Interview: Martin Silvestri, Joel Higgins & Christine Andreas Talk About the Past and Future of THE FIELDS OF AMBROSIA at Surflight Theatre

One of the most enduring of human beliefs is the idea of the existence of an afterlife. All sorts of terrors and challenges can be endured in an earthly life if one believes in a world beyond where things will be not only better but perfect. That is one of the central ideas of THE FIELDS OF AMBROSIA, a musical that is opening next week at Surflight Theatre in Beach Haven, NJ on Long Beach Island.

The musical by Martin Silvestri and Joel Higgins is based on the 1970 film THE TRAVELING EXECUTIONER which starred Stacy Keach and Bud Cort. The play is set in 1918 in the rural South in the final summer of World War 1. It follows Jonas Candide, a former carnival con man who has gone legit and travels around with a portable electric chair, offering his services to local prisons. The plot is set in motion when he is sent to execute Willy and Gretchen, a German brother and sister who have been accused of murder and treason. He dispatches the brother, but the sister proves harder to do away with than he thought. As he falls in love with her, the complications mount. The black comedy had a highly successful first run at the George Street Playhouse in New Brunswick, NJ back in 1993 and a problematic brief run at the Aldwych Theatre in London in 1995.

The creators of the show are looking for a bit of an afterlife themselves. They are anxious to see how their show plays to a new generation of theatergoers. Fortunately, Steve Steiner, artistic director of Surflight Theatre was in the cast of the original George Street production and is one of the play's biggest fans. Steiner plays Doc in the current production. In full disclosure, this writer is also a member of the company. I was fortunate enough to sit down with the creators of the show, composer Martin Silvestri and writer/lyricist Joel Higgins. Also on hand for this interview was one of Broadway's most reliable leading ladies, Christine Andreas, who starred in both the George Street and Aldwych productions alongside Mr. Higgins. This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

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I'm so glad we get a chance to talk about this iteration of your show, THE FIELDS OF AMBROSIA. Let's talk about the genesis of the show. What was it you saw in THE TRAVELING EXECUTIONER that made you say "Yes, this should sing?"

Joel Higgins: Marty called me in the middle of the night and said, "What are you wearing?" No, no, no. He said, "Have you ever seen this movie called THE TRAVELING EXECUTIONER with Stacy Keach? And I said, "I have seen that movie." He said "You're the only other person who's ever seen it. So why don't we write music?

Martin Silvestri: What grabbed me? I remember the first scene so vividly as Jonas is comforting Willy in the chair. I said, "Wow, that sings!" That's what you look for as a composer, where does it elevate into a song? I thought if that's not a song, I don't know what is. It's kind of dark and has some elements in it that aren't exactly theatrical like HELLO, DOLLY, but it's intriguing.

How did you decide that this was going to be a through-sung piece as opposed to a more traditional musical play, like HELLO, DOLLY?

Joel Higgins: I felt that the passion of it spoke of an operatic sort of sensibility. And at the time, a lot of shows like Les Miz were being sung-through. I don't think we started out to do that. But I just started writing lyrics to everything they had to say. There's so much poetry in it. When you're writing a typical musical, you have to have a way to get into a song. You have to have a reason to get into that song and it has to move the play forward. So many of these things have recitative that can be very bland and boring, just to get you from song to song. What we wanted to do was use melodies from something that's called back or projected that you're going to hear later.

Christine Andreas: Like opera.

Joel Higgins: Like an opera, yeah. That was really both a challenge and great fun to get your teeth into. As far as the subject matter, we did a lot of backers auditions, as you can imagine, to raise the money for the show. I would tell them, "It's about a guy who travels around the South with his electric chair in the back of a pickup truck, servicing the condemned of the state." Then I would always say, "And you can see why we jumped at the opportunity to do a musical of this." But we did in fact. I don't think we've ever looked back.

Martin Silvestri: I said to Joel, it's a double-edged sword here. People are going to pay attention when you say what he just said. We're going to have to prove to them that it's worthy to be seen. The key was always the opening number. I said if we can execute a guy on stage, not that we ever see him executed. But if you can do that and they still are so overwhelmed with the music and the words, then we have bought 20 minutes to start our plot and they'll come with us, you know? At the first preview at George Street Playhouse, I watched these people looking on in amazement. I had no idea how they would react. There was this thunderous applause. In that little split second, I thought okay, we can go.

Christine Andreas: We put the audience in a rapture.

Martin Silvestri: It never failed to put them on the edge of their seat.

I don't think there's anything more compelling than someone who knows he's going to die. That's a very powerful idea.

Joel Higgins: Jonas says "Did you ever think what it's like to know it's your very last day? What you wouldn't give to have somebody just convince you everything's gonna be okay." That's Jonas. That's what he does. That's what the whole play is about. He redeems everybody.

Before we go any further, let me ask you a very pedestrian question. How long did it take you to write the material of this play? And walk me through the process of how you work together.

Martin Silvestri: We figured the time factor was seven years.

Joel Higgins: Seven years until George Street. Neither one of us at the time were full-time writers. I was acting and Marty was conducting. But we had a jingle company. So we worked together writing commercials and television theme songs. That was the beginning of our collaboration. I'd be on the west coast and he'd be on the east coast and I'd get a call. "We need a lyric for this commercial we're doing". We'd be back and forth on the phone. We began to have a shorthand about how we work. I think we realized we both have the same taste in music and lyrics.

Christine Andreas: You have the same sense of humor too.

Martin Silvestri: We were always looking for a project to write. I had been working with the British director, Tony Tanner, and of course, we did JOSEPH together. I worked with Tim (Rice) on that. That opened up a lot of avenues and people asked "What else are you doing?" I think your show had just ended at NBC. You were in LA. I was in LA and we would spend every day together, beginning to move this thing along. And we literally moved in chronological order. I would come up with a musical idea while we were together and he'd write a few points down. The next day I'd show up and he'd have a page of stuff.

Joel Higgins: Most of the time, I would show him what I wanted to do with the lyric rhythmically, and then he'd take it and do it melodically.

Martin Silvestri: I had never worked that way, where we were both in the room almost all the time. We would lock that time in and just close ourselves down. So it was probably two and a half years, three years, just getting to the end of the first act. When we felt we really had a tight first act, he called some friends and said "Come over to my living room and we'll sing it for a few people that are interested in what we're doing." We put it together and they sang through it. And we waited and they all went "What happens?" And we said, "We don't know, but if you like it enough, we'll go back to work." And they said, "Go back to work!". So that's sort of the history of how we work together. And you know, we've done three other musicals since.

Christine Andreas: They have the most extraordinary rapport...and mutual respect. I've never seen a better marriage/collaborative relationship than these two.

Joel Higgins: It's a funny thing. We've known each other now for 50 years. And when you think about all the people that did collaborate and had so many problems. We've never, never had any.

Martin Silvestri: We have an immense amount of trust, which is really important.

Joel Higgins: And, as you can tell, we also just have a great time.

Christine Andreas: The atmosphere that an actor walks into has been set. That really matters, you know, coming into any kind of creative process. If there's discord of any kind it filters down to everybody. But if there's this kind of buoyancy, then even if the part you're about to enter is disarming you, there's this support, this bedrock,

It's very clear, as an actor in this production, that we are dealing with two writers who are clearly very passionate about what they've created. I'd like to talk a little bit about the tone of the play. It occurs to me that this play is particularly American in its outlook. It's really in a lot of ways, a piece of Americana, like say, THE MUSIC MAN. Tell me how this musical ended up in the West End. What were the challenges of performing this material for a British audience?

Christine Andreas: That's a big story.

Joel Higgins: It's true. It's terribly American. It's been my understanding that THE MUSIC MAN has never done terribly well in London.

Christine Andreas: Really?

Joel Higgins: Well, it's not only because it's American. It is a very American thing to be this type of con man. Kind of carnival barker type of con man. Harold Hill is that and Jonas Candide is that too.

Christine Andreas: Ruggedly individualistic, right?

Joel Higgins: And somebody just living on their brains. I think it was Peter (Filichia) who said the difference between these two con men, Harold Hill and Jonas Candide is that they're both kind of criminal and despicable in what they do, but Jonas Candide has a heart. And even though he does something that you could find despicable, it's obvious to everybody that he's somebody to cheer for. And that's something when you can get people cheering for an execution. He is redemptive.

Martin Silvestri: Back to London though. George Street was such a phenomenal success, they extended it.

Christine Andreas: In a blizzard.

Martin Silvestri: They were selling seats on the steps, which is against the fire marshal. But people wanted to see it. It had all this enthusiasm and some really nice reviews from good people. Michael Sommers, Peter Filichia, Variety. Really solid money reviews, as we used to say. So we talked to our agent and she said, "Well, why don't you try to do this?" We got a producer. But there wasn't enough money to go to Broadway.

Joel Higgins: It was tough. It's a big show.

Martin Silvestri: And subject matter. We had never done a Broadway show. People were interested. We had enough money to go Off-Broadway. But that would mean re-scoping it. We had scoped it exactly for that thrust stage at George Street, which is a Broadway-size stage. My agent, the wonderful Bridget Ashenburg at ICM called Lincoln Center about the Beaumont. They said, "We'd like to look at it, but we're contracted for two years if you're willing to wait for two years.

Christine Andreas: An eternity.

Joel Higgins: We had momentum.

Martin Silvestri: And we were not wanting to drop that momentum. I take the blame as much as you for being youthful and anxious. So our producer said "Well, you know, they did it with KISS OF THE SPIDER WOMAN. Remember they were up at, uh....

SUNY Purchase

Martin Silvestri: ...And they were not getting anywhere. They weren't getting their money. But they had enough to go to London where they got great reviews and they came back and it was a success. So we said, we could pattern ourselves after that. That was the thinking. But the key problem there was the execution. And we didn't get draft of this until our wonderful music director, Mark Warman asked, "Have you ever wondered about how we Brits would feel about the Americans still executing people?" Evidently, that's what they wanted to hammer us on. Like we were savages still here in the States. And no matter how clever and kind a description you are making of Jonas, they could not get over that.

Joel Higgins: Well, they found that dichotomy even more of a problem, the dichotomy between this being a good guy and doing what he did. And they had a problem with the fact that there's a lot of humor in this show.

I hadn't really thought of this, but the idea of the anti-hero is a peculiarly American idea.

Martin Silvestri: And rooting for the underdog. Even if he's a little off the mark.

I want to talk about these two leading characters, Jonas and Gretchen, who are unusual in a lot of ways. Your play is structured almost like a classical tragedy. Except for the fact that your hero's tragic flaw is a positive one. It's Jonas' compassion that is his undoing.

Joel Higgins: You're right. And his vulnerability.

Right.

Joel Higgins: Because that compassion leads to vulnerability, which makes him vulnerable to her. Yeah, that is his flaw.

It is one of those classic stories about a con man who's conned by his own game.

Joel Higgins: Exactly. She's a better con man than he is.

Christine Andreas: But she's a woman in a man's world. If she was a man, who would she have been with her brains and wit, her ability to turn on a dime, her resilience?

Joel Higgins: And her and her physical beauty.

Christine Andreas: And her beauty. I mean, she could have been somebody. And instead, she has to constantly manipulate for position in a man's world. So there must be in her a certain reaction to that, disdain for the weaker man who she must manipulate. And yet at the same time, she's such a huge appreciator of the beautiful things in life. So this gives her a sparkle and charm and a joy. She's a lady or a tiger. You don't know which. And she has a very ruthless streak because she simply has had to survive, even in Europe, not just in the United States.

Joel Higgins: Because of the breakout of World War I, she is brought over by a rich American and he gets killed. He's murdered. She and her brother are Germans. It's small-town America, during the war. And by God, it must have been their fault. And it could have been.

Christine Andreas: She's been there a year in that cell.

Joel Higgins: She's been a year living among these savages.

Christine Andreas: The worst of life.

Joel Higgins: And this guy comes in.

Christine Andreas: He's the only safe place she's seen since she's been there. So the stakes are always uber high.

Joel Higgins: But the stakes keep getting raised. Originally all she's trying to do is get a delay so that the governor will give her a stay. Eventually, he starts to think not only does he not want to do this, he doesn't want her to die at all.

Christine Andreas: He's falling for her.

Joel Higgins: And she knows he's falling for her.

Christine Andreas: So it becomes more a play about man's ingenuity than about any chair.

Joel Higgins: He has to pull out all his old con man tricks to figure out a way to get her out of this game.

Christine Andreas: And that's really what you celebrate watching the show. What's he going to do? It's kind of like the myth of Icarus flying too close to the sun. You just keep going for something that's so sparkly and beautiful, but you're not aware you're going to die.

Martin Silvestri: In Greek tragedy, when you defy the natural order of things you will pay. But the setting is so rural.

Christine Andreas: This may be like the common man's HAMILTON. This man represents the American spirit of a certain time when you could reinvent yourself. Jonas represents this common guy who isn't putting a limit on himself.

So before we wrap up, talk to the Surflight Theatre audience. Tell them why they should see your show. How is it relevant to 2022 and how is your play different than it was in 1993?

Christine Andreas: Is it different?

I think just the way that the world has changed makes the play very different.

Joel Higgins: Yeah, I think so too. I think in terms of what's happened in the theater over that time. Absolutely. I think that the darkness is more appreciated in musicals now. It can be both entertaining and funny and have dark elements.

Martin Silvestri: I'll try to answer your question about the change in the world rather than in the theater. I don't think when we wrote this, we would ever think that we would see the effect of conning, lying, people believing something that's not true in our world, in our country. We are witnessing people lining up for the con in my opinion. I think that that element may read somewhere where we didn't intend it to read 30 years ago.

Christine Andreas: It's possible we were a little bit ahead of our time. When we opened at George Street. It was like a tidal wave coming at us. It was a magnificent response, you know? So I'm praying that the timing is right.

As are we all. Thank you, Martin Silvestri, Joel Higgins, and Christine Andreas for taking the time to talk to us at BroadwayWorld. We all hope the Surflight production is a huge success.

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FIELDS OF AMBROSIA will run at Surflight Theatre in Beach Haven NJ from September 8- September 25. Direction is by Elizabeth Lucas, Choreography by Paula Hammons Sloan with musical direction by Nick Guerro. For tickets and information go to surflight.org or phone the box office at 609/492-9477. The original London cast recording of THE FIELDS OF AMBROSIA is available on Amazon and all streaming sources.

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