and I color-code who the notes are for to help jog my memory later.

Erasable colored pens. Now that I’ve discovered these, I cannot live without them.

My water bottle. Hydration!

I have a little knitted banana that I made in 2016, and I put it on or near my keyboard whenever I do a show. It’s a nice personal touch and a good conversation-starter for curious audience members who peek over at what I’m doing. 

What’s your favorite moment from the show to watch/hear?

At the top of “This Girl”, Jenn Colella’s solo song, Jenn makes this amazing face because Alice, Shaina Taub’s character, has just dissed her pretty hard. I want a meme of that face. It brings me joy every day.

That same song also includes one of my favorite parts of the whole orchestration. It’s a moment of the song I really care about, and I told our orchestrator Michael Starobin all my hopes and dreams for what I wanted that moment to feel like, and he orchestrated it perfectly. I love playing it and hearing it every night!

What has been your favorite backstage moment in your time with this show so far?

Any of the many small community-building moments that have evolved naturally within the company. Whenever there’s a birthday in the band, someone brings flowers and birthday treats and we sing to them at intermission. Whenever the cast gathers for a company meeting, we circle up and end up doing a breath or two and the now-traditional Suffs group cheer. It’s such a kind and caring group of people, and those moments make me feel so lucky to be with them.

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About Andrea Grody

Andrea Grody is an Olivier and Drama Desk Award-nominated music director, arranger, and composer with a focus on developing new work. She is currently the Music Director & Music Supervisor of the Broadway musical SUFFS, for which she also wrote vocal and incidental arrangements.

Andrea was the Music Director, Music Supervisor, and Additional Arranger for the 10-time Tony Award-winning musical THE BAND’S VISIT (Broadway, National Tour). Andrea was also the Music Director, Music Supervisor, and Vocal & Incidental Arranger for the Broadway musical TOOTSIE, which was nominated for 11 Tony Awards including Best Musical. Other favorite projects include the Public Works musical adaptations of AS YOU LIKE IT (music by Shaina Taub) and THE TEMPEST (music by Benjamin Velez) at the Delacorte Theater in Central Park, AN AMERICAN TAIL at Children’s Theatre Company in Minneapolis, CAKE OFF at the Signature Theatre in Arlington, VA and the Bucks County Playhouse, THE GREAT IMMENSITY at The Public Theater, and ROBIN HOOD at the Williamstown Theatre Festival (as Composer/Music Director).

Andrea was Music Supervisor and Producer of the original Broadway cast recording of SUFFS and Music Director and Co-Producer of the world premiere recordings of Michael Friedman’s THE GREAT IMMENSITY and Mr. Burns: A POST-ELECTRIC PLAY. She was Music Supervisor of the original Public Works cast recording of AS YOU LIKE IT and Music Director and Supervisor of the original Broadway cast recordings of THE BAND’S VISIT (Grammy Award winner, Best Musical Theater Album) and TOOTSIE.

Andrea’s writing credits include the full-length musical STRANGE FACES, a commission from the PRISM Saxophone Quartet, and several songs for The Civilians’ Let Me Ascertain You series, which have been performed at Joe’s Pub, Le Poisson Rouge, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Andrea graduated summa cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa from Princeton University, where she majored in Music and minored in Theater. She holds a Master’s degree with Highest Honors in Musical Theatre Music Directing from the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland. Andrea is Associate Director and Resident Music Director at New York Vocal Coaching and the creator of WordWaves.