It's been reunion time for Anthony Rapp and Idina Menzel, who first worked together nearly 20 years ago as original cast members of "Rent." Now they are on a post-Broadway tour of "If/Then," recreating the roles they originated when the new musical opened in 2014.
But a funny thing happened on the show's way to New York. The Disney movie "Frozen" opened while "If/Then" was in out-of-town tryouts, and by the time they reached Broadway, Menzel's recording of "Let It Go" had become a phenomenon. Her sudden superstar status helped power the musical past the largely mixed reviews.
"Idina is a force of nature," Rapp said recently from Denver, where the SF-bound tour recently had its debut. "The tour probably would not have happened, certainly not on the scale it's happening, without Idina being a part of it."
It's not just Rapp and Menzel reteaming for the tour, but also fellow co-stars LaChanze and James Snyder. "The four of us knew that we were going to do it before we closed on Broadway," Rapp said, although when the show was first announced for the SHN season it came with no casting information. "It's a little trade secret, but they like to parcel out information."
In the show, written by Tom Kitt and Brian Yorkey ("Next to Normal"), Rapp plays Lucas, the bisexual friend of Menzel's character who herself has a bifurcated trajectory. Newly divorced and arriving in New York without clear direction, Menzel's Elizabeth becomes Liz in one road taken and Beth in another, with the results of these different choices woven throughout the musical.
Rapp's and LaChanze's characters also have dual experiences in relationship to the Liz and Beth stories. "It's like the same soul, but very different outcomes in their lives that affect them quite profoundly," Rapp said. "So it's exciting to delve into both worlds."
That LaChanze's character Kate is a lesbian and Rapp's Lucas is a bisexual is just part of the fabric of the show, Rapp said, with no particular spotlighting of this fact. "For me, that harkens back to 'Rent,' with one of the hallmarks of the show was just simply having these characters not make anything about their sexuality other than being just who they are," said Rapp. "At the time, that was rarer than it is now, but it's still rarer than it should be."
Lucas' romantic life is certainly a big part of the "If/Then" story, and while he is a rare major character who is identified as a bisexual, his love story is with a man. "Lucas is probably a little more gay than hetero," Rapp said, "but some reviewers in New York said he's straight in one of the stories and gay in the other. No, he's bisexual in both."
Rapp can relate, having had relationships with both men and women, and he prefers to call himself queer rather than gay or bisexual. And like Lucas, he's more gay than hetero. For the past 20 years, his romantic partners have been men, though he is currently unattached. "Something ended recently before I left for the tour," he said. "I wasn't expecting it, but he felt he needed to move on, so I'm not going to argue with him."
Rapp will be back in New York in January when the original Broadway foursome leaves the cast, with new leads carrying it on from there. "I think people are definitely coming to see Idina, but hopefully by then the show will have been established, because it's a little under the radar." Rapp knows who will be replacing Menzel, though he's not at liberty to say. "She's no slouch," he said, "but she's more a Broadway than a household name."
Rapp worked with "If/Then" creators Kitt and Yorkey and director Michael Greif as they were developing "Next to Normal," and the role of Lucas in their new show was fashioned for him. "Part of the reason I'm glad the tour is happening," he said, "and not because I like doing the show and it's a job, is because I believe in this piece, and this gives it a chance for more life to preserve its legacy. I think of this show in the world of 'Rent,' 'Hamilton,' 'Next to Normal,' and 'Spring Awakening,' shows that feel like they're reflecting back life in an authentic way."
Greif also directed Rent, which helped make Rapp an overnight sensation despite the fact that he had been acting professionally since he was 9, when he joined the cast of the Chicago company of Evita. The following year, he and his mother left Joliet, Ill., to relocate to New York when he was cast opposite Michael York in "The Little Prince and the Aviator." The Broadway musical ran for 16 previews before closing without an official opening. Fortunately, he was soon cast as Anna's son in a tour of "The King and I" starring Yul Brynner that brought him to San Francisco for the first time.
"My mother was a single-mom nurse, and she didn't know anything about show business," Rapp said. "She was the opposite of the typical stage mother. We just sort of put one foot in front of the other, and it worked out."
When Rapp returns to New York, he hopes to get his one-man show, in which his late mother figures prominently, back on stage. Titled "Without You," it's based on his book "Without You: A Memoir of Love, Loss, and the Musical Rent." In the show, he punctuates the story with an eclectic collection of popular hits, traditional ballads, and several songs from "Rent."
"The singers who inspire me are people like Michael Stipe, Elvis Costello, and Peter Gabriel," Rapp said. "They sound like themselves, like they're not putting on a voice. They sound like their voice is coming from their core, their soul. And that's what I always hope to do."