Expanding GODSPELL
By
Rusty Andrews
Shoestring Theatre Company, Los Gatos, California

Directing GODSPELL can be one of the most fulfilling—and frustrating—experiences any theatre company can have. Fulfilling because this John-Michael Tebelak/Stephen Schwartz show provides almost limitless opportunities for both directors and cast members to expand their horizons and hone their improvisational skills. Frustrating because its cast is so small—only ten characters and no chorus.

If you’re working with a school with a very large talent pool or a theatre company like ours which has a firm policy of casting everyone who shows up for auditions, you’re stuck on the horns of a dilemma when confronted with a show with such a small cast. If you were producing almost any other musical you’d be able to place the "overflow" in the chorus. Here you’re stuck—GODSPELL doesn’t have one!

So the question is, "How do I expand this cast without doing violence to the material?" Please note the second part of the question, "…without doing violence to the material". There are all kinds of ways to expand a show, but some of them will damage the deceptively-simple (and surprisingly fragile) show that is GODSPELL.

Definitely not recommended. It’s vital to the success of GODSPELL that each of the disciples experience and portray a "character arc" (see the Director’s Notes that are included in the package you receive from Music Theatre International or Theatre Maximus). Splitting up the eight disciples into, say, sixteen disciples (or even twelve) will dilute each of them and make accomplishing that arc virtually impossible. Your audience will become confused and will come away from the show having been entertained, but also having lost the message behind the show. Taking Peggy and breaking her up into Peggy and Gertrude will simply create two very colorless characters. Besides, doing this would be a MAJOR violation of the license agreement that your organization signed with the licensing agency and lay you open for an ugly lawsuit. Who needs that?

This is pretty simple and straightforward and will gain you up to eight additional parts. It also creates a group of fairly low-impact (in terms of rehearsal time) parts that you can assign to fine singers who are just too busy to attend all of the rehearsals. The philosophers are only in the Prologue and are never heard of again unless you choose to utilize them later in other roles.

Our production had three "pure" philosophers, three philosophers who reappeared later in the guise of Pharisees (more on this later), and two who "converted" and joined Jesus’ disciples. When we performed the prologue, the six persons who comprised the remainder of Jesus’ eight disciples appeared on stage dressed in black (a la Martha Graham dancers) and moved frantically between the various philosophers as they spouted their various opinions. Rather than having the philosophers become violent as described in the stage directions we had the "listeners" portray their confusion and frustration with being unable to find a philosophy that suited them, ending with them holding their heads in pain during the final "Ohhh. Ohhh" of the Prologue.

When John the Baptist arrived on the scene, all the Philosophers "took in" his message during the opening part of "Prepare Ye", although each group reacted to it differently. The listeners/disciples eagerly accepted it. The Philosopher/Disciples "broke away" from the others to be baptized and join in with "Prepare Ye". The Philosopher/Pharisees stood apart, obviously making fun of John and trying to prevent the Philosopher/Disciples from joining him. The "pure" Philosophers backed away in horror and left the stage.

In Act 2 Jesus has a very acrimonious confrontation with three Pharisees. In the script these parts are assigned to disciples. You can, if you wish, assign these parts to other performers who do not make up part of Jesus’ inner circle. We did it by having three of the Philosopher/Pharisees from the Prologue reappear to challenge Jesus’ teachings. These three characters appeared again after the Last Supper, gloating over Jesus’ crucifixion.

You could also use performers who haven’t been on stage before. This would gain you three more parts.

This is tricky. To maintain the show’s integrity you can’t simply have a chorus come trooping in out of nowhere and participate in the "big" numbers. If you’re going to add a chorus they have to be fully integrated into the show so they don’t "jar" the audience and interrupt the rhythm of the show. We created a chorus of "urchins" who were essentially part of the scenery.

I think that my concept of the Urchins was probably strongly effected by my having seen The Roar of the Greasepaint, the Smell of the Crowd when I was in high school; that show has a chorus of urchins written into it. In that show the urchins are sometimes part of the scenery, sometimes observers of the onstage action, sometimes comment on it, sometimes essential parts of the music and action. In Godspell I used the urchins in essentially the same way but also as audience-surrogates. As the show progressed and—we hoped—the audience became more involved, the Urchins reflected this increased involvement.

They appeared during the Prologue, moving from philosopher to philosopher, emphasizing the confusion that this number attempts to portray and then taking up positions at either side of the stage and observing what was going on just as the audience was; if I had been working with a deeper proscenium stage I would probably have placed them on scaffolding behind the fence. They didn’t participate in the first several big numbers or "mini-dramas". Instead they simply watched the primary action or "napped". This gave the audience time to get used to them and, I like to think, even begin identify with them in their "observer" roles.

The first time they were brought into the stage action was during the parable of the Good Samaritan when the disciples drafted a number of them to use as "puppets" to play the characters in the story. They then continued to join in during the parable of the Prodigal Son as the son’s fair-weather friends and as partygoers at the father’s house, during the story of Lazarus as the demons in hell (they really relished this part), and during the parable of the Sower as the seeds, wheat, and weeds. In the second act they portrayed the animals in the short Noah’s Ark sequence and took an active part in the Gethsemane sequence.

The first musical number they participated in was "All for the Best". As the show progressed they appeared in "All Good Gifts", "We Beseech Thee", "Light of the World", and "Turn Back, O Man", and the final upbeat portion of "Prepare Ye" during the Finale.

I assigned "On The Willows" exclusively to the urchins; since this piece is essentially "background music", it seemed appropriate for the "background" to sing it. We gave them battery powered candles and placed them on the opposite side of the stage from Jesus and the Disciples. This turned out to be one of the most affecting moments of the show.

During the Gethsemane sequence—as the Disciples slept—the urchins suddenly appeared around Jesus at the line "If you are the Son of God…." speaking in unison the lines that are assigned to various disciples in the script. The sound of the children’s voices speaking these lines was very effective—and just a little eerie—exactly the effect I wanted to achieve.

Whenever they were not actively involved in the onstage action they returned to their "home bases" at either side of the stage so they could turn back into "scenery" or reflect what we hoped the audience was experiencing.

The Urchins were a very interesting addition to the show. Like I said, they start out essentially as scenery (in opera terms, "supernumeraries"). But as the show progresses they become more and more involved in the action, assuming a role more like that of a Greek chorus. We must have done something right with them. Another highly-experienced director, watching our show, commented, "You would never know that the show wasn’t written that way". That was exactly what I wanted and was so pleased to hear it.

GODSPELL is a surprisingly difficult show to stage—surprising because it looks so simple and improvised. All that simplicity and improvisation takes an incredible amount planning and rehearsing, at least as much and perhaps more than for a standard stage musical. When you’re dealing with shows like Annie or Oklahoma you have a starting point: there are conventions to be observed. You don’t hear stories about directors placing Annie on a Trailways bus or in a bar or (God forbid!) on a spaceship. For some reason, directors seem to feel free to "make free" with the material on the basis of "updating" it. The show doesn’t need updating—except, perhaps, in some of the minor bits of business and humor. GODSPELL is just as much an American classic as Oklahoma or My Fair Lady and deserves your respect and understanding as much as any other major piece of theatre would.

In the end, whatever you do to expand GODSPELL is going to reflect the director’s attitudes and opinions about the show. I strongly urge anyone about to embark on directing this deceptively simple show to spend a lot of time "pre-thinking" the show. Use the Web to research how other directors have put the show on stage. Check out the GODSPELL posts on the Stephen Schwartz forum and the GODSPELL articles at MusicalSchwartz.com. Explore your own feelings about the show’s theme and message. Then you’ll be ready to begin figuring out how to expand the cast.