Back on the Balcony
The other day I posted a video here of two wonderful stage performers, Sierra Boggess and Julian Ovenden. They’ve had their separate careers, though have sung together at a lot of the BBC Proms (she’s American, but I think moved to England for a while, and for all I know still lives there) and have released a lot of videos of themselves singing together. And just released a CD of duets that they did apart during lockdown, "Together at a Distance."
Sierra Boggess probably best-known for starring as 'Ariel' in the original Broadway production of The Little Mermaid, but she’s also appeared in several Andrew Lloyd Webber musicals, notably Phantom of the Opera and its unsuccessful sequel, Love Never Dies, and has appeared on Broadway in Les Miserables.
I first became aware of Julian Ovenden on a Masterpiece Mystery series Foyles' War that's one of my favorite British series. (He played Foyles' son who wasn't a weekly regular, but a recurring character.) He also was a semi-regular in Downton Abbey and Bridgerton, and played Capt. Von Trapp in the live TV production (in England)of The Sound of Music, that was later shown here on PBS. And was in the PBS production of Show Boat, as the rakish gambler Gaylord Ravenal.
This is another video of them singing together at the 2012 BBC Proms, which I think is really stand-out. They do the full 7-minute “balcony scene” with dialogue from West Side Story. What I love and think is what makes this so excellent is that they clearly dove deep into the scene, rehearsed at length, brought out the characters, and didn't just "do" the dialogue to get to the singing. They go all in.
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