Bernard Brings Hedwig Back to Artswest

July 20, 2023 | Publisher

ArtsWest is proud to present the final show in its 2022-23 Season: BEGIN IT — Hedwig and the Angry Inch (by John Cameron Mitchell and music and lyrics by Stephen Trask). This groundbreaking rock musical will return to the ArtsWest stage after five years with its original star, Nicholas Japaul Bernard in the iconic role of Hedwig. Aside Bernard in the role of Yitzhak is the powerhouse vocalist
and performer Kataka Corn and the Angry Inch will be portrayed by Seattle-based multimedia artist, Michael B. Maine.

Hedwig and the Angry Inch tells the electrifying story of Hedwig, a German emigrant who suffered a botched sex-change operation, as she travels the country in hopeless romantic pursuit of her former lover. First a hit on stage and again on screen, John Cameron Mitchell's hard-rock tale of transformation has earned critical acclaim
and a legion of fans across the world. Beyond the thrill of its bold, unapologetic music and lyrics, Hedwig and the Angry Inch is a powerful, and penetrating portrait of a performer grappling with their identity through music.

ArtsWest's production of Hedwig & The Angry Inch promises to be an extraordinary event, offering an immersive and transformative experience for theater and music lovers alike, under the direction of Eddie DeHais with Music Direction by Aaron Norman.

We chatted with Bernard last month.

On Hedwig:
Nicholas: What when I first the first time that I got the call from Matt, it was I'd never seen the show or the movie. I had an ex boyfriend from high school who like loved it, but we never sat down and watched it. And I think they they really needed someone for the job and they were having trouble because you know a lot of them a lot of the musical theater girlies in this town are equity and not all the theaters can afford to hire an equity actor or not even afford. There are certain rules and stipulations around how many equity contracts that theater can have and they might spend them somewhere. It's this whole game of chess that the girls on the other side of the audition table are not privy to. So but Matt was trying to find someone to do the role and Jay just kept pushing. She was like, this is my best friend. He moved here for this. I promise you; I promise you he's the one. Just give it to him. So Matt took a chance and gave me the part and it was through doing it the first time that I learned to love Hedwig and the story. I love that.

On the Re-imaging of Hedwig:
NB: I would say it's mostly a complete re not reinvention but re imagining. I'm definitely there are like little bits and pockets and pieces that I learned from the first one that being someone who also believes the idea that the best artist steel. I'm going to steal I steal I'm going to steal for myself. It's like if I know that this works and this works and this works and this works. I will take that and try to fit it into all these things to this new thing that we're doing. Because of the way they're approaching the show now most of the things that I did in the last one will not translate to this one. I don't want to re-translate I instead of rejecting it and going no I have to make a whole new like no, we can take that we can some people, people have similar things all the time. So like, I don't feel a way about in creating this new person that some qualities from the old person I made, kind of seeped into there.

On the Character:
I think Hedwig, I love her. I think she's hurt. I think she's the true embodiment of an artist in that in order to be an artist you just have to like; you just have to endure everything. You have to endure everything and not necessarily get better from it but then you have to make something out of it. You're not enduring to heal you're enduring to have life and she's just; she just deserved a lot better. I think that if Hedwig had gotten them, in my brain, and I think about this character and like what she goes through and what she says about herself and the things that she does. I think that she actually was born to be one of our greats. I think that human could have been it could have been Hedwig what we were saying instead of Beyonce I truly believe that. But the life she was handed just beat her and beat her and beat her and all she has all she has left is that she has to she has to learn to love herself. And that's what she can do now, she will she can't go on to do these amazing things because she doesn't have. So She just she doesn't have the grounding in herself, and the gratitude for life because life has been given her anything to be grateful for.

Favorite song:
NB: Oh, yes. Okay, a beautiful thing about this musical is that there's an author's note in the beginning that doesn't let I won't say that it lets you just completely reconfigure the play. That's not what it's asking you to do, but it does give you a lot more leeway to edit and put in and make it more juge' than most musicals do. Honestly, I think Hedwig is a shining example of what we should be allowing musicals to do. There's a way that this musical has other musicals don't have and if other musicals did have this leeway I think we'd see more interesting productions of shows. But for this one for the last one I think my favorite probably was like Wig in a Box, which I do still love. But this one since we're like fucks and around with the music and we're adding what the music director Aaron Norman says also Aaron Norman is a fucking genius. I mean, you can put this in print in big caps, but it should just be everyone should hire Aaron Norman to be a music director, all the time. Really, they're genius. But what we're doing with the music now and the seasonings that we're adding on to it right now sugar daddy has become my favorite song. We've taken it we it's we've taken it in a slightly different direction. In my heart of hearts in the version of this show, where we like actually get like copyright rights. If you look at the lyrics of sugar daddy. That's literally a Trina song. It's a city girl song like it's a little insane. And when she take the music out of it. That's not what we're doing. So, everyone can unclutch their pearls. We will not. That's not what's going on. But it's that that energy is in the song it's very much a like and give me your money like that's what it's giving. So that one that one lyrically. I'm really in love with. And then also what we're doing it, doing with it musically right now it kind of like it's giving the similar vibe to like some Nina Simone situation, the way that we're doing it right now. It may like, it's going to get plucked and brought it to more because we have like three and a half more weeks to like work on it, but I'm really enjoying what's happening to 'sugar daddy'.