Interview: Sean Grandillo of the OKLAHOMA! National Tour

The smash Broadway production of OKLAHOMA! launched their first national tour this weekend, and on November 17 they arrive at Greenville's Peace Center.

The New York Times called this reimagined staging of the classic 1943 musical "the coolest show on Broadway." Stripped down to reveal the darker psychological truths at its core, director Daniel Fish's new production breathes brand new life into this quintessential American musical. You've never seen OKLAHOMA! like this before.

Actor and recording artist Sean Grandillo stars as Curly, the cowboy who so memorably opens the show by singing "Oh, What A Beautiful Mornin'". No stranger to Broadway, Grandillo appeared in Deaf West Theatre's acclaimed 2015 revival of SPRING AWAKENING and has since been seen in numerous TV roles, including an extended run on MTV's "Scream" and ABC sitcom "The Real O'Neals."

I spoke to Grandillo a few days before the tour's opening performance. Here is a lightly edited transcript of our conversation.

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BWW: First, please tell us a little bit about yourself.

Sean Grandillo: I am originally from Cleveland, OH. I've been doing theater only since I was about 17 years old. I found it in high school after playing in rock bands and, like, emo punk bands for a lot of my youth. So I was a performer, but those things went by the wayside - band broke up, literally, something like that - and there was a program at my public high school where you could attend a neighboring school for half the day for various technical programs and the new one on trial was a theater program. And I just thought that sounds like a fun idea to still get to perform in front of people and get out of half a day of school. So I auditioned for that, and that was how I found this crazy life and outlet. I'm glad that 17 year old me made that decision. I often question my foresight, even now, but that was a good one. And after that I went to Ithaca College for musical theater and from there some things just went right. I was in the right place at the right time.

I ended up doing SPRING AWAKENING, which brought me to New York, and got me in the world of professional theater and here I am. I'm also a musician, which, of course, for this show, that helps. I've done a few actor/musician gigs now and I love it. I love getting to play the instrument while you're doing a show like this.

I think it brings a whole additional level, certainly to the performer, but also to the audience. It's another thing we're doing up there!

That feels like an extra level of complication in creating a character. How do you balance that?

It is an additional layer of complication and in this process it has been one of those things that is a little bit like tapping your belly and rubbing your head. The fun thing is when it clicks, I find it very grounding. It's behavior that is built-in for you instantly, and it's something that - If you play instruments, which I'm lucky enough to have started doing when I was younger - it's a behavior that informs your physicality for the rest of the performance. And it's an extension of, literally, the what-do-I-do-with-my-hands kind of moment. And what's cool about this production, with the band on stage, is you don't feel like "Oh, the actor has an instrument here" or "Oh, the actor is playing music here." It blurs those lines between the band and the actors. The band are like characters and members of the ensemble, and I'm a member of the band. It's a really cool aspect of this production that I think is done really well and is very different than OKLAHOMA! has been seen.

What is your experience with OKLAHOMA! in general?

I have not performed in it. I am a big musical theater fan in addition to all the other music that I'm a fan of. I love the Golden Age musicals. SOUTH PACIFIC is actually my favorite musical. So Rodgers and Hammerstein are important to me, but OKLAHOMA! is not one that I had done all that much exploring of, and it's awesome to be this deep in it. And in a production where we're on stage a lot of the time, where you're really bearing witness to a good majority of the show, it's just incredible to see a piece that still feels relevant and the music is still so gorgeous and moving. And to watch my peers interpret and sing it in this new way, and think about the fact that this thing has remained timely and that each of our lived experiences is really fitting in here and bringing something out of it, it's quite a testament to the piece.

This show has long been seen as a turning point in the history of musical theater and this production kind of brings a whole new approach to it. Can you tell us more about that new approach?

I agree with you, I think it was one of the first book musicals, as we think of them now, with the songs actually moving the narrative forward. And this production has been interesting, even rehearsing, because it's felt different, even as an actor in the part of the process where the sausage is being made. It's very much about a group of people being in the moment with each other and performing a ritual or a rite. That's something we've heard a few times in our rehearsal process and we're taking that very seriously - and also having fun and being loose within that. It's a cool thing to turn it into a tribal musical in a way. It's like the entire cast is delivering a ritualistic moment where we don't know what's going to come out of it each time, and how important it is that we deliver it, and see the results that we get. And all that just brings a heightened sense of stakes, and a heightened sense of joy. The high moments and the dark moments are heightened.

A friend of mine saw it on Broadway and for them it was too dark. How would you address that reaction?

I think it's a provocative piece and if you leave having thoughts about it, then it has done its job. What's been interesting as a performer is seeing the way that various actors respond to certain moments in the material - and we haven't had an audience yet. But I also saw it on Broadway and I remember it as a show that affects you. It is affecting to witness and I think that's important. And I think that's good art. Art is subjective and, as an audience member, when you see anything you bring into the theater your own experience. And I think it's important to remember that this is OKLAHOMA!, as written, this is the show. This stuff is all in there. This is the text as written. These are the songs you know. There are gorgeous new orchestrations and the band is a bunch of amazing professional bluegrass musicians, so you're going to hear things in a new way as well as see them in a new way. But I think the cool thing is how familiar these melodies and songs are to a lot of people and how some different feelings may arise with this same material.

The director said something in rehearsal that has stuck with me, and that is everyone in this production is in the same room - the actors and the ensemble and the audience - and we want it to feel that way. A lot of times we go in the theater and watching it, through the suspension of disbelief, the lights go down and it's almost like we're in one room and we're watching whatever is happening in another room. But in this production, we're all in the same room. So having, you know, 1,500 other souls in that room with us is going to make additional little subtextual things in OKLAHOMA! come out. And I think that's how I'm going to keep this thing exciting on the road going forward. It's a new group of people in that room with us every single night, and that's going to affect us. It's going to affect all of us in there and I am so excited to do it. I can't wait!

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OKLAHOMA! runs November 17 - 21 at the Peace Center in downtown Greenville, SC.

For tickets and additional information, call the box office at 864.467.3000 or visit peacecenter.org.

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