What an afternoon – and what terrific performances. The basement of Jack Solomons Club in the West End of London was the underground setting for the press launch of the highly anticipated, revamped theatrical production of Anaïs Mitchell‘s Hadestown, which is set to open at the Lyric Theatre in February 2024, five years after its sold-out run at the National Theatre from November 2018 to January 2019.
Blending modern American folk music with New Orleans-inspired jazz, the Original Broadway Cast Recording of Hadestown is one of the most streamed cast albums of all time, with over 300 million listens to date. It won the Grammy Award for ‘Best Musical Theatre Album’, topped Billboard’s Broadway Cast Recording chart and debuted at #8 on the Top Album chart. Hadestown intertwines and updates two mythic love stories – that of young dreamers Orpheus and Eurydice, and that of King Hades and his wife Persephone. An ultimately optimistic retelling of these two myths, Hadestown also invites us to imagine the world as it could be.
Anaïs Mitchell, best known to readers of Folk Radio for her abilities as a singer-songwriter, originated Hadestown as an indie theatre project and acclaimed album. She then transformed the show into a genre-defying new musical alongside artistic collaborator and Tony Award-winning director, Rachel Chavkin.
The press launch was introduced by producer Mara Isaacs before a cast performance of Way Down Hadestown from the musical itself. Acting as host for the afternoon’s proceedings was Cerys Matthews, BBC Radio 6 DJ and singer-songwriter.
Matthews interviewed Anaïs Mitchell and quizzed her as to the origins of the production. Mitchell said that inspiration first came to her when she was in her early 20s, starting out as a singer-songwriter when she was prepared to drive long distances just for tip money. She said that the chorus of the song, Wait For Me, seemed to drop into her lap and reminded her of the Orpheus and Eurydice myth. This led her to think about how she might be able to develop a long-form version of the story. The Threepenny Opera by Bertolt Brecht was also said to have been a huge inspiration.
When asked what the particular challenges were in bringing the production to fruition, Mitchell said it was the fact she wasn’t studied in the theatre, having come from a musical and Texas songwriting tradition. Also, that people expect and demand far more from a song in a theatrical setting where it needs to serve as exposition for the overall story. Mitchell described the process as the equivalent of needing to “break the songs in order to make them fuller and bigger”. Furthermore, what was notable was the intensely collaborative nature of work in the theatrical world, while the uncompromising nature of the work ethic required to succeed there could be summed by Rachel Chavkin, her director, advising Mitchell that: “you need to find a way to work past your fatigue”.
Alongside a moving performance by Anaïs Mitchell herself of the song Flowers from Hadestown were cast performances of some of the songs from the musical, including When The Chips Are Down, Wait For Me, Our Lady of the Underground, and Wedding Song.
The interview was a fascinating glimpse into the process of developing a score for the stage and how the overlapping worlds of folk/Americana and the theatre were brought together in this production, while Anais Mitchell deserves huge credit for successfully making the transition into a sphere of the arts for which she had no previous grounding or experience. On describing the success she’d already experienced through Hadestown, she said humorously it was not dissimilar to the feeling a dog might have if it had “been chasing a mail truck for years and finally catches it”. As for the Hadestown story itself, her plucking of the storyline for the show from the ether meant, “It doesn’t feel like it’s mine at all; it’s like it always existed”.
All round, this was a hugely appealing appetiser for the feast that is Hadestown to come.
Further details about the show and how to get tickets for the Lyric Theatre are available here: https://uk.hadestown.com
