Robert Cuccioli, Glory Crampton, Dana Moore and More to be Featured in New Music Video Tribute to NINE

 

Broadway may be dark, and the theatre industry has been hit hard by the pandemic, but the pandemic has not slowed down Broadway musical theatre soprano and leading lady Glory Crampton.

Since relocating to Naples last year, Ms. Crampton rechanneled her singing, acting and directing talents and conceived Project 9 -- a new 15-minute music video homage to the Tony Award-winning musical NINE reconnecting an all-star Broadway cast and full orchestra, filmed and recorded separately from quarantined homes, using advanced iPhone technology.

Today, she announced Project 9 will premiere online Wednesday, April 28 at 7 pm EST immediately followed by a live Q&A session with the actors. A two-minute sneak-peek trailer is available now at Project 9 online video première honoring NINE the musical - Glory Crampton where guests may RSVP online for the complimentary unveiling.

NINE, based on Federico Fellini's movie 8½, featuring music and lyrics by Maury Yeston and book by Arthur Kopit, is the story of Guido Contini, a famous Italian film director who is suffering from a creative block and identify loss and the many women in his life who journey beside and ultimately help him regain his inspiration.

"During the shutdown, many of my Broadway friends were feeling isolated and fearful about losing their creative drive," Ms. Crampton recalls. "I was looking for an uplifting and empowering way to reunite "The Niners" - a group of my cast members from an earlier production of NINE - and challenge everyone struggling with our 'new normal' by reconnecting with each other through our joint creativity. I also wanted to offer a way our cast could revisit the show on screen together, bringing a new, fresh and empowered emotional temperament to the piece," she continues.

"Serendipity, I invented a New Medium to enjoy Broadway talents online," she says.

A musical theatre veteran the New York Times describes as "exquisite in every detail," Ms. Crampton has starred in over 40 productions. She is best known for roles in Phantom (she created the Christine Daae role for the world premiere, RCA Records), Nine, Camelot, The Fantasticks (opposite Robert Goulet), My Fair Lady (opposite Charles Shaughnessy), and the NYC and London premieres of Rothschilds & Sons (opposite Robert Cuccioli) written by Sheldon Harnick, well-known composer of Fiddler on the Roof.

Ms. Crampton is an accomplished solo artist with concert credits singing for dignitaries around the world, most notably for the Royal Crown Prince Guillaume of Luxembourg and former President George H. and Barbara Bush, and opposite the legendary Jose Carreras (one of The Three Tenors) at a sold-out performance at Radio City Music Hall. She can be heard singing on 14 Broadway cast and compilation recordings including a solo recording with The National Symphony at Abbey Road Studios in England. She is also a featured singer on Andrew Lloyd Webber's compilation recording of his music recorded at Abbey Road Studios. Ms. Crampton is a well-respected global TEDx inspirational speaker presenting positive techniques that release stress and stage fright and refocus energy. Prior to the pandemic, she directed and produced a televised symphony concert in China.

"Project 9 is not a video about the quarantine. It is a musical video subtly highlighting NINE's themes about resilience and liberation," she says, citing the importance of staying within one's joy and power while looking forward to the future in a positive way. Project 9 also considers the importance of valuing and cherishing younger generations.

"The final song 'Getting Tall' is about a young Guido accepting he's going to be fine even if he can't have everything he wants. It's reflective of all individuals today doing their part for the greater health of everyone during restrictions," she says. "I believe, now more than ever, people can relate to Guido's journey after everything they've endured during the past year."

Project 9 began in May 2020 in Naples, Florida, reconnecting a cast of Broadway's best including Robert Cuccioli (original star of Jekyll & Hyde - cast recording) as Guido Contini, Glory Crampton as Luisa Contini, Dana Moore (Fosse dancing star) as Lilliane LeFlur, Lauren Blackman (Anastasia) as Claudia Nardi, Jesmille Darbouze (Kiss Me Kate) as Our Lady of the Spa, Julie Tolivar as Carla Albanese and introducing Sid Kamat (TV's Sesame Street) as nine year old Guido.

According to Ms. Crampton, the audio tracks were completed within the first 45 days. Fifteen individual video performances were filmed throughout late July until September.

No state-of-the art recording studios, film sets, or cameras were used in creating the music video. The entire cast and full orchestra rehearsed and performed completely separate from each other in Naples and Palm Beach, FL, New York City, New York, and Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

Naples-based editing engineer Reuben Vasquez and New York-based music director Jeremy Franklin Goodman (who also relocated to Naples from New York during the pandemic) say the main production challenge was uniting individually filmed segments of 37 different people and 28 separate instruments to sound like one full orchestra recording and then weave together actors, singers and dancers with multiple songs and scenes.

"More than once, we spent a full day in the editing room working on just one half of one song, layering and "ghosting" (a technique used to add depth to multiple people on screen) in order to bring everyone together," explains Vasquez. "We needed to create the emotion of the songs through editing and the process took four months to complete."

"The music tells the story as much as the actors do," describes Ms. Crampton. "Because we used a video medium, we did not have the wide scope of actors to see onstage. Each actor was filmed separately, so it was much more difficult to convey the intensity of live theatre. We focused on pinpointing exact gestures or quick looks or body movements to intensify the storytelling and the music. This helped make the video more theatrical, although the camera picked up everything, so occasionally we needed to tone down our over-the-stop instincts," she says.

The creative team added a bit of humor with a 2-minute blooper segment at the end of the video that shares several comical and endearing outtakes and surprises.

"Project 9 reminds all of us we must sacrifice immediate gratification and comfort in order to provide comfort for one another in the long run," says Ms. Crampton, noting she hopes to develop a Project 9 documentary with "behind the scenes" experiences and challenges creating a music video during the pandemic.

 

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