Interview: A Conversation with BUDDY HOLLY's Andrew Harvey and Jayson Elliott

“To do this show, you’ve got to have a bag of tricks. Everybody in the cast has to be multi-instrumentalists, as well as actors and singers.” Actor Jayson Elliott is talking about the complexities of performing THE Buddy Holly STORY, which MSMT will present on its main stage beginning June 28. Elliot is reprising his role of J.P. Richardson, known as “The Big Bopper,” and he and MSMT newcomer, Andrew Harvey, who essays the title role, are discussing the intricacies and appeal of this juke box musical and its inspiration, rock and roll legend, Buddy Holly.

Harvey  and Elliott have worked together before on this show with director Angela C. Howell at Tuacahn Amphitheatre in Utah, and both actors have considerable experience with their roles.  Elliott says he has played The Big Bopper some twenty times; Harvey has four productions under his belt, and they both note that the MSMT cast of eighteen can cumulatively claim to have performed in some one hundred productions.  Harvey says, “ I have worked with quite a few of these people before, and I am enjoying being together again.  They are all insanely talented musicians – which you have to be in this kind of juke box musical.”

Yet, despite the fact that both Elliott and Harvey have done THE Buddy Holly before, they maintain it is different each time.  Says Elliott: “ It’s always fresh.  [An]Drew has a different take on the role than Andy Christopher did the last time I was here. It’s good to see it through someone else’s eyes.  We have some fresh faces, new blood, and the energy is super high.”

Harvey hails from Buffalo where he recalls coming to his vocation in high school when he auditioned for a community theatre production of THE WEDDING SINGER for which he taught himself guitar. After that he taught himself several more instruments, building on the foundation of his childhood piano lessons and capped his education with a degree in musical theatre from Marymount College.  Elliott began his career in his native Indianapolis, having been both an athlete and a singer-actor in high school.  Also largely self-taught as a muisician, he plays guitar and a plethora of other instruments and has worked extensively in regional theatre and in New York in shows like THE FULL MONTY, THE MUSIC MAN, SISTER ACT, and THE WIZARD OF OZ.

Both cast members agree that Buddy Holly was truly a musical pioneer. Harvey describes his character as “revolutionary in his time. He was always putting a new spin on things. He produced his own music, and at the end of his life, he had created his own record label and was recording some very original stuff - hybrid rock and orchestral swing - and wanted to sign other young artists like Ritchie Valens. The format of his band became a blueprint for the Beatles; it was Buddy who popularized that foursome of one lead guitar/vocalist, rhythm guitar, bass, and drums.”

Elliott adds,” Sir Paul McCartney once said that Buddy had a chance to become the fifth Beatle.  They loved him.  They studied the way he strummed his guitar. Without Buddy Holly, there are no Beatles.  Bands like the Grateful Dead were also influenced – all in such a short time. He was only twenty-two when he died.”

Harvey and Elliott feel that it is Holly’s music which drives the book of THE Buddy Holly STORY. Says Harvey,” The book is not Shakespeare; it’s goofy, cute, often poignant Americana. But I love the way the show is constructed. It tells the story chronologically from his first recording contract to the plane crash, and it is where the songs are placed in the script that does a great job of driving the piece forward. The first and last scenes of Act One are concerts; the end of Act Two is also a concert. [The action] is so fast paced..”

Elliott gives an example: “I love that they place ‘That’ll Be the Day’ in the Decca scene. It could go anywhere, but putting it there allows Buddy to say to the record executives, ‘You are not going to tell me what to do.’”

Harvey observes that, though the audience knows the ending before it ever happens, the fast pace of the script leading up to the crash makes for a powerful moment. In the midst of the Clear Lake Concert, when the audience doesn’t want the music to end, suddenly there is this instant of stillness – actually the first one we see in the show.  The audience realizes the ride is over, but the script alights so quickly and poignantly and then segues back into the concert and a couple encores.”

Adds Elliott: “You know this abrupt ending is coming – ‘the day the music died’ – as Don McLean writes in the song “American Pie.” Buddy’s death somehow signaled the loss of an entire era of the 1950s- of coke, Chevies, and rolled up jeans. The country was moving on from the World War II era. We had turned to corner into another time. It feels shocking, but then the music resumes, and the show goes right back to living again. ”

Asked how they have prepared to play their roles based on real people, Harvey explains that while he did listen to Buddy Holly originals, “I have to sing the songs in a way that is healthy and honest for my body and my sound. At the end of the day, we are actors, playing roles, but there has to be a part of me that connects with a part of Buddy.  How do I connect and what do we have that is in common?  That is my starting point.”

Elliott says that J.P. Richardson was, by all accounts, “a larger-than-life character – a bit of a nut ball.  But it is humbling and cool to live through that fun.”

And Harvey sums it up best, perhaps when he says, “It’s really fun to be a rock star eight times a week!”

Asked if there is something special both actors hope the Brunswick audience may take away from this new production of THE Buddy Holly STORY, Elliott replies: “ Theatre is such as beautiful escape – such a lovely way to hit pause on life, on the world on fire, on politics one fire.  It’s a chance to be entertained by live human beings, and that must be treasured. I tell my students – Elliott has been teaching youth in Indianapolis since the pandemic – that each time we perform, someone in the audience is seeing that show for the first time and someone else for the last time.  We owe it to them to give everything we’ve got.  And in this show, we are the stewards of the music for Buddy and the Bopper and Ritchie.”

Jayson Elliott attests to the power of Buddy Holly’s music. He tells of the time in Nashville during the Clear Lake Concert scene when this little boy with special needs came sprinting down the aisle and jumped onto stage.  I was freaking out because here we were a bunch of adults jumping around on stage and all those cables and equipment, so I put my arm around him and contained him a bit, and we played air guitar.  After the show, we spoke with his parents who were mortified, but we all said they shouldn’t be. That was the most beautiful moment I have ever seen. The boy couldn’t express how the music was affecting him.  All he knew was that he needed to be a part of it.  He wanted more.”

Inspired by that anecdote, Andrew Harvey recounts how some of his favorite memories of playing the role of Buddy Holly have been those when he wins over an audience member – especially a younger person for whom this music is new. “Most of the time the people [who come] are fans, and they come ready to appreciate the story, but I remember one performance a thirteen-year-old girl sat there sullenly with her arms crossed. But, by the end of the show, she was on her feet, too, clapping and dancing. And I thought, ‘Gotch ya!  Now you know this real-life story and this music, and you love theatre more than you [otherwise] would have.”

These powerful narratives from the actors’ past experience with THE Buddy Holly STORY illustrate the sheer visceral appeal of the musical and of Buddy Holly, himself, whose life and music exert a timeless fascination.  And as Harvey’s and Elliott’s reminiscences suggest, MSMT’s production of THE Buddy Holly STORY will not only delight existing enthusiasts of the legendary musician, but is also guaranteed to make new fans as well.

 

Photos courtesy of MSMT, Production photo, Jared Morneau, photographer

THE Buddy Holly STORY runs from June 28-July 15 at MSMT”s Pickard Theater on the Bowdoin College campus, 1 Bath Rd., Brunswick, ME   207-725-8769  www.msmt.org

 

 

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