Interview: Garrett Clayton of IT: A MUSICAL PARODY at Chelsea Table + Stage

There is a phrase used today for artists whose reach spans out in many directions: The Multi-hypenate. Garrett Clayton has taken his work as an actor, activist, social media artist, musician, singer-songwriter, podcaster, dancer, and philosopher to a new level, necessitating a moniker more along the lines of The Multifacet; for Garrett Clayton is a diamond. He is a rare jewel bringing beauty and inspiration to the people who live with him, work with him, or derive pleasure and strength from the internet artistry with which he reaches millions of people.

Garrett is in New York City this week and next to appear at Chelsea Table + Stage in a Halloween show titled IT: A MUSICAL PARODY, which runs through Halloween night. The Rockwell Parodies production has arrived from Los Angeles for the Season of The Ghouls, ready to rock it with fans of the Stephen King novel, the Tim Curry mini-series, or the recent movie series, but it is a show suitable for anyone that loves live entertainment, exciting music and dancing, and sexy, dirty, evil clowns.

Performing two shows nightly may be exhausting, but Garrett Clayton took an hour out of his day yesterday to pose for some pictures and to talk about IT, about those insanely entertaining Instagram and TikTok videos, and the value of knowing when to say, "Love me for who I am."

Get reservations to IT: A MUSICAL PARODY at the Chelsea Table + Stage website HERE.

Garrett Clayton's Instagram is HERE , his TikTok is HERE and his Spotify podcast is HERE.

Photos by Stephen Mosher; visit the Stephen Mosher website HERE.

This interview has been edited for space and content.

Garrett Clayton, welcome to Broadway World!

Thank You!

You are in town to do IT A Musical Parody.

That's right.

Which you've already done on the Los Angeles theater circuit.

Yes, years ago

Has it changed a lot between then and now?

We have a lot of elements that are original to what we had originally made - but any new incarnation has to have some surprises. Otherwise, it's not fun for an audience to come back and see it regurgitated. We have to keep you on your toes.

This is originating out of a company called Rockwell Musical Parodies. (See Rockwell on Instagram HERE.)

Yes.

You had done some work with them before.

Yes, for a few years. I did Clueless, Stranger Things, 10 Things I Hate About You, IT and a couple of others.

What is it about this type of entertainment that draws you in?

I think there's something so fun. I mean, in general, I just love theater. I've always loved it. I've been doing it since I was very young. I originally was in a musical theater program, and then I had film opportunities, which is why I went to California in the first place, but I've never stopped doing theater through that time. I've always made a point to keep it in my life because I have this organic pull to it - it's like gravitational for me. I can't get away from it, and I don't want to go away, I love it. I think there's something so magical about seeing people live, whether you're at a concert, you're at a theater venue, you're seeing a musical, you're seeing a play. There's kind of something - am I allowed to swear?

Yes.

There's just something no-bullshit about it. We've all heard stories of movies that have been doctored together by smart editors and smart directors, things that have been altered to work because maybe it didn't, in the way it was filmed. But there's something so no-bullshit about theater, that, if you're an audience member and you're sitting and you're watching, people are either doing their job or they're not. Y ou don't mask it. You can't go back and edit it to be better for another day. And there's something so freeing, as an artist, to go "I did great today" or, the next day, maybe I didn't do something, or you try something, and I can always go back and work harder tomorrow. I can always try something new tomorrow. I think there's something so magical about theater, that way.

While making film and television, you continued your theatrical training: were you doing plays in black box theaters in Los Angeles? How did you keep the instrument up?

I've always worked with a variety of coaches on different techniques, whether it's vocal or acting. I've continued dance, which I still do a lot online. I've done different shows regionally around, at TUTS in Houston or TPAC in Tennessee. I did a show in North Carolina. I've done stuff at Pasadena Playhouse, Pasadena Civic, and obviously the Rockwell Parodies. I did another play called God Looked Away with Al Pacino and Judith Light, so I've just gone out of my way to keep this in my life because it just feels real. It feels organic to me.

You mentioned the internet dances - they're amazing.

Thank you.

How much work goes into one of those one-minute dances?

It depends on the variety of the technique that we're using. I'm lucky that I get to do it with a lot of people who've become very good friends of mine, and usually, we will message each other, "Hey, let's do these four or five," and because I'm a homework freak about my work, I like to learn them beforehand, or sometimes, if I don't have time, we learn them together on the day. But we'll prepare all of that: we know that, maybe, we'll have a few costume changes, so that way we can have fun with it. And it feels like we're not just spitting out the same thing, wearing the same clothes. And for me, it's just fun. And it was also such a good outlet during the pandemic, when everything was locked down and you had to have a bubble of people, and that was kind of what got me through. It was feeling like, "Oh, I still have a creative outlet, I still have a community and we know that we're safe around each other."

You've mentioned the word fun a couple of times.

Yeah!

How fun is doing IT?

It's a f*ckin' blast! I LOVE it.!!

You had worked with Rockwell previously - were you part of the creation of this piece?

Yes.

Tell me about the genesis of IT The musical parody.

They originally needed to do a new Halloween show, and I'd done a few shows with them before, and they were building this and they said, "We love the mini-series and the movies, but we don't want to just take what they did, we want it to feel like a new property." Because, if you've noticed, every time they do it, they recreate the world to be its own thing. So they didn't want to just regurgitate it. They ended up calling a bunch of us because there's a wide variety of people who've all worked together for years now, almost a decade, and they said, "Typically we would just call you guys, or maybe we would need to audition certain roles because we didn't know where the pieces would fit, but, for this show in particular, we need everyone to audition for everything." Pennywise can be in a variety of things because Pennywise is an alien and, only in the film versions have they kept it a male-identifying form. In this production, they went out of their way and, without giving too much away, there's a section of the show where I'm a guy clown, but then we really lay into the alien aspect and the shapeshifting aspect of it - that makes it so much fun. And it's fun in the element because, yes, I'm a clown, but what's a variety of a clown? What are the shapeshifting elements of that kind of fear and how can you manifest that into different styles of music or different styles of comedy, different characters, different costumes, different ways of playing with how creative can you be with this one clown that doesn't have to stay in the same costume the whole time. You don't have to have the clown be one character the whole time. And that's also the charm of the Rockwell Parodies, is that one person can play a variety of roles - it really is like an actor's playground, which is why I've always had so much fun. It's very freeing. And there's also a little bit of improv in it because the audience is an inch away from your face, if something happens, you get to acknowledge it.

It's playing a cabaret room - this is a nightclub.

Yeah.

Is IT something that could potentially sit down in a theater or is it strictly nightclub material?

No, and that's the beauty of it. The show shapeshifts, it fits to the venue. That's what's so fun about it: we really build the show around the venues we're in. And even in this incarnation, we said, we can still have all the elements that the audience and the fans loved of it (in LA), let's just build it around the room we're in.

What you're describing sounds very Shakespearean, the idea of a troupe of actors traveling to a location and making due with what they find there.

Yeah.

Were you a horror person before this?

I was, actually.

Had you seen the different incarnations of IT? When did the last movie come out? Was it before or after you started this?

I believe the first one had come out, and the second one was on its way.

What did you think of those versions of IT?

The newer ones?

All of them - had you read the novel, as well?

What's funny is my husband is an avid reader, so the moment I even talked about, "Rockwell called and they want me to come in and want to see if I can be an evil clown, an evil sewer monster," he was like, "Oh, the books are crazy." So we got to talking about the books, I started cracking open the book, and you hear about the universe on a turtle shell and these crazy Stephen King things we even call it out in the show. I'm worried about saying too much and giving away other people's jokes in the show.

There are no spoilers here today. As someone who likes the horror genre, getting to create this new version of this iconic character, did you feel free to just do whatever you wanted with Pennywise?

Yes and no because I think there are certain expectations that come with the role, and people do expect some kind of menacing or looming feeling about the character - I didn't want to force it. I wanted it to feel like it came from an organic place, and truthfully, my great-grandma, who just passed away... was it last year or the year before? I feel like, because of the pandemic, I can't keep a sense of Time.

Yeah, I have no head for the passage of time, anymore.

But she was a clown... and may or may not have murdered someone. (Giggling.)

Interesting.

It was like a big family thing growing up, where everybody was like, "There's this thing that she won't talk about, no one will talk about, and no one really has the full story now." And now she's passed away, so we can never really crack the code. What a fascinating, crazy life. But she used to bring me to parties, dressed as a clown, and if you see pictures, she's actually terrifying. It's unbelievable.

So did you use grandma to inform your Performance?

One of the characters I play, I use her voice because she has a very specific speaking voice because she's from New York, so I was like "My Granmother's an evil clown" so I have to insert her in here somewhere. And she would bring me to birthday parties.

Both of you dressed as clowns?

Just her. She would bring me because, at the first party she did after clown school, she had me there, and all the people were like, "Oh, this is cute. You're the grandma who brings her grandson." And the people were booking her on parties, so she would call my parents and be like, "I want him to come with me because people keep booking me when he comes with me." (Laughing)

How old were you?

It was my youth, growing up, so I was a little kid, five to thirteen.

Hilarious.

She would bring me to the parties, but she was also a real estate agent, and a hoarder.

This is a fascinating woman.

Oh, trust me. She used to pull out all of your presents you would get would be garbage from around her house, and she'll call them Sitto bags.

She called them what?

My dad's side is Lebanese, that means "Grandma" - and so she would pull, there was like piles around her house and she would pull things from them and put them in grocery bags and tie them up and they'd be Sitto bags. And then she'd give you a Sitto bag and happy birthday, Merry Christmas. My favorite one, I got a car wash glove, a key chain, an old box of cereal that was opened, a three-year-old bag of licorice, pencils, and a notepad with her face on it, and it was in a plastic bag. (Laughing gleefully.)

Were you just in love with this woman?

I just didn't know any different, so I just thought this is what grandmas do, this is what my great-grandma does. She brings me a bag of trash.

I love that story. Now.

Yes.

Pennywise.

Yeah.

Tim Curry.

Mmm-hmm.

You have an association with Tim Curry roles.

I can't help, I just love Tim Curry. There's something so magical about the way that he approaches creativity. I always tell anybody I work with: if we're not having fun, then I don't want to do it. There's no point. We are working in entertainment, if we're not having fun doing it, it's not going read. Anybody who's watching it is going to see that we're not having fun, so they're not going to have fun. I got into this business because I thought "I want to have fun for the rest of my life." I want to spread that kind of joy and if that's not happening, then I don't want to do it. Let's do something else. Let's find another way of approaching it. And I feel like I can see the joy in all of his work - I see the freedom in it, and it feels so unguarded and raw and powerful.

Like, something about when I get to do Frank-N-Further bits, it feels so powerful and I don't feel scared. I don't feel like I'm worried about what people think of me. I've never felt more free than when I play a clown sewer monster. I'm a dirty sewer clown and I feel strong and cool and sexy and powerful and loud. And I don't care what anybody thinks about me. I get to go and have fun. And if you like it, then great, and if you don't, that's okay, then it wasn't for you and you can go watch something else you like.

Are there times when you've felt scared of what people might think of you?

Yeah. I think everyone goes through that phase in their life.

But that's not you now.

Absolutely not. I had that moment and I think I went to therapy for it.

Get it out.

Yeah!

Forever.

Yeah.

You live very authentically to yourself. Your social media is an inspiration.

Thank You.

Do you hear from people, from young queer people that are inspired by the social media, by your very public love affair and marriage? You live in the light: does feedback come to you about that?

Yeah. It makes me feel very emotional sometimes. We will get messages from young people or people from an older generation that either haven't or couldn't live the way that they felt, or young people who aren't in situations where they don't feel safe to be who they are authentically. And they have said it feels like an escape, sometimes, for them or it gives them comfort to know that there's a kind of light at the end of the tunnel, maybe when they get out of high school or college and can move out on their own. It breaks my heart a little bit. It makes me a little bit sad. Oh my god, I'm getting emotional. (Laughing.) I guess I remember growing up in that environment - there was a period in my life in high school where I was bullied relentlessly, and then there was times publicly, when I still wasn't out yet, that I felt that same kind of bullied pressure of people making jokes out of the way I walked or talked or act or spoke. I still had representation on the other side, telling me the way to act, the way to be, and I think (that) once I let go of all that crap and said, "It's never going to be enough for people who don't like me. So I just don't care anymore...."

There is great power in not giving a f*ck.

And I don't. And I can't. I genuinely don't have the energy to care about people who, if you don't have time to care, or if you don't like me, I don't care: go find someone you care about. I was just telling a friend the other day, "I can only meet you in the middle." I don't have time to be in spaces I'm not welcome - I'm going to go find a space I am welcome. I'm not meant to be here if the energy isn't right, if the people don't want me there.

I have an old friend who taught me a great saying that I've never forgotten: I am only looking for the people who are looking for me.

Mm-hmm.

That's the way I feel about things. Now, I want to pivot.

Yeah.

I want to talk about makeup.

Oh yeah.

The makeup - I don't want to really say tutorial cause they're not really tutorials - but on Instagram, you make a video where here's Garrett, SWOOP, here's Ursula the Sea Witch.

(Laughing hard.) Yeah!

Is that something you went to school for or did you just spend a lot of time fine honing that in front of your own mirror?

A bit of both. When I was in my BFA, which, I only was there for a year, so, I literally picked one gen-ed and, then, packed in all of the courses in my music theater program that I wanted - every design course I could get my hands on, every dance class I could find, I had a classical vocal coach and a music theater vocal coach, I was like, "Give me all the tools I can get before I have to go." Because I started getting opportunities and I knew that, at some point I was like, "I'm not going to be able to stay." I started working when I was 13. I was on Greyhound buses doing my homework with my mom, working extra hours so we could afford to go to auditions. I'd worked a long time to, hopefully, have these opportunities and when I started to get them - It doesn't knock twice. I wasn't going to wait and hope to find out if, maybe, I would get a second chance. When I had possible representation in California, I went and took it. I learned a bit of the makeup stuff in college, and then I started learning more on sets. Then I got really into Halloween, my whole life, so I was pretty good at prosthetics. The way I would lay them down wasn't always the cleanest, so I started looking things up online, and when the pandemic hit, I had enough free time to really invest in it, and I'd been doing theater for so long - nine times outta ten, you're doing your own makeup, so if you don't have the skills, you better learn them because no one's holding your hand.

What would it take to get you on Broadway?

The right opportunity. Yeah. I think as long as the right opportunity comes along, I would love to be in the city for a long period of time. I would love to do a show for a long period of time here. I love New York, I love the people in it.

But right now your focus is on your music.

I really believe that we can have and do all the things we want to do. Just this year alone... I'm very fortunate that I've had a show with Spotify for the last year, that I've been doing on Spotify live called A Gay In The Life. And I had a show premiere on Paramount Plus, The Fairly OddParents. I've been working on music in Nashville. There's the musical I'm doing right now, there's a movie I'm attached to, and another movie that's coming out that I did a cute little cameo in. Then there's a short that's been circulating the festivals, which is a beautiful real-life story about the largest archive of love letters from World War ii, from any queer couple, and their names are Gilbert and Gordon. The director's name is Andrew Valentine, my co-star in it is Matthew Postelthwaite, and we get to tell this love story, it's short form right now, but there are hopes for bigger things with it. It's a true story and there's no other story like it that, literally, you have the evidence in front of you.

What is it called?

The Letter Men.

(Read an interview with The Letter Men director Andy Valentine and see the trailer HERE.)

Where can people see it?

It's just online right now. It's been circulating and they just put it online.

Online is a beautiful thing.

Yeah.

You just ran down a list of a hundred million trillion million things that you are doing. How do you keep track of it all?

Just keep having fun.

All right. So tell me what it is that makes IT A Musical Parody a parody?

It makes jokes about itself. It's very meta in the way that we can call out things in the world that are very current. We can call out hilarious random things about how absolutely insane the book is, sometimes. I promise you go: read this book and you'll go, "Holy Shit. This thing is crazy." So we get to kind of make jokes about how wild the books are, or make note of certain things that happened in the movies, and still find a way to make it its own unique encapsulated show, which I think it really is. All of us feel... we call each other family and we feel so lucky just to have each other, and you know you're safe with every single person on that stage. The creative team is the same creative team that did it originally and everyone flew out to make sure that we protected the egg because we had something special and we didn't want to lose what made it so special in the first place. It really is the joy of what we built out of awesome harmonies and cool music and great jokes and beautiful dancing and the lighting design. I'm just like, god, it's so weird how you can have something so R-rated humor and still have something so beautiful. I think that's the duality of it. It's frightening and it's beautiful and it's funny and you're like, "How did they make this weird mesh ball so cool?" That's what it feels like. It feels like a cool night to watch something that makes you feel alive.

I will be there tomorrow night.

I'm glad you are.

Thank you, Garrett, for spending this time with me.

Thank you. This was fun.

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