Written by As two legends of Broadway, André De Shields and Patrick Page have been in just about every kind of show. Yet Hadestown: The Musical represents a return to a project that has been in each of their orbits for over a decade. De Shields was one of the first to read the part of Hermes, and became an instant icon in the role on his way to a Tony win. Page proved to be among the most fearsome figures on stage as Hades, earning himself another Tony nomination as well. The two icons spoke to FandomWire about their return to the roles, including Patrick Page’s injury during rehearsals that threatened his chance to play Hades one more time.
FandomWire Interviews André De Shields and Patrick Page about Hadestown: The Musical
FandomWire:Thank you, André and Patrick for speaking with me about Hadestown: The Musical. I love this musical so much. First, André, your ability to create comedy out of thin air, out of mere anticipation, is unrivaled. What are some of the aspects of the comedy that come out in the filmed version that you don’t think people would realize based on the cast recordings?
André De Shields: The film is actually more intimate than the live performance, not only because camera can put us in your face, but also because the message of the play: We have to do this again and again. The film immortalizes the experience, so you can come to it repeatedly and learn so much more than having to glean everything in one sitting. And you can do it affordably.
FandomWire: It is such an incredible, emotional experience. Like you said, it’s so intimate, Patrick. I really feel that in your performance during “Build the Wall.” There’s a moment where the camera zooms in on you, and you give a little smirk during the scene, and it communicates so much. Were these new layers you were able to add onto the performance that you may not do in a normal theatrical setting?
Patrick Page: No, I think all of us, well, I’ll speak for myself, tried to give the best performance I could. I think the difference is, of course, that the camera has the ability to capture a lot of things that, if you’re sitting in the audience, you might miss. Those kinds of details, incidentally, are not fixed in my performance. That may happen on one night, but not on another night. It may happen in a different place. It may not happen at all. It’s all dependent on what has occurred just before it and up to that point, and a thousand other variables.
Every performance is different. The camera captures what happened that time, and I think that was one of the things that Rachel was very insistent about with the whole framing of the picture. It was the capturing of a moment in time, not a definitive expression of something.
FandomWire: André, you performed in the first reading of Hadestown back in 2012. What about this show makes you want to keep coming back to it year after year?
André De Shields: It is an oath that I made to the character that I was creating back in 2012. I knew we weren’t doing anything that was set in stone, and that [Anais Mitchell] wasn’t making a promise to any one of us. But I knew that this was a blessing with my name written on it.
So I said to the character that I had created, Hermes, and this was long before one could use CRISPR to change a portion of DNA. I said, “When this jumps off commercially, come back to me. Come back to the one who created you.” It took seven years, but he came back to me. You see that in my performance: the confidence, the assurance, the ability to be there when the audience needs something explained came from that oath to the character.
FandomWire: And you can feel that, especially as you said, with the point that you are retelling the story again and again. You can feel that you have told the story so many times that it really is all throughout the performance, and I love that about it.
André De Shields: But each time is the first time.
FandomWire: Patrick, you’ve had this amazing career, playing villains on Broadway, but also playing misunderstood antiheroes. What about Hades challenges you as a performer in ways that say Green Goblin or The Grinch might not?
Patrick Page: The first thing that challenged me was that the role was essentially sung through. I didn’t begin my career as a singer, and I’ve always felt insecure in that area. And then the moment of transformation, the single most important scene in the play, is a dance. The only thing I felt less comfortable doing than singing was dancing. So between those two things, it was going to be a challenge for me, and then, of course, I ruptured my Achilles a week before we shot. So then, dancing was even more of a challenge.
FandomWire: Well, and I was going to ask about that. What was it like to have that diagnosis, and then also just push through it and be on stage for that moment anyway? Because you feel the crowd love you when you come out for that final curtain call.
Patrick Page: It was crushing. When I felt it snap, and I was pretty sure I knew what had happened, I knew that that was an injury that required surgery and a year of recovery. My heart literally sank in a way that I don’t know that it has at any other point, except when a loved one has died. I went into that state of being crushed for a little bit.
Then, after I was put in a boot, I began to think, “Well, now hey, wait a minute. Maybe I could do this.” Then we began to have conversations about what adjustments would have to be made, and so we did that, which I don’t recommend. Nobody should be working on a ruptured Achilles. It was what it was, and had I not done it, I would not have been able to be part of the film.
FandomWire: The performance is still marvelous. You can feel everybody in love with your effort and your passion on screen and with the audience. So, thank you for giving us that performance.
Patrick Page: I thank the audience. They were very supportive, and it was wonderful. And you know, as we were alluding to, every performance is its own unique event, and so all we were doing is folding in the reality that Hades is injured.
FandomWire: André, you have played a kind of similar role with Cats: The Jellicle Ball recently. What were some of the things you took from Hadestown that you’ve put into your Jellicle Ball performance? It feels like both roles are in conversation with each other.
André De Shields: Nothing specific. The character Old Deuteronomy is heavily influenced by my friend Ken Page, who is no longer with us. He created it for the Broadway stage back in the other century, 1982, and that Deuteronomy, if you recall, the whole cat experience happened in the junkyard. Deuteronomy was sedentary.
I thought, if indeed we’re gonna if we’re gonna perform a vivisection on this cadaver and find these new organs with fresh life, that what I needed to do was animate old Deuteronomy, so that the performance is the opposite of the opening line. “My legs are tottery; I must go slow.” And Deuteronomy should be, if I’m on point, received as if he is a Chimera, not a storyteller.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Hadestown: The Musical is in theaters now for a short theatrical engagement. Bleecker Street distributes.
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