Interview: Ava Nicole Frances Dreams Big in THE DREAM THAT I SEE at The Green Room 42

Singer Ava Nicole Frances will grace the stage at the Green Room 42 on Saturday October 26th at 9:30 pm with THE DREAM THAT I SEE. American Idol finalist and two-time Broadway World Cabaret Award winner Ava Nicole Frances honors her dreams and aspirations with the songs she’s longed to sing – songs that spark the imagination and have the power to turn a vision into reality.

In this all-new personal and multifaceted show, Ava merges the worlds of Broadway, pop, The Great American Songbook and her own originals, including songs from Stephen Sondheim, Beyonce, Meredith Wilson, and Stephen Schwartz among many others.

Joining Ava will be special guests Susie Mosher (The Lineup at Birdland), American Idol’s Luke-Michael, and musical director Michael Collum. There are plenty of treats in store for this Halloween weekend celebration – costumes optional!

Read a conversation with Ava about the show.

What are you most looking forward to about your upcoming show at the Green Room 42?

There’s so much to look forward to with this show. It’s very different from anything I’ve done before performance-wise. I’m really excited to show a different side of myself. I do a lot of big singing. I'm a Broadway girl at heart, but being on American Idol last season opened me up to so much more, so there are a lot of different styles in this show. We have some pop, some theater, some jazz, some countryish songs. It’s really fun. 

What was the process like of putting together the set list for this?

I think the most important thing for me was I wanted everything to be real. I was going through some major changes in my life, in school, professionally, personally, and I felt like I could help redefine myself with the songs I chose to sing. It’s an entirely new show, some of the songs I already knew and loved and some of them I discovered and learned, but everything is new to my show. 

You're doing a few of your original songs at the show. Can you tell me a little about the inspiration behind writing one of the songs you're planning to sing?

I’ve always been a writer, but I usually stayed in the book style of writing. Then I went through a breakup a few months ago and I guess I just had a lot to say! It’s not all sad breakup songs, there’s just a lot put into each one. They all come from a very real place. And everything worked out in the end because I got to work on these songs with a close friend of mine who is actually one of the guests in my show, Luke Michael. I met Luke while doing American Idol and he’s a phenomenal singer and he has such a way with words, so I feel really grateful that he’s been a partner in this writing process. 

Aside from getting ready for this show, what have you been filling your time with lately?

I just had the immense honor of leading a new musical called Olivia O! It follows the story of a 14-year-old immigrant and her mother who come up from Guatemala to find Olivia’s Tia Isabel who lives in El Paso. But at the border, Olivia gets detained and her mother gets deported, so she embarks on a really crazy journey. It was a heartbreaking story to tell but I was so glad to be a part of it. I joined the cast as the original Olivia back in March 2024 for a staged reading, and now we just did it to close out the Spark Theater Festival in NYC, where I reprised my role as Olivia, only this time it was a fully staged version. It was beautiful, and the cast and crew were genuinely some of the best people I’ve ever worked with. It’s such an important story to be told, especially now, so I just threw myself headfirst into that story and into Olivia. I was also lucky enough to be asked to perform in the Cabaret Convention by the incomparable Natalie Douglas, so I’ve been doing a lot of prep for that as well. And I was recently in Susie Mosher’s show The Lineup, which is always a ton of fun. Susie is also one of my guests in my upcoming show at The Green Room 42, and she is the best to work with and to be around. I’ve been very lucky with everything I’ve been doing recently. 

Who should come see this show?

Short answer, everyone! The thought-out answer goes a bit deeper. I don’t think I’ve ever felt more grateful than when I was doing Olivia O! I remember walking to rehearsal from Penn Station every day and looking around and listening to music and really genuinely thinking “How lucky am I that I get to do this?” I’ve always felt grateful and honored that I get to do what I do, but it never presented itself in the way it did then. I think I was just coming to terms with the story I was telling. I was taking on the role of a little girl who lost everything and was clinging onto the tiniest sliver of hope of her dream. And yes, Olivia wasn’t a real person, but she represented the millions of people who lived a story just like hers. And I get to live my dream, walking down the streets of New York to go perform, something I’ve dreamed of doing since I knew what a dream was. So, I have just been feeling immeasurably grateful, and I take that feeling with me into my show now. The whole thing is about the dreams I’ve had, who I am now, and what my dreams look like today. So, I guess what I’m saying is anyone with a dream. My hope is that people will leave my show feeling grateful for all of their dreams that have come true already, big or small, and excited for the dreams to come. 

Is there anything else you'd like to add?

Yes… Please vote. Please vote. Please. Vote.

---

For more on Ava visit www.avanicolefrances.com

Tickets are available on the Green Room 42’s website. The show will also be livestreamed. Livestream tickets are available on GR42’s website as well.

To post a comment, you must register and login.